Carolyn G. Hart - A Little Class on Murder

EMERGENCY FACULTY MEETING

Annie reluctantly edged inside the room. As expected, she read surprise and disdain on the faces of several faculty members. She would notout of delicacyhave attended this meeting, except for Maxs importunings. And she devoutly wished Max were here right this minute to face these hostile glances.

Even Burke looked blank as she stepped inside. The air crackled with tension.

Burke closed the door, then walked to the lectern. His bristly eyebrows were drawn into a sharp V over his beaked nose, and his green eyes moved searchingly from face to face.

There was no buildup, no marshaling of facts, just the implacable demand.

Which one of you did it?

Silence.

Silence so absolute that the restless drumming of Crandalls fingers thudded like the muffled drum roll accompanying a riderless horse untilabruptlyhis hand stopped.

Burke clawed savagely at his cheek and left reddened streaks against his leathery skin.

By God, Im going to find out. Those green eyes smoldered with fury. Whoever you are, Im going to find you. One way or another.

Bantam Books by Carolyn G. Hart

Death on Demand Mysteries
DEATH ON DEMAND
DESIGN FOR MURDER
SOMETHING WICKED
HONEYMOON WITH MURDER
A LITTLE CLASS ON MURDER
DEADLY VALENTINE
THE CHRISTIE CAPER
SOUTHERN GHOST
MINT JULEP MURDER

Henrie O Mysteries
DEAD MANS ISLAND
SCANDAL IN FAIR HAVEN

To Professor Mack R. Palmer, my old friend and former colleague, who teaches the kind of journalism I believe in

Open stacks. A boon to scholars and to those surreptitiously in search of esoteric knowledge.

The reader in the shadowy, out-of-the-way carrel stifled a whoop of delight. Here it was in exquisite detail: how to put together a bomb, a nice little bomb timed to explode at precisely the right moment. In a manual on guerrilla warfare, courtesy United States Army. The coffee-spattered cover was a dull green. Such an innocuous-appearing pamphlet, but full of means to maim and destroy. Right here on the shelves of the Chastain College library.

Emily Everett was heavy. Thats how she put it to herself. Heavy. But she couldnt help it. She didnt eat that much more than other people. Why did everyone else have to be thin? Why should it make so much difference?

She tugged on her bra and her enormous breasts quivered. Damn thing choked her. Something always hurt. Her back. Her feet. She sighed and reluctantly hoisted a thick stack of yellow folders. She stared at them with loathing, then slowly shuffled across the office. She hated filing, almost as much as she hated typing. She hated working while going to school.

The main office door burst open and a slim redhead bounced up to the counter. Hi, Emily. Is God back yet?

Mr. Burke is out of the office this morning, Emily replied stiffly. Who did Georgia Finney think she was? But Emily knew the answer. Georgia Finney was Sports Queen, chief photographer for The Chastain College Crier, president of her sorority. And gorgeous, with a brilliant shine like maples in the fall.

Emily fastened malicious, resentful eyes on Georgias cheerful face, and said in an innocent tone, Oh, Georgia, I saw the notice that Professor Crandall and his wife are having the Student Press Association over next week. Wont that be fun?

And Emily felt a thrill of triumph, because the look in Georgias eyesfleeting but so revealingwas a compound of fear, misery, and despair.

The hardest part was coming home to the down-at-heels apartment house with its faded green stucco exterior and hummocky grass. Charlotte Porter walked stiffly, her thin shoulders rigid. Shards of glass from a broken beer bottle glistened in the late fall sunlight on the cracked sidewalk.

In her mind, she carried an image of a gracious house, an old and dignified house high on a bluff overlooking the river. Never a grand house, but so human and so filled with memories.

But here, it was easier not to think of Jimmy.

Spilled cola made the front steps sticky underfoot. Those loud Stemmons children. But what could be expected, no father, and a mother working two jobs. Not like Jimmy, who had been the center of her universe with every care she could give. The vestibule door was ajar. The Stemmons children again. Too young, too much in a hurry, too unruly to remember to close the door. Charlotte nudged it open wider with her elbow, her hands full with her purse and her briefcase.

Shifting the briefcase to one hip, she fumbled in her purse for her keys and poked the tiny one into the front of her mail slot. A massive wrought iron mailbox had weathered sixty years on the shady porch of Riverway.

The usual mail. Sudden tears blurred her eyes as she glimpsed the ornate writing on one square white envelope. The annual University Womens Thanksgiving tea. Shed not missed attending for more than a quarter of a century. A mistake that the invitation had come, obviously, because shed dropped out of her clubs, all of them. She no longer went to the luncheons, every second Wednesday of the month, every third Thursday, with their high fluttering chatter of women, so like the evening chorus of birds settling in the treetops, and their familiar programs on quilts or silver, lace or church history.

Shed told everyone, when shed moved to the apartment house, that it was financial reverses, that dreadful stock market drop.

No one knew how the money had gone, how desperate shed been.

She jammed the invitation, circulars, and bills into her purse, opened the second door, and started up the narrow wooden stairs, the treads covered with cracked linoleum.

What a tacky, hateful place.

But she could just barely manage the rent and continue to make restitution.

At least, no one knew about that.

She couldnt bear it if anyone knew about that.

Could life be sweeter?

Agatha, Annie announced to her cat as she stepped down from the ladder, marriage is marvelous. I recommend it.

The sleek black feline atop the coffee bar paused in the fastidious cleansing of a pink-padded paw to regard Annie with unimpressed amber eyes.

Annie wasnt surprised at the lack of response. Salmon souffl would garner Agathas respect, but not the irrelevant (to food) musings of her owner. And Agatha would assuredly take exception to that designation of possession. She had no sense of humor and a clear sense of her own preeminent position at Death on Demand.

The finest mystery bookstore this side of Atlanta, Annie announced, picking up her adored feline and stroking her silky black fur.

With the ease born of long practice, Agatha draped herself comfortably over Annies shoulder, yawned daintily, and focused her inscrutable gaze on the back wall.

Following Agathas glance, the bookstore owner observed with pleasure the new watercolors she had just finished hanging over the mantel on the west wall. She could always count on drawing the islands most omnivorous mystery readers (and upping sales for the day by at least thirty percent) on the first of every month. They hurried in for a glimpse of the mystery paintings. Competition was keen. The first person to correctly identify all five paintings by title and author received free coffee for a month and a free book. (New, of course. Some of her first edition collectors items were pricey indeed, such as Michael Inness