Grey Zone (4 page)

‘Wait!' Abandoning her bag, Dulcie started forward, a little less sure. The man, all in shadow, waited. ‘Mister—' And then he, too, turned and took off into the night.

FOUR

‘
Y
ou
what
?'

Dulcie had been thrilled to find Suze at home when she arrived, a little short of breath having trotted most of the way. Her room-mate, however, seemed less than enthusiastic about Dulcie's exploits.

‘You went after an armed man?'

‘Suze, don't exaggerate.' Now that the slight scare had faded, Dulcie basked in a bit of pride. She
might
have gone after an armed man or broken up a fight. But her essential honesty won out. ‘I said they were squabbling, not that he was armed. Besides, I don't really know what was going on. At first, I thought they were just talking, or, you know, cuddling.'

Suze looked up over the pasta sauce she was stirring and made a face. She'd moved from volunteering at the law school clinic to helping out with a women's shelter this semester. It hadn't made her any more sympathetic to Dulcie's heroics. ‘You do know about the attacks, don't you?'

‘I've seen the fliers. But they're for little things. Crazy things.'

Suze shook her head. ‘This kind of violence can escalate, Dulcie. If you heard some of the stories I hear at Safe Place, you wouldn't take this so lightly.'

‘I'm not taking it lightly.' Dulcie poked about in the cabinet until she found a box of grissini. ‘I mean, I
didn't
go after the guy.'

‘I know.' Suze reached to take a breadstick from the box. ‘But you are more concerned with a crime from the year 1800.'

‘Seventeen ninety-four, really. And, Suze, that's my thesis.'

‘But this is your community, Dulcie.' Suze used the breadstick like a pointer. ‘You should go to the police tomorrow. Tell them what you saw.'

‘Uh huh.' Dulcie finished her breadstick. ‘But I didn't see the guy. I'm not even sure I saw an attack.' Rather than argue, she started to retreat. As she did, she felt her ankle encircled and the pinprick of teeth through her wool socks. ‘Esmé! No!'

‘She's been staring out the window all afternoon.' Suze checked the other pot, lifting the lid to a cloud of steam. ‘Probably desperate for someone to play with her.'

‘Guilty as charged.' Dulcie scooped the kitten up and held her, looking in her eyes. ‘Now, what would Mr Grey say about biting like that, kitty?'

‘He'd probably say that some animals are born hunters.' Suze reached for the box of spaghetti. ‘And the rest of us ought to watch out.'

Once again, the night was stormy. The wind, wicked, whipped through the trees and slashed its way through the dark mountain gulleys. Dulcie, waking in her upstairs bedroom, wondered for a moment at the ferocity of that wind – and of the steep mountain pass, funneling its force upward. A tempest was brewing: something so big that it threatened to shake her castle keep.

‘
There are forces at work.
' She sensed the voice, rather than heard it, and imagined herself looking out a window, down into the stony dark below. ‘
Forces that buffet us, that shape us through their pressure. Forces that we respond to – for better or for ill.
'

‘I'm dreaming,' she muttered to herself, before flipping over.

‘
Yes, little one. Yes, you are.
'

‘Mr Grey?' Suddenly the wild weather seemed less threatening, and she remembered those glowing eyes, emerging from the sparks. But when she reached out blindly, hoping to find the large longhair, all she felt were little paws, grabbing at her hand as if to play. ‘Oh, Esmé.' She pulled her hand away and faded back to sleep.

‘So there are forces at work?' Suze was gone by the time Dulcie awoke, and so she called Chris as she made her way into the Square. ‘Do you think that means anything?'

He sounded a little loopy, as he often did at this hour. While Dulcie knew the large travel mug of caffeine she carried would solve most of her mental problems, her nocturnal beau probably needed a good eight hours of sleep before he could do more than just parrot back her words.

‘Some kind of malevolent forces.' Dulcie took a sip. ‘Though, I don't know. Mr Grey said something about “shaping,” and that makes me think of teaching. You know, we shape young minds and all?'

‘Mr Grey?'

Damn, she hadn't realized she'd mentioned her dream's feline narrator. It wasn't that Chris didn't believe, exactly. It was more that he thought the enigmatic ghost was some manifestation of Dulcie's consciousness, of her desire for her lost pet. Sometimes, Dulcie thought he might be right. But when she heard his voice so clearly . . .

