50. In Gun We Trust

After the Fort Hood shooting in 2009 in which 14 people were killed and 32 injured, there was the usual call for gun control and its opponents’ cry for the protection of the 2nd Amendment of the US constitution that states the right to bear arms for all citizens. People, including students, all over America protested in the streets demanding that the 2nd Amendment be abolished, or at least that “something be done.” 

The President of  Schumaker University acted immediately and peremptorily. He announced to the press that the University’s renowned School of Criminal Justice would respond to these student protests by scheduling a special seminar that would examine the 2nd Amendment in detail and consider whether or not it really did express the right for all citizens to carry or own assault weapons, and even consider whether it should be abolished all together. The obvious professor to teach such a seminar was, of course, the only lawyer on the Criminal Justice faculty, Professor Theodore Garcia (aka Ted the Red), currently demonstrating with the students, though also the most feared professor on campus.

This was a most remarkable and brash step of the university, especially as it garnered broad attention from the media. However, the edict came directly from the President’s office, bypassing the faculty. That is, Provost Dolittle was not consulted, or if she was, she said she was not. You may remember that our university President was a former prison governor, so we should not be all that surprised that he would respond in this way. He had even once confided in Colmes (so Colmes once told me in one of his few lighter moments) that he had a collection of guns, and loved to go deer hunting every season. There was yet another concerning fact about this measure. The Dean of Criminal Justice was not consulted either. Or more precisely, the Dean was informed by the President that he had asked Professor Garcia to teach the seminar on the 2nd Amendment. At the time, however, the President had not yet made contact with Ted the Red who was somewhere downtown demonstrating with students demanding more gun control.

Now, while one might understand the annoyance of the Dean of Criminal Justice for having this laid on her, the nuisance of having to adjust the class schedules to cope for this special class, there was a further issue that worried her. She was concerned that Ted the Red would not be able to teach such a small class, and further, he was so feared by the students that she doubted that anyone would sign up for a small class conducted by Ted the Red. It was one thing to sit in a class of maybe eighty or more students with Ted the Red haranguing them and calling on students to answer a question. In a large class there was a reasonable chance that one would not be called upon. But in a seminar of maybe a dozen students, the situation was, to say the least, frightening. 

One might add that the Dean of Justice was a formidable force in her own right. She was a tall, upright woman in her late fifties, a copious head of gray hair, coifed in a way that a shock of hair hung down over her slightly drooping left eyelid. People joked that she could be Lady Justice, if given a set of scales to hold. And she would need to be formidable to cope with the likes of Ted the Red. In fact, the way that she dealt with this submerged possibility of some kind of abrasion between them, was to avoid him. So the President had, maybe by accident or maybe through cunning, communicated directly with Ted the Red to teach the seminar on the 2nd Amendment, thus saving the Dean from having to speak with Ted the Red herself.  She was much relieved at this, so was almost happy to put up with the nuisance of rearranging the class schedules, though she knew that Ted the Red would demand a price for taking on the course. Probably, he would ask for a semester off teaching, which she would refuse, and he would then go directly to the President.

But Ted the Red had his own concerns.

*

According to Colmes’s prodigious memory, Professor Theodore Garcia, aka Ted the Red, was born somewhere in Washington Heights, NYC, not far from the  Dominican enclave that extended all the way uptown where it merged with Harlem. His biological parents, though, were unknown, because he was apparently abandoned and found wandering around the Holyrood Episcopal Church and was taken in by a Dominican Republic couple. To his adoptive parents’ surprise, Ted grew at a rapid rate and by the time he was finishing high school he was well over six feet tall, lean and thin, surely a budding professional basketball player, which was of course his dream. The theory was, actually I think it was the Colmes theory, that Ted’s aggressive persona that glowed from every point of his stringy body originated and was even encouraged by his high school basketball coach. All of this his Dominican parents watched in awe and consternation. Neither of them was tall, though they were not short either. Yet they felt small every time they found themselves near him or talking to him, because he did, as do many who are naturally very tall, look down at others, I mean lowered his eyes, while others, of course, had to look up to him.

 A few headhunters sniffed around and watched Theodore play for his local high school, but eventually shrugged, and said that while he was obviously very tall, he could not play pro basketball because he was too thin and could not hold his own against the better built and musclebound opponents from Harlem and elsewhere. But Ted refused to give up on his dream and, thanks again to his parents’ hard work and string-pulling (he was white after all, and they were not), received a basketball scholarship to enter college at NYU. Maybe College basketball was the place for him, said his parents.

So Ted’s story was that he would have been a pro basketball player, if only his parents had encouraged him and fed him more so that he could muscle up. But his parents, although they could not afford it from the  income they made in their tiny restaurant, fed him enormous amounts, but he remained skinny. And when his well-meaning parents saw that he was not going to get any bigger, and likely never would be a pro basketball player, they began to harp on him that he must study more and go to graduate school. Then as luck would have it (or bad luck however one chooses to look at it), when he was a senior in the final game of the College playoffs, he fell as he came down from the highest leap he had ever managed, and his left leg crumpled beneath him. He had thrown the winning goal, but his knee was severely damaged, and his ankle broken in several places. He would never play competitive basketball again.

His parents were greatly relieved and gave thanks to Jesus and Mary in their favorite Church of the Incarnation. And Ted reluctantly agreed that he would apply to law school. Again, his parents pulled out all the stops, and managed to get him accepted into NYU law school on a disability scholarship, the argument being that he was handicapped by having non-white parents. Though, as the admissions director pointed out to him, because he was born in Washington Heights there was a good chance that he was actually Jewish. “And what did that have to do with it?” Ted asked belligerently, though in retrospect, he realized (I am guessing here),  that he was really asking that question of himself.

I needed to tell you all of this because what happened next could not have been anticipated. Ted did not especially excel at law school though he did well enough.  There were many reasons for this. First, he felt out of place at the law school. He came from the Dominican Republic (the NYC version that is) and just did not fit in with the mostly all white students, even though he was white himself. The majority of his class mates were focused on one thing: graduating into a top law firm and making lots of money. And most of them would need to, of course, given the debts they ran up to pay for their law school fees. But more importantly, because of his outsider complex, it slowly dawned on him what his parents had done for him. Against all odds, they had so many hurdles to overcome to get him through high school and then to college. They had sacrificed a large portion of their lives. All for him. And they continued to slave away in their little restaurant, dealing with rude government officials, cops who would expect a free lunch and the rest.

Please understand that I am only speculating here. Maybe there was some other reason. In any case, out of the blue as his last year in law school was coming to an end, and he had put up with the awful periods as an intern at various law firms, and had concluded, telling his parents, “I love the law, but I hate law firms,” he received an offer from the Dean of the new School of Criminal Justice at upstate Schumaker University. As a professor in this great new experiment in higher education, he would be the only lawyer in the new school, the other professors would be from various kinds of social sciences and public administration.

*

Theodore Garcia accepted the generous offer for a position as Associate Professor with tenure, not realizing how incredibly unusual this was. Every beginning professor would traditionally in the American system receive a three year term as an assistant professor, then go up for renewal, then go up for tenure in their fifth or sixth year. Whether Professor Garcia knew how amazing this was, or whether he simply accepted it as his due, one cannot tell. I am inclined toward the latter for reasons that will become clear shortly. In any case, this matter of his teaching a special seminar on the 2nd amendment coincided with his having just received promotion to full professor. This, mind you, after barely five years as an associate. But during those five years he had established a reputation of being fiercely stern, a severe disciplinarian, and demanding of very high standards. I can attest to one case, which if we have space, I will recount in a later case, of the student whom he failed in a final exam outright with no possibility of appeal, because, Professor Garcia said, his handwriting was illegible.

So, bypassing the Dean, the President sent an emissary to Professor Garcia who was, as was his proud custom, demon­strating his solidarity with a small bunch of students, in front of the Capitol building in downtown Albany, demanding the re-hiring of a university gardener whom the President of the university had fired because he trimmed the hedge in front of his university residence too low.

When he felt the tug on his arm, Ted the Red raised that arm ready to slap whoever it was, assuming it was some kind of government official, maybe even a cop. It was, however, a very pretty young woman, might even have been a graduate student.

“May I have a word?” she asked, “the President sent me to give you this.”  She held out a brown New York State envelope.

“Can’t you see I’m busy?” answered Ted curtly. Of course, like most of his professorial colleagues, he derided  admin­istration officials, regardless of rank.

“I am the President’s secretary,” she  shouted trying to overcome the noise of the protesters.

“What, then?” called Ted, pulling up straight, reaching his full height, looking down on this puny but beautiful secretary.

“He wants you to teach a select seminar on the second amendment, starting next week. Twelve students, mixed graduate and undergraduate,” she instructed with great satisfaction.

“Fuck off!” shouted Ted.

The plucky secretary held her own. She pushed the official memo from the President into Ted’s hand and left hurriedly. Professor Garcia didn’t scare her, but she was frightened that she may get scooped up by riot police and end up in jail with Ted the Red, a horrible thought!

*

Over severe protestations by Ted the Red at having to drop everything and teach a special seminar to just twelve students, the seminar was inserted into the official calendar of the School of Criminal Justice and twelve students, six seniors and six graduate students signed up for it, after some cajoling from the Dean but also the agreement that the seminar would be for six credits, and would be free. Professor Garcia could hardly have refused to teach the seminar. After all he had been downtown on several occasions protesting with students demanding that the 2nd amendment be abolished. 

However Ted the Red had other concerns, in retrospect quite understandable, and had shared these concerns with none other than my mentor, Professor Colmes. I had heard Ted’s gravelly rolling voice come through the wall from Colmes’s office. So was none too surprised that I received the familiar bang on the wall and cry of “Hobson!”

I entered Colmes’s office and found Professor Garcia sitting back in the old overstuffed leather chair in the corner, his long legs protruding well into the rest of the office. I took up my place on the wicker chair across from my mentor.

“The two of you have met?” asked Colmes directing the question to me. Ted showed no inclination to respond.

“We have, though maybe the professor does not remember. I took his constitutional law class some years ago,” I said looking across at the professor.

“I expect that you have heard of the seminar on the 2nd amendment that Professor Garcia has kindly offered to teach,” said Colmes with a wry smile.

“Sure. But what is the problem? I take it there is a problem or we would not be meeting like this,” I said trying to convey a confidence of my own.

“The professor here is concerned that there may be some, shall we say, potential for violence, in the class,” observed Colmes.

“With only a class of twelve? Surely that can be controlled easily enough,” I said grandly, forgetting who was sitting, steaming, in the corner. I looked sideways and saw Ted cross and uncross his long legs.

“What we say stays in this room, right?” demanded Professor Garcia.

“Indeed. Indeed,” assured Colmes. “Is that not right Hobson?”

“Of course, Colmes. Of course.” I said assuming that the more I repeated myself the more likely I was to be believed.

Garcia sat forward on the edge of the old leather chair, doubling up his legs. “The fact is, that if I was teaching it in a regular class of my usual seventy or eighty students, that is easier to control than a small group that sits in a small room, where we are all on the same level, within touching distance of each other,” explained the professor.

“How so?” I asked cheekily. I admit that I have never much likely this pompous bully. A typical lawyer.

“Since you have taken my course, you know that I use the Socratic method,” he informed me as though he were beginning a lecture.

Of course, I was well acquainted with it. It was the bastardization of the Socratic method as used in all law school teaching. The professor has a seat plan and every student is assigned a seat where they must sit in every lecture. This meant that the professor could call on someone at random by name and demand an answer in response to his question. It meant that in fact, the professor would rarely get to know anyone in his large class, never really relate to any of them person to person, even though it looked like that on the surface. The real Socrates engaged his students man-to-man, so to speak. “I do,” I replied, biting my tongue.

Colmes intervened. “The professor is concerned that in any discussion on such a heated topic, a fight might break out in the seminar, since people are basically sitting on top of one another, and ever so close to the professor, whom,—correct me if I am wrong about this, Professor — they may resent anyway, and maybe even direct their aggression towards whoever they see as the aggressor which may well be him, the professor.”

“You mean,” I offered, turning to face Garcia,  “that up close in a small group you are not as scary, as you are facing a large faceless crowd?”  I asked a little cheekily.

“I would say so,” answered Garcia, bristling a little.

“Isn’t the answer, then,” I said confidently, “to offer a series of lectures to a large crowd rather than to a small seminar?”

Colmes leaned forward. “I agree. But both the Provost and the President, neither of whom have much experience as teachers, will accept it. In their view they are doing Professor Garcia a favor. Much less preparation they point out, no long lectures to prepare. Simply assigned reading and serious discussion in an intimate setting. A highly personal experience for the students.”

Garcia stood and looked down on us. “What really pisses me off is that if I were teaching in a law school, I would be paid twice the money I’m getting here,” he said, to us, plaintively and pathetically, and obviously a totally irrelevant observation.

I was about to say something that would be insulting, but Colmes intervened. “Indeed. Indeed. But I think that it is a different matter that you should take up with the Provost. For now, let me suggest that my excellent colleague here, Hobson, sit in on your seminar and act as a kind of rudder, should the discussion get out of hand.”

“But you will not attend?” pleaded Garcia. “That is precisely why I came to you.”

“For me to remain available to intervene when necessary, all my work must be behind the scenes. Besides I will appear like some intruder or something, as I am too old to be a student. Hobson here actually is technically still a student,” insisted Colmes.

Ted the Red looked down to each of us in turn. He walked towards the door, then returned. “You understand, that it will be on you if something happens,” he warned.

“Indeed. Indeed,” repeated Colmes.

*

The seminar was scheduled in a small meeting room that sported rows of empty bookshelves around the walls, a small window at one end, the entire space of the room filled with one long polished rosewood table with lean-back chairs that seated twelve people comfortably. Rather like a small boardroom, as I imagined it to be, since I had never been in one. I purposely arrived a little late, planning to seat myself away from the table, but as it happened, I ended up sitting at one end, facing Garcia who, as he was unable to think otherwise, took up what he thought was his natural place at the head of the table.

Now, as an observer of the classroom of considerable experience, mostly as a full time student, but also on and off as a teaching assistant to various professors, I could see that by placing himself at the head of the table, Garcia assumed that he would be the natural supreme authority. He was, after all, a bully, and thought that it was his natural right to “lay down the law.” As far as I could tell, the students were self-selected on a first come first served basis. There were half a dozen undergraduates who had no idea what to expect, cowed by the presence of half a dozen graduate students, all of them as far as I could see, doing their doctorate, except for one older male. One is tempted to characterize this class as a kind of academic version of the movie “Twelve Angry Men.”  There was in fact just one female student and she was black. The rest were an assortment of young students, except for one male who I guessed was one of the NYPD cops having a great time with a year off with pay to attend grad school and get his Masters. All the students leaned forward in their chairs expectantly. The cop pushed back in his seat as did I, to survey the scene before him.

Ted the Red, as he handed out a sheet of paper that contained a half dozen questions, introduced himself and the seminar. “Welcome to this our first seminar on the 2nd Amendment of the Constitution concerning citizen right to bear arms. Let us get to know each other. Starting on my left, please tell us who you are and a little of why you are here…”

I need not go into the niceties of the start of a class. But I can say that I already saw that the black female and the cop were both equally aggressive and I’m guessing opinionated. They would dominate the discussion.

Ted continued, “in case you have not read it, there is a brief summary of the 2nd amendment on the back of the question sheet. Let us begin with the first question. What are arms?”

Silence.

To a professor who is used to lecturing in class, or calling on a petrified student from a seating plan, silence is the most feared non-event in the classroom, like “dead air” in a radio broadcast. There is the assumption that nothing is happening. This may be so on the radio. But in the classroom there is a lot going on, especially during uncalled-for silence. I watched the cop, whose name was Ben, and the black female who told everyone to call her Peggy, the slave name of  her grandmother. For only a few seconds, that I am sure seemed to Ted like many minutes, all students squirmed and shifted in their seats. Who would be first to break the silence?

The professor could not wait. The silence already informed him that he was not in control. Students were resisting his request. He wanted to call on someone as he would do in a class of fifty with a seating plan. He had no idea who these students were and had already forgotten their names. And so he broke the silence.

“Let’s begin with the collective rights theory,” he pronounced with his usual lawyerly authority.

The cop, Ben, immediately responded, tapping himself on a place near his left breast.

“I knew it. This is bullshit. Why not start with the individual right theory? You’re biased like all the rest of the commie students and faculty at this place!”

“Please mind your language,” growled Ted, staring down at the table, unable to believe that a student spoke like this, to a professor no less.

“Apologies. It’s just that I’m sick of the obvious bias against guns without any understanding of why we must have them,” responded Ben with an air of considerable confidence.

Ted was tempted to take up the argument, but managed not to get caught. Instead he continued with his professorial lawyerly style, and addressing Ben directly saying, “if you turn over the question sheet you will see the exact language of the 2nd amendment. Read it out for us, if you would please… Ben, is it?”

Ben’s face went a little red. He was not going to do it. He sat looking sullenly at the table. Another dreaded silence descended on the room. It was more than Professor Garcia could stand, so, without thinking, he stood up and started to walk about the small room, reverting to his usual lecturing manner, reading the text of the 2nd Amendment. “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be…."

Suddenly, Ben again tapped the bulge near his left breast and said, “I’m a cop and packing a gun right now. So what? Are you going to disarm me?”

“You racist son-of-a-bitch,” blurted Peggy, the grand-daughter of a slave.

“Decorum please,” pleaded Ted, who now had returned to his seat. The rest of the class looked down and shuffled nervously. “I hope this is just talk, Ben. Guns are not allowed on campus,” lectured Ted. The necessity of the moment that he address students by their first name irked him. He preferred the formal  last name, even though there was some difficulty these days concerning gender and marital status.

Ben was not going to let it go. “Who says? Where’s the rule? Off-duty cops are allowed to carry their gun in New York.”

Peggy would not remain quiet either. “You racist pigs are all the same. You think that shooting someone solves every problem!” she exclaimed, looking around the room trying to catch the eyes of everyone, but all were looking down at the table, the most useful piece of furniture in a seminar room.

“Please refrain from ad hominem dialogue,” lectured Ted.

“Ad who?” mocked Peggy, “why not ad feminem?” Peggy grinned broadly. She had at least provoked a small titter from the other students, especially the women. Except for Ben, the male students in the room sat quiet, sullen.

Another dreaded silence descended. 

Ben slowly and carefully reached for his gun and placed it carefully on the table in front of him. He looked around the room. All stared at it, shocked. Ted stared at it too. He was very tempted to reach out with his long arms and take it. Instead, he sat back and crossed his arms, as would a teacher who was about to make a wise and serious comment about his students’ behavior. 

At this point, I chose to excuse myself making certain movements to convey the fact that I needed to go to the bathroom. A few students looked sideways at me, but most kept their heads down, waiting for the next potentially explosive event. I had decided that things had already gone too far. I planned to find a phone and call Colmes who had asked me to keep him informed. However as soon as I exited, I almost tripped over Colmes’s protruding leg where he sat just outside the door, cross legged.

“Trouble?” asked Colmes.

“You wouldn’t believe it,” I muttered. “One of the students who is a cop has produced his gun and placed it on the table.”

“Was he provoked?” Colmes asked calmly.

“Maybe. The only black student in the class called him a racist pig.”

“Indeed! Indeed!” exclaimed Colmes. Get back in there and tell Professor Garcia to dismiss the class. This is dangerous!”

“OK!” I turned to go back in.

“On second thoughts, I had better do it,” said Colmes.

“OK again.”

I went to open the door when it was suddenly thrust open and Peggy rushed out followed by all the other students who then dispersed in different directions, chattering loudly to each other.

“What happened?” I asked Peggy, as I hurried to keep up with her.

“Ask the asshole cop. I’m going home,” she growled.

Colmes had already entered the seminar room and was quizzing Professor Garcia. Ben the cop sat, his gun no longer on the table, presumably he had put it away.

“I tried to inform them,” said Ted, “that in a university differences are resolved by civilized discussion, that the presence of a gun undermines rational thought and action. That is why if they are not banned on campus, they should be.”

Colmes turned to Ben. “I am Colmes,” he announced quietly, “one of the university’s security officers.” He reached for his ID, but Ben immediately got up to leave.

“No need. I know who you are. I’m leaving,” said Ben. “I can see that cops are unwelcome on a university campus. They will learn their lesson next time there is a campus mass shooting.” He stalked out of the room, in a great hurry.

Colmes bowed ever so slightly in eastern style to Ted, and extended his hand.

“Sorry this has fallen on your shoulders,” said Colmes.

“Does this mean that the seminar is off?” asked Ted, with an expectant grin.

“Who knows?” quipped Colmes. “We faculty are always the last to be consulted.

Ted eyed Colmes with a mixture of amusement and puzzlement.  “Oh, I didn’t realize you were one of us,” by which he meant that he thought Colmes was not a professor but one of the diffuse administration.

“I teach every day,” pronounced Colmes, “it never stops, does it Hobson?”

Taken by surprise, I quickly replied, “Oh right!” and then added, “you know, I think we should follow up on this disaster.”

“There has been a disaster?” asked Colmes, “I was under the impression that it was just a fiery disagreement between a couple of students.”

Ted looked down at Colmes and growled, “true, but there was a gun involved.”

Colmes appeared to ignore Ted and asked me, “follow up where or when?”

“The carpark. They both walked towards the carpark.”

“Indeed! Indeed! Why did you not mention this before? Cars are just as dangerous as guns!” cried Colmes. “Hurry, there’s no time to waste.”

We both ran off, leaving Ted, who could not join us because of his knee injury. We arrived just in time to see Ben walking slowly to his car, preoccupied no doubt and wondering what the consequences of his confrontation with the African American woman in class would be. He had foolishly produced a gun in class. All the other cops who attended class carried their concealed weapons on campus. Now there would be an inquiry. And he would be blamed.

He looked across the car park and saw me and Colmes running towards him. Then he looked behind him and saw an old blue 1980s Dodge K-car bearing down on him. Peggy screamed “take this you fucking pig,” as she drove straight at him. His head told him “pull out your gun! Your gun!” But his body had already responded and he reflexively jumped sideways enough for the K-car to just graze his backside and send him sprawling away from the speeding car.

“Racist shit! That will teach you!” yelled Peggy as she turned out of the car park and looking in her rear vision mirror, drove away, singing, “Go Down! Moses!” at the top of her voice.

I was about to wave to Peggy, but Colmes grabbed my arm. “Now, now! Dear boy! Don’t reveal your colors,” whatever that meant. “Let us tend to our policeman and make sure he is not harmed. It is a good idea to be on the right — I emphasize right — side of the law, don’t you think Hobson?”

49. The Cheat

Hou Wang’s parents were so proud of him when he was born. He showed great intelligence immediately he was delivered. His eyes wide open, looking all around the room, and even cooing instead of crying. His gaze settled first on his father when he received him into his loving arms, then to his mother laying exhausted on the bed, head pushed back into the pillow. But there was no doubt about it. His eyes followed his mom or dad whoever was closer to his little body. He clearly absorbed everything around him. His dad loved to pick him up, raise him quickly above his head, and Hou Wang would scream with delight as his dad let go and caught him as gravity brought him down. Such a happy family!

They were certain that they had given birth to a genius. His mom double checked to make sure that his name was down for the very best English multi-lingual school in Beijing. It was not long before he was talking. His mom spoke to him in Chinese, his dad in English, not to mention some French and a little Spanish. They could hardly wait for him to start school. 

There was, however, one troubling coincidence. The day Hou Wang  was born was the day of the Tiananmen Square massacre. Of course, it was just a coincidence. But his mom was very concerned. Coincidences occurred for a reason, she insisted. But Dad told her not to be silly. They were both well educated, and serious devotees of Confucius so were not inclined to take much notice of the signs and symbols of everyday life. But they occasionally dropped by a Buddhist temple to say a little prayer and leave a frangipani petal just to let the great spirit know that they acknowledged a life beyond their own.

It so happened that on that infamous day, Dad, or about-to-be-Dad, sprinted across Tiananmen Square on his way to the hospital. He had received word that the baby would be born any time soon, and, remarkably, had received permission from his boss at the local post office to attend the birth. It was early in the morning and the demonstrators had not yet appeared at the Square. He noticed camera crews getting into place, arranging their cameras, but thought nothing much of it. There were often gatherings at the square. It was only much later when he arrived home with his wife and new  baby that they heard from neighbors what had happened.  None of it was, of course, shown on the TV. But there were other sources of information pouring in from the west via faxes, radio and so on. The Chinese Government had not caught up with the new communication technologies and was still working on controlling what the western media could have access to in Chinese territory..

But what the Chinese government did have well developed was a system of spies and some of their own technology, especially cameras installed in many places, particularly at Tiananmen Square, not to mention in the hospital where they monitored the one child policy. 

The brief moment of joy that Hou Wang’s mom and dad had when their one baby, and a boy at that, was born was soon shattered by an arrest of Dad and threats against Mom that the authorities would take away their one child, as it was clear to them that they were not responsible parents if the father was going to participate in an insurrection. In fact, a petty official pointed out to the father that the punishment for his appearance at Tiananmen square could have been death.

These were the origins of Hou Wang’s life. How his parents eventually managed to escape to Brazil when Hou Wang was ten years old, where the family managed to scrape by running  a tiny Chinese restaurant, the Confucian Grill, in Rio de Janeiro, as one of many Chinese refugees. One that finally led, when Hou Wang was sixteen years old, just graduated from high school, to the treck up through Mexico and the walk across the Rio Grande into the USA to enter God’s promised land. These stories Hou Wang had not told anyone at the School of Criminal Justice where he was accepted as a graduate student in 2005. His English by that time had developed greatly in its fluency, though his mother tongues remained  Chinese and close seconds, Portuguese and Spanish. He zoomed through the School of Criminal Justice graduate program, and in fact I attended his dissertation defense, a brilliant performance and a dissertation written beautifully, the topic being a study of juvenile delinquency in New York City’s chinatown. It also happened that it was a dissertation that Colmes had helped supervise, though was not its chair. That position, was, believe it or not, occupied by the Provost, most unusual, since Provosts were supposed to be too busy with academic affairs to have the time to serve on dissertation committees. But it was her way, as Colmes pointed out to me later, of making herself look scholarly and very much one of the faculty, an academic first, and an administrator second. Hou Wang went on to pursue a career at John Jay college where he received early tenure in 2012. It was just after he received tenure that Colmes received the call.

***

I quickly stopped trying to draft my dissertation proposal and responded to Colmes’s call and bang on the wall. No sooner had I taken up my place on the wicker chair than Colmes plunged into one of  his favorite topics.

“Cheating,” insisted Colmes, “is breaking a rule in order to gain unfair advantage.”

 We have had many a debate about this perennial problem that is endemic to academia, if not life in general, and Colmes went on as though this were the continuation of one of our debates. My retort has always been, yes, but rules are made to be broken, that without there being any rules, there would be no such thing as cheating. And therefore no villain to vilify. Colmes always made fun of my position, simply chuckling and saying what he thought was obvious, that rules are necessary to maintain order. What would happen if everyone did what they pleased, regardless of the rules? There would be chaos.

