Cast a Blue Shadow (8 page)

“SHERIFF say something to Coach Willhite?” Branden asked Royce.

“He is rather a blunt fellow, wouldn’t you say?”

“More than most. Not as bad as some,” Branden said. “I’ve known him since we were kids, and he has mellowed considerably in recent years.”

“Do tell,” Royce said, playing with one end of his black mustache. “Look, Mike, this is all rather unnerving, to say the least. Juliet Favor and I were considerably more than friends.”

Branden nodded. “You saw her last night?”

“At dinner, like everyone else. But you were there and already know that.”

Branden leaned over on his forearms, studied the wood grain in the dining room table, and asked, “I thought you might have come out earlier, or stayed late, Phillips,” he suggested.

“I am quite certain that would not be any of your business, Mike, even if you are helping with the investigation of Juliet’s murder.”

“I guess I’m a little bit involved,” Branden said.

Royce tipped his head knowingly. “Did you get anything out of Arne about the cutbacks?”

“We don’t know if she signed any papers,” Branden said.

“She hadn’t,” Royce asserted. He took out a pipe with a curved stem and started packing it with tobacco from a leather zippered pouch. Royce lighted the pipe, took several deep puffs, and said, “I doubt the kids will mind a little smoke today.”

“You’re taking this rather well, Phillips,” Branden said.

“I offer no excuses. She was quite aware I didn’t love her,” Royce said and blew smoke toward the ceiling. “She rather preferred it that way. As for me, I liked proximity to power and money. The sex was agreeable, to be sure,” he added wistfully. “I’ll miss the finer things that money can buy.”

“That’s rather cold, Phillips,” Branden chided.

Royce leaned forward on the table, planted his elbows, pipe hanging from the corner of his mouth. “Look, Mike,” he said. “Juliet Favor took pleasure in only two things. Money and power. And for her, the two were interchangeable commodities. Why do you think she was hounding Arne Laughton about being chairwoman of the board? I was just a diversion. Believe me, there have been others.”

Branden took a deliberate pause. Royce sat back and puffed on his pipe.

“Why are you sitting here, Phillips?” Branden eventually asked.

“Morbid curiosity,” Royce replied. He stared steadily at Branden’s eyes, and then appeared to soften, as if his careful affectations of disinterest had failed him. Eyes lowered, he said, “Truth is, Mike, I can’t bring myself to leave.” Then, as if that brief moment of honesty were an embarrassment to him, Royce said, “I guess I’m here, like everyone else, for the money.”

Branden let that comment hang between them for a moment and said, “I’d be surprised if you’re not in her will, Phillips.”

Royce stalled, and managed to temper his expression, while tamping the tobacco deeper into the bowl of his pipe. He took the measure of Branden, took out his flask and drank a swig, and said, unapologetically, “It will augment my salary and endow a few fine arts scholarships. Everyone knows they pay us shabbily enough at the college. But, if you’ve got any suspicions, I’ll tell you flatly that my department and my professional work wouldn’t have suffered unduly, even if she had lived to implement her new programs. I had no reason to kill her.”

“You’ll not be surprised to learn, then,” Branden said, “that all of the rest of us were slated to take a cutback of 30 percent or so.”

“The history department?” Royce asked.

“Also 30 percent. The museum, too.”

Royce smiled. “So it wouldn’t constitute much of an exaggeration to speculate that you would have had as much a motive for murder as anyone.”

“Quite,” Branden said. “Quite right. And I guess there’s the crux of it. With Favor’s dying before implementation of her new budgets, we all are indirect beneficiaries, and indebted to the one person who decided to do more than just talk about it.”

“Including the children,” Royce added.

“What do you know about them?”

“Very little, actually. Sally I know enough to realize that she disapproves of me. And Sonny—I guess you’ll know as well as anyone that he is an insufferable brat.”

“Phillips!”

“You serve as his adviser,” Royce countered. “Tell me I am wrong.”

“You are, to a point,” Branden said. “He’s—” Branden hesitated, “underdeveloped.”

“That boy is mature enough to have wrecked the work of one of my most gifted students!”

“Martha Lehman?”

“The same, Professor. Since they have taken up together, her photographs, when she actually makes any, have been desultory.”

“That bad?”

“In the extreme.”

“But I thought you considered Martha a natural behind the lens.”

“And in the darkroom, Mike. But not anymore. She used to attack a subject like the lens could bare its soul. Profound insight, really. Composition. Point of view. Depth of field, and the technical matters, too. Her best color prints rival Frederic Joy’s.”

“But not lately?”

“Not by the proverbial mile. Last semester she constructed a studio strobe system for studying glass and crystal images. Shapes, color, and lighting. Remarkable, really. This semester, she hasn’t logged ten hours on the project. The equipment is dusty, Mike. The studio stays dark.”

“And you blame Sonny?”

“No, Professor, I blame you.”

