An Educated Death (18 page)

"Columbus Day weekend," I said. "A bunch of you were going down to the Cape. Your sister was going to chaperone?" She nodded, edging toward the door. "Did Laney go with you?"

She shook her head and edged a little more. "What did she do?"

She shrugged. "At the last minute, she said she couldn't go. Too much work. It was a lie, I think. I don't know what she did, but she ruined the weekend for all of us. Josh was in a piss-poor mood and he spoiled things for everyone. That was Laney. She didn't care about other people's feelings one bit. She never thought about us."

She nipped out the door, leaving me staring at the spot where she'd been standing. One of Santa's elves, eh? Only if she worked for a very twisted Santa. Under the guise of not wanting to tell me anything, she'd painted a very unfavorable picture of her so-called best friend.

Everything about this business was harder than I'd anticipated—ugly death, difficult people, evasive answers. It had seemed so straightforward when I started—ask some questions, get some answers, and write it up in a report for Dorrie saying either that everything was hunky-dory and the school had behaved responsibly or that the situation revealed some problems with the system that ought to be corrected. My problem was that I couldn't eliminate the human factor. Yes, this was about the role of a boarding school in monitoring the lives of the students; it was also about a child who had died.

I couldn't keep things at an arm's length, the process wouldn't let me. The more I learned about Laney Taggert, the sadder the whole business seemed. Even her self-proclaimed "best friend" hadn't entirely liked or trusted her. It was depressing to think that an attractive, bright young girl could die the way Laney had and leave behind such a legacy of distrust, uncertainty, and dislike.

I checked my schedule. Next up—I'd come to think of them as batters—was Kathy Donahue, Laney's housemother. I was hoping she'd have a more mature and compassionate view of Laney, some insights that could help me put the others' comments in perspective.

Meanwhile, I had five minutes to myself and five hours' worth of stuff to do. I called work and spoke with Lisa. I wanted to get her going on the King problem. Then I put my head down on the desk. I know they say that we use only a tiny portion of our brain capacity, but mine felt full. Between Bucksport and King, I had too much work. Then there was Andre, Sarah's marriage, my trashed condo, the fact that Bobby was avoiding me, and the joyous holiday season with all that it entailed. Even with a clone, I didn't see how I was going to do it all.

If appearance was any criterion, Kathy Donahue was the perfect model of a grown-up prep school girl. Her straight blond hair was pulled back and secured with a demure pink bow. She was wearing a pale pink hand-knit sweater patterned with pastel flowers and a matching pink skirt. Small pink pearls in her ears. Everything about her said neat and prim and perfect. She shook my hand briefly and sat cautiously on the edge of her seat, legs crossed at the ankles and hands folded on her knee. Her face was grave as she waited for my questions.

I went through my usual introduction, explained my mission, and began. "Were you Laney Taggert's housemother all year?" She nodded. "What about last year?"

"Yes."

"Laney's mother says that Laney liked you very much and saw you as a substitute mother figure. Is that how you perceived the relationship?"

Kathy Donahue had to think about that. Finally she nodded. "I guess you could say that."

"What was she like?"

"Complicated."

"In what ways was she complicated?"

The question seemed to annoy her. "Complicated," she repeated. "Hard to understand."

"Did you feel that you didn't understand Laney?"

She shook her head quickly. "Oh, no."

She was hoarding her words like precious jewels. I wondered how someone so silent and undemonstrative could be an effective house parent. I tried to give her the benefit of the doubt. Maybe she just didn't understand. "Look," I said, "I'm trying to get a picture of Laney. Trying to understand what she was like, and I need your help. Didn't Dave Holdorf explain that?"

She nodded. A small, spare nod. I waited for more, for an expression of understanding, a description of Laney, or at least an explanation of her reticence, but nothing more came my way. Grief takes people in strange ways. I knew that. But Kathy Donahue didn't seem to be grieving. She seemed indifferent, cold, unwilling to get involved. "You were her housemother, supposed to stay in touch, have some contact with her every day. And you can't tell me anything about her?"