“Rules,” pronounced Colmes in his Victorian manner, “maketh the man.” 

“Indeed, and you are their direct product,” I would say with a grin.

“And I am proud of it,” Colmes would say in his most haughty manner. He would then go on to use the example of the game of cricket, a game above all games in his opinion, that could not be played without the detailed rules of the game put in place at its foundation, and the willingness of players to abide by those rules.

And again I would point out that there are many games, if not all, in which players will try to use the rules to their advantage, a typical technique being to trick an opponent into breaking a rule, such as in basketball, when one commonly tries to “draw a foul” from the opponent. (You will immediately see that this is yet another variation of “entrapment” as are described in other cases.)

“Ah yes, there you have me, Hobson, there you have me,” Colmes would retort, sitting back in his chair, tapping his fingers together. “But this incontrovertible fact is a necessary evil, for without it there would be no game to play.”

“True, so true,” I would respond, “though maybe life would be better without competitive sport, which is basically what you are defending.”

“The game of life, Hobson! Mutual aid is impossible, my boy! If only humans were made differently! You are an anarchist at heart,” Colmes would say, signaling the end of our debate. For he had resorted to the trick of attacking the person rather than the issue. The first step to abuse.

But he always allowed himself the last word. There were, after all, no written rules for our discourse. Colmes would say that they were informally agreed upon. Which really meant that he made up the rules to suite himself.

 “By the way, Hobson, you have surely noticed that all the Ivy League universities have revered team sports since their very inception. They are a means of cementing students together, raising rules of the game to  a sacred level.”

“Colmes,” I sighed. “Is this the only reason you summoned me? To make our past debates a kind of debating game? I am trying to write a dissertation, you know.”

“I will withhold any comment on that,” said Colmes with a wry smile.

I had left myself open on that, and deserved any sarcastic comment he might choose to make about my inability to get my dissertation done.

“Do you remember our student Hou Wang?” he asked as though we were starting our conversation afresh.

“I certainly do. A brilliant student.”

“Indeed, indeed. I just received a frantic phone call from him asking for my help.”

“What? Surely it’s not something to do with our little cheating discussion?”

“It certainly is. He has been fired from his position. It seems that our dear Provost informed them that he in fact did not write his dissertation, that he paid someone else to ghost write it.”

I was aghast and could not believe it.

***

The case of cheating that I will now relate to you is not especially unique or different from  the many cases of cheating Colmes has had referred to him. One would think that, given cheating in academia is absolutely forbidden, there would be no necessity to refer any case of cheating to Colmes. The rules were clearly stated in the University’s handbook, and professors were encouraged to include a statement something like “cheating is a serious matter and may result in expulsion of the student from the university”  in their class syllabus.

But before we get to the case in hand, you should know — and if you have been a student yourself no doubt you have experienced cheating either as a participant or recipient of cheating and its outcomes—that there are many forms of cheating in academia. Here is just a short list of some of the ways students may gain unfair advantage:

·       Submit a paper as your own that was written by someone else (a friend or foe, bought off the internet)

·       In a formal written exam, short answer or multiple choice, copy answers from a person sitting next to you (perhaps the more traditional form of cheating, commonly practiced throughout one’s life beginning in kindergarten).

·       Copying chunks of text from a text book, stringing them together to make a paper, commonly called plagiarism (a very complex form of cheating as we will see in a later case).

·       Feigning illness during a formal exam, thus gaining more time or even a chance of a do-over.

·       Claiming a disability (e.g. dyslexia) in order to get additional time to complete a formal exam.

·       Students combining their efforts to complete a “take-home” exam. This is cheating unless assigned as a group effort by the teacher. The grading of these assignments is however fraught with difficulties, not the least being that there may be a freeloader in the group, who contributes little but still gets the group grade.

·       Sneaking answers or forbidden materials such as books or  notes into a formal  exam.

·       Requesting a bathroom break from a formal exam when it is not needed.

·       Stealing a look at a formal exam paper ahead of time. This takes considerable effort and innovation on the part of the student or students.

·       Bribing or other methods to get the answers to exam questions in advance.

·       Asking a teacher to explain a particular multiple choice question in order to glean the correct answer.

·       Sleeping with one’s professor.

There are many more variations of the above. No doubt you are acquainted with many of them. The charge made against Hou Wang is one of the many types of cheating. This was unusual only because it was made a few years after the student had graduated and had a job elsewhere.

***

You will pardon me from indulging in a little, what one might say, racial or ethnic exegesis.  I do this knowing that I may tread on a fine line and may perhaps fall off one side or the other. But it is necessary in order to understand the intricacies of this case.

Our Provost, as I have noted in other cases, is of Chinese origin, though I am not privy as to how much Chinese she is. I hasten to add that in my personal opinion the answer to that question is irrelevant to the actual substantive details of the case, that is, (1) whether or not employing a ghost writer is against the rules, and (2) does it make moral or ethical sense to retrospectively punish for the offense, the effects being catastrophic, that is, loss of one’s job, and in all likelihood, making it impossible for Hou Wang to work in academia ever again. Is it simply a matter of whether what Hou Wang did was cheating or not? Or does that irascible fact of time erase or soften the offense?

But let me take my observations further, further than is wise, I admit. For it is my carefully considered observation that many whose background is similar to that of Hou Wang, educated in environments that place great emphasis on rote learning and recitation, especially the recitation of texts (often religious or political) are more likely to be charged with various forms of plagiarism. And yes, you see where I am going. Might this not also apply to the Provost who, if my guess is right, comes from a similar background as Hou Wang, has herself committed such acts of cheating? 

I followed Colmes into the Provost’s office. I was surprised that he had allowed this to happen. For being her “guests” we were surely placed on a somewhat lower platform, under her watchful eye.

“Please take a seat, gentlemen,” said the Provost calmly, “I will be with you in a moment, just finishing off the official five year plan that the faculty senate has approved, and it will now go to the President for his approval.”

Colmes took up a chair across her desk and indicated me to do the same. He had a serious look, though I was not sure whether this was put on for her benefit. I also of course, remembered the past incident of the snakes, so although the social setting in the Provost’s office may have appeared that she had the upper hand, Colmes held as always the ace card. However, as he often reminded me. You only get to play the ace card once.

The Provost continued to write. Colmes glanced at me as if warning me that a red light was approaching. “Who made the call to John Jay and made this preposterous allegation against one of our finest alumni?” he asked in a demanding, pedantically controlled voice.

The Provost did not look up. “The letter came from me, but it was typed up by one of my secretaries,” she replied in a monotone.

“I am aghast, Madam Provost, at your recklessness,” Colmes  pronounced in his best anglicized Chicago accent. This was enough for her to put down her pen and look across the desk, first at Colmes then at me.

“I don’t know how you put up with him and his hastiness,” she addressed to me.

I shifted in my chair, but waited for Colmes to answer, since the question was really leveled at him.

“The revelation is all the more concerning should it become public knowledge. The media will have a field day with it,” warned Colmes.

“So you don’t deny that the allegation is true?” asked the Provost, herself the picture of moral righteousness.

 “That is irrelevant. But tell me, why did you do this?  Do you not understand what you have done? These issues are complicated as you well know. They are best left alone and kept within the bounds of the academic institution. Furthermore, it is surely likely that similar activities go on at John Jay. It is not in their interest to have this revealed.”

The Provost began writing again and did not look up. Now her endemic rudeness showed, a fact of which Colmes would take advantage. He continued.

“It is puzzling to me, since I know that you are guilty of the same or similar offense, are you not?” Colmes had raised his voice at the end of the sentence, causing her to stop writing and stare at the paper upon which she wrote. “Are you not?” repeated Colmes aggressively.

I shifted on my chair and cleared my throat. The fact was,  this was getting a bit too close to home. My own record was not unblemished. Who in academia could say they have not cheated in one way or another? Bearing in mind, of course, the huge array of actions that could fall under the general heading of “cheating.”

The Provost finally stopped her writing put down her pen, pushed back in her chair and asked both of us, “What do you want of me? To take back the accusation?”

“Madam Provost. I think only of the reputation of our fine institution, but also of the life and livelihood of our outstanding alumnus. He is an outstanding individual, given where he came from, well on with a wonderful career, much of it thanks to us, but also recognizing all that he has overcome in his life. has achieved wonders…”

“I think Mr. Hobson should perhaps leave us for a moment,” interrupted the Provost.

“Do not try to distract from the substance of this natter. My esteemed colleague and good friend is party to everything I do. He is completely trustworthy. At question here, Madam Provost, is your trust.” Colmes was now at his  bullying best. I thought I saw her cringe just slightly, hunching her shoulders a little. She gave me a quick look, then turned back to Colmes.

“So what are we to do?” she asked plaintively.

Colmes changed slightly his position, and placed one hand on her desk. “Who has dealt with this matter at John Jay?” Colmes asked now as though they were two friends plotting a course of action.

“Only my counterpart at John Jay.”

“And have you spoken directly with Hou Wang?” asked Colmes.

“No. I left it all up to their Provost.”

“Left what up to the Provost?”

“I did not make the first call. It was their Provost who called me. Someone had tipped him off. He would not tell me who.”

“Indeed! Indeed!” cried Colmes. “Now I see what has happened. Our Hou Wang has an enemy. And most likely that enemy is someone working for the CCP.”

“The who?” asked Provost Dolittle. I was glad she asked.

“The Chinese Communist Party. They never forget or forgive,” pronounced Colmes with much affected authority. In any case, I believed it.

The room fell silent. Colmes looked across at me, as though expecting me to say something.  Provost Dolittle returned to her writing. We were at an impasse.

For some reason, I was stirred to speak. I returned Colmes’s look and made the plunge.

“If we are honest,” I mused, as though speaking in a tutorial, “cheating is inevitable, indeed, cannot be avoided. Everyone does it. It’s just the unlucky ones who get caught. And there are some who have suffered so much in life, they deserve a break…”

Madam Provost looked up from her writing and slowly and carefully put down her pen.  But it was my boss Colmes who picked up the point, though  not in a way I would have liked.

“Right you are, Hobson. But that does not solve our problem of how to repair the damage done.”

I was about to respond when the Provost intervened. “Everyone does not cheat, and in any case, even if they did, it does not excuse Hou Wang’s behavior. What would the roads be like if there were no punishments for traffic offenses, which everyone at some time in their lives commits?”

I stirred again. “It’s not so much a matter of whether to punish, but how much. Hou Wang has been punished by having his entire career destroyed, this after a stellar performance. It is excessively destructive. What if people who committed speeding offenses lost their job for driving five miles per hour above he limit… their lives destroyed?”

At that moment there was a light knock at the door.

“Come!” called the Provost.

In walked a dapper, smartly dressed young man, thin, tall and standing stiffly upright like a staff, hands at his side, one hand holding a shiny new briefcase. For a moment I thought he was going to salute. It was Hou Wang. He looked younger than he did five years ago when he defended his dissertation.

“Come!” beckoned Colmes, “we were just finishing up.”

The Provost glared at Colmes. We were neither finished, nor anywhere near a solution, as far as she was concerned.

Hou Wang stood nervously facing us all. There were no other chairs, and I quickly realized that Doctor Dolittle had no intention of calling for one. So I did. “Here, take my chair,” I said as I made for the door and called for a chair. Hou Wang bowed slightly, his eastern habits still with him. But he remained standing. Colmes stood and shook his hand.

“Very nice to see you again after all these years,” he said cordially.

“Thank you for inviting me,” said Hou Wang, smiling nervously. Colmes could not help admiring his handsome eastern face, large brown eyes and beautifully smooth olive skin, a small nose and a thin mouth that lit up his entire face when he smiled.

“Do you have an appointment?” asked the Provost coldly. “Your name is not in my calendar.”

By this time I had returned with another chair, but it was clear that Hou Wang wanted to stand. He opened his briefcase and retrieved a large stack of papers and placed them on the Provost’s desk.

“What is this?” asked the Provost, as though he had dumped a rotten apple on her desk.

“It is his dissertation draft with corrections and additions, if  I am not mistaken,” intervened Colmes. “I remember it well.”

“How come?” asked the Provost, clearly getting set for a fight.

“You forget that I was on his dissertation committee. In fact it was I who advised him to have a professional writer go over his work.”

My jaw dropped, as did the Provost’s. “You what?” she asked, like a dog following a scent.

“You heard me. I have done this with many of the doctoral students I have supervised over the years, especially those whose mother tongue is not English. I see no reason why they should be discriminated against simply because they cannot write flowing and fluent English as do those who are fortunate enough to have been born into the English speaking peoples.” All of this Colmes had said with a wry smile. It was his turn to be righteous.

“I will need to speak with the President about this,” mumbled Doctor Dolittle, indicating that she didn’t really mean it.

“If I may,” said Hou Wang nervously,  “I simply took the advice of my supervisor. And besides all of my friends did the same, and it is standard practice at John Jay to help those whose mother tongue is not English.”

The suggestion that John Jay was a step ahead of our school in reaching out to help foreign students, of which there was a rapidly growing number, and an important source of income to the university in times of budget freezes, was not lost on the Provost. She looked across to Colmes expecting him to speak up in support of his former student. But Colmes knew that this was a moment to let the Provost stew a little.

Seeing that he was making progress, Hou Wang then made a serious error. He took his argument a little further. “Some of my friends in grad school, and even some that I supervise at John Jay, pay professional statisticians to do complex statistical analyses if necessary. After all, that is what many seasoned academics do these days, as I understand it.”

Doctor Dolittle sat dumbfounded. Colmes, sensing a pivotal moment, stood up and began in his characteristic fashion to walk back and forth in front of the Provost’s desk. She looked at him with nothing less than scorn.  “Times change,” he waved his arm around to emphasize the point. We must change with them,” he pronounced.

“Let me see your papers here,” said the Provost as she reached for the dog-eared draft of his original dissertation. There were notes and comments scribbled all through it. Then Hou Wang produced a bound monograph from his briefcase, the finished submitted version of his dissertation. She quickly scanned a few pages and compared them to the original. They were obviously a distinct improvement, in fact excellent English. On the other hand, the original draft was written in grammatically correct English, but simply did not have the flow of proper English, and was not so easy to understand. Colmes watched her closely.

“If I may,” said Hou Wang, “I think it is clear that I actually wrote the dissertation, but the professional polished it into a form that made the English more English, if you understand me.”

“Indeed we do,” intervened Colmes.

The Provost looked up, handed the copies of the dissertation back to Hou Wang, then said with a frown, “wait outside my office while we consider the matter.”

I was expecting Colmes to say that he need not leave. But he did not. And found out why as soon as Hou Wang had left.

“Madam Provost,” addressed Colmes, “you understand what is at stake here. I will, if necessary take the steps to exonerate this fine young man and get him re-instated in his position at John Jay. He has a wonderful career ahead of him, and has overcome many great challenges. He deserves nothing less. Besides, it is clear that in fact he has not cheated at all. Simply taken advantage of opportunities provided him, not to mention some of this at the recommendation of his adviser, that is, I. However, it is you who mistakenly jumped to the conclusion that he had cheated, and you who did him this terrible damage. Therefore it is you who must make this right.” Colmes stood and raised his body straight so that he looked down upon what looked like the crunched up body of the Provost. I looked in awe as Colmes played the bully as he was want to do.

Doctor Dolittle sat, morose, looking down. Colmes laid it on a little more.

“I insist that you fix this,” frowned Colmes.

The Provost remained silent. Then slowly, she looked up from her desk. “I will make the necessary calls to John Jay and get him reinstated. However, I will not do this until after I have cleared this with the President. In any case, any official business between this university administration and that of another university has to be approved by the president.”

“That is your call,” said Colmes, “though my advice to you, and actually to the president as well, is that the less he knows the better.“

And there, I leave it. Another complex case solved by Colmes using nothing more than a little gentle persuasion. Of course, he did not need to mention anything of the snake. It lay there curled up. Always ready to strike.

48. The Sit-In

The Vietnam War and its aftermath seeded a revolution in universities across America. Students, largely the product of the baby boom that followed World War 2, spurned by adults as spoiled brats, suddenly saw through the hypocrisies of their adult forebears and refused to go to war. They instead began demonstrating in the streets against the  injustices they claimed lay hidden behind the facade of suburban life, the “little boxes” as Pete Seeger sang, and most pressing, racial discrimination.  In response, politicians were moved to create the “great society” (probably a failure, but that is another story and one that not even Colmes could tackle), and students suddenly came to life en masse, especially after the great march on Washington demonstrating against the Vietnam War. Universities were exciting places, alive with all kinds of movements and demonstrations, though by the time of Richard Nixon’s exit, the violence of student protests had died down.

An important part of that process was the “sit-in.”  Students  copied the well-established non-violent form of protest pioneered by the African American students known as the “Greensboro Four” who in 1960 occupied “whites only” seats at the counter of an F.W. Woolworths store in North Carolina. When they were denied service they refused to leave. Gradually they were joined by many more students until the number reached over a thousand. Eventually, the civil rights act mandated desegregation in public accommodations.

 These many protests had one thing in common, which was a list of demands.  This case is about one such list. Well, I suppose I should admit that the case was not so much about the list of demands itself, but the ripple effect it had on some of its voluntary and involuntary participants.  The case was more or less “solved” by Colmes, but that might depend on one’s point of view.

One more caveat about universities. They are popularly looked upon by many, especially the media, as crucibles of change. This is probably false, at least a misleading generalization. Universities everywhere are and always have been places where the hierarchy of knowledge is religiously defended. I use that word intentionally, since most if not all modern universities had their beginnings as religious institutions of some kind or other. And the idea that universities add to the repository of knowledge is unshakeable. Dissertations are born and defended upon such a principle.

The hierarchy of knowledge is the foundation on which the classroom sits, solidly, though in subtle ways always vulnerable to attack. Questioning and doubt are rigidly controlled, allowed only as long as they do not undermine the tree of knowledge.  The formal lectures are its colorful blossoms, in which the professor stands before the class in an auditorium of some kind, delivers a lecture, the gospel, students take notes and then are examined on their comprehension (that is, memory) of that knowledge.

This is the backbone of all education that begins in kindergarten. I provide you with this somewhat cynical view of education because it is that colossal structure that student sit-ins fight against. They are destined to lose. Or are they?

***

In the case of No Exit, I related how Akira Tanaka’s suicide threat and the bomb scare set the stage for successful protest by students, taking advantage of the nervousness of the university administration, assuming that the administration would give in easily to a set of student demands. In the current case, the graduate student association called a meeting to discuss their grievances. Undergraduates were excluded from this meeting. They probably had their own grievances, and besides they were, and are, rather low on the maturity scale. Why these grievances became so severe that they demanded an organized student protest I still do not quite understand. The matter seems to be full of contradictions. 

The insistence by university administrators and the academics who despise them, on one shared and profound belief in the hierarchy of knowledge, (sometimes called the cumulative theory of knowledge), is these days expressed by the popular caveat: “follow the science,” for that field most clearly promotes the cumulative theory and practice of knowledge. Indeed it would die without it. And of course, it is the scientific method (the practice) that expresses most clearly the advantages of assuming this fortress of an organized and slowly built body of knowledge, the pieces of which we commonly refer to as facts.

My apologies as usual. I am here wandering off the path, unable to hide my preference for philosophical musings. At the time of this case I was, in fact, trying to write my dissertation for my criminal justice Ph.D., unable to shake off the fluff of thinking without boundaries, an admitted defect of mine, a symptom of my ADD, I insist.

But I do think that these ill-defined  thoughts are surely related to explaining how the sit-in arose, or at least what started the demand for change. There are probably few acclaimed “liberal arts” universities in the USA and elsewhere where sit-ins of one kind or another have not taken place.

***

The sit-in and its resolution by Colmes had its start, I think, with what happened with Akira Tanaka, and the apparent solution that the faculty reached once the bomb was removed from the classroom and the issue of the grades for all students whose exam was interrupted by the bomb scare was resolved.

Note. I called it an “issue.” The solution that was reached  by a unanimous vote of the faculty student performance committee of the School of Criminal Justice, to accede to the demand of the bomber to pass all students who took the exam at that time. This was a momentous decision which, when it was taken before the full faculty, created much debate, not so much about issuing a pass for all students, but that Professor Garcia complained (an understatement) that his rights as a professor, his academic freedom, were recklessly disregarded. After a three hour faculty meeting, Ted the Red finally gave in and rather than  vote against, was pressured by the Dean to simply abstain. It was essential that they have a unanimous faculty vote on such an important breaking of the rules of student grading. This decision would not become part of the University rules and procedures until it was approved by the faculty senate subcommittee on student grading, and then finally by a vote of the full faculty senate. And only after all that to be approved by the Provost then taken to the President for his signature.

***

A quiet sense of outrage simmered among the students that the faculty could simply decide who passed a particular exam, regardless of their performance. It seemed to suggest that examinations were not important any more if all students regardless of preparation, performance or whatever, were going to pass anyway. And this was worsened when a rumor circulated that the entire cause of this outrage was the threat by a student that he would kill himself if he did not receive a passing grade. On the other hand, many were pleased that his happened in the Constitutional law class, the professor of which, Ted the Red was a widely disliked individual by students, seen as a dictatorial bully, rigid and uncompromising. There was even the story that he had once failed a student because his writing was illegible, and would not budge from this decision, even though the student had it typed under careful supervision, so that no cheating would be possible. Still Ted the Red did not budge. An exam is an exam, he insisted. You either do it properly or not at all. This and other stories of arbitrariness, especially of closed book timed exams, brought the students to formulate a bold statement demanding that all examination procedures and grading be reviewed and be changed to meet student needs, rather than those of the professors.

A meeting of the graduate student association was called. It had not met for some months, having apparently considered that there was no business to attend to. In fact, the main purpose that the graduate student association served was to organize the end of semester party. The position of president of the graduate student association was not elected, but simply fell on the student or students who took it upon themselves to organize the booze and goodies for the party. But now, with these rumors of protests and awful injustices being done to the students by their professor, there was cause for concern, and when serious issues arise, there must always be a committee established and chair of the committee elected.

Thus it was that a chain of events occurred to bring Colmes into a situation that would change his life—well, that’s my look on it, I doubt he would agree and insist he was in control of all events into which he inserted himself. He proclaimed (boasted) that  events never controlled him, he controlled them.

Professor Colmes had just been designated the university’s Interdisciplinary Professor, and there was only one of them in the entire university. So just that was enough to strike awe and envy in other faculty, and wonder by students who bothered to find out who he was and what he did (a challenging task in itself). I was in my early stages with Colmes at this point. He had called me in on a few cases, the most recent the case I have just recounted of the threatened suicide. I now took it upon myself to attend the first student association meeting that was called by a lovely first year graduate student, Ruth Cardigan, a jolly, persistently happy person, whose constant big smile relaxed all in her presence. I took the unusual step for me, to propose Ruth for chair of the Graduate Student Association. As you may have already concluded I prefer on most occasions and certainly in social occasions, to remain in the background, observing, and speaking only when asked to do so. At the time I thought I did this on a whim, but later I realized that I did it because I thought that this might be an occasion where Colmes should be involved, but if I suggested it, I would end up having to take on being president of the association. Ruth was by far the most attractive person for that position, and I do not mean by her looks which were pleasant, but I would not say stunning or even beautiful. It was her happy and radiant smile coupled with what was obviously as soon as she spoke, someone who was very smart, or more accurately, sharp.  I could see her sizing up those students present, eyeing them off one by one, smiling and joking.

Only four students showed up for the initial meeting, but I was sure that many more would join in once it got around that change was afoot, especially if it involved exams and grading.  It would not be long before the students became very active,  perceiving injustices in every corner and under every cushion.

I was about to recommend that we ask Professor Colmes to help us make our case, draw up a list of demands, when Rose the elder came into our meeting room, a small room buried in the catacombs of the library basement. I had met Rose a few times at various meetings, but did not really know much about her, except of course, her never ending knitting. Ruth’s countenance lit up even more than ever when Rose entered.

“Oh Rose!” she smiled, “Come join us! We need your experience and no nonsense ways if we are to negotiate our demands with the faculty.”

Rose plopped her rather weighty bottom on to the nearest chair and kept knitting. “Do not let them bully you,” she said calmly looking at her knitting.

“Rose, I knew you would say that! It’s why we need you to be our spokeswoman.  I can’t do it, I’m too nice, so they say,” said Ruth, giggling in an attractive self-effacing manner.

“No problem,” answered Rose now furiously knitting,  “is what you say?”

“Right on, Rose” I blurted with more enthusiasm than was called for.

Rose looked up from her knitting and directly at me, which made me cringe. “Him,” she said pointing at me with a knitting needle, “go out. You should not be here.”

Her Russian accent was solemn and deep, spoken with such harsh authority, I imagined being ordered around by a guard in the Gulag. Instead of speaking up for myself, I just sat staring at Ruth expecting her to ask why. But she just looked at me expecting me to answer, and when I did not, Rose continued.

“Colmes. Your supervisor,” she said, “in this situation can’t be trusted.

Ruth, still radiating goodness, looked at me raising her eyebrows, a pale brown. “Goodness!” she cried, “we can’t have that, can we?” Spoken as though to a class of little children at Sunday school. Rose, though, wasn’t fooling around.

“You stay until we have our list of demands. Then you take them to Colmes,” she ordered, doing me the honor of looking up from her knitting.

I hesitated a little, which caused her to repeat, “otherwise you go now.”

“But why to him?” I asked, “and who elected me as the messenger?” I added with not a little annoyance.

At last Ruth decided to speak up a little as the President elect. “From what I heard I thought Dr. Colmes was more on the side of students. I mean, he helped poor Akira, didn’t he?”

“That’s right,” I added with too much enthusiasm.

“The faculty have already requested him to intercede,” growled Rose.

“Are you sure? How do you know?” I asked, upset that Colmes might have told her something and not me.

Ruth then settled into her role as president elect. “I don’t think those little things matter. Let’s get down to making our list of demands.”

“There are only three of us here, two if you discount Mister Hobson here,” observed Rose. 

“Maybe we three could draft a list of demands then put out a call for student input by leaving a note in their mail boxes inviting then to a meeting to discuss the list and any necessary  changes,” said Ruth calmly and sweetly.  Rose grunted and nodded her assent.

***

Our problem was that we had to decide what complaint ailed us most. I will not bore you with the many twists and turns of our surprisingly calm discussion. We were, after all, in basic agreement that we were the good guys and the faculty the bad guys. That it would take some forceful action to get their attention in the first place. But we had to have some expression of our discontent made public and made forcefully.

After a few hours we came up with two demands.

1. General Complaint: Faculty should not make rules by fiat without student input. Solution: Students should have representation on all faculty governing committees and have equal voting rights.

2. Specific Complaint: The grading system is vague, rigid and arbitrary, and discriminates against those who for whatever reason are unable to pass them. Solution (a): A committee with equal numbers of faculty and students should meet and draft a new system of grading that is equitable and just, and does not discriminate against any person who is challenged by examinations. Solution (b) Abolish grading completely because of its labelling and stereotypical outcomes,  dividing students into winners and losers.