“Whatever for?”

“You’re the one who introduced Sonny Favor to her.”

“I’d hardly put it like that, Phillips. He’s just in our class, like anyone else.”

“As you say, Mike. But not at all ‘like anyone else.’ You should have known that a girl with her background would have been overwhelmed by all the trappings of the Favor mystique.”

“As far as I know, he only took her to a few Indians games.”

“And his Lexus is just a car, Mike. Did you know that his mother bought season tickets for him as soon as he was admitted to our fair college?”

“I don’t see that as a problem for anyone.”

“Did you know that Sonny took her to New York City?”

“No,” Branden answered, on guard.

“She wanted to photograph Ground Zero.”

“I knew that, but I didn’t know she had actually done it. Not with Sonny.”

“He’s a profligate moron, Mike, and he’s ruined Martha Lehman as an artist. Ten hours in the studio, Mike. That’s all I’ve gotten from her this semester,” Royce said. He took off his thick black glasses and polished the lenses with a handkerchief, pipe hanging from his mouth. Folding the handkerchief ceremoniously, the art professor got out of his chair and pointed the stem of his pipe at his colleague. “I don’t care if she is one of your projects, Mike. I want her back in the darkroom and the studio, or she’s not going to pass my tutorial.”

Branden nodded. Changed the subject. “Are you still pressing your motion at faculty meeting?”

“Of course,” Royce said. “It is decidedly not fair that the sciences get all that money for lab courses. Other departments have expenses, too.”

“I doubt the scientists are trying to get away with anything, Phillips. They’ve got legitimate expenses.”

“Then the science students have got to pay more tuition.”

“That’s hardly the spirit of the liberal arts.”

“Science is not a liberal art.”

“It is very much so!” Branden exclaimed.

“Then I will expect you to argue against me tomorrow afternoon.”

“Count on it, Phillips.”

“If Juliet were still alive, your vote wouldn’t count for anything on this issue.”

“How so?”

“You would have to ask Henry DiSalvo. But special budgets for the sciences were to be a thing of the past.”

“How sad.”

“That studio lighting system I told you about?”

“Yes.”

“Seem fair to you, Professor, that that equipment came out of my pocket?”

“Not at all, but hurting one branch of the college isn’t the way to address the problem.”

“When did you cross over to the other side, Mike?”

“Science is the ally of art, Royce. That’s the way it’s supposed to be.”

“Well, it is not my ally. Not in the slightest. It hasn’t been, at Millersburg College, for years.”

“And you think Juliet Favor had set out to correct that problem?”

“Talk to DiSalvo,” Royce said confidently.

“I will.”

“Good. And I suggest you stay sharp tomorrow at faculty meeting. I’m not the only professor who feels this way. Not the only one at all.”

16

Saturday, November 2 9:35 A.M.

AS THE SKIES cleared briefly, Caroline Branden gunned the engine in her Miata and slid sideways to a stop in the parking lot of Evelyn Carson’s building. She got out in deep snow, kicked angrily at the ice packs around her back tires, and then opened the trunk of the car. The bright sun seemed incongruous with the cold air and snow, since to Caroline, after nearly thirty years in northern Ohio, cold weather spoke mostly of cloudy skies.

She popped the zipper of her coat up to the top and pulled her hood over her head. From the trunk of her car, she retrieved the things she had gathered from Martha’s room, and closed the lid. Sliding her boots through the snow, she followed the path made earlier to the side door of the Victorian house, and inside, she stomped her feet to knock off snow and ice.

On the second floor, she pushed through the door into Evelyn Carson’s office, her arms wrapped around the well-stuffed travel bag, Martha’s bucket of toiletries, the camera bag, and a now-wrinkled photograph of a smiling Amish man. She dropped the load on an overstuffed chair and pulled the used pregnancy tester out of her coat pocket. This she placed on top of the pile, noting that Martha’s eyes had picked it up immediately.

Evelyn Carson came out of the small office bathroom drying her hands. She saw Caroline, tipped her head toward Martha, and said, “I’ve got her cleaned up, but she still hasn’t said anything.”

“Where’s her apron?” Caroline asked, keeping her gaze fixed on Martha.

“In the bathroom, here. Haven’t dealt with it. I’ve been trying to talk with Martha, but it’s like before. She hears and knows almost everything, but won’t respond.”

“Not even with her eyes?”

“They track, and the pupils are normal, but they don’t register any response to what I say.”

“She’s afraid to talk?”

“Not quite.”

“That’s how she was back then.”

“That’s only partly true. But, today, she seems resolved not to talk. It’s not so much a clinical muteness as a willful one. It was like that then, too, only to a lesser extent because she was so young.”

“You think she can talk, but chooses not to?” Caroline asked. She took a seat beside Martha and held one of her hands.

Evelyn Carson sat down on the other side of the girl. “She always could talk, Caroline, even then. But like then, I suspect, she has compelling reasons not to talk, now.”

