Diane Davidson - The Cereal Murders

“But these people who wanted Miss Ferrell to …do this for them, could they…”

He shook his head. “They’re in Martinique. With their son. You see, they go every year at the end of October, and the boy gets rather behind in his work.” He raised his eyebrows at me. “They want me to give him credit for going to Martinique! They say he speaks some French there, so why not?”

“Purity of pursuit,” I said softly. “Did you change the grade?”

He stiffened. “That’s not the kind of question I answer. You wouldn’t believe the pressure I’m under.”

“I would believe it,” I said truthfully. “Just look at what’s happened around here the past two weeks; Speaking of gifts, could you tell me any more about this scholarship Julian received? I’m afraid there may be strings attached. Maybe not at this very moment, but as you yourself would say, not yet. Like your teacher with the coat. Maybe next week, or next month, Julian could get some anonymous message saying if he wants to keep his scholarship, he has to flunk a test, not apply to a certain school, something like that.”

Perkins shrugged and looked back at the neo-Turner.

“I know as much as you do, Ms. Bear. We received a call from the bank, period. To the best of my knowledge, nobody at this school knows the donor. Or knew,” he said, to my unanswered question about Miss Ferrell.

“Why do you think someone killed her?”

“We all have a constituency, Ms. Bear. You do, I do, Miss Ferrell did.” He held up his hands in his mannered gesture of helplessness. His voice rose. “As a caterer, you must do what you know is bad for your constituency, because it is what they want. If the obese want fudge rather than oat bran, well, why not? When it comes back to haunt them, you’ll be long gone. Displeased parents make my life a misery with phone calls and letters and all kinds of threats.”

“Yes, but are you saying Miss Ferrell wouldn’t play along? Sort of like Miss Samuelson?”

Anger blazed in his eyes. I felt myself recoil at the unexpected intensity of his obvious distress, his loathing at my bringing up this topic. Perkins had tried to disguise his dislike for me by trying for sympathy in – unprofessionally, I thought – sharing details of his emotional load. But it hadn’t worked. Now he pressed his lips together and did not respond.

I said, “Did you tell the police that Miss Ferrell wouldn’t play along, perhaps?”

His haggard face turned scarlet. “Of course I did,” he snarled. “But they think somebody might have been searching her room that morning. They can’t find her grade book; they don’t know what was going on or who might have been having problems. And I doubt that any parent or student would dare put the pressure on me now.” He leered. “But perhaps I don’t know all she did.”

“What about Egon Schlichtmaier? Have you talked to the police about him?”

He ran his hands impatiently over the cottony mass of hair. “Why are you so interested? Why not just leave it to the authorities?”

“Look, the only person I’m worried about is Julian. I want to know who would give him this scholarship and why.”

He tugged the lapels of his sport coat. “Julian Teller is a fine student.” His lips closed firmly.

I mumbled something noncommittal, and Perkins said he’d see me that night for the last of the college meetings. The bell signaling class change rang, and I made noises about it being time for me to leave. But instead of the usual metaphorical sendoff, Headmaster Perkins merely swiveled back to the painting by Turner’s great-grandson. As I left his office, my mind groped wildly.

Someone searching her room … they can’t find her grade book…

In the hallway I saw several seniors I recognized. All avoided me by looking away or starting to talk animatedly to the person nearest to them. Discovering two dead bodies can get you ostracized, I guessed. Except by Macguire Perkins, who came lumbering down the hall and nodded when I said hello. I pulled his sleeve.

“Macguire,” I said, “I need to talk to you.”

“Oh well, okay.” He led me out the school’s front door.

I looked up. For that was where he was, this lanky, painfully acne-faced basketball star – way up. A blue plaid lumberjack shirt hung out over jeans that ended in weathered hiking boots. No preppie outfit for the headmaster’s son.

“I want to talk to you about Miss Ferrell.”

“I, uh, I’m real sorry about Miss Ferrell.”

“So am I.”

“You know, I know she was mad about my college visit, and… other stuff, but I think she liked me.”

“What other stuff?”

“Just,” he said, “stuff.”

“Like having your driver’s license suspended for drinking and driving? Or stuff like your use of steroids to muscle yourself up?”

His scarred face turned acutely red. “Yeah. Anyway, I stopped the steroids. Last week, I swear. Ferrell was talking to me about it, said I could be strong without them, like that.”

“She was right.” I hesitated. “There’s something I need, Macguire. Something she might have feared would get stolen.”

“What?”

“Miss Ferrell’s classroom might have been searched last Saturday. It was a mess when the police got to it. I’ve just had a talk with your father and it made me think… . Listen, I need her grade book. You of all people know your way around this school. Is there any chance she could have hidden it somewhere?”

Macguire looked around the snowy parking lot before replying. Was paranoia a side effect of his brand of drug abuse?

“As a matter of fact,” he said reluctantly, “I may know where it is. You know, being tall, I see things other folks don’t see.”

“Tell me.”

“Remember when I read my essay about I.U. at the front of the class?” I nodded. “She has those big posters up there by the blackboard. Behind that framed one of that arch in Paris, I saw something. Like a brown notebook. I could go look…”

“Please do.” He trundled off, and within two minutes he was back, grinning triumphantly. He shrugged his backpack off his shoulder and unzipped it. Another quick visual scan of the parking lot. “Luck,” he said simply. He pulled out a brown fake-leather spiral grade book and handed it to me. I hadn’t brought a purse, so I just held on to it.

“Give that to the cops,” he said. “Maybe it’ll tell them something.”

My heart ached for this sad, loose-limbed boy. “Thank you, Macguire. I was so worried about you Saturday morning. You seemed so nervous about the test.”

“What, me?” He backed away and held up his hands in protest. “Your cookies were great. I thought later, why should I have been so worried about the SATs? I’m not going to be somebody by going to Harvard. What the hell, I’m never going to be anybody.”

20

I phoned Tom Schulz when I got home in the hope that he might have returned from Lakewood. No luck. I told his machine I had Suzanne Ferrell’s roll book with the class grades, and where was he? The evening’s event loomed and I knew I had food to prepare. Still, I was getting close to the answers to a lot of questions; I could feel it. Cooking could wait. I sat down at my kitchen table and opened Suzanne Ferrell’s grade book.

It was larger than most grade books I had seen, about eight by eleven instead of four by six, and with many more pages. The notebook was divided into three parts: French III, French IV; and CC. When I flipped to it, CC proved to be college counseling. There I saw an inked list of the top-ranked seniors: I. Keith Andrews, 2. Julian Teller, 3. Heather Coopersmith, 4. Greer Dawson, 5. Brad Marensky… . A quick check showed that Brad Marensky and Greer Dawson were in French III; Julian and Heather Coopersmith were in French IV. Keith Andrews had also been in French IV. They were all, including Macguire Perkins, in college counseling.