Now it was time for action. Under pressure, I agreed to be the communications person and convey our demands to the faculty. This required the preparation of an additional document announcing our demands and calling for a sit-in. The document I designed looked something like this, only of course in much larger letters:

JOIN OUR SIT-IN

DEMAND EQUITY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL STUDENTS!

ABOLISH EXAMINATIONS

ABOLISH THE DICTATORSHIP OF THE  FACULTY

Before I could finalize this document we had one more issue to decide. What place would we occupy?

This proved to be an especially difficult decision. I started by suggesting the library, since it was exams time and there would be a lot of students there. This was resoundingly rejected for the obvious reason that we were demonstrating against faculty  not students. I could see that Ruth was a little hesitant about putting forward an alternative. Rose, of course, the heavyweight among us, said, “go for the jugular, the President’s office.”

Ruth and I looked at each other. There was no option but to agree. It was a bold, and very scary move, but it followed the tactics of other successful sit-ins that had occurred at other universities. We wound up our meeting and agreed to meet again first thing in the morning outside the President’s office. Ruth volunteered to bring as many supporters as she could find and a few sleeping bags. I would bring cups of coffee. Rose sat doing her knitting. She did not exactly say that she would join us. The rest of the time I spent crafting the notices, one listing the demands, the other announcing the sit-in. I gave a bunch to Ruth and we posted them on every noticeboard we could find. Ruth lived off-campus and I still lived in a dorm, a small room on the ground floor where I had the job of dorm supervisor. It was now late at night so I insisted on accompanying Ruth to her apartment off-campus that was maybe a ten minute walk down Eastern Avenue, one of the main roads that passed the university.

I won’t deny it. I was very taken with Ruth. Her happy demeanor was so refreshing. She radiated love—both kinds. And when we reached her apartment we said our goodnights, I wistfully, she brightly, chirping that she would meet me at the President’s office in the morning, “and don’t you be late,” she said laughing and wagging her finger..

***

Unfortunately, I was late getting to the President’s office because I received an early morning phone call from my new mentor Colmes, requesting that I come by his office as soon as possible. It was urgent, he said. I hurriedly showered, though I was tempted not to, given that I faced the possibility of an all day and maybe night sit-in. I arrived at Colmes’s office around eight-thirty. The door was ajar so I walked in, knocking lightly. Colmes sat at his desk, doing the NYT crossword.

“Ah, Hobson. There you are! At last,” he said, not looking up.

“My apologies, sir,” I said, “I was…” But Colmes cut me off.

“Never mind. We have a new and quite unusual case, Hobson.”

“We? We’re a team already?” I asked mischievously.

“For the moment, Hobson. Though I should add that it will depend on how this case ends up, given that you have already involved yourself in it.”

“And what case is that?” I asked innocently, an awful feeling gripping my stomach.

“I believe you are involved with a very sweet young lady,” said Colmes, raising his eyes from the crossword, and almost smiling, that twitch at the corner of his mouth.

“Sir, I can explain…” He cut me off again.

“Hobson, I told you when I first took you on that you must not call me ‘sir.’ Now, it’s Colmes, or nothing. Right?”

“If you say so, Colmes,” I said with a strong hint of defiance. It occurred to me right then that this might be the end of a very short relationship.

“Ruth, I think her name is,” he said, and this time he did smile, well almost.

“I’m not really involved,” I began, “I mean…”

“I know what you mean, Hobson. I do. And it’s fine. And you were not to know.”

“Know what?” I asked innocently.

“That I have been asked by the President and Provost to negotiate with the student representatives who have issued a list of demands, and are as we speak occupying the President’s office.”

I gulped, and bit my lip a little. Of course, I should have known. But then I followed up with a kind of recalcitrance that was to become a tendency of mine when working with Colmes. “I am just following your example with Rose,” I said with a silly grin.

Colmes almost smiled again. “You Aussies. You must have your nettling jokes.”

“If you say so, Colmes. And if you think you will be negotiating with me, you are wrong. Rose is our negotiator.” I said this with a good deal of satisfaction. I had got one back at him.

“Yes indeed. Indeed. An interesting situation, don’t you think Hobson?” He stared at me, but I did not flinch.

“Indeed,” I said, “indeed.”

***

Colmes had advised President O’Brien to get out of town for the day, as students would be taking over his office for a sit-in. It was a crisp day in early spring, so President O’Brien had taken off with Chi-Ling for a day of skiing at Gore Mountain. He especially enjoyed demonstrating to everyone that even with his gammy leg, he could ski and without a walking stick, because he had poles of course. Chi-Ling had never skied before and although she took a lesson, decided it was not for her, so retired to read by the fire in the club house. She had heard of the sit-in and had urged him to be tough. Such lack of respect for their elders and particularly their teachers that these students showed was truly repulsive. If she were president she would punish them severely, suspend them for a semester, and for the most recalcitrant expel them for good. But Finneas was so kind, really too kind. And as she felt the warmth of the fire in her face, she moved away from it a little, and took a deep breath. ‘You are in America’ she reminded herself. ‘Nobody respects authority here.’

***

I arrived at the President’s office a little flustered. I had stopped by the cafeteria to buy some coffees and goodies to take to the sit-in but could only carry so much. And I was worried that I would be forced into some kind of confrontation with Colmes, and if that happened, I knew I would lose. When I arrived there, though, the place was deserted except for about ten students. All the outer office personnel, the organizers, secretaries, schedulers and the rest were gone. The President must have given them the day off. Many of the students already had drinks and munchies so I was most pleased to be able to offer something to Ruth who sat on the floor beside the President’s desk, at the foot of Rose who sat in his chair, knitting what seemed to be a rather long scarf. I leaned down to offer her my last cup of coffee. She shook her head and almost smiled, raised her knitting as though to say how can I drink a cup of coffee while I am knitting?

Suddenly there was a blinding flash and I turned to see a photographer accompanied by a reporter approaching me. This was news! “Are you Colmes?” she asked, looking straight at me. Rose gave a big grunt and smiled a little, but kept looking at her knitting.

“Me? Colmes? Ha! That’s a good one,” I replied.

“Indeed it is,” came a distant voice, you can guess whose it was.

“What’s this sit-in all about?” asked the reporter addressing her remarks to no one  in particular.

Rose put down her knitting. “Student needs have been ignored too long,” she announced in her thick deep Russian voice. “We demand to be heard!” then she returned to her knitting. I looked at Ruth who sat smiling and filling the room with her happiness.

Colmes approached the president’s desk and leaned over to look very closely into Rose’s face. She seemed a little shocked, dropped her knitting and leaned back as far as she could.

“No need to be frightened,” said Colmes. “I won’t bite you.” His pompous manner was truly repulsive to us all. Murmurs of discontent spread among the students, and a few more students walked in, the President’s office now beginning to feel a little cramped. Colmes did not appear to have noticed any of this. I was most surprised. I had thought that he would be an excellent manipulator of a large group. He seemed only to be interested in Rose.

“A very nice scarf,” he observed, “the university colors too.”

Rose ignored him. Ruth’s innocent eyes were pleading with Colmes to back off. Instead he leaned further over and whispered to Rose. What he said was inaudible. But it had great effect. She dropped her knitting and leaned forward. I swear their noses were almost touching. 

“You leave us, come back when you have something sensible to say,” she growled.

“What did he say?” asked Ruth.

“Yes, what?” cried other students. “Leave us! Leave us!” the students began to chant.

Colmes turned to face the small group. ”I simply said…”

“Stop!” called Rose. “Stop!”

“Then you agree?” asked Colmes.

“Agree what?” asked the students frustrated.

Then Rose shocked us all. She threw down her knitting and stood up behind the desk. “He said that the university agrees to all our demands.”

“Then that ends the sit-in,” I naively muttered.

Loud cheers came from the students, the noise echoing off the walls of the president’s office, a large office, but seeming very small when stuffed full of so many people.

Rose picked up her knitting and held it in one hand. “Is not to be believed. Is lies!”

The flash of the photographer added to the excitement, and the reporter rushed forward to Colmes. “Is that so? Is that what you said? You accede to all demands?” she asked, thrusting a microphone in front of his face.

Colmes raised his body into his very straight and upright position one that I would become most familiar with over the years. It reminded me of the soldiers who exaggerate their posture in the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. He addressed all those present.

“President O’Brien and the Provost have given me full rights to speak on their behalf. They accede to all the student demands. Of course, the demands are rather broad, and do not address the complexity or implications of what abolishing exams will mean. But in the name of  peace on campus, I accept on their behalf and the university. It is for you, the students, to now present us with a detailed plan of what, if anything, will replace the exams. And, of course, it remains to be decided what kind of representation students may have on all university committees, that is what proportion. and how they will be selected. Will you, for example, have a place or places on promotion and tenure committees? On hiring? And so on.”

All of this and more Colmes prattled on, seemingly for a very long time, and the students, their attention spans limited, especially when crammed in a small space, became very restless, and then, rather than start more chanting, began to slip away until there were only myself, Ruth, and Rose left. And Colmes finally stopped.

Rose had returned to her knitting, and it seemed that the world had returned to its former, recognizable self. Colmes appeared most pleased. It was as if he had won the battle, by losing. He looked down at Ruth and said in his most charming Victorian manner, “and with whom do I have the pleasure of meeting?”

Ruth scrambled to her feet and extended her hand. “I’m Ruth Cardigan,” she said, “president of the graduate student association.”

I stepped forward (I had never sat down) and stammered, “Oh, sorry, I should have introduced you.”

Colmes looked at me with amusement, and then looked back at Rose. “Well Rose,” he said, “I think we have much to talk about. Why don’t we all retire to my office and apartment. This agreement calls for a small celebration, does it not? “

That celebration spawned something quite extraordinary, or at least I thought so. When we returned to his office he led us through what I would come to call Door Two, down to the kitchen. Ruth was all smiles and complimented him on his lovely kitchen while he dithered around making tea and retrieving some scones from a tin. Finally, Rose put down her knitting and elbowed him out of the way. “I will make tea,” she said. “You have jam and cream for scones?”

Indeed he did! And I watched in pleasant amusement as the two of them prepared tea and scones with jam and cream, pretty little floral tea cups, sauces and matching plates. And the tea left to draw in a teapot covered with a tea cozy, that I was sure had been knitted by Rose.

I edged my way across to Ruth and pulled out a chair from the table. “May I?” I asked displaying my excellent (for me) English manners.

As you could guess, the ensuing half-hearted attempts to abolish exams never produced results. The meetings among the students became abusive. They finally gave up on the idea of abolishing or even replacing exams with something else. But there was one small success, which was that one student representative was allowed to attend faculty meetings (little did they know what they were asking for), though, a new rule was introduced by the School of Criminal Justice, where after all, given the subject matter, authoritarian structures were always preferred, the student votes were counted separately, as were the assistant professors’ and those of the untenured. 

But from my point of view, the major outcome of this small student uprising was that Rose moved into Colmes’s apartment and became his housekeeper, and Colmes offered me the office next to his should I become officially his research assistant. Of course, I could not decline such an offer, even though I was a little nervous about inhabiting an office so close to my supervisor, who I had concluded already was a bit of a bully. But my hesitancy was  fueled more by my fantasy that I might move in with Ruth and live off campus.

47. The Stalker

I began this third series of stories with the case of the snakes because it demonstrated just how far Colmes would go in order to bring a case to its conclusion. He planned in quite some detail to construct a situation in which the Provost, bless her frozen heart, had no way out. The death of Colmes would have been easily pinned on her. And of course, the publicity of the snake worship would have destroyed her career. Police use this technique often, especially to catch sex offenders.  It is part of the tricks of the law enforcement trade: install a red light camera at the bottom of a hill, catch speedsters by hiding in wait in a police car just around the corner and dart out to catch the once innocent driver. Install speed cameras in so many places, especially in areas that appear to be deserted, set up a ‘sting’ operation in which you advertise stolen goods for sale, or a very popular sting, engage anyone on social media pretending you are an underage girl, then set up a meeting for sex.  One could go on.

One of the reasons stings are so popular with law enforcement is that (according to what I learned in my criminal law class) they have a very high conviction rate, especially if you have video to back up the evidence. Mind you, lawyers, especially defense lawyers, call these operations “entrapment.” Their argument would seem to be insurmountable: police entrap an otherwise innocent  suspect. By doing so, they create crime (they are supposed to prevent it, right?), because the innocent perpetrator would not have committed the crime had they not been offered the opportunity (or even enticement) to do so. Generally, so my law professor taught me, juries don’t buy the entrapment defense, especially if there is video evidence.

There was no jury present in the case of Doctor Dolittle. But there was the threat of one. Colmes had risked his life by getting himself bitten by a rattle snake during a snake-worshiping charismatic meeting overseen by the University’s Provost, arguably the person with the most authority and power in the whole university—in many cases and instances more than the president himself, whose policy was to delegate authority anyway so as to shield himself from responsibility in case of a scandal or something worse. That, no doubt, was why (and still is so I am told by the ex-convicts who now attend the university School of Justice as part of the out-reach program of the state of New York) trusties were so popular in prisons as an enforcement arm of the prison administration. 

But it is also why an individual like Colmes existed on campus. He was an enforcer of sorts, though he would be most offended if I said this to him. He insisted that he simply responded to cries for help. He worked for no one. He was his own man. He was driven by a very strong sense — I would go so far as to say moral sense— of justice. If, when a case came before him, he perceived an injustice, or a situation that he thought would inevitably lead to injustice, he would take the case, and would not rest until it had been settled to his own satisfaction—not that of the justice system, I might add, to which he rarely forwarded a case.

I entreat my good readers to keep this fact about Colmes in mind. He and I had many heated debates over this matter.  What (not who) gave him the right to decide on matters of what were fair and just and what were not? And so on. You get the point.

But now on to the present case that occurred well before the snake case. One in which there was no entrapment in the classic sense. There was no need of it, since we already knew who the alleged offender was.

* *

I should begin by saying that the stalker was not the first and no doubt would not be the last stalker on campus. For it is a wonderful place for stalkers, so many people banded together in close proximity to each other, many young and beautiful people of all genders. And of the young, the vast majority of them wondering who they are and what will become of them? They are, thusly, ripe for the picking by someone who is, one might say more “mature” than they. (Though, the stereotype of stalkers is that they are immature, a judgment usually made after the stalker has been caught). But such predators, in our experience, are usually professors or those who are older and have established themselves or have given up on that life endeavor and simply live for the present. Indeed, the latter have unquenchable desires to consume as much of the present as they can. Given that outlook, they are, to some, if not many, the object of envy, for their crazed impossible quests for conquests return many more failures than successes, as Kierkegaard observed many years ago. He thought (or maybe not) that the small returns were worth the many failures.

But Colmes reckoned that our stalker fitted none of these categories. “Our stalker has tried,” says Colmes, “these peripatetic endeavors. But unlike those he envies, he mortally fears failure.  It takes only one, and that is enough to force him to climb back into his shell, a cloaked figure who sneaks around as though he were the hunchback of Notre Dame.”

Perhaps I overstated it when I said we already knew who the stalker was. We did not, in fact. That is, we had no name, or any indication of who exactly they were. What I meant before was that we knew the kind of person that the stalker was. You may have noticed and it will become evident as I recount our most sustainable cases, that I do fall into a bit of exaggeration from time to time. It is all the result of my enthusiasm, which, as Colmes enjoys pointing out, spoils my otherwise ability to almost match him in rational thinking. It’s getting it down on paper where I fall short. You might think that this must be a severe disappointment to Colmes who hired me to “keep intellectual house”, as he called it, with the clear intention of utilizing my writing skills to make up for his dyslexia. However, as you have already gained an inkling, my writing is perfectly matched for recounting in an interesting manner the sustainable cases of Professor Colmes. It’s just that it is not a proper style for writing a dissertation, which must be flat and boring, certainly with no climaxes, though, there are certain techniques, especially in the realm of statistics where exaggeration can be indulged in without penalty. 

But now to our case.

Rose the elder had just brought us our afternoon tea of scones with jam and cream and a pot of hot tea, made with fast boiling water, left to sit and draw. And, of course, delivered on an ornate tray, teapot in a cozy, a tiny jug of milk (we both liked our tea strong with a small dash of milk). It was quite early in my new job as Colmes’s assistant. I therefore found the English practice of afternoon teas and morning coffees, the whole ritual an amusing, silly after-birth of  British Imperialism. But I kept all that to myself. After all,  my relatives back in Australia indulged in this tea fetish, though without the fancy rituals.

***

This case explains a lot about Colmes, and maybe a little about me. You may have wondered how Colmes came to have a housekeeper, in typical Victorian style, I might add. Perhaps I exaggerate a little (I have warned you!). But Rose, when she was an “older” graduate student (in her fifties, one never really knew) was well known around the university for her forthright manner, her often biting and raw criticisms of anything she observed around the campus and beyond. These observations and views she poured forth into the Student Newspaper, The Flotsam. And she never held back in class as I can attest, when she took the constitutional law class that I also took that same year (what year does not matter).  In that class, the professor (that’s right, Ted the Red, a man with an eye for any woman who would present herself) picked on individual students in the classic tradition. But Rose never waited to be picked upon, and, even though she did her knitting constantly, she thought nothing of butting into an interrogation between the professor and an intimidated student. Every time Rose intervened a titter flowed across the class like a swarm of locusts. As if that were not enough, though, she was always the student who approached the podium at the end of the class and peppered the professor with questions. Some students even remained after class to watch her in action. Knitting in hand, doing pearl stitch as she went, she would in her gruff Russian accented voice, point out to the professor (a most liberal one of course) that he had no idea what free speech was all about. The professor, a tall, heavily sun-tanned figure, an ex-basketball player one guessed, and a deep rolling voice would step up to her, looking down from his great height, she small and dumpy not looking up though. She had, after all, to watch her knitting. Instead, she prattled on as she knitted. The professor, nicknamed Ted the Red (as I have noted elsewhere, thought to be a communist because he led student protests downtown in front of the capitol building).

Colmes knew a lot of what went on in that professor’s class because many students came to him to complain about the professor’s bullying style. This, even when they knew that there was little Colmes could do, and besides he had no wish to cross this law professor. Why did the professor act in this way? The simple answer was that he was a bully. The complicated answer was that he considered it his responsibility to scare the hell out of students because that was what practicing the law was all about. Besides understanding the law required a lot of study and a lot of reading, something that many of the students in this (then) Criminal Justice Program were not used to doing. So, according to the professor, it was his duty to make them read the material. He was not there to entertain them. The students sniggered behind his back though. They knew of his failed and successful attempts with particular students of his fancy. And his quarries were not spurned by other students. Not at all. They were looked on in awe, especially by the male students who no doubt felt inferior because they were unable to conquer (a carefully chosen word) women the way the professor did.

It would come as no surprise then, that he and Colmes got along quite well. After all, Colmes was, as I have intimated, a bit of a bully himself. As I have noted, his interrogations were carefully targeted. So when students came to him to complain, he politely explained to them that he was not in a position to intervene in a professor’s teaching style. It all had to do with the First Amendment in respect to free speech, did it not? And besides, he was not a school counsellor, he was the  University Distinguished Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies.

***

I was tapping away on my little Olivetti portable typewriter, trying once more to write an outline for my dissertation. The title was going to be “Time and Place as a Life Course.” And I was about to rip the sheet out of the typewriter in frustration, when I heard voices next door and Colmes banging on the wall between our offices to tell me my services were needed.

“Hobson!” came the shrill voice.

I grabbed my legal pad and pen and quickly ran in. Unfortunately, my wicker chair that was always drawn up to the front corner of Colmes’s desk was already occupied by none other than Rose and her knitting. I stood uncomfortably next to her, as there was no other chair in the office except the overstuffed leather chair in the far corner, just behind the door through which I had just entered.

“Now what can I do for you, Rose?” Colmes asked warmly.

“I am being stalked,” she growled in her gruff monotone, male- sounding Russian accent.

“Stalked?” asked Colmes trying to hide his surprise. “Are you sure?”

“I wouldn’t come to you if I wasn’t,” snapped Rose.

“Tell me more,” responded Colmes, almost smiling.

“Here. Look at this.” Rose reached into her knitting bag and pulled out a handful of pieces of paper of varying sizes, that had clearly been screwed up and thrown away, then retrieved out of the waste bin.

“Good Heavens!” exclaimed Colmes with some exaggeration, “you have quite an admirer!”

Rose did not take kindly to this flippant remark, but continued in her monotone. “Also, I thought tfirst. But they kept coming. So I think something wrong.”

“And rightly so,” said Colmes trying to make up for his flippancy.

He took the papers and looked them over as he flattened each one then placed them carefully on his desk to examine them all together. “This is the lot, or are there more?” asked Colmes. “And when was the first one and where were they deposited?”

“In my student mailbox, ever since the beginning classes, which four weeks ago,”  said Rose, knitting away.

“Hmm. And on any particular days?” asked Colmes, leaning forward and scanning the notes.”

“I think yes. Monday, Wednesday Friday. That is when I have my constitutional law class. I always check my mail box after class.”

“Then we may deduce, perhaps that it is someone who is taking the same class?”

“Or maybe the stalker follows Rose to class but does not go in?” I offered.

“Do other students of that class also check their mailboxes at that time?” asked Colmes.

“Some do,” said Rose, looking up from her knitting.

“I see that all the notes are handwritten. Do you recognize the writing by any chance?” continued Colmes.

“No,” answered Rose. “And he’s following me too. I feel like he’s everywhere I go.”

“Even now?” asked Colmes.

“Well, I don’t know about now,“ said Rose, in the middle of a stitch.

I stepped up to look at the notes. Colmes sat back out of the way while I leaned forward. One thing immediately struck me, and Colmes noticed.

“What is it Hobson?”

“It’s written by a left handed person with their right hand to try to cover it up. See how wobbly it is and the excessive slope?” I observed with  satisfaction.

“Yes, I believe you are right, Hobson. Well done!”

“That not get us very far, does it?” put in Rose, looking up from her knitting.

“And we can hardly go over all the students in that class and ask who is left-handed. A violation of privacy or whatever.” I observed sagely.

“And what else have you observed Hobson?” asked Colmes.

“The  bits of paper. They are from a legal pad, I think.” I said.

“Don’t know how you figure that. Besides lots of people use them in the university. Pretty impossible to track it down, I’d say,” observed Colmes.

“What I do?” asked Rose. “Dr. Colmes. Other student tell me you best person for this job.”

“Indeed. Indeed,” agreed Colmes. ”I would suggest that one simple step be taken, and we will see what happens.”

“Shouldn’t we look over the notes and analyze what the Stalker has written? They are all pretty adoring of you, Rose,  I must say,” I said a little condescendingly, unconsciously emulating my master.

“Is rubbish!” she growled.

“Rose, could you perhaps place them in order of when they appeared in your mail box?” asked Colmes. “Each one is different, you know.”

This was a lot to ask of Rose. She would have to put down her knitting.  But the fact that she did says a lot about the depths of her concern. She stood up, placed her knitting on my wicker chair, then stood beside Colmes and leaned over the notes. She juggled them around a bit, and finally ended up with an order that satisfied her. One could easily see the progression. They began with long, flowery expressions of love, affection, and adoration, laced with some lines of poetry of some English romantic poet. But they quickly degenerated into crass sexually explicit comments, then finally with lurid details as to what he would do once he had her in his arms, an all-encompassing embrace that she would never forget in a lifetime. The notes were written in such a way that the actual gender of the stalker was not clear. The immediate presumption was male, of course. What was clear was that the unknown stalker wanted Rose, and once he had her, she would be his slave. No wonder Rose was frightened.

“Yes, now. Indeed,” muttered Colmes, “The notes have not told us much, except that we need to get you out of danger immediately,” announced Colmes seriously. “There is a very simple first step, as I mentioned before.”

“What that, Doctor?” asked Rose as she finished a line of knitting and switched over.

“Remove your name from the mailboxes. The stalker will then be unable to deliver the notes and will have to try something else.”

“But what if he keeps following me?” cried Rose. “If all he’s going to do is leave me notes, I can put up with that. But  I’m certain he’s stalking me!”

“I doubt it,” said Colmes. “But don’t worry, Rose. I have a spare bedroom here in my apartment. You can stay there until we solve this problem.”

I tried not to show any surprise. Colmes, with a house mate? Hard to imagine. My having an office next to him is enough for me. Poor Rose!

Colmes looked at Rose expectantly. She looked directly at him and put down her knitting.  “Oh! Dr. Colmes. I couldn’t impose like that,”  she said almost smiling, sounding a bit Victorian if you ask me.

“I consider it my duty and an honor to have you as my guess until we are sure you are safe,” pronounced Colmes. “Either I or my excellent colleague Hobson here, will accompany you everywhere you go, twenty four hours a day. Won’t we Hobson?”

I shifted uncomfortably.  “Absolutely!” I said with a big smile.

And so the trap was set.

***

Rose’s mailbox was removed from the student mailboxes. The administration of the school had agreed that she should call in at their office and collect her mail. It was left mostly to me to stay at her elbow, and when possible out of sight but watching closely, to see if there was anyone stalking her. I saw nothing.

Colmes happily took the night shift, and watched over her, presumably as she was sleeping in his spare bedroom. This went on for well over a week, after which time I was getting a little restless. I did attend the constitutional law classes with Rose and looked carefully at all the other students. None seemed to show any special interest in her, except for the obvious,  her constantly interrupting the professor. Ted the Red, the law professor, seemingly did not notice my presence, since my name was not on his class list — I had taken his class a few years ago. Of course I had made sure I was seated away from Rose, somewhere near the back of the class so that I could spy anyone who might be paying her too much attention. And besides, the professor would have noticed me if I sat beside Rose, because she constantly peppered him with questions.

Then on the tenth night, I had been out drinking with some friends and had staggered back to my apartment, or thought I had, and by mistake I entered Colmes’s apartment, to which of course I had a key in case of emergency (which this was not!). Realizing that I was in the wrong place I foolishly called out “Colmes! Never mind. It’s just me!”

But there was no answer.  I should have turned and left. But I did not. My eye caught the overstuffed chair in the corner, which beckoned my drunken body.

***

The relationship between Rose the elder and Colmes was rather complicated. She was I suppose 15 years or more older than Colmes, whose age anyway was a mystery. But I was guessing somewhere in his forties. I could see from the beginning that Colmes enjoyed her abrupt manner, her refusal to put up with small talk, and persistence when demanding answers. This is what drove her professors mad in class, not just confined to Ted the Red. She was someone to be feared, that’s what she was. And Colmes loved her for it. I don’t mean “true love” or whatever. I mean that he approved of her behavior very much, so much so that he really, really liked her as a person. And at the time of the stalker case, that was about a far as it went, I thought.

However, when he suddenly announced that she could move in with him until this stalker problem was solved surprised me, for he was also a man who greatly valued his privacy, mixed very little socially with others beside myself, though I am not sure how much of our relationship was social in contrast to collegial.  In any case, I am proud to state that we were and are very good friends as well as colleagues.

