Another Margaret (The Randy Craig Mysteries Book 6) Read online

  The décor wasn’t the real draw when it came to HUB mall, though. The daily kaleidoscope of human activity was amazing. At ten minutes to the hour, every hour, a swarm of colour whirled through the corridors, down the sidewalks and across the covered walkways. HUB felt like the Piccadilly Circus of the U of A, if not the New World. You could probably run into everyone you knew—if you could bear to sit there long enough.

  There was something disheartening about seeing someone half your age wearing half your yearly budget on her back, though. I took to slinking back to my office with my coffee, at least until I’d had a chance to upgrade my cords and cottons to flannels and cashmeres.

  My office was a refuge and haven in all possible senses of the words. I was lucky to be assigned to an office, since I wouldn’t actually be teaching till the new year, but since I had a research assistanceship and some essay-marking work to tide me over, I was entitled to workspace. Not that it was a palace. It was furnished with two desks, two bookcases, two garbage cans, one filing cabinet, and a door that locked. At first sight, the second desk scared me; I’ve never been particularly good at sharing anything, let alone air space. After meeting Maureen, however, I realized that there wouldn’t be any problem. She spent all of two hours a week in the office, during which time she counselled bewildered students. The rest of the time she spent in the library or at home, beavering her way through a massive reading list for her candidacy exams. I never did quite figure out what she was studying, and her dissertation title—“Architectonics in The Wasteland”—didn’t provide many clues. To tell the truth, I didn’t spend many sleepless nights wondering about Maureen. She was pleasant enough when I saw her, but most of all I loved her for her absences. The office quickly became my fortress.

  I have always been a big fan of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Entropy, which most people equate with chaos, denotes to me the contrary. Anywhere you look, you’re bound to find at least part of what you’re looking for. Perhaps I’ve only adopted this philosophy as a defence for my sloppy habits. It could be a chicken-and-egg question. Whatever the case, my office soon took on outward manifestations of the organized turmoil that was my mind.

  For the turmoil of my mind, there was no solution, but there were plenty of reasons: three graduate seminars a week, a bibliography course which met one hour a week, and a “teaching university English” course that took up another hour a week, and a contract to mark papers and do minor research for two professors in the department. During the breaks, I was trying to fit in a little eating and sleeping. Selfish of me, I know, but then I’m like that. I stopped trying to count sheep. Instead, at the end of a long day, I’d try to recall the reasons why I’d thought university would be less stressful than the real world. I’d usually drop off to sleep after Reason One: Not having any money means not having to balance your chequebook. Welcome to grad student life, Randy Craig.

  On top of which, I was still trying desperately to track down and waylay Dr. Hilary Quinn.

  5.

  Almost the very first thing I’d done after arriving at the Department of English was to sit down and write a letter to Dr. Hilary Quinn, in which I explained my fascination with Margaret Ahlers, made flattering remarks about Dr. Quinn’s articles on the subject, and expressed a desire to meet with her—and, perhaps, to work under her. I had contemplated writing to her before applying to the program, but at the master’s level, that just seemed too presumptuous. After all, she couldn’t very well invite me to come work with her if the school hadn’t approved my application first.

  The whole rush to get enrolled had been a blur, with deadlines to meet, transcripts to be applied for and sent on, a chesterfield and table to sell, and move to be made—I had received the Department Blue Book, listing all the courses, professors, their specialties and who was teaching what, and Quinn was in there, and it didn’t seem as if her schedule was so punishing that she couldn’t take on a grad student.

  That now seems like such a thin amount of knowledge to base a cross-country move on, but back then I had friends who, on a whim, would drive to Vancouver for a cup of coffee. Being young and stupid has its benefits.

  Still, I remember it beginning to scare me when I didn’t hear from her right away. It took me three weeks to convince myself that my finely crafted epistle hadn’t been inadvertently buried under departmental newsletters. Dr. Quinn wasn’t taking the bait.

