…A Dangerous Thing (13 page)

Or maybe he didn't want to talk about knocking Henderson through his office window during the confrontation, Burns thought.
 
He said, "Where was Walt last night?"

Dawn didn't even have to think about it.
 
"Oh, he was at home with me.
 
We watched TV.
 
Coach
and
Roseanne
.
 
Those are our favorite shows."

Burns wasn't a TV watcher.
 
"What time did he get home."

There was a clock on the office wall.
 
Dawn looked at it as if it might tell her something.
 
"About six-thirty.
 
He had to stay late and work on some expense sheets."

Six-thirty.
 
Henderson had landed on the walk at about six-fifteen.
 
And
Melling
lived only a short distance from the campus, which meant that he could have clobbered Henderson, left Main, and gotten home by six-thirty with no trouble at all.

"Was he upset when he got home?" Burns asked.

Dawn looked surprised at the question.
 
"Well, of course he was.
 
Wouldn't you be if someone got killed right outside where you were working?"

"I'm sure I would.
 
But was Walt questioned by the police?"

"No.
 
He said there was nothing he could tell them.
 
And he was too upset by what had happened to stay here at school.
 
So he just came home."

Burns considered that.
 
It was possible.
 
It was even more than likely, if
Melling
had thought he might somehow be implicated because of his earlier statements about Henderson.
 
He wouldn't have wanted to stay around Main and talk to the police even if he were innocent.

"Did he want to talk about it?" Burns asked.
 
"Tom's death, I mean."

"Yes.
 
He knows I'm very good at helping with things like that.
 
I have a way with soothing the savage breasts."

Burns started to say something, but he thought better of it.
 
Dawn was simply guilty of a slight misquotation, and not an uncommon one, though people usually mentioned beasts instead of breasts.

He said, "I'm sure you do.
 
And did Walt seem all right after you talked things over?"

"He certainly did.
 
He slept like a bug."

Burns caught himself before he asked exactly what
that
meant.
 
"And he came to work today?"

"Yes.
 
He has a recruiting trip tomorrow, and he had to get things set up."

"I should probably talk to him," Burns said.
 
"It might get his mind off his troubles."

"Oh, would you?"
 
Dawn took
Burns's
hand again and gave him a confidential look.
 
"It might be good for him to talk to another man.
 
Sometimes there are things you might not want to discuss with your wife."

Burns got his hand back.
 
"I'll talk to him.
 
I know that your talking to me has helped me deal with things."

"I'm glad," Dawn said.
 
"To tell the truth, you're the first person who's come in for grief counseling all day."

"If I see Dean Partridge, I'll tell her how much it meant to me."

"Thank you.
 
And please do go by and see Walt."

"Don't worry," Burns told her.
 
"I will."

W
alt
Melling's
office was quite close to Dawn's, practically on the other side of the wall, in fact, but to get there Burns had to leave the counseling area and go back out into the main hallway.
 
Then he had to go through another glass door to the recruiting office.

The sad truth was that Hartley Gorman College, unlike the big state-supported universities, the schools of the Ivy League and certain other prestigious colleges, and well-known party schools, didn't get its pick of the nation's high-school graduates.
 
In fact, HGC had to scratch for nearly every entering freshman it got.

Not that things were as bad as they had been under the previous administration.
 
Franklin Miller was a master of public relations as well as a shrewd money-raiser, and he had improved both the school's image and its financial situation.
 
However, that didn't mean it was easy to persuade students to attend a small liberal arts college with no national reputation, a losing football team, and a location that might best be described as out-of-the-way.

All of which meant that it was necessary to have a staff of full-time recruiters, men and women who travelled around the state to attend "College Night" at high schools from the Red River to the Rio Grande, setting up at a card table and passing out college catalogs and pamphlets praising the virtues of the small, liberal arts college.

And since HGC was a denominational school, it helped if the recruiters had certain talents beyond the ability to glad-hand high school seniors and their parents.
 
Being able to sing a solo at the local church's Sunday service was a real plus.
 
A talent for preaching didn't hurt, either.

Or, like Walt
Melling
, you could be a former football hero with a full head of wavy black hair, soulful brown eyes, and only the tiniest beginning of a paunch that signaled that the stomach muscles were finally loosening up a tad.

Coach Thomas,
Melling's
best friend, was in the recruiting office when Burns entered.
 
Thomas and Walt
Melling
were swapping football stories.
 
Thomas had once tried out for offensive center with the Houston Oilers, and while he hadn't survived training camp, he was as close to a pro as anyone in Pecan City knew.
 
Melling
had been neither drafted nor signed as a free agent.
 
He was good enough for small college ball, but he was too slow for the big boys.

The walls of the office were decorated with black and white photos of Walt in his college football glory.
 
There was an obviously posed shot of Walt leaping gazelle-like through the air, offering a perfect
stiffarm
to a nonexistent tackler.
 