You may have noticed that I am avoiding getting to the point, beating about the bush as it is commonly called in Aussie talk. That is because I am embarrassed to described what happened next.

 Curled up like a ball I snuggled into a corner of the overstuffed chair and let the alcohol take me into a deep slumber, or so I thought. Perhaps that is what happened. But from my viewpoint, I was just dropping into a deep slumber when  I felt as though someone was stabbing me all over with some kind of sharp instrument. I tried to open my eyes but they would not open.  This was a drunken nightmare of the likes I never had. Usually I went off like a light and knew nothing until morning when I woke up.

Then I felt two hands grab me by the ears and shake me. I cried in pain.

“I knew it!” growled Rose. “Can’t hold your liquor, like all men!”

Barely conscious, I slid off the chair and on to the floor on my knees.

“Now I see why you not do the night shift to protect me,” she said gruffly.

I shook my head and raised my arm hoping she would take it and help me stand. And she did, which, had I been sober, I would have noticed. All I could think of was to ask, “where’s Colmes?”

“He come later. Say had important matter to attend to,” answered Rose, looking back to the office door which was still open.

“Better close it,” I mumbled and managed to stagger over and slam it shut. “Wasn’t Colmes worried about leaving you alone?” I asked.

“Didn’t seem like. But we only just in nearby faculty bar,” replied Rose as she walked towards her bedroom. “I go to bed.”

It didn’t sound like Colmes to me. Surely he would not be that casual. Had I done the same he would no doubt have castigated me no end. It meant that Rose was alone for the five or so minutes it would take for her to walk from the faculty bar to Colmes’ apartment. The overstuffed chair beckoned me again. It was too late to go to my own place. I settled down to another deep sleep, or so I thought. I was just dozing off when I thought I heard the light scratching of a key in Colmes’s door. “That must be Colmes,” I thought in my sleep or was I awake?

The door opened slowly and a dark, squat figure, its face only just visible inside a deep dark hood, the light bending its way from Rose’s room through the various passages and into the eyes of the hooded creature. And creature it was. Pig-like flattened nose, one that surely snorted all the time. Eyes, placed wide apart on the face,  each one almost touching its ear. As the dark figure turned to close the door quietly the light of the outside hallway revealed the big red rimmed pig-like eyes with thick, curly white eyelashes, above high piggy cheeks. In the gloom, I shook my head, straining to smother a gasp. The dark figure threw back the hood and for a moment,  flashed open its cape, a witch’s cape if you ask me, and I swear the figure was naked beneath, except for…

I remained breathless curled up in the black leather chair. I dared not move, for I had recognized who it was. The fright of its entry had sobered me up. I watched as the figure almost pranced forward out of Colmes’s office and through door number 1, that led to both Colmes’s and Rose’s bedrooms. To this day, I wonder whether I should have done something then. For now I knew what was happening. This was all Colmes’s doing. Or at least, he had set it up that way.  This was the stalker! And how he knew it I still do not completely understand. But my recognition of who it was put me in an impossible position. No doubt Colmes had engineered this so that he could catch the stalker in flagrante delitto.  But delaying would place Rose in danger of a dreadful attack by the obviously insane stalker. If I intervened right now, it would mess the sting up completely. The ungendered stalker would simply invent an excuse for having entered Colmes’s apartment.

But perhaps Rose knew what Colmes was up to?  In which case she would be ready for the stalker’s momentous entry.

I need not have worried.  The door to Colmes’s office suddenly flew open. In walked Colmes, flicking on the light as he rushed past me. “Follow me Hobson!” he muttered. I staggered up and ran to catch up with Colmes who was already well down he passage.  We both heard a deep guttural scream, Rose’s voice to be sure.

“Get out! You filthy beast!” she cried.

But we heard nothing of the beast.

“Come Hobson, you are in for a treat!” yelled Colmes over his shoulder. 

We then heard a faint voice, or kind of snivel.  “I want you!” it cried. “Can you not want me? Look what I have to offer!”

Colmes and I arrived at the bedroom, both trying comically to fit through the doorway together. I stepped back of course to let my master through.

“So now! Tochiarty. Cease and desist!” Colmes ordered, “and cover that disgusting body.”

It was only just dawning on me what was disgusting. I still had etched in my alcohol-poisoned mind the picture of the beast’s entrance, the cape thrown open. I had not quite comprehended what it was I saw that frightened me. It was, ready for it, a huge red dildo attached to its body in exactly the place where ordinarily the appropriate piece of anatomy would be.

And now comes the cruel part. The whole scene looked to me like an 18th century Hogarth print. The lumpy unattractive figures of Rose hunched up at the head of the bed, reaching for her knitting, and Tochiarty standing over the bed, poised to fulfill the role of the Rake’s progress, and Holmes and I representing the upright figures of morality. Colmes’s usually tight lipped mouth opened just enough to allow a superior smile. But yours truly, lacking any sense of decency or decorum, let out a huge  epithet, “Holy Shit!” and laughed until Colmes grabbed me tightly by the arm as if to say, “that’s enough!”

Dear reader. Please understand. This occurred long before there was anything like LGBTQ.

Tochiarty sank to her knees, wrapping the cape around her disfigured body, pulling the hood back over her head. “All right. I am yours. Do as you wish,” she sobbed. Tears streamed from her red-rimmed eyes, sticking to the piggy white lashes, then falling to the gray carpeted floor.

“You disgusting pervert!” snarled Rose the elder.

“There, there!” announced Colmes in his most steady, superior voice, the moral man in control. “This incident is very unfortunate,” said Colmes, as though the whole incident was a kind of accident, even though I am sure he had engineered it all.

And then he said, as if it were not the 1990s but the 2020s, “all have the right to be who they are or want to be, so long as they do not trespass on the other.”

And I wanted to add facetiously, “….so help me God!”. But I did not of course.

Rose the elder had now recovered from her fright and returned to her abrupt manner, and to her knitting.

“Doctor Colmes. This filth must be removed from our sight,” she demanded as only a Russian could.

“Indeed, indeed,” agreed Colmes, but it was clear that he was thinking of other matters already. “Rose, my dear, you may pack up your things and Hobson here, my most dependable colleague, will accompany you to your apartment. It is off campus, I presume?”

“Yes professor, but what about it,” she pointed at Tochiarty with her knitting needle,

“You can leave all that to me. Be assured that you will never be bothered again by this stalker,” answered Colmes with authority. He then turned to me. “Hobson, young man, please conduct Rose to her apartment.”

“Certainly, Sir. Come Rose, let me take your things,” I replied reluctantly. All I wanted was to get to bed and sleep off the booze.  “It’s not too far I hope?”

Rose did not answer. She slid off the bed, gathered up her few overnight things and crammed them into an old leather bag. She was already dressed as she had not had time to change into her sleeping attire by the time Tochiarty showed up.

***

The next morning I arrived at Colmes’s office as usual, carrying a tray of eggs on toast and tea that I collected from the cafeteria on my way. I was naturally curious to find out what Colmes did with Tochiarty, who would in years ahead  become his nemesis, and how he had solved the case. The answer to the latter partially explained the former.

When I arrived Colmes was in good humor. He sat at his desk doing the NYT crossword puzzle, and avidly grabbed the tea when I arrived, poured it out of the paper cup into his little teapot, then into his decorative English tea cup.

“Come, Hobson,” he smiled, that thin smile of his that projected both mystery and satisfaction.

“Colmes,” I asked as I took up my place on the wicker chair, “do tell me what happened after I left!”

“You don’t want to know how I solved the case?” asked Colmes, toying with me.

“Of course. That is most important, and I would have appreciated it if you had kept me informed from the beginning. But you always do this. Keep it all to yourself, and make me look foolish at the end by making the case look simple that any fool could have solved it.”

“My goodness, Hobson. This is your hangover talking, no doubt,” teased Colmes.

“Maybe. Sorry. Do tell,” I replied sighing deeply.

“The solution was very simple,” said Colmes leaning back in his chair, tapping his extended fingertips to each other.  “It was in the fake handwriting on the notes. I recognized it immediately, the color of the ink, the thickness of the strokes, written with a cheap Bic ballpoint pen, and many more indications.”

I remained silent. I was not going to give him the pleasure of my constantly having to ask him to explain and give more detail. So he continued:

“I have received many such notes on regular matters, usually containing threats — you have seen her threaten me on a regular basis in my office to which she has acquired a key — with the usual accusations, I am not qualified, I am an imposter and so on.”

I continued my petulant silence.

 “Though I had my suspicions, I was not entirely sure why she would have directed her repeated attack on Rose the elder. At first I thought it was because it was her way of getting at me, through someone she knew I considered a friend, and who, as you know, I have used as my housekeeper from time to time.”

Silence again. I looked him right in the eye.

“Indeed. Indeed, Hobson. You are in a bad mood this morning,” observed my master as he continued. “But then I asked myself to consider the, well, unlikely, possibility that Tochiarty was truly attracted to Rose, to her gruff, down to earth manner. And maybe, just maybe, behind all that knitting, the knitted clothing and so on, there lay a warm and inviting body. You get my drift, Hobson?”

This insight did catch my attention. I changed positions on my wicker chair and crossed my legs. “Ah, now I see…”

“Indeed. Indeed Hobson. Now I have your attention. We now have a solution that goes beyond the stereotype of the stalker being a ravishing male ready to pounce at any moment on his prey.”

“So the ‘he’ of the stalker was a ‘she’ who was really a ‘he,’” I interrupted with grand enthusiasm.

“Or a he want-to-be,” responded Colmes, avoiding the common abbreviated expression..

I shifted in my chair again. “You could have shared this with me, Colmes, it’s  not fair that you purposely keep me in the dark. You had information that I did not have, and would have reached similar conclusions as you did, had I known the details.”

“Evidence, Hobson, evidence elucidated by deduction. You know me well, I think. I am always reticent to come out with a solution until I am  absolutely sure that I am right. Sharing only half the truth is worse than sharing none,” recounted Colmes. I of course, did— still do — know him well. And yes, this little lecture was his way of apologizing, but at the same time informing me that he was not likely to change his ways.

Thus, I remained silent.

Then, unusually for him, Colmes leaned across his desk and for a moment I thought he was going to reach out and clasp my hand. Oh, what an event that would be! All in my imagination, of course. Rather, he tapped on the desktop with his three middle fingers as though he were playing a trill on the piano.  “Are you following me, Hobson my friend?”

Again, he would usually have said “boy” or “young man.”  He was going to open up at last.

“The fact is, Hobson, that Tochiarty is my nemesis. She has badgered me and those above me incessantly since she came here four years ago. She is convinced that I am CIA or FBI or whatever else, and that I am not qualified in any way to be a university Professor. I am, you might say, a malignant obsessive object to her. Her constant harassment of me is a form of stalking. She has been through all my files and investigated my past (with no success I might add). And I have no doubt that she will continue to do so. But now, I have turned the tables on her. I have information that would destroy her career if it were made public.”

“But there’s only you, Rose and me to attest to it all,” I countered.

“True. But you forget my cameras installed everywhere in here and all over campus as well. Believe me, I do have photographic evidence.”

I looked at his fingers as he once again lightly drummed them on the desk, this time with a flourish.

“So are you going to tell me what you did with your  nemesis after I left last night?”

“There’s not a lot to tell,” answered Colmes nonchalantly.

“Sure. Do tell,” I said, implying that he was trying to hide information from me yet again.

“First of all, I could not allow her to remain with me dressed, or should I say undressed, the way she was. I went to my closet and found some trousers, a shirt and jacket. And told her to get dressed. I confiscated the dildo, which I will keep with her finger prints all over it, as evidence. She lived off campus so I phoned for a taxi to collect her from outside the cafeteria and accompanied her to that place. And as we waited for the cab, she began to compose herself muttering to me as the cab rolled up that nobody would believe me if I revealed all that had happened, especially about the dildo. I pointed out that I also had her stalker notes, and there would be Rose’s testimony if needed. But I knew as she climbed into the cab that this was not the end of her dedication to my destruction. It had bought me time, that was all, and I would use the incident to force her into silence for as long as I could.”

This explanation seemed to be enough for my report to end the case, though I had a nervous feeling that Tochiarty was here to stay and would not let up on Colmes. She was, if not anything else, an individual whose obsession would one day cause her to act in a way that would destroy herself, and possibly others that were within her range. This explains why she recklessly continued to harass Colmes about his past and lack of credentials long after this incident.

I asked Colmes why didn’t he expose Tochiarty for what she was, a raving mad Lesbian, who stalked suitable targets and exposed herself at will. He looked at me, almost glaring.

“And who would replace her? You have not heard of the saying ‘better the devil you know...’”

I nodded, yes I understood. Colmes was a master of social control. To make all public would be to lose control of both the narrative and  all people involved, especially Tochiarty. The latter was a nuisance and would continue to snap at his heels, but for the foreseeable future (which one could never foresee anyway, according to Colmes) there was no point our making anything more of the incident. And what a field day the media would have if the story were made public.

I also learned a lesson from this incident. Don’t get drunk on campus.

46. No Exit

Ideally, universities are dangerous places, where students are subjected to education unlike that of their previous schools of lower education. They are challenged to think for themselves, not brainwashed, though there is a place for that, usually in small seminars where the favorite— usually fashionable — ideologies of professors assert their superiority. Such professors could not exist without the youthful exuberance of students who provide the mass approval of their radicalism. Thinking for themselves is often, perhaps inevitably, confused with questioning everything of the older generation. “Question everything” is fine except it becomes a tool to support an uprising or protest, in which the protesters instead of thinking for themselves behave without thinking as in an angry mob. Historically, dramatic changes in societies may develop or be fostered by such uprisings, protests, and demonstrations of university students. Probably, student protests helped end America’s war in Vietnam.

In a later case I will report to you how Colmes dealt with an uprising that threatened the existence of the entire university. In the case that I am about to describe, the entire university was not under attack or threatened, although at times it appeared as though it might be, along with all universities everywhere. This case is also of significance to me personally, because it was in this case that I first met Professor Colmes and was the case that brought the two of us together.

I came to the United States from Australia in the nineteen seventies. I prefer not to give specific dates because it would make it possible for some of my agile readers to track down the identities of some of the characters I mention in my stories. And while the people I describe are indeed real persons, I have of course reconstructed their features and habits to protect their privacy, in the true American spirit .

The seventies was the period in which the Weather Underground was in action thoughout American universities. The members of that essentially communist organization, actually I should not call it that. It was more a coming together of like minds, and though its organizational skill was limited, did manage to have a loose network of members in many universities, and to pull off some successful violent attacks. If they were communists, of course, their organization would have been rigidly structured, each “cell” with its tough leader who ruled the cell with strict and merciless discipline. In that decade, discipline was the last consideration in any protest movement.

*

I was hard at work studying for my constitutional law exam, sitting in one of those cubicles they provide doctoral students in the maize of the main library that inhabited the entire west side of the university’s square podium. There was no door to these cubicles, we students just sat at our desks that faced the wall, a shelf for books, a hard chair, the rest of the library at our backs. These cubicles were hard to come by and during periods of examinations, they were strictly let out only for limited periods, usually for two hours.  There was a small slot attached to the cubicle entrance into which we had to place our library card and fill out our name and time of entry.

I was engrossed with my reading (a bit of an exaggeration, maybe I was dozing) when I heard a light tap on the side of my cubicle. I turned and there stood a strong looking man, medium height, a long chiseled face, thin lips, a slight twitch at one corner, and a gleam in his blue-gray eyes.

“Mister Hobson, I presume?” he asked, his voice a slightly high pitched but most penetrating one, rather like the warble of an Australian magpie.

“G’day,” I said in Australian, “and you are?”

“Interdisciplinary Professor Thomas Colmes, but you can call me just Colmes.”

“OK. Colmes it is,” I said with Aussie bluster, “and you can call me Bill. What’s going on?”

“Hobson, if you don’t mind, I never call students or anyone else for that matter, by their first name.”

“No problem, mate,” I replied a little put off. His accent was kind of English, as though there was a plumb in his mouth, like my Dad used to describe all pommies (English migrants to Australia). “You’re a pom…I mean English?” I cheekily asked.

Colmes ignored the question. I would find out later that his particular origins were a bit of a mystery.

“I need a student I can trust who is unbiased, forthright, and down to earth.” And then he added, unnecessarily I thought, “I see you are reading Tribe’s Constitutional Law. I hope you have spied his deeply buried biases.”

“Don’t think so, Colmesy.” Just learning it by rote for Professor Garcia’s exam.”

“Excellent!” he almost smiled. The bloke was too serious for my liking. “And it’s Colmes, if you don’t mind.”

I ignored the correction and then asked the obvious, “so you wanted me specially for something or other?”

Colmes took a deep breath and looked around. “We cannot talk here. What I have to tell you is something that is of a very serious nature, and requires the utmost care and secrecy.”

“Well I do have my comprehensive exam tomorrow,” I kind of announced like the information wasn’t especially directed to him.

“I am aware of that,” said Colmes, “and I also know that it is an open book examination, is it not?”

“Yair,  but…”

“I need your help, Hobson, and I might add that it is a matter of life or death,” he said firmly, his English accent exaggerated.

“Well, I suppose if you put it like that…” I mumbled submissively.

“I do indeed. I do indeed,” spoke Colmes, a big frown on his forehead, his long ears slightly flinching.

I turned to my desk, shut the books I had open, placed them on the shelf above, grabbed my small canvas bag that contained my notebooks and lunch, and turned back to face this mysterious man called Colmes.

“Alright. Alright,” I replied with a big grin, mimicking what I would later discover was his favourite expression “indeed.”

Colmes had already turned and walked towards the library exit. I trotted along trying to catch him up

In other cases, I will describe for you Colmes’s office, deep in the bowels of the underground tunnels that served the university. By my reckoning he led me down and through a maze of tunnels—as I thought at the time, now I know them like the back of my hand—to his office that I reckoned was somewhere under the main podium, maybe even under the big fountain that gushed next to the clock tower.

Colmes fiddled with his keys that were on a small chain hanging from his trouser pocket, not unlike the chain on a watch fob of older days. He led the way in, grabbed a wicker chair that sat just inside the door, and placed it at the front of his desk, across from his own desk chair. “This is your chair,” he said all businesslike.

“The other one,” I said jokingly pointing to the overstuffed leather chair in the corner, “looks more comfortable.”

“The wicker chair,” emphasized Colmes.

I was beginning to see that Colmes did not have much of a sense of humor, or at least showed it only rarely.  On the other hand, we Aussies knew that the English had a pretty poor  sense of humor compared to us Aussies. And they certainly couldn’t take a joke. I was about to plonk myself down on the overstuffed chair, but held it back. Instead, I calmly sat on the wicker chair as directed.

“So what’s up doc?” I said foolishly, indeed flippantly.

“If we are going to work together, it will be necessary for you to excise your Aussie superficialities. The business before us is very serious,” lectured Colmes, a straight, now seeming gray to me, even sallow face. Did I really want to work for this bloke?

“Are you acquainted with a criminal justice student named Akira Tanaka?” asked Colmes seemingly unaware of my not well disguised doubts about working for him.

“Don’t think so, Colmes,” I said with a hint of belligerence, or that is how it seemed to me, calling an esteemed professor by his last name.

“I want you to find out as much as you can about his background, and especially as of now, what he is doing, what examinations he is lined up for, what courses he likes and dislikes. I would normally have Rose my Russian assistant do this for me, but I think that you would be less imposing or shall we say less scary than would Rose.”

“Rose?” I asked with a grin. “The one with the knitting? Everyone knows Rose.”

“Indeed, they do,” answered Colmes. “She is a treasure, but not good for this particular job.”

“So what do you want me to find out about this Akira guy?” I asked, and before he could reply I added, “what’s the problem?”

“As you may have deduced, Hobson, he is Japanese. It has come to my attention, from a confidential source, that he is having suicidal thoughts.”

“I leaned across his desk and  muttered, “isn’t that a Japanese thing? Like, Hara Kiri and all?”

“Perhaps one should not call it a Japanese thing,” corrected Colmes.

“I thought you wanted me to be straight forward, no bull shit,” I answered defensively.

“Indeed. Indeed. You are right Hobson. I thank you for being open and forthright. I doubt that in this case it is particularly that he is Japanese, but simply a matter of his fear of failing his final comprehensive exam.”

“I can attest to that,” I said with a wry smile. “And you didn’t say who gave you this information.”

“Right again, Hobson. I did not…”

“And besides,” I  continued, “I’d say all grad students facing their finals suffer the same psychological trauma.”

“Very good, Hobson. You have mastered the jargon of the psychotherapist,” said Colmes, and I thought I heard a quiet chortle, like a magpie.

I was about to add that I was a psychologist in my former life in Australia, but Colmes cut in first. “Yes, you worked for the Victorian education department. I hope it was not too Victorian?” This was Colmes’s idea of a joke.

“Probably not enough for you,” I countered.

Colmes fingered his key chain. Then turned serious again and began to answer my original question. “The student counseling people have reached out to me. It seems he went to them saying that he was going to commit suicide, but would give no reason or hint of what it was that was driving him. Usually it is some form of depression, as you would no doubt know, Hobson, in your former role as psychologist.

“My cases were mainly younger children,” I answered, “so I have no hands-on experience with teens or older. Nevertheless the fact that Akira went to the counseling department surely is an indicator that he is serious and is seeking help, a good thing.”

“Indeed. Indeed. Now I want you to find out everything you can of him, his friends, any support group. Where and what he does every minute of the day. Rose had a brief poke around and reported to me that he is very secretive and does not mix much with the other students. Understandable, since according to Rose, he speaks very little English.”

I was frankly flabbergasted. “No English and he’s doing his comprehensive?” I gasped.

“Apparently it is all an open book written exam, an exam method that is all the rage these days.”

“Seems to me that gives an advantage to students who can read and comprehend quickly,” I mused.

“Perhaps. But it maybe works against a student who can memorize answers to anticipated questions, then write their answers down in the exam within the strict amount of time permitted. It’s a matter of learning by wrote, as against reading, filtering, organizing and extracting information on the fly, as one would say, if it were open book.”

I was most impressed by the way Colmes had succinctly summarized the situation. “So you think that this open book form of exam discriminates against those who come from an education system that emphasizes rote learning, as is common in some if not all, Asian countries?”

“Precisely. Indeed. Indeed. It is why I have taken on the case. In fact I informed the counseling department that I would take the case providing that they kept out of it and gave me complete control. They were only too happy to agree, They did not want a suicide on their hands.”

“Neither do we,” I said, making us a royal ‘we’ without thinking.

“Indeed. Hobson my boy. Indeed,” endorsed Colmes, which much pleased me, except for the boy part.

I walked out of Colmes’s office with a light step, pleased that this big deal professor had chosen me of all people, to assist him. I came away, though, only with the name of the student and nothing much more. Had I stayed in my position as president of the criminal justice students’ association, I would have surely known Akira. But I had given up the students’ association a couple of years back when student protests were running hot. I didn’t mind the protests in themselves, but it was just mentally exhausting, and too much conflict for my liking. But I had best keep those things for another case, which pivoted around student protests.

Akira being Japanese made it a simple matter to find him. I looked up the class schedules that were pinned on the school noticeboard, and dropped by any that were meeting. It was the last week of classes, so I knew that I had to get on it right away. The final exams would be the following week. I saw that Professor Garcia’s constitutional law class was on right then, so I hurried across the Podium to the lecture center. It was always a large class because his was a required class for all students, the Constitution after all, considered to be, the very core of criminal justice, and rightly so, in my opinion. I slipped in the door at the back of the lecture hall, way at the top, so I could look down at the rows of students, all sitting there, nervously waiting to be called on, by the professor,  as I will describe in another case.

Looking down, though, only gave me a view of student heads, and since Akira was Japanese I assumed that his hair would be straight, copious, and black.  I now realized that this was not a good idea, but now that I was in there, I would wait until class was dismissed and hopefully catch up with him as they all left. Eventually, not seeing any sign of him, I asked a student who looked Asian to point out Akira to me. I know, my doing this was tinged with a bit of racism, “they all look the same” mentality, but I did it anyway. And it paid off, to some degree. The student was most friendly, and said that Akira was in the class but he did not come to class because he was too afraid he would be called upon and couldn’t speak much English. She then invited me to a meeting of the Asian students’ association which Akira did attend, because it was a group that helped each other with studying and preparing for exams. And because Constitutional law class was by far the hardest and scary class, they all met after class in a small room that the school assistant dean had kindly put aside for them.

There were three others in the room, and I quickly recognized Akira. He was the only Japanese, the others were Chinese, I guessed. They all opened their notebooks, except Akira who sat with his notebook closed, staring blankly at the floor. One looked in my direction, then turned back to her books. I sat in the corner and watched them work, most industriously. They were studying the law on whether individuals could be committed to a prison or asylum without a trial.

After fifteen minutes or so, Akira stirred, the other students turned to him, then he picked up his books and left, bowing nervously, backing out of the room until he hit the door, which  I quickly opened for him and followed him out.

“Akira!” I called, “just one moment, please.”

He stopped, and waited for me. He was a smallish person, of stocky stature, one could imagine him playing soccer, edging opponents out with his body, running fast up the field. “May I speak with you?” I asked.

He stopped and looked down. It was easy enough to see that he was not a happy person. “Speak English?” I asked.

“No,” he said, shaking his head.

“I am Bill Hobson. Professor Colmes sent me to talk with you.” I hoped that he had heard of this famous professor. Indeed, his eyes lit up a little, but then he looked down again. “I am here to help you,” I said trying very hard to be kind and helpful.

“No one help me. Not can,” he replied in a deep voice, unexpected from such a small person.

“I understand that the final Con Law exam is next week, a week from today, right?” He seemed to understand, nodded a little. “I am sure I can help you. Professor Colmes has found a Japanese translator who can sit with you in the exam.  It’s an open book exam, you understand what that is?”

Akira nodded, and he almost smiled, but there was a very deep frown on his face, his eyebrows forced down almost shutting his eyes. I started to gesticulate trying to convey what I assumed my English did not. “Come with me,” I said pointing first to him then to me, “and we will meet with the translator and get everything sorted out.”

I wanted to put my arm around him he seemed so forlorn, so deeply unhappy. But he appeared to have understood me and did follow me as I led us across the Podium to a small office buried in the labyrinth of the library. It was located in, of course, the Asian studies collection area, which heretofore I never knew existed. We entered the small office, not much bigger than a cubicle, three walls totally glass, one could see all the way down the library stacks. The translator, surprisingly, was not Asian at all, or did not appear so, though there was some hint of high cheek bones. She saw me gaping at her and said quickly, “I am a descendant of the Japanese who were locked away during World War Two,” she said, then turned directly to Akira. “Please take a seat,” she said. He complied, then to both our consternations, he broke down and cried. His head in his hands, his knees pulled up to his elbows, so that he sat precariously on the edge of the small chair. 

The translator looked at me. “My name is Joan,” she said. “Let’s see what the problem is.”

