Grey Expectations (21 page)

Unless – Dulcie picked up speed again – the dream had meant something. A woman, pursued, traveling under cover – under a false name, maybe. Even though the morning was bright and sunny, Dulcie shivered, pulling her sweater around her. She felt that cold, the bone-jolting rhythm of the carriage ride. The woman in her dream had been exhausted, frozen, and scared. Dulcie flashed back to how she had felt the night before, when everything seemed allied against her. Was that all her dreams were? Gothic re-castings of her own daytime woes?

No. She stopped short. Her dreams had led her in the right direction before. They were linked to her author, to her studies. And the woman in her dream had been defiant. Had been traveling on, despite fatigue and cold and fear. Dulcie felt her spirit. The woman in the carriage, whoever she had been, was not the kind to recant her forward views, no matter what she faced. She might use subterfuge, she might hide, but she would not give in. Dulcie remembered the stranger's hand. She could feel how the dream woman had grabbed her cloak and roughly turned away, protecting herself and –
and what?

Although she stood on a sunny Cambridge sidewalk, Dulcie tried to place herself back on that frozen road. The woman had been hiding something in her cloak. Jewels or coins, most likely; a woman traveling alone, especially in the early 1800s, would need to be able to pay and pay well, if she expected to be left unmolested. Still, somehow Dulcie didn't think that was all.

‘Why send me this dream if it's just about her avoiding being robbed?' Dulcie asked a squirrel. The grey beast had paused, halfway down a tree trunk. He didn't respond, but he didn't flee either, remaining in place as the distracted human started to walk again, wandering past his tree in a daze. ‘Was that scene – the groping hand – tied in with the essay in the blue volume? Part of her disguise? Was—'

Dulcie stepped off the curb into a space between two vans, not seeing the Zipcar that had come careening around the far corner, its driver unaccustomed to the narrow Cambridge streets.

Behind her, the squirrel lifted one white paw, reaching out as if to stop Dulcie as she passed between the vans, invisible from the road. The car wove, as the driver reached for a map. The squirrel screamed.

And Dulcie's phone rang, bringing her to a halt.

‘Lucy?' She turned back toward the sidewalk, unaware of the squirrel, which was now panting with relief. ‘What's wrong?'

Nine a.m. Cambridge time meant six in the commune. And her mother, Dulcie knew, was always more of a daughter of Luna than a sun worshiper.

‘You do have the gift! I knew it.' Her mother's voice, crowing with pride, caused Dulcie to roll her eyes. The squirrel scurried away. ‘It's no surprise.'

‘I'm not psychic, Lucy.' Dulcie started off again, a little more aware of her surroundings. ‘I'm simply stating the obvious. It is early for you to be phoning me. Therefore, by deductive reasoning  . . .'

‘Oh, Dulcie,' her mother interrupted her. ‘Let's not argue. That will only make this harder to tell you.'

Dulcie bit her lip. Her mother never liked to call with bad news. Usually, it was up to Dulcie to find out what bills were overdue.

‘You still there, honey?' Lucy, now that Dulcie thought about it, sounded anxious.

‘I'm here, Mom.' Dulcie rarely used that word. Lucy had actively discouraged it when she was young, and Dulcie had chosen her mother's given name over Squash Blossom, her totem at the time. ‘You can talk to me.'

The big sigh that followed, echoing all the way from the Oregon forest, actually served to relax Dulcie. If her mother could go for the drama, whatever was bothering her wasn't too bad.

‘Did you have a vision?' Dulcie ventured. Though these had died down in recent years, Dulcie had heard her fill of them, most of them sounding suspiciously like the result of empty-nest syndrome. ‘Again?'

‘You say that like they're common.' Lucy had evidently regained her composure, so Dulcie waited. ‘But, yes, I did. And, Dulcie, it was horrible, just horrible.'

Dulcie looked around. She was about ten blocks – maybe as many minutes – from the Square. There had to be a way to hurry her mother along. ‘Did it have a message?' She tried the obvious. ‘Was there a message you needed to impart to me?'

‘As a matter of fact, there was.' Lucy paused, but before Dulcie could prompt her again, she came back. ‘But it wasn't just the message, Dulcie. It was what I
saw
.'

