Fenton nodded encouragingly at each student, but what he wrote down were notes for what he planned to say at his testimony on Gen’s behalf at the end of the week. Ruby had asked him to testify, not Gen herself. He and Gen hadn’t spoken since his trip to the cabin, and the loss of her from his routine hurt like the devil. As stubborn as she was, though, he had determined to wait for her to come to him.
When he called Margaret Sutter’s name, she announced she’d be auditioning as Amanda Wingfield from The Glass Menagerie. Fenton sat up straighter and put down his pen. Everyone before her had chosen tired monologues from Shakespeare, mostly Hamlet or Juliet.
“I think you’re doing things you’re ashamed of and that’s why you act like this,” Margaret said. “I don’t believe that you go every night to the movies. Nobody goes to the movies night after night.”
Her delivery was mature and resonant, suggesting she had worked hard at it and developed an understanding of the character. Students clapped louder at the end than they had for their other peers, and Fenton joined in, forgetting he hadn’t applauded anyone else. He wished he’d chosen the Williams play, even with its tiny cast. Margaret’s performance could have carried it. But under the dean’s scrutiny, he would never be free now to stage something by such a blatant homosexual.
After the other student actors had filtered out of the theater, Margaret hung back and approached him. “Mr. Page? Sorry to bother you.”
He stopped in mid-note about Gen’s dedication to her students. Could he say that without it coming out the wrong way?
“No bother, Margaret. What can I do for you?”
Margaret’s gaze dropped to her hands. The quick motion called Fenton’s attention to her nails, so bitten they looked painful.
“I think you’re friends with Dr. Rider,” she said hesitantly. “So you know about the dean’s committee?”
Fenton shifted his focus to her eyes, which had watered over. “Yes, I do.”
She paused and drew in a long breath. “They asked me to testify, Mr. Page. No one will tell me why. Do you know?”
“You mean, someone from the dean’s office notified you?”
Margaret nodded. “What could I tell them?” she burst out. “Maybe they know about that stupid card someone sent her? She thought it might be me, but it wasn’t and I—I haven’t done anything wrong!”
He couldn’t admit Gen had confided in him about the kitten card, so he let it drop. “I know you haven’t.” He struggled to keep his voice even. “The dean probably just wants to hear from students who admire Dr. Rider. Her advisees.”
Margaret’s teary eyes met his. “You think that’s it?”
“That would be my guess.”
“So . . . what should I say?”
He smiled with encouragement he didn’t feel. “All the nicest things you can think of. Pretend it’s a monologue you’re delivering. Let’s talk it through.”
✥ ✥ ✥
The note was waiting for him in his mailbox at home:
Dear Fenton,
I know you are set to testify on my behalf and I appreciate your desire to help, but I would rather you not appear before the committee. Please do this as a favor to an old friend, and withdraw your name from the schedule.
Gen
He had just spent almost an hour coaching Margaret on her testimony and then another half hour finishing his own notes. It wouldn’t look good to back out just days before his hearing. Besides, Gen needed all the support from the faculty she could get. Her request made no sense to him.
Fenton didn’t want to think Gen might be embarrassed about him. He was an actor, for God’s sake, and had played straight more times than he could count. He could handle the dean’s interview.
He was tired from work and needed a cocktail, but he drove to her house immediately. She peeked out the window at him before opening the door. To his surprise, she was fully dressed with her hair styled, as she might be on any school day.
“Are you going somewhere?” he asked without saying hello.
“I have a meeting.”
She said it crisply, like they’d never been close. Something splintered inside him and the measured speech he’d rehearsed on the drive over left his mind.
“Well, can I please come in for a second, or do you want me to make a scene on the porch?”
Gen stood aside for him to enter but didn’t take his coat, and she made no move to offer him a drink. “You got my note.”
“I got your note. Were you trying to hurt my feelings?”
She stepped back. “Why would I do that?”
“You don’t trust me not to swish into the hearing and act like some big old fag!” He’d never used the epithet about himself, not even in jest, but now it was his first thought.
“What an awful thing to say about yourself. That never occurred to me.”
“Then you’re worried because of the police thing? You know that came to nothing.”
Gen’s lips tightened. “Here’s what did come to something for me. What you said at the cabin about the bike rumors, and wondering if I’d been with a student. I mean, I tried to forget it, but I can’t. Suppose the dean asks a question and you blurt out something you didn’t mean to.” Her head wagged. “I’m not saying you’d do it on purpose. But what you really think of me—that I might actually have abused my position as a teacher—well, no, I don’t trust you.”
Fenton reached past her for the doorknob and swept out of the house. In his haste to get away, he missed a porch step and sank onto the brick walkway with a groan. His palm, scraped pink and bloody where it had broken his fall, throbbed with pain. Momentarily shaken, he thought of calling out to Gen for help, but she had already closed the door.