She leaned over and stroked Akira’s head, as one would when consoling an unhappy dog, and out of her mouth I imagined came a stream of goodness, all in rapid Japanese. This seemed to have some effect, as Akira’s sobbing gradually became less violent, and soon, just one small sob came every now and again, and Joan offered a tissue for him to wipe his eyes. He then responded with a stream of Japanese, gesticulating wildly, his face contorted with what looked to me was close to rage.

Joan sat back and looked across to me. “He is frightened he will fail the course because, he says, the open book exam makes it impossible for him to read the material quickly and then write an answer in English.”

“Perhaps he could write it in Japanese and you, if you would be prepared, could translate it for the Professor to read?” I suggested.

Joan addressed this suggestion to Akira. His face became contorted again, as he replied at length to Joan, who frowned and said to me, “he says he tried that, even went to the Dean to request it, but Professor Garcia flatly refused. Seems that this professor once failed a student because of his illegible handwriting.”

“I’m not at all surprised,” I answered. “Then we will have to find another way.”

Joan then spoke to Akira in a kind and motherly way, I thought, though I did not know what they were talking about. I assumed that she was reassuring him that a solution would be found. But when Joan spoke to me after her long conversation with Akira, she expressed much concern. It seems that the possibility of failure in Japanese culture, according to Joan who says she believes it to be so, for a family member to fail, especially he being the eldest of the three children in his family and the only male, is not unlike failing on the battlefield. The shame can only be eradicated by one thing, the only way out, suicide.

“Are you serious, I mean, is he serious?” I asked, aghast.

“Yes! Yes!” cried Akira. And he got up and left. I was left wanting to speak more with Joan to see if there was anything we could do, but also wanting to chase after Akira to try to talk some sense into him. I rose from my seat, but as I did so, Joan grasped my arm.

“Leave him be. I think he is in the process of resolving the problem for himself. You may have noticed that he almost smiled.”

I had noticed that, but had thought I imagined it. “What is he going to do?” I asked.

“He assured me that he will not commit suicide. At least not before the exam.” She replied.

“That’s not much of a reassurance,” I said.

“No it’s not. But at least it will give you a little more time to try to work something out with the professor, who sounds like an ogre, if you ask me,” Joan said, raising her eyebrows.

“Indeed he is,” I agreed, retreated to the door and expressed my deep appreciation for her help.

 It was a week until the final exam.

I reported back to Professor Colmes, who praised me for my hard work, but was a little perturbed. “I am a little concerned that, after such an emotional outburst that you describe, he then miraculously, recovers and walks off saying he has a solution. We all know that the only viable solution is suicide. Unless…” Colmes mused.

“What,” I asked, “what?”

“I will speak with Garcia. Maybe he will listen to me, but I doubt it. I will suggest to him that he simply pass the student,” said Colmes as though he were the Godfather who would make an offer that Garcia could not refuse.

“Really? You could get him to do that? And besides, is that not unfair to the other students who have worked hard to get their degrees. It cheapens their degree, don’t you think?” I said in a most forthright manner, one that I regretted, only having just started work for him.

“I appreciate your toughness, Hobson, Indeed I do. But really, what does it matter? One student, going back to Japan. Gets his degree in an unorthodox manner. His family are happy. So what? Is it worth losing one’s life over an exam?” Colmes looked at me square in the face. It was a forceful, intellectual, or was it emotional, challenge?

“Whatever,” I said dismissively. “Garcia will never go for it. He’s heartless.”

“We will see,” said Colmes tapping the fingers of each outstretched hand together, communicating a kind of satisfied though pensive state of mind.

“Then we’re done?” I asked Colmes, as I made to leave.

“Not quite. This case is not solved yet, we must keep at it. I will meet with Garcia and see what I can do. You should keep an eye on Akira to the extent that it is possible.”

“You mean tail him? I mean, I’d have to live with him every minute of the day to stop him from trying to do himself in,” I asserted.

“Of course. Just do what you can and let me know if anything happens.”

“No problem,” I replied, “and you will do the same, I take it?”

Colmes nodded and I took my leave.

As it turned out, from that day, Akira disappeared. I could not find him anywhere. If he had killed himself, surely the body would have been found, even if he jumped in the Hudson river. And Colmes insisted that we not report him as a missing person. That he would show up sooner or later.

*

The day of the constitutional law final exam came, and nervous students sat in their assigned seats chattering, arms full of books, waiting for Professor Garcia to show. Until now I have refrained from calling him by his nickname Ted the Red, because this was the very first case in which I was involved, and people except students did not refer to him by the nickname. But for this case, the  nickname is pertinent, given that he earned his nickname from the demonstrations he had participated in downtown, protesting outside the legislature and capitol in Albany, against whatever issue it might be, for the most part the Vietnam war, death penalty abolition, homelessness, hunger, corruption, whatever the SDS or Weathermen or Black Power movements were pushing. All of these referred to by politicians and the popular press as communists of one kind or other. Hence Professor Theodore Garcia’s nickname Ted the Red.

Now I sat at the back of the lecture hall and waited for Ted the Red to enter. He did so, carrying a stack of blue books, the traditional exam booklets in which all students were required to write their exam answers, and of course, the sheaf of legal size papers containing the exam questions. To my surprise, I spied Akira sitting in the front row. This being an exam, there were no assigned seats as the professor would not be calling on individuals by name.

I walked down to the lectern where Ted the Red was standing, checking over his list of students, counting them to see if all were present. He smiled at me as I passed Akira who seemed to be writing furiously and covered his work when he saw me. His round face seemed to be free of stress and anxiety that had overcome him during our meeting. What on earth could have happened, I wondered, and even suspected that it had all been an act. Ted waved at me with a sheet of paper in his hand. He looked amused, and looked down on me his face wrinkled with a mixture of amusement and superiority.

“Take a look at this,” he said, handing me the paper. “Now you can see that I was right all along. The asshole was faking it.”

I took one look and was struck speechless. It was a note typed in capitals in the middle of the paper that said:

PASS ALL CON LAW STUDENTS NOW OR SUFFER THE CONSEQUENCES.

LONG LIVE THE WEATHER UNDERGROUND

“You have to dismiss the class,” I proclaimed, “It’s a bomb threat!”

“Bull shit! It’s that little Japanese asshole trying to weasel his way out of the exam,” he growled.

“But it’s the Weather Underground. They’ve blown up several places over the past couple of years. You’ve got to dismiss the class!” I turned as if to address the class. “If you will not, I will!”

Ted grabbed me by the arm and roughly dragged me to the door of the lecture center and pushed me out. I tried to forced my way back in, but he was too strong and held the door closed. Thereupon I decided that my only alternative was to raise the alarm. I looked for a fire alarm, but could not find one. Then I realized that the bottom doors to the lecture centers opened into the tunnels. I would run to Colmes. He would have a solution, I hoped. I ran one way, then turned and ran the other. I had only been to his office that one time when he hired me. It was like a rabbit warren down there. Then I heard the clacking of a typewriter and followed the sound, which led me to a large office with one person, surrounded by TVs and other audio and video paraphernalia.

I rushed in and grabbed at the typist’s phone that sat on her desk. This gave her a big fright and she was none too pleased.

“What are you doing?” she asked, “who are you?”

“I need to use the phone,” I said.

“Put your quarter in the jar there and you can use it. Dial 7 to get an outside line.”

“But I don’t have a quarter. Besides this is an emergency,” I cried.

“We have to mind our budget down here,” said the typist as she grabbed my wrist in a very strong grip.

“Colmes! “ I yelled. “Where’s Professor Colmes’s office?”

“Oh. Him? The one that never even says hello when you pass him in the tunnel,” she said in a most disapproving manner.

“His office. Where is it?”

At this point she at last comprehended that there was something  serious going on. She let go my wrist and pointed, “Go that way, first right, second on the left.”

I rushed off and soon found Colmes’s office and banged on his door. The lock quickly opened, and Colmes appeared, frowning. “What is it?” he asked.

“I went to Professor Garcia’s exam in the off-chance that Akira might show, thinking that he would not be there of course, since he hasn’t been seen for a couple of weeks.”

“Indeed. Hobson. The situation is very serious. We must get to Garcia’s class immediately. I have more information as we get to his class. In fact I was about to go there when you banged on my door,” said Colmes.

“It’s just a few minutes down the tunnel,” I said. “Akira showed up to the class and seemed to be writing his exam.”

“I am sure that he was faking it. In fact, I have reliable information that he has been meeting with the Weather Underground and that they are, or have been, planning to plant a bomb in the examination classroom.”

“That is what I was coming to tell you. Garcia received a bomb threat, here it is.” I handed him the note but he pushed it away, saying that he could not read it. It was his dyslexia, of course, but at that time I did not know this. I simply put it down to his being easily annoyed and wanting to do his own thing. “I tried to get him to make an announcement and dismiss the class. But he would have none of it. Would not take the note seriously, even though it was signed by the Weather Underground.”

“Yes,” said Colmes as we got to the lecture center door, “that is to be expected. He has his reasons, I can tell you.”

Breathless, I opened the lecture center door and we rushed in. All was quiet. Garcia walked back and forth in front of the blackboard of the lecture center. I spied Akira still apparently writing his exam.

“I’ve been waiting for your arrival,” grinned Ted the Red, “you can see that we have not yet been blown up.”

Colmes took a deep breath and walked up to the lectern. “Attention class!” he called. “Please close your examination booklets, make sure your name is written on the front and leave the classroom in an orderly fashion. Take all your things with you, and hand your exam booklet to Dr. Garcia, Mr. Hobson or myself as you leave. There has been a bomb threat and we have good reason to believe that it is the Weather Underground.”

Ted the Red was extremely angry. “Hold it! He screamed. “I will have no one vacate my class, or submit to threats by persons of violence and insurrection!” Some students stopped, others ignored him and kept going. Garcia continued and it was clear that he would not let up. “My father, his father and many of his relatives were murdered by the Nazis during world war two. It was only by the tenacity and bravery of my mother that she managed to escape with me out of Germany, and eventually, since none of the allies would take in Jewish refugees, we ended up in Cuba, and eventually  the United States after the war was over…”

You can understand how strange, yet moving, this appeared. Here were scores of students scrambling to get out of a classroom to escape a bomb, and Ted the Red is reciting his personal history, banging the lectern to drive home his point, seemingly oblivious to the danger into which he had thrust his students.

Colmes gathered up Garcia’s papers and wedged them under his arm, then gently, but nevertheless with some necessary force, guided Professor Garcia out of the classroom. I walked through the aisles collecting the exam blue books, as they called them (the covers were a light blue). I stayed until all had left, except Akira who remained, sitting silently, staring into space.

“You need to leave,” I  said softly.

Eventually, Akira did gather up his things and leave. I was the last one out, and there was, obviously, still no explosion. In the meantime, Colmes had called the authorities to report the threat. And as I exited, a couple of bomb specialists, dressed in their military-like uniforms, though they were New York State troopers, showed up to search for the bomb.

In fact a small bomb was found sitting in one of the cupboards that contained chalkboard  materials just  below the blackboard. According to the experts the bomb was poorly made, and they could find no indication of how it would be detonated, though there was a sizable amount of TNT sitting there. The days of remotely detonated bombs and suicide bombers were yet to come.

 However, settling the dispute, and dispute it was, concerning the Con Law grades was no simple matter. There were two reasons for this. The first and obvious one was what is called, indeed revered, the principle of academic freedom. Supposedly the professor has total and complete authority to make all academic decisions including the content of their courses, grading of their students, and behavior in the classroom. So Ted the Red was completely within his rights to ignore the Weather Underground demands. The second was, how to assuage the inherent skepticism of the Weather Underground and their supporters that the professor’s submission of the grades would in fact be recorded in the students’ transcripts. The recording by a professor of a student’s grade went through several layers of bureaucracy until it was finally entered into the student’s official academic transcript. The process took weeks, if not months to be completed. Though the Weather Underground probably had no understanding of the lengthy process of recording a student’s grade, they nevertheless were sufficiently distrustful of the people who were, derisively, over thirty years old, so effort would have to be made to assure them that indeed their demands had been met.

Of course, there is one final unfinished matter that I must now attend to. Did Akira commit suicide? And was he truly involved in the Weather Underground?

Colmes had the answers, although there was some controversy as to the true outcomes. Certainly, Akira did not commit suicide. Or at least not during the difficult negotiations with the Weather Underground whose representatives proved most cantankerous. But, according to Colmes, he was deeply involved in the Weather Underground planning and implementation of the bomb. He knew this from the intelligence he received from none other than his housekeeper Rose (later known as Rose the elder for reasons that will come clear in later cases) and permanent graduate student like myself, who had obtained the Weather Underground’s confidence by the simple fact that she was Russian and spoke English with a strong Russian accent. They assumed, wrongly, that she must be a communist, and therefore could be trusted even though she was probably over thirty.

Colmes, therefore, knew about the planting of the bomb, especially Akira’s central part in it. Akira appears to have  overcome his supposed deficit in the English language to convince the Weather Underground to attack Ted the Red, claiming that he was a CIA spy and only pretended to be a left wing extremist.  Colmes claimed that this was a cunning trick on Akira’s part, to get the Weather Underground to have Ted the Red pass all students regardless, the argument being that giving grades was just one more overbearing tactic of the professorial elite  to keep the students in submission and stop them from seeing through the obvious hypocrisies of the academic ruling class. This was quite ahead of the times. There would be demonstrations throughout the United States and even Europe charging that assigning grades was a heartless act of authoritarianism and discriminated against those students who were not good at tests.  Colmes leaked this information to the FBI and Akira was listed for deportation, which occurred soon after the faculty senate and university administration caved to the Weathermen demands and all Con Law students were given a passing grade. Needless to say, this created an uproar among all other students who immediately demanded automatic passing grades in all their courses.

Thus, concluded Colmes, a suicide had been averted, one life saved, at the cost of  degrading the education of all other students from that time forward.

45. The Snake

I have chosen this case to begin the collection of cases because it  represents a case, the solution of which was essential if my position in the School of Justice were not to be terminated. [The omission of ‘criminal’ in the name of the school is not a mistake on my part. There occurred a name change in more recent times—as a matter of fact, the outcome of one of the few cases in which Colmes failed to prevail.]

I had just entered my office, having dropped off Colmes’s tea and toast for his breakfast, when I heard the loud bang on my office wall signaling to me that my presence was required. I had planned on that morning to at last finish off a draft of my dissertation proposal. “Hobson!” I heard through the wall. The rather high-pitched sound of Colmes’s voice easily penetrated the wall, without his having to yell at all. I rarely answered. Rather, simply walked out of my office and into his, without knocking.

Colmes looked up from his crossword and gulped down the last drop of tea from his daintily decorated English tea cup, having poured the tea into it, out of the much despised disposable cup in which it came.

“Hobson, we have a most interesting and pressing case before us. I will have to give it much careful thought before we proceed. I trust that you are not too busy? ”

“I was just putting the finishing touches to the first draft of my dissertation proposal,” I answered in my Australian mono­tone, trying to appear nonchalant.

“Well, I do not want to interfere with your studies,” he said, still working on his crossword puzzle.

“It can wait,” I answered. “You know me. I can only do a little at a time anyway, as you know it’s so difficult for me.”

“Your ADD ?” asked Colmes, still not looking up.

“I can manage it.”

In fact, I had been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder in Australia when I was eight years old. It was one of the reasons I ended up coming to the USA. In Australia they were good at diagnosing the disease, but hopeless at doing anything about it, especially in schools where teachers interpreted my inattention as a defect in discipline, and dealt with it accordingly. My ADD also interfered with my learning and memory. So at a very young age I developed a habit of recording everything, or just about every­thing, in a notebook or even on a scrap of paper if it were nearby. Hence, filing cabinets were the first piece of furniture I installed in my office.

Colmes finished his tea and returned the cup to its saucer. “This case has come to me directly from the President’s office. You know he used to be the Dean of your school, right?”

“You mean criminal justice? I’m in the philosophy depart­ment now, you know.”

“Yes, I am aware of that. But you have not yet defended your dissertation for criminal justice, is that not so?”

“Er, yes, that’s right, but you know why that is.”

“Indeed I do, Hobson,” said Colmes with an amused smirk.

I decided to pick up where I left off. “Oh, yes, Dean O’Brien who was once the governor of Sing-Sing Prison, right?”

“Indeed. A most controlling sort of person. In fact he was once overheard to say in a meeting that he thought universities were not all that different from a prison to run. A good fit, wouldn’t you say?”

I nodded, but refrained from responding. Colmes was used to this, and I can attest that he rarely, at least with me anyway, expected to get an answer when he asked a question, unless it was part of a direct interrogation of a suspect or witness. Otherwise his questions were almost always rhetorical.

Colmes continued. “It appears that our President-come-governor-come-Dean has decided on a cost-cutting operation and plans to disband your School.”

This stirred me to ask, “you mean he’s going to abolish the whole school, the doctoral program and all the faculty?”

“It’s not altogether clear how far he intends to go. But my good friend who resides in the President’s office—universities have spies and confidants hidden everywhere. Let’s call my friend our “trusty” just like in a Mississippi prison. He has raised the alarm and asked me to devise a way to stop this terrible dest­ruction of an essential part of the university.”

I pulled up a wicker chair, one that was probably made by prison labor, and leaned my elbows on Colmes’s desk. I detected the usual small twitch at the corner of his mouth, a sign that he found what he had just said amusing, almost a joke. Of course, one had to agree with the President. Whoever heard of a School of Criminal Justice anyway? Invented by some politician close to Governor Rockefeller, so I was told. Schumaker university was the first university to house such a school. Others followed, but remained very few. Judiciously, I remained silent.

Then he looked up from his crossword and stared at me intently, as only he could do. The twitch at the corner of his mouth remained. I knew I had to respond.

“If the School is abolished along with the faculty, I will not be able to defend my dissertation and anyway there will be no such thing as a Ph.D. in criminal justice. Criminal justice will be no more,” I muttered.

Colmes stared back at me, his lips now pursed together tightly. I knew I had to speak again.

“And it will be the end of my assistantship. No money. No job.” I muttered forlornly.

“Indeed. Indeed. That is so. An inevitable deduction, Hobson.”

I sat back in my chair and waited. Colmes would have a solution, I knew it.

“Now, now Hobson. Not so glum!” smiled Colmes. “With your assistance, we will fix this.“

“I can put aside my dissertation draft. After all, there’s no hurry to finish it, is there?”

Colmes ignored my question. “Now here is what I want you to do.”

“Dig up dirt on the President?” I asked eagerly.

“Hmmm. An obvious solution, but too direct and besides, I do not think that the main force behind this is the President. Or if he is, there is no easy way to get at him. Certainly, he cannot make such a big change without the assent of…”

I broke in, “The faculty senate!”

“Indeed not! Indeed not!” retorted Colmes. “It has little standing except a pretense that faculty are always ‘consulted’ by the administration. The senate is always consulted, but only after the decision has been made.”

“Then what? Who?” I asked, perplexed.

“We will begin with the new Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs.”

“You will confront them?” I asked, with some happy anti­cipation.

“Confront? Indeed not! Confront creates resistance. And it’s ‘her’ not ‘them.’ She has two titles, and so far she fits the Colmes basic rule of identification in academia. Her name is Doctor Catherine Dolittle”

I sat mute, awaiting his explication of the rule.

“The more the titles, the more the incompetence,” pro­nounced Colmes his bottom lip dropping a little as though he had just said something disgusting.

“Very funny, sir,” I said, inadvertently breaking another of his sacred rules: never address him as Sir.

Colmes stood and began to walk up and down in his office, hands behind his back, head and chin held high. He then stopped at my side, where I was still sitting on the wicker chair pulled up to the desk. “Hobson, you must stop and think. Everything rev­olves around the Provost. We must make her ours.”

“But how?”

“Information, of course. Here’s what you must do. Get a hold of her resume. Track down all the publications she lists and find any coauthors. Track her back to her undergraduate and high school academics. Get all of her grades. In short, find anything that could be a black mark against her.”

“But how? I can’t just go in and ask for all that stuff. What about the privacy rules?” I complained.

“Indeed. Indeed. But there are ways. Say that you are work­ing for the Arcade Personnel Agency,” Colmes handed me a business card, “and say that the Provost is applying for a top government position in Homeland Security and that you are gathering information to assist in her clearance.”

“But will they believe me?”

“They will when you show them your badge,” announced Colmes.

Struck speechless I mechanically put out my hand to receive the badge. It even had my photograph ID on it.

Colmes licked his top lip slightly as he did when pleased with himself. “You will need money to get to Philadelphia.”

“Philadelphia? You mean, that’s where she got her doctorate?”

“Yes, at Drexel. In environmental studies, I believe.” Colmes turned to the wall behind him that was lined with books from floor to ceiling.

It bears repeating that his entire office walls were lined with books. Not unusual for a professor. Professors either sported a large personal library, or instead piled up papers, books, folders, unread dissertations, ungraded papers all over the floor with barely a passage for any visitor to reach the professor’s desk. This was their way of demonstrating to gullible students (graduate or undergraduate) their industry and total devotion to scholarship. But there was something out of place with Colmes’s walls of books. None had been read, or at least one could not see any finger marks that had been left in the layers of dust that clung to the books.

Except for one that was shiny and well used. Colmes grab­bed it, a heavy criminal law casebook. Immediately he lifted it from the shelf, it set in motion machinery that pushed back two rows of books, and in their place a safe came forward with two separate doors. He muttered something to himself, seemingly for a very long time, turned a knob, and the door on the left swung open. He reached in and pulled out a wad of $100 bills and coun­ted out twenty of them.

“This should see you through. Bring back to me whatever is left over, if any. Take the train, it’s the least stressful.”

I was about to say thank you, and ask did I really need that much money, when he quickly slammed the safe shut and closed up the bookshelf.

At the time, I did not know it, but he had extremely sensitive hearing, supposedly a result of a birth defect, or should I say his inherited gift. Anyway, lucky for us, because right then the door to his office flew open, and there, standing right in the doorway was—there is no other way to describe her, his nemesis, Dr. Hannah Tochiarty (pronounced Toke-iarty), Vice President and Dean of Human Resources. In contrast to Colmes she had a way of showing up anywhere at any time. She obviously had a master key so could enter any room or office. And she was convinced that Colmes was not what or who he said he was. His personnel file lacked any information at all, except one folder within which was typed on a single legal size paper: NO CLEARANCE ALLOWED. She had taken this as high in the administration as she could go—to the President after all, supposedly a former prison governor (we know that was true) and should be a stickler for security, but he refused to do anything about it. Just shrugged it off and said to her, “there’s nothing I can do. You know what they are like.” And she would be ushered out of his office. Who “they” were she had no idea and not the courage to ask.

Colmes pushed back in his chair, placing his hands behind his head. “Good morning Dr. Tochiarty. You bring good news, I hope?”

Dr. Tochiarty answered only indirectly, which is to say she ignored him, instead she looked my way.

“Good morning. Mr. Hobson, isn’t it?”

“That’s right Doctor. I was just leaving,” I answered in my most polite manner, conveying the fact that I recognized her power. She could make or break pretty much anyone on campus. Colmes had battled with her over many a case. But she did not step away from the doorway, so it was impossible for me to leave without bumping into her or nudging her aside, both options were sorely tempting. She just stood, hands on her protruding hips that seemed to hold up the weight of her balloon-like upper body, a scowl erupting all over her face, from chin over fatty bulging cheeks, a tiny flat sow-like nose, to eyes almost closed by the swelling of her cheeks and the deep frown of her forehead.

“Excuse me,” I muttered meekly.

She turned back to Colmes who looked at me, enjoying every minute of this impossible encounter. His face, though, only gave the tiniest indication of his personal pleasure. I  know him so well. He holds everything in. His stern grey face acts as a mirror, an aggressive mirror that turns any emotive behavior of anyone he meets, back on themselves. The result is that they invariably feel uncomfortable, and, in a different way, seriously inferior from this person, Colmes, a man of brilliance—as I attest that he in fact is.

Dr. Tochiarty made a small step forward. “The news is that your housekeeper position has been approved, though the money allocated is limited.”

“Indeed! Indeed!” cried Colmes, breaking out all over in smiles, a rarity no less. “One Rose lost, another Rose found!”

Rose was the daughter of Colmes’s former housekeeper, a kind of Victorian era housekeeper with a thick Russian accent, who would cook for him, clean his house (or office-apartment as one might call it), go food shopping or attend to any other tasks he required. The old Rose was in fact a graduate of the Depart­ment of Philosophy, the department with which I was now also enrolled doing my second Ph.D. Colmes had actually chaired her dissertation. The new housekeeper, her daughter Rose, had recently graduated with her Ph.D. in Criminal Justice, so I knew her somewhat from my studies there. In fact she looked exactly like her mother. Always dressed in rather ill-fitting knitted sweaters, shirts, and even leggings and dress. And when she was not tending to her chores, even when doing other things, such as defending a dissertation, she always found time to knit while someone asked her a question, or even while she answered.

I managed to step around Doctor Tochiarty, muttering an “excuse me.” It was my first up-close encounter with her, and I was aghast at the smell, her tobacco breath blended with a strong whiff of excessive amounts of baby powder plastered all over her round, moonlike face. I quickly glanced over my shoulder at Colmes, and I am sure I saw him sniggering.

“And when will she start?” I heard Colmes as I made my way next door into the safety of my office, Tochiarty having stepped a little aside.

*

Upon returning to my office, I put away yet another rough draft of my dissertation proposal, and pottered around, placing books back on their shelves. As usual, I was not altogether sure what I was supposed to do. From Colmes, all I had was my pass as a headhunter. I retrieved as much information on Dolittle as I could from Google, it had only been going for a couple of years, but was already a great quick source of information. And the rest I scoured the Chronicle of Higher Education for any articles that might mention her. But obtained very little. I called the human resources office at Drexel and managed to confirm that she in fact did attend there, but they would give little else over the phone. A trip to Philadelphia was warranted. In all my time upstate New York I had never ventured south past New York City. A train trip was called for.

Meanwhile the scratchy, loud voice of Tochiarty seeped through the wall of my office, mixed with the steady high pitched mutterings of Colmes. I discovered later that Tochiarty had informed Colmes that she had launched an official investigation of him and that he would be required to answer some questions put to him by the university lawyer whose main function was to confront, warn and accuse individuals that Tochiarty fingered as having broken the equity and diversity rules of the university. This was not at all new. The Provost indulged in constant harassment of persons, whether student or faculty, whom she, for whatever reasons of her own, targeted for investigation and castigation. I even asked Colmes why he didn’t go after her, but he responded that she was a known entity and that she had been a useful ploy on occasion, in fact helped solve a couple of cases. As I would find out in future cases, this turned out to be so.

