Right To Die

5

"TAKE YOUR SEATS, PLEASE.”

Shuffling mixed with comments and laughter as thirty or so students arranged themselves in the classroom that could hold seventy-five. Unlike my day, the ratio of women to men was now almost fifty-fifty.

The room itself hadn't changed, though. Floor flat rather than pitched, tiled rather than carpeted. Fixed, narrow tables in straight lines. Fixed, narrow benches as well, the backs too low and at right angles to seats too shallow. It was as though an extraterrestrial designer had been told the function of the room without being shown the human bodies that would occupy it for hours at a time.

A slightly raised Stage was centered at the front of the room, a blackboard on the wall behind Maisy Andrus. She looked at her notes on the podium, then looked at us and said, "Welcome to the special session course, Ethics and Society."

Andrus came down off the stage and began moving around the room, a trial attorney opening to the jury. She was even more imposing at floor level. Nearly six feet tall in one-inch heels, she had auburn hair swept up from her ears and back behind her neck. sprigs of gray here and there. The face was boxy but attractive. Germanic or Scandinavian in cast.

Andrus wore a yellow sweater-dress gathered loosely by a teal sash at the waist, the hem riding a bit above her knees. She spoke about the required text, office hours, and other housekeeping details of the course. Her manner reminded me of a black Special Forces captain in basic training who ran the TTIS, the Tactical Training of the Individual Soldier, the most miserable obstacle course I ever experienced.

"… and regarding class hours, your attendance and punctuality are not just expected, they are required. Sufficiently severe absence, especially in a four-week course such as this one, will be grounds for barring you from the examination. Effective class participation can raise your grade. Ineffective, incompetent participation can have the opposite effect. Effective participation requires preparation of the written materials assigned for discussion as though you were the lead counsel litigating that case. You by now have the expectation of being treated like the budding lawyers you are. Appreciate that I will hold you to the standard such professionals are expected to attain and maintain."

Every head, male and female, followed Andrus. Each student had a notebook open and a pen or pencil in hand, but nobody took notes. No one even smiled or jabbed a neighbor in the ribs. All were focused on her.

A blocky man in a continental suit and old-fashioned pompadour had come into 205 with Andrus. Pompadour sat, arms folded and feet flat on the floor, watching her with the rest of us. Just occasionally he glanced over at me, seeming not to care if I noticed him doing it. I bet myself that Pompadour was the house servant Alec Bacall had called Manolo. If so, Manolo was acting very much like a bodyguard.

"… and now, a little warm-up for tomorrow's session." Andrus swung her head once in an arc of the room, then pointed to a gawky kid with blond hair. "Male student in the maroon shirt. Stand, please."

I'd never seen this before. The kid got to his feet.

"Your name?"

"Uh, Dave."

"Your last name."

"Oh, uh, Zimmer."

"Mr. Zimmer, do you believe in the use of torture to extract information from someone under governmental control?"

Zimmer blinked.

"Mr. Zimmer?"

"Could you repeat – "

"It's a rather simple question, Mr. Zimmer. Torture, yes or no'?"

"No. Uh, no, I don't believe in that."

"Why not?"

"Why?"

"W-h-y. Why don't you believe in it?"

"Well, because… it's not right."

"Why isn't it right?"

Zimmer took a quick look around the room. No volunteer sent up a hand to take the heat off him, and I sensed that none would.

"Mr. Zimmer. Today, please'?"

"Because it's an invasion of the right of a citizen."

"The right not to be tortured by one's own government?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Why is that an invasion?"

"Yes."

Zimmer seemed to rally a little. "Because the government's supposed to exist to defend a citizen from invasion of his rights, not to do – "

"His or her, Mr. Zimmer."

"Excuse me?"

"In this class, if you refer to a person who hasn't been identified as a man or woman, you will use 'he or she,' 'his or her.' In the real world, you must not run the risk of offending your audience. This is especially important if the 'person' involved is a client or an authority figure in the system, like a judge. Now, Mr. Zimmer, please restate your point."

