Grey zone, p.8
Grey Zone, page 8
‘Isn’t this good news?’ she asked. ‘I mean, she must have had a fight with her boyfriend and taken off. That’s what you’re concerned about, right?’
‘Not necessarily, Ms Schwartz.’ The detective leaned forward again and tapped a few more keys. ‘For example, did you notice the date of this response? It’s from yesterday. Less than an hour after your initial email.’ More key strokes. ‘But she’s not on the university grid, that’s for sure.’
‘She’s probably over at a friend’s house or something.’
He looked up. ‘Look, Ms Schwartz, since you do seem to be in touch with her – or with someone using her log on – why don’t you help us out here? Why don’t you type her another message, asking her to get in touch with me, at this number?’ He wrote down ten digits in a blocky hand.
Dulcie looked at the number and at her laptop, which Rogovoy had turned back to her. ‘Tell her to call the police?’
‘Tell her we want to talk with her. That’s all.’
‘But she’s OK, and—’ Dulcie wasn’t sure what she’d been about to say. That she wasn’t a stool pigeon. That she didn’t work for the police. But one look from the hefty detective stopped her.
‘Your friend was “OK” yesterday, Ms Schwartz, but now it is today. Please, you have to take me serious here. I’m not at liberty to discuss the circumstances around Ms Mines’ disappearance. Let’s just say that we are concerned. But the policy with missing adults, and Ms Mines is of legal age, is that we do not investigate unless a family member files a report, which they haven’t, or we have reason to believe she is at risk.’
‘At risk, like, she might hurt herself?’ Dulcie thought of that little smiley face, and of the failings of email.
He nodded.
‘But if you thought she’d been . . .’ She paused. Boyfriend trouble? ‘Hurt, or something, then the city police would be involved, too. Right?’ Dulcie scanned his face, looking for clues.
‘Look, Ms Schwartz.’ He leaned in, and she did, too, hoping for a confidence. ‘Your name was familiar, so I did some asking around. I know you’re a smart girl, and I heard about what happened last summer with your room-mate . . .’
She caught herself nodding and stopped, waiting. She really didn’t want to get into those horrible memories. Never again would she rush into a summer sublet.
‘So, what part of “I’m not at liberty to discuss the circumstances” don’t you understand?’ He sat back, and Dulcie made the effort to close her mouth. The heat in her face let her know that she was blushing again, with a vengeance. Her initial impression was correct: the man was an ogre.
But once again, his voice turned soft. ‘Miss, I’m sorry, but this really is confidential. And we’d really appreciate you doing us this favor.’
She nodded, appalled at the tears that had suddenly filled her eyes.
‘Look, it’s OK. I mean, it’s probably nothing.’ He had dropped his voice. ‘This isn’t even about her any more, OK?’ She nodded. ‘There’s been another incident, and we just have some questions for her. And even that might not be anything more than what it seems. An accident, maybe. Or a suicide.’
Dulcie swallowed, the tears gone. ‘I know about—’ She couldn’t bring herself to say ‘incident.’ Such a cold little word. ‘About what happened at the Poche Building. I was there. There, too.’
That got the officer’s attention. ‘You weren’t by chance with the recently deceased?’
She shook her head, hoping to shake loose the image. ‘No, no. Not at all.’ She paused and remembered the guard. Her ID. ‘I was in the lobby, looking for one of my students, when, well . . .’
‘Did you give a statement to the officer on the scene?’
‘No,’ she told the floor. ‘I needed to leave.’ He had to understand, didn’t he? After a moment of silence, she looked up. He was still staring at her, his face unreadable. ‘But, I’m here now.’ She heard the quaver in her voice. ‘And I’ll do what I can.’
‘Thank you, Ms Schwartz. If we can find this girl, she’s – well, let’s just say we need to talk to her.’ He waited, and with a nod, Dulcie reached for the laptop.
Glad 2 hear it! That sounded casual, didn’t it? But folks are worried. Call? She typed in the number, took a deep breath, and hit send.
When she looked up, Detective Rogovoy was nodding. He was also holding an oversized Manila envelope. Dulcie could have sworn that hadn’t been on the desk a minute before. ‘Thank you very much, Ms Schwartz. And one more thing.’ He pulled a white sheet out of the envelope. ‘That man with the girl? The one you didn’t see?’