*

Amazingly, the train from Rensselaer to New York was on time, and I managed without difficulty to change to the fast train to Philadelphia, out of 30th street station in New York, alighting in a little over an hour at Philadephia’s 30th street station. Then it was an easy walk to Drexel university where I showed my badge and chatted with a human resources official. After the usual pleasantries and joking about my Aussie accent, I managed to get the entire file of Dolittle. It was huge, containing an amazing amount of irrelevant information, at least that is what I thought, concerning her personal life. She had had two abortions, it seems, was never married, failed her comprehensive exams for her doctorate in religious studies twice, and was saved only by the fact that her second abortion had affected her performance in the second attempt at her comprehensive exam, so she was given a conditional pass, taking into account her handicapped condition. While this was interesting scuttlebutt, I could not see how this would help Colmes to get Dolittle to desist from her attempt to destroy the School of Criminal Justice. There was little else in the thick file, most of it listing the various honors and awards she had received, especially a big one for being the diversity faculty of the year. This was a bit puzzling since she was, after all, a middle aged white woman from the main line of Philadelphia. There was also an award for her work with the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Apparently she also worked as a volunteer at the Philadelphia Zoo for many years. I phoned Colmes and infor­med him of my progress. He was most appreciative. I told him that I did have to pay a little money to get access to the file, $100 in all. He asked me to read out to him all the juicy bits of the file.

“Do you want copies of everything?” I asked. And to my surprise (at the time) he answered, “no need. Good job, Hobson. Get back as soon as you can. By the way, what was her disser­tation topic?”

”Just a minute. I have it written down here… Ah yes. “The Inspiration of Species and the Discovery of Christian Purity.”

It was a long trip back as I missed the train connection in New York City. I found a Starbucks hidden away somewhere deep in the busy station, sipped coffee and wondered what Colmes was up to. I was puzzled that he did not want any copies of the Dolittle file. And it was then that I had realized that there were actually no file cabinets in Colmes’s office. How could that be? When he must have dealt with many cases before I joined him? All the filing cabinets were in my office, but those were what I installed. There were no files of his, until I began to make them. And even then, he seemed a little annoyed that I had done so. Of course, I am so glad I did, because without them I could not be recounting to you our cases. And he would have been truly angry if he knew that I had submitted articles based on them to the Chronicle of Higher Education.

*

Of his many talents, Colmes was an outstanding photo­grapher. He had, tucked away in the drawers of his desk and elsewhere in his apartment, a huge variety of cameras, old and new. They were hidden and operative all over his office. He had also installed them in various places around the university. To this day, I do not know where they are. I once asked him for a map or something so I could help keep track of them, but he scorned the idea. Besides, he insisted that he had what he called a ‘“photographic memory” and so knew exactly where every camera was installed. He could literally see the map inside his head. I had no idea what this meant, and certainly doubted that such a detailed map could be “seen” as though one had eyes inside one’s head.

Correction. Of course eyes are physically located inside one’s head. But in order to see something, there has to be a physical object outside the head (in this case a map) in order to see it inside one’s head, right? Otherwise, if one sees something inside one’s head without looking at something outside one’s head, then you are having a “vision.” Right? The sort of thing that the “prophet” Girolamo Savonarola in 15th century Florence insisted on seeing. But even there, the objects (sword, fire and brimstone etc.) had been seen prior to the vision. They could only take shape inside the head once their exterior shape previously had been seen and identified.

My apologies. There I go again, You can understand why I am doing my second Ph.D. in philosophy. It is a field that can make even the simplest of things very complicated.

*

The phone rang in my little dormitory apartment and woke me with a startle. I groped for the phone and mumbled, half asleep, “who is it?” After my long trip to Philadelphia, and miss­ing the train connection back, I had arrived to the comfort of my Dorm apartment very late and so decided to sleep a little later than usual. I need not have asked who it was phoning me at this ungodly hour of eight a.m. It was Colmes of course.

“Hobson?”

“Colmes?” I retorted, annoyed.

“There, there, Hobson. The case is but solved, thanks to you!”

“What? Where? How?” I spluttered.

“Meet me in the environmental studies department in ten minutes.”

“Colmes? Professor?” I called. But he had hung up.

I dashed out of bed, attended to my morning ablutions, rushed down to the small cafeteria that served our dormitory, grabbed a cup of coffee and a piece of bacon from one of the many plates of breakfast fast food, and was on my way, grabbing a napkin to wipe my greasy fingers as I went. What solution could he have come to—deduction as he called it—from the meager amount of information I gave him?

Fortunately, it was not too far to the environmental studies department, housed in a large section of the Science building, at one corner of the podium. It too, was a heavy concrete structure, though not a high-rise as were the dorms, instead a squat four story building with the characteristic ascending narrow windows. I no sooner entered the building via the heavy double doors at the entrance, and there was Colmes, pacing back and forth in the lobby.

“Ah Hobson, my boy! At last!”

I thought I had done very well getting there as soon as I did, and resented Colmes’s impatience. And his calling me ‘boy’ of course I resented, though could not complain since I was, after all, his student. But I should say, that I have carried such silly little resentments for many years. I try not to take his frequent annoyances to heart. They are simply the symptoms of genius, unintended, and without malice.

“So, Provost Dolittle has moved to the department of envir­onmental studies?” I asked.

“Not at all, though she does visit the department a lot,” answered Colmes with a slight grin, more of a smirk. “But then, one can understand that, if she is continuing her devotion to the prevention of cruelty to animals.”

“Sure, but how does this knowledge point to a solution to our case? And why was it so urgent that you had to call me so early in the morning?”

“All in good time, Hobson. Follow me!”

Colmes led the way down a narrow passage to the end, knocked then entered through the heavy door. We stepped into a large room, full of rows of benches populated with many cages and glass cases, all containing various kinds of animal life. A person, presumably a lab assistant (she was wearing a white lab coat) smiled as we approached.

“Doctor Colmes,” she said extending her hand, “it’s an honor to meet you, and I hope I can help in any way I can.”

 She was a small person, though seeming to have arms that were rather too long for the rest of her body. I realized that this impression was because she was stretching into a glass case in which there lay coiled up a very large snake, striped in yellow and dark brown.

“Is this what you had in mind?” she asked.

“Possibly” answered Colmes with a satisfied gleam in his eye.

“Just a minute,” I intervened, “that’s a tiger snake, isn’t it?”

“It sure is,” answered the lab assistant as she gently scooped up the snake and drew it out of the glass case. “I’m surprised that you recognized it.”

“I’m Australian,” I retorted proudly, “we’re used to lots of snakes down there.”

Colmes became a little agitated, and looked all around us. He was either annoyed that I had interrupted his mild interrogation or he was looking for something else. But I merrily continued on.

“But don’t you have any rattle snakes? This is America after all,” I said jokingly.

At this, Colmes quickly averted his penetrating gaze back to the tiger snake. The lab assistant noticed and held the snake out, now hanging loosely over her arm.

“Dr. Colmes, would you like to hold it?” she asked, smiling.

“I think not,” growled Colmes, “but you did not answer my colleague’s question.”

This intervention pleased me greatly. I must have accid­entally turned the interrogation into a direction that suited Colmes.

“Rattle snakes? Oh yes, we have a bunch of them in the annex along with a lot of other native varieties.” She pointed out the window to a small wooden building that was obviously a temporary addition to the laboratory.

“And the Provost? She is satisfied that all your animals, snakes included are treated well?”

“Well of course, Dr. Colmes. We are very happy that she shows such interest and are well aware of her work with the Society. We work closely with her to make sure that all our species are well cared for. She even on occasion takes some of them home to mind, should we happen to be short staffed. And as I am sure you are well aware that in these times of austerity, we are often short staffed.”

Colmes nodded his assent and smiled just a tiny bit, the corner of his mouth twitching. Of course, the university, as are all universities, was in a perpetual state of austerity, even in the best of times. Such a condition provided ready excuses for whatever criticism might be leveled at academia from time to time.

“And that includes the snakes?” he asked casually.

“Oh yes. They are quite safe if you know how to handle them. She comes by pretty much every week and takes a few home with her, and sometimes if she is too busy I will take an animal or two to her house.”

“I see, said Colmes as he stood up straight and almost snapped his heels together. It was time for us to leave. “Come Hobson, I think our work here is done.”

“Aren’t we going to see the rattlers?” I asked in a silly schoolboy manner.

Colmes was already starting to leave as the lab assistant replied to my query. “Oh, I’m sorry, but there are none in the annex right now. They are with the Provost who is giving them special care this weekend. She feeds them a special diet. They have to be well fed or they become a little vicious and hard to handle.”

I saw Colmes hesitate, a slight misstep perhaps, but he then called out over his shoulder. “Come, Hobson. We are done here!” And repeated, “come Hobson, we must now meet with the Provost and settle this problem once and for all.”

I hurried to catch up with him. “Are we bringing the tiger snake?” I asked again with the relish of a mischievous schoolboy.

“No need!” cried Colmes who was already at the door to leave. “Thank you for your excellent help,” he called over his shoulder to the lab assistant.

I also thanked the lab assistant, but then called out to Colmes, “Professor. Why don’t we take the snake? Might get her to talk?”

Colmes was already at the door. He stopped and turned to face me.

“Ah, Hobson. You would enjoy that, now would you not?” he smiled, “but how would it look in the Chronicle of Higher Education, that Colmes and his assistant intentionally, with a venomous snake, scared the daylights out of the Provost, and they were both, understandably, forcibly removed from the campus never again to return?”

“Oh, I suppose so,” I answered with a snigger. This was one serious defect of Colmes, probably a symptom of his disability. He had a limited sense of humor.

“No, Hobson. We shall wait until we have all our evidence and then act,” muttered Colmes.

We left the environmental studies building and Colmes led the way down to the tunnels, under the podium, and back to his office. I followed him into his office and took up my position on the old wicker chair at the front of his desk. I was itching to hear from Colmes what had led him to the snake, what on earth it could have to do with the Provost, and of course, how it would help us rescue the School of Criminal Justice. But as usual, Colmes more or less ignored me, which meant he discounted my ADD disability, but it also meant that he had solved the problem and would let me in on his piece of deductive brilliance when he was ready. If this sounds a little sarcastic, I admit that it is. I consider Colmes a great colleague and even friend, though the idea that one would be a devoted friend of one’s professor is a little bit of a stretch. We could never be equals, not in a university setting, at least.

So now it was my usual turn to get up from my chair and walk to-and-fro in his office. In the meantime, Colmes had dis­appeared into one of the rooms in his apartment, Door One I called it, and I heard voices. I was about to leave and go to my own office when Colmes entered from Door Two.

“Rose is preparing morning tea for us. Would you like to stay, that is, unless you have pressing engagements elsewhere?” asked Colmes, seemingly oblivious to my fidgety condition. Of course, an affirmative answer was presumed. It was another of Colmes’s questions that did not expect an answer, or at least to which there was only one presumed answer.

“Oh, sure. I’d love to,” I quivered, embarrassed that I would now be in a position of having an equal, that is Rose, a fellow grad student, wait on me. Besides, I was hoping that Colmes would now inform me of what he planned to do to save the School of Criminal Justice from the Provost.

Rose entered carrying a large tray with embossed pewter handles, loaded with two ornate cups with saucers, a small match­ing plate with two scones, two small plates, a teapot covered with a tea cozy, two small dishes, and of course two tiny pots one with raspberry jam, the other with whipped cream. Colmes sat at his desk, while Rose struggled to place the contents of her tray on his desk. It was an amusing sight, one must agree. There she was stooping over the desk, trying not to spill the tea, all the time her knitting needles stuck in her thick hair bound loosely into a bun at the top, just like her mom.

“There you are, Professor Colmes, doesn’t all that look lovely?” said Rose in her Russian voice, a light accent laced with inflections of upper class English vowels.

“Thank you Rose. You are a gem, and so was your mother,” said Colmes, trying his best to sound nice and friendly. Trouble was, as I have already intimated, Colmes had trouble being friendly. He was a loner, through and through. It took me a long time to understand and accept that. We all have our own disa­bilities. Including Rose. Hers was her knitting, which she inherited from her mother.

But now Rose, having emptied the tray, stood back, drew the knitting needles from her hair, and tears came to her eyes. “Oh my dear mother,” she cried “how will we ever survive without her?” She had also learned from Colmes. It was a question that did not expect an answer.

As for me, I just had to stand and walk around a little, until she had gone back to the kitchen through Door Two. “Thank you Rose,” I whispered, not expecting that she would hear.

“Milk first?” asked Colmes with a grin.

“Whatever,” I said, as Colmes poured a little milk in each cup, then poured the tea. This was a ritual with which I was well acquainted, being an Aussie and all. It was the kind of imperialism that I willingly bore. I sat on my wicker chair and looked across at Colmes as he devoured one scone with jam and cream with one huge mouthful. Nothing dainty about Colmes. This was surely Chicago style eating. Nothing English about that. But it was a good sign. I knew that once he had munched the scone and swallowed (you could see the bulge move down his neck) he would be ready to tell me what was going on.

“An excellent morning’s work, Hobson, don’t you think?”

“If you say so, Professor. But I don’t know what the Aussie tiger snake has to do with getting the Provost to cancel the plans to do away with my former School.”

“All in good time, young man,” Colmes answered. That is, he once again, having taken the opportunity created by myself, put me in my place.

“Doctor Colmes,” I said with a smirk, knowing how much this would get under his skin, though I could have added ‘it’s Doctor Colmes, right?’

Colmes sipped his tea and looked past me at the open door of his office. Naturally, I turned to see who was there. But of course, there was no one.

“Hobson, close the door, if you don’t mind,” he said with a serious tone.

I put my cup down on its saucer, got up to close the door, and returned quickly, now at the ready to receive his pearls of wisdom.

“When you mentioned that the Provost’s dissertation was a combination of religion and environmental studies, it rang a bell. I often wonder what our unconscious mind is up to, when it seems to remember things that you do not know you have remembered until something triggers that memory. That is what happened when you mentioned religious studies.”

I nodded in assent. It was the sign for him to continue.

“I suddenly remembered that she carries with her a small leather bound book, one of those that has a little ribbon that keeps one’s place. Not only that. She carries it everywhere, meetings, even while giving a talk to a faculty meeting. I even saw her looking at it in the cafeteria when she was eating, even in the faculty dining room, though she kept it under her bottom on her seat.”

Colmes paused. I knew not to interrupt. He gave a little cough, as if to warn me that something important was coming.

“At first I assumed that it was her daily diary, you know. These administrators have an awful lot of meetings to attend to. They need a notebook of some kind. I understand that. Especially if those people have a poor memory, not like me. I have every­thing stored in my head.”

Colmes looked at me frowning, not expecting me to say something in agreement, but simply assuming that I already knew that. Which I did. He had what lay people call a photographic memory, a characteristic of his dyslexia, and what, in my opinion contributed to his genius. I fidgeted a little with the pencils contained in an old honey jar that sat on the corner of his desk. It annoyed him, I knew. But then he gazed seeming vacantly over my shoulder, and again I turned to see if there was anyone there, but there was not. I turned back, and saw that tweak at the corner of his mouth. He was playing with me! Though I had worked for him for some sixteen years at this point, I was not always ready for his smart-ass tricks of what could only be described as broken social graces. Still, I knew to keep my mouth shut, and in time, he would reveal his plot or plan.

“Hobson, are you not curious at all? Do you not see where the snake fits into this puzzle?” teased Colmes.

“It’s a puzzle of your making,” I mumbled, “so I suppose you are the only one who knows its answer.” There, I had taken him on, sort of.

“Quite right, Hobson! Quite right! But mind you, it was your research that pointed the way to the solution.”

I slumped back in my chair and looked at the pencil jar. I wasn’t going to get dragged in to another “I told you so.”

Colmes again looked over my shoulder to the door, but this time I heard footsteps followed by a light knock at the door.

“Enter!” called Colmes.

I turned and saw before me the most beautiful young thing ever. No doubt a young undergraduate, oozing with the spright­liness of youth, her African American hair pulled tightly to a bunch at the top of a tall slender body, her face gleaming with life. Good God, I thought to myself, how did Colmes find her?

“Ah, Cecilia,” purred Colmes with much solicitude, “you got it.”

“Yes, Professor. It was easy. Doctor Dolittle is such a lovely person. And she didn’t mind one bit when I got up close to her. I think she likes people like me, if you see what I mean.”

Did I see Cecilia wink just a little at Colmes? I admit that I was completely overwhelmed by her presence, not to mention Colmes’s solicitude. Colmes reached out and Cecilia placed in his hand (their hands did not touch, I watched closely to see that, I can tell you) what I guessed to be the Provost’s diary.

Colmes got up from his chair and stood up straight; for a moment I thought he was going to click his heels and salute. But then he flipped through the diary as Cecilia turned to leave.

“No wait, my dear,” said Colmes, “I need only a few minutes then you can take it back and put it in her handbag and she will never know it had been on a small journey without her.”

He flipped through the pages, quickly taking in every important notation. I had known him long enough to recognize his incredible mental gift at work, he was memorizing the entire relevant contents of the book. And he even chatted as he did so.

“And how is granny, these days? Healthy and robust I hope?” asked Colmes.

“She’s great, all thanks to you, Professor. She sends her love by the way.”

I tried to catch Colmes’s eye, but no luck. His eyes were fixed squarely on the book as the pages zipped by. This was a mystery remaining just out of sight, that I would for several years hope to find the answer. Were Cecilia’s mother, or was it grand­mother, and my boss once a couple? I ventured to ask myself, not game to ask Colmes of course.

“Excellent. This is exactly what I needed,“ announced Colmes as he handed back the book and with a very light bow, or nod of the head, hard to say which, he thanked her again, and asked to give her mother his love.

“So you want me to sneak the diary back to the Provost?” asked Cecilia, smiling broadly, obviously enjoying her under­cover work.

“Indeed. Indeed. No doubt you can do that, I have no doubt at all,” answered Colmes with a broad smile, one that I rarely saw.

“Bye, then,” grinned Cecilia, and off she trotted, even giving me a little nod as she passed me, glued as I was to my wicker chair.

I turned back to Colmes who was now leaning back in his chair, rhythmically tapping the fingers of both hands against each other.

“I think we have it,” he said with a look of satisfaction that seemed to be focused over my shoulder. “Yes, indeed. We have.”

“The book? Or was it a diary?” I asked. I could not see what kind of book it was from where I was sitting.

“Interestingly, Hobson, it is something of both. A diary, I’d say, primarily, but it has a page from various passages of the bible —New Testament mostly,—one for every day.”

“Good Lord!” I exclaimed, grinning at my own sort of joke, “how could so much be crammed into such a small sized book? The printing must be very small, and the pages very thin.”

“Right again Hobson. Indeed. Indeed. It was a bit of a chall­enge for me to comprehend all those passages from the bible, lucky that my eyesight is as good as an eagle’s.”

 “But, professor, what does the bible have to do with envir­onmental studies? And the snake…” I asked, feeling so foolish that I had not been able to deduce from this meager amount of information in the way that Colmes obviously had.

Colmes appeared to take pity on me, or perhaps it was the natural expression of his superiority that could not be hidden. Either way, I was well used to it and took it simply as a defect in his character caused by the disability of his genius. He leaned forward a little in his chair, still tapping his fingers together.

“First, there was no entry for her visiting the Department of Environment Studies at any time of the day and we already know that she went there often. Second there is a series of entries for every Saturday afternoon that simply states ‘Voorheesville’ I think that might be what we are looking for.

I turned to Colmes in consternation. “Voorheesville. It’s just a little country village a few miles from here. So what? She could be visiting a relative or something.”

“Indeed, indeed. It is time we met with the Provost.

*

What I am about to tell you is based on my experience over several years working under the Provost, fair disclosure I think, and necessary because as years pass, and incidents occur that may be unrelated to the current case, nevertheless may make me vulnerable to exhibiting biases or grudges even (I don’t think I have any, but one never knows what is going on in one’s, should I say it, “unconscious” a Freudian word that is very much out of favor these days). Since I have never been ambitious in the academic sense, I have never had to undergo those awful proced­ures of getting a tenure track line, getting one’s position renewed or going up for tenure. It is the Provost who, as the academic head, and on the “advice” of various faculty committees and Deans, pronounces, as does a judge in a large courtroom, or an Emperor in the Colosseum, a thumbs up or down decision.

In any case, here is what I now know about her (at the time of the case I here describe I knew very little as she was quite a new addition to the faculty and administrative staff) , some of it quite strange but very interesting. First, there is her Asiatic look and composure. I say “Asiatic” because I have never been sure, and never found the right moment or person to ask, exactly where she came from. One can detect no special accent in her English, though I have heard that she speaks Chinese and possibly Jap­anese. But I have no personal knowledge of such. Keep in mind, though, at the time, not that long after the Vietnam war, persons of Asiatic extraction were relatively rare in the small cities and towns of the USA, especially upstate New York. For those of us whose experience with a person of Asiatic extraction was limited to the stories of Fu Manchu, or to comic books of the Korean war, of Americans fighting the “Gooks,” Asians were a mysterious bunch, who ate weird foods and too much rice.

Dr. Dolittle was, therefore, an object of curiosity to me, though in her mannerisms and physique rather entertaining. She was tiny, by my standards (I’d say about five feet), yet a solid squat body, not skinny as were all Asians supposed to be. She wore always a tightly fitting dark gray women’s suit, the top piece, as a male I would call it the “suitcoat” seemed to be too small for her, tightly buttoned giving the impression that her breasts were fighting to be released. And the shoulders of the jacket square and pointy, as though the jacket in that respect was a little too wide at the shoulders. And then, the most unappealing part, she wore no makeup as far as I could tell. And no perfume that I could tell. In fact if I happened to get close to her which was rare, she had the faint aroma of boiled cabbage, none too enticing. Her face that was round, even broad, high cheeks of course, pushing up against her, yes, slit-like eyes by Caucasian standards, but a beautifully glistening darkish skin (not yellow as we all thought it should be), and a thin almost always tightly drawn mouth, out of which came, when she spoke, a deep and resonating voice. Again, not what one like me would have expected. All in all, this was a face and body that did not reveal to me, or anyone who was a “westerner” what she might be thinking, or reacting to whatever people or environment might be around her. I suppose, in retrospect, I am trying to say that she was kind of foreign, I hesitate to admit it, and not quite as human as we anglo-saxons.

In sum, she was someone to be reckoned with. Someone who could suddenly turn on you. Give snappy orders and commands. And when speaking in a meeting or conference or any other setting, she appeared not to look anyone in the eye. All of this taken as an indication of her ruthlessness, her lack of empathy. One might say, the perfect administrator, no doubt why she was hired as a Provost. So, given this admittedly jaundiced and cynical view I had of her, and maybe mixed with a little racism as well, I was not all that surprised that it was she who came up with the idea to demolish the School of Criminal Justice. After all, it was composed of just a little more than a dozen faculty and was founded upon the distinct policy of not offering a major in criminal justice to undergraduates. It was established and designed to be an elite graduate school.

If you are not familiar with academic institutions at all, the dozen faculty of the Criminal Justice school compares to the fifty or more faculty who inhabit the School of Education, for example, and similarly for the School of Arts and Sciences. So you can see why the School of Criminal Justice was an easy and logical target. Regardless of whether or not it was rated as number one by U.S. News and World Report.

But I bore you with these little details.

*

Provost Doctor Dolittle sat at her desk in a very large office, three times the size of a standard full professor’s office, and one entered it through a large anteroom that contained three desks with a secretary or assistant at each desk, each banging away on the latest Dell computer. And although the sounds of their key­board did not match the clacking of their forebears the IBM selectric typewriter, they gave the impression that a lot of work was being done, all were very busy.

Colmes ignored them and led the way into the Provost’s office. And before she could welcome us, Colmes had already pulled up a chair for himself, and I followed suit as we sat across from her desk.

“Good morning,” spoke the Provost, laced with sarcasm. “What trouble are you bringing me today, Mr. Colmes?” The Provost delighted in calling him “Mister” rather than any of the other academic terms that recognized one’s status on the acad­emic hierarchy. “And you, Mr. Hobson,” she said looking at me with a peremptory glance then back to Colmes, “I see that the two of you are still together.”

Colmes ignored the insinuation. Instead he pulled up a seat right beside the Provost’s desk and leaned into her, his face so close to hers one would have thought they were about to kiss.

“I will not allow you to demolish the School of Criminal Justice,” he growled. “I will not.”

“Mister Colmes. This is really quite an act. You, who has no authority or even any statutory reason to exist on this campus, deigns to tell me what to do with my faculty.”

I wanted to blurt out that we (I should say they) are not your faculty, but had learned that my place as a permanent graduate student was to watch only and to shut up. And the days of student protest were long past.

“I am aware of your dealings with the Department of Envir­onmental Studies, Madam Provost,” announced Colmes as he leaned back, then stood up, raising himself to his lean six feet in height.

“And I am aware of your nosing about in faculty business,” the Provost quickly interjected. “I will be submitting a report to the President to have you marched out of this place. Besides, it is well known in academic institutions all over the United States that I am at the forefront of charitable work to rid us of animal cruelty and save endangered species. Of course I visit the Depart­ment of Environmental studies often. And I repeat, it’s none of your business. Now, get out of my office, both of you.”

I quickly and robotically stood up from my chair and turned to leave. Colmes, however, stood as erect as he could, his hands on his hips, chest pushed forward, as though he had just finished a marathon run.

“Thank you, Madam Provost. You have been most helpful. You have told me all I need to know.” He turned, slapped the top of her desk with his hand and said, “come Hobson. Our work here is done.”

I followed my leader out and more or less had to trot to keep up with him.

*

Outside the Provost’s door, the secretaries were slavishly tapping away on their Dell computers or the occasional IBM Selectric. None looked up. Colmes looked at his watch, a massive contraption that covered the entire width of his wrist.

“I have one more important stop to make. Shall we meet up in my office in, say, one hour?” he asked as he looked down his nose at me. Then irrelevantly added, “a most unpleasant person, Hobson, I’m sure you would agree.”

“Who? I asked in feigned ignorance with a grin. “I don’t mind accompanying you. It will save me having to sit in my office staring at a blank page trying to come up with a dissertation topic.”

Colmes looked away. His mind was somewhere else. And typically, my joking around simply passed over his densely populated and rational brain.

“No need,” he said, “just looking up an old friend of mine in the biochemistry department.

This was his code for “mind your own business.” I shrugged and we each went our own ways. He to the biochemistry depart­ment, in a wing of the same department of environmental studies building. Me, well, back to my dorm apartment for a badly needed nap. I was naturally, well, I think so anyway, puzzled and annoyed that Colmes would not tell me what was going on inside his head, his thoughts and trial hypotheses of what line of attack we should take to save the School. Like a dog, I was forced simply to follow him around, at his heels in fact, never truly knowing why we were going in whatever direction. And, just as dogs get into a habit of behaviors, I too habitually followed Colmes around, though unlike a dog, it was not without question. A serious side effect of this animal habit was that, when my master was not there to lead me, I found myself often walking around in a kind of daze, not necessarily going in the original direction I intended. So at this moment, I suddenly found myself, not at my dorm apartment, indeed nowhere near it, but outside my office door right next to my master’s. What other choice did I have at that moment but to sit at my desk and make another attempt at writing an outline for my dissertation proposal. I sat, pen in hand, intending to jot down ideas, but none came. It’s possible I fell asleep, but in any case, I was much relieved when I heard the bang on my office wall and the professor calling out “Hobson!”