‘Oh?' Dulcie was passing the big psych tower now and had to walk more carefully. Pale and distracted undergrads were queuing up at the entrance, while others leafed through books. Dulcie checked her watch. The last exams of the semester were about to start.

‘To start with, you were on a journey. Some kind of terrifying, desperate journey.'

‘Really?' If it had been anyone else on the line, Dulcie would have interrupted to relate her own dream. Right now, she only wanted her mother to finish. She made her way through the crowd.

‘You were being carried away – that was key, away. Like you were being kidnapped. And there was a tower: it looked just like the Rider deck's card for the tower. And so when I woke up, I did a reading for you—'

‘Wait a minute. Lucy?' Dulcie paused as the worried undergrads milled about her. Right now, she envied them their focus. If she wasn't careful, this call could go on all morning. ‘Was that it for the dream? That I was being carried away? Because if that's all there was  . . .' She hesitated. How does an only child, on the brink of adulthood, break it to her mother that she is, in fact, leaving?

‘No, Dulcie, there was more. It's just hard to say.'

Dulcie waited, looking around for the deliverance she knew would not come.

‘It was—'

‘Hang on!' Past a small clique of smokers, heads bent together, she'd seen blonde hair – a particular shade, almost white, cut in layers. ‘Lucy? Just a minute.' She put the phone down as she leaped up, waving wildly in the air. ‘Trista! Trista!'

Her mother was still talking. Dulcie could hear her voice as she pushed by the smokers. ‘Trista!'

The head was retreating, caught up in a sea of brunettes. ‘Tris!' Dulcie called again, silently cursing her lack of height – and her friend's tendency to wear earbuds. ‘Damn.' She had lost her. ‘Sorry, Lucy,' she said, speaking once more into the phone. ‘What were you saying?'

‘I was saying that it was dark, Dulcie. There was a heavy darkness covering you.'

There she was. The blonde, away from the crowd and turning toward Dulcie. Maybe coincidence, or maybe she had heard Dulcie's call – heard the urgency if not the name. Only, now that she'd turned, Dulcie could see it wasn't Trista. Younger, maybe a little more waiflike in her thinness, it was the undergrad who Dulcie had mistaken for her friend once before.

‘It was blood, Dulcie.' Her mother's voice reached her, tinny and far away. ‘You were covered in blood.'

In that moment, the blonde saw Dulcie. They locked eyes, and Dulcie tried to smile. But with a look of horror, the younger girl turned and ran away.

THIRTY-THREE

‘
L
ucy, I believe you.' Dulcie was upset. Not at her mother's dream, but at the strange interaction. ‘I promise. And you can tell me about my reading later. Tonight. I'll call you. And, yes, I'll be careful. Really, I have to go.'

It could be anything, she thought. Maybe she – Dulcie – looked like someone the girl knew and wanted to avoid. Maybe she had a thing about grad students. Or Goths. Still, the timing – seeing that look of horror just as her mother related her nightmare – had left Dulcie spooked.

‘It's this week,' she said to herself as she turned the corner. ‘What else could go wrong?' Then it hit her: she had forgotten to call ahead. Martin Thorpe might not seem to have much of a life, but it would have been a courtesy to request an appointment with the man who had so much control over her fate. Still, nine fifteen on a Friday, where else was he likely to be?

‘Hi, Dulcie!' Nancy, the departmental secretary, sounded as chipper as always, her warm greeting going a long way to salve Dulcie's frayed nerves. ‘I just put a fresh pot on.'

Dulcie found herself smiling back at the plump brunette. Thorpe might be the acting head of the department, but Nancy was its warm heart. ‘Thanks, Nancy.' She dropped her bag on a chair and headed for the coffee-maker. ‘Is Thorpe around?'

Nancy shook her head. ‘You just missed him.' She sounded as sad as she ever could. ‘He's been all caught up in this Codex business.'

‘Great.' The coffee tasted the same as always, ever so slightly burned. It was Dulcie's taste buds that had changed. She put her mug down. ‘Is he coming back?'

‘I hope so.' The secretary lowered her voice. ‘Professor Coffin came by just a few minutes ago. He just missed him, too. Only, he has an appointment.'

‘He's up there now?' Dulcie looked up the narrow steps, but Nancy was shaking her head.

‘Back conference room,' she said, her voice still soft. ‘I didn't think, what with everything going on, Mr Thorpe would want someone alone in his office.'

