Stork Raving Mad (6 page)

“The library it is, then,” I said. “Rose Noire, could you show Professor Wright there? I think Professor Blanco wanted some
privacy to make phone calls, so perhaps someone could show him to my office.”

“I’ll take care of him,” Probable Alice said.

“No problem,” Rose Noire said. “Alice and I will take care of everything.”

Neither of them seemed to notice the demotion I’d given the prunes.

“Make sure the door to Michael’s office is still locked,” I told Rose Noire in an undertone. “And the doors between his office and the library. And—”

“Of course,” she said, and hurried toward the door to the hall.

I didn’t have to give Alice any instructions about my office because anything sensitive or valuable had already been locked up months ago, when I got too large to get near my anvil and had to put my blacksmithing business on hold for the balance of my pregnancy.

“And you might open the French doors to the sunporch and crack a few of the jalousies,” I called after Rose Noire. “A little ventilation would be nice. She’s wearing gallons of some ghastly perfume that makes me sneeze.”

“The library will be freezing if I do that!” Rose Noire protested.

“True,” I said.

“We’ll give it a good airing as soon as she leaves,” Michael said.

“Good idea,” I said as Rose Noire tripped away. “Michael, can we talk for a moment?”

I indicated the pantry and Michael followed me in.

Of course, so did the smell of the sardines, mingling with the remnants of the paella. In the small space of the pantry, the odors seemed more overwhelming.

“We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” he said. And then he noticed my face and scrambled to find something on the shelves.

“Here.” He twisted open the top of a little jar of stick cinnamon and handed it to me.

“You’re a mind reader,” I said, holding the jar to my nose. “That helps.”

“The zarzuela’s a little overwhelming,” he said.

“Zarzuela? I thought that was a kind of theater?”

“It’s also a kind of Catalan fish stew—sort of like bouillabaisse.”

I wrinkled my nose at the thought.

“I thought he was fixing paella.”

“He’s fixing both.”

“Yuck.”

“Just inhale the cinnamon,” Michael said. He unfolded the stepping stool I kept in the pantry to reach the top shelves, and I perched on the seat. “It’s supposed to stimulate the brain.”

“Brain stimulation’s good,” I said. “Because we need to strategize.”

“Art and Abe are on their way,” he said. He had closed his eyes and was leaning against the door. “You realize that this could torpedo my bid for tenure.”

There. One of us had said it aloud. According to all the new age books Rose Noire kept giving me, naming a worry was supposed to help you realize that it wasn’t really as bad as you
feared. But this was every bit that bad. It plopped down and brought our conversation to a dead stop as both of us thought about it.

“Yes,” I said finally. “But Dr. Wright’s probably already gunning for you. And anyway—can you live with yourself if you don’t at least try to fix things?”

“No,” he said, without hesitation. “We have to help Ramon. I just wanted to make sure you were okay with it.”

“I’m fine with it,” I said.

“And I think Groucho and Harpo would understand,” Michael said.

“Oh, God,” I said, clutching my belly. “Not Groucho and Harpo!”

“Why not? I thought you liked the Marx Brothers.”

“Yes, but there were three of them—don’t forget Chico. Haven’t there been rare cases where people thought they were having twins and ended up with triplets? Don’t jinx us!”

I began looking around for someplace to put my feet up.

“Actually, there were five of them—don’t forget Zeppo and Gummo. I’m pretty sure the doctors wouldn’t overlook an extra three.”

He pulled a twelve-pack of paper towels down from a top shelf and set it where I could use it as a footstool.

“Thanks,” I said. “And humor me—let’s stick to doubles only.”

“So Winken and Blinken would be out, too.”

“Since two of the hyenas at the zoo are already named that, I think not. But we’re wandering. Back to the problem at hand. What do we do?”

“We can’t just jump in without thinking. We need a plan.”

And he was probably expecting me to help him formulate the plan. Normally, that was the sort of thing I was good at. Why did this crisis have to hit when I felt as if my brain was full of sludge?

Just then P squirmed, as if expressing his impatience, and non-P predictably delivered several thumping blows.

“Settle down and take a nap, kiddies,” I said, patting them. “Mommy needs to think.”