I quickly went to his office and pulled up the wicker chair to his desk.

Colmes looked at me with a slight glimmer of a smile. “Do you still have your little Mini Minor?” he asked.

“You mean my car?” I asked foolishly. After all, what else could it be?

Colmes did not answer, but just looked at me with an expression of amusement, perhaps even derision.

 “I do,” I said. “Don’t know how much gas is in it though. Haven’t used it in a couple of weeks.”

“Then please get it ready. Tomorrow afternoon we are taking a trip to Voorheesville”

“Why there?”  I asked perplexed as usual.

“Hobson, young man, you are so impatient.”

“I wouldn’t be if you would just keep me informed as to what you are up to. I’m only a research assistant, but surely I’m a bit more than that to you by now? I mean, we collaborate, I mean, I don’t want to suggest that we are equals, of course that would be silly. But it’s not fair that you keep me in the dark for so long. I do my best to help you, and have done so for some time now and hopefully will for long into the future…”

My voice trailed off, and I looked down, embarrassed. Colmes looked across his desk to me. I thought he was even going to put out his hand and hold mine to reassure me. But he did not. Silly of me to have thought so.

“Hobson, young man,” said Colmes his grey-green eyes staring right in mine (dark brown I think). “You are irreplaceable to me. I could never manage without you. My apologies for holding back. But you also know me. I do not like to expose my thoughts until I have the entire problem solved in my head. Then I share them. And I am very close to that now.”

I looked down, thankful for the apology. Then looked up again. “Why Voorheesville?” I asked meekly. “What did you find out from the Provost that I did not?”

“Ah! Hobson. There you are. At last you have realized that you missed something there. Did you not notice the necklace she was wearing?”

“Well come to think of it, I did see it. Silver, I think it was.”

Colmes smiled. “Ah Hobson! Very good. And were you not surprised when I leaned forward so close to her I could have kissed her?”

“Well, yes, I did see that, I was very surprised,” I answered.

Colmes continued. “The necklace held a kind of medallion that on first glance I thought was the Caduceus of the medical profession. You know? The snake curled around a staff topped with the wings of an eagle?”

I nodded. There was obviously more to come.

“Well, when I leaned forward into her to get a closer look at the necklace, I saw that it was not a Caduceus, but two snakes coiled around a human body arms spread out as though on a cross.”

Colmes looked at me as though expecting me to ask what that stood for, but I just sat, my mind stuck as though covered tightly by a lid of some sort. I couldn’t think of an answer. And Colmes did not continue. A tense silence had descended upon us.

This was too much for me. I could not sit in one place for long in the best of circumstances, but now this silence, I also could not take. I stood up abruptly and the wicker chair fell backwards behind me.

 “But Voorheesville?” I persisted.

Colmes smiled with great satisfaction. “As soon as I saw that necklace I went back to Cecilia and asked her to check out whether the Provost has a frequent visit to any place off campus. But more important, to check out all the student clubs.”

“And?” I asked, thoroughly involved.

“Seems that she goes often to the village of Voorheesville, and the repeated entries in her diary, as I now recollect say ‘town meeting Vhs.’  ”

“So maybe she lives there,” I said, unconvinced of its rele­vance. “But anyway, what does this have to do with her wanting to demolish the School of Criminal Justice?”

Colmes pursed his lips, his sign of impatience. And I admit, he needed to have plenty of patience, once I got attached to a line of thinking, I couldn’t let go.

“She does not live there,” said Colmes, almost sighing.

“And the student clubs? What could they possibly have to do with the Provost and the eradication of my School?” I per­sisted, now well aware that I had adopted a tone that was typical of my mentor: interrogation ad nauseam. But Colmes simply ignored me and continued with his own line of responses.

 “She founded a student club called φίδι, which is Greek for ‘snake’!” Colmes pushed back in his chair and stood.

“No kidding!” I exclaimed, jumping out of my chair. “What does a snake club do and how is it relevant to our case?” I asked with a stupid grin.

Colmes returned to his chair, and leaned back tapping the tips of his fingers together, indicating that he was finished with me and that I should stop with my impudence.

“Thank you Hobson. It will be a pleasant trip to the foothills of the Helderberg mountains and we can have a classic American lunch at the Voohreesville Diner on the way.”

 “I’ll get the car ready and see you tomorrow,” I said grum­pily. “Let’s hope it will start,” I called out over my shoulder as a kind of parting jab.

*

I had planned at the time to rid myself of my old Morris Mini-minor. To be honest I could not justify the expense of owning and maintaining it, given that I used it so rarely. In any case, I had always preferred to walk wherever I needed to go on campus, and off campus sometimes a bicycle, weather per­mitting, to the shopping center for occasional items for personal use. In fact, I kept it solely for Colmes’s use (he contributed to its upkeep) for those occasions when we needed to travel to places that could not be reached easily by train or bus. Later when Uber emerged we found it much more convenient, and certainly more comfortable than two fully grown adults squeezing their bodies into such a small space.

Owning a car on campus was, quite frankly, a nuisance. One had to have a parking sticker, could only park in designated places which were always a long way from the dormitories or offices, fine when the weather was warm and the winds calm, but a version of Dante’s hell frozen over, in the depths of winter. Thanks to Colmes, though, I did have a coveted special parking permit that allowed me to park the car in many more spaces than were available to regular students. However, the cars were naturally kept outside, there being no need of an underground or covered garage since the campus grounds were extensive, having been built, so I was told, on land that was previously a golf course. The result was a campus, supposedly designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, that took up pretty much the whole area of a few square miles, most of the green of the former golf course transformed into concrete and bitumen, though dotted with many young trees planted in rows all over, and as yet too small to make much of a splash of green to compensate for the black of the parking lots. As it happened, I was later to be relieved of the nuisance of own­ing a car, but that is another story, indeed another case.

It was a beautiful day, late spring, when I reached my car, drove up to the podium and parked in a special parking lot. I had taken a big risk and not checked the day before that the car would actually start. Normally I would have, but I think that I was still annoyed with Colmes’s refusal to reveal to me why we were going to Voorheesville. But that’s Colmes, I know. I should be used to it, but I was not, and still am not.

I walked up the steps that led to the podium, the noise of its central fountain echoing back and forth from the huge towers of concrete dormitories at each corner of the campus that looked down from their location. In spite of everything, the warmth of a spring day caused my feelings of resentment towards my mentor to subside and by the time I reached his office were transformed into excitement and anticipation.

Colmes met me at his office door. He nodded, a slight frown on his face, then we walked quickly together down the tunnel then up the steps to the spring day that awaited us.

“Ah, Hobson!” breathed my mentor, “at last a spring day that we can enjoy, though a pity it is so late in spring.”

I wondered whether Colmes had been out of his office-come-apartment at all. His face was pale from not enough sun­light, I always thought.

We reached the car and I held open the door as Colmes struggled a little to get his rather wiry long body curled up enough to squeeze into the passenger seat. I hurried to the other side, climbed in and pressed the starter button and to my great relief the little engine sprang to life. I drove out on to Western Avenue and we were away, on our route to Voorheesville. And once we got off the busy Western avenue into the bright green fields of small farms and deep greens of apple orchards, Colmes gave a little cough, and I knew that at last I was going to learn something of our case. Though it was not until we passed, on our way through the fringes of the little village of Voorheesville, a dilap­idated old church, once bright white, now with paint peeling off, long grass and weeds growing all round it.

“Slow down a little,” directed Colmes, “after we have had our brunch, that is where we shall find the solution to our case.”

I slowed the car to a roll, a bit of a challenge with a stick shift, requiring a lot of manipulation of the clutch.

“It looks deserted to me,” I said. “Are you sure that’s it?”

“Do not doubt me, Hobson. It is indeed. According to the Provost’s diary entry, they meet in this former old Methodist church every Saturday afternoon, 1.30 pm.”

Colmes raised his hand and pointed. “Keep on going. The diner is just a few hundred yards ahead.”

I drove on and sure enough there was the diner, a small village diner, one with only a few tables, most customers sitting up at the counter. And on entering, to my surprise, Colmes was greeted by the manager-come-waiter-come-cook as an old friend.

“Hello Professor. Here on a Saturday? You want the usual?” he asked with a friendly smile.

We took up our places at the counter and were quickly served a cup of coffee each in well-worn heavy mugs.

“Yes I’ll have the usual, thanks Rudy,” said Colmes, clearly very much at home.

“Could I have the menu?” I asked timidly.

The cook slid a sticky laminated menu across the counter.

“I recommend the hash browns,” smiled Colmes.

“Is that what you’re having?” I asked, trying to read the menu quickly.

“No, I’m having my usual lunch. Coffee and an order of fries.”

“That’s it?” I asked, querulously.

“Yes. Before I lived off campus, many years ago, I rented a little house in this township and came here for breakfast every morning,” muttered Colmes, as though he did not actually want to answer me. This was quite a revelation. I had been working for him some years now, and never thought of him having a life outside the campus.

“I’ll just have bacon and eggs,” I said, trying to toss off this revelation as nothing special. I was about to ask him when that was, but the cook interrupted.

“Right you are,” called the cook. “Eggs over easy or what?”

“Oh, er, easy will do,” I said, then wished I had said hard.

“Coming right up.”

I turned to Colmes. “Now,” I said, twisting myself around at the counter so that I could look straight into his pallid face, “why are we here, exactly?”

“Now! Now! Hobson,” Colmes grinned as his order of fries came sliding across the counter. He picked one up between thumb and forefinger and gobbled it down, his mouth open trying to cool the hot morsel as he chewed it. “You remember the snake we looked at in the department of environmental studies?”

“An Aussie tiger snake,” I replied, “how could I forget that?”

“Well, I’m sure that there are other snakes involved. You remember the lab assistant said there were rattle snakes in the annex and in particular the Timber rattlesnake?”

“I don’t understand. Involved in what?” I asked impatiently.

“Come! Come! Hobson. You can do better than that! The Provost, of course!”

“You mean….”

“The necklace, Hobson. Her necklace,” pressed Colmes.

“You mean….she’s a snake collector?”

“With a snake necklace like she has, don’t you think it would be something more than a collector?” asked Colmes, impatiently. “The cross, Hobson! The cross!”

“Oh, now I see. She’s a snake worshipper. But so what? What has this to do with her wanting to demolish the School of Criminal Justice?”

“My goodness, Hobson. It must be too early in the morning for you. The cross, Hobson, The cross tells us what she is up to, or, should I say, might be up to.”

“So you’re not sure yourself?” I asked, hoping in some way to bring my mentor down to my level.

“These are deductions I have made from what flimsy evidence we have so far. But as I have repeated to you often, Hobson, I only draw final conclusions as to the solution of a case once I have collected the evidence. We do not have sufficient evidence yet. But after today, hopefully I will have the evidence that will convince the Provost that destroying the School of Criminal Justice is not a wise thing for a person in her position to do.”

Having reached a point at which I more or less knew as much about the case as did Colmes, we whiled away the time chatting with each other and the cook. I came to value this time very much, in retrospect. Away from campus, away from the confines of Colmes’s office, I felt a kind of personal freedom and one of almost true friendship with Colmes, the “true” part of it being that we were equals, perhaps not intellectually, though even there I began to feel at least his equal in many ways, that I could match him intellectually in other respects, especially when we were chatting without there being any “secret knowledge” that Colmes was holding back. From that time in the diner, I slowly came to realize that we were in fact friends, equals, respectful of the other’s desires and outlook on life. We both had our disabilities and recognized them. His disability—his genius which I certainly did not have—was nevertheless matched by my ADD disability. We were, you might say, a “perfect couple,” without the accoutrements that I am sure you have already imputed to us.

Colmes took care of the bill leaving a generous tip. We decided to leave the car at the diner, and walked the few hundred yards down the road to the old church. We could already see in the distance that there were now several cars pulled up outside the old church, including a small passenger van. I thought I could hear the sound of music or singing.

“You hear that?” asked Colmes, whose hearing was amaz­ingly acute as was his sense of smell. In fact all of his senses were way more acute than mine, or of most people. “It is the half-chant-half singing style of the Pentecostal Charismatics sect, and if I am not mistaken, the Franciscan charismatics,” observed Colmes, his anglicized accent standing out.

By now we had reached the old church and stood out front, listening intently. The voices were many. The singing high pitched, suggesting, observed Colmes, that there were many students in there as well as adults. Notice that. He did not consider students to be adults (and I admit I more or less agree with him).

“So are we going to stay outside or what?” I asked in my impatient manner that must annoy Colmes constantly.

“Indeed not! Indeed not!” exclaimed Colmes.

He led the way down the path overgrown with weeds, to the front entrance and when we got to the door, rickety and almost falling off its hinges, he reached into his tweed jacket and pulled out a small camera. The door creaked a little when opened, but the noise of the singing and chanting drowned it out. We stared down the aisle and saw one person dancing around, seemingly shuddering and shaking, as snakes hung precariously over each of her outstretched arms. Colmes looked across at me with a knowing stare. Yes, I acknowledged, she was aping the necklace, the cross and the snakes. And further, the ‘she’ was none other than the Provost, her dumpy little body writhing, twisting, bouncing and shaking all together, the snakes dangling, not doing much at all, and probably rattling, though if they were, the noise of the singing drowned it out. And once I took my eyes off the Provost, and scanned the congregation of some twenty or so, I observed that it was composed almost entirely of undergraduate students, more or less equally boys and girls, and in retrospect, for at the time I had taken no notice, diversities appropriately represented.

Now comes the fun part. Colmes handed his camera to me and nodded towards the Provost and whispered, take as many pictures as possible, of everyone.” Then Colmes stepped into the aisle and began—I know it’s hard to believe for such a tightly bound person as Colmes—to shake and wabble and dance in time with the Provost, gradually making his way up front. Some of the students recognized him, others did not, but were no doubt a little concerned, especially the girls, to have an aging male joining them in their, one might say, vulnerable condition, their bodies subject to the timeless gaze of the other (my apologies for lapsing into the current jargon of the social theorists of academia).

And there was music somewhere, a portable keyboard. I searched for its source and found it away to the side in an alcove in which many years ago there was probably an organ or piano. At the keyboard was our acquaintance from the Environmental Studies department, and in a glass case on a stand at the side of the keyboard, was the tiger snake lying in a coil, its head probing this way and that, who knows what it was looking for, or whether it was the noise that was driving it a little crazy. For a moment the pianist looked up and caught a glimpse of Colmes or maybe me, no matter. The effect of it was that she suddenly stopped playing and quickly the singing faded out, the occasional voice lingering on. And with the music gone so was the dancing.

The Provost was aghast, to say the least. I sneaked around the side to the alcove and snapped a couple of photos of the pianist and then Colmes as he approached the front, still kind of jiggling, his arms out to the side, mimicking the dancers who stood staring, dumbfounded.

Still jiggling, Colmes turned his face up to the heavens, through the old oak beams of the roof rotting away, aged and weary as they were, some even broken, and cried, “Oh Saint Francis Keeper of God’s precious animals! We offer you the venoms of our Timbers that you will know us when we meet thee!!”

The Provost, struck dumb for a brief moment, her arms outstretched to the sides, her entire body in the shape of a squat, though slightly corpulent cross, stood transfixed as Colmes danced towards her. The congregation of young students gawked and heaved great sighs of consternation, all wanting to laugh at the sight of a middle aged male dancing so ineptly, lacking grace, knees knocking each other, a wobbling eyesore, but a mockery of the deep religious joy that all had been promised by their fearless leader, the Provost. Anticipating some kind of calamity, the pianist turned back to her keyboard and began playing again, possibly a hymn that may have been ‘Onward Christian Soldiers.’

“Stop it blasphemer!” yelled the Provost, “stop the music!” as she leaped forward, waving her arms, forgetting the snakes dangling over each of them. And Colmes, fearless, kept coming. A clash of the titans was inevitable. No matter. I was busy taking photographs as directed.

Then the most horrible thing happened. In fact many horrible things happened all at once. The students bolted out of their pews, shouting at Colmes, and chanted, “kill the sinner! Kill the sinner!” And the Provost stopped momentarily crying, “No! No! No violent protesting, you know the University’s respect for our guidelines.”

Then the worst came. I had dropped the camera after being shoved by a couple of students. I leaned down to retrieve it, and to my horror saw Colmes’s head bang down on the floor right by my hand as I reached for the camera.

“Colmes!” I called. “Distinguished Professor Colmes!” I called again foolishly thinking that calling him with his full title would garner more attention or whatever. I didn’t know what I was doing. But I did snap some more pictures, and just in time to get a good shot of a rattler slithering out of the leg of Colmes’s pants. “Colmes!” I called again.

I struggled to turn him on to his back. His eyes flickered. He tried to lift his head. “My hand!” he whispered. “Quick!”

I crawled across his body and reached for his right hand that was closed. His other hand I saw was open. I prized open his clenched hand and there fell out a small syringe. “Hurry!” called Colmes in a whisper that frightened me. “One minute left!”

I grabbed the syringe, flipped off the cap and plunged it into his neck. Why I chose his neck, I don’t know. It just seemed to be the biggest bare piece of flesh available. I threw the syringe away and felt his neck for a pulse. I couldn’t find it, though I probably didn’t really know where to look. Then I was knocked forward and fell beside the comatose body of my mentor.

“You evil no-good-bully!” snarled the Provost who had pushed me over Colmes’s body with her foot. “Perhaps now, you have at last found your proper place!”

Indeed. I thought. It seemed so. My mentor was dead! And, in my somber opinion. The Provost had killed him!

On the brink of collapse myself, I was about to cry, “some­one call an ambulance.” But remember, in those days, there were no mobile phones, so in order to call an ambulance someone would either have to drive to the nearest telephone box, or knock on a neighbor’s door and ask them to call. I decided on the latter. I would run down to the diner. But that was easier said than done. The student worshippers were running this way and that, the responsible ones trying to find the two snakes that had by now found comfortable places in the many nooks and crannies of the old wooden church. Others, though, if they were not howling and wailing on their knees (foolish if the snakes were still around) asking for mercy or whatever else, were pushing against the Provost who remained dumbstruck, leaning over Colmes’s lifeless body, her shoulders pushing against my head as I tried still to feel for Colmes’s pulse.

“For Christ sake, get back!” I cried, forgetting where I was. My call was greeted by angry voices of “blasphemer!” “go to hell where you belong” and I felt the crowd pressing down even more. Now I understood why first responders always said when they arrived at the scene of some incident, “get back please, give us room to breathe!”

I had now been crouching for some five minutes and my bent legs were beginning to cramp. I twisted my body around so that I could speak directly to the Provost, whose face now was inches from mine. Her breath smelled like boiled cabbage, no mistaking it. Taking my hand off Colmes’s neck I muttered, “Please, you better get an ambulance,” then added, “unless you want to call the cops.”

The Provost at last came to her senses and managed to stand up, elbowing her way to an upright position. She looked around her wailing worshippers, then down at Colmes. Anger boiling up in me, I was about to yell, again, “for Christ sake call an ambulance,” when I felt a tug on my arm, which quickly turned into a strong pull.

“Help me up,” whispered Colmes, “an ambulance will not be necessary.”

I looked down, and there was Colmes now sitting up. I grasped his outstretched hand with both mine and he managed to stand, a little groggy, his face haggard and pale from want of blood. His apparent return from the dead had an immediate effect on the wailing congregation. Like wind in the willows, their collected gasps of awe spread throughout the old church. The Provost now stood, her hands on her hips.

“I think I’ll call the police,” she said, querulously.

“That won’t be necessary, Madam Provost,” muttered Colmes. He squeezed my hand, a silent and rarely offered communication of friendship. In response I grinned and nodded as I looked at him expectantly.

Colmes continued. “Yes, and thanks for administering the antidote. You are wondering where I got it.” He smiled just a little with smug satisfaction.

“Not only that, but why you knew ahead of time that you would need it,” I said.

He smiled yet again, superior and much pleased with himself. “I will leave it to your fierce intellect to deduce that for yourself.”

I stepped back. Annoyed of course. I had just saved his life and he was already treating me like some pathetic student. But then he tugged lightly on my sleeve. “You got lots of photos, I hope, especially of the snake biting me. But of everything.”

“Indeed I did. All of it.” I replied, though it was half a lie. I may have missed the snake biting him. It all happened so quickly.

In the meantime, the Provost had induced her congregation of students to quiet down and they sat cross-legged on the floor looking down, pondering the significance of this incredible dem­onstration of God’s presence. Colmes approached her.

“And now a minute of silent prayer, after which we will sing a calm hymn, that we sing at the end of every meeting,” announced the Provost as she looked over at the naturist-come-pianist at her keyboard, who nodded her assent.

The Provost approached Colmes warily. “So now, what is it you want, Mister Colmes?” she asked with a touch of bellig­erence, though nervously awaiting what she knew was to be his coup de grâce.

Colmes stood up as straight as he could, still a little weak at the knees. He turned first to me. “The camera, Hobson, please.”

I fumbled in my pockets and finally produced it.

“The evidence is on this camera. Including my death, caused by your careless and foolish snake worshipping…”

The Provost interrupted. “We don’t worship snakes, Mr. Colmes, we simply dance with them. In these troubled times, ruled by Marxist driven student protest, how else could I attract so many students to get close to Jesus Christ?”

“I need not enter into such a silly debate with you. The fact is that you almost killed me, and that you risk the lives of our students every time you meet, which I assume is every week. Your job is on the line, Madam Provost.”

“What is it you want, Mister Colmes?” snarled the Provost.

“You know what I want. Leave the School of Criminal Justice alone. Cease and desist. If you do not. You will go down with it.” He waved the camera in the air. “I have all the evidence I need.”

The Provost’s mouth, a small one at that, contorted into an awful look of a mixture of fear and disdain. For a moment I thought she was going to burst out into tears. But instead, she nodded a silent assent to Colmes, then turned to the pianist and cried in a shaky voice, “Our closing hymn, please.”

The keyboard sprang to life, tuned to a sweet melodic cadence and the worshipers sang along:

“All things bright and beautiful,

all creatures great and small,

all things wise and wonderful:

the Lord God made them all.”

I am not one hundred percent sure, but I would swear that I saw Colmes’s lips moving, singing along with the congregation, as we quietly walked past them and out the rickety front door.

44. Colmes

The relationships among humans and the institutions in which they reside are mysterious and ephemeral, so insists Professor Thomas Colmes. They are fraught with unexpected events, unpre­dictable consequences of actions, yet driven by the hard choices people make every day of their lives. How humans act and react to each other remains the greatest question of life, according tothe professor. If you can foresee, indeed, “understand” how others respond to each and every person they meet, you will know how to arrange their social and physical environment and thus solve the problems of human action that present themselves.

In the matter of “criminal action,” most often the mistakes made in commission of a criminal act, combined with the mistakes made in uncovering and detecting such an act, if understood, will lead to a solution of the problem. I have never quite grasped this approach to human problems, but it is what Professor Colmes preaches to me and applies to the treatment of his clients daily.

His great skill, however, is the professor’s ability to size up a quarry (that is, someone who comes to him for help) and to draw conclusions as to what they really think and plan to do. That is what he means by “truth” something that he insists is fleeting, exists only temporarily in time. All one can do is to make a calculated guess about any statement that a person makes, as to what it means, or more importantly, what it intends.

If this sounds rather academic, maybe full of fluff, indeed that is so. We inhabit, after all, academia. Any academic insti­tution resides in a thick cerebral fog within the bricks and mortar of its building, filling its offices, oozing under the cracks of closed doors into hallways, classrooms, even wafting in the breeze of courtyards and sports grounds (though the latter exist warily on the fringe of academic bounds as our later case of The Student Body suggests). It’s a fog of words. I give you here only a small taste of Colmes’s magic. His “method” if one may call it that, is far more complex, as becomes apparent when you see it at work in his cases.

*

I might say that Professor Colmes remains a mystery to me, even though I have known him, and have been his research assistant—the polite name of one who serves his master in academia— for almost all of my many years here in the land of the (almost) mighty dollar. I am quite sure that he was instru­mental in my admission to the university, for I cannot understand how I would have qualified for admission otherwise. After all, my English was, and is, only passable, having come from Aust­ralia in 1975. He has always referred to me by my last name, Hobson, as he does to everyone else, student or faculty, which maybe belies his British origin, though his accent is very faint. Rather his American accent is more Bostonian if anything. In any event, his overall presentation is one of Victorian intellectual superiority and refined upbringing. But the scuttlebutt among the students is that his accent is put on, and that he really grew up in the slums of Chicago. Whatever!

Yet his role as a problem solver is embedded in the univ­ersity administration. Whenever a particular problem arises, large or small, he is called in. I should say that this is not quite correct. I am never sure how he communicates or gets a case referred to him. But I always know that something is up when I hear the bang on the wall of my office that separates mine from his, “Hobson!” And sometimes if he is in a jolly mood “Hobs!” And off I trot, out of my office and into is.

*

We reside in Schumaker University just seven miles east of Albany, New York’s capital city, across the other side of the Hudson as if to avoid interference from the New York State legis­lature. It is a magnificent edifice, laid out in rectangular pattern, four high rise dormitories at each corner of a huge square, built during the golden years in the 1960s during the reign of Governor Nelson Rockefeller. Our offices are located on a part of the campus that few would even know exists, with the exceptions of those who attend the submerged heating, cooling and other mech­anical systems essential to keep the physical structures of the university up and running. That is, our offices are in a basement. Mine is a long narrow office, more like the end of a tunnel or narrow hallway, one side of it covered with cupboards and closets that house what is probably the communications system of the building, because it lets out a constant low hum. What building it resides under one can only guess, what with the high rise towers of some sixteen floors at each corner, connected to a quadrangle, not unlike the early design of an American penitentiary. All of this hovering over wide tunnels that form a basement, one of which houses our offices.

The professor’s square-shaped office, is lined with books on all four of its walls, though strangely as I noticed the first time I entered, there were no filing cabinets, at least nothing to speak of. The exceptions are the drawers that make up the sides of his desk. Though I know that they too are almost empty. One would think that during the course of thirty years and counting, he would have accumulated many documents concerning his past cases. I almost said “problems that he has solved,” but that would be an exag­geration, for Professor Colmes insists that no matter what the problem, it can rarely be completely solved. All one can do is to reach an agreeable conclusion with a decisive action that will solve the problem for that moment to the satisfaction of all parties, but in truth, the relationships between people are so complex and their desires so irascible, that relationships are constantly on the edge of dissolution. Thus he considers it a gross exaggeration to claim that one has completely solved a problem.

But back to the filing cabinets, or lack thereof. They instead line my office, along one wall, bookshelves above them, which means I have very little room to spare for anything else except my narrow desk and a small square stool that I stand on to reach the top shelves. The cabinets only exist because I started long ago to write up the cases we dealt with, collected the relevant docu­ments, and stored them away in the filing cabinets. Colmes was amused at this, and I detected a kind of resentment that I took it on myself to do it. The reason I did so will become apparent as I describe his many fascinating cases, drawing on the notes I kept along the way in my time as his willing and doting assistant.