  I wrote another letter. This one was more humble; I was an MA candidate searching for a thesis advisor. Could I make an appointment to see her?

  Still no answer. I was beginning to wonder if I’d somehow managed to offend her without knowing who she was. Had I bumped into her shopping cart at the Safeway? Had I barged into line in front of her at the Student Union Bookstore? Was she the woman who had glared at me when I collapsed, exhausted, onto the last free bench space in HUB? If I’d had time to really put my mind to it, I probably could have worked myself into a serious complex.

  Luckily, I didn’t have time to worry about my own sense of self-worth. I’d just finished marking a set of first-year essays and was starting to organize my thoughts for a presentation in my Canadian Lit seminar. It was tough slogging. Everyone in the seminar seemed to be taking a different critical stance, and as far as I could tell, none of the tacks had anything to do with whether or not you “liked” the story. I was desperately trying to sort out New Criticism (which was considered passé) from narratology (which had little to do with “what” and an awful lot to do with “how”), how to separate deconstruction from structuralism (a stance I had previously thought peculiar to engineers and architects), and how to tell a Leavisite from a Marxist. Some of my fellow students watched my flounderings with contemptuous sympathy, but it didn’t honestly bother me all that much. When you come back to school as a mature student, you kind of get a kick out of being called “naïve.”

  I’d begun to get my sea legs around the department, so I felt comfortable enough to sit in a corner of the Graduate Lounge with a cup of coffee from the drip machine in the corner. Maureen was offering grammatical advice and Kleenex to the under-50% crowd from her class, so it was impossible to get any work done in the office, anyway. Snivelling might be good background music for Chekhov, but it did nothing for my appreciation of Susannah Moodie.

  I was immersed in Upper Canada conundrums when a voice broke through the soundscape: “You’re Randy, aren’t you?”

  I bit off my stock reply—“Maybe? What did you have in mind?”—and looked up, nodding, into the biggest pair of green eyes on the planet.

  Still nodding, I took in the rest of him. He had dark blond, curly hair arranged in a style someone’s mother would call a mop. His long, angular body was covered in a faded plaid shirt, a brown jersey that looked like it had seen better days in 1962, and a pair of blue jeans. His scuffed hiking boots gave the impression he wore them for the right reason. The only thing wrong with the picture was that a knapsack hung from the hand where his guitar case should have been. I twitched my head to clear it; this was the U of A, not the Mariposa Folk Festival. I’ve always had a thing for musicians, and even for reasonable facsimiles thereof.

  “I’m Guy Larmour,” the dream spoke. “May I sit down?”

  As I slid over on the couch to make room, I realized I was still nodding like a bobblehead. I stopped, feeling heat start to move outward from behind my ears. Guy didn’t seem to notice; he was too busy folding himself onto the couch. He stuck one leg up on the coffee table and grinned.

  I needed an original gambit.

  “I haven’t seen you around before,” I blurted and kicked myself internally. Even to me, that sounded pretty flat. I think that explains why I became a writer in the first place—I always seem to need the safety net of a second draft.

  “No, I just came in to get my mail,” Guy said without missing a beat. “I’m working at home this year.” Working from home in grad school is code for “I got a big wonking scholarship and don’t have to juggle teaching or marki
ng while I am adding to the body of human knowledge, sucker.” He then went on to tell me all about his scholarship, his study of wordplay and game theory, and his work schedule, as if he were the most fascinating topic anyone could hope to come across. The trouble was, given the options, he was beating C. Parr Trail’s chatty sister all to hell.

  “What about you?” The green eyes turned on me like headlights on a rabbit. The tips of my ears immediately began to get hot again.

  “Oh, the usual. Seminars, marking for profs, and struggling to find a supervisor.”

  “What’s your area?”

  It was as if Ali Baba had just hummed the first few bars of “Open Sesame.” Out poured everything: my interest in Ahlers, my attempts to get hold of Quinn, my frustrating inability to catch her in her office.

