9
The state of man: inconstancy, boredom, anxiety.
Midnight July 16, 1995
Claxton wasn't in the phone directory. They found the name of the Dean of Faculty on a placard in front of a closed and darkened administration building of gleaming steel and glass. Parry telephoned the dean, identified himself and asked for the whereabouts of Dr. Claxton. The dean, shaken by the late night call, finally gave him the home address for a Dr. Donald G. Claxton. He lived within walking distance of the campus and they were soon on his doorstep, pounding away like a pair of Nazi Occupation troops.
Claxton was a big man, filling the doorway. He was also a belligerent bastard who refused to allow them inside where the sound of some less-than-classical music blended with heavy breathing, the telltale blue cast of a video screen rising and falling. Parry caught sight of someone hastily dressing and stumbling around behind Claxton's large frame, no doubt another of his students catching up on some late assignment.
Claxton was bearded and balding with the appearance of a man once active and involved in sports. Nowadays it appeared that boredom, beer and coeds made up his sporting life, and if his students were good sports, they'd receive good grades; otherwise, they got what was considered in college the ax, a grade of C. Parry recalled that Linda Kahala had gotten a C in her Shakespeare course, but had done superbly well in all of her other English classes.
Parry quickly introduced himself and Tony. “I want to talk to you about Linda Kahala.”
Claxton was immediately on the defensive. “Yes, of course, I'd heard about her disappearance. Tried to locate her about a grade conference but, well, some kids don't want to be found. Has she? Been found, I mean?”
“ Found, yeah, she's been found.” Parry watched intently for any reaction to this news.
“ Thank God. It must've been a nightmare for the parents.”
Either Claxton was an extremely cool character, or a sociopath-which their killer must be-or the man had no idea that Linda Kahala had been brutally murdered. At this point, Parry didn't want to disturb his line of questioning with the fact the girl was found dead. “I understand she had a problem with you, Dr. Claxton?”
“ Problem? Oh, well, she wasn't too bright; she failed to do well in my class, but-”
“ Why's that, Doctor?”
Tony snidely asked, “She didn't do well on her orals or what?”
“ Because she didn't pass your goddamned sex exam?” Parry bluntly added, having agreed on the ride over to press the man this way.
Claxton visibly reddened there in the dark doorway. “What the hell is this? I'll thank you to leave now, you gentlemen of the law.”
“ We know all about your classroom tactics, Claxton,” Parry retaliated. “And now one of the girls you sexually molested has turned up dead, mutilated beyond recognition and-”
“ Dead? Mutilated?”
“- and that's a bit too much to overlook, Doctor, even for a man of your refinement and reputation. Now, are you going to cooperate, or do I have to get a warrant to search, and maybe a second to arrest?”
He stood there breathing heavily, pondering his options. “All right, all right, what the hell do you want from me?”
“ We'd like to come inside, look around,” said Tony. “ 'Less you got somethin' to hide.”
He looked over his shoulder, eyeballing his guest. “It's really a bad time for me. What about coming back tomorrow, say two in the afternoon?”
Parry pressed on. “You gave Linda a book of sonnets?”
“ I give a lot of books away.”
“ Did you or not?”
“ What if I had? What's it to you?”
“ This book?” Parry's sleight of hand with the book impressed Tony, whose eyes bored into Claxton, his fists clenched.
“ Yeah, maybe… I suppose I may've given her a book. I give away a lotta books.”
“ When? Before or after you raped her?”
“ Raped her? Are you guys nuts? What rape? There was no… never any rape. She… consented.”
“ Yeah, right,” muttered Tony.
“ Right there in your office, Doctor? Where you backed her into a corner?”
“ God damnit, do you know how many of these kids with poor grades go shouting sexual harassment these days?”
“ She's told others about the incident,” Tony added.
“ It's her word against mine.”
Tony instantly corrected him. “Was… was her word against yours.”
“ And who's a court to believe, Doctor? You or a poor dead girl whose life was shattered first when her professor put his hands all over her, from where she spiraled down to the street?” asked Parry.
“ What exactly do you fuckin' cowboys want from me?”
Parry and Tony heard the noise of a back door closing. “Go get that person, Tony. Maybe we'll have a talk with her, too… corroboration, maybe.”
Tony started away. Claxton called out. “All right, all right.”
Tony stopped at the foot of the stairs. Parry motioned for him to return.
“ Now, Dr. Claxton, I want you to tell me where you were on the night of the 11th when Linda Kahala disappeared.” Claxton backed from the door and pushed it open for them to step inside, saying, “Look around. Does this look like the house of a maniac?”
Parry stepped in, followed by Gagliano, who said, “You got any coffee?”
Claxton ignored the request.
They went through the necessary questions and as they did so, Parry began to feel that Claxton, while a scum, was no killer. He finally asked Claxton, “Have you any students, particularly male students, that Linda gravitated to in class? Was there anyone she worked with in particular, studied with, say on a class project, anything?”
“ She was dating some guy in my nine o'clock. That's all I know.”
“ We know about the boyfriend, Oniiwah,” replied Tony. “He's clean.”
“ Anyone else she might have shared a book like this with?” pressed Parry.
“ A guy, huh?” He had lit up a cigarette and now he blew out a long stream of smoke. He sat back on his lounge chair in his robe, naked beneath, rolls of fat making a spiral of snakes about his relaxed midriff. “I couldn't say… I don't know… I'm no mind reader… Don't pay that much attention to these kids, you know. Besides, I have a lot of classes and students.”
“ Sounds like the Albert Schweitzer of academia, don't he?” asked Tony.
Parry said, “This would be a guy in her class.”
He shrugged. “I can give you the roster; you take it from there. I didn't notice anything in particular going on with her and another student. Course, I don't pay that much attention to the private lives of my students.”
“ No, I guess you wouldn't. You're just interested in their private parts.”
Claxton started to protest but thought better of it.
“ Let me have the roster. Fact, let me have all your rosters.”
Claxton nervously bit at his inner jaw, but went to a desk and ripped several computer printouts from a book. “Here, take them. I got others.”
“ Jesus,” moaned Tony as he stared over Jim's shoulder at one of the lists which numbered three hundred students.
