Shadows on the Ivy (6 page)

“Good morning, Maggie. Although how anyone can call a cloudy, cold day like this good I don’t know.” Claudia Hall had short, dark hair that varied in curliness depending on the weather. She had been the American Studies department secretary forever and was always ready to provide gossip, chocolates, and a depressing interpretation of life to anyone who came near. This year the department members to whom Claudia offered solicited or unsolicited advice included Maggie, Paul Turk, Linc James, who taught American ethnic studies, and Geoff Boyle, who specialized in American religion and intellectual history.

“Good morning, Claudia. Any messages so far?” Maggie took two chocolate Kisses from the red candy dish on Claudia’s desk. Other secretaries let telephone callers leave messages on voice mail. Claudia felt she could provide value-added by answering the calls herself.

“A pile of them. Isn’t it awful about Sarah Anderson?”

Clearly, the word was out.

“It’s very sad. I’m going to check on her later today.”

“Then you should return Dr. Stevens’s call first,” Claudia suggested, shuffling through Maggie’s pile of pink slips. “He said it was important. And Mrs. Whitcomb called you. The Whitcombs have to be really upset. I mean, Sarah collapsing at their house and everything! Mr. Whitcomb called Paul Turk this morning. And President Hagfield called and said you shouldn’t talk to any reporters. You should only answer direct questions from the police and not volunteer anything.” Claudia lowered her voice. “That was just before Evan Connors called from
The Star-Ledger.
President Hagfield must have known he was going to call. He must be awfully worried about Somerset College’s reputation. If the word about Sarah gets out—and it will!—then all our students could withdraw, and we could all be unemployed.” Claudia’s expression implied she had been waiting for just such an event. It was only a matter of time. “And Tiffany Douglass called. She wants to see you. She wouldn’t say about what. But I know her grades haven’t been so good recently.” Claudia looked as though now she had the world organized.

Maggie reached over the desk and took the pile of pink slips. “Thank you, Claudia.”

“If there’s anything I can do to help, Maggie, I’ll be right here. Unless that murderer who tried to kill Sarah Anderson strikes again. I always thought Somerset County was a safe place to live, but this just shows you can’t trust anyone. I’ve decided to stay close to the office today. I won’t even go out for lunch. You never know who might be out there. We all need to be vigilant.”

“I’m sure everything will be fine.” Maggie opened the door to her office, which Claudia must have unlocked earlier, and a cat streaked out. “Claudia, would you make sure Uncle Sam stays out of my office? He’s taken too much of a liking to my snake plant.” Dirt from the three-foot-high plant was all over the floor around it, and Maggie sniffed the air. Something else had been added to the large flowerpot in place of the dirt. That was why she didn’t have indoor plants at home to tempt Winslow.

“I’ll watch him, Maggie.”

Uncle Sam was striped, and the biology department would probably have dubbed him Tiger, but the white star on his fore-head symbolized something else to the American Studies professors. Sam had been the unofficial departmental cat since he’d appeared in the office two years ago. Claudia was the assigned cat manager, and she took him home on weekends and vacations. They all chipped in for the cat food that was stacked next to the Poland Spring water dispenser. Claudia was also in charge of the litter box behind the copy machine. No wonder she kept letting him into Maggie’s office to visit the snake plant.

Maggie’s office was small and cluttered. Bookcases to the ceiling overflowed with books stacked horizontally as well as vertically, filling every bit of space between the shelves. The top of the file cabinet in the corner was covered with papers. She stood the Currier & Ives prints she’d used this morning next to the cabinet. Then she unlocked her desk, took her student record books from the lower right-hand file drawer, noted the attendance at this morning’s class, including the man who’d left a request for an excused absence on her home computer last night, and locked the record books up again. She must clean out her office. Maybe during Thanksgiving break. In the meantime she looked at the pink message slips, took a deep breath, and picked up the telephone.

Voice mail answered. “Dr. Stevens? This is Maggie Summer, returning your call. I’ll be in my office for about half an hour.” Maggie checked her watch. She wanted to stop at the day-care center to see Aura. “If you miss that window, then maybe I’ll see you at the hospital later this morning when I visit Sarah.”

