Fiddlers (10 page)

�Christine,� Shea informed them. �The one on the left was taken while she was still in college. The other only last summer. But there�s the same vibrant love of life in each photo.�

�Got any idea who might�ve wished her harm?� Brown asked. Standing there big and black and scowling, he sounded and looked as if he might be accusing Shea of the crime; actually, he simply wanted to know if Christine Langston had any enemies that Shea knew of.

�At any university, there are interdepartmental jealousies, rivalries. But I sincerely doubt any of Christine�s colleagues could have done something like this.�

How about you? Kling wondered.

Shea was a man in his early seventies, still robust, clear-eyed. The super of his building had told them the lady - meaning Christine - had moved in with him around Christmas time. The super said they seemed like a nice couple.

�How long did you know her?� Kling asked.

�I met her four years ago. We published a book of hers. I edited it.�

�What sort of book?�

�An appreciation of Byron.� Shea paused. �Do you know who I mean?�

�Yes,� Kling said.

�You�d be surprised how many people don�t know who Byron was. Or Shakespeare, for that matter. In one of her classes last week, Christine asked her students if they were familiar with the words �To be or not to be.� Christine asked them to identify the source, and extend the quotation if they could. Eight students in the class. What would you guess their answers were?�

The detectives waited.

�Four of the eight couldn�t identify the source at all. Three of them said the source was Hamlet. The eighth said Romeo and Juliet. Six people couldn�t extend the quotation at all. Two people could add only, �That is the question.� One student told her after class that it would have been a lot easier if Christine had given them a quote from a movie. �To be or not to be,� can you imagine? Only the greatest soliloquy ever written for the English-speaking stage!� Shea shook his head in despair. �Sometimes, she would come home weeping.�

�When did you start living together?� Kling asked.

�Well, almost immediately. That is to say, we kept our own apartments, but de facto we were living together. She didn�t give up her place and move in with me until last Christmas.�

�When�s the last time you saw her alive, Mr. Shea?� Brown asked.

�Yesterday morning. When she left for work. We had breakfast together and then� she was gone.�

�What were you doing last night around eight o�clock?� Kling asked.

Shea said nothing for a moment. Then he said, �Is this the scene where I ask if I�m a suspect?�

�This isn�t a scene, sir,� Kling said.

�I was here in the office. Working on this very manuscript,� Shea said, and lightly tapped the pages on his desk. �Dreadful, I might add.�

�Anyone here with you?�

�Any number of people. We work late in publishing.�

�What my partner means��

�Did anyone see me here? I believe Freddie Anders stopped in at one point. You might ask him to corroborate. His office is just down the hall.�

�What time was that? When he stopped in?�

�I believe it was around six thirty, seven.�

�Anyone see you here at eight, Mr. Shea?�

�Oh dear. Now we have the scene where I ask if I need a lawyer, isn�t that right?�

�You don�t need any lawyer,� Brown said. �We have to ask these questions.�

�I�m sure,� Shea said. �But to set the record straight, I didn�t leave here until ten last night. When I got to the apartment, the police were already there, informing me that Christine had been shot and killed. For your information, I loved her enormously. In fact, we planned to be married in the fall. I had no reason to kill her, and I did not kill her. And now, if you don�t mind, I�d like you to leave.�

�Thanks for your time,� Kling said.

Shea turned back to the manuscript on his desk.

* * * *

�Everybody�s always innocent,� Brown said. �Nobody ever did anything. Catch �em with the bloody hatchet in their hands, they say, �This ain�t my hatchet, this is my uncle�s hatchet.� Wonder anybody�s in jail at all, so many innocent people around.�

�You think he was lying?� Kling asked.

�Actually, I think he was telling the truth. But he had no reason to get all huffy that way. We do have to ask the goddamn questions.�

The car�s air conditioner wasn�t working, and the windows, front and back, were wide open. The noonday traffic sounds were deafening, discouraging conversation. They rode in silence, in stifling heat.

�Artie,� Kling said at last, �I got a problem.�

Brown turned from the wheel to look at him. Kling kept staring straight ahead through the windshield.

�I think Sharyn and I may be breaking up,� he said.