  “Well, she’s not around till Christmas, is she?” Guy inserted at the end of end of my diatribe.

  “What do you mean?”

  “She’s on some sort of half-leave, I think. Hold on a sec, I’ll check it out.”

  He unwound himself from the contortions of sitting in a human-sized chair and loped out the lounge door.

  He was back in a matter of minutes.

  “I’ve just asked in the office. Quinn is on a half-term, unpaid leave until January. They’re collecting her mail for her because she didn’t want it forwarded. Her teaching schedule next term is Tuesdays and Thursdays, with an evening class on Wednesday nights. Must make for nice long weekends, don’t you think?”

  I was amazed. I was about to ask how he’d found out all that information in so little time when I caught sight of those green eyes again and connected the dots: the office staff are all female.

  “Thank you for taking the time—” I managed to stammer, before I was silenced by the shaking of his head.

  “Oh, no you don’t. ‘Thanks’ does not cut it as a reward.”

  “What does?” I found myself smiling.

  “How about pizza? There’s a great place a couple of blocks away called Tony’s. Draft beer, thick crusts, gingham tablecloths, candles dripping over basketed bottles. What do you say to seven o’clock?”

  I felt more like a cork on a wave than an immoveable object, but there was no doubt at all about Guy being an irresistible force. I felt myself nodding again.

  “Great. I’ll see you then.”

  He was halfway out the door when I asked him, “By the way, how did you know my name?”

  He turned and flashed a grin. “Oh, I make a point of being well-informed.”

  I had no trouble believing him. Taking a gulp of ice-cold coffee, I managed to bring down the blush he’d left behind.

  Even thinking about that meeting now still makes me feel hot behind the ears. I wondered again if Guy was going to be coming to our reunion, and how I was going to be able to ask Denise without her making a big deal of it. If he wasn’t going to be there, I probably wouldn’t have to bother telling Steve about him at all. Of course, Steve Browning could likely suss out what I was thinking from just looking at me. I called it his cop sensibilities. He called it my inability to maintain a poker face.

  Not that Guy would be any threat to our relationship, of course. Not now. But back then was another matter. Guy had something about him, a charisma that made girls and women want to drop their books and plans and follow. He was a pirate right in the middle of the safety zone. It was as if good girls who had studied hard and toed the line and headed straight to the cloister of higher education were suddenly face to face with a rock star, and they turned into camp followers and groupies as he walked by.

  He was constantly trailed by several girls he had taught in introductory English classes. They would fawn and offer to buy him a cup of coffee or a beer. He had the grace to treat them with kindly distraction, flicking them off the way a stallion twitches horseflies with his tail. They drove me crazy, though, mostly because any time I was with him, I could feel their feral hatred aimed at me, as if I was somehow stealing something that didn’t belong to me.

  Yes, then Guy would have been a threat to any relationship, no doubt. I too had been quite smitten with Guy Larmour, to the point of being dithery and distracted. That first date was a case in point.

  You’d think I was dressing for my senior prom for the amount of time it took me to decide which sweater to pull over my cleanest jeans. I was still feeling uncertain as I pushed open the door that had “Tony’s” woodburnt in script across it. Guy was already there and waved to me from a table in the back corner of the nicely dim restaurant. As I approached the table, he smiled with a look of approval that made me thankful I’d chosen the rainbow pullover that looked like it was knit out of pipe cleaners. It had cost a whole fifteen-minute radio segment (first draft) at ACTRA rates, but it had clearly been worth every penny. I wear my clothes like armour, and in that sweater I always felt invincible.

  “Isn’t this place great?” Guy poured me a glass of beer from the pitcher on the table. “I found it the second week I was here, and it’s been my hole in the wall ever since.”

  Tony’s was a nice place. I abdicated to Guy’s decision about dinner once I’d made sure he hated anchovies, and I took in the place as he ordered for us. There were enough patrons scattered around the room to put some trust in the food, but nobody close enough to intrude on our dinner. Music was playing softly on a stereo; I couldn’t quite put a name to it—Telemann or Mozart, I thought. The waitress left the table, and I felt Guy’s attention turn back on me. There was something unnerving about the way he looked at a person, as if he was calculating checkmate six moves ahead.

