Hush Money

“Sounds good,” I said.

I smiled to myself.

“Why are you smiling.”

“Just happy,” I said.

We walked Pearl down to my place and put her in my living room. I put fresh water in Pearl’s dish, and turned on the radio so she’d have music to listen to. She hated talk radio. Susan kissed her good-bye, and we went out. We came back out of my apartment and turned left on Marlborough Street and right on Arlington.

“Talk to me a minute about people who stalk people,” I said.

“Sure,” Susan said. “I suspect you know what I know. It is some sort of attempt to maintain or, I suppose, acquire the feeling of power over someone. Following a person may not give you real power, but it gives you the feeling of it. You watch them. You know where they go, what they do, who they see.”

“Knowledge is power,” I said.

“Exactly,” Susan said.

“Are stalkers dangerous?” I said.

“Not necessarily. Sometimes the need for power extends to physical coercion, sometimes not. Sometimes dirty tricks, sometimes not.”

“And the purpose?”

“Fear of loss,” Susan said. “A lover, say, from whom you are estranged. You fear if she gets out of your power you’ll lose her. And the feeling of power is a way to feel as if you haven’t.”

We were at the corner of Commonwealth less than a block from The Ritz when Susan spotted KC Roth. She stopped dead in her tracks and stared at her. KC realized that Susan had seen her and tried to look as if she were just strolling along and didn’t notice us.

“What the hell is this?” Susan said to me.

“The lovely and tenacious KC Roth,” I said.

“She’s stalking you again?”

“Yep.”

“You knew it?”

“Yep.”

“And you didn’t say anything?”

“I thought it would be more dramatic if you discovered her yourself.”

“It is,” Susan said.

She was quiet for a moment, then she turned toward KC Roth and yelled.

“KC!”

KC tried to look startled.

“Susan?”

“Get over here,” Susan said.

KC walked over to us.

“Susan, what are you…?”

“Shut up,” Susan said.

She jabbed at a bench on the mall.

“Sit down,” she said.

Her teeth were clenched and her face was hard-edged and kind of white except for red splotches on her cheekbones. I stood a few feet away. Oh boy!

KC wasn’t brave, but she was stupid. She stood there looking at Susan.

“Wha…?” she said.

Susan took hold of her blouse with both hands and yanked her to the bench and slammed her onto it.

“Now listen, you asinine little shit for brains,” she said with her teeth clamped hard together. “This is the last time you bother him, you understand?”

“Bother?”

Susan still had hold of her blouse. She pulled her close for a moment and slammed her back against the bench.

“Call, follow, whine at, see, talk to, touch, look at, a

KC began to cry. She twisted loose from Susan and stood up.

“I need him,” she screamed at Susan. “You have no right to keep him from me, if it weren’t for you…”

With her clenched fist Susan hit KC on the jaw with a left hook just like I’d taught her, getting her shoulder into it so that the power came from the body, not the arm. KC fell backward and sat down hard on the bench. Her lip was bleeding.

“Are we clear?” Susan said.

KC touched her mouth and took her hand away and stared at the blood on it.

“My God, I’m bleeding,” KC said.

“You’ll be sleeping with the fishes, you neurotic bitch,” Susan said, “if you don’t stay away from him.”

KC nodded, still staring at the blood on her hand.

“Say it,” Susan said with such force that I was a little scared.

“I’ll stay away.”

“You bet you will,” Susan said.

She turned and looked at me and said, “Come on,” and started off toward The Ritz at a very fast pace. I followed her. We went in the Commonwealth Avenue entrance and across the lobby into the cafe. The maitre d‘ put us in a window seat only a few inches from passersby on Newbury Street.

“My hand hurts,” Susan said.

I nodded.

“You didn’t tell me that it hurts your hand to hit someone.”

“Mostly,” I said, “if you hit them on the face or head. It’s why I try to use my forearm or elbow when I can.”

“I’ll try to keep it in mind.”

“Were you influenced by Freud or Adler,” I said, “when you gave KC a whack on the kisser.”

“Wonder Woman, I think. Not very shrink-like, was I.”

“No.”

“Did you mind?” Susan said.

“No. I liked it,” I said. “It was what I wanted to do, but felt I couldn’t.”

“You knew I’d blow my top,” Susan said.

“I was hoping,” I said.

“What do you think she’ll do?” Susan said.

“Dash back to the shrink you sent her to, that she stopped going to.”

“So she can report me,” Susan said.

“Yep.”

Susan smiled.

“So maybe it was just the right thing to do,” she said.

“I’m sure it was. Will your reputation be destroyed in the psychiatric community?”

Susan smiled again, more broadly than before.

“No, my colleagues will envy me.”

“Good,” I said. “Want to see if they’ll bring you some ice for your hand?”

“No, but they’d better rush a martini out here pretty quick,” she said. “Before I’m overcome with pain.”

I signaled the waiter.

“Right away, Mrs. Silverman, I sure as hell don’t want to cross you.”

The drink came promptly, and a beer for me.

“You think it worked?” Susan said. “You think she’ll leave you alone?”

“Oh, I’m sure it will,” I said. “But you better not let word get out about my sexual performance, or you’ll be beating up beautiful women every week.”

Susan raised her glass toward me and touched the rim of it against the top of my beer bottle.

She said, “Be my pleasure, big guy.”

CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

The university tenure committee held Robinson Nevins’ reconsideration meeting at the university on the third straight day of rain in late August in a room next to the president’s office. It was my first tenure meeting. The English department tenure committee, which had originally denied Robinson tenure, had voted not to reconsider, but the university committee, which had the right to overrule the department committee, agreed to a second hearing. This already seemed like several committees more than I wanted anything to do with, but Robinson needed some testimony. Robinson, and Hawk, and I all agreed that it was best not to turn Hawk loose among the academics.

The meeting was chaired by a professor from the Law School named Tillman. I sat against the wall behind Tommy Harmon, who sat at the conference table as Robinson’s faculty advocate. Bass Maitland and Lillian Temple were there representing the English department tenure committee. Maitland was speaking in his large rich voice.

“So whatever ex post facto changes may have occurred in the matter of Robinson Nevins’ tenure, the department feels that a decision arrived at in good faith should stand. To do otherwise would be to set a precedent that most of us would regret in the years to come.”

“Even though the basis for the denial of tenure turned out to be not only unfounded but part of a criminal conspiracy?” Harmon said.

“I believe it is an alleged criminal conspiracy,” Maitland said, “until a court of law reaches a judgment.”

He leaned back in his chair contentedly. Lillian patted his thigh. Professor Tillman looked a little tired.

He said, “Thank you for the reminder in law, Bass. Tommy, do you have a witness for us?”

Tommy Harmon said he did and introduced me.

“This is not a court of law, and you are not under oath, Mr. Spenser,” Tillman said. “Still the business of this committee, which today is particularly serious business, ca