“We’ve got to figure out why, if we’re to help her,” Caroline said. “Martha, tell us what has happened.”

Martha did not turn to Caroline. She stiffened slightly, eyes locked straight ahead. She closed her eyes, drew in a deep breath, and opened her eyes. Slowly, she shook her head side to side, shut her eyes, and this time squeezed them tight.

Caroline looked past Martha to Evelyn and nodded toward the bathroom door. The two got up and opened the door to the bathroom, stepping in. On the back of the door, Dr. Carson showed Caroline where she had hung Martha’s stained apron. Then she said, “I checked her car when you were gone.”

“Evelyn! We shouldn’t be leaving her alone.”

“She’s not going anywhere. She isn’t running from anything, Caroline. It’s like before. If she wanted to run away, she wouldn’t have come here at all. No. She’s protecting someone. There’s a reason for her silence, just as there was years ago. She was protecting her younger siblings, then. It was self-sacrificial. It could very well be the same thing, now—protecting herself, or someone else.”

“She knows we’ll have to turn this apron over to Bruce Robertson, if it figures into his investigation.”

“There’s blood in her Lexus, too,” Carson said.

“It’s Sonny Favor’s Lexus.”

“Well, there is blood in the car. On the steering wheel and on the door handles.”

“This could mean anything, Evelyn.”

“It could mean the most obvious of things. Prepare yourself for the worst,” Evelyn said. “Have you spoken with your husband again?”

“His cell is off.”

“Great.”

“I know. We could call the Favor residence and ask for him.”

“If we tell him anything, then he is obliged to report that, right?”

“Yes,” Caroline said, following the doctor’s train of thought. “OK. Maybe he has done that on purpose, then—switching his phone off.”

Evelyn agreed. “The longer he gives us with her, the better it’ll be right now. Let’s get what we can from her and wait for him to call you.”

Caroline pulled strands of her long auburn hair around in front and fiddled with the ends, leaning back against the bathroom sink. Evelyn Carson had been her friend for nearly ten years, Caroline and Mike having helped Martha Lehman when the young teenager had been Evelyn’s patient. And the Brandens had seen to Martha’s education when she had started college. Now the psychiatrist studied Caroline’s eyes and read both present concern and past tragedy, a child in jeopardy being the one thing, she realized, that still could call Caroline’s deep faith into question. But where despair might rule, Cal Troyer had taught Caroline to pray, and Evelyn Carson knew that Caroline would again muster unshakable resolve and relentless passion to the cause of Martha Lehman.

Caroline stirred from inward thoughts and said, “I can think of two things to try. Long shots, both, but worth a try.”

Back in the office, Caroline took the half-used pregnancy test kit over to Martha and held out the used stick. Then she took out the second tester and handed it to Martha.

Slowly, Martha reached out for the tester and took it in the fingers of both hands. She looked up, first to her psychiatrist and then to Caroline, and sighed. Getting up slowly, she walked to the bathroom, closed the door, and came out some moments later, holding the tester horizontally in front of her. She seemed to stall just outside the bathroom door, and appeared likely to faint. The two women rushed up to her, and each took hold of an arm. With her free hand, Caroline pushed Martha’s things out of the chair, and the photograph of the young Amish man caught the air and landed face-up on the carpet several feet from Martha. They eased her down into the plush chair, and Evelyn took possession of the tester. She looked at it, handed it to Caroline, and Caroline confirmed the positive result with a nod. Together, they guided Martha out of the chair and sat her down between them, once again on the sofa.

“How long have you known?” Caroline asked Martha.

Martha said nothing.
Two days,
she thought.
Two days, and the world is upside down. How could She have known? White trash? How could She have said that? All ruined for Sonny. Maybe not, I don’t know. What has he done? Will they tell him about me? I almost hope they do.

“Who knows besides us?” Caroline asked.

Maybe I was always trash. Why else the affair with Royce? No good, backwards, Amish trash. His mother was right. Dead.

“Martha, have you told anyone?” Evelyn pushed.

There was a barely perceptible movement of Martha’s head from side to side.
No one knows.

“Is it Sonny Favor?” Carson asked.

Sonny Favor. Fallen.

Caroline knelt on the carpet and retrieved the photograph she had found hanging in Martha’s room. She held it up for Martha and Evelyn Carson to see. “Martha,” Caroline said. “It’s not him, is it?”

Martha took the photograph tenderly and smoothed the creases, as tears spilled from her eyes.

Dr. Carson said, “You need to tell us, Martha. Have you been seeing Ben Schlabaugh again?”

But Martha dropped the photograph and buried her face in her hands. A torrent of emotions washed through her, and she seized on the memory of a poem she had written in the sixth grade with Dr. Carson’s help.

There you are, Dread and Silence;
Twin companions, true.
From this pit I must escape
The shadows—clutching shades of blue.