The Admirer Read online

  Helen cut him off. “We are not going to have this conversation.” She tapped her manicured nails on the steering wheel. “I am three hours away from campus, and I will be back by 10:00 a.m. at the latest.”

  At the other end of the garage, a door slammed. Startled, the birds rose and exited in a squall of black wings. Another shadow darted toward the staircase at the corner. Helen shivered. She could handle Drummond. She could handle the alumni, the endowment, even the bad PR from an incident on campus. It was the shadows that troubled her.

  Chapter Three

  Helen drove through the Pittock campus gates, once again noting the cryptic school motto emblazoned above the entrance. According to Josa Lebovetski, emeritus history professor, the first class of students had chosen the famous Latin phrase, Et in Arcadia ego. I too was there in Arcadia. However, Lebovetski had explained at great length, Jedidiah Pittock, the founder, a man of intense religious fervor, had demanded they change that motto because of its carnal implications. They ended up with this one: Ego quoque angelos vidi et tremui. I too have seen the angels and trembled.

  Viewing the campus through a haze of summer heat, the students’ first motto seemed the better choice. Most of the buildings were in disrepair, but from a distance, the whole campus looked like a postcard. The same lack of funds that hindered repairs on the old buildings had prevented new construction. The academic halls were 19th century originals, not the mishmash of architectural styles common on New England campuses. That was one of the things that had drawn Helen to Pittock. It was under-funded, but it was secluded and unspoiled. At least until now.

  She parked in front of the administration building. Drummond emerged just as she entered. A familiar figure, he was about sixty with a full head of silver hair, a tie knotted close to his throat, and a tweed sport coat, buttoned despite the heat. She greeted him with a handshake and as much of a smile as she could manage. The picture of blue–blooded decorum, his face belied nothing.

  “The police are investigating the scene,” Drummond said. “The media has arrived. I presume you’ll be joining me.” He gestured toward the playing fields and, beyond that, the forest. Together they crossed the campus.

  “Fill me in,” Helen said. “What do you know?”

  “Marcus Billing saw the body first. He’s a freshman. Barely eighteen. From the Midwest. He’s in the summer theater program and starting his first year this fall. Apparently, he was jogging with some of his friends and went off the path to urinate.” Drummond frowned his disapproval. “He was shaken up when he returned, but did not say why until they went back to campus. Then he told his boyfriend.” Another frown. “He thought he had seen something in the woods. The boyfriend told some upperclassmen. They told the head resident in the Ventmore dormitory. She told Adair Wilson.”

  “Ah.” Helen shielded her eyes as they stepped out of the shaded quad onto the sunlit street that separated the academic buildings from the grassy hill leading to Barrow Creek and the playing fields. “Marcus told his boyfriend, who told some upperclassmen, who told the head resident, who told Wilson.”

  Helen caught a flicker of a smile on Drummond’s face.

  “You can see why security did not sound the five–siren alarm immediately,” he said. “When Wilson dragged Marcus into the security office, he was so busy apologizing and trying not to be a bother that he practically recanted. He wasn’t sure what he saw. It could have been a deer. He didn’t look closely. His boyfriend agreed that Marcus was easily spooked. Mark Miller, the head of security, took a few men into the woods. They didn’t find anything.”

  “And then?” Helen asked.

  “Blame Wilson.”

  “Or thank her?”

  “After security turned up nothing, she went back into the woods.”

  “To look for the body?”

  “Yes.”

  “By herself?”

  “Apparently.”

  Helen had to admire the nerve.

  “It must have been after eight or nine when she called the newspaper,” Drummond added.

  “Is Wilson all right?”

  “Oh, Wilson is fine. You can’t touch Wilson.”

  Helen glanced at Drummond, trying to read his thoughts. His face was relaxed except for a slight twitch at the corner of his eye. He tucked his hands in the pockets of his slacks and shrugged.

  They had just crossed the footpath that led over the Barrow Creek. To their right stood the Pittock House, Helen’s new home and home to every Pittock president since Jedidiah Pittock. To their left lay the playing fields and past those a blue forest. Beyond the forest, Helen knew, stood the ruins of the old Pittock Asylum, a Kirkbride building, saved from the wrecking ball by its architectural significance. They met the path that led into the forest.

  Helen paused. “She contacted the media. Did she call the police first?”

  “No,” Drummond said.

  Helen waited for him to expound. When it was clear he would say no more she asked, “Why not?”

  “Because it’s Wilson.”

  “How are the media handling it?”

  “They are capitalizing on the gory details. It is a mystery and reporters love a mystery. They are not trying to link it to any other incidents, though. Count your blessings.”

  Helen raised her hand to stop him. “What incidents? What link?”

  Drummond didn’t answer. She and the provost had rounded a bend in the narrow, woodland path and walked directly into a throng of television reporters, each one trying to lift his camera higher than the next, hoping for a glimpse of the crime scene. On the sidelines, newspaper reporters badgered the students who had been brave or morbid enough to follow the police through the woods. Beyond the crowd, a strip of yellow caution tape barred the path. Behind the tape and a screen of slender maples, Helen could make out figures moving slowly in the humid air. Police radios crackled in the distance.

  As soon as the reporters caught sight of the two administrators, they rushed over.

  “Can you tell us what the college is doing to protect the student body?”

  Helen smoothed her hair and adjusted her collar. Her black suit felt funeral. She tried to soften her expression without actually smiling. “We are concerned, but not panicked. Pittock College has adopted additional security measures to protect our students, staff, and faculty. With increased security and awareness, I am certain….”

  The small, detached voice in the back of Helen’s mind said, tomorrow, wear navy.

  “In the past three decades, Pittock College has experienced less than one violent crime per year. It is one of the safest colleges in America.”

  Helen felt like she was looking into a mirror that kept talking, in calm, melodic tones, about safety shuttles and lighting. Meanwhile, the real Helen stood frozen, staring at the yellow caution tape. It was still there: the pain the victim had felt. That much pain did not dissipate into nothing. It lingered like smoke. Helen felt it burning, hot and tight in her throat. She could smell it.

  “You’re new to Pittock College. How has this campus tragedy affected you, President Ivers? I understand you recently lost your sister,” a young, female reporter asked, trying for the human angle.

  “It is an honor to be able to serve the college at this time. I believe we will come to learn that this crime has no connection, beyond proximity to our campus. In the meantime, there is nowhere else I would rather be. We will weather this together, as a campus community.”

  Behind them, an ambulance grated its way over uneven ground. A young, African American police officer emerged from the woods and signaled for the crowd to back away. They were extracting the remains.

  I can smell it. Helen knew that smell. She clasped her hands behind her back and pinched the skin on the back of her hand until the pain seared up her arm. Focus.

  “In many ways, this is the safest place for students. Unlike an urban campus or a large state school, we know all of our students by face and name.” It was a lie but a plausible one. �
�All students live in residences on campus. No one is isolated or unaccounted for. With our new security measures, this campus will be a safe haven for all who study, work, or live in its shelter.”

  The reporter thanked Helen and turned off her microphone.

  For the first time, Helen noticed Wilson perched on a granite boulder, her head held in her hands. Her blonde hair glistened in the dappled sunlight. The muscles in her bare arms were visible like cords of rope. She sat like a broken marionette, her head limp, her spine crumpled. As Helen watched, Wilson looked up. Her eyes were swollen and red from crying. For a moment, their eyes met.

  “I have to talk to Wilson,” Helen said.

  She felt more than heard, Drummond’s grumble.

  “If there is something worse than finding a body near campus, it’s Adair Wilson finding a body near campus.”

  Helen did not like administrators who bad-mouthed faculty any more than she liked faculty who bad-mouthed students. If nothing else, both groups—with their quirks and foibles—were job security. At best, they were acolytes, tending a fire that fuelled human inquiry. Lose sight of that and there was no point in salvaging a little liberal arts college on the brink of financial ruin. However, as Helen considered Drummond’s statement, she realized it was a joke.

  She chuckled. “I guess it will be trial by fire. I have it coming, don’t I?”

  “No.” Drummond shook his head. “You don’t.”

  “Thank you,” Helen said.

  They stood in silence, watching the police step back and forth over the crime scene tape. When Helen looked back at the boulder where Wilson had been, the professor was gone.

  Chapter Four

  Helen was not able to find Wilson in her office, nor could she reach her on her private phone. She asked her secretary, Patrick, to keep trying. With everything else going on, she did not have time to search further. She barely had time to take a drink of metallic–tasting water from the drinking fountain in her building before the police arrived. They met in the conference room. Helen took her seat at the head of the table. Drummond sat to her right. Across from them sat three uniformed officers.

  Drummond introduced Chief Robert Hornsby. He struck Helen as a blue collar version of Marshal Drummond. She had never seen Drummond out of his sport coat. One look at Hornsby told her she would never see him out of uniform. His crew cut looked as permanent as Mount Holyoke.

  “He is a pillar of our community,” Drummond added. “We are fortunate to be in his charge.”

  Helen took Hornsby’s hand across the table and shook it firmly.

  “These are his officers,” Drummond continued. “Tyron Thompson and Darrell Giles,”

  The junior officers looked like perfect opposites. Thompson, the African American officer Helen had seen at the crime scene, was lean and loose jointed with the improbable lightness of a grayhound. His colleague, Giles, had the body of a bulldog and the complexion of something that lived underground. Both of the younger men shifted anxiously in their chairs. Helen guessed it had only been a few years—or months—since they graduated from the police academy.

  “What can you tell us, Mr. Hornsby?” Helen asked.

  “I’ll tell you what we know, but it’s not a lot. We’ll do our best to keep you up to date. The college is a big part of Pittock.” Hornsby sat with his arms spread apart on the table, a man used to accommodating the bulky gun at his side.

  “Of course,” Helen said.

  The chief drew a notebook from his breast pocket and flipped through the pages. “Yesterday, around 1100 hours, your chief of security dispatched a search party. At 1500 hours they returned and reported that the student’s concerns were unjustified. Adair Wilson—thirty–five years old, faculty, employed by the college, no criminal record—pursued her own search starting at 1800 hours, resulting in the discovery of two human legs. She alerted the media at 1900 and the police at 1940.”

  “So she did call the police?” Helen looked to Drummond. His face was grim.

  “She arranged for the media to arrive in time for the excitement.” Drummond picked his words like a man picking over an unappetizing plate. “Had Chief Hornsby not worked quickly, the results could have been disastrous.”

  “We were further delayed,” Hornsby added, “because our investigators were working with the Boston coroners during the hurricane cleanup. We secured the crime scene and placed a guard on duty until the team arrived this morning. And you.”

  “What do you know so far?” Helen asked.

  “The coroner identified two human legs,” Hornsby said. “Female. Caucasian. Probably between the ages of seventeen and twenty-five. Apparently, severed by the train. The coroner estimated time of injury around 5:00 a.m. because that’s when the Berkshire–Western comes through. Emergency personnel took the limbs to the morgue in Holyoke.”

  Despite the air conditioner humming in the background, the room felt hot. Sweat ran down Helen’s side. Another tragedy. Pittock was supposed to be her refuge, or at least her last resort.

  “Chief Hornsby, do you think that it’s one of our students?”

  The police chief exhaled heavily. “She was between seventeen and twenty-five. I wouldn’t rule it out.”

  “However, there is the asylum.” Drummond directed this comment toward Helen. “The old Pittock Asylum closed several years ago. There were supposed to be halfway houses built, but with shortfalls in state funding, allocations had to be made selectively. Not every project received funding.” He was such a politician. “A lot of the mentally ill simply got let loose. They did not have the resources to move, so they stayed here.”

  “It’s what they know.” Hornsby concurred. “She may have been a vagabond.”

  Hornsby returned to his notebook. “There was a thunder storm that night, a lot of rain. It washed away most of the trace evidence. We’ll send samples to the lab, but I know we won’t get much.”

  Helen’s jaw tightened. A dull ache filled the back of her head.

  “There was no sign of a struggle,” Hornsby went on. “So the victim may have known her assailant. Of course, there were the straps. The legs were tied to the track with zip ties.” He set down his notebook. “I’ll call the local hardware stores to see if one recently sold zip ties. They’re at most stores, used for staking trees, household stuff. Unless we get a hit on that or someone reports her missing, we don’t have much.”

  “Are we certain this woman is dead?” Helen asked. She spoke slowly, understanding the implication. It had taken more than an hour for her sister, Eliza, to “exsanguinate” as the coroner had termed it. The bloody handprints on the cupboards were proof. Eliza had crawled around the kitchen after she could no longer stand. Helen tried to dispel the image of a young woman bleeding to death in the leaf litter on the forest floor or, worse yet, struggling to escape her assailant. Under the table, Helen pinched her hand.

  “The girl is dead,” Hornsby said. “Thank God. The train cut her legs above the straps so she would have bled out instantly.”

  Thompson cleared his throat. “The ties aren’t the strangest part. The real question is: where’s the rest of the body?”

  Hornsby shot him a look that said he was meant to be seen and not heard, “We’re going to search this afternoon. Naturally, the body will tell us a lot.”

  “I think we should call Great Barrington,” Thompson added. “They will loan us their K-9 officer.”

  “K-9 officer,” Hornsby snorted. “You might as well send my beagle.”

  “Dogs have been instrumental in solving thousands of cases. We worked with them in the Academy. Dogs can find a body in minutes whereas a human search team takes hours, and that’s if they find the victim at all.”

  “With fifteen mile per hour winds and six inches of rain, I don’t think so,” Hornsby said.

  “A dog can find a scent in water, but you’re right.” Thompson held up his hands for attention. “Every hour that goes by, it gets harder. Let’s get out there now before we lose a
ny more time.”

  “That whole forest was soaked,” Hornsby said. Despite his pressed uniform and upright posture, he looked exhausted. “This whole thing makes me sick.” He ran a hand over his crew cut. “Some sick bastard did that to a woman. If I thought it’d help, I’d get out there with a magnifying glass and a herd of Chihuahuas, but that’s not going to change facts. That forest was drenched, and everything we want to know washed away in the storm.”

  Thompson opened his mouth to speak.

  “I think the chief has this under control,” Drummond said in a conversational tone. He dismissed Thompson, summarily, like a child. Helen made a mental note to talk to Thompson in private when she could. In the meantime, she cut the debate short.

  “How can Pittock College help?” Helen folded her hands on the table and met each officer’s eyes in turn. “We are ready to put all our resources at your disposal.” She looked at Drummond to see if he would protest. He nodded.

  “Keep your people out of my way. Let us do our job.” Hornsby hooked his thumbs in his gun belt, puffing up for a moment. Then his hands dropped to his sides and he slumped in his chair. “I don’t know. We’ve got a small department. We’re borrowing men from around the area.”

  “Who does this?” Helen asked, not really questioning Hornsby. “What kind of a person butchers a woman like this?”

  Chapter Five

  He had been seven years old, almost eight, when he first experienced the need. In retrospect, it had been the end of his childhood. For years to come, his nannies would defend him to Father. “He’s just a kid,” they would plead as Father uncoiled his belt. But he knew what Father did not guess: his childhood ended the day he found the book on forensic medicine.

  He was waiting for Father under a table in the asylum library. He had pulled the book from the shelf and was examining the pictures. It was an old book with a heavy binding. If not for the gruesome content, it would have made an attractive book for Father’s parlor, one of the many rooms Father forbade him from entering.