The Englishman (15 page)

He also taunted me about my short hair and my absence of cleavage and once gave me a Chinese burn that bruised my arm so badly I couldn’t wear a t-shirt for two weeks because I didn’t want to have to explain how I got it.

“You didn’t give Mrs. Krevitz my number, I hope.”

“Yes, I did. Now, don’t shout at me—there’s really no harm in it. There’s more harm in only ever seeing your own colleagues and talking about work all the time. Some change will do you good.”

No doubt about that. The idea of sitting in a quiet restaurant in the Real World and making Observatory-unrelated conversation has a definite appeal, but with Bernie the Bully?

“Yeah, maybe. All right, if he calls me, I’ll go, but I won’t call him first. I’m too old-fashioned for that kind of thing, Mom.”

Chapter 9

T
O
C
ELEBRATE
T
HE
C
OMPLETION
O
F
M
Y
F
IRST
W
EEK
of teaching at Ardrossan, Tim takes me bicycle-shopping. He claims to “know a little” about bikes, and unlikely as it seems, he is well known to the bearded, tattooed guy who runs the store.

“Hey, professor. If you came to get spares for your Colnago, gotta disappoint you, man.”

“No, I’m not here for myself today. Anna, this is Chuck—Chuck, Anna, a new colleague of mine. She’s looking for a bike to commute to work.”

Chuck assesses my biking credibility which, since I’m wearing a skirt and ankle-strap sandals with heels, can’t be impressive. “What you been riding before?”

“Uh—nothing.”

Now Tim, too, is staring at me in disbelief.

“But you
can
ride a bike—or are we talking training wheels?”

“Look, I used to ride a bike to school all through high school, and I had a bike in Cambridge, and I shared one when I lived in London. Yes, that means it’s been three years since I sat on one, but—well, is it true or isn’t it? That you never forget?”

My words echo in silence. Chuck gives himself a mental shake and turns to Tim.

“Gonna do her for a Jamis, a 700C—over here.” The men converse in low voices about my options and present me with a choice of three bikes, which I try out on the parking lot behind the store.

“This one, I think.”

“Good girl. Helmet.”

“Awww…do I have to, Mommy?” I wail, but pipe down when Chuck gives me a stern look.

“Sure don’t look purdy, does it? Well, neither does brain matter on asphalt!”

When Tim lifts my new acquisition into the trunk of the Subaru (mental note: send photo of bike in car to derisive Liebermans in Queens), I can’t help grinning from ear to ear.

“This is so cool! Thank you very much!”

“You
look
cool on it, too. Now, will you be all right setting it up, or are you going to thank Uncle Timothy by inviting him to the tomato farm for pizza?” The round blue eyes are all innocence.

“Tim, I appreciate your help, and you’re welcome to come round to the farm any time you want. But if you were straight, I’d be thinking you’re coming on to me—big time. So what’s with the attention?”

He groans and contemplates the traffic rushing past for a few moments. “Martin’s parents are visiting.”

“Martin?”

“My…partner.”

“But being nice to the in-laws is part of being married, so—”

“I am not
married!”
he snaps. “I only moved in with Martin because my building was sold and the lease expired, and I didn’t want to commit myself to anything, property-wise, before my promotion is through. This is a temporary arrangement, completely unofficial, and I see no reason to become all lovely-dovey with his mom and dad!”

Lots of strong feelings, and none of my business.

“Well—” I shrug “—if you’re really up for the drive, and you know a good take-out pizza place between here and there—because the farm ain’t got no delivery service, dude—I got beer, and I got soda, and I got a porch to sit on and trees to look at. All yours for fixing the handle bar and adjusting the saddle.”

Judging by the cars clogging up the parking space on the farm, the Walshes are having friends round. Tim and I park as best we can; I carry the pizza, the pump, and the helmet; Tim pushes the bike.

“You. Are. So. Weird,” Tim breathes as I open the farmyard gate. Dolly and Jenny are playing with a girl their age and a toddler on the swing hanging from the chestnut tree, and Pop, Howie, and two other men are getting the barbeque going. Pop sees me, sees Tim, and I make sure to nod a greeting. First time the new tenant is bringing home a man—that will be food for gossip.

“Weird for wanting to live here?
Living in Ameeerica
…suits me down to the ground. Along here.” I direct him past the main house and the steel barn. The cottage comes into view, blue as the sky on this warm evening, and my heart glows with proprietary pride.

“Mind you, Cleve lives in the sticks, too.” Tim shakes his head. “More remote than this, even. Without the farmers.”

“Why do you call him Cleve?”

“Oh, from when we were at school. I don’t see the appeal, myself, of this rural living.”

“You were at
school
together?”

He grins. “I bet that gives you all sorts of salacious fantasies, doesn’t it? Foreigners invariably think English boarding schools are hotbeds of adolescent sexual depravity.”

“Aren’t they?”

“No more than other establishments that lock up several hundred males with each other.
I
had a good time.”

“You can’t have been there together long,” I try with an objective handle. “He’s quite a few years older than you are.”

