Are You Nuts? (18 page)

“In fact that was what led to the divorce. Before it became public knowledge, somehow my husband found out. I'm sure I was much less clever than I thought I was. I would have left town, but I certainly wasn't going to go crawling back home to southern Illinois. My husband left me, and I only had my paltry income from working in the library.”

“But why does any of this have an effect now?”

“Lydia and Belutha and Jerome somehow found out. The three of them wanted me to turn on you. They wanted me to tell secrets about you. I'm not sure I know any to reveal. Do you dress up in women's clothes?”

“Not even on Halloween.”

“Well, that's the kind of information they wanted. I was to help them against you. I refused. By trashing you, they hoped to be able to trash Kurt and all that he'd done with the union.”

“Why? He wasn't running again.”

“But Lydia, Belutha, and Jerome wanted to run against his record. You can't imagine how desperate they were. Or maybe you can. You've met them and you know that type of person. Even a race for dogcatcher can bring out the worst in people. They were using it for revenge—to get even.”

“I feel like I'm living in Morons R Us. Were there no lengths to which any of these people would not go?”

“And if they wouldn't, their friends would egg them on. One person after another would tell the latest rumor, each more fantastic than the other. It would make them more desperate to win. As their anger increased, their rhetoric heated up, and they did more and more outrageous things.”

“Why didn't Seth and Jerome ever just talk to each other?”

“It's either high stupidity or religious fanaticism, which is basically the same thing, I guess. I think they actually wanted to get together, but winning the presidency was also part of Lydia's and Belutha's faction attempting to control one more elective office. Jerome couldn't back down. His buddies had made a commitment.”

“What tangled webs we weave. Sorry, Jon Pike is getting to me.” I told her what he'd threatened to do.

“It never ends, does it?” Meg said.

“Nope.”

“One last thing. I feel bad I couldn't tell Agnes the whole story that night. I hope I didn't get her into any trouble.”

“She's fine. Worried about you like we all are.” I stood up. I gave Meg a hug and said, “I'm going to try and get a good night's sleep tonight so I can be fresh for harassing suspects. Call Todd and tell him everything. He'll know exactly what to do. Meanwhile, don't give up hope.”

She smiled wanly and thanked me.

 

I drove home as the north wind was rising to a gale. I had the window down and my arm draped over the edge. It was deliciously cool. I pressed the remote control switch on my key ring to open the outer gate. I pulled into the driveway and shut off the headlights. I stopped to listen to the silence and watch the twilight deepen to night. The early stars began to glow. The rim of an orange moon began to peak over the horizon. I let the car idle forward into the garage. I entered the house through the breezeway into the kitchen.

All the electric lights were off. Two votive candles were burning on the table. The smell of garlic and rosemary filled the air. The windows in the living room were partly open admitting the refreshing air. A fire of applewood and sage burned in the fireplace.

“Honey, I'm home” didn't seem like the right thing to bellow out.

I loosened my tie and draped my sport coat over a chair.

I found Scott in the library. All the walls had built-in bookcases to the ceiling. The only gaps were for the windows and the door. A set of leather-covered furniture clustered in the center of a Persian rug.

He was reclining in a brown leather chair. A reading light was on next to him, and a book was open on his lap. He was gazing out the window at the rising moon. The heels of his black leather boots rested on each end of an ottoman. He was wearing black leather pants. You have to have the right build to wear leather pants, and if you're sitting down in them, the slightest bulge of a love handle will show. Scott looked perfect. He wore no shirt but had a metal chain around his neck and a leather band around his right biceps. A visor of a leather cap hung low over his forehead. Another fire was in the fireplace. I could smell the leather of his pants and the chairs.

Definitely not a “Hi, honey, I'm home” outfit.

I could see my reflection in the windows and I presumed he could too. He spoke to my reflection. “Hi, Tommy.”

I sat down on the floor between his legs. I felt him move them as pillars on each side of me. He leaned down from behind and finished untying my tie and placed it with his book on the teak end table. He was rereading
The Wind in the Willows
.

He placed his hands on my shoulders and gently kneaded the muscles. He murmured, “I was reading the part where Mole stops Rat so they can go to the hole Mole abandoned. His old home.”

