(2012) Cross-Border Murder Read Free Page B

guilty.”
    “He didn’t know my father.”
    There was not much I could say to that. Who knows a father best? A cynical policeman? Or a loving daughter?
     

CHAPTER TWO  
     
    The next morning, I decided to walk over to the campus of Winston University. I felt a need to revisit the scene of the crime, to try to recapture something of what I had felt back then. Walking one of the corridors of the engineering department I passed a door with Dean Peter Gooden’s name on it. He had been the youngest of the seven people in the photo Gina had left with me. On instinct I walked into his outer office. I handed his secretary my card. On it I wrote two names: that of Gina’s father and that of the murdered professor. I asked her to take it in to the Dean. She studied the card. She wore no make-up. Her hair was soft and blow-dried. She was wearing a jean jacket with an expensive designer’s label on it. I figured she was five years younger than Gina.
    “He only sees people by appointment,” she said. Obviously my business card had not impressed her. The names on the card, including mine, were probably unknown to her. Or maybe she had been instructed to stay clear of the press. Most secretaries are. Most bureaucrats are understandably jittery of any publicity they don’t initiate themselves.
    “I’ll mention that in the paper tomorrow. I’m sure everyone will be impressed.”
    She was not amused. Her boss was an important person. I was just someone to be viewed with suspicion. I went and sat down in one of the three chairs provided for those who were fortunate enough to have scheduled appointments with the Dean.
    The three chairs were empty.
    The secretary frowned in displeasure. After a few moments she offered what she may have thought was a civil concession. “If you want to phone later I can try to make an appointment for you.” I just shook my head. “I’ll wait until he turns up or comes out that door,” I said, as if I had all the time in the world. I prefer to talk to people before they’ve had a chance to rehearse all their answers. But I was not about to explain that to her.
    A buzzer rang on her desk. She rose, went to the door, and after a polite knock, went through it. She shut it very carefully behind her.
    In the photo, he had looked too young to be a professor. I assumed he was reading my card and debating whether to see me. In a few minutes, his secretary re-emerged. With a studied indifference she said, “He can see you, but only for a few minutes. He has a meeting at eleven.” She stood aside to let me through, then closed the door behind me.
    It was the change in the way he was dressed which struck me first. In the photo he had been wearing a pair of crumpled cords and a cotton t-shirt with some writing on it. He was now dressed like the CEO of a power utility. All I could see as he rose from behind his desk was a blue blazer with silver buttons and a pink striped shirt with a starched white collar. The tie that went with it had been carefully selected to match. He had also gained weight and his blonde hair had begun to thin.
    As he motioned me towards a chair, his slate-gray eyes studied me: but like my usual first meeting with a banker, they were careful to reveal nothing: not even curiosity. “So what can I do for you?” He said as he sank back into his chair.
    I went straight to the point. “I’ve decided to re-examine the circumstances of professor Monaghan’s death.”
    His only response was a slightly raised eyebrow.
    “I gather you were part of a group he hung out with around the time of his death.”
    There was a hint of a frown. “I wouldn’t quite put it that way. He was one of my professors. I was one of his graduate students.”
    “But you attended some of the same parties.”
    “I suppose so. A few. We all did. But it would surely be an exaggeration to say that we hung out together, as you put it. May I ask just what reason motivates you to, as you put it, re-examine the