“Swee’pea, I’m not as young as I look. Although I obviously prefer being older than I look to looking older than I am.”

“Well, three or four years older than me. Right?”

“I’ll be thirty-eight before the year is out.” Tim is actually blushing. “This is what Shakespeare and I have in common: there are six lost years in our biographies. I doubt, though, that Shakespeare spent them on tenure track at a reputable American university and failed his five-year review.”

“You didn’t!”

“Let’s just say there is a reason why I prefer to keep my closet door carefully closed. Hey, this is neat!”

“Eat your words, city boy, and get comfy. Bathroom, if you need it, is here, but there’s a pile of girl’s laundry in there, so be warned.”

While the pizza is in the oven for quick warm-up, Tim sets up my bike and I exchange my skirt and heels for jeans and Birkenstocks and get rid of my contacts.

“Try this for height,” he says when I come down the porch. “And tell that kid to stop staring at the whoopsie.”

I look up to where he is pointedly not looking and see Jules sitting on one of the tractors, watching us.

“Hey, Jules!” I shout assertively, because I’m not going to be stalked by the Calderbrook Cinderella. “What’s up?”

She jumps off the seat, but instead of making herself scarce, she comes over.

“Is something the matter, Jules? Not to be rude, but you see I have a visitor. So why don’t we each look after our own, hm?”

Something clearly
is
the matter. Embarrassment and the desire to make mischief are fighting it out on her face.

“The men are wondering whether he is the man who raped the girl!”

“
What?”

The shockwave of Tim’s reaction makes even Jules flinch.

“Don’t shout at me!” she says defensively. “I’m just saying what they’re saying!”

“
No
is the answer to that one, kiddo!” Tim seems even more upset than I am.

“Jules,” I intervene, “what do you mean, the man who raped the girl?”

She glowers at Tim, who seems absolved from the original accusation but is now in disgrace for having shouted at her.

“Lorna O’Neal—” she cocks her head into the direction of the main house “—works as a secretary at the Folly, and she said that there is a student who was raped by a professor.”

“But—when?”

“How should I know? Yesterday, last week?”

“Yes, but recently?”

“Yeah, like—she—or her boss, dunno—found out only this morning!”

Tim shrugs his exasperation. “But that could be anywhere in the college.
If
it’s true, that is!”

“It
is
true!” she flings at him. “And it was an English professor! I’m not stupid, you know!”

I am so stunned I have to sit down on one of the steps leading up to the porch. Tim leans on the bike saddle as if he was going to be sick.

“
Jesus F.
—”

“Hey,
pas devant les Chrétiens!”
I turn back to Jules. “Jules, this kind of information would be top secret, absolutely and totally confidential. Your parents’ friend wouldn’t be allowed to share this.”

“It’s all confidential,” Jules says petulantly. “She told my mother. I overheard them. And Bill O’Neal told Grandpa and Howie.”

“And you told us.” Tim and Jules are no dream team. She glares at him, her cheeks dark with resentment.

“Okay, I’ll go back and say it
is
you! I’m a rat, after all, so what do you expect!” She stalks off toward the group of men who have been watching us.

“Honestly, Tim…”

“The little punk. How come she’s black? Is she adopted?”

“Sort of. The daughter-in-law was married before, so Jules is the, uh, black sheep of the family. Be nice.”

“She isn’t really going to tell them I’m a rapist, is she?”

“I doubt it. And even if she did, they wouldn’t believe her.”

“Because that would be really ironic, if I was lynched by a mob of rednecks who think that I raped a woman!”

“The Walshes are no rednecks, Tim!”

He looks at me like a very troubled baby, his convex forehead deeply lined. “Let me get my phone.”

In the shade of my living room, the news seems even more ominous than in the bright sunlight outside.

“Just because someone was accused doesn’t mean someone else was really raped,” I think aloud, somewhat incoherently. “I hate to say this, but—it might be a trumped-up harassment charge, filed by some snowflake to be revenged on a professor who gave her a ‘C’ for her essay.”

Tim looks up, and I have not yet seen him so grim. He actually looks his age for once.

“I wouldn’t have said it if you hadn’t,” he admits. “But ten to one it’ll turn out to be something like that. Boning student totty is one thing, but actual
rape?
I don’t believe it.”

“Oh, snap! You know what we’re doing, don’t you?”

“We’re blaming the victim.”

“Exactly. For shame! Who are you calling?”

He sits on my sofa with his phone in his hands. “Who’d know?”

“Ma Mayfield knows, for sure, as Dean of Studies, but—”

We stare at each other, overawed at the thought of phoning Elizabeth Mayfield on the little matter of a scandal involving a student, a professor and a count of sexual assault. Then we collapse in a fit of hysterical laughter.

“You call her Ma Mayfield?” Tim asks. “That’s perfect! Why does it ring a bell, though?
Ma Mayfield
…”

“
Brideshead Revisited
. The nightcl—”

“The nightclub Charles and Sebastian go to in London, where they get sloshed and pick up those two prostitutes! Ma Mayfield is the proprietress! Oh, that is
perfect!”
Tim cackles. “Wait till I tell Giles!”