of the table is very quiet as the head breaks into subdued but anxious tumult.
My eyes are fixed on Cleveland’s cheekbones. If he clenches his jaws any harder, they will crack.
“Well, if no one else can see their way toward taking one for the team, I would offer my services once again.” Dancey leans back in his chair, trying and failing to suppress a smirk. I realize with a lurch that if Dancey becomes chair, he would make maximum use of all student complaints against me. Dancey as chair is my personal worst-case-scenario.
Go on, Cleveland—volunteer!
So far he has said nothing at all.
Ortega turns to him. “Giles. Could we prevail on you?”
“I’m afraid not, no.”
She raises her eyebrows at his calm but categorical reply. “Some people might feel that you owe the college one or two favors, Giles. Would you care to explain why you won’t even consider offering your services in your department’s hour of need?”
“No, I’m sorry, Holly, but I don’t want to explain. I have my reasons, and they weigh heavily. Perhaps we can leave it at that.”
Something is wrong. I knew it! He is now as immobile as he was fidgety before. Very still, he sits there, one hand clasping the wrist of the other as if he had to steady himself. I can tell that he is desperately trying not to offend Ortega. But I can also tell he will not budge.
“Giles, you were going to go up for full now, weren’t you? Maybe the college will scratch your back a little over that, if you scratch theirs.” Elizabeth Mayfield has largely kept out of the debate, and her voice is as placid as always, but she clearly agrees with Ortega that Cleveland ought to feel obliged to take over from Hornberger. Perhaps to protect the department from Dancey’s rule?
Cleveland says nothing. But because I am sitting next to him, and because I am looking toward the head of the table as if I were interested in them rather than him, I can see a dark patch appearing under his left armpit.
“This does look like a rather blatant case of cherry-picking, Giles.”
I don’t know how Cleveland is able to withstand the combined glares of Elizabeth Mayfield and Holly Ortega, but he remains silent. Shrugs his shoulders.
“You have to count me out. I’m sorry, Elizabeth.”
Never in my life have I more keenly craved inclusion among a group of knowledgeable insiders than after Ortega and Dancey send us on our way with the strict reminder not to encourage rumor, and we disperse toward our various floors and offices. As if accidentally, I trail Tim, Eugenia, and Erin, and halfway through the great hall Yvonne and Joe Banks catch up with me.
“Anna, I’m taking bets on how long before the full story appears in the papers,” Joe says. “I give it twenty-four hours.”
We laugh, and Erin turns round.
“Nervous tension releasing itself in laughter?” she guesses.
“I need to release my tension into a beer or three,” says Tim. “You coming?”
The following two hours in the Astrolabe are far and away the most informative I have yet spent at Ardrossan, even if afterward I feel I need to take a shower to rinse all the sleaze out of my hair and off my skin.
“In a way it doesn’t matter what happened and whether it was a rape,” Tim says. “If there’s a stink and the media smell it, the damage is done. It’s very clever of Hornberger’s bit of stuff to go to the police as well as to the campus authorities.”
“Clever?” Erin lashes out at him. “Honestly, Tim, could you possibly be more biased in this matter? We’re talking about a rape allegation!”
“Or a rape allegation,” he points out.
I throw myself between them. “It is certain, though, is it? That it’s Natalie Greco?”
Apparently so, and Joe and Erin not only confirm that she is by no means Hornberger’s first fling with a student, but that his reputation preceded him when he came to Ardrossan twelve years ago.
“Nick may not be able to keep his hands to himself, but I cannot believe he’s capable of violence.” Joe lifts his glass to his mouth, sighs, and sets it down again without having drunk. “What do you think?”
It is no fun, gossiping about rape.
“I cannot believe even Nick is stupid enough to use violence,” Tim says.
“In other words, you believe Natalie is stupid enough to ruin her own reputation by pulling this preposterous allegation out of thin air?” Erin is a forthright woman,