Zimmer inhaled. "The government's job is to protect a citizen's rights, not to invade his or her rights itself."

"And, ultimately, why is that, Mr. Zimmer?"

"Why…?"

"Why is it that government is to defend its citizens from invasion of their rights?"

"Because everybody has the right to life."

"I see." Andrus turned and pointed to a brunette woman who had squirreled herself in the farthest corner of the room. "Female student, pink blouse. Stand, please."

Rising, the woman knocked her notebook askew, the pen rolling off the page and down onto the floor in front of her table.

"Your name, please'?"

The woman seemed to speak to her departed pen. "Queenan."

Andrus cupped a hand to her ear and said, "I can't hear you."

The woman lifted her head and boomed a little. "My name is Queenan."

Andrus nodded. "Ms. Queenan, do you agree or disagree with Mr. Zimmer's position?"

Hopelessly, Queenan looked at Zimmer, who had folded his hands in a fig-leaf pose of prayer.

"Ms. Queenan?"

"I agree that a government shouldn't use torture on its citizens."

"Just its 'citizens,' Ms. Queenan'?"

"I'm sorry?"

"Your rule of no torture would apply only to protect the citizens of the country involved, not visiting tourists or resident aliens?"

"No. I mean, yes, the government shouldn't use torture on anyone."

"On anyone. Mr. Zimmer, agree or disagree."

"Uh, I agree."

"Because you hold human life of any citizenship sacred, correct?"

"Correct."

"Ms. Queenan?"

"Right. I mean, I agree with that."

"Is that a pretty basic principle for you, Ms. Queenan'?"

"Basic?"

"Yes, basic. Bedrock belief. The sanctity of human life above all else."

"Well, yes, I guess so."

"You guess so."

"I mean, yes. Definitely."

"Definitely. Mr. Zimmer, definitely for you also?"

"Yes."

"Very well, then. Mr. Zimmer, a deranged man has kidnapped a four-year-old girl from outside a day care center. He has placed her in a homemade coffin, with only a limited air supply. By great luck, someone saw the man near the center, and the police have arrested him. There is no doubt the man in custody is the kidnapper. He even boasts that the girl has only three hours of air remaining. You are the highest-ranking police officer available, Mr. Zimmer. Do you authorize torture to extract from the man the location of the girl in the coffin'?"

Zimmer looked at Queenan, but she was staring at her notebook as though it were the Holy Grail.

"Mr. Zimmer, yes or no?"

"No. I'd have my cops search his house and all first."

"Excellent idea, Mr. Zimmer. Ms. Queenan. same hypothetical, only now you are the police commander and the search has come up empty. Any other suggestions. or is it torture?"

"No." Queenan seemed to spark a little, even copying the rhythm of Andrus' speech pattern. "No, it's never torture."

"Never."

"That's right."

"You'd never break your rule of no torture."

"That's right."

"And why is that, again?"

"Because human life is sacred."

"All human life."

"Yes."

"Including the little girl's?"

Queenan pondered that.

"Ms. Queenan?"

Zimmer spoke. "That's not fair."

Andrus turned on him, but more excited than angry. "What's not fair, Mr. Zimmer?"

"You're putting her in an impossible position."

"Am I?"

"Yes. You're asking her to sacrifice her principle."

"No, I'm not. I've been asking Ms. Queenan, and you, if you agree with a given rule of society, and then I've been asking you about the ethic you have that drives that rule, that justifies it. Both of you seem to think that the no-torture rule makes sense, and both apparently for the same ethical reason, the sanctity of human life. Now I'm just asking Ms. Queenan a simple question. Ms. Queenan, how about it? Is the kidnapper's life more important than the little girl's?"

"No. I mean, they're equally important."

"Equally," said Andrus. "Let me get this straight. No doubt that the girl will die from lack of air if the police don't find her."

"All right."