"She liked to read
Moby Dick."

"Who were her friends?"

She shrugged. "Merri Naigler."

"Merri was her only friend?"

"And Josh. Josh Meyer. He was her boyfriend."

I tried asking the question a different way. "What about kids she hung around with? I understand she was part of the theater crowd." She nodded. "What I meant," I said, trying to keep my irritation from showing, "is who is in the theater crowd?"

"You'd have to ask someone who does theater, I guess."

After a few more questions and monosyllabic answers, I gave up. When Laney's mother had described Kathy Donahue as a second mother to Laney, she'd been right on the money. Kathy was as indifferent, oblivious, and self-involved as Laney's own mother. Even if I found nothing wrong procedurally with the Donahues' care of Laney, Dorrie and I needed to talk about the distinction between technical observance of procedures and genuine concern for students.

"According to Dean Perlin, students who are going away for the weekend have to complete a card and leave it with you. Is that right?"

She had picked up a fold of her skirt and was twisting it between her fingers. "That's right."

"Did Laney fill out a card for last Friday night?"

"I don't know. You'd have to ask my husband, Bill. I was sick last Friday."

"You and your husband never discussed it?"

"No."

"Even after Laney's body was discovered?" She didn't answer.

"Is there a particular place where the cards are kept?"

"Yes. Well, no. I mean, sometimes. That is, there's a place where they're supposed to go, but sometimes Bill and I are a little careless about getting them into the box." She started picking pills off her sweater.

I didn't think she'd looked at me once since I started asking questions. "After the accident, did either of you look for a card?"

She shrugged. "Maybe Bill did."

"So, as far as you know, no one has looked for Laney's sign-out card? No one has asked you for it?" It seemed unlikely, since they'd been so efficient about giving me the sign-out card for the Columbus Day weekend.

She abandoned her lint picking for a minute. "Oh, people asked. Dorrie wanted it. Maybe Bill gave it to her."

"But you don't remember?" I said, hearing the accusation in my voice. "You have no idea if you had one or what's happened to it?"

Kathy Donahue shrugged. "I've had a lot on my mind."

I wanted to shake her out of her dreamy complacency and make her acknowledge that Laney Taggert's death mattered. "Dean Perlin said that you were afraid Laney's death might have been your fault because you and Laney had had a conversation about how pretty the pond looked in the moonlight. Can you tell me about that conversation?"

Kathy Donahue looked at me for the first time. Her face was a perfect blank. "I don't remember saying that to Joanne. Laney and I had no such conversation. Laney had been kind of withdrawn lately. I'd tried to talk to her but she hadn't been responsive." I waited for more but that was all she said. She went back to picking lint off her sweater.

"Did Laney often go to Merri Naigler's for the weekend?"

"I think she went a few times."

"Did she usually sign out when she went to Merri's?"

She shrugged. "I don't remember."

"Do you remember her signing out for Columbus Day weekend?"

"No." I gave up. To answer these questions, I'd have to go back and look at the cards I did have.

"Genny Oakes said that she had asked for another roommate. Did you discuss that with Laney?"

"Of course. I was hoping Laney and Genny could work things out once Laney knew that Genny was unhappy, but it didn't seem to be working. Laney didn't care whether she stayed with Genny or not. It was just a bad match, that's all. It happens sometimes."

"What did Laney say when you told her that Genny wanted another roommate?"

Kathy Donahue gave me another one of her infuriating blank looks and gave the answer I expected. "I don't remember."

"Did she seem upset? Did she wonder why? Did you suggest the two of them try to work things about? What is the procedure for handling a roommate conflict?"

She shrugged as if she were enormously tired and I was keeping her from her nap. "I don't think she said anything. Laney was like that."

"Had Laney seemed unusually depressed lately?"

