the bullies. The miserable truth, however, is that I am, and I do.
“When did you arrange that?” Dancey snaps at him.
“Friday afternoon.” Cleveland folds his arms again and scoots down in his chair so that only the protuberance of his tailbone is stopping his descent.
“On whose authority?” Hornberger apparently feels he has to assert himself as chair. “If we all went round changing the teaching arrangements, this place would descend into chaos! We’re not a co-op, you know!”
This evokes subdued chuckles from some, and twisted grins from others. Cleveland is gazing at Hornberger with an odd, private little smile on his face, as if he was pleased that Hornberger had said something stupid.
“Communism, I thought, Nick. What’s mine is yours…and so forth.”
“This will have to be corrected,” Dancey decides, still white around the mouth. “How can Anna take over Bob’s class? She’s not a medievalist.”
“Matthew, who among our many medievalists were you going to suggest might take over Bob’s classes?” Cleveland sits up and leans forward on his elbows as if he were interested in the answer. He doesn’t get one, because the round table is now arguing among themselves in increasingly loud voices.
There is more to this than meets the eye—has to be, because the issue itself is so minor—but I take very great care not to seem overly curious. I keep my head down and draw a lacy border on my sheet of notepaper, and when Dolph Bergstrom murmurs, “Well, that’s all going very nicely, isn’t it?” I stupidly think at first that he is referring to my doodling.
“Oh, come on!” I groan when I realize what he means. “Could you please not be quite so blatantly hostile?”
I had been given conflicting advice on how to deal with Dolph. Irene advocated flattery, while Debbie felt I should give him some time to lick his wounds. Neither of them had recommended a cat fight.
“I would take on another comp section, sir,” pipes a female voice lower down the table from me, below the salt, where the graduate assistants and the exploited adjuncts have to sit.
“Danielle! Would you? That’s fantastic!” Hornberger leaps at her offer like a trout leaps at a mosquito. “Right, then, moving along to Family Weekend, and the black lining on that cloud, Homecoming. Any suggestions? Bright ideas?”
It is half past seven when we finally pile out of the stuffy room into the hallway, grateful for our escape. It is an eternal mystery why, if everybody hates them, faculty meetings are so endless. Ordinarily, I would dash back to my office, grab my stuff and head home, but these people are my new colleagues, and if there is any socializing to follow, I must not miss it.
“There.” Tim comes over to me and whispers next to my ear. “Your baptism of fire is over. Let’s see your burns.”
“Anna!” Rich Westley appears from the direction of the men’s room. “So great to see you back on campus! Sorry about earlier—that was meant to be a joke, about you being a new grad student. Not so funny, I know.” He takes off his eyeglasses and peers at me.
“Thank you, sir—”
“Rich.”
“Rich, it’s wonderful to be back.”
“Found your way to the Astrolabe yet? That’s our watering-hole. Across the parking lot, and so considered to be off campus. We always adjourn there to moisten our throats after meetings. I’ll take you, if you like.”
“Sorry, Rich—Anna wanted me to show her my first editions.” Tim tugs at my elbow. “We’ll come later.”
“Show her your—what?” Westley grins. “I’ve never heard it called that before!”
“Associating with you will soil my reputation,” I say darkly when Tim’s office door has closed behind us.
“Nonsense. I want to bitch to you about Dancey and Hornberger.”
Tim’s office is as functional as his suits and ties, very neat and tidy, no personal touch at all, except for a model of the Louvre glass pyramid on his desk and a steel-framed print of Jackson Pollock’s Convergence on the wall. There is a knock on the door, and he narrows his baby blues in a grimace of ultimate vexation.
“Come in!”
“Listen, Tim, can you make sure that—oh. Sorry.” Cleveland looks up from the sheaf of paper in his hand, sees me, and a deep crease appears between his eyebrows.
“I was just about to give Anna a few glosses on the meeting.” Tim waves him in, but Cleveland remains rooted to the threshold.
“Right, I’ll get back to you later. You should go and drink with the others.” This is Giles Cleveland doing some mentoring.