I leaned my head back into his crotch and listened to the gentle flow of his words as he described the scene almost verbatim. I lost myself in the rhythm of his thrumming baritone. I began caressing him. After we finished, we had a dried-out but not burned dinner.

 

Scott had made a trip to the city. He had had a conference with his banker, broker, and accountant and then stopped at his penthouse. I filled him in on the latest developments in the case.

“I like thinking she didn't do it,” he said, “and I sort of respect her for being willing to bash him a good one.”

After the dishes were done, we both put on gym shorts and white socks. He wore a Bullwinkle T-shirt. I chose one with a University of Oz logo—tiny ruby slippers, and a small witch flying against the background of poppies and the Emerald City. We sat in front of the fireplace in the living room.

We were discussing the murder. “I think the body being moved convinced me,” I said. “Somebody doesn't just stagger around then plop over dead.”

“I don't know,” Scott said. “That seems kind of possible to me. The first blow might have made the subsequent ones more effective.”

“The book being moved tells me she's innocent.”

“If Meg was telling the truth.”

Reluctantly, I agreed.

Scott said, “Meg's at least partly guilty.”

“We're all capable of violence and we all have those feelings. What about when you aim at a batter's head?”

“I've never beaned anybody intentionally.”

“But you've hit a few guys?”

“Yes.”

“Meg just went a little farther. Since it wasn't in the context of a game, she couldn't possibly get away with it.”

As we lay in bed later reading, he the article “Sport Contracts” his lawyer had given him, I,
Entries from a Hot Pink Notebook
, I said, “You know, I'm a little worried about the kids' reaction tomorrow. The ‘high school mind' is not usually set to be receptive to openly gay teachers.”

“I bet the reactions will startle you or rather the lack of them. The vast majority simply won't care.”

“The insecure idiots will feel compelled to make a statement. They always do.”

“Yeah, you can't predict which way they'll jump. High school kids are emotionally volatile.”

“Got that right.”

First thing the next morning, I checked my room for further sabotage and to do any last-minute preparations for the imminent teenage onslaught. The humidity was back and the wind had died. The breeze made feeble attempts to puff through the opened windows. Everything seemed fine until I tried to turn the computer on. Nothing worked. I began punching keys and softly swearing. The door to my room opened. It was forty-five minutes before school was to start, and I didn't expect anyone. A slender kid about five feet eight inches in dark horn-rim glasses stood in the doorway. He carried a computer disk in his shirt pocket—the pocket protector of the nineties.

“Can I help you?” I asked.

He looked behind him in the corridor, then eased several steps into the room and shut the door. He looked solemn. “Mr. Mason, if it's okay, I wanted to say thanks for all you've done.”

“For what?”

“Being on television and everything. I feel better about myself because of you. I think you and your lover are really brave. The gay kids I know are really proud of you.”

“Thanks,” I mumbled.

He glanced nervously around. “I can't stay long. I also came to give you some information.” He edged a little farther into the room.

“What's your name?”

“Jason Brewer. I don't have a lot of time. I heard that a few of the kids are going to be out to get you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Like, when you walk down the hall, to more than accidentally bump into you, or slash the tires on your truck, wreck things, stuff like that.”

“Who told you this?”

“Lots of kids know. I heard it from three different sources. Friends of mine. They wouldn't hurt you, but everybody knows what's being said. The only thing I could tell for sure was that it was some of the troublemakers here at school.”

I banged my hand on the top of the computer. “I don't need the hassle.”

“You could hurt the computer if you do that.”

“Doing what?”

“Banging on it.”

“The stupid thing isn't working anyway.”

“It's not plugged in.”

I glanced at the floor and the wall. I felt silly. The cord and outlet were near him. He took several steps forward and reached down.

“Jason, wait.”

But it was too late. He plugged the machine in. Several things happened simultaneously. The computer screen lit up for a second, then the insides fizzled, and puffs of smoke rose from the back. Jason was hurled against the wall. He slumped to the floor.

As I rushed to his side, smoke alarms started to sound. He was no longer in contact with the electricity. He was breathing. Moments later several custodians with fire extinguishers rushed in. The computer fizzled a bit and let out a last puff of smoke as they thoroughly doused it and the surrounding area.

It took the paramedics seven minutes to arrive. Jason hadn't regained consciousness by the time they took him away.

Edwina arrived to assess the situation. “You are kind of a menace,” she said.