One down. Voice mail was a blessing and a curse. What had Dr. Stevens wanted? She hoped Sarah wasn’t any worse.

Max Hagfield’s call was clear enough. Don’t talk to reporters. As though that would stop reporters from finding someone on campus to talk with. She had other things to do in any case. No call back to
The Star-Ledger.
How had a major New Jersey daily heard so quickly anyway? And Tiffany wanted to see her. About her grades? About Sarah? Tiffany had never expressed any interest in discussing her grades before, despite Maggie’s concern.

“Morning, Maggie. You look lovely today.” Paul Turk was dressed in what might have been termed
corporate casual
attire in his corporate world. The clothes worked; at about forty (and rumored to have been divorced twice) he still looked like a
Gentlemen’s Quarterly
ad as he leaned against Maggie’s doorway in pressed Ralph Lauren jeans and a tweed sport jacket over a pale blue shirt unbuttoned just one button too low for corporate decorum. Paul had the office next to Maggie’s and often stopped in with questions or comments. Usually she was happy to chat; this morning she had other issues on her mind.

“Just wanted to know how that girl—Sarah—was. Lovely young woman. Such a shock when she collapsed last night.”

Maggie nodded.

“You went to the hospital with her, didn’t you? I thought of following you, but then I saw Dorothy Whitcomb leave, too.”

“Dorothy and I both went to the hospital. The doctors pumped out Sarah’s stomach, but she went into a coma. She wasn’t allowed any visitors.” Maggie thought of Sarah, and of Aura. “I’m going to see her daughter this morning, and then go over to the hospital.”

“Would you like company? I don’t have a class until after lunch. I’d be glad to go with you.”

Why this sudden interest in Sarah? Maybe he was just trying to be helpful. “Thanks, Paul, but that’s not necessary. You didn’t know her, did you?”

“I’ve heard about her, of course; I’ve heard about all the Whitcomb House residents, from Dorothy and Oliver. But, no; I hadn’t seen her before last night. I just thought you might like someone with you. Visiting the ICU isn’t fun.”

“No. But I’d rather do it myself.” Paul had worked with Oliver Whitcomb in New York, but last night was the first time he’d talked even a little about his relationship with the Whitcombs. Usually he only talked about his current job, and about the plays he still attended regularly in New York. He must be closer to Dorothy and Oliver than she’d realized if he’d heard about individual Whitcomb House residents. And yet—hadn’t Claudia said Oliver Whitcomb had called Paul this morning? That must have been how Paul knew Sarah was in intensive care.

“Are you sure? I really wouldn’t mind going with you.”

Maggie shook her head.

In the past month Paul had asked her to join him for dinner twice, but she’d been busy both times. She’d assumed he was lonely; he’d just moved to the suburbs. Could he be having other thoughts about her? Maggie looked at him again. Paul wasn’t a bad-looking man, for sure. And he was intelligent and certainly knew how to dress. If it weren’t for Will…but she had no commitment to Will. They were friends. Close friends, perhaps, but just friends. In any case, with Sarah in the hospital this wasn’t the time to think of anything other than Sarah’s condition and prognosis. And about what to do for Aura.

“I’d really rather go to see Aura and Sarah alone,” Maggie said. Her telephone rang. “You’ll excuse me?”

Paul waved and left the doorway.

“Professor, this is Kayla Martin. The police have been here at Whitcomb House all morning. They said Sarah’s been poisoned! They had a search warrant; they went through Sarah’s room and really messed it up, and then they went through the rest of the house. Most people were in class, so they haven’t spoken with the police. But I have. And—could I see you? I need to talk with someone.”

She should have warned the students, Maggie thought. Police arriving first thing in the morning must have been frightening. She was older, with no small children around, and she hadn’t been too thrilled when they’d showed up at her house. “I’m going to see Aura at Wee Care and then I’ll stop,” she said. “Will you be there in”—Maggie checked her watch—“about half an hour? Maybe a little longer. And is Tiffany there?”

