Five Smooth Stones (49 page)

And all the time the bleak, cold voice was talking, Merriwether Goodhue had the feeling that this part of the conversation was a prelude; that there would be more, and perhaps worse, to follow. When it came it took him a moment to adjust his thinking.

"There is another matter, Dean, which I must take up with you. You are, I believe, the person in authority closest to the students."

"I try to be."

"I'm certain you do." There was more than acid in the tone now, something other than sarcasm, and Goodhue fumbled in his pocket for the comfort of his pipe. "About my son's car."

"Ah, yes. It is quite safe, Doctor. I have seen to that. We have been waiting for your instructions. I had planned to call you tomorrow if we did not hear. I hated to trouble you during this unfortunate time—"

"Thoughtful of you. The car. It is to remain in the possession of David Champlin. He is now the legal owner. Transfer of ownership was taken care of this morning by my attorney, and the papers sent airmail. I believe Champlin has been driving it?"

"Er—I believe he did—while Clifton was here. But not since he left us. It seemed wise—er—to ask him to relinquish the keys until we received word."

"You have received it."

Goodhue could have told the doctor politely that he was encroaching on territory where he had no right; that for certain good and valid reasons it was considered unwise to permit Champlin to have a car on campus, but he did not. The college was in the soup already; it was his job to get it out, not push it in further by antagonizing this thoroughly aroused man.

"Thank you, Dean. Now if you will be kind enough to give me the name and telephone number of your medical director —Dr. Hathaway, did you say?—and tell me how to reach President Vidal as quickly as possible—"

Goodhue cradled the telephone finally, muttered, "And God have mercy on their souls—" then picked up the matches and started again for the fireplace; the room was like a tomb.

***

Two envelopes were in David's mailbox when he came back to Quimby House for lunch Wednesday, and he carried them upstairs without opening them. He ate in his room most days now, at least at noon. When he didn't he always wound up wishing he had, unless Nehemiah or Chuck or someone like that was around. And it wasn't too good then, either, because he was worried about the connotation others might put on any student's close association with him. One thing that was good about it, he kept saying to himself, was that he could brush up on study for the first afternoon class—and if that wasn't pure rationalization, what was?

One envelope, marked "Airmail," bore in discreet type in its upper left-hand corner, the name "Maynard Sutherland, M.D.," and the address of the Sutherland Clinic in Boston. The other proclaimed itself in lower case as being "from the office of dean goodhue" and contained some hard, oblong object. He opened it first, and smiled as the leather container for the keys to the Yellow Peril slid to the table. He opened the half-sheet memo that was also inside the envelope. The note it contained was brief and in longhand. There was no salutation:

Because it is never my intention to work undue hardship on any student in disciplinary matters, I am returning to you the keys to Clifton Sutherland's car. I understand that you are employed in the city on weekends. I suggest that in the future, as long as you are at Pengard, you guard against impulsive actions that, however well meant, constitute a definite breach Of regulations and are detrimental to the college as a whole.

Merriwether Goodhue

The car is in stall #5 in the faculty garage behind the Administration Building.

David murmured,
"Um-ummmm.
The old bastard. The ofay bastard." He looked at the note again, read, "... as long as you are at Pengard..." I'm still here, you son of a bitch. What's holding you up? Want to be sure I'll flip, waiting for the other shoe to drop?

He slipped the keys into his pocket, made a sandwich and coffee, and sat down, feet cocked up on the table, munching cheese on rye as he opened the other envelope. There was a document in the envelope, but he concentrated on the letter. It was typed, dated Monday, and glancing at its conclusion he saw that it had been dictated to someone whose initials were EG. He slid further down into his chair and began to read:

Dear David Champlin,

Saturday afternoon Mrs. Sutherland and I drove to the sanitarium where Clifton must remain for a few months, and returned with many messages for you and his other classmates. The gist of them all was "best wishes." He is lonely and wanted me to thank you for the humorous cards you have sent him. They have been good therapy, as has been the knowledge that he is not forgotten. Unhappily, patients in sanitariums sometimes tend to feel that they are, and I hope you will continue, and ask his other friends to continue, to keep in touch.

