“Oh,” McCall said, not knowing whether to be disappointed or relieved.
“Just enough to know that what you have in your mind, Mr. Investigator, has nothing to do with campus unrest or murder. In fact, Mr. Investigator, you’re rather crudely on the make. Is that a fair statement of the facts?”
“Pretty fair,” McCall said, “though I don’t think of myself as crude.”
“Naturally not. What man does? Well, I’m not buying today, McC. You took me by surprise, and I may have responded a little more warmly than I would have ordinarily, but don’t take it as setting any precedents. If Ina Vance had walked in on us I’d probably have lost my job.”
“What is she, anti-love?”
“Love?” Those delicious brows rose. “She’s anti-smooching on the college’s time.”
“I’m sorry,” McCall said. “You really shouldn’t look the way you do.”
“Oh. Well.” Miss Cohan felt her hair again. “After all, there’s a time and a place—”
“When? Where?”
She laughed. “Go away, Mike. I have work to do.”
“I came in here for something—”
“I know you did. Did you get to see Damon Wilde?”
He told her about his talks with Wilde, Sullivan, and Eastman.
“Eastman’s a queer bird. They’re all queer birds, when you get right down to it, but Perry... he was flying. I smelled pot in his room, and I suspect he’s on speed, too.”
“Oh, come on, Mike, where have you been the past couple of years?” Kathryn said. “A majority of these kids smoke grass — some just to try it, true, but a lot of others as a steady diet; and there are plenty of acid heads, too. How did our latest riot strike you?”
“Frightening. It was directed. Like a movie scene. Who’s behind things like this on campus? Outsiders?”
“Et tu?” she asked scornfully. “Next thing I know you’ll be looking under my skirt for Communists. No, Mike, not outsiders. There’s a small group of militant student leaders who are — or claim to be — true revolutionaries. They’re the ones who direct these attacks.”
He nodded and felt for a cigarette. When he realized what he was doing he sat down on the edge of her desk. “Do you know Graham Starret?”
“Not really. I’ve seen him around, of course. He’s the student who found Laura, isn’t he?”
“Yes. Lieutenant Long pulled him in on suspicion — I expect he’s had to let him go by this time. Long’s a racist, did you know that?”
“I’ve suspected it.”
“Interesting that Starret came running to Dean Gunther with the news rather than to the police. After seeing how Long handled him, I begin to understand why... I’m pretty sure Laura’s beating and Gunther’s murder cross somewhere. I certainly can’t tie Starret in to Gunther’s death. Still, I can’t forget him. Finding Laura as he claimed he did seems to me a bit pat.”
“Which reminds me,” Kathryn said. “I meant to tell you and didn’t get the chance. There was some trouble between Dennis Sullivan and John Snyder.”
“Who’s John Snyder?”
“An English professor. I don’t know exactly what it was about, but it wasn’t nice.”
“What kind of trouble?”
“He hit John with his fist — I mean Sullivan did. Maybe you ought to talk to Snyder. It might have had something to do with something.”
McCall made a mental note.
“You know a Veronica Gale?” he asked.
“Yes. What has she done?”
“Eastman claims Damon Wilde’s been sleeping with her. And Sullivan told me his girl is a Pat Reed.”
“Pat’s a knockout. Marvelous singing voice. I didn’t know she and Dennis Sullivan were cosying it up.”
“But if Wilde’s been romancing Veronica Gale, and Sullivan’s been shacking up with this Reed girl, why were they both after Laura?”
“Were you a one-girl chaser in college, Mr. McCall?”
“I’ve forgotten,” McCall said sadly.
“These kids today get around. They tumble in and out of bed like acrobats on a trampoline. No sexual hangups go with their degrees! They’re a lot better off, too.”
“You think so?”
“Don’t you?”
“Then why don’t you act that way?”
“Not in my office, Mr. McCall. We’d better get back to cases, don’t you think?”
“Can I get their addresses? I mean Veronica Gale’s and Patricia Reed’s.”
She got up and went to a bank of filing cabinets. She had to stretch, pulling the kelly green skirt high and tight across her bottom. He watched with pleasure and respect.
She came back with the addresses.
“Where do you go from here, Mike?”
“For the time being Wilde’s my number one,” McCall said. “It seems to me he was closest to Laura. And he resented me. I also think he’s more hip to what’s going on at the college. Sullivan struck me as a phony. Perry Eastman’s probably the brightest of the three.”
“They’re all bright. Don’t underestimate any of them, Mike. Damon Wilde’s a big man on campus, but so is Sullivan. Damon had a lot to do with the disturbance this morning. He’s leader of the non-hippie, non-Yippie malcontents.”
McCall nodded absently. “I’d better drop in on this English professor, Snyder. Where do you suppose I can find him at this time of day?”
“Well, his desk is in the English faculty room over in the liberal arts building.”
“You know what I hanker to do right now, Miss Cohan, don’t you?”
“Don’t spell it out,” Kathryn said coldly. “I read that look in your lecherous eye loud and clear. Goodbye.”
“It’s just what I’d like to do,” McCall said. “You don’t see me trying to do it, do you?”
“Is this your patented approach to all females who don’t stop clocks, Mr. McCall? If so, you’ll have to develop a different one for me. I like a little subtlety with my seductions.”
“Truth is beauty,” McCall said. “See you tonight?”
“Definitely not.”
“Why not?”
“Unless I can scare up a chastity belt in the meantime.”
“Try the museum, medieval section,” McCall said. “Look, you’re in absolutely no danger. I’ll take a slug of saltpeter or something.”
“That’s a myth. I mean about saltpeter acting as a damper.”
“Then I give you my word. No attacks, no taking advantage. I’ll let you set the pace.”
“I’m not so sure I can trust myself, either,” Kathryn said ruminatively. “Well, maybe.”
“Then it’s a date.”
“Will you get out of here?”
“I like those glasses on you. They’re cute as hell.”
She threw a look at him that would have melted glass.
McCall left the administration building whistling. A student pointed out the liberal arts building, and he retrieved his Ford and headed that way.
He found the English faculty room without difficulty, but no Professor Snyder. A bearded young man, whom McCall mistook for a student and who turned out to be an instructor, told McCall that John Snyder was conducting a class.
“Where?”
The instructor directed him to Room 321.
A girl in a brief leather skirt came down the third-floor hall. McCall stopped her as she was about to enter 321.
“Excuse me. This is Professor Snyder’s class, isn’t it?”
“Yes. Please, I’m late.”
“Do me a favor. Tell him he’s wanted out here by Micah McCall. Tell him it’s important.”
“He’ll be furious. He has a rotten disposition.”
“I’ll chance it,” McCall smiled.
She smiled back and dodged into the classroom.