Another showed him receiving a flawless pass from an invisible quarterback.
 
Yet another was a head-on shot of Walt, charging down the field, eyes narrowed, nostrils flared, teeth clenched.

Burns thought all three were excellent photos, but he thought they would have been considerably more realistic if only Walt had been wearing a helmet in them.

"Hey, Burns," Thomas said.
 
"Conjugated any tough verbs lately?"

Thomas was always saying something like that, but Burns didn't hold it against him.
 
He didn't really mean anything by it.
 
Actually, he was quite fond of Burns, who had gotten him out of a jam after the murder of Dean Elmore the previous year.

"How does the recruiting for next year's team look, Coach?" Burns asked.

"Going great.
 
I was just telling Walt that if we can sign that kid from Pecos, Ralph
Rippon
, we'll be in the tall cotton.
 
None of the big schools want him because he's only five foot four, but he's faster than a mule deer.
 
He'll be an all-conference receiver his freshman year, you hide and watch."

"Do you believe that, Walt?" Burns asked.

"Huh?
 
What?"
 
Melling
obviously hadn't been paying the least attention.
 
His mind was on something else, maybe on his recruiting trip, but somehow Burns didn't think that was the case.

"That Ralph
Rippon
will be all-conference his freshman year."

"Oh, yeah, quite a kid.
 
An honor student, too.
 
You'll get him, Coach.
 
Don't sweat it."

Thomas left the office with a smile, obviously lost in dreams of a winning team.
 
Burns thought it would be nice if the Panthers could just break even one year.

"It's not like it was when you were playing," he told
Melling
.

Melling
nodded.
 
"Nope.
 
But that was before everybody wanted to go to school where there were shopping malls and movie theaters on every corner."

"Is that what they're looking for?"

"I guess so.
 
I don't really know to tell you the truth.
 
But the old idea of a little school where everybody's somebody doesn't sell like it used to."

Looking for a way to change the subject, Burns glanced out the office window.
 
He could see the sidewalk where Henderson had landed.

"Nice view," he said.

Melling
was looking too.
 
"Sometimes."

"Not last evening, though."

"No."

This wasn't getting them anywhere.
 
Burns decided to take a more direct approach.
 
"I heard that you and Tom had a little disagreement not long ago."

Melling
hadn't asked Burns to sit down.
 
They both stood there looking out the window.
 
There were two students coming up the walk, a man and a woman.
 
They both stopped and looked down at the approximate spot where Henderson had hit the concrete.
 
Rose or someone had hosed down the walk to clean off the bloodstains, but Burns suspected that there still might be signs of Henderson's sudden demise.
 
After a second or two the man pointed to the second floor window.
 
The two students looked up for a while, then shook their heads and walked on into the building.

"I wasn't the only one who had a disagreement with Tom,"
Melling
said.
 
"Lots of people didn't like him."

"Who?" Burns asked.

"You should know.
 
One of your faculty members told him that he'd better stop asking questions about him."

Burns didn't have to ask who
Melling
meant.
 
"Did you see Tom fall?"

"No.
 
I was working at my desk.
 
I didn't know a thing about it until I heard all the commotion."

"And then you just went home."

Melling
turned his head slightly and looked at Burns.
 
"That's right.
 
I saw that you were there, and I didn't think there was anything I could do to help."

Burns knew that he could have been seen from either the window they were standing in front of or the one in Henderson's office, but he didn't think
Melling
was going to say which one he'd seen Burns from.

"About your disagreement with Tom," Burns said.

"That's all it was.
 
Just a disagreement.
 
I didn't kill him, if that's what you're getting at.
 
I know you're in tight with the police."

That
had
been what Burns was getting at, more or less, but he didn't want to admit that to
Melling
.
 
He didn't want to admit to being "in tight with the police," either.

"I didn't mean to be prying," he said.
 
"I was just curious about your reaction to Tom's death, considering what he said to your wife."

Melling
turned his entire body toward Burns.
 
His face didn't look nearly so handsome now.
 
"You know what he said?"

"Well, not really.
 
Just sort of generally.
 
I mean, I didn't hear him say it.
 
So how could I know what he said?"

Melling's
face didn't change.
 
The hands that had carried a football for more than a thousand yards two seasons in a row were balled into fists.
 
"Nobody says things like that about my wife.
 
Not if I find out about it."

"I don't blame you for being angry," Burns told him.
 
"Not that I know what Tom said, mind you, but I'm sure it wasn't pleasant."

"People shouldn't say things like that.
 
Especially not if they teach at a religious school."

"You're right," Burns said.
 
"You're absolutely right.
 
Well, I know you have to get ready for that big recruiting trip, and I have a class.
 
I'll see you around, Walt."

Walt didn't say anything to that, and Burns left before he thought of something.
 
Walt, Burns thought, really didn't look much like his old photos any more, except for the one where he was charging down the field.