His last words were almost lost in the baffle of city traffic. Brown always looked as if he were scowling, but this time he really was. He turned to Kling again, briefly, scowling in reprimand, or disbelief, or merely because he wasn�t sure he had heard him correctly.

�I thought she was cheating on me,� Kling said. �I followed her.�

�She�d never cheat on you in a million years, man.�

�I know that.�

�So what the hell�s wrong with you? You go tailin the woman you love?�

�I know.�

�Playin cops and robbers, the woman you love.�

�I know.�

�Where�s this at now? Where�d you leave it?�

�She doesn�t want to talk yet. She says I hurt her too much.�

�Yeah, well, you did! I ever go followin Caroline, she�d put me in the hospital.�

�I know.�

Brown was shaking his head now. �Big detective, what�s wrong with you, man?�

�She thinks� Artie, can I say this?�

�How do I know what you�re gonna say before you say it?�

He sounded suddenly angry. As if, by betraying Sharyn�s trust, Kling had somehow betrayed his trust as well. Something was sounding a warning note. Kling almost backed off. He took a deep breath.

�She thinks I didn�t trust her because��

Brown turned from the wheel.

�Because she�s black,� Kling said.

�Well?� Brown said. �Is that the reason?�

�I don�t think so.�

�Then why does she think so?�

�That�s what I�m asking you, Artie.�

�What, exactly, are you asking me, Bert? Are you asking me would a black woman think her white partner who followed her was unconsciously harboring the thought that all blacks are devious and deceitful and not to be trusted?�

�Well, no, I��

�I�m your partner, too, Bert. Do you think I�m devious, deceitful, and not to be trusted?� �

�Come on, Artie.�

�So what are you asking me, Bert?�

�I guess I�m asking� I don�t know what I�m asking.�

�I never dated a white woman in my life,� Brown said.

Kling nodded.

�Only white men I really know are on the squad. I trust them like they were my own brothers.�

Heat ballooned into the car. The traffic sounds were deafening.

�You�re asking me will it work, isn�t that it? You�re asking me will black and white ever work? I�m telling you I don�t know. I�m saying there�s centuries here, Bert. Too damn many centuries. I�m telling you I hope so. I hope you find a way, Bert. There�s more than just you and Sharyn here, man, you know what I�m saying? There�s more.�

He nodded, looked at Kling one more time, and then turned back to the road and the traffic ahead, hunkering over the wheel, still nodding.

* * * *

Professor Duncan Knowles was wearing a purple butterfly bow tie patterned with little white daisies. He looked as if he might be ready to take off into the wind. Lavender button-down shirt to complement the tie. Tan linen suit. Sitting behind his corner-window desk, mid-morning sunshine setting the campus outside ablaze in golden green.

�A terrible thing,� he told the detectives. �Terrible. What happened to Christine, of course, but also terrible for the department and for Baldwin itself.�

Knowles was the head of Baldwin University�s English Department. Kling hoped he wasn�t equating Christine Langston�s murder with the school�s reputation. Brown was wondering where he�d bought the big bow tie. He was wondering how he�d look in a similar tie. Wondering if his wife, Caroline, would go for him in a tie like that one.

�A big-city campus,� Knowles said, �you might expect unfortunate incidents such as this one

Unfortunate incidents, Kling thought.

�� but security here at Baldwin is unusually good. We�ve never had anything like this happen before. Never in our history. No one has ever wandered in from outside, intent on mischief.�

�But someone did,� Brown said. �Last night.�

�Exactly my point,� Knowles said. �This is terrible for the school. Well, look at these,� he said, and slapped the palm of his hand onto the morning newspapers spread over his desktop. �Christine was murdered last night, and already the newspapers are in a feeding frenzy. Look at this headline. �Are Our Campuses Safe?� A single incident��

Incident, Kling thought.

�� and they�re making it sound like an epidemic�

�What we�re trying to do,� Brown said, �is find some link between Christine�s murder and two other cases we�re investi��

�Oh, yes, and don�t think the papers aren�t making hay of that as well. �The Glock Killer�! Making him sound like Jack the Ripper. Three murders coincidentally��

�We don�t think they�re coincidences,� Brown said.