Chatty old boy, thought David; sounds nice. The letter became more formal:

We discussed the matter of the car, which he calls the Yellow Peril. From what he has told me, it appears to be well named. It is our unanimous decision—and i include his mother— that you retain the car, not merely physically but legally. Therefore I instructed our attorney to draw up a bill of sale, which I enclose. (You will pay no attention to the "consideration" therein referred to.) I am also enclosing my check to cover transfer fees and insurance. I was shocked to learn that Clifton had been driving it for more than a year with no insurance. Please attend to this detail immediately.

Yes, sir, thought David. Yes,
sir.
Right now. He was grinning. The tone of the letter changed again:

We hope that you will find time one of these vacations to come to Boston and visit with us. You probably will not want to leave your grandfather at this season (you see, my son has told me a good deal about you), but should you feel free to do so we would be delighted to have you spend some time with us, and go up with us to visit Clifton. If not at Christmas, then perhaps later in the year?

Mrs. Sutherland joins me in extending our most sincere wishes for a happy holiday season and a bright New Year.

Sincerely,

Maynard Sutherland

He had stopped eating the sandwich halfway through the letter, and sat now, looking straight ahead. He was six feet and a bit, a man now, and a desire to bawl like a five-year-old meant he had to be slipping fast. Gramp was fond of saying, "Things'll be made clear, you'll see. Up yonder things'll be made clear." He figured he was going to have a hell of a long wait, healthy as he was, before he made it up yonder. He started fixing another sandwich; sure would be nice if the problems of life, death, God, and the hereafter, were as simple as Gramp saw them to be.

Crossing the campus to class after lunch, he gave way to relief that the Yellow Peril would be in his hands now. It had been rough getting back from the city Sunday. Going in hadn't been so bad, because Chuck had been with him on his way to a date with a UC girl. Tom and Hunter had headed for parts unknown. "Where'd they go?" he asked Chuck after they were on the bus. "First thing I knew I saw 'em hightailing it down the road with overnight bags to catch the bus before this one."

Chuck, sitting next to the window, kept his face turned away, gazing intently at familiar countryside. He'd never been a good liar, but they had all agreed not to tell David that Tom was seeking advice from his father, Hunter from Dr. Sutherland. "Where'd they go?" he said. "Who knows? Who knows where those two characters take off to for weekends? Maybe it's better if we don't. Maybe we're too young. That Tom—"

"Yeah. If that girl—what's her name? Gwen?—really knew—"

"They'll come back peaked and wan, and well be bright-eyed and rosy-cheeked."

"I'd sure look a mess with rosy cheeks—"

They laughed together as the bus rumbled through a dusk that became night before they reached the city, David remembering a ride less than two weeks before, Sudsy beside him, singing off-key along with him:
Come on, man! Put your back in it
—
"Pharaoh's army got drownded—Oh, Mary, don't you weep...."

***

Special permission had to be granted for private telephones in students' rooms, a restriction made necessary by the number of unpaid phone bills at term end in previous years. Hunter Travis was one of the few who had sought and obtained permission at the start of his second year. Now, on this Wednesday afternoon, three days after he returned from Boston and his talk with Dr. Sutherland, Tom Evans sat at the telephone, cheeks flushed, eyes glistening. Hunter sat cross-legged on the floor, an unfailing sign of complete absorption in the matter at hand, while Chuck sat on the extreme edge of the couch, elbows on knees, big hands clasping and unclasping nervously.

"Relax, Tom," said Hunter. "Stay loose."

Tom dropped the receiver back into its cradle, and said, "Line's still busy." He felt like a man who has just received a time bomb in the mail and doesn't know how to deactivate it.

Three quarters of an hour ago a long-distance operator had traced him down through the college switchboard to the billard room in the rec hall. When he went to the telephone Bull Evans's voice greeted him, a circumstance so unusual he was certain for a moment that their house had burned to the ground with all hands except Bull in it. "Everything all right, Pop?"