“More premature labor pains?” Michael asked. I’d been having something called Braxton-Hicks contractions for weeks now. After one late-night visit to the emergency room and several anxious calls to Dad and my ob-gyn, we’d stopped panicking.

“No,” I said. “Just the kids doing their calisthenics. Just as well, since if I were getting contractions now, they might not be false.”

Michael’s face took on the anxious look he always got at the thought of me going into labor.

“And that’s fine,” I reminded him. “Remember, the kids are big and healthy and nearly full term, and at my last appointment, Dr. Waldron said if they came anytime from then on it would be just fine. Though obviously it would be better if Gin and Tonic delayed their arrival until the current crisis is over.”

Michael took a deep breath.

“Sorry,” he said. “When the time comes, I will do my best not to behave like a stereotypical new father. And I shouldn’t be putting you under this much pressure right now.”

“You’re not, the prunes are,” I said. “And remember, a problem shared is a problem halved. Many hands make light work and all that nonsense. So, one plan coming up.”

I pulled out my notebook-that-tells-me-when-to-breathe, the worn notebook that serves me as a combination to-do list and address book. I started a new page and held my pen poised to begin making notes. Michael smiled, as if he found the appearance of the notebook as reassuring as I did, and took a comfortable position leaning against the pantry counter.

“So what kind of records do they keep in the English department about dissertations?” I asked. “Would Ramon’s proposal be on file there after it was signed, sealed, and approved?”

Michael’s smile disappeared.

“If he turned it in. He told me he did, but maybe I shouldn’t have taken his word for it. From now on—”

“From now on, you don’t trust your students on anything. They’re drama students, not bureaucrats. And frankly, that kind of nitpicking isn’t your forte, either, so why don’t you get someone who is good at organization to come up with a system to do it for all the drama students and professors?”

“Kathy Borgstrom,” he said. “She loves doing stuff like that, thank God.”

And Dr. Wright didn’t seem to like Kathy. Was that really because Kathy had no official position, or had Kathy managed to turn in papers the prunes would rather have seen lost?

“That’s good,” I said, scribbling a couple of items in my notebook. “But right now, we’ve got to find Ramon’s paperwork.
Maybe it’s in the files and maybe it’s somewhere in his frozen room.”

“And maybe it’s in a landfill somewhere.” Michael sounded discouraged.

“Think positively,” I said. “I assume we can consider Kathy an ally?”

“Absolutely,” he said. “She’s militantly in the camp that thinks drama should be a separate department.”

“Let’s get her to see if the paperwork’s on file in the English department.”

“Excellent idea,” Michael said. He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and began pushing numbers. “Kathy? Michael Waterston. We’ve got a problem here.”

While Michael explained what was going on, I scribbled a few more notes.

“Make sure she doesn’t let the prunes know what she’s up to,” I called over to Michael. “Or anyone else on the English department side of the rift.”

“She already said the same thing,” Michael said. “And she says she’s worried that they may already have gotten to the files.”

“You mean she thinks they might deliberately destroy Ramon’s paperwork if they got hold of it?”

“Kathy wouldn’t put it past them.”

“Trolls,” I muttered. “Can I talk to Kathy a sec?”

Michael handed the cell phone over.

“Hey, how are the babies?” she asked.

“As eager as I am to protect their daddy’s student,” I said.
“Not to mention their daddy’s hopes of tenure. They start kicking the second they see the prunes. I mean, Dr. Blanco and Dr. Wright.”

“Prunes is better,” she said. “What can I do for you?”

I peered down at my notebook, and Michael shifted his position so he could see over my shoulder. I pushed the speaker button so he could hear too.

“Is there someplace outside the English department where the paperwork on dissertations would be kept?” I asked.

“Someplace the prunes can’t get at? Not until the department approves them.”

“So if someone doesn’t make the grade, only the English department has that person’s files?”

“Well, I have my files,” she said. “But no one considers them official. There’s no official record outside the department until after they’re approved.”

I heard Michael mutter a couple of words I hoped he’d stop using once the twins arrived.

“But the college has some central record of people who get doctorates?” I asked.

“Yes, that would be on file in the registrar’s office and the alumni office, and the dissertations are kept in the college library.”