✥ ✥ ✥
Fenton removed the wooden roller bearing the heavy New York Times and set the paper in front of him on the library table. He dedicated time early on Tuesday mornings to dive into the Sunday edition, which took its sweet time wending its way through Springboro. No one but the periodicals librarian had touched it, and the pristine pages crackled pleasingly under his fingers, the fresh ink smudging the tips. As Fenton leafed through the pages, his memories shot back to the previous, glorious summer. Every Sunday morning, if he hadn’t stayed out too late or didn’t have an overnight guest, he would venture out and bring the Times, coffee, and a Danish back to his Village sublet to relish.
This Tuesday, though, he had trouble savoring the paper, even his beloved arts section, book review, and magazine. The cuts from his fall at Gen’s house had scabbed over and itched, but Gen’s bruising “I don’t trust you” still stung.
Years ago, he’d picked her out at a faculty get-together and latched on. Before Baines, he’d bopped from job to job and performed a lot of summer stock. He had charmed his way into stage manager and costume designer jobs to make ends meet. Once a community theater hired him to direct two shows back to back. He developed casual acquaintances but no real friends. The prospect of staying put appealed, so he answered an ad for “Theater Director, Small College in Bucolic Virginia.” He wasn’t the most qualified for the job in terms of directing, but one summer job in Saratoga Springs had been close enough to New York to satisfy the hiring committee.
The pay had proved steady, though not generous, and he’d enjoyed a certain level of freedom. Summers were always the best. Then this past fall had offered nothing but trouble—the menacing police and mayor, the snoopy provost, his own attempts to straighten up. And since he broke up with Kathy Yost, he kept running into the girl at the bank, the bakery, everywhere. At Darnell’s Drug Store, she had loudly accused him of following her.
Now Gen was in distress, and all he’d done was make matters worse. She wouldn’t even let him testify on her behalf. What could he do?
His first instinct was to escape, get out of Gen’s hair, start over somewhere else. He might have good enough credentials to direct in New York now. The friend who had sublet his apartment to Fenton over the summer suggeste
d his theater company might be hiring. If he actually looked around, maybe other attractive opportunities would offer a way out.
The idea locked onto him. He flicked through all the Times sections, picking up speed when he didn’t locate the job ads. Then he returned to the front page and started over.
“There’s no employment section in the Times,” he said to the librarian behind the desk.
“Are you sure? Sections might be out of order.”
“I checked twice. Did you leave it behind the desk?”
Creases formed at the woman’s mouth like parentheses. Last spring at closing convocation, she had received a plaque for twenty-five years of service to the library—an unimaginable amount of time to Fenton.
“That is unlikely,” she said with crisp assurance. “A section could have gotten left out when the sorting happened at the printer.”
It was a reasonable explanation, but Fenton stared at her with the demand, And what will you do about it? ready to pop out. After a long moment, he nodded and said, “Sorry, Mrs. Plunkett.”
The librarian relaxed at his apology and softened her tone. “You’re not thinking of leaving us now, are you, Mr. Page? I so look forward to your lovely shows.”
Fenton forced a smile. “Thank you. No, I’m not going anywhere.”
“Oh, good! You know, Our Town is probably my favorite play. Such a wholesome, lovely story.”
“Why don’t I send you some extra tickets? You can bring the family.”
She beamed back at him and repeated the word “lovely.”
✥ ✥ ✥
Testimony of Miss Lee-Anne Blakeney, sophomore, Baines College for Women, to the College Committee on Values and Moral Standards
Interview conducted by Arthur Burnside, Esq., Chief Counsel, Baines College for Women
Arthur Burnside: You look a little shaky, Miss Blakeney. Would you like to put your coat back on? Can we turn up the heat in here?
Lee-Anne Blakeney: I’m okay.
AB: If you become uncomfortable, you let us know. Now, do you understand what this committee is looking into?
LB: I think so. Dr. Rider, right?
AB: Yes, but more specifically, whether Dr. Rider should be teaching here at the college. [pause] You understand?
LB: No one put it that way before, but yeah, I understand.
AB: And do you also know why we asked you to come before the committee?
LB: Because of what I told my mother and Dr. Thoms?
AB: That’s right. We’d like to go into more detail about the incident you related to them. So why don’t you tell us what happened on Halloween?
LB: Well, everyone was dressed up, all over school. I wore my coming-out gown and went as Cinderella. My mother let me borrow her silver pumps because the ones from my deb ball were worn out. But my mother has a smaller shoe size, and hers pinched. So in the hallway Dr. Rider noticed me hopping on one foot with the other shoe in my hand—
AB: Like Cinderella losing her shoe.
LB: Yeah, right, and she said something like, “Let’s hope Cinderella doesn’t have far to go.”
AB: What were you doing in the hallway? Was anyone else around?
LB: Maybe—no, I don’t remember.
AB: Are you sure?
LB: I didn’t see anyone else.
AB: Here’s the thing: Dr. Thoms told the dean privately that he was in the hallway that day and saw the two of you, quote, having words. In your interview with him he said you became very distraught and told him Dr. Rider had made an improper advance.