‘You heard his voice again?'

Had she said that aloud? ‘Yeah, Chris, I did.' They'd been together for long enough; there was no need to lie to him. If he was going to drop her for being loopy, well, he'd probably have done that already.

‘Dulce, you do know that you don't actually know what Mr Grey's voice would sound like.' His voice was soft; he would always be a gentle man – but he couldn't help being rational. ‘I mean, beyond “meow” or something.'

‘Forget it, Chris.' She did not need to have this conversation now. Not when she was late for a departmental meeting. Martin Thorpe, the acting chair, did not tolerate latecomers, and the quiet little man had a dozen ways of needling the tardy. ‘I was just wondering about the message. I mean, am I stirring up trouble?'

‘I thought you liked your students this semester?' She could hear him yawn and felt a twinge of guilt. He'd probably only just gotten home when she'd called him.

‘I do, but maybe breaking up that fight last night—'

‘What?' Her boyfriend was awake now. ‘You didn't tell me about a fight.'

Hadn't she? With a sigh, Dulcie gave him a quick recap. ‘So, I didn't really get involved. I just yelled, and they both took off.'

‘Dulcie, sweetie, you've got to learn to take care of yourself.'

‘But I didn't
do
anything.' Neither Chis nor Suze seemed to be hearing what, to her, was the major point. ‘If anything, I wonder if I should have.'

‘No.' Chris sounded quite decisive. ‘No, you shouldn't have. You should have run back to the library and alerted the guard. Or used one of those blue-light emergency phones. I think they've added more of them, you know, since the attacks.'

‘But it might just have been a lovers' spat.' She paused for a moment to think about their recent past. ‘And I wasn't sure what was going on, not till it was too late.'

‘Sweetie, that's the problem.' He was sounding sleepy again, and Dulcie wondered if he had taken her admission for an apology. ‘That's always the case.'

‘Suze thinks I ought to tell the university police.' She waited for him to say this wasn't necessary. When he didn't, she offered a prompt. ‘I don't even know what I'd tell them, though.'

‘You want me to go with you? I should be free by one or so.' That wasn't the answer she wanted. But he was fading, she could tell.

‘No, I've got to meet with one of my students. You working tonight?' The question was automatic. Still, for a moment she hoped.

‘Yeah, all week.' Dulcie didn't trust herself to say anything more. ‘I'm sorry, sweetie. I'll see if I can get away for an hour or two. Leave your phone on?'

‘Of course,' she said, working hard to keep the disappointment out of her voice. ‘Love you.' But he was already gone.

‘Nobody understands me but my cat,' Dulcie said to the uncaring emptiness as she rounded the corner to the departmental headquarters. After yesterday's meeting, it didn't look quite as welcoming. Maybe her colleagues were right, she mused as she walked up the street. Maybe the looming new psych building
had
ruined the little house's appeal. She checked her watch. If the meeting were on time, it would have started. And while that was doubtful, it did mean she didn't have time to touch base with Suze, either. Another gray squirrel, this one halfway up a denuded maple, paused as she spoke. ‘Even you are more thoughtful than my kitten. Or my friends,' she said, addressing the bright-eyed creature. It raced up the tree, and with a sigh, Dulcie mounted the steps.

‘Conference room,' Nancy stage-whispered, pointing toward the back.

‘Just a quick refill.' Dulcie popped the lid of her mug. As she did, she looked over at the bulletin board, where ads for sublets and calls for journal submissions usually held sway. To her surprise, a large flier took precedence today, tacked boldly over something about the undergrad poetry magazine. The flier, dated that morning, asked in bold letters: HAVE YOU SEEN THIS STUDENT? Underneath was a little information: the student being sought was named Carrie Mines. She'd lived off campus and so was affiliated with Dudley House. She was a sophomore. In her distracted state, Dulcie felt a memory tickling. The name was familiar. Had she had her in a section? Dulcie moved closer to examine the face. The photo had clearly come from an ID card, the kind everyone grimaced over and would never willingly share. To make matters worse, it had been blown up almost to the point of graininess, but the face was still distinctive. Striking, rather than pretty, with wild dark hair and wide-set light eyes, maybe gray, maybe blue. Underneath, bold type read: ‘Campus police are seeking any information.'