“Tiffany left. I assume she’s on campus. She took her books and that fancy leather briefcase she always carries. But I’ll be here.”

“I’ll come as soon as I can, Kayla.”

Maggie stopped at Claudia’s desk on her way out. “If Tiffany Douglass calls again, see if she can stop by my office about four this afternoon. I checked for her at Whitcomb House but she’d already left for the day.”

Claudia nodded. “Those poor kids. You just never know what will happen next, do you?” She carefully folded the wrappers from the two chocolate Kisses she had just put in her mouth and dropped them squarely in her wastebasket. “A person could die just from the fright of it all.”

The Somerset College Wee Care Center, a day-care center for the children of students and members of the college staff, was a small, bright green building near the gym. Its grassy playground, now browned by November cold, was surrounded by a high fence, giving it the appearance of a secure army base, with swings and slides added for attempted camouflage. Inside the rooms were warm and bright, the walls painted in primary colors and covered by children’s crayoned drawings.

Maggie gave her name at the reception desk just inside the front door. Her college identification card got her inside, but she knew it wouldn’t be enough to let her take Aura home. Each parent had on file a limited list of people who could, after showing their identification and signing, take their children out of the building. The parents at Whitcomb House had made arrangements so that any of them could drop off or pick up any of their children. Other than that, pickups were limited to biological parents and perhaps one trusted neighbor or older sibling. Too many national newspaper reports of kidnapped or missing children had resulted in security here being far tighter than anywhere else on campus. Too bad security hadn’t been as heavy as this at the Whitcombs’ house last night.

“Professor Summer? Welcome. Aura is in the Bunny Room, on the left, but most of the children there are taking naps now. Let me check with one of the aides.”

Maggie nodded, looking at the rows of brightly painted lockers that lined the hallway, their owners’ names pasted in large block letters on colored poster board. Aura’s locker was red, with her name in yellow. A small, pink fleece jacket hung inside it.

The receptionist was back in a few minutes, holding Aura by the hand. Kayla and Tiffany had done their job well. Aura was dressed neatly in denim overalls with a long-sleeved, orange T-shirt. Her curly hair was mussed, as though she’d been rolling on it.

“Look who wasn’t sleeping after all! Aura, do you remember Professor Summer?”

Aura nodded. “Hi.”

“Hi, Aura.” Maggie knelt down so that she and Aura were on the same level. Aura smelled of baby shampoo and breakfast cereal. Maggie resisted the impulse to smooth her unruly curls. Aura was a beautiful child. And one with a bigger problem than any four-year-old could imagine.

“Did you come to take me to Mommy? Kayla said Mommy was sick.”

“Yes. She is sick, Aura. But the doctors are taking care of her. I can’t take you to see her right now. I promise to tell her that I saw you and that you have a beautiful smile.”

Aura smiled a little back. “When can I see Mommy? When can Mommy come home?”

“Soon, I hope, Aura. Very soon. But Kayla and Tiffany and the other people at your house will be with you after school.”

A tear straggled down Aura’s face. “I don’t want them. I want Mommy.”

Maggie reached out, and Aura stepped into her arms. “I know, Aura. I know. And Mommy wants to come home to you, too. But she has to get better first. It’s going to take time.”

The girl’s arms around her neck felt warm and trusting. Maggie wanted to hold her forever, to keep anything else from hurting her.

Aura stepped back. “Mommy misses me, I think. She always misses me when she’s away, even when the away is just a little.”

“I’m sure she does. But you have to be big and brave for her and know she loves you, even if she isn’t here to tell you herself.” Maggie felt her eyes filling. It wouldn’t help for Aura to see her crying. She stood up.

“That’s what Kayla said. That I should be brave.”

“Kayla was right. Now, you go and take your nap with the other boys and girls, and I’ll do everything I can to bring your mommy home.” If only she could. How could anyone have done something to separate this little girl and her mother who had only each other? Maggie’s anger almost took over her voice. “I promise.”

“I’m going to lie down, then. Mommy’s lying down, too, isn’t she? Because she’s sick.”