“Wrong again, O wise leader. The people who did this are the menace. The victim of the crime is not the guilty one.”

“Yeah, well, we can't have this going on all the time.”

“Which means, I'm sure, that you're going to dedicate yourself to finding who is responsible.”

“If I could get rid of you, it would be a lot easier.”

“Edwina, did you involve yourself in the school board elections?”

“I didn't care enough to be involved. I've got two years and three days until I can take early retirement.”

The bell rang and the distant murmur of voices and slamming lockers began moments later.

“You can't teach in here today. The police will have to examine everything.”

I held up the unplugged chord. “Somebody frayed the connection.”

She didn't even glance at it. She said, “With the new school in operation we have enough empty space here that we can find someplace you can use temporarily.”

“Did you think about getting one of those community service kids to keep watch like I asked you?”

“Little late for that now.”

“Better than nothing. I can't stand guard.”

She gave a martyr's sigh. “I'll see what I can do.”

“When?”

“I'll do it.” She left.

 

I wound up in an old art room. The only student behavior I noted as even mildly threatening or different during the morning was almost a nonincident. It happened as the kids were streaming out of fourth-hour class to go to lunch. One student, notable only for his short, baby-fat-covered body, was about to be the last one to exit the room. In a stage whisper he said, “I don't want to be the last one out. I don't want to be in the room alone with him.”

And they were gone. A demeaning insult, but what would be the point of making an issue of it? And why is it always the fattest, ugliest, and most unattractive straight, white males who think people are interested in them sexually?

I stopped in the office to call the hospital and find out how Jason was. He was out of danger, but they were keeping him under observation. If he was still in the hospital later, I would try to visit him. I called Scott and told him about what had happened. He promised to keep checking on Jason.

Edwina told me Frank Murphy was waiting to talk to me in my classroom.

Frank got right to the point. “It's a good thing you were there so early. It narrows down who we have to question.”

“Couldn't somebody have come in overnight?”

“We're working on people who had access. Fortunately, it's a short list.”

“Could it have killed anyone?”

“Very possibly. That kid was really lucky.”

A uniformed cop walked in with a male teenager whose shoulders slumped, acne festered, and head hung.

“Which one is this?” Frank asked.

“David Blake, one of the community service kids. The only one who was working as a custodian this morning.”

“An adult could have done it,” the kid said with a snarl as irritating as a buzz saw.

Frank said, “You were supposed to be polishing floors in the newer wing. Two adults say they saw you come down this corridor this morning.”

“Who? Nobody saw me. I …”

“Just goofed,” Frank finished for him.

“That don't mean nothing.”

“The kid who plugged in the computer might die,” Frank said.

“I didn't kill nobody.”

“We don't know that yet. If you can tell us who's behind all this, maybe we can go easy on you.”

“Wasn't nobody behind nothin'. It was just a couple of us messing around. Nobody was gonna get hurt. Wouldn't have if Mason had kept quiet about who he is. It's his fault for opening his big mouth.”

Silence equals safety mixed with the “it's the queer's fault” defense. I was torn between wanting to punch him and pitying him for how pathetic he was.

Frank's good at eliciting information from reluctant teens. Before the end of lunch the kid was in tears and had given Frank two more names of the saboteurs—one of whom was a computer expert.

Near the end I asked, “Which one of you put the bloody encyclopedia behind the books?”

The kid gave me a blank look and asked, “What encyclopedia?”

No kid is that good of an actor. If I was any judge after all these years of teaching, his uncomprehending look was genuine.

 

The next hour was my planning period. First I stopped in the library and counted the
Smith's Comprehensive Encyclopedias
. There were now three of them. I wandered down to the office to talk to Georgette.

She smiled at me. “I talked to Meg a few minutes ago. She told me how you'd been so kind. What can I do to help?”

“It looks like they caught the saboteurs from my room, so that's one less headache. As for the murder, I'm convinced it has something to do with the relationship between all these people years ago.”

“Back when?”

“When all this union business started. It seems to have gotten mixed with all the anger in the community.”

“I can tell you about the union. I was here then.” She looked around. “I can get Adele to answer the phones. It's time for my lunch anyway.”

We sat in the little room off the office that the secretaries eat lunch in. Georgette took hers after everyone else so we were alone.

“What exactly happened so long ago?”