  “So, why grad school?” he shot at me suddenly.

  “I thought I’d explained. I want to write a thesis on Margaret Ahlers, and this seemed like the best place.” I felt my voice fading as he shook his head slowly.

  “No, I don’t think that’s it,” he said. “There’s something about you that doesn’t jibe with the whole student set-up.”

  There was a moment where I wasn’t clear on whether I should feel flattered by his interest and focused insight into my character after the fifteen minutes he’d known me, or irritated. “What am I then, a spy?” I wasn’t sure whether it was his omniscient attitude that was nettling me, or the fact he’d seen right through my pose. I wasn’t all that sure I belonged in academe, but I didn’t think it shone like some neon mark of Cain.

  Guy seemed to think it was funny. “I can see it now—Comrade Randy reports that they use an obscure nine-point grading system at U of A! No, I didn’t mean that you’re here for some ulterior motive. It’s just that I sense you’re on some sort of mission, rather than just jumping through hoops to get a few extra letters to put at the end of your name on a business card. Missions aren’t all that common in the English Department, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  “I’m surprised you’re not in the Psychology department, putting your interpersonal skills to better use.” My words sounded archer than I’d meant, and I immediately regretted them as I saw Guy’s smiling face take on a mask-like quality.

  “Sorry,” he muttered. “I wasn’t meaning to pry.”

  “Of course you weren’t,” I said, treading water and trying to get back to the comfortable island of conversation we’d been on just moments before. “It’s not that I mind, either. Actually, it’s quite flattering to be the focus of attention. It’s just that no one likes to feel absolutely transparent to total strangers.”

  “I wouldn’t call us total strangers,” Guy interjected. “Total strangers do not share Tony’s Bacon, Cheddar Cheese and Green Pepper Specials.”

  “Forgive me, I was wrong,” I chuckled. “You belong in Law, not Psychology.” I gave him a mock salute with my beer glass. “I suppose that makes us kindred spirits of a sort. You’re an attorney in scholar’s clothing, and I’m some sort of Moonie in search of a degree.”

  “This isn’t fair,” Guy pouted. “Where I come from, I’m usually allowed to be the life of the party.” He gave me another quick, penetrati
ng glance. “I was serious before. You’re after more than an MA, aren’t you? You can tell me—I won’t let on to the rest of the flock.”

  “Would they even listen to the black sheep?”

  “Who’s the psychologist now? I guess you’re right, though. I’ve never been sure whether I chose the role or adapted to it once it was thrust upon me.” He reached across the table and gave my hand a quick squeeze. “I’m glad you turned up, Comrade. It’s been lonely here at the top.”

  The pizza arrived just in time to keep me from making a stupid remark. As I chewed through the mass of molten cheese, I was glad I hadn’t spoken up. It struck me that Guy had been speaking the truth about himself. I’d sneaked a peek at his dissertation proposal in the file in the mailroom earlier in the afternoon. On first read-through it had seemed very scholarly, with references to Huizinga and Nabokov and Barthes. There was something about the tone, however, that made me give it a second read. I couldn’t be certain, but I had a growing suspicion that Guy Larmour was making a game out of game theory. Anyone who could pull that off, in what struck me as a rather conservative department, had every right to preen a bit. Guy’s words broke into my thoughts, and I realized that I hadn’t been the only one doing some clandestine research that afternoon.

  “I picked up One for Sorrow at Audreys today,” he was saying, “but Two for Joy isn’t in paperback yet, so I checked it out of Rutherford Library. I assume you won’t be needing the library copy?”

  Startled, I assured him that I had my own copy.

  “Why so surprised?” Guy laughed.

  “I just didn’t think you’d be so interested in a relatively new Canadian author.”