"And no doubt that the police have the right man. Both an eyewitness and his own confirming confession."

"Yes."

"But still no torture?"

Queenan looked around the room. For the last few minutes every head had moved to each player in turn, like a tennis audience at match point.

Queenan said, "If I use torture, I save this girl, but I open up a lot of people to torture in the future."

"So you let the girl die."

"I have to. I mean, otherwise I break this rule and everybody might get tortured."

"Mr. Zimmer. Do you let the girl die?"

Zimmer took a very deep breath. "No."

"No?"

"No. I torture the guy to save her."

"You do? Why?"

"Because she's more innocent than he is. Also, if I torture him, maybe nobody dies. If I don't, we know she'll die."

"Ms. Queenan, does Mr. Zimmer's new logic persuade you?"

"No. I mean, no, it's not new logic. Now he's sacrificing his principle."

"Sacrificing his principle. Mr. Zimmer, are you doing that?"

"No. If the principle behind the rule is to have the government protect human life, then torturing him advances that principle."

"How, Mr. Zimmer?"

"Torturing the kidnapper saves her life without killing him."

Andrus said, "Ms. Queenan, if you don't save the girl by torture, haven't you let your rule control the reason or ethic behind the rule instead of the other way around, instead of the ethic or reason controlling the rule?"

Queenan shook her head. "I don't know."

"Not acceptable, Ms. Queenan. That answer is not acceptable in this class. You must always come up with a response to an opponent's argument. Otherwise, the opponent has won. To close this hour, let me make an argument you might have made, an argument I'll be asking several of you to pursue next time. Mr. Zimmer?"

"Yes?"

"Mr. Zimmer, what if he dies?"

"What…?"

"What if, in torturing the kidnapper, he has a heart attack and dies before telling you where the girl is?"

Zimmer opened and closed his mouth twice before saying, "Then I broke the rule and got nothing for it."

For the first time since she'd left the stage at the beginning of the class, Andrus returned to the podium. "Did you'? Or did you, and Ms. Queenan, find yourselves in a conflict between rule and purpose, between the rule you use to protect society and the purpose you had in mind in imposing the rule on society to protect it. These conflicts will arise, and you must learn to reason them through even if they present unattractive alternatives for action. We shall see you next time."

Andrus closed her own notes and exited the classroom immediately. Manolo of the Pompadour jumped up and elbowed a male student out of the way to follow her.

A black woman sitting next to Zimmer stood, clapping him on the shoulder. "Hey, Zim. Gonna be a long season, I'm thinking."

With the change of class, more students were milling around in the halls. By the time I found my prospective client's office, Andrus was nowhere in sight. Manolo was sitting in the anteroom, next to a desk with a little brass pup tent on it saying Inés L. ROJA. Eyes on me and palms on his knees, he pushed himself to a standing position that blocked access to an inner doorway behind him. Roja came quickly through the inner door. stepping between us. Reluctantly, Manolo's face left me to look at her.

Moving her lips very slowly and using some kind of sign language, Roja said, "He is here to help the professor."

After watching carefully, Manolo moved his head up and down once. More a wrenching than a nod, accompanied by an abrupt hand signal. Simmering, he sat down, again palms to knees. Roja said to me, "Manolo is very protective of the professor."

"Is he armed?"

"No. But helping her is his purpose in life."

"And every life should have a purpose."

Roja didn't seem sure I wasn't joking. "Yes, I believe that." She reached to her telephone console and pushed a button twice. "You may go in now."

I opened the inner door and entered an office that was awash in papers. Some were stacked haphazardly on tables and chairs. Other piles had slumped against walls and onto windowsills. Trapped in a corner was a computer that seemed accessible only by helicopter. On the desk in front of Maisy Andrus several books peeked out from a mass of yellow legal pads, pink message slips, and dog-eared photocopies.

Andrus stood and smiled in a receiving-line way. "Mr. Cuddy."

"Not 'male detective, gray suit'?"