He leaned in as he slid the sheet toward her on the table. It was slick and shiny. ‘It wouldn’t be this guy, maybe, would it?’
He flipped the sheet over to reveal a glossy photo. A man’s face, close up. Dimitri.
THIRTEEN
‘I don’t know if he was actually an ogre, Dulcie, but I’d say your initial instincts were right on. You were played.’ Dulcie had called Suze as soon as she’d left the police station. What her friend was saying did not make her feel any better. ‘That cop sounds awfully good at his job.’
‘But Suze, I was trying to help. I mean, I told him about the email. So we know she’s alive. And maybe what I saw did mean something. You were the one who said I should go down there.’ She looked around. The tall red-haired stranger was nowhere to be seen, and Dulcie realized she was a little disappointed. She could have used a knight.
‘No, that was the right thing to do. I should’ve gone with you, though.’ Suze was at work, and Dulcie could hear a baby crying in the background. ‘I’m not at all sure about him asking you to email that poor girl. The legalities of that are iffy.’
‘You’ve got your hands full, Suze. I thought I could handle it. But, Suze? The officer said something about Carrie that really worried me. I mean, he said they want her for questioning. But I think she’s in trouble, like somebody is after her. You don’t think it’s Dimitri, do you?’
‘Hang on.’ The line went dead.
‘Suze?’
Her friend came back, talking fast. ‘I wouldn’t worry about Dimitri, Dulce. I mean, you recognized him, but you didn’t see him with that girl. You didn’t see them fighting. Maybe there’s some connection. She did say “boyfriend trouble,” right? But maybe they’re asking about him for something entirely different.’
That thought didn’t make Dulcie feel any better. She knew she had blanched at the sight of Dimitri’s pale and smiling face. After that, she’d had to identify her colleague, and even though she swore up and down that she didn’t think he’d been the one in the passageway, she didn’t know if Rogovoy believed her.
Meanwhile, Suze was still talking. ‘Maybe it’s simply that they’re worried about her. You know, these things can be contagious.’
‘What things? I’m sorry, Suze. I was distracted.’
‘Suicide. You know. One person does it, and the idea goes around. Especially on a college campus.’
‘What?’ It was too late. Dulcie heard the phone clatter on to a desk and waited. She was standing outside the police headquarters, leaning into a cornice to hear. ‘Suze! What do you mean?’
‘Sorry. Crazy as usual.’ Suze was back. Dulcie tried to interrupt, but her friend kept talking. ‘Hey, I’m probably not coming home tonight. Let me make some calls, see what I can find out.’
‘Wait, Suze. Suicide?’ It was too late. The line was dead, and Dulcie didn’t even know if her friend had heard her. Suicide was contagious, like a cold? And Carrie? No, it didn’t make sense. That email had sounded so chipper, and, more to the point, the detective had said that they hadn’t thought Carrie Mines was ‘at risk.’ Still, she wondered as she made her way across the Yard, could you really tell someone’s mood from an emoticon?
And what role, if any, did Dimitri play in all of this? Walking down the Memorial Hall steps to the tiny office she shared with Lloyd, Dulcie thought about their absent colleague. Dimitri Popolov might sound like the name of a Russian gangster, but the quiet scholar Dulcie knew was anything but. Slim, pale, and soft spoken, Dimitri looked more likely to be a victim of violence than its perpetrator. True, his area of expertise – Raymond Chandler and his ilk – was bloody. But that kind of dichotomy wasn’t that uncommon. After all, she – Dulcie – considered herself an extremely rational person, a fan of detailed proofs and abstruse arguments. And here she was, studying highly emotional Gothic fiction.
‘And talking to ghosts.’
Dulcie started. ‘Mr Grey?’ The basement room was always dim, but today less light than usual came from the high-set window.
‘Yes, kitten?’ A swirl of dust, a slight movement in the shadows, drew her eye, and Dulcie realized she was holding her breath. Recently, it had seemed that her late cat had manifested only in the apartment, and even then, only to instruct Esmé. It wasn’t that she was jealous of her own kitten, or not exactly. But if she was going to have a conversation, she wanted to make sure of whom she was talking with.