“I was an assistant secretary in one of the elementary schools back then. We were all petrified about what to do if the union called a strike. We'd been warned that if we didn't cross the picket line, we would all be fired.”

“There was going to be a strike at the time the union was formed?”

“Yes, it was a mess. The teachers had demanded the right to have a collective bargaining election. The school board kept putting it off, in hopes of staving off the need to negotiate that year, but the teachers went to court and forced them to have the election. There was a big fight between three factions, the IEA, IFT, and no union at all. Agnes was leading the IFT faction. She seemed to have the most support at the high school. Beatrix was leading the IEA faction and was more popular at some of the elementary schools. After Beatrix won the election, everything around here became chaotic. She can organize a classroom like nobody's business, but she just cannot handle people. She knows how to complain, but not how to run things. The teachers turned down the settlement that the negotiations team came back with. I remember it was something like a one percent raise. When they went back to the negotiations table, the board laughed at them. The teachers then voted to strike. That lasted half a day. Beatrix had no idea what to do. She wouldn't listen to the advice she was getting from the IEA. The board was ready for the strike. They had mobs of parents in all the buildings and substitute teachers in half the classrooms. Some teachers crossed the picket line. I called in sick. I know that's a coward's way out, but I couldn't betray my friends. The strike failed. The teachers wound up getting no raise at all. Everyone was furious. The parents who'd gotten involved on the board's side tried to get some of the teachers fired. The teachers threw out the IEA and got the IFT in. The high school teachers have been in control of the union ever since. Most of the teachers are gone from back then, but people can carry grudges a long time.”

“I never knew most of this.” I also wondered a bit about Agnes Davis's explanation about what had happened all those years ago. She'd left out a lot of information. I wondered if it had been deliberate.

“You started about ten years after it happened. The old guard was tired of fighting by then. Things were quiet for so long. People quit or retired.”

“Was Jerome involved in that election?”

“I don't remember specifically, but everyone was involved somehow.”

“Who was in charge of the no-union camp?”

“Carolyn Blackburn.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“She kept trying to make peace between all the factions. She would meet with one side, then the other. Several sides accused her of selling out. I heard rumors that the school board wasn't all that united either, although I've never been able to confirm that. Carolyn did everything she could to make things work. Nobody was willing to listen. The next year she started working on her administrative certificate.”

I thanked Georgette for all the information and returned to class. My room was now free. An odd moment happened when I was unlocking my classroom door. The halls were extremely crowded with the changing of classes. I realized I'd left a plastic container from my lunch in the faculty cafeteria. Instead of proceeding directly into the room, I turned to go back. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw an elbow swipe past where I would have been. In the swirl and eddy of students, I couldn't tell who had done it. Perhaps it was nothing.

After school I went in search of Beatrix and found her in her classroom. She gave me a hostile look. Her “What do you want?” came with as good of a snarl as the most accomplished teenager.

“I'm not here to accuse you. I was wondering if you would tell me about the big union fight back when you were all getting the organization started here in the district.”

“Why should I?”

“Because I think it has something to do with the murders.”

“How could it?”

“I don't know. I do know that you've been busily threatening everyone or making duplicitous promises around the district. I know you promised both Seth and Jerome your support, and you've been badgering Trevor. Is there nothing you would stop at to get your way or cause trouble?”

“That kind of crack is supposed to make me want to confide in you?”

“I'd like to hear your side of the story.”

Meg walked into the room accompanied by Edwina.

“What are you doing here?” Beatrix snapped at Meg.

“Last night Tom and I talked about events in the past,” Meg said. “It made me do some thinking.”

Beatrix stood up. “What is going on? How can she be in the building?”

“She's with me,” Edwina said.

Beatrix said, “I want my union rep here.”

“I am your union rep,” I said.

She gave me a nasty look. “If my union rep won't protect me, maybe he shouldn't be union rep anymore.”

“I'm not here to accuse you,” Meg said. “I just want information. Who were the administrators back when you were setting up the union?”

“You should know. Old man Quigley was the head of the board of education.”

“Beorn's dad,” I added.

They ignored me.

“But wasn't there a religious faction at that time too?” Meg asked. “Not like the vocal and obnoxious one we have now. Back then I recall they were simply in favor of the status quo. But who was it on the board who was in favor of the teachers? I've never been able to figure that out.”