Shaking hands, the smile went lopsided. "Sit, please."

Back in her chair, Andrus fixed me with an interrogation look.

"You don't care for my teaching technique?"

"That depends."

"On what?"

"On what level students you're using it with."

Andrus picked up a pencil. "Would you explain what you mean?"

"It seems to me that what you were doing in there was boot camp. Kind of tear them down before you build them back up."

"Let's assume you're correct. Therefore?"

"Therefore I'd think it was something you'd do with first-year students, not upper-level kids taking a short course on ethics and society."

Andrus tapped the pencil silently on the only corner of her desk blotter visible under the mess. "You attended law school, Mr. Cuddy."

"Yes."

"Where?"

"Here."

"But you never graduated."

"That's right."

"Are you curious how I knew these things?"

"No."

"No?"

"Ms. Andrus, it's your nickel, so we can play around as much as you'd like. I used the expression 'first-year' instead of 'freshman.' I knew Ethics and Society would be an upper-level course. Accordingly. it's a good bet I attended law school. But I went here, and you hadn't heard of me, which probably means I'm not a grad who decided to become a detective, because that's the kind of oddity that would get around the halls. So you could have deduced that I attended but didn't graduate law school, or you could just have asked Tommy Kramer. Either way, I'm not curious about how you know these things."

Andrus appeared pensive. "You're acting out a bit. Could it be because you feel a little uncomfortable being back at your old, almost alma mater?"

She had a point. "Maybe. Sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry about. Tell me, why did you leave law school?"

"I didn't think it had all the answers."

"Is 'it' law school or the law itself?"

"Both."

Andrus shook her head. "Losing faith in law school is all right. We must occasionally lose faith in most means in order to eventually I improve both means and end. But the law itself, you must never lose your faith in the law, Mr. Cuddy. The law is what protects us all."

"St. Thomas More?"

The lopsided smile again. "Yes."

"Pre – Henry the Eighth, anyway."

Andrus gave me a real smile, one that made her seem ten years younger with aggressive good looks. "Alec has always had a capacity for finding good people. Tell me truly, what did you think of the class just now?"

Let the games continue. "I've never seen people have to stand before."

"It helps get them over the butterflies of presenting in public. Also, I'm terrible with names, and making them stand helps me to remember them, at least in the short term. But I really meant, what did you think of my hypothetical'?"

"The Dirty Harry thing?"

"I can no longer rely on the students having read the classics, Mr. Cuddy. So, I disguise subliminally familiar movies or television shows as my hypos. Again, what did you think of it?"

"I think torture is a serious matter. I think you do your students a disservice by abstracting it and then making it seem they have no way out of an intellectual puzzle."

"Have you ever witnessed torture, Mr. Cuddy?"

I thought back to the basement of a National Police substation in Saigon. Suspected Viet Cong subjected to bamboo switches, lit cigarettes, telephone crank boxes and wires. Walls seeping dampness, the mixed stench of body wastes and disinfectant, the screams-

"Mr. Cuddy?"

"No, Professor, I've never seen torture."

She looked at me more carefully, her lips pursing. "I'm sorry. Truly."

"Like you said before, nothing to be sorry about."

Andrus exhaled once. "The notes I received, Mr. Cuddy. What is your professional opinion of them?"

"I'm no lab technician, and I haven't talked to the police about what they may have found on the originals."

"I meant… do you believe I have anything to fear from the author?"

"Nobody could tell you that, even psychiatrists after examining the guy."

"You're assuming it's a man."

"From the words used to describe you, yes."

A nod. "Mr. Cuddy, I have received many threats. Half the unsolicited mail that arrives here disagrees with my position in a way that could be interpreted as threatening."

"But most sign their names, and all are delivered here by mail, not to your house by hand."

Back to tapping the pencil. "That is correct. I would still like to hear whatever analysis you can give me of the notes."

" 'Analysis' may be too scientific a word."

"That's all right."