“Yes. She’s resting so she’ll get better.” I hope, Maggie added to herself. How could you let a child know her mother might not come home? But it was still way too early to think about that. Sarah might be fine. Please, please be fine, Sarah.

The aide took Aura’s hand. “After your nap maybe you’d like to draw a picture for your mommy, Aura. A picture of how happy you’ll be when she’s home again.”

“Yes!” The smile was back.

“Good-bye, Aura.” Maggie stood and watched as the heavy door closed on the classroom. There was nothing she could do medically to help Sarah recover. But she could try to find out why someone had been targeting her. Maggie had a sudden chill. Whatever reason that person had, she hoped it didn’t extend to Aura.

Kayla and Sarah had been friends; maybe she knew something that would help.

In the meantime, Aura was as safe here at the Wee Care Center as she would be anywhere.

Kayla opened the door at Whitcomb House. She was twenty-two, but looked older. Her black family hadn’t approved of her marriage to a white man, but her daughter, Katie, was a stunning and exuberant combination of brown skin and wavy black hair. Now Kayla’s husband was her ex-husband, an army corporal stationed in North Carolina. He paid child support occasionally, Maggie knew, and sent postcards to Katie. Kayla was one of the few single parents in the house in touch with their child’s other parent, although she made it no secret that she was actively looking for a new father for Katie, and a new husband for herself. She was wearing jeans and a form-fitting top today, but her clothing style was not as provocative as Tiffany’s.

Kayla’s cup of coffee was on the kitchen table. “Would you like some coffee, Professor Summer? Or I can heat water if you’d like tea. Or cocoa? The kids love it, so we have boxes full. Mrs. Whitcomb is always bringing us more.”

The practical Formica-topped table was large, piled with books and papers and several boxes of cereal that must have been out for breakfast. Most of the cabinet doors were open; two drawers of silverware and kitchen tools were dumped on the counter. A pile of dirty dishes filled the sink. “Cocoa sounds great,” Maggie agreed.

Kayla turned on the kettle while she pulled a box of instant cocoa packets from a cabinet.

Maggie noted that the dozen hand-colored 1840s steel engravings of apples, pears, and plums that Dorothy had carefully selected from Maggie’s collection and framed for Whitcomb House’s kitchen were now almost totally covered by crayoned children’s drawings taped on the glass. Crayoned drawings also covered the refrigerator and most of the kitchen cabinets. With six small people proud of their work, there was never enough space to display it all.

Would her kitchen someday sacrifice her favorite Cassell roosters to drawings of purple houses and people without legs? Maggie smiled to herself. She could live with that.

“I stopped at Wee Care on the way here. Aura looked fine, but she’s upset that her mother’s not home.”

“Of course she is. And so are we.” Kayla sat down to wait for the kettle to come to a boil. “We talked late last night, after you left.” She hesitated. “People were pretty nervous. Someone had to have given her something that made her sick. But we couldn’t think of a reason why she’d be a target.” Kayla paused. “Now we know for sure that she was poisoned. But it all seems unreal.”

“Could someone she knew before she came here want to hurt her?”

“No one anyone of us knew about. And even if there were someone like that, how could it have happened? She was here all day yesterday until we went to the Whitcombs’ together. No one at the party had any reason to be angry at her.”

Kayla was right; who would have had both motive and opportunity to poison Sarah? And based on what Dr. Stevens had said, the poison had worked quickly. So the source must have been here, at the house, or at the Whitcombs’.

“The police went all through the house…” Maggie suddenly connected that the open cabinets and piled-up food might not have been left that way on a typical Monday morning. “They dumped Sarah’s room, and the study area and bathroom she shares with Tiffany. They took Sarah’s address book, her calendar, and some papers from her desk. I overheard one of them say so. They told me to stay in the living room while they searched. I felt so stupid, not to be able to help. Or to stop them from touching everything.”