"No more than usual. Laney wasn't a very happy person." She hesitated and then added, "And she was mean and selfish." She sounded almost childish as she said it.

"Mean? In what way was she mean? To the other girls? To you?"

She shrugged. "She was just mean."

"What is the procedure for handling roommate conflicts?" I repeated. I wanted to shake her. If she was the type of caretaker Bucksport was offering the students they were in for a lot of trouble. She hadn't used the words but everything about her attitude said that frankly she didn't give a damn.

She sighed and plucked at an especially large piece of lint. "I already told you. They sign out on cards. We keep the cards in a box."

"I asked you," I said, unable to keep all my irritation out of my voice, "what the procedure is for handling roommate problems and a request to change roommates."

"Why do you want to know that?" she said, rousing for a minute from her trance, "Laney's dead. Genny doesn't have to worry about it anymore."

"Mrs. Donahue, have you been paying any attention to this conversation at all?"

"You don't have to yell at me," she said petulantly. "I can hear perfectly well. We were talking about Laney Taggert."

"No. I've been asking questions about Laney Taggert. You haven't been answering."

"I've been completely cooperative," she said, "and I don't have to sit here and take this from some nosy outsider who doesn't understand."

"I've been trying to understand. Maybe you need to explain it to me again. How do you feel about all this?"

"Tired," she said, getting up and slinging her purse strap over her shoulder. "I'm going back to the dorm to lie down. Get Bill to help you." She walked out, leaving me staring after her in astonishment. This listless, uncaring woman seemed no more racked by guilt about Laney's death than a cat that's just killed a mouse. I couldn't picture her as Laney's substitute mother or as Josh Meyer's confidante. I'd spent much of the last seven years interviewing private school personnel—hundreds of them—and I'd rarely met someone as indifferent as Kathy Donahue.

 

 

 

Chapter 9

 

I looked at my list. Next up was Josh—an official visit this time—followed by Bill Donahue. Then I had to jump in my car and hightail it back to Route 128, swoop down around the south of the city, and meet with the King School folks, and check out my condo. An hour here and an hour there. What the hell. I was queen of the road, even if thinking about it did make me weary. I yawned but that reminded me of the repellent Kathy Donahue. I snapped my mouth shut and stood up. Somewhere along the line I'd better bag a sandwich or I was going to be in poor shape to deal with the alleged sins of Denzel Ellis-Jackson. I took a break to freshen up and went to get some hot coffee and beg for food.

Lori and Ellie Drucker were standing by the coffee machine talking about a case in the local news where a teenage girl who was having an affair with her coach had taken her father's handgun and tried to kill the Coach's wife. "It seems so unfair," Lori was saying. "If anyone deserved to be shot it was the husband."

Ellie shook her head vehemently. "I disagree. Why not the girl? If I'd been the wife, I would have shot her. She had no business messing with a married man."

"But he was the adult. She was just a kid. He's the one who ought to have exercised self-control," Lori began, "and anyway, I don't think the wife knew. The whole thing's a mess. What really offends me is that now probably all of them will get rich selling their stories."

"I don't know which is worse," Ellie mused. "The cases where the wife knows or where she doesn't. I think one of the worst situations is where the wife doesn't know but everyone else does and they're feeling sorry for her."

"It's time to bring back the stocks and the ducking stool," I suggested. "That guy was the girl's coach, wasn't he? There have always been cases of older men getting involved with young women, especially in the educational arena, because the opportunities are there—sex for grades, or adults taking advantage of student crushes or vulnerable students. It's an area where we've learned we can't cut the offending adults any slack. We need to enforce the obligation, as teachers and as adults acting in loco parentis, to retain the adult role and act responsibly and maturely for the benefit of the students. We stress it, schools stress it, the law stresses it, yet I've been in this business for seven years, and if I had a hundred dollars for every breach I've dealt with, I could retire. In some schools, it runs rampant."