"Notes don't usually make sense if somebody's rationally trying to kill you. They're just an additional warning and possibly a lead the police can follow back to the killer. Notes do make sense if the guy is just a nut trying to get his jollies from scaring you. Or if he wants to get some publicity from you going to the cops and the notes becoming a media football."

"Which is why I was opposed to Alec and Inés going to the police in the first place."

"Yes, but our guy didn't send the notes to the press or tack them to your office door. As I understand it, two were mailed to you here, and one was in your mailbox on Beacon Hill. For your eyes only, so to speak."

"How do those facts fit your theory?"

"They fit if we have a nut who wants to scare you."

"And if we have a 'nut' who wants to scare me and kill me?"

"It's a possibility, but that brings us back to the psychiatrists, Ms. Andrus."

"I wonder, could we drop the 'Ms. Andrus"?" It makes me feel like Our Miss Brooks."

"Professor, then?"

"I call my students by their last names, and I expect the same from them, because I'm preparing them for a world in which formality, especially in the courtroom, is necessary to avoid the appearance of favoritism or sexism. I call my secretary Inés, but even after six months on the job, she can't get over using Professor for me. Something from the respect someone her age in the old Cuba was supposed to show for university teachers. So be it. For us, how about Maisy and John?"

"It's still your nickel."

The face hardened a little. "Yes. Yes, it is. Tell me, John, what do you think of my position?"

"Your position."

Andrus dropped the pencil and all of the smile. "What do you think of my position on the right to die?"

"You think that's relevant to my working for you?"

"No, I don't. But I am curious."

I cleared my throat. "You know about my wife."

"Alec told me that she died of cancer."

"Brain tumor. She lingered for a long time, months. In and out of awareness, a lot of pain. We didn't end it, the doctors and I."

I had the feeling that I'd stopped too soon, that Andrus was hanging on my starting again.

I said, "That's it. We waited, and she died."

"What did you… feel about that?"

"About her dying?"

"Yes."

None of your business. "I think I'd still like to keep my own counsel on that."

Andrus smiled sympathetically, but in a practiced way. "Then let me tell you about my spouse, John." She squared the chair around, elbows on the desk.

"Working for a large law firm in Washington, D.C., I represented hospitals, among other clients. I met Enrique at an interdisciplinary conference in London. Medical-legal issues, that sort of thing. Enrique was fifty, a respected doctor in northern Spain. I was barely thirty, only fifteen years older than his son. I had no Spanish, no ear for languages at all. Enrique's English was wonderful, and if I'd still been a virgin, the romance novels would say he carried me away on a wave of passion. But that really was how it felt. I left the firm for a teaching position at a law school in a D.C. suburb, just to have summers off to be with him."

"You and he were married but didn't live together?"

"During the school year. At Christmas and summers I'd fly to him, or he'd somehow make time to fly over to me. Anyway, we'd been married for two years, doing this transatlantic shuttle – money was no object, we were both quite comfortable – when Enrique had a stroke. Now, you have to understand, he had been a saint to the poor people of his area, noblesse oblige, during much of Franco's dictatorship. Manolo is a good example."

"The guy in the anteroom?"

"Yes. Manolo was born deaf. His parents cast him out. Literally. Enrique took him in, taught him rudimentary signing, and made him a sort of houseman/orderly to help with the patients he saw. In any case, Enrique had the stroke. Incapacitating. He was paralyzed, could barely sign to Manolo, seemed to forget his Spanish, and only I could understand him, in terribly garbled English."

"Where was his son?"

A muscle jumped in her jaw. "His son, Ramon, was over here, in the States. Studying. I told him he should come back, it was his duty. But he didn't, not until almost the end. And then…"

I gave Andrus time.

"Sorry. Enrique was deteriorating, horribly. Bodily functions… as a doctor, he knew exactly what was happening to him. He knew he couldn't get any better, and he had too much pride, too much respect for the human spirit, to drift into getting worse. One night, he asked me, begged me to end it for him. I refused. For weeks I watched him decline, his begging now reduced to a single word, John. 'Needle'."