*

It is now almost sixteen years since I entered grad school. Good grief! You are understandably thinking. What a bludger! (Aussie slang describing one who lives off others and doesn’t have a job). Professor Colmes, in his lighter moments, of which there are few, refers to me as the permanent fixture of the univ­ersity, a little like a piece of furniture, a piece of furniture that evokes Andy Warhol’s obsession with such—a wood filing cabinet with human features squashed into the top drawer its arms crossed in the second drawer, and legs, carved into the bottom.

I entered graduate school for all the wrong reasons, at least with no ambition to become any kind of scholar, or to study a particular subject in depth and eventually emerge as a “doctor” of something. Which is why I chose the new (at the time) criminal justice school, a school that nobody in academia had ever heard of before, a whole school devoted to criminal justice, at a univ­ersity in the USA, and why, with my doubtful GRE scores—I never opened the envelope that contained my score, so I really do not know to this day what I got—the university chose me, for whatever reason. Actually, I know the reason but I am not telling you. For the purposes of these cases that I will describe, such information is irrelevant.

I am not a bludger! And worse, you probably and rightly do not think of grad school as being anything like work. As an aside, I acknowledge that being a professor in a grad school isn’t much like real work either. And even if it were, you may think that sixteen years in grad school is way too long.

But I have my reasons. Simply put, it was, as is the case with the majority of students, a matter of money and with a minority of students, I could remain in the USA on my “F-1” visa, which was valid only while I was a student. This is why I have never graduated with my Ph.D. in criminal justice — that is, I studied criminal justice, wrote my dissertation, but never bothered to graduate. Instead, as soon as I had finished that course, I applied to the Philosophy department to do a doctorate in that field. I reached out to that field at the urging of Professor Colmes. But for the moment, that story can wait.

Criminal justice? At a university? Surely that field belonged at a technical college or community college of some kind, you may well ask. When I applied, I had no idea that there were universities, and there were universities. The real ones, you paid for if you had lots of money, the run-of-the-mill ones, were cheaper, almost affordable, and funding was more available. Either way, the School of Criminal Justice to which I applied, not only accepted my application, but also gave me a means of sustenance, a research assistantship funded by the U.S. Law Enforcement Assistance Administration (LEAA). Unfortunately, this turned out to be a bit of a fiasco, and my funding only lasted for my first semester. Someone in the U.S. Department of Justice noticed that I was not a U.S. Citizen, so therefore, the U.S. Gov­ernment could not use American tax-payers’ money to pay a non-citizen. It was the law, and nothing could be done about it.

The good part of this story (though it depends on what one means by “good”) is that it was because of this crisis of money that I came to meet Professor Colmes. A slightly older fellow student, who always came to class dressed in collar and tie (ridiculous) and carrying a black briefcase, when he heard of my predicament, suggested that I seek out Professor Colmes, who, he said, was rumored to be a whiz at helping students in trouble. This mysterious professor was not a member of the department, or was it a school? I was confused even about this simple matter of nom­enclature, coming from Australia I did not know the differences between a Department and a School. (I still don’t).

I found my way to Professor Colmes’s office (a challenge in itself), knocked timidly on his door, heard a muffled call, “enter!” I turned the large brass knob and pushed at the really heavy door that opened only just far enough for me to slip into the room. Professor Colmes sat at his desk reading the New York Times. (I discovered later that he never read it and got all his news, so it seemed, from the radio broadcasts and TV.) He looked up briefly, I saw a slight twitch at the corner of his tight-lipped mouth, a glimmer of amusement, I thought, dressed as I was in shorts, unshaven, long unkempt hair, scruffy shirt not tucked in.

I almost bowed in his presence, his demeanor was so overpowering, even though he made no attempt at all to stand or even stop what he was doing. In fact, he exclaimed “Ah yes!” picked up a pencil and filled in a word in the Times crossword puzzle.

“Sir, er Doctor, Professor Colmes” I mumbled, unsure how to address him.

“Yes, yes, take a seat. I’ve been expecting you. And for Heaven’s sake, don’t call me Doctor. I’m not a doctor, you understand?”

“Sorry sir!”

“And no sir either.”

“Then what, sir, I mean…”

“Colmes, call me Colmes. Forget the rest.”

And I have worked as his assistant ever since. I even had an office next to his! I had no idea where the money came from, but I received my meagre assistantship allowance every month, and this has been so now for all those many years.

If you have any acquaintance with university life, you may quickly ask, “how can Professor Colmes be your mentor in both departments, even different schools within the university?” You would have to ask him. I could venture a guess. It is because he occupies a unique position in the university, an official title of Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies, which allows him to serve in any department or school of his choosing, for any length of time.

The word “serve” of course does not really describe what he does. No doubt he carefully made sure of that. For, as far as I can remember, I have never seen him enter a classroom, unless he was investigating a particular case that required it. Nor do I know what his doctorate is in. He has always evaded it. In fact, he insists to everyone he meets that he be addressed as “Mister,” his full name being Thomas Colmes, and he signs all his letters (of which there are very few) as simply “Colmes.”

As for myself, my sixteen years have flown by much too quickly. As Colmes likes to say, and often, time is our worst enemy. One dare not stop to wonder why, or time will pass one by. And if one hurries, tries to cut corners, beat time maybe, time will surely trip you up. Colmes says, “there may be no time like the present, but if you pause to find it, it will already have passed.”

But I digress. In fact I have found a quite comfortable means of living, now a supervisor of some years in the North West Dormitory high rise. No, I do not inhabit the top sixteenth floor. I inhabit a small (by grown-up standards) but comfortable apart­ment, self-contained, my own kitchen, a bedroom big enough that looks out over the courtyard through several long and narrow sealed windows that stretch up to the sixteenth floor. When I first acquired this space (a result of certain machinations of Colmes) I found it especially comforting, surrounded by what seemed to me then millions of tons of concrete that protected me from the evils of outside life. When I mentioned this to Colmes he looked down at me, his gaunt long face, pale and grey surrounding his penetrating dark greenish-grey eyes, sniffed and wrinkled his nose and said, “physical objects have their uses, but protecting you from yourself is not one of them.”

“That’s not what I meant,” I countered defensively.

He ignored my remark, and turned back to his Times cross­word puzzle, which he did every morning, as he feasted on his tea and toast that, until I was displaced by a live-in housekeeper, I dutifully picked up from the campus dining room as I crossed the campus from my dorm to his office.

Those of you who are old enough would already have surmised that the nine-eleven attack destroyed the idea that one could be protected by several million tons of concrete. For a few weeks after the attack, I took myself off to the Adirondacks with all my camping gear and camped in the cold, and even the snow. Colmes thought I was mad. In fact, he rarely at all stepped out of doors. His whitish, gray-lined sallow flesh showed it. The most he went outdoors was to emerge from his office to cross the podium and enter the gym where he worked out for at least one hour every day, and when dealing with a particularly difficult case, he might even stay there for several hours. His favorite workout: the punching bag. Actually, since you may have been wondering, his office also served as his apartment. There were doors, three in fact, that led out of his office, into a spacious apartment, large kitchen-dining room (the “open plan” as they call it in Australia), eating area and large bedroom with attached bathroom. It was several years after I became his assistant that I saw his apartment. And I saw it then only because of an incident that occurred in his office that required a quick exit.

But now you can see how difficult it is for me to remain on point. I started out telling you about my own situation, but inevitably ended up telling you more about my mentor. He is a dominating presence. No, I don’t mean dominate as a tyrant or bully—though I have seen those characteristics, which he uses only as a technique to advance a solution to a case he is working on. I can attest that he is truly a passive person, taciturn to a degree, even shy and quiet, but behind that facade lies a person whose rational, even mathematical mind, causes him to lose touch with those around him, to be entirely enveloped in his own thoughts, driven by reason (his idea of it, to be clear) and an unquenchable thirst to solve problems, whether they be cross­word puzzles, or grander puzzles that may affect the life and future of the institutions that comprise this university, or the life or lives of those whose problems have found their way to his office. Fittingly, in one corner of his office there is a small coffee table, upon which sits his chess set, a game always in play, and always against the same opponent, his Russian friend (Trotsky) who mails his move every few days, to which Colmes responds at about the same rate.

How he solves problems is the envy of all those who have benefited from his successes. And what sorts of problems does he tackle?

That question is impossible to answer. I have pondered on it for some years, in fact I once considered—many years ago when trying to come up with a topic for my criminal justice dissertation—doing one on problem solving. But in the end I gave up, for there seemed to be no clear structure to what Colmes did. In fact, there were many times when he made a spur of the mom­ent decision based on no logic at all as far as I could see.

But now, I see him slowing down quite a bit, age catching up with him at long last, and he has begun to drink heavy amounts of red wine, even though alcohol is forbidden on campus (for the usual reasons). I have even entered his office to find him sitting back in his overstuffed leather chair in the far corner of his office, mumbling to himself, a glass of wine to his thin lips in between puffing a small cigarillo, his slightly graying hair ruffled (it is usually carefully groomed) locks of it creating a rough fringe on his still unlined forehead. Could this be the end of Colmes? I hated myself for asking this of myself. It is why I have embarked on a quest to place in the official record, where all could see, his most memorable cases. And I will let those cases speak for them­selves.

One final remark. An admission I suppose. Over the years I have actually written accounts of Colmes’s cases, at least the most memorable and fascinating ones and sent them to the Chronicle of Higher Education so that the practitioners, adminis­trators and teachers could learn of his accomplishments. But every single case I submitted was politely rejected with a simple form letter saying, “we do not publish memoirs, or other accounts of individuals whose privacy may be infringed by such cases.

And now to those cases.

Many friends and relatives or others who claim to know me have asked whether or not a particular novel or short story I wrote was “autobiographical.” To this unavoidably prurient question I always answer, “all writing is autobiographical, and that includes nonfiction as well as fiction.” To me the answer is obvious. I am a human. All of what I do is part of me, and thus logically is autobiographical.

Take any piece of writing no matter what topic or author. The syntax is often a dead giveaway, the choice of favorite or habitual words another. In non-fiction, the author (note author and autobiographical begin with the same Greek syllable). You may doubt the truth of this claim, especially in respect to scientific writing. But just look closely at the issue or scientific topic that has been chosen. Will I experiment with frogs, chickens, or humans? Shall I study the mechanics of the brain? The eye? The anus? Shall I study atomic energy? Climate change? All such choices are value choices and it is values that form the basis of any human personality. So the case that nonfiction is unavoidably partly autobiographical is easy to make. I say “partly’ with some caution, though many dedicated (note that value-added word) individuals devote their lives to their entire scientific field of study.

The question of embedded autobiographical traits in fiction is much more difficult to discern. The novelist or story writer is very much a play actor, magician, teaser, and most of all liar. The saying “oh what a tangled web we weave” (Sir Walter Scott — a creature of the courtroom where plots are invented and uncovered) sums it up nicely. Fiction writers of course write about themselves and inextricably about those they have met, some momentarily, others every day of their lives. The devilish fun of the fiction writer is to hide the habits, traits, peccadilloes, physical and other attributes, some of them sliced off a real life person so that they will not even be recognized in the characters that the fiction writer invents. They bury all these small and large attributes in a thicket of plot, mystery, action, even physical surroundings such as furniture.

 This series of short stories, is loosely connected to a vague plot that remains in the background. I have adopted (some might say distorted) the style and structure of story writing from the works of Arthur Conan Doyle, though his books of collected short stories were published well after each of his stories had appeared in various weekly or monthly magazines. Faithful to his two central characters, Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson, the two main characters in these stories are Professor Thomas Colmes, the Sherlock character, and William Hobson A.B.D. the Dr. Watson character. What A.B.D signifies will become clear as the stories unfold, though readers who have studied at the graduate level of a university will immediately recognize it. The setting for all the stories is not Victorian London, but a provincial university in a provincial town in upstate New York, late twentieth century to early 21st century. The university is called Schumaker University a state university named after the revered democratic senator of a similar name who reigned (that word chosen carefully) in New York for some decades and who laid its foundation stone in 1961.

The stories are written in the form of cases just like Conan Doyle, and they are recounted by Colmes’s trusted assistant, Hobson, A.B.D. All cases are based on absolute fact, unless the reader discerns otherwise. To put it another way, the truth of the stories lies hidden behind the facts. I leave you to sit and chew over the slippery problem of autobiographical writings, and their veracity, in preparation for the first story in two weeks time, titled simply “Colmes.” Actually it’s not really a story. Rather an introduction to the character of Colmes, his method, and some hint as to my personal relationship to him.

I remain, your devoted recorder of the truth, Colin Heston.

Hanging in the Balance

The select and secret committee on the prevention of terror­ism met only twice over the coming year. One would have thought, though, that it was constantly in session, since the halls of UNSDRI were full of Ferrapotti’s incessant talk, telling visitors and staff alike that he was off to his secret committee on terrorism. Not only that, he had a theory concerning the bombers. He was sure that one of the Red Brigade terrorists, possibly its main strategist, was a crimin­ologist just like him.

Well, not ideologically, of course. He had formed this opinion after the bombing in 1972 of Giangiacomo Felt­rinelli, famed publisher and activist, and claimed that it was his followers who assisted the kidnappers of his friend and colleague Di Napolitano in 1975. He insisted that the careful planning of the kidnapping, especially the communications with the Italian press, followed well known procedures of terrorist organizations, and that these could not be carried out successfully without contacts in the media. And Feltrinelli was an expert and owner of such media. Further, when Di Napolitano’s kidnappers were interrogated, it was clear that they would not have been capable of carrying out the procedures by themselves. They had to have the help of someone who was much smarter and educated than they. One who understood the mind of the terrorist. He therefore suggested to the secret committee that it  was most likely an academic, a criminologist in a university somewhere other than Rome. He was the top criminologist in the University of Rome and knew all others in the university very well, so it had to be a criminologist from somewhere else.

The secret committee listened politely to his theories, but declined to act on them. One of the committee, whom Ferrapotti suspected was in bed with the CIA or some other intelligence organization, hinted that Feltrinelli’s demise was not the accident of a clumsy attempt to set off a bomb, as was the popular theory, but that he was assassinated by someone else. How could it be that Feltrinelli, a brilliant man, well versed in terrorist procedures, would blow him­self up, when he had contacts who were bomb experts to do the bombing for him? And as well, why would he choose a power pylon that was on his own property as the target?

Ferrapotti did not listen to these criticisms. In fact, he never heard criticisms, because he was too caught up in his own theories, not actually theories, but simply talk. It was talking that Ferrapotti did all the time. Incessant talk. That was what drove his friends and colleagues everywhere a little crazy.

Yet, events that followed were to prove him right. Or seemingly so. His star patient, Roberto Calvi, while he did not manage to keep his appointments every week, did show up at least every few weeks for his therapy session. And on a hot and sultry day of July 1980, met Dr. Ferrapotti in his clinic at the Vatican. They sat as usual, Calvi on the couch, and Ferrapotti on the wicker chair.

“I’m afraid that this will be my last session for some time,” announced Calvi, clearly in an agitated condition.

“You seem upset,” said Ferrapotti, “what is the trouble? Michael has spurned you?”

“No, not at all, although I am upset that I must go away for a while,  I’m not sure where it will be yet,” said Calvi with an air of mystery, or perhaps resignation.

“Oh, I see. Something has happened?” asked Ferrapotti looking around the room as though he were concerned that someone was eavesdropping.

“Well, yes and no. They are after me, going to pin the blame for the collapse of the Banco Ambrosiano on me. There was money involved, lots of it. Some sent overseas, some coming in from unknown sources. I can show that I personally had nothing to do with it. But they will not believe me. I am sure of that. And you may have seen the leaks in the media.”

“That you embezzled a huge amount? I read that and dismissed it as disinformation by someone,” said Ferrapotti the therapist.

There was a light knock on the door. It would be Michael.

“Just one moment,” called Ferrapotti.

“I just want to warn you. The CIA and MI6 are now involved. They have tremendous resources. I am sure they are targeting me, for some reason I cannot fathom,” said Calvi.

“Now, Roberto, you’re getting paranoid. Are you taking your medication?”

“No. I decided not to take it. Too risky. Besides it makes me drowsy and numbs my senses. And I need all my facult­ies as sharp as ever, otherwise I will slip up and the CIA or whoever will get me.”

“I find this hard to believe. Are you sure of this?” Ferrapotti leaned forward from his chair.

“I am very sure. I must take my leave, you will not see me for some time. But don’t worry, I will not succumb to depression. Strangely, now that I am being pursued, it keeps me positively active, no time for dark thoughts.”

Calvi got up to leave. The faint knock at the door sounded once more.

“Coming,” called Ferrapotti as he stood quickly and muttered, “please be careful. I am here to talk whenever you want.” Then he added, unable to stop himself, “you know, I’m on the secret government committee on terrorism prev­ention. There’s a CIA member on the committee, I suspect. I could talk to him.”

“It’s too late for that,” Calvi replied. “Besides you may become a target yourself. But I leave you with these last words. Watch out for Bologna. There’s something big coming down. It will convince you that I am not imagining all of this.”

Ferrapotti opened the door to Michael who entered on tip-toe it seemed, dressed impeccably in a gray suit, care­fully fitted shirt and tie. Calvi put out his hand and they shook. Then he turned quickly and left, putting his arm around Michael as they departed.

*

Ferrapotti, more agitated than usual, paced up and down the halls of UNSDRI, peering into Di Napolitano’s office, going into every office, his voice streaming away. “I have to call a special meeting of the secret committee,” he kept saying to whoever would stop and listen. “Something big is going to happen. I know. I have my sources.” Finally, Di Napolitano came out of his office, put his arm around Ferrapotti and said, “Franco, you need some rest. Why not go home and have a good nap this afternoon?”

Ferrapotti stopped and pulled himself away from his dear friend. “It has to be a criminologist. There’s just one. Of course, I know who it is!”

Dennis came out of his office, and Andrea too hurried up. The supreme Director, had departed on mission, back to his homeland of the Congo. Ominously, he had sold his Mercedes just before he left.

“Ferrapotti!” called Di Napolitano, “I have no idea how you have reached this conclusion. Be sensible. Whatevidence do you have?”

“I have my sources!” said Ferrapotti, defiant. “I must call a meeting of the secret committee immediately. There’s no time to waste.”

He ran into his office and made several phone calls, none of them  successful. The truth was that he did not know whom to call, as the secret committee always called him to notify him of the meeting. He tried calling the defense Minister Cossiga, but of course, could not get past his secretary. This, even when he shouted that there was going to be a terrorist attack in Bologna. He had also remembered the name of a criminologist in Bologna. It was Aldo Semerari.

*

At 10.25 CEST, August 2, 1980, a bomb exploded in the waiting room at the Bologna train station. 85 people were killed and some 200 injured. On August 26, Semerari and others were arrested and interrogated, but were released from prison in 1981. In 1987 many persons were charged and prosecuted in lengthy trials. There were convictions, followed by appeals. The trouble was that, as later became clear, the various Italian intelligence agencies (SID etc.), assisted by the CIA and MI6, conducted complex and successful disinformation campaigns, including counterfeit documentary evidence, resulting in arrests and prosecutions of right wing fascist operatives together with left wing Red Brigade operatives. Each, it seemed impossibly, masquer­ading as the other.

*

Ferrapotti enjoyed being right. He had partly predicted the bombing in Bologna. However, the secret committee never met again, so he was denied the satisfaction of being able to say, “told you so.”  He was, however, concerned about the whereabouts of his star patient, Roberto Calvi. He had received a note from Michael that Calvi was actually living in an apartment in Rome, but Calvi had not contacted him at all. Ferrapotti made inquiries of his sources (though the information was freely available in all the daily news­papers) and discovered that, in the heat of the various investigations and accusations made against Calvi in respect to his failed Banco Ambrosiano, and especially the apparent (though later “exonerated”) involvement of the Vatican Bank, Calvi had disappeared. Investigators (we do not know whether one can call them “police”) pursued him to Venice, thence to Zurich and finally London, where the trail ended.

Meanwhile, the “scandal” of P2 (Propaganda Due) erupted in Italy. Why right then, is a bit of a mystery since its existence was well known, though supposedly its members were not. However, in the course of collecting evidence concerning Calvi’s involvement in the collapse of the Banco Ambrosiano, investigators once again visited Licio Gelli’s house and found a list of members of the P2 secret organization. On the list were many top officials of public companies, not to mention key political posts in the govern­ment and out of it. One of the members listed was Franco Ferrapotti. Licio Gelli, the individual you may remember who briefly acknowledged Ferrapotti’s UNSDRI name tag in Milano, was the purported head of the lodge. The members of this mysterious masonic lodge referred to each other as “frati neri” (black friars). It was Gelli, according to popular media, who was the real perpetrator of the collapse of the Banco Ambrosiano, and who had funneled the money into the Vatican coffers. Even today, in the 21st century, the list can be found easily on the Internet. Ferrapotti was then informed (actually it was Calvi’s friend Michael) that Calvi had fled to London, where he stayed at a safe house that was provided him by Licio Gelli.

Then on Friday June 18, 1982, a person walking across Blackfriars Bridge in London noticed something hanging from the scaffolding beneath the bridge. The Police were called, and it turned out to be Calvi, hanging by the neck , his clothing and pockets filled with bricks and $15,000 dollars in various currencies. The death was ruled a suicide, according to London’s coroner.

When Ferrapotti read of the death of his patient, he immediately thought that it was consistent with Calvi’s depressive state. However, the results of two separate investigations each 10 years apart was that the injuries to Calvi’s neck were not consistent with hanging. Ferrapotti’s sources informed him in latter days that it was of course, the work of all three intelligence agencies of the CIA, MI6 and SID and its variants. Why exactly they would collude to do this, and what if any Calvi’s death had to do with the warring factions of terrorists from right and left did not appear to bother anyone. The media speculated that it and the major Bologna bombing were the result of the concerted efforts of all three intelligence agencies’ disinformation campaign to undermine the authenticity of both right and left terrorists, especially left terrorists, and that the Bologna bombing especially, though actually probably, were carried out by right wing terrorists, but attributed to the Red Brigade and its ancillaries. Thus, by disinformation, the communists were defeated in Italy. It was not until 2020 that it seemed the actual person behind the Bologna bombings was none other Licio Gelli, according to the Italian weekly L’ Espresso. But then, who could believe that?

 Money and its vicissitudes

In any mystery, scandal or crime, veteran investigators always say, “follow the money” and you will find the crime or culprit. Perhaps this is true, but in Roberto Calvi’s case, it was not so simple. The fact is that he lived in money, it was his life. So when an investigation into the alleged illegal movement of some several billion lire from the Banco Ambrosiano, to an undisclosed recipient or recipients was commissioned by the Bank of Italy,  Calvi was naturally targeted because he was President and Chairman of that bank. It is possible that the missing money might  have been overlooked were it not for the fact that the bank was closely associated with the Holy See. And of course, the Vatican was a perennial target of far left politicians and various agents of the PCI (Italian Communist Party). In retrospect, after many commissions and inquiries, we now know that there were many other “parties of interest” involved in this alleged irregular movement of funds. Those parties included, but were not limited to, the CIA, MI6, the FBI, and Italy’s various spy agencies: SIFAR, Armed Forces Information Service (Servizio Informazioni Forze Armate), SID, Defense Information Service; SISDE, Service for Intelligence and Democratic Security; SISMI, Service for Military Intelligence Security.

If there were any stalkers following Calvi therefore, he would have led them to the Vatican Library on a regular basis, once every week. That he would do this, a man so loaded with work and personal problems, find the time to come from Milan to Rome once a week and spend the afternoon in the Vatican was amazing; incredible that Calvi was physically and mentally able to find the time,  incredible to his watchers who recorded his every move.

#

Dr. Ferrapotti’s official consulting room was tucked away on the second floor of the Vatican library, between the Biblioteque Pontificale and Cortile S. Damaso. He was such a busy man, what with his students at the University of Rome and his research at UNSDRI, that he had no time for regular patients, so he confined his psychiatric practice to the referrals he received from the Vatican. He had developed a lucrative and very effective practice, essentially dealing with patients who were sent to him by the upper echelons of the Vatican, by far the majority of them involving problems of a sexual nature. At the time, homosexuality was a crime in Italy, punished by various amounts of prison time. Further, if prosecuted, the Vatican of course preferred to avoid the inevitable media sensations that would result. Dr. Ferrapotti therefore provided an essential service. He diagnosed such patients as mentally ill, unfit to stand trial, so the case would never reach the court, and his congenial relationship with the various prosecutors and judges he knew in the Vatican and even outside, assured that the case would be stamped “cleared.” Thus the patient remained free, but usually required to meet with his psychiatrist on a regular basis, for a particular period of time.

One can see, then, that it was most unusual for Ferrapotti to have invited Roberto Calvi to come to him regularly for therapy (a vague word if ever there was one), not to mention that his office was inside the Vatican. The media and others, unspecified, would be watching Calvi like hawks, and undoubtedly report that Calvi had been seen entering the Vatican.

#

At the time, there were no privacy laws, so what went on between therapist and patient was not, technically, legally protected. This fact was actually irrelevant in Calvi’s case, or any of Ferrapotti’s cases for that matter. Ferrapotti was, as we have seen, a very talkative person, who loved passing on information, embellishing it, manipulating it, and exchanging it for other information he deemed necessary for his personal and professional life. Every sentence he uttered was laced with intrigue, and delivered in a loud whisper. Thus it was, when he responded to the light knock on the door to his clinic, he opened the door quickly, pulled Calvi inside, then poked his head out and looked up and down the corridor. He quickly retreated into his clinic and locked the door, turning a huge key in an ancient lock almost half the size of the door itself.

“Welcome to my humble clinic,” smiled Ferrapotti in a whisper. “Make yourself comfortable on the couch.”

Calvi, looking thin and a little haggard, smiled a little and sat on the couch. The decor of the clinic was hardly comforting. There was no window, only a faint incandescent light  hanging from the ceiling,

“You can lie down if you want,” said the good doctor.

“I don’t know if I can keep this up every week. A lot of things are happening. I feel like I’m being hunted like a dog,” complained Calvi.

Ferrapotti picked up the small wicker chair from beside his modest mahogany desk and placed it in front of Calvi. He sat down, his rotund weight causing the chair to creak. He then broke one of the first rules of psychotherapy. Never physically touch the patient. He took both Calvi’s limp hands and squeezed them gently. “Roberto, I am your friend and counsellor. Tell me. Tell me anything you want. No matter. You will be better for it.”

“Doctor, Franco, do you mind if I call you that?”

“Si, senz’ altro!”

“You are a member of P2, right?”

“Si. What of it? I only do it to keep up with what is going on. You know?”

“Yes. But I thought I was protected. But now I’m not so sure.”

“What are you saying?”

“My bank. I think they’re trying to destroy it.”

“My friend. Who? P2? They couldn’t even if they wanted to! It’s not really organized. Just a club, you might say.”

“Franco, I’m afraid you are very naive. It is now dangerous to be associated with P2.”

“What do you mean? Oh..ar..the communists?”

“Maybe. But there’s a lot of others. They have infiltrated P2.” Calvi looked away. Then back. “I tