Ada Madison - The Square Root of Murder

“Proteins,” Rachel said, coming back to life at the mention of her passion. “I’m purifying proteins. It’s just a matter of separating the different types of proteins that exist in a mixture, so-”

“Right.” I was at my limit of understanding Rachel’s biochemical specialty. In my mind, numbers were already pure, thus eliminating a lot of complicated chemical processes.

“Sorry,” Rachel said. “I can get carried away.”

“No, no. Someone has to do it.” I glanced at the hot, clear sky. “God knows, those proteins need purifying.” I got the smile I wanted and pushed ahead to ease Rachel’s mind. “Maybe Dr. Appleton was just in one of his moods,” I suggested.

“Or maybe I’m not cut out for graduate work, let alone making it through med school.”

“Of course you are.”

I held back the diatribe that was on the tip of my tongue. Keith Appleton was the only Henley faculty member who didn’t command my utmost respect. He seemed to thrive on making his students’ lives as difficult as possible, considering it a great achievement when the majority of his class failed his midterm. And he didn’t stop at students. His record of supporting faculty rights was dismal.

“Also, I did something stupid.”

“Which was?”

“I sent him an email right after he made those comments. I should have waited until I cooled down.”

Always a good idea. “What did you say in the email?”

“I kind of told him he shouldn’t even be teaching.”

Never a good idea. “In those words?”

“Maybe even worse. I can’t remember exactly. After I wrote it, I decided not to send it, but I hit send accidentally. I couldn’t believe it whooshed off and there was nothing I could do.”

“Let’s hope it doesn’t come across to him as harshly as you meant it.”

“Would you talk to him?” Rachel asked as we continued on to the parking lot. “You know, professor to professor. Pretend I didn’t tell you anything and try to find out what he really thinks of me and my work.” Rachel stopped again and put her hands to her ring-laden ears, a minimum of six silver baubles on each. “No, wait. I don’t want to hear it.”

I looped my arm in Rachel’s, glad to see that she’d kept a sense of humor about her situation. “I’ll give it a try, but we’re not exactly best friends.”

“If Dr. Appleton had any friends at all, you’d be it.”

“Ouch. I’m not sure I like that distinction.”

“He always says how you’re the only one who remembers his birthday.”

“That’s because it’s the same day as Lamarck’s, August 1.”

“How do you do that? Remember dates? Like for some eighteenth-century biologist?”

“For Lamarck and Dr. Appleton, I make the association that both of them developed theories that don’t work.”

“I like that. Dr. Appleton’s theory is that if you torture your students, they’ll learn better,” Rachel said.

“And Lamarck’s is that if you keep frowning, the lines on your forehead will deepen and your kids will inherit deep frown marks.”

Rachel gave me a broad smile that smoothed out her forehead. “I get it.”

“Much better,” I said.

When we arrived at my car, Rachel turned to me. “If you don’t feel comfortable talking to him, don’t worry. I’ll be okay.” She gave me a reassuring grin. “If I don’t make it to med school, well, doctors don’t make the money they used to, anyway.”

“And we all know that’s what matters most to you.”

I gave Rachel a playful nudge, and waved good-bye from the front seat of my smokestone metallic Fusion. Strange name for a color, but today the interior felt like I imagined a smoking stone would. I could barely turn the key in the ignition, very hot to my touch. I cranked the A/C to max.

I couldn’t let Rachel down, but I didn’t look forward to talking to Keith Appleton either. He was my age, midforties, yet he had a way of making me feel unimportant and inexperienced. There was no telling whether my interceding on Rachel’s behalf would help or hurt her chances of gaining his approval of her thesis.

My fondest hope was that somehow the situation would resolve itself before I had a chance to contact him.

Fifteen minutes late for my beading class, I tried to sneak in through the back door of A Hill of Beads, the shop owned by my best friend since high school, Ariana Volens. She and I had gone off to different colleges, on the west coast and in Boston, respectively, but reunited as soon as we moved back to town.

I breathed in the scent of Tibetan incense. Sweet jasmine this time, Ariana’s latest favorite for calming the mind. I tiptoed to a seat at the end of a long table where six other women had gathered, but I should have known Ariana wouldn’t let me get away with a quiet entrance.

She stopped mid-demonstration and swung her long, graceful arm in my direction. “And, finally, our eminent Dr. Sophie Knowles joins us,” Ariana said, a big smile on her face. She knew she’d pay later for this drama.

Ariana’s platinum blond hair was streaked with strands of red and blue, her eye-catching, patriotic design of choice for the summer. My hair, on the other hand, won compliments without my even trying. My short dark locks were graying in a design of their own choosing-a jagged stripe of white hair about an inch wide had grown out on one side of my head. I’d learned to simply say, “Thank you” when people complimented me on my artistry.

I’d been talked into beading by Ariana.

“You need a hobby,” she’d told me a month ago.

“I already have one.”

“Making up puzzles and brainteasers doesn’t count. It’s too much like math,” she’d said. “You might as well be talking square roots.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

Ariana had rolled her eyes.

I agreed to try a hobby, partly to keep Ariana quiet. It came down to beading or handwriting analysis, Ariana’s new passion, and the latter seemed a bit too woo-woo for me. I couldn’t see myself making judgments about someone’s personality based on how she drew a capital S. I, myself, wrote it differently every time, no matter what Ariana claimed.

Beading seemed innocuous and apolitical enough.

I had to admit, Ariana had a point in wanting me to expand my horizons by meeting Henley townsfolk who weren’t part of the college community. With a full load of classes, plus office hours, faculty meetings, and research, sometimes it was hard to get off campus until late in the evening. Bruce Granville, my dark-eyed boyfriend, kept even stranger hours. A former Air Force pilot, now flying a medevac helicopter, he worked seven days on, from nine to nine, and then had seven days off. We’d settled into a routine that excluded nearly everyone except my students, a few colleagues, and Ariana.

“Your world is too small,” Ariana often told me. On those occasions, invariably, she’d form a circle-a planet, I figured-with her arms. “You need to get out more. And even if you don’t fall in love with everyone in the beading class, you’ll end up with something useful,” she’d added, appealing to my multitasking, goal-oriented personality. She’d held up, in turn, a beaded basket, a bead-fringed bookmark, and a ballpoint pen covered with multicolored seed beads. I thought it was a stretch to call them all useful .

After a couple of classes I found I liked the craft and the crafters more than I’d expected. All the other stresses in my life disappeared when our conversation focused on the best gauge wire to use for each kind of bead. Or when I had to concentrate on picking up tiny beads with a needle and thread and keeping them from rolling off the other end. I was a novice at the hobby, however, and doubted I’d ever be as good at it as I was at making and solving puzzles.