The tic again. "Ramon finally arrived. Repelled by his father's condition, he couldn't even sit in the same room with him, his own father. I wasn't getting much sleep, but I was doing a lot of thinking. I decided that what Enrique was asking me to do was illegal but not immoral. Finally, one night, I found a bottle with a label on it that I could read, and I injected him."

Her voice quavered. "Enrique was aware of what I was doing. He smiled at me, John. He slipped away blessing me."

Andrus used the edge of her index finger to wipe her eye. It was so like Nancy's gesture that I started a little in my chair, but the professor didn't notice.

"That should have been the end of it. But I didn't know much about Spanish politics. General Franco had just died, and the leftists were trying to push the Franquistas out of government. The undertaker saw the needle marks, how awkward I must have been when I helped Enrique. There was an autopsy. The prosecutor – Spain has a different system, but what we'd call the prosecutor was a Franquista. Except for Enrique's funeral, I never met him, but apparently my husband had once saved the life of the prosecutor's wife. So the man felt indebted to us and basically sat on the autopsy report. I returned to the States, trying to put my life back together while some Spanish lawyers probated Enrique's estate."

Andrus shook her head. "A journalist, a real left winger, got a whiff of the autopsy results, showing that Enrique died from an overdose of drugs. When it turned out the Franquista had covered it up, there was a scandal. Worse, it was made to look like corruption, as though I had somehow bribed the man. The prosecutor was ruined, and I became a fugitive, though my lawyers here were able to fight the halfhearted extradition effort. I never even lost my holdings as Enrique's widow in Spain."

Andrus came forward in her chair. "That's the perversity of it all, John. I helped a man I loved move through the pain and hopelessness of incurable illness to the peace that follows. Everyone who tried to do the right thing in that direction was vilified by the system, but in the end nothing changed in the society."

"How did the son feel about all this?"

"Ramon? He seemed pretty indifferent. Almost glad that it was over. Enrique's will split the estate between us. I got the house. on the ocean in Spain – in Candas, near Gijon – though I just rent it out. Ramon was interested more in the movable assets."

"Movable?"

"Yes. He decided to settle in the States, even shortened his name to just Ray Cuervo."

"Where does he live?"

"I believe somewhere on the north shore. I haven't seen him in years, but… Marblehead, perhaps." Andrus altered her expression. "Why do you ask?"

"I might want to talk with him."

"I can't believe Ramon could be involved in this."

"How about Manolo?"

"Manolo doesn't know anything. I've questioned him extensively. Over the years he's become good enough in recognizing English for us to communicate with him on simple things."

"I meant, could Manolo be involved in this?"

"Manolo?" A laugh. "Manolo is like the sun and the moon, John. He was devoted to Enrique, never left his side."

"Manolo watched you inject your husband'?"

"Watched me with the needle, yes. Not with the bottle."

"Manolo ever figure out that you killed your husband?"

"John, Manolo is loyal, in the medieval sense of the word. I'm sure that at some point Enrique signed to him that he was always to serve me. After Enrique died, I packed to come back to the States. So did Manolo. In his mind there was no question that where I went, he went. A simple man, but not stupid. For example, if you talk to him, you have to say the words out loud, not just mouth them. Otherwise, Manolo can tell from the way your throat looks that you're not really speaking, and he's hurt."

"How did you ever get him into the country'?"

"I was able to work things out with immigration before the dam broke in Spain. Manolo has stayed on with me ever since. I even got him a driver's license, but please don't ask how. He has no place else to go and nothing else to do."

"How does your present husband feel about that?"

"Tuck?" Andrus seemed amused and affected a southern accent. "Tucker Hebert rolls with the punches, John." Resuming her voice, she said, "Nothing bothers him, which is a refreshing attitude to share once in a while. Tuck gets along fine with Manolo. Besides, Manolo was already a part of my household when Tuck met me."

