Grey Matters (30 page)

She turned – and was smacked.

‘Sorry! Sorry!’ A young man yelled and waved as he bustled past, a briefcase in one hand and a cell phone up to his ear. As he lowered the hand holding the briefcase, he nearly caught a bicyclist on the back. The cyclist responded with a stream of truly inventive invective that left Dulcie feeling both impressed and vindicated.

And, if she were being honest with herself, filled with second thoughts. One of the things she loved about the academic world, and the little city on this side of the Charles River, was its sense of community. People watched out for each other here, and the oblivious ones – like that cell phone guy – were still in the minority. She turned and surveyed the crowd. So many of these people were probably just like her. Maybe not academics, but dreamers, looking for a way to make things work. In fact, she almost felt like she recognized faces in the crowd. It wasn’t that big a city after all. And with that thought, her mind was made up. Turning back toward the river, she bypassed the police station. She’d talk to the cops, but only after she had told Lloyd her intentions.

When she got to Lloyd’s building, a looming old brick thing, she stepped into a tiny alcove and was relieved to see PRUITT spelled out on the bell. Suze might run almost every day, but the twenty-minute walk had tired Dulcie. Her first ring went unanswered, however, and she began to doubt the wisdom of marching down here without warning. What if, after all this, Lloyd was right now in their shared, convenient office? She rang again.

‘Hello?’ Even with the electrical pop and hiss, the voice was clearly Lloyd’s.

‘Lloyd, it’s Dulcie.’ She paused, and heard only silence. ‘Dulcie Schwartz? I need to talk to you.’

More silence, and for a moment Dulcie wondered if the ancient wiring had cut out.

‘Dulcie.’ Lloyd came back with a hiss and a crackle. ‘Hang on. I’ll be right down.’ The line went dead for real.

Dulcie looked around the small alcove. The tile floor was littered with takeout menus; the wood paneling above the mailboxes showed the wear of generations of renters. Not the best place for a heart-to-heart. She stepped back outside and down the three cement stairs. Was there a park near here? Any kind of shared yard? A bare tree took up the space to the right of the stoop, its grey bark nearly matching the color of the steps. To the left, a sickly shrub seemed to extend around the building.

‘Raleigh?’ No, it couldn’t be. As she’d been looking around, she thought she had seen the pretty undergrad rushing, head down, from behind Lloyd’s building to the nearly identical one next door. She’d caught a glimpse of long chestnut hair and longer legs. But young women were far from rare in Cambridge, and when the dark-haired girl didn’t look up, Dulcie shrugged. She was seeing familiar faces everywhere this morning. And right behind her, she heard a voice.

‘Dulcie?’ It was Lloyd. ‘You wanted to talk?’

She jumped. ‘Oh, yes!’ Suddenly, she felt flustered. ‘Sorry to show up unannounced. But, well, is there some place we could sit?’

He looked at her, concern on his pale, round face. ‘What is it, Dulcie?’

‘I need to go to the police, Lloyd.’ She hadn’t wanted it to be like this, standing on the sidewalk in the middle of Cambridgeport. But every moment she waited just made the burden worse. He had asked, and it just came out. ‘I need to tell them what I know.’

‘Dulcie.’ He looked exasperated, rather than angry, and Dulcie took heart. ‘What do you know?’

‘About the book, Lloyd. About the wrapped package I saw on your desk. And that Professor Bullock had reported a book missing, and now you’re saying that this book supposedly didn’t exist.’ She took a breath. ‘And I know that you’ve been buying books in his name, Lloyd. I don’t know what any of it means, but something’s going on. I know it is, and I think the police should know, too. But, well, we’re friends. Officemates, anyway. And so I wanted to come and tell you that I was going to do it.’ Saying that gave her courage. ‘I mean, you could come to the police with me.’

‘Yeah, maybe I should.’

That startled her. ‘You will?’

He nodded. ‘I just needed some more info first.’ He motioned to the stoop and Dulcie followed him. The concrete was cold, but it felt more congenial to be sitting side by side, even if they were only facing a sagging triple-decker. ‘I called that dealer back. The message you took for me? And he’s confirmed it. There’s something wrong with that book Bullock was so excited about.’

‘What do you mean?’ How could a book be “wrong”?’

Lloyd shook his head. ‘I don’t know yet. I’m working on it.’ Dulcie looked at him, and he sighed. ‘Dulcie, things have been weird for a while now.’

‘Yes?’ Dulcie could hear the trepidation in her own voice. Whatever was going on, Lloyd was involved. Now that he was about to tell her, she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to know.

‘You know I work pretty closely with Bullock, right?’ She nodded. ‘Well, it started out just as research. But recently, my duties, such as they are, have been growing. For instance, he’s been having me check the provenance of any book he was interested in, having me do the paperwork. Handle the actual purchase for him.’

The auction report. Dulcie nodded.

‘Now, with Gosham, that’s never been a problem. He’s used to working with Bullock. He’s been selling to him for years. Every now and then, Bullock gives him something back to sell. Like, when he got that first-edition Sterne?’ Dulcie didn’t know about that, but she nodded anyway. ‘It was in better shape than the one he had, so he got Gosham to fix it up, list it online. Got a good price for it, too. But over the last few months, he’s been getting a little crazy.’

‘Roger Gosham?’ Dulcie remembered the bookbinder’s outbursts, both at Polly and herself. But Lloyd was shaking his head. ‘No, Bullock. He’s been in a sort of frenzy, selling stuff that I know he cares about – and then buying books without really thinking about them. Books he already has copies of, books that, well, have dubious origins. A few times, I had to step in when he was going to make purchases without checking out the wares first. That’s what gave me my first clue. I’ve learned that I’ve got to be careful. In some ways, I’ve become his protector.’

A city bus drove by with a cloud of exhaust and the two jumped up, coughing. ‘Lloyd? What are you talking about? What do you mean by protector? I mean, you took his book – and now you’re saying there’s something wrong with it?’

‘It is a fake, Dulcie. A forgery. Very well done, but not the real thing.’ Lloyd stared after the bus, his round face grown sad. ‘Browning Antiquarian is the top Elizabethan expert in the country. I told Bullock I suspected as much. That’s why he got so angry at me.’

‘But why? I mean, it’s not your fault, unless you—’ She paused, the central question coming back to her. ‘You didn’t buy it for him, did you?’ Lloyd shook his head. ‘Then how did Bullock get it?’

Lloyd was still staring after the bus. ‘I don’t know, Dulcie. I don’t know how that book got into his collection. I think, maybe, things have finally progressed too far for me to control.’

‘For you to—’ Dulcie reached out to Lloyd and he turned to her. ‘Lloyd, I don’t understand, but first things first. What are you going to tell him? And what did you mean when you said the book didn’t exist?’

‘It may as well never have.’ He shrugged, a small smile on his face. ‘You see, Bullock hasn’t seen that book for over a week now. He’s probably forgotten that it ever existed.’

FIFTY-SEVEN

I
n retrospect, it all made perfect sense, and as Lloyd explained, Dulcie found herself plugging in the details. Everyone knew that Professor Bullock was slipping. Hadn’t the department made moves to push him toward retirement? But nobody knew the extent of his decline.

‘At first, I thought he was just tired or something. Then, I just felt bad for him. I don’t know if it’s Alzheimer’s or what,’ Lloyd was saying. ‘Some days, he’s still as sharp as a tack. But on his bad days . . .’ Lloyd shook his head. ‘The problem is partly that he knows, at some level, what’s going on. And he hates it – and hates anyone who knows it. So, on one hand, he’s taken me into his confidence. He trusts me to look out for him. But then sometimes he lashes out. In fact, when I first heard about Cameron, I was afraid . . .’ He looked at Dulcie for confirmation, but she shook her head.

‘No way. I was with him. Unless you think he could have planned it?’

‘He’s not capable.’ Lloyd grimaced. ‘I mean, I don’t think he could be organized enough anymore. The most he can do is get angry and react.’

‘The arrest?’

‘Yeah.’ Lloyd looked grim. ‘He was really unhappy with me that day.’

‘So, the pen and the letter opener probably weren’t stolen.’ Dulcie found herself piecing things together. ‘Probably nothing was, no matter what Polly said.’

Lloyd shrugged. ‘Polly.’ His voice was noncommittal, but it didn’t convey respect.

‘She doesn’t know?’ Dulcie found that hard to believe.

‘I don’t know what she knows.’ Lloyd paused and then looked at Dulcie. ‘Or what she wants to believe. She’s got some issues, and he’s like her god, you know?’

Dulcie nodded. ‘Yeah, I believe it. I wonder what she’ll do?’

‘He’ll need someone to look after him. I don’t think he has any family.’

With that word, something occurred to Dulcie. A wave of relief flooded over her, and she felt her troubles washed away. ‘What did you say?’

‘That Bullock has no family?’

‘No, but I do.’ As quickly as she could, Dulcie explained Lucy’s vision to Lloyd. ‘So here I’ve been terrified that
The Ravages of Umbria
is an elaborate forgery. But maybe that’s not what she was talking about. Except . . .’ The other shoe dropped. ‘Oh, hell.’ She sunk her face in her hands. The anthology. The phrase. It wasn’t all in Lucy’s head.

‘What?’ Lloyd bent down to look into her face. ‘Come on, it can’t be that bad.’

‘Yes, it can.’ She turned to face her friend. ‘And now neither of us has a competent senior faculty member to help us out.’

Sick at heart, Dulcie didn’t feel like talking about it. Besides, they had been sitting at the side of the road for more than a half-hour by then. They both had sections at ten, and so Dulcie took Lloyd’s hand and let him pull her to her feet.

‘We should tell the cops, you know.’ The concept was collegial now, not threatening.

‘Yeah, we should.’ Lloyd still didn’t look happy about the idea. ‘Especially now that I’ve heard from Browning.’

‘Are you worried?’ After all, Dulcie wasn’t the only one who had hitched her wagon to Bullock. Lloyd was not only further along on his doctorate, he also counted on the professor for employment. When news of Bullock’s increasing incapacity broke, he would end up looking bad, the scapegoat for the delayed cover-up. Plus, everything he had written or published under Bullock’s auspices would be suspect.

‘It’s not fair,’ said Dulcie, once Lloyd had pointed this out. ‘I mean, if anything, it should be the opposite way around. You should be getting more credit. You’ve been doing his work for ages.’

Lloyd smiled at her. ‘Thanks. In truth, he hasn’t done much. And he’s good on automatic pilot. I’ve just been doing my own research and trying to keep him out of trouble at book auctions. But what are you going to do?’

‘I don’t know.’ Dulcie shook her head. In some ways, she’d be like Raleigh, launched on a thesis and suddenly without an adviser. The thought of the pretty undergrad brought to mind the figure she had seen, flitting between the buildings. ‘Hey, Lloyd. Does Raleigh live around here?’

‘No. I mean, I don’t think so.’ He looked flustered. ‘Why do you ask?’

‘Nothing.’ It had been a full morning, and the two were now back in Central Square. ‘So, you want to go talk to the cops?’

Lloyd looked at his watch. ‘Not if I want to keep one of my jobs. I’ve got a tutorial in ten minutes.’ Dulcie raised her eyebrows. ‘But I will, Dulcie. I promise. This afternoon.’

Dulcie felt like she was sleepwalking for the rest of the day. For one section, she just let her students argue. (‘Well, that imagery doesn’t seem very metaphysical to me!’ It wasn’t worth clarifying.) Even her junior tutorial floated by.

‘Dulcie? Miss Schwartz?’ Lindsay, her most annoying student, actually looked worried.

‘Sorry,’ she’d smiled in response. ‘Thesis worries.’

‘In this economy, I’m not surprised,’ her student had sat back, pleased with having gotten a response. ‘My mother says that anybody who goes for an advanced degree in the humanities these days should be independently wealthy. Or certified.’ Her expression was smug, challenging, but Dulcie refused to rise to the bait.

By the middle of the afternoon, she realized that she just didn’t have the energy to go to the police. Yes, she had promised Suze and Chris as well, but so much had happened since last night. And now she was about to be cast adrift, a grad student without a thesis adviser. Without, possibly, a thesis. In response, she found herself heading over to Widener. She could completely understand Lloyd’s reluctance to say anything. As long as the problem wasn’t public, they could pretend it didn’t exist. Maybe they could wait until she just had something on paper.

With a start, she remembered that she was supposed to be meeting with Bullock the next day. And she was supposed to be able to report on her progress. Poor Professor Bullock! The thought came to her unbidden. No wonder he wanted her to show some tangible results. He was fighting for his position – for his sanity, really. Well, it wouldn’t hurt her to give it one more day – and maybe in the long run, having some paper filed in some office saying that she’d made significant progress on her thesis would do them both good, the student and the teacher.

Of course, that would all disappear if Lloyd had already talked to the cops. As she made her way across the Yard, she dialed his number. ‘Lloyd, I was thinking,’ she said to his voicemail. For all she knew, he was already in the Central Square police station, telling all. ‘If, well, if you haven’t spoken to the police yet, maybe we could wait? I’ve got a meeting with Bullock tomorrow.’ She paused. He would understand, wouldn’t he? ‘Well, maybe you’re already there. Let me know, will you?’ And with that, she snapped the phone shut and ascended the stairs to her last refuge, the wide grey library that held so many of her dreams.