‘Smart.' Nancy clearly had more spine than her boss, Dulcie thought as she reached for her bag. The thought was inspiring, or perhaps the caffeine kicked in then, because she paused and reconsidered. Thorpe wasn't available, and when he did return, odds were that he'd be tied up with the bigwig now sitting in the back of the building. Maybe she should follow the secretary's lead and confront Coffin directly.

Dulcie pictured the large man. Somehow, she couldn't see him relaxing in any of the worn Harvard chairs, and she wondered if he'd taken advantage of the back door to let himself out on to the small porch. It was turning into a lovely day, and the porch, under the shade of an ancient, if somewhat shabby, oak, was a comfortable place to sit. It was also – she was thinking – her territory. If she ever wanted to approach the fearsome curator, this would be the place to do it.

‘Do you think he'd mind if I joined him?' she asked, and Nancy looked up, silent for once. ‘I just have a few quick questions.'

‘Oh, Dulcie, I don't know.' Her broad brow wrinkled. ‘Be careful. He's – he's not a nice man.'

‘I know.' It helped to have someone else acknowledge it. But she was Dulcinea Schwartz, doctoral candidate. She was not going to be held back by fear of some overblown librarian.

Taking another sip of her coffee for courage, she headed down the hallway. At this hour, the building was silent, and the gentle clicking of Nancy's typing followed her all the way to the back.

The door was closed, and she knocked softly. ‘Professor Coffin?' There was no answer, and she knocked again. ‘Professor?'

If the curator had in fact stepped out on to the porch, he probably wouldn't hear her. Dulcie considered for a moment. She could go around the back, climb the steps by the big oak.

No, that was what she would do if she were afraid, sneaking around like that. Besides, she was short enough already. If he were up on the porch and she approached from the ground, she'd feel like she was approaching a king. She knocked one more time.

‘Professor Coffin? It's Dulcie Schwartz. Could I speak to you for a moment?'

Nothing. She pushed open the door and stepped into the room, right into the puddle of blood.

THIRTY-FOUR

I
t was like a nightmare. A particularly vivid nightmare. And instead of a storm or a horse-drawn carriage, there was blood, a large pool of blood. And Dulcie was not, at that moment, a brave heroine, determined to continue her voyage. She was a goldfish on the counter. A breathless voice, gasping. Trying to scream.

‘Help,' she whispered, the words barely squeaking from her throat. ‘Help? Help?'

‘Are you all right, dear?' The words like a lifeline reached her. Nancy.

Dulcie turned. ‘Help?'

She had no clear recollection of what happened after that. Something in her face – or maybe its complete lack of any color – sent the secretary running, and the next thing Dulcie knew for sure, she was sitting in Nancy's office, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. It hadn't been cold that morning, not that she could remember, but her teeth wouldn't stop chattering, and she pulled the blanket closer. The movement sparked a memory, a hand, but just then Nancy's face appeared, hovering like a worried moon. ‘Drink this, dear.'

Dulcie reached for the mug, but Nancy held on to it, steadying her. She smelled tea and tasted honey.

‘You need something in your system besides coffee. You've had a shock.'

‘His face. It was his face.' Dulcie knew, in some vague way, that she wasn't making sense. But if the uniformed policewoman standing beside Nancy insisted on asking her questions, she could only try to say what was on her mind. ‘It was  . . . upside down.'

The young black cop turned back, toward a colleague who had just appeared. Dulcie could hear them talking softly, but the words weren't registering. All she could think about was what she had seen: Professor Coffin, lying spreadeagled, white-faced in a spreading dark pool. The young cop stepped away.

‘So, Ms Schwartz, how are we doing?' She looked up as a large man took the chair next to hers. The nose, the craggy face  . . . It was Detective Rogovoy. ‘You need anything? Want to lie down? You've had quite a shock.'

‘No, I'm OK.' She shivered and pulled the blanket tighter. ‘It's just that  . . . finding him  . . . . I keep seeing it. Him.'

‘Completely understandable, Ms Schwartz. And I promise, we'll let you go as soon as we get a statement. Nancy here has already spoken to your boyfriend.' He clicked the button on a ballpoint. ‘But first, if we could just get your story.'

‘It's not a
story
.' Dulcie didn't know where the tears came from, but suddenly her eyes were full. ‘It was horrible.'