‘That is you, isn’t it?’ She couldn’t help the peevish note creeping into her voice, even as she reached toward the corner with the darkest shadow. ‘It’s been so long. And, well, you never come to the office any more.’
‘Dulcie!’ She wasn’t the only one who could sound annoyed. And if there was any question of who the shadowy presence was, a sharp scrape – like a slap with unsheathed claws – caused her to pull back her hand.
‘Sorry.’ She slumped into her desk chair, head in hands. ‘It’s just been horrible, Mr Grey. Professor Herschoft. The police. The missing student.’ She didn’t know how much he knew, but as a living cat, he’d always been able to pick up on her moods. Surely, he would now. She waited, but when the only response was a little chirp – part purr, part inquisitive – she went on: ‘I thought everything was going to be fine, but now, I don’t know. Suze was telling me about how the idea of suicide can spread, and, well, maybe that’s happening here.’
The full implications of what she had just said hit her. ‘I might have been the last person to see her, Mr Grey.’ She paused, swallowing the end of her thought. ‘The last to see her alive,’ she choked out. ‘I should have gone straight to the cops, I know I should have. But there’s so much going on. Chris, Chelowski. And I didn’t want to get more involved in this, Mr Grey. I have my own life.’
The silence that followed lasted so long, Dulcie was sure he had gone. She had chased him away with her whining. With her refusal – she nodded as the truth hit home – to take her responsibilities seriously. Did it matter if the girl had dropped her class? Dulcie was a teacher. She was another woman on campus. She had an obligation to help. To get involved. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Grey. I guess I’ve just let everything get to me. And, well, Suze is hardly ever around any more, and Chris is always busy.’ She didn’t even want to go into her fears about her boyfriend. Luckily, she didn’t have to.
‘I’m here for you, Dulcie. Never forget that.’
She breathed a sigh of relief and reached out, once again. Sometimes, if she was lucky, she could still feel the long, silky fur of her late pet.
‘Teaching is always part of it.’ She felt a passing touch of a damp nose, the brush of a soft muzzle – and then teeth. ‘There are connections, Dulcie. We touch those we teach. We always touch them. But there are limits. A teacher has responsibilities beyond the text, Dulcie. And with responsibility, there must always be limits.’
‘But how can I tell—?’
Before Dulcie could finish her question, the door opened, raising a cloud of dust that sent Dulcie into a coughing fit. Lloyd entered, fanning the dust out of his own face, and scrambled over to pat her back.
‘I’m fine, Lloyd,’ she managed to choke out. ‘Fine.’
In truth, she was more confused than before. Had Mr Grey been interrupted in the middle of his message, or had he said all he’d meant to say? Sometimes, Dulcie suspected he knew what was about to happen and timed his appearances accordingly. At other times, he seemed to enjoy being enigmatic. Maybe those were the last vestiges of his mortal feline nature. Or was it just that he was so far above her, both as a cat and as a spirit? That final comment about teaching gave her pause.
And raised some other possibilities. As Lloyd retreated to his own desk and Dulcie rummaged through hers for a tissue, questions floated about like dust motes. Had it been Dimitri she’d seen with Carrie under the arch? Had Dimitri been the missing girl’s teacher? But what kind of pedagogical interaction would have resulted in the scene she had witnessed?
Could it have anything to do with the section she had dropped – that Dulcie had let her drop? No, she tried to reassure herself. That class had been a year ago. Whatever it was that had sparked Monday’s confrontation, it was current. Plus, it was more likely something personal, rather than academic. And that, given the cloistered environment of the university, probably meant romantic. There was a history of this kind of thing. Heloise and Abelard. Lloyd and Raleigh. It didn’t really matter, she realized, blowing her nose. None of this absolved Dulcie of her responsibilities.
She had a moral obligation to look into this. But how? She looked over at her office mate. He was humming, flipping through yet another blue book, with a pile of about thirty others before him. Clearly, he was better at keeping up with his grading than she was, and she hated to disturb him. Still, he was the logical starting point. Not only might he have some information on who taught what classes, because of his own complicated – and forbidden – relationship, but he might also have other insights as well.