"At a tennis tournament?"

"At…? Oh, no. Well, yes. I guess so. It was at Longwood Cricket Club, where they hold the pro championships out in Brookline? But he wasn't playing actively anymore."

"How does Tucker feel about your position on the right to die?"

Andrus tented her fingers, rested her chin lightly on the fingertips and rocked her head back and forth. "lf you'll be working for me, you can ask him."

"You realize that I can't both bodyguard and investigate at the same time."

"Manolo's presence is all the 'bodyguarding' I can tolerate, John. Understand this, please. I didn't like the idea of Inés and Alec going to the police precisely because of my position on the right to die. It cannot look as though I can be bullied by crank notes into playing turtle. I will not dilute one aspect of my approach to the cause, including tonight's debate."

"Debate?"

"At the Boston Public Library. Three of us extremists will go hand to hand in front of a slavering crowd."

"I'd like to see it."

"Fine." She softened a little. "Because of what happened to me with Enrique's death, I will not be stopped until what should happen morally is what can happen legally. However, I think that having you investigate is not inconsistent with that goal. I believe we understand each other, even if we don't agree."

"As long as you understand that if I do my job right, the sender of these notes is going to realize you've hired me to go after him."

"That's fine. Let him think about being the target for a while. And, if you catch him, so much the better."

"I'll want a retainer of twelve hundred against four hundred a day fee, plus expenses."

"Only three days worth up front? You think you're that good?"

"No, but I think you're that rich you're good for it."

"Inés has the checkbook."

"I'd also like to see some of your other hate mail."

"Inés keeps an alphabetized file. Steel yourself."

As I opened the door back into the anteroom, Manolo was already on his feet, but this time facing a man about five feet ten in a three-piece suit with lapels an inch out of fashion. Fortyish, he had brown hair with a very narrow widow's peak and a brown mustache, both hair and sideburns a little too long.

The man held a fat manila folder near Inés Roja's nose as he dripped sarcasm. "With all the world's problems preying on her mind, no doubt Professor Andrus merely forgot that she's a member of the Long-Range Planning Committee."

"As I said, sir, I left a message for you that the professor could not attend the meeting because of an emergency."

The man acknowledged me with a scowl. "A pressing issue no doubt. 'Should we pull the plug on Grandmama now or wait till after she's stood treat for lunch?' "

Roja said, "I will ask the professor to call you as soon as possible."

"Yes, yes, you do that, Inés. I'll no doubt be in the dean's office, discussing nonteaching faculty responsibilities and how to assure them."

He turned and walked away, his toes splayed outward like a duck's.

Manolo sat down.

Roja turned to me and said, "I am sorry."

"Who was that?"

"Professor Walter Strock."

"He usually come on that way?"

"He and the professor do not get along well." More seriously, Roja said, "Is there anything I can do?"

"Write me a check for twelve hundred dollars so I can start looking into the notes."

Her eyes lit up. "I will do it."

"I'd also like to see the other hate mail the professor's gotten. You have a file?"

Roja nodded and moved to a tall metal cabinet. Taking a key from the pocket of her suit jacket, she unlocked the top before sliding out a drawer. "All these, alphabetic by the name of the person or organization writing. Except the last folder, for the unsigned ones."

I whistled through my bottom teeth. "You have a box I could carry those in?"

"I can get a carton from the Xerox room."

"One other thing. This debate tonight?"

"You will attend?"

"What time is it?"

"Eight o'clock. At the Rabb Lecture Hall of the Boston Public Library."

Time for dinner first with Nancy. "I can make it."

"Good. Alec will be there too." She smiled and blushed. "I am really glad now that we asked you to help."

"Don't be too sure, Inés. Your boss seems to put her faith in the law."

"I would rather put my faith in people, John. Meaning no disrespect to the professor?

As Roja said it, I realized that I couldn't seem to call Andrus by her first name either.