Ada Madison - The Square Root of Murder

Only Keith’s bookcases and the walls of his office looked as they did the last time I was here. Two walls were peppered with degrees, certificates, and photographs of Keith with distinguished scientists. Here and there were framed articles of his that had appeared in technical journals. I couldn’t imagine doing that with my own articles, but that was Keith.

“If we don’t promote ourselves, no one will,” he’d said often.

Whatever works, I’d thought.

His newest award, the designation as Fellow for his distinguished participation in the Massachusetts Association of Chemists, hung front and center on the Keith A. Wall, or, alternately, the Apep Wall, as I’d heard the students call it. There wasn’t a single family picture. There never had been.

I stood still, continuing my efforts to absorb the reality of Keith’s death. I was ashamed that I’d come here partly out of curiosity, like rubberneckers unable to avert their eyes from an accident on the highway. I wasn’t proud of the other reason either, that I thought I was smarter than the police-hadn’t I already proven otherwise, in several orders of magnitude?-and that I’d be able to see at a glance something they’d missed. Something that would exonerate Rachel, if not point directly to Keith’s real killer.

Now that I was here, however, it behooved me to at least make myself useful. I looked around. Keith’s bookcases were intact, as was an open magazine rack in which he always kept the latest technical journals. A black mesh organizer that held rubber bands and paper clips neatly separated had been left in its place at the corner of the desk.

A short side desk, where Keith had kept his laptop, stood empty.

I’d assumed the police would have confiscated Keith’s computer. The last time I’d seen him in his office, a few days ago, he’d been updating his organic chemistry grade sheet and complaining about the poor quality of students in his class. No one above a C, he’d said. I’d thought of recommending a peer review of his teaching style. Now I was glad I hadn’t.

I wished I could have had a look at his computer files. As I tugged at his desk drawers, I saw that the police hadn’t completely emptied them, though they’d definitely been rummaging and probably had taken a significant bundle away. I pulled open the shallow middle drawer. Pens and pencils were arranged next to each other on a long built-in tray. The rest of the space held a familiar folder with Henley College letterhead and its blue-and-gold Henley seal, issued to every faculty member. Nothing else crowded the drawer.

My own middle drawer, on the other hand, had the same items, but tangled together and mixed with eraser shavings and cough drop wrappers.

I moved on to the top right drawer, which held full-size file folders. Here, also, were signs both of Keith’s neatness and the slight disruption of order by the police. I imagined their going through every folder, taking only what seemed relevant, and wondered how they’d made their decisions so quickly.

I noted the labels on the manila folders and recognized committee names and issues actively being debated at faculty meetings. Keith was into every facet of life at Henley, from academic standards to fundraising to administrative policies and procedures. I was convinced that something in this office held the key to his murder, but I wouldn’t have been able to explain why I thought the police might have passed over that all-important clue.

I wished I could settle myself in his leather chair, which belonged to him personally, and read through everything.

A rattling sound out in the hallway brought my rummaging to a halt and reminded me that getting comfortable here was not a good idea. Something or someone was bumping along the tile floor.

I took some calming breaths. No bad guy bent on malicious mischief would make that much noise. In fact, the sound was familiar, and one that Rachel had described, the sound of a large barrel on wheels, being driven by a janitor.

In a few seconds, Woody Conroy appeared in the doorway wearing his denim overalls and looking, as usual, well past retirement age. He’d been about to call it a career last year, but his wife of forty years died suddenly and he couldn’t bear to be home alone all day. We were glad to keep him occupied.

“Afternoon, Dr. Knowles. Surprised to see you here today.”

“Hi, Woody.”

While I fumbled for something other than “I happened to be in the neighborhood,” Woody went on with his own agenda.

“Isn’t it awful what happened here?”

“It certainly is.”

Woody shook his bald head and rocked on the heels of his thick work shoes. “Never in my life, and I’m an old man, did I see anything like that.”

As I understood the crime, it was about as bloodless as you could get. But the impact of the scene, gory or not, would have been tremendous for whoever was unlucky enough to be the first to come upon it.

I wondered how soon I could interview this first-on-the-scene person without being thought too insensitive. I waded in.

“You must have been very upset, Woody. I’m sorry for Dr. Appleton and I’m sorry you had to see him that way.”

“I hear things, you know, and I know a lot of people thought Dr. Appleton was mean or stuck up or just ornery. But he was always nice to me, always said thank you when he saw me taking out his trash.”

What a surprise. “I’m glad to hear that.”

Woody opened his denim shirt a bit and showed me a familiar Henley College logo T-shirt in blue and gold, the school colors. “He give me this for my birthday.”

What? I who prided myself on knowing birthdays did not know our janitor’s, and Keith Appleton not only knew it but gave him a present? I could hardly stand it.

“How nice of him,” I said. “When is your birthday, Woody?”

“May twentieth.”

“Like Cher,” I said.

“What’s that, Dr. Knowles?”

“Never mind.”

Woody took my comment as liberty for him to go on about the great Keith Appleton. “Well, there was also that time I was off a couple of weeks with pneumonia, he give me a little something to help out. Not that I asked, but he slips me a check one day and says how I probably could use a bit to tide me over while I got back on my feet.”

Stunned, would have been putting it mildly. Keith the Good Samaritan? Keith the champion of the worker?

“He was kind-hearted,” I said, astonishing myself.

“No matter what anyone thinks, he was a man, you know, and no man deserves that.” Woody pointed over my shoulder into Keith’s office, where that had happened.

“You’re absolutely right, Woody,” I said, and meant it.

When Woody left, surprisingly not asking what I was doing in the deceased’s office, I shook myself into focus. Information, clues, I told myself. You’re here to work.

I went back to the desk and opened the second of the file drawers. This one had folders with names of students I recognized as Keith’s chemistry majors. I flipped through and saw term paper after term paper. Again, I was overwhelmed with the desire to hide in a corner of the office and read every scrap of what the drawers contained. Now that I knew Woody was around, I felt more comfortable, as if an old man past retirement was all the protection I’d need against a murderer. I was glad neither Woody nor I would be here after sunset.

More noise in the hallway. Woody was back in the doorway, this time with a dolly piled high with empty cardboard boxes.

“This should be enough to start with, Dr. Knowles. Dean Underwood didn’t tell me who she was sending over to clean out Dr. Appleton’s office but I guess you’re it.”

No wonder Woody hadn’t questioned my appearance at the crime scene. “Uh-” I stammered.