�There must be thousands of such weapons in this city��

�No, the same gun was used in each of the murders.�

�Well, that�s beyond me,� Knowles said, and spread his arms like wings, enforcing the notion that his huge bow tie might indeed be a propeller. Brown still wondered where he�d bought it.

�We have the other victims� names,� Kling said, and reached into his inside jacket pocket for his notebook. �It�s unlikely any of them were students of hers at any time��

�Why do you say that?�

�Well� their ages, for one thing.� He had opened the notebook now, and was consulting it. �Or did she teach any adult night classes?�

�No. Well, she taught one class at night, yes. But that was a seminar. And these were young students as well. She taught three day classes a week, you see, two hours for each class. One on Modern Poetry, and two on the Romantic Poets. Those would have been Keats, Shelley, Wordsworth, and Byron. The course was divided into two sections.�

�So altogether she taught six hours a week.�

�Well, plus the seminar, of course. That would have been another two hours a week. Eight hours in all.�

�And she taught this seminar at night?�

�Yes. Thursday nights, from seven to nine P.M. On �Keats and the Italian Influence.� Either in her classroom or her office. There were only half a dozen students in the class� seven or eight at the most. Certainly no more than that.�

�But this Would�ve been a Thursday night, you say.�

�Yes.�

�Why would she have been on campus on a Wednesday night?�

�Any number of reasons. She may have been preparing lesson plans, or grading papers� or doing research in the library. The library closes at nine.�

�What sort of research?�

�I know she was writing a paper for the PMLA. About the influence Charles Lamb�s sister had on his work.�

PMLA? Kling wondered. Pre-menstrual something or other?

�She was quite ill, you know, his sister, Mary. In fact, in a fit of temporary insanity, she killed their mother.�

Brown raised his eyebrows.

So did Kling.

�Oh yes,� Knowles said. �Lamb had to place her in a private mental institution. Well, he was not without his own mental problems, you know. After a disastrous love affair, he himself had a breakdown. Spent a great deal of time in an asylum in Hoxton, yes.�

�And Professor Langston was writing a paper on this?�

�Yes, hoping to have it published in one of the Modern Language Association�s journals. On how Lamb�s sister affected his work, yes. She titled it �The Madness of Mary Lamb.� We joked about that a lot.�

�Joked about it?� Brown said.

�Oh yes.�

�Who did?�

�Her colleagues in the department. We called it �Mary Had a Little Madness.�

�So you think she might�ve spent some time in the library the night she was killed,� Kling said.

�Possibly, yes. I�m sure you can check that.�

�But normally, what time would her classes have ended?�

�Well, except for the seminar��

�On Thursdays

�Yes. Except for that, she taught afternoon classes. Three to five.�

�All young people.�

�Yes.�

�Does the name Alicia Hendricks mean anything to you?�

�No, I�m sorry.�

�One of the victims. Fifty-five years old,� Kling said. �How about Max Sobolov, fifty-eight? Blind?�

�No. Neither of them. And, as you say, they couldn�t have been Christine�s students here at Baldwin. Far too old.�

�Any other way she might have been connected to them?�

�I�m not sure what you mean.�

�Well,� Brown said, �is it possible they were relatives of one of her students? Or friends? Or in any other way linked to Professor Langston?�

�How would I know that?�

�Can we check your records?� Kling asked. �Get the names of her students for the past several years? See if we come up with a match for either of them? Hendricks? Sobolov?�

�She taught here for the past twelve years,� Knowles said. �She was a tenured professor. Surely you don�t expect to go through all the��

�Grudges sometimes go back a long time,� Brown said.

�Grudges?�

�A student she failed? A student she embarrassed? The kid might�ve told a parent or a friend, might�ve initiated a grudge that

�I see,� Knowles said.

He was thinking.

They both saw him thinking.

�Yes?� Kling said.

�I can recall only one such incident,� Knowles said. �But the student�s name isn�t anything like those you mentioned.�

�That only eliminates a relative,� Brown said.

�What was the incident?�

�Christine threatened to fail this girl. The girl went over her head, came to me. I protected Christine in every way possible, but� you know� we don�t fail students here. We simply don�t.