‘Dulcie?' The secretary was holding a full pot, ready to pour. But Dulcie wasn't looking at her. Something about the eyes in that photo – a little too open, a little wild – had finally sparked a connection. The picture – the grainy head-shot – was of the woman she had seen last night. The woman who had run from the arch.

FIVE

‘
M
s Schwartz?' Dulcie stumbled into the conference room, oblivious to the particularly pointed look Martin Thorpe was giving her over his glasses. ‘So nice of you to join us.'

‘Dulce.' A flash of silver caught her eye. Her buddy Trista was nodding her over to an empty seat, the ring in her nose as effective as a lighthouse in her current fog. Trista's specialty was nineteenth-century fiction, her thesis on ‘Characterization through Metaphor in the Late Victorian Novel,' but in appearance she was adamantly postmodern. As Dulcie slid into the seat, Trista leaned over to whisper: ‘Thorpe's gonna blow.'

Dulcie waited till the acting chair seemed diverted before responding. ‘What's up?' It came out louder than she'd meant, and instinctively they both glanced over. Thorpe was bent over a schedule, his fluff of white hair glowing in the fluorescent light. ‘Is it about that missing girl?' she continued, her voice softer.

Trista shook her head. ‘It's Dimitri. He's a no-show.' Her friend had misunderstood her, Dulcie realized as she glanced around. The handsome transfer, a new addition the previous fall, was not among those seated around the big table. ‘So, how'd the meeting with Chelowski go?'

‘And do you have the new forms, Ms Wright?' Thorpe's question caught Trista off guard. ‘The question was rhetorical,' he continued, as she started to stutter some kind of response, and tossed some sheets of paper on to the table in front of her. Only then did Dulcie realize that nearly everyone else had already taken their copies from the acting chair's three neat piles. ‘The problem will be real, however, if you don't learn the Coop's new procedures for taking book orders.'

Dulcie picked up her copies and pretended to peruse them as Thorpe droned on. She didn't really want to talk about her disastrous meeting with her adviser right now. Besides, she kind of liked the acting chair. His specialty, Renaissance English poetry, bored her to tears, but the man himself, little and nervous, had her sympathy. Maybe it was because of her own fashion sense – or lack thereof – but she identified with his rigid uniform of khakis and pullover sweater vests. Growing up on a commune – what her mother called an arts colony – she had found life back East mystifying in so many ways. These days, she had her own uniform: layering the bulky, but colorful sweaters her mother knit, usually out of commune-carded wool, over jeans or, when the occasion merited, a long gypsy-like skirt. Thorpe's argyle fixation was another issue – the socks matching the sweater vests matching his scarf – but, after years of fashion faux pas, she could relate. Or maybe, she realized as he wiped his pale hands together for the third or fourth time, it was that he looked a little like a mouse. A diamondback mouse. But surely these forms weren't as important as a missing girl. A student. There was something else about the girl, something Dulcie couldn't quite place. Maybe she had sat in on a class once.

‘Ms Schwartz?' The mouse was addressing her.

‘I'm sorry?' She sat up, aware of all the eyes on her.

‘Your new student?' That was it. She'd been in one of the sections Dulcie led – the discussion group for one of the big survey courses – but hadn't stayed. ‘Ms Schwartz?' Dulcie looked up and realized that Thorpe wasn't the only one waiting. ‘A Ms McCorkle?'

‘Yes, she's one of mine.' Across the table, Dulcie saw Lloyd, her office mate, wince. So that hadn't been the question. ‘I'm sorry, Mr Thorpe. My mind was wandering.' Dulcie had been at the university long enough to know something about politics, and an apology delivered with a big smile was as good as she could do.

To her surprise, Thorpe smiled back, briefly, and then colored and ducked his head. ‘That's fine, that's fine.' He cleared his throat and rubbed one pink, paw-like hand over his mouth. ‘What I was asking, Ms Schwartz, was how our various honor candidates are doing. I have your report on Ms Hall already.' Raleigh Hall, undergrad wunderkind and Lloyd's not-so-secret girlfriend, was wrapping up her senior thesis with aplomb – and with very little need for Dulcie's help. Even Thorpe probably realized that she was likely to head up the department one of these days.