Its door was standing open. The woman init was the wellscrubbed ageless type who looks old in her twenties and young inher forties. She wore her brown hair rolled in a bun at the back of her neck.Her only concession to glamour was a thin pink line of lipstick accenting herstraight mouth.

She was a good-looking woman in spite ofthis. Her face was finely chiseled. The front of her blouse curved out over herdesk like a spinnaker going downwind.

"Come in," she said with aseverity that I was getting used to. "What are you waiting for?"

Her fine eyes had me hypnotized. Lookinginto them was like looking into the beautiful core of an iceberg, all green iceand cold blazing light.

"Sit down," she said. "What is yourproblem?"

I told her who I was and why I was there.

"But we have no Dolly McGee or Dolly Kincaid oncampus."

"She must be using a third name,then. I know she's a student here. She has a job driving for Dean Bradshaw'smother." I showed her my photograph.

"But this is Dorothy Smith. Why would sheregister with us under a false name?"

"That's what her husband would like toknow."

"Is this her husband in the picture withher?"

"Yes."

"He appears to be a nice enough boy."

"Apparently she didn't think so."

"I wonder why." Her eyes werelooking past me, and I felt cheated. "As a matter of fact, I don't see howshe could register under a false name, unless she came to us with forgedcredentials." She rose abruptly. "Excuse me for a minute, Mr.Archer."

She went into the next room, where filingcabinets stood like upended metal coffins, and came back with a folder whichshe opened on her desk. There wasn't much in it.

"I see," she said more or lessto herself. "She's been admitted provisionally. There's a note here to theeffect that her transcript is on the way."

"How long is provisional admissiongood for?"

"Until the end of September."She consulted her desk calendar. "That gives her nine days to come up witha transcript. But she'll have to come up with an explanation rather sooner. Wedon't look with favor on this sort of deception. And I had the impression thatshe was a straightforward girl." Her mouth turned down at the corners.

"You know her personally, DeanSutherland?"

"I make a point of contacting all thenew girls. I went out of my way to be useful to Miss or Mrs. Smith-Kincaid. Infact I helped to get her a part-time job in the library."

"And the job with old Mrs.Bradshaw?"

She nodded. "She heard that there wasan opening there, and I recommended her." She looked at her watch."She may be over there now."

"She isn't. I just came from Mrs.Bradshaw's. Your Dean lives pretty high on the hog, by the way. I thoughtacademic salaries were too low."

"They are. Dean Bradshaw comes from awealthy old family. What was his mother's reaction to this?" She made animpatient gesture which somehow included me.

"She seemed to take it in stride.She's a smart old woman."

"I'm glad you found her so," shesaid, as if she had had other kinds of experience with Mrs. Bradshaw."Well, I suppose rd better see if Mrs. Smith-Kincaid is in thelibrary."

"I could go over there and ask."

"I think not. I had better talk toher first, and try to find out what's going on in her little head."

"I didn't want to make trouble forher."

"Of course not, and you didn't. Thetrouble is and was there. You merely uncovered it. I'm grateful to you forthat."

"Could your gratitude," I saidcarefully, "possibly take the form of letting me talk to her first?"

"I'm afraid not."

"I've had a lot of experience gettingthe facts out of people." It was the wrong thing to say. Her mouth turneddown at the corners again. Her bosom changed from a promise to a threat.

"I've had experience, too, a goodmany years of it, and I am a trained counselor. If you'll be good enough towait outside, I'm going to try and phone her at the library." She flung alast shaft as I went out: "And please don't try to intercept her on theway here."

"I wouldn't dream of it, Miss Sutherland."

"Dean Sutherland, if you please."

I went and read the bulletin board besidethe information booth. The jolly promises of student activities, dances andgettogethers and poetry clubs and breakfasts where French was spoken, onlysaddened me. It was partly because my own attempt at college hadn't worked out,partly because I'd just put the kibosh on Dolly's.

A girl wearing horn-rimmed glasses, and abig young fellow in a varsity sweater drifted in from outside and leanedagainst the wall. She was explaining something to him, something about Achilles

© Alexander Sviyash, 2009