She paused. That wasn’t exactly fair. Their situation was different from any that might have pushed Carrie Mines into danger. Raleigh wasn’t that much younger than Lloyd, and they had started seeing each other when she was in a different department, which meant the romance had initially been kosher. Still, it was a link. Who knew? Maybe there was a secret fraternity of scholars who were involved with their students.
Dulcie was mulling over this unlikely possibility when her phone rang. ‘Suze!’ she answered. ‘Did you learn anything?’
But the caller wasn’t her room-mate. ‘I can’t believe you ratted out Dimitri to the police.’ The voice on the line was furious. And female. ‘And you call yourself a friend and a colleague. You’re nothing but a rat, and you know what happens to rats.’
The line went dead, and Dulcie found herself staring at the phone. Whoever had called had blocked the number from being recorded.
FOURTEEN
‘I didn’t “rat out” anyone.’ Dulcie couldn’t believe she was defending herself. ‘I went to tell the police what I’d seen. And, yeah, I recognized Dimitri from the photo. But I never said he was the man I’d seen. I don’t understand it.’
‘Who uses the phrase “rat out,” anyway?’ Trista focused on the etymology.
Lloyd sat opposite Dulcie, his attention rapt. Twenty minutes after the strange call, Dulcie felt angry rather than frightened. But his suggestion that they leave the office for some air and a snack had been welcomed anyway. Trista had seen them on their way into the Square and was now clearing away their empty plates to place another, with three more chocolate chip cookies, on the café table.
‘It sounds like something from one of Dimitri’s stupid books,’ Trista added. Dulcie couldn’t disagree.
‘I think you should call the cops,’ Lloyd said. ‘After all, they got you into this.’
‘No.’ Dulcie was firm. ‘No way. I don’t need any more of this.’
‘Wait, catch me up here?’ Trista broke off a piece of one cookie to dunk in her mug. ‘You went to the cops this morning?’
Dulcie went through it all again. The fight on Monday night, the misery of yesterday.
‘Chelowski,’ Trista, who had heard some of this, muttered under her breath. She and Lloyd made eye contact and he nodded. Dulcie wished she hadn’t seen that.
‘You guys know something about him?’ The words stuck in her throat. She didn’t need more problems.
‘He’s just—’ Trista waved a hand in the air. ‘Weird.’
‘Let’s be fair,’ Lloyd added. ‘He’s not likeable, but we all would rather have someone smart and on point than someone who panders, right? He’s just sort of competitive with the other departments, that’s all.’
Dulcie nodded, remembering his callous comments about Herschoft. ‘Besides, it was a female voice.’
‘Oh, I didn’t mean that he—’ Trista and Lloyd fell over each other explaining, until Dulcie interrupted.
‘No, you were both just sympathizing with me. I’ve got the dregs of the department now, I know.’ She swallowed again. Hard. ‘Actually, Lloyd, I didn’t even tell you the worst.’
The look of horror on both their faces made her sorry for her phrasing.
‘No, it’s not that bad. It’s just that he thinks I’m on a wild goose chase. He thinks I’m malingering.’
To her surprise, neither rushed to disagree.
‘What?’ She looked from one to the other.
‘I’ve been thinking about it.’ Trista shrugged, as if to soften her words. ‘And you have been getting a little off topic. You’ve got some great stuff with the text, but then you get into that whole disappearing-author thing.’
‘Great.’ Suddenly her coffee tasted bitter, and Dulcie pushed her mug into the plate of cookies.
‘Hang on a minute here.’ Lloyd, the peacemaker, centered the plate. ‘We all have the right to complain about our thesis advisers. I mean, I lost Bullock, too, when he retired, and it could have been me, stuck with ol’ Norm.’
Dulcie nodded and reached for a cookie. ‘But you think he’s right?’ She broke the cookie, not wanting to look up at her friends.
‘Honestly, Dulce? I don’t know.’ Trista answered for them both. ‘It is kind of scary to think about finishing, about going out into the world.’
‘But you’ve got Jerry.’ Dulcie looked at her friend and waited. There had to be a reason she hadn’t come to the pub with Jerry the week before. ‘Tris, is everything all right with you?’
