Ada Madison - The Square Root of Murder

A moment later a female officer caught me as I fell into her arms and the other three ran into the store.

When the officer patted my back to assure me I was safe, tiny purple and green beads fell out of my shirt, onto the ground.

The romantic dinner for two turned into a midnight potluck with Bruce and me joined by Ariana and Virgil. We stretched the pasta and mushroom sauce with a large salad provided by Ariana and an extra large pizza ordered by Virgil.

“I really like pepperoni better than steak,” Virgil said, reminding me of my promise to cook him a better dinner some day.

“What a relief,” I said, swiping my hand across my brow.

We ate as though we’d been lost in the desert for a week, which, in a sense, was true.

As hard as we tried to avoid conversation about what had put Henley College on the front pages of Boston newspapers and YouTube, we strayed now and then.

We talked briefly of the tortuous route Gil Bartholomew had traveled on the weekend of the murder. She had to take measures to get what she needed for a lethal dose of a chemical that otherwise was stocked in small medicinal quantities. She had to murder Keith at a time when everyone else was busy partying. She worked hard to frame Rachel, then deepen the frame by adding to the crime scene. Who knew how long ago she’d retrieved yellow pages from the trash. She had to track down the files from Keith’s office, steal them, remove what she wanted, and take them back to Franklin Hall.

“Why did she return the boxes, again?” Ariana asked, confused by the timeline of people in and out of the deceased Keith Appleton’s office. “And what happened to Sophie’s usable discards?”

Virgil shrugged. “I’ll bet you’ll see those discards down at the Main Street Thrift Shop. As for the boxes of files, she probably just didn’t want to get caught with them. Otherwise she’d have to destroy all those files and boxes and that would take time, and also attract attention. A midnight drop at the school was an easy disposal method. One time, back in Boston, this bank robber took a briefcase-”

“Virge.” Bruce interrupted his friend in an attempt to get us off the crime tack.

“Never mind,” Virgil said, grabbing a few circles of pepperoni from the pizza, still in its box.

I couldn’t help apologizing over and over to Ariana about the mess I’d left in her shop. Between the undoing of the beaded curtain and the counter of bead trays Gil had knocked over, it would be many days before the inventory at A Hill of Beads was back in place.

Ariana waved away my mortification. “I’ve been wanting to reorganize anyway,” she said. “And I’m going to order this neat velvety, shimmery curtain that I’ve had my eye on for the back room.”

I felt a little better.

I checked my email before going to bed. I read one from Rachel with the subject, “Confession.”

“In police custody,” it read. “Kidding. But I’m happy to be assigned to community service all next semester.”

I smiled as I opened similar messages from Pam, Liz, and Casey, with the same general sentiment.

The community would be well served next semester.

By the end of the week, the heat wave had finally ended and cool breezes blew through the campus and the town of Henley. The weather was even better on Cape Cod when Bruce and I finally checked in to a cottage at a beach in Hyannis for a long weekend.

Bruce eventually stopped beating himself up for being miles away while I was being held hostage. Reminding him that he was exactly where I’d sent him that evening-looking for samples of Gil’s handwriting-and that he had sent the Henley PD to the shop, helped a little.

“A lot of good I was, camping out to protect you.”

“You could sign up for more shifts,” I said.

By Monday I was back in my office, filing some and tossing other material from the summer program. One thing I passed through the cross shredder was the difficult puzzle Gil had solved and returned to me. I wanted no reminders of the deadly weekend.

All my students had turned in their papers early. I guessed they were as eager as I was to put the summer session behind us.

Courtney called right before lunch. “I’ve been trying to reach you.”

“I took a few days off.”

“I know what it was.”

“You know what what was?”

“You know, the urgent matter you had to talk over with the dean the other night.”

I’d nearly forgotten and now I started. “You know?” Had the dean told Courtney about her son? That surprised me. Who else knew?

“Yeah, she came in the next day with the agenda for the faculty meeting. I’m not supposed to tell anyone. Big LOL here, ’cause I know you know you got your promotion. Full Professor. I’m so excited for you.”

In what corner of the world, academic or business, were administrative assistants not the first to know the latest news?

“Oh, that,” I said, containing my own excitement.

“So, of course that’s what your meeting was about the other night,” Courtney said, triumphant.

“Of course.”

“Awesome!” she said.

I had to agree.

Sophie Knowles doesn’t expect that everyone will be able to unwind with arithmetic, but she feels that doing puzzles and mental arithmetic keeps you sharp, and improves your memory and your powers of observation. Here are some samples of puzzles and games that exercise your wits.

Browse in your bookstore and library, and online for more brainteasers and have some fun!

1. Why is 6 afraid of 7?

ANSWER: Because 7 8 9.

2. Try solving this classic riddle.

As I was going to St. Ives

I met a man with seven wives

Each wife had seven sacks

Each sack had seven cats

Each cat had seven kits

Kits, cats, sacks, wives

How many were going to St. Ives?

ANSWER: Only 1, the narrator. There’s no indication that the others were going to St. Ives.

Another interpretation, that all were going to St. Ives, requires a considerable amount of arithmetic:

1 narrator

1 man

7 wives

49 sacks (7 x 7)

343 cats (49 x 7)

2401 kittens (343 x 7)

Total = 2802

Multiplying a 2-digit number by 11

There are several shortcuts for this case. Here’s a two-step device for multiplying a 2-digit number by 11 without using paper.

1. Take the number (we’ll use 52) and imagine a space between the two digits:

5_2

2. Now add the two numbers together and put the sum in the middle:

5_(5+2)_2 = 572.

That’s it!

If the numbers in the middle add up to a 2-digit number, just “carry 1 over”-that is, insert the second number in the middle, and add 1 to the number on the left. For example, for 99 x 11, the steps are:

9_(9+9)_9

9_(18)_9

(9+1)_8_9

10_8_9

1089 is the answer!

Another way to multiply by 11 is to multiply the number by 10, then add the original number:

52 x 10 = 520

520 + 52 = 572

For the second problem, 99 x 11:

99 x 10 = 990

990 + 99 = 1089

The correct answer, again!

The doublet, attributed to Lewis Carroll, involves transforming one word into another by changing only one letter, with each intervening change being a word.

Example: Transform HEAD into TAIL.

ANSWER: (the letter in bold is the letter changed on the way to the final word):

HEAD

HEA L

T EAL

TE L L

T A LL

TAIL

Try turning WHEAT into BREAD!