“I got her as she was just leaving to go home. She lives in Heber Springs, and she said she’d probably talk to you after Christmas if you went up there to see her. She wanted to talk to her parents first. She doesn’t want to be involved and is mad at me for telling you.”
She’ll get over it, I think but don’t say.
“What’s her number in Heber Springs?”
Sarah gives it to me, and I hang up and dial Lauren Denney’s number. She may be a terrible person, but she has a nice voice, unusually low but distinct, and she agrees at once to meet me at Danny’s, my diner that plays the golden oldies. I started to suggest the Ozark, but one rumor floating around is enough in this case When Lauren strolls into the restaurant twenty minutes later, I get a good look. She is wearing tight jeans and a tobacco-colored sweater that blends nicely with her long, honey-colored hair. If I were a Razorback, I wouldn’t have any trouble being inspired. We are escorted to a booth in the rear by a boy in a ponytail. I ask her what she would like to eat, but she says she just wants coffee, and I order some for both of us. She looks tired and admits it.
“Exams,” she explains needlessly.
“I haven’t slept for two days.”
I feel selfconscious, but she could easily pass for my daughter.
“I won’t keep you long,” I say, deciding to get to the point. If Sarah is correct, this girl doesn’t need any priming. I explain briefly what Sarah has told me and that I believe Dade has been set up, but that I can’t explain the motive.
“Why would she pretend she was raped?”
As if on cue, Lauren narrows her eyes.
“To keep Dr.
Hofstra seeing her for as long as she could. He was trying to break it off, and she thought she could get his sympathy by claiming she had been raped.”
I put down my spoon.
“How do you know this?” I ask, dumbfounded.
Lauren doesn’t miss a beat. She tries her coffee first and then says, “She told me.”
“Told you when?” This girl has a way of dramatizing everything she does. I see what Sarah means. She is charming, but I don’t trust her and I’ve only been with her five minutes. The jukebox plays “Runaround Sue” by Dion. There must be five guys my age in here by them selves. It suddenly occurs to me that Danny’s is a gay hangout. Boy, I’m dumb. I thought they just liked the music.
“See, Robin and I used to be good friends. We were in school together up here this past summer, and we shared an apartment. She took a history course, and like an idiot, he showed up one day in our living room. I wasn’t sup posed to be there that weekend, and I walked in on them.
They were just sitting there, but after he left, it was so obvious they were sleeping together that I made her admit it.”
All this comes out in a voice that drops even lower as she continues to talk. The lack of sleep has turned her into a junior Lauren Bacall. I ask, “Did he say anything?”
She stretches, straining her breasts against the wool until I think they are going to pop through. I don’t know whether this is for my benefit or she thinks I’m so harm less that I don’t even notice.
“He muttered something ridiculous about her exam, turned red as a beet, and got out of there. You see, Robin is supposed to be so sweet and demure, but she attracts guys like you wouldn’t believe When I heard she spoke at the WAR rally, I nearly died laughing. She’s no more a feminist than I am. What a hoot!”
It sounds as if Lauren is the jealous one, but I can’t imagine why. Even exhausted, she looks great.
“How do you know she was still having an affair with him when she accused Dade of raping her?”
“Just the week before she told me she was!” Lauren says, wideeyed and innocent as a lamb.
“We had just finished practice, and were walking across campus, and I asked her if she was still seeing him. She didn’t say any thing, but she nodded her head like this.” Lauren moves her head quickly up and down, and then stares into my face to see what kind of effect she has made.
“She said he was trying to break it off, but she had gotten in so deep that she’d do anything to keep him.”
Do anything, huh? It sounds plausible, but because of Sarah’s skepticism, I find I am doubting her. Why? If people were disqualified from testifying in court because of character flaws, there would be no judicial system.
“What did you say?”
“I told her that she’d just end up getting him and her both in all kinds of trouble.”
St. Lauren. It’s a bit of a stretch.
“Why did y’all have a falling out?” I ask.
“Because she’s a hypocrite!” Lauren exclaims.
“I was sympathetic until she started acting like such a martyr.
Robin knows exactly what kind of impression she makes when she walks into a room. Lots of guys love an ice queen like her. They want to be the one to melt her. I can’t prove this, but I think she had liked Dade back in the spring. She never would admit it, and gave out all that crap about helping him in communications. I could understand her liking him, but he’s black and that’s just not worth it up here.”
The jukebox starts up with “The Great Pretender” by The Platters, but she doesn’t seem to be holding much back.
“Who else did she tell about the affair with her teacher?”
“I have no idea,” Lauren says breezily.
“I haven’t told but a couple of girls about it.”
A couple of dozen probably. Honesty mixed in with lies is an irresistible combination, but her story is for the jury to decide.
“Would you be willing to testify at the trial and at a hearing before then if I need you?” If I’m going to be able to get this information into evidence, according to the rape shield statute, I’ll have to file a motion with the court and ask for a hearing.
Lauren stares at the bright red lipstick she has left on the lip of her cinnamon-colored coffee cup.
“Do I have to?” she asks.
“I’d hate to hurt Robin.”
Yeah, right. I resist the temptation to laugh in this girl’s face. Lauren would run over her with a truck if she had the opportunity.
“I’ll have subpoenas issued for you, and that way you won’t have any choice about coming. You’ll have to come back early from Christmas vacation. Is that okay?”
“Cool,” she says, the fingers of her right hand beginning to tap out the beat of the song though I can’t imagine she has ever heard it.
I take out my card and slide it across the Formica top.
“What’s the woat thing Robin knows about you?” I ask, wondering what ax is being grinded here.
“That I can be a real bitch sometimes,” Lauren says, smiling sweetly at me.
I just barely resist saying that I have heard that. We talk for a few more minutes, and then she leaves, but not before I get an address and phone number at her home in El Dorado. I watch her walk out. The other guys don’t even look up. With friends like Lauren, who needs enemies?
At ten o’clock the next morning I watch as a student comes out of Dr. Joseph Hofstra’s office and heads for his door. I want to surprise the guy and watch his immediate reaction. My guess is that he might like to avoid Dade’s trial almost as much as Dade. If Robin is still involved emotionally with him, she might not want to go forward with the trial if he is going to be dragged into it.
The door to his office is open, and I introduce myself to a dark-haired man who looks around the eyes like a young Warren Beatty. He is around thirty, dressed in blue denim pants and a blue workshirt. I can see how the coeds could keep his office hours busy. He squints as if he ought to know who I am but can’t place me. He puts down a book whose title I can’t make out, and asks, his voice droll, “Are you one of my students?”
He probably thinks I’m a book salesman. From the hundreds lining the walls I’d say he doesn’t need any more. I say bluntly, “I represent Dade Cunningham in the rape trial that is coming up in a couple of weeks. I under