“For the whole college? Great!” I said. “Can you get someone reliable down to the library and the registrar’s office to do some research?”

“What do you want?”

She sounded puzzled. For that matter, Michael looked
puzzled. Maybe having a father who read detective novels by the bagful was rubbing off on me, just a little.

“It might be useful to have someone look at a whole lot of doctoral dissertations to establish that there’s a precedent for using foreign language material in dissertations. Especially in the English department, but precedents in history, philosophy, art, and so forth might help.”

“Gotcha.”

Michael nodded his agreement.

“And is there some way we could compile statistics on the percentage of drama department grad students who complete their master’s and doctoral degrees compared with other departments?”

“The attrition rate.” Michael said, leaning over my shoulder so Kathy could hear him.

Silence on the other end.

“Is that not something we can get?” I asked.

“You need to talk to Abe,” she said. “And Art.”

“They have attrition statistics?” Michael asked.

“Some,” she said. “They’ve been working on that as part of their campaign to secede from the English department. We’ve got statistics and they’re not pretty, and the prunes are going to fight like hell to explain them away. But maybe it’s time for the showdown.”

Michael and I looked at each other. We both knew that the ongoing tension between the drama faculty and certain powerful members of the English department was a volcano waiting to erupt. Was Ramon’s problem going to set off the eruption?

Michael squared his shoulders.

“I already called them about an emergency meeting of Ramon’s dissertation committee,” he said to Kathy. “Maybe you could get hold of them and warn them to come armed with the attrition statistics, in case they feel it’s time to use them.”

“Can do,” Kathy said, and I could hear the tapping of keys. I suspected Kathy had an electronic equivalent of my notebook. “If they’ve already taken off, I can bring the papers out myself.”

“You’d be more than welcome,” Michael said. “We’ve got heat. And enough paella and sangria to feed the whole college.”

“I’m already on my way,” Kathy said. “I’ve been getting frostbite over here. Anything else?”

Michael shook his head.

“If we think of anything else, we’ll call,” I said.

“Up the rebels!” she said. “Death to the prunes!”

And with that she hung up.

“I think I feel better already,” I said, as I made a few scribbles in my notebook. “What next? Should we try contacting the Spanish department?”

“Why?” Michael asked.

“Maybe we could enlist them to help in the battle?” I asked. “Surely someone there would be insulted at the slight to one of their most notable living dramatists.”

A slow grin spread over Michael’s face.

“Mendoza’s not exactly the Spanish Shakespeare,” he said. “More like the Spanish Three Stooges.”

“Oh, great,” I said. “Your tenure’s on the line for the Spanish equivalent of ‘Nyuck-nyuck-nyuck’.”

“Or maybe the Spanish Benny Hill,” Michael said. “There’s a lot of mildly suggestive stuff in it—the sort of thing that would amuse a teenage boy. Bathroom humor.”

“Benny Hill? This isn’t making me feel any better about defending him. Wait—is Mendoza’s play the one where all the actors keep hitting each other over the head with plastic zucchinis?”

Michael nodded. I closed my eyes and shuddered.

“They’ll be using real zucchini in the show,” he said. “And
for tonight’s dress rehearsal. We just wanted to keep the zucchini budget as low as possible. See, we’ve got the real ones all ready.”

He pointed toward a shelf at the back of the pantry. I craned my neck and saw zucchinis, dozens of them, stacked, row upon row. Their deep-green skins had a curiously menacing sheen, like some kind of sinister organic arsenal.

Michael must have seen the dismayed look on my face.

“There’s political content, too,” he said. He leaned over, picked up a zucchini, and began tossing it from hand to hand like a beginning juggler. “All anti-Franco, anti-Fascist stuff. Which means it’s pretty obscure. Although I suppose Blanco and Wright could have picked up on the left-wing, antiauthoritarian tone and disliked that.”

“That’s assuming they even bothered to read it,” I said. “They could have just said ‘Oops, graduate drama student on the verge of actually completing a doctorate!”

“Quick, Dr. Blanco!” Michael struck a pose, holding the zucchini up as if using it as a sword to lead a charge. “ ‘We must act quickly to preserve the purity of our department!’ ”