"Fine. Fine. Your sister just won some kind of intercity swim meet—"

"In this weather? Hope it was indoors. That what you called about, for gosh sake?"

"No. This line goes through a switchboard—"

"Yes."

"O.K.; so don't talk. This is about the matter we discussed Sunday. You're to go to a pay telephone or a private line and call the number I give you, collect. It's Stu Prentiss's place. I'm there now."

"Good ol' Uncle Stu? Jeez, Pop, you got him in on tins— on what we talked about?"

"Yes. If you've got a couple of friends you can trust, O.K.; we may need their help. I'd keep the boy who's most involved out of it. Now. Take this number down—" Bull articulated it carefully, while Tom wrote it on the back of an envelope. "Now get going, son, and call back as soon as you can. We'll be at this number for a couple of hours."

It took half an hour to round up Chuck and Hunter, another ten minutes to give them a rundown on Bull's instructions and Prentiss's identity on their way to Hunter's room. Now they sat waiting, Hunter apparently unmoved except for a darkening of the skin around his eyes, Chuck not even trying to hide his excitement.

Tom dialed the operator again, and Hunter laughed softly. "Damnedest thing—"

Tom glared at him. "Shut up, will you, for gosh sake, I can't—Hello? Uncle Stu? Hi! This is Tom—"

"Howya doing, boy!"

Hunter and Chuck crept nearer, crouching with their heads close to Tom's so they could catch Prentiss's words.

In Chicago, in the combined office and living room of Stu Prentiss, Bull Evans, massive head on one side, sat with one huge hand nursing the ankle that was cocked up on his knee in a characteristic posture thousands of labor men would have recognized. He learned all he needed to know from Prentiss's end of the conversation.

"Good to hear you, Tom.... Listen, I'll be down there one of these days.... Yes, in Laurel. But take it easy. You never saw me before.... No, you didn't.... And I don't want so much as a blink out of you if you see me on the street. Got it?... Now I want you to find out the names of the kids this man Goodhue has been most friendly with.... For as far back as you can get them.... No, no, Tom. They won't be in any trouble.... No.... All right, all right. Then do it this way: don't give me their names but find out how many of them have been away from the college on weekends and when. Where, too, if you can... No, Tom, you will not be getting them in a jam. I'll guarantee it.... Now listen. Sometime soon someone who will be doing a magazine article on why culture is moving into the Midwest will show up and be in touch with you.... Have him interview these boys if you can.... How can it be anonymous?... Figure something out. If you can't, then drop that angle. He'll interview one of the faculty too.... Call me when you get anything.... And give me a number where I can reach you, pay phone or private line.... Where is it?... Travis. Hunter Travis?... Trust him?... O.K., boy. Got everything?... Repeat it.... Right. Be talking to you...."

Tom hung up and looked at the others with something like panic in his eyes. "My God, what've we done?"

Hunter had straightened up and returned to his cross-legged position against the wall. "Nothing, Tom. I think I know what he's after. None of those poor, misguided blokes will be publicly involved." He smiled, the sharp planes of his face softening. "You guys'll have to give up reading private-eye paperbacks. You're living one."

Tom's eyes were troubled. "We don't want to stink as bad as Cozy does."

"We won't."

"I don't think I like it. I should of stood in bed."

"And let Cozy kick David out—and any other guy whose complexion he doesn't happen to like? Another thing—one of these days his fun and games with the kiddies is going to backfire. Some apple-cheeked laddie"—he grinned at Tom's wince—"is going to turn out not to like the rules of the games and run home and holler bloody murder to Papa. Cozy's just been lucky. When that happens it could mean the law and all kinds of crap and corruption—for all concerned. If your friend Prentiss says these kids'll be protected, it's good enough for me."

Chuck said: "I couldn't hear it all, but I can't see now that you've got much to say about it, daddy-o. You and I and Hunter could drop dead right now, and it sounds like this guy would keep right on going. It might take longer, but it'd get done."