LB: He did?
AB: Yes. So please think hard. Did she say something else, something that was inappropriate? Because, quote, Let’s hope Cinderella doesn’t have far to go, seems like good fun to me and not very threatening. How’s it sound to you, Miss Yost?
Kathy Yost: Like a joke.
AB: There.
LB: Look, it wasn’t anything she said. I had to lift my skirt up to slip my shoe on. Dr. Rider was watching me the whole time, looking at my leg. It made me uncomfortable, I didn’t know why at the time. Later, I thought, that’s how men look at your legs. And her tone was—I don’t know.
AB: There was something sexual about it.
LB: I—I don’t know if that’s the word.
AB: But you do know, quote, that’s how men look at your legs. [pause] Does that shrug mean yes?
LB: I think I meant boys, not men. The boys at D and L might look at your legs.
AB: I see. Were there any other instances that you recall Dr. Rider making you feel uncomfortable?
LB: Not like that. Sometimes she touches your arm when she’s talking to you, or maybe she puts a hand on your back. Other girls have mentioned it, too.
AB: When she does, is it different than, say, what a mother or aunt might do?
LB: A little, maybe.
AB: More like what a man—no, a boy—might do?
LB: I guess.
AB: Tell me, did you notice this about the professor before the accusations against her came out? [unintelligible] Could you speak up and stop shrugging?
LB: I may have, I’m not sure. But I did notice she was different. All the girls have. There’s just never a man in her life, and she’s pretty, you know?
AB: Have you ever personally witnessed her being free with her hands with another girl? Or doing anything inappropriate?
LB: No, but—
AB: Go on. [pause] Are you still thinking about it?
LB: I’m not sure this counts.
AB: Why don’t you let us decide that?
LB: My friend, Susanna Carr? Her mother is the one who saw, you know, the kiss in the window.
AB: Dr. Rider has touched her?
LB: No. I mean, maybe. She told me that her mother saw a blue bike parked all night at Dr. Rider’s house that day, the day of the kiss, and that nobody knows whose bike it was.
AB: Do you? [pause] Miss Blakeney, do you have information about the bike that you’d like to share?
LB: There’s this girl. Margaret Sutter? She’s one of Dr. Rider’s advisees. Susanna and I always thought she had a crush on her.
AB: Who had the crush, Margaret or Dr. Rider?
LB: Margaret. She always looks so moony over Dr. Rider and she goes to her office a lot. Dr. Rider treats her very friendly. Susanna and I kind of made a joke out of it, it was so blatant. We even—
AB: Yes?
LB: We made a joke out of it, that’s all.
AB: And how does your joke relate to the bike?
LB: Margaret’s got one. A blue one.
AB: You’re sure of that.
LB: Yeah, I saw her riding it on the trails. She fell off it, actually, and when I offered to help her I got a good look at it. A blue Schwinn. When Susanna told me about the bike at Dr. Rider’s, I thought—
AB: You can’t say for certain.
LB: No. But given how much Margaret idolizes her, how friendly they always seem, it would make sense. If you saw them together, you’d get it. It’s more than teacher and advisee. You wonder what goes on in that office. Did someone crank up the heat in here?
AB: We’re just about finished, Miss Blakeney. Anything you want to add?
LB: No, that’s it. But wait—are you going to tell Margaret what I said about her?
AB: We won’t use your name. But the bike is of definite interest. Thank you for that.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Margaret
When the secretary ushered Margaret into the book-lined meeting room adjacent to the dean’s office in Old Main, the atmosphere put her at ease. Dean Rolfe, whom she recognized from opening convocation, greeted her warmly and motioned toward a chair across from him at the mahogany table.
The secretary asked if Margaret wanted water, and she accepted. Her throat still smarted from crying out in her sleep the night before. “A bunch of times,” Polly had told her. “Blood-curdling. Like someone was killing you.”
“We won’t keep you long,” the dean assured her. “We
’re just waiting for Mr. Burnside. The college attorney.”
Her fear must have shown on her face because the dean continued in a calm voice, “He’s just here to ask the right questions, keep us on track. Your testimony could actually help Dr. Rider.”
The secretary brought the glass of water then, and Margaret took several large sips.
“They predicted snow today,” the secretary said, more to the dean than to Margaret. “I used to love sledding on Rebel Hill when I was a student.”
Dean Rolfe turned to Margaret to include her. “You have a sled, Miss Sutter?”
She cleared her throat and took another drink. “Not here. It’s home, in the garage.”
The dean inquired where “home” was when Mr. Burnside, the college’s attorney, strode into the room carrying a legal pad. Margaret’s stomach pitched at the sight of the inordinately tall man with a hunch to his shoulders, wearing a black suit that reminded her of an undertaker’s. His thick eyebrows met in one wriggling line.
“Sorry to keep y’all waiting,” Burnside said as he fished in his jacket pocket for a pen.
Testimony Page 21
