Aaron Elkins: Fellowship Of Fear

Once, after hearing several speakers use the term, Gideon leaned over to ask Bozzini what a "you-socker" was, thinking it was a military word.

Bozzini laughed. " You are, man. A USOC’r." He waited for Gideon’s answering laughter, which did not come.

"Don’t you get it? United States Overseas College; U-"

"I get it," Gideon said.

About an hour into the speeches, Gideon, in a happy, nearly mindless daze, was puzzled to find his tablemates making peculiar faces at him, wiggling eyebrows and jerking heads. At the same time he became aware that the room was quiet.

Finally, Bruce Danzig spoke in a stage whisper, mouthing each syllable extravagantly. "Gide- on, stand up!" Frowning, Gideon stood.

"Ah," said the platform speaker with heavy joviality, "we wondered if you were still with us, Professor." Dr. Rufus, the college’s chancellor, had an avuncular smile on his pleasant, smooth face.

"Sorry, sir," said Gideon with a sheepish smile. "I was deeply engrossed in mental preparation of my lecture notes."

Laughter and applause came from the other tables, as well as shouts of "Give him some more wine!" Gideon was pleased to see Janet smile.

The chancellor went on. "Dr. Gideon Oliver, whom I am happy to have you all meet, does well to so occupy himself. He has a lot of lectures to give. Professor Oliver, as I mentioned a moment ago-some time ago, actually- is this semester’s visiting fellow. He comes to us on a leave of absence from Northern California State University"- scattered applause and a look of surprise from Eric Bozzini-"where he is an associate professor of anthropology. As those of you who are old-timers know, the visiting fellow is expected to cover quite a bit of ground in two months, both academically and geographically, ha, ha."

There was a polite spatter of laughter from the tipsy scholars, and Gideon smiled dutifully.

"Professor Oliver," boomed Dr. Rufus, "will be presenting the Visiting Fellow Seminars in Human Evolution at, um…" He consulted his notes. "Let me see; Sicily first, then back here to Heidelberg, then Madrid, then, ah, Izmir…"

Gideon’s mind focused soggily. Izmir? Madrid? Sicily? That wasn’t the schedule he’d contracted for. Heidelberg had been on it all right, but the other places had all been German cities too-Munich, Kaiserslautern, some others he couldn’t remember. Was Dr. Rufus confusing him with someone else? He hoped not; the revised schedule was tremendously more exciting. But they might at least have checked with him about it.

"As most of you know," continued Dr. Rufus, "we have not had a visiting fellow since the semester before last, ever since…well, since the semester before last."

Dr. Rufus frowned and paused, and a small ripple of discomfort seemed to spread over the room. Was Gideon imagining it, or did most of the eyes watching him suddenly avoid contact?

Dr. Rufus had lost his train of thought and did not recover well. "And so," he said, no longer jovial, "and so I… with pleasure I welcome Professor Oliver to the USOC faculty for the fall semester. Thank you." Abruptly, he turned from the lectern and went to his seat.

"Hey, man," said Eric before Gideon had quite sat down. "I didn’t know you were from California. Northern Cal, where’s that at, near San Francisco?"

"About twenty miles south. San Mateo."

"Far out. California. No kidding." He turned to Janet. "Hey, Janet, remember that other guy we had from L.A., Denny Something?"

Janet laughed. "The one who fell asleep after he taught a class on a submarine, and wound up at the South Pole?"

"Nah, that was Gordon Something. I mean the chemistry instructor, remember? Who got stuck in jail in Spain because the border guards thought his demonstration stuff was coke?"

They were both laughing now, well into their cups; old friends excluding Gideon and not paying much attention to Danzig, who sipped his wine and stared into the middle distance.

"Mmm," Janet said, spluttering slightly into the brimming glass at her lips, "what about the time-was it ‘74?- when they wouldn’t let Ralph Kaplan off a base during a big alert, so he swiped a general’s uniform and tried to get through the gate?"

"Yeah, with that beard yet!" Eric and Janet both spluttered this time, spraying Gideon with Reisling.

"Ooh," Janet said, "what about Pete Somebody, remember? That funny visiting fellow in Economics, I think it was, the one who didn’t show up for class half the time, and then finally disappeared altogether and-"

"Uh, Janet." Eric put his hand on her arm. He made, Gideon thought, a faint motion in his direction. Janet looked confused for a moment, then closed her mouth.

"Look," Gideon said, "what is it with this visiting fellow? What happened to him?"

After an uncomfortable silence, Danzig spoke carefully. "Really, perhaps we shouldn’t be frightening off our new fellow with horror stories from the remote past."

"Horror stories?" said Gideon.

"Figuratively speaking," said Danzig, composing a prim smile. "Just your typical war stories. You’ll be telling them yourself a few months from now."

Janet and Eric studied their glasses. Bruce added, "Nothing you need concern yourself with, Gideon." He made the statement word by separate word, slowly, as if it were loaded with significance. But then, thought Gideon, that’s the way he tells you the time.

He began to ask another question, but changed his mind. If they wanted to play at being coy or whatever they were doing, the hell with them. He was going home. To the hotel, that is. Gideon shoved his chair back from the table and stood up, ready to leave. His high spirits were suddenly gone, the good-old-boy stories did not entertain him, and his half-hatched plans for Janet were somehow no longer of interest. Jet lag had finally hit him; if he didn’t get to his bed at the Hotel Ballman very shortly, he’d curl up and go to sleep on the floor of the Weinstube.

He turned from the table without saying good night, catching what he thought was a brief, silent glance between the three of them, and made his way towards the door. Others were milling about, getting ready to leave, and he caught sight of Dr. Rufus self-consciously circulating about, bearlike and jolly, thumping shoulders and shaking hands. When he saw Gideon, he smiled briefly-a twitch of the lips was more like it-and rather suddenly engaged himself in deep conversation with an older man and woman, both senior faculty members.

Gideon waited quietly. There were things that were bothering him, and he was going to buttonhole Dr. Rufus whether the chancellor liked it or not. When the older couple had made their good-byes, Dr. Rufus turned innocently in the direction opposite to Gideon and moved quickly toward another clump of people. Gideon called to him.

The chancellor turned, registering surprise. "Ah, the estimable Professor Oliver! I hope you had a pleasant evening."

"Yes, I did, thanks, but there are a few things I’d like to ask you."

"You bet; certainly. Ask away." He beamed at Gideon, blue eyes twinkling, rosy cheeks shining.

"Well, that schedule of mine. Is that right? I was expecting to go to Munich, Kaiserslautern-"

"Oh my, didn’t you get my letter? No? It was a sudden change indeed. Had to change quite a few schedules. When did you leave the U.S.?"

"Tuesday."

"Ah, yes. I believe it was mailed-they were mailed- letters to people whose schedules we changed…uh…" He mopped his glistening pink face with a handkerchief. "Mmm, uh, last Friday. Probably passed you going the other way. No inconvenience, I hope?"

"No, not at all. It’s rather exciting. It’s just a surprise."

"Well, I’m sorry if this has caught you off guard. Happens all the time in this business. Military exercise or an alert, and we just have to change our schedules. Fortunes of war. Here to serve. Well, my boy, good night-"