One Coffee With

"Andrea's right, so just sit down and stop being tiresome," he said. "Continue, Lieutenant."

Their eyes locked, then Sigrid referred to her notes again. "Professor Leyden, I understand that Qui

"Riley was incapable of appreciating neo-realism," Leyden said airily, "and he didn't like my friendship with his wife. We were the best of enemies. You know, I'll probably even miss him."

"So what he pla

"Don't be naive, Lieutenant-of course it did! The gallery-trotting, picture-buying public is smart enough to read but dumb enough to be influenced by self-proclaimed savants; so I'm very lucky that Doris Qui

There was a wicked gleam in Leyden 's dark eyes, and Nauman shook his head at the artist's audacity. "So now you'll get to dictate your own version, and Doris 'll get the pleasure of your company until the book's safely published."

Except for Detective Tildon everyone in the room knew Doris Qui

"Just don't burn yourself out." Vance cautioned.

Sigrid looked at Andrea Ross. "With Qui

Andrea Ross carefully tapped her cigarette ash into her empty cup and nodded.

"And you've admitted bitterness at being passed over the first time?"

Again the woman nodded, and Vance said, "Better remember that, Oscar."

Sigrid rounded on him sharply, "You keep acting as if this were all a big joke, Professor Vance. You were in and out of this office all morning, and you were here just before Professor Qui

"And where's my motive?" taunted the stocky printmaker. "I wasn't in his book, I'm not sleeping with his wife, and he didn't cut me out of a promotion!"

"But if the poison had been meant for Professor Nauman?" she asked softly. "It's my understanding that if the chairman's an artist, the deputy must be a historian and vice versa. If Professor Nauman had taken that cup, Riley Qui

"Now just a minute," cried Vance. "No offense Oscar, but if I'd meant to kill you, you'd be dead now-not Riley. Besides," he said to Sigrid, "I'm no shoo-in. There're at least ten members of this department who hate my guts, and who would enjoy voting against me."

He said this proudly, and Sigrid noted wryly that he seemed to rate his standing as an artist by the number and caliber of his enemies.

"If the poison was for Oscar, that lets Saxer and me both out," said Leyden thoughtfully.

Professor Simpson cleared his throat. "Also me, I presume?"

"And you, Professor Ross?" asked Sigrid.

"If you think promotion's a strong enough motive for murder, then I'm still in. Either way an associate professor gets promoted to full, and I'm next in line for the associate."

The medievalist leaned back in her chair and lit another of the cigarettes she'd been chain-smoking all morning. Her brittleness had become even more apparent as the net tightened.

"We're like the Mad Hatter's tea party, aren't we Lieutenant? 'Move down! Move down!' Only there's an extra chair left over at this party and I'm not the only one who benefits either way, am I?"

Piers Leyden had been puzzled by David Wade's presence, and now he beamed appreciatively. "Why, Andrea, how very perceptive of you!" And he too, turned to stare at the young lecturer.

David returned their stares in bewilderment. "I don't understand. What's it all got to do with me?"

"Nothing!" cried Sandy, crumpling her empty cup in agitated hands. "He wasn't even here. He was in the library."

"That's true," Sigrid said. "We even have a student aide and a librarian from the reserve stacks who'll swear to it. But you were here, Miss Keppler."

" Sandy?" said Wade incredulously. "You've got to be spaced out. She's the last person in the whole department! Didn't you know? We're getting married this summer. Probably move to Idaho."

"Why?"

"Because my contract's expired and-oh."

He looked like a man who'd been kicked in the groin, and his eyes sick as he spoke to Andrea Ross. "That's what you meant about an extra chair left over."

"I'm afraid so," said Sigrid. "Your contract expires in June. They couldn't extend it without offering you tenure, and until Wednesday there wasn't a tenured position open. Now there is. After Professors Simpson and Ross are promoted, there'll be an unfilled position left on the history side. Either way Wade would get tenure, wouldn't he, Professor Nauman?"

Nauman nodded stonily. "A chairman teaches only one course. Riley dead or promoted to chairman-either way-someone would have to take up the slack of his other classes. I was going to speak to David this afternoon. Discuss tenure."

"And who has David Wade's career interest most at heart?" asked Sigrid. "Who very loudly read the warnings on the container of potassium dichromate last month? Who could unlock that chemical closet at her leisure or leave the coffee wherever she chose and maneuver things so as to implicate as many people as possible? Who could mark the coffee lids and position the cups on the tray, knowing which Qui

"No!" cried Sandy. The white foam cup was now only a formless ball of plastic that slipped from her nerveless fingers as the girl shrank into her chair.

"Yes!" said Sigrid inexorably.

There was a stu

When they led her away, a scared and angry David Wade insisted on going with her.

The six people who remained in the large office stared at each other, incredulous and bewildered by the sudden finality of it all.

"She said academic positions were so scarce now," murmured Professor Simpson. The white-haired classicist seemed distressed and uncertain. "She chided the Harris boy for not taking the high rate of unemployment seriously, but even so…"

"I hope Washington doesn't hear of her solution," said Vance, but the quip was automatic, mechanical response, a numb reaction to the grim reality of Sandy 's arrest.

"I don't believe it," said Nauman, who'd been silent. "Sometimes I do get back first. She wouldn't have left it to chance."

"You said it yourself, Oscar," Piers Leyden reminded him. "Either way-you dead, or Riley-Wade would still have got tenure. That's the whole point. It wouldn't make any difference to her as far as making a place for Wade on the staff goes. And maybe the chanciness of it made her feel that it was out of her hands. Up to fate. Kismet."

"Anyhow," said Jake Saxer, fingering his pointed beard and breathing easily again, "poisoning is traditionally a woman's method."

"Thanks a lot!" snapped Andrea Ross. "You're saying that if Sandy weren't guilty, I'd be the only logical alternative?" She stubbed her cigarette and stood up. "I'm going to lunch."

Professor Simpson, still upset, began murmuring about finding a lawyer for Sandy; but before anyone could leave, Rudy Turitto, who taught photography and who, to his great regret, had missed Wednesday's dramatics, burst into the office.

"Where's that Lieutenant Harald?" he demanded excitedly.

When they told him, he dived for the phone book, then quickly dialed a number, forestalling their questions.

"Hello? Police?" he said as the call went through. After identifying himself, he said, "Lieutenant Harald's on her way there I've been told. As soon as she comes in, have her call me- Art Department, Vanderlyn College. It's very important."