Catch a Falling Knife

Chapter 9

“Mr. Hoffman doesn’t know much about his daughter,” I said as we drove back toward downtown Bethany.

“You don’t know that,” Tess said. “There’s no reason he would discuss a sexual harassment charge with strangers. Particularly since the proceedings are confidential.”

“Even if that’s true, she’s his little angel and would never work in a strip club.”

“Again you’re making an assumption. You haven’t proved that Elise Hoffman is the Shooting Star.”

Why did Tess always throw cold water on my theories? Maybe her role in my life was to keep me honest. At least I had found out the name of Mark’s accuser without him telling me. Of course it was pure luck, but as a statistician I can tell you that if you want to succeed in life it helps to be lucky. But I would have found out her name in due course, anyway.

Now it was time for action. “I’m getting hungry,” I said. “If you can stand the noise and confusion, let’s eat lunch at the Crescent Heights College cafeteria. It’s a small school and there’s a chance we’ll see Mark there.” Or Elise.

We didn’t see either Mark or Elise at the cafeteria, but we did get some tasty pizza. They don’t serve pizza at Silver Acres and I have been known to talk my younger relatives and friends into going to a Pizza Hut upon occasion.

After we had eaten I asked Tess if she wanted to take a stroll on the campus, but she declined. She is not a stroller. I said, “Let’s go find Elise’s apartment.”

Tess gave me her look that means she’s on to my schemes and said, “She probably won’t be there.”

“No, but at least I’ll know where it is. For future reference.”

“You’d better be careful about contacting Elise. You could get Mark into more trouble than he is already.”

“I know that. I’ll be careful. I’m always careful.”

Tess snorted. But she assumed her duties as navigator and guided me to the apartment building. It had one story and all the apartments faced the street. We found Elise’s number with no trouble and I parked on the street in front of it.

“I think I’ll go ring the doorbell,” I said.

“Big surprise,” Tess said.

I rang the doorbell, but nobody answered. I returned to the car.

“Well, what should we do now?” I asked.

“We wait,” Tess said. “I know that’s what you want to do. I blocked out the whole day for you so it’s no problem with me. We missed pool aerobics this morning. I knew we’d never make it back for the Bridge Club. In fact, I brought along a book to read.” She pulled a paperback copy of a Sue Grafton mystery out of her purse. She started reading mysteries after we solved a murder last summer. “We’re two detectives on a stakeout.”

But Tess’ idea of a stakeout was to read a book, not to watch for anything. I had to do that. After a few minutes I knew the meaning of boredom. And then Tess fell asleep, leaving me completely alone. This was not a glamorous job. I had trouble staying awake, myself. Several times I dozed off and woke with a jerk. After an hour I was ready to give up.

I heard a car pull up behind me and stop. I glanced in my rearview mirror. I got a quick look at the face of a young woman. It wasn’t Elise, but it looked familiar. She got out of the car and I could no longer see her face in my mirror. She walked around the back of my car and up the sidewalk to Elise’s apartment. From the back she reminded me of the girl from the Administration Building, the way she had looked as she had run away from me after telling me about Club Cavalier. What was she doing here?

She went up to the door, but instead of knocking or ringing the doorbell it looked as if she was using a key. The door opened and she went inside and shut it after her. She must be Elise’s roommate. Donna. I remembered her name. I pulled out my spiral notebook and checked my notes. Donna Somerset. I had learned not to rely on my memory.

I had to see her face again to make sure. I could knock on the door, but she would recognize me. If I waited, maybe she would come out. But I couldn’t wait here, because she had undoubtedly noticed the two of us sitting in my car, even though only the backs of our heads had been visible to her. If we stayed here she might get suspicious and take a closer look. And she could see the car from her front window.

I started the car and pulled ahead, intending to park a short distance up the street.

“What’s going on?” Tess asked, sleepily.

“I’ll tell you in a minute,” I said. I had a thought. “I need to get the license plate number of the car behind where we were just parked. I’m going to turn around and drive by it. You can help me read the license.”

I pulled into a driveway on the other side of the street and backed out, reversing our direction. Then I cruised slowly past the other car. It was some sort of Chevrolet model, not new, not old. Between us, Tess and I read the license plate and she wrote it down.

“There’s a girl coming out of that apartment,” Tess said. She was looking back over her shoulder.

“Damn,” I said. “I need to get a good look at her.” I pulled into a second driveway and turned the car around again, as quickly as I could, with Tess helping by warning me not to back into a parked car I wasn’t going to hit, anyway. As I drove past the girl’s car she was just opening the driver’s side door and I had to steer wide to miss her. She looked up and we stared at each other for a split second. I had no doubt that she was Donna Somerset.

I turned right at the next corner.

“She didn’t look like Mr. Hoffman’s daughter,” Tess said.

“She’s not. But I know who she is. I’ll explain later. Right now, we have to get back to that street.”

Easier said than done. The streets didn’t necessarily run in straight lines, I found out, and it took me about ten minutes to return to the vicinity of the apartment. When I did I parked about 50 feet from it instead of directly in front. Donna’s car was gone.

“This would be a lot more fun if I knew what was going on,” Tess complained.

“All will be revealed in good time,” I said. “Right now, we have to watch for Elise. We’ll give her ten minutes and if she doesn’t show up we’ll get out of here.”

To keep Tess interested I decided to tell her about Donna, and we were pondering the relevance of the fact that Donna and Elise were apparently roommates when I noticed that something looked different about the apartment window.

“It looks as if the drapes behind the white curtains have been opened,” I said. “They were closed before.”

“Donna might have opened them,” Tess said.

“I don’t think so. I’m going to the door again.”

“Be careful.”

As I walked up the sidewalk to the front door I confirmed my observation about the drapes. Somebody was inside and it wasn’t Donna. As I rang the doorbell I felt a lot tenser than when I had tried it the first time.

I heard a noise from within and the door opened. I looked into the stunning eyes of Elise Hoffman.

For a few interminable seconds I lost the power of speech. Then I said, “Hello, are you Miss Hoffman?”

She nodded and gave me a look that said, “And what are you trying to sell?”

“I’m Lillian Morgan-Professor Morgan. May I come in a minute?”

Whether it was the “professor” or the fact that I looked harmless, she reluctantly stepped aside and let me in, closing the door behind me. She remained where she was, with one hand on the doorknob, and didn’t offer me a seat. Unless I could thaw her quickly this would be a short interview. I knew I couldn’t mention her father so I had to find another way to break through her reserve.

I took a look around at the sparsely furnished front room, complete with posters on the wall. And pictures. Several of the pictures were of Elise in a leotard, doing gymnastic routines. I said, “You’re a gymnast, aren’t you?”

Elise nodded again.

“Were you on a team in high school?” I didn’t know whether Crescent Heights College had a gymnastics team.

“Yes. We went to the state championships two years in a row.”

She stated it as a fact, without bragging. She had warmed up a few degrees. “It’s wonderful to be so athletic. I was always too tall for gymnastics, but I played tennis.”

“I play some tennis too. But I wasn’t good enough to make the team in high school. And I don’t have time for any sports here.”

I had been prepared for Elise to be a conniving bitch, but she didn’t appear to be malicious or scheming. She didn’t seem hard or emotionally distant. I was sure her reticence now was normal when talking to a stranger. I decided to be frank with her.

“Elise,” I said, “I need to say some things to you. Listen to me for two minutes and then you can ask me to leave if you want to. I am a friend of Dr. Pappas, but he didn’t give me your name or ask me to come here. I discovered your name by luck. He hasn’t violated any part of the sexual harassment rules.”

Mark’s name had registered in her expressive eyes. If I had had any doubts about whether she was his accuser before, they were gone. As I paused to collect my thoughts, I waited for her to kick me out, but she didn’t say anything.

“Dr. Pappas-Mark-is a good person,” I continued. “He would not intentionally hurt anybody. I have heard his version of what happened between you two. I haven’t heard your version and I won’t make a judgment about who’s right and who’s wrong, but let me say this. If Mark is found guilty by this panel, this committee, or whatever it’s called, it will destroy his career. He will never work as a college professor again.”

I paused for breath. “You’ve seen how the procedure works and you know by now that it is completely unfair to him. He can’t face you or question you, he can’t call witnesses; he can’t even hear the complete testimony against him. This is not how a free country is supposed to work. I know you didn’t write the rules, but ask yourself whether or not you want to be a party to his ruin.”

I stopped, trying to think what else I should say. The eyes of Elise were locked on mine; they disconcerted me. If they bothered me, what must they do to men? I didn’t want to cheapen what I had already said by repetition, so I finished, “That’s all I have to tell you. I’ll leave now.” I took a step toward the door.

“Wait,” Elise said. “I want to talk to you. Please sit down.”

I picked a beanbag chair to sit in and immediately wished I hadn’t. It was too low and too squishy and I would have a hard time getting up from it. Elise didn’t sit, but paced nervously back and forth in the small room. She had the graceful movements of an athlete, even though she appeared to be going through some sort of internal battle.

She stopped in front of me and said, “I knew I’d seen you before. You came out of Priscilla’s office just before I went in. And I believe you were sitting in on Dr. Pappas’ class that morning.”

I didn’t try to deny her statements.

“You probably saw the demonstration that was going on that day. I didn’t have anything to do with it. I was told the complaint procedure was confidential. I assumed that meant that both of our names would be protected. I don’t have any association with those…those people. Please tell Dr. Pappas that.”

“I’ll tell him”

“This hasn’t gone the way I thought it would. I thought he would get off with a reprimand, but that doesn’t appear likely.”

“Even if he does, the whole world will know about it.”

“Yes.”

Elise paced some more. Jeans weren’t becoming to many girls, but she looked good in them. Still, whatever happened to dresses? When she stopped in front of me again, I saw a tear on her eyelid.

“Tell Dr. Pappas…”

She paused for so long I thought she wasn’t going to say any more.

“Tell Dr. Pappas…I’m sorry.”