Kayla wiped her eyes and turned to pour the now steaming water from the kettle into the cocoa powder in Maggie’s cup. “Sarah likes her things to be neat. I picked up some of her clothes and remade her bed, but her room is still a mess. I would have cleaned more”—she waved her arm to indicate the mess in the kitchen—“but then I saw this morning’s paper, and I couldn’t concentrate on cleaning. I had to talk with you.” A rumpled copy of
The Star-Ledger
was on the table.

Maggie picked it up. The article’s headline was “Unwed Mother Poisoned at Somerset College Affair.” Maggie winced. How had the newspaper gotten the information about the poisoning so quickly? There had to be a direct line from the police station to the news bureau. No wonder President Hagfield had told her not to talk to reporters.

She was sure Max was wincing at the “unwed mother” line, too. “Single parent” he could cope with, but…

“It makes all of us seem awful,” said Kayla. “Immoral. Some of us weren’t ‘unwed’ when we had our babies! And the police said they were going to check the backgrounds of everyone Sarah knew. Will they do that? Do they have the right?”

“Until they find the person who hurt her.” Kayla was the second person today who had implied she didn’t want to be investigated. Maggie understood the desire for privacy, but couldn’t think of anything in her own life that would be unearthed by any inquiry. I must have a boring life, she thought to herself. Nothing to hide. Dorothy, though, and now Kayla…

“I don’t have anything horrible in my past except a bad marriage,” Kayla continued. “And my family’s being embarrassed to know me. Nothing the police could dig up that would look like a motive to hurt Sarah. But that’s not true for everyone.”

“The other people in Whitcomb House?”

“We’ve all had some problems. I know some things, but I think you’d better ask the others yourself. Or the police will. But Sarah…”

“Yes? You and Sarah are close, aren’t you?”

“Sarah isn’t really close to anyone. Of course, she knew Tiffany before she came here. But she doesn’t talk that much even to Tiff. She doesn’t share a lot.”

“She knew Tiffany before she came to Somerset College?”

“They shared an apartment last summer for a couple of months. Tips weren’t good at the diner where Sarah worked, so she advertised for a roommate. She knew she’d be coming here in late August. I think Tiffany found out about Whitcomb House from her. Neither of them talk about it much. I got to know Sarah more because Aura and Katie became such pals.” Kayla smiled. “They’re so alike—so full of energy and fantasies—yet so different.”

“Like two wonderful four-year-olds should be,” agreed Maggie. “You and Sarah are good mothers to them.”

“Katie has a father, too. Even if he isn’t here a lot.”

Maggie remembered Dr. Stevens’s question. “What about Aura’s father, Kayla? Did Sarah ever say anything about him?”

Kayla hesitated. “Not by name. I got the impression he was older. Maybe married. Remember that lawyer you brought in to talk to us about parental rights and obligations?”

The lawyer had emphasized that
both
parents had moral and legal responsibility for their children. That even if the father or mother of your child had taken off, they should accept some of the financial burden. One parent should not have to shoulder that alone.

“Some of us were talking after that. Maria said Tony’s father, Eric, might settle down and come back to them. You know she’s always believed that?”

Maggie shook her head. She hadn’t ever heard Maria mention Tony’s father. “Tiffany said she was definitely going to sue Tyler’s father for child support. But that it would be better to find a new father for him. Or a more consistent source of money.”

“What did Sarah say?”

“That she didn’t want Aura to ever know who her father was. That he was pond scum, and he could stay in the pond.”

“So she knows who he is.”

“It sounded that way. Definitely. Knows who he is and wants Aura as far away from him as possible. But that’s why I called you this morning. I remembered something else.”

“What?”

“About a month later I was in Sarah’s room, getting Katie so I could give her a bath. Aura and Katie had been playing together. They were coloring all over papers they’d found in Sarah’s wastebasket.” Kayla hesitated. “This may mean nothing, Professor Summer. But I picked up the papers and put them back in the wastebasket before I took Katie to our room. One of them was a fancy envelope addressed to Sarah here at the college. The return address sounded like one of those ritzy law firms—lots of names one after the other. The return address was somewhere in Princeton. I noticed it because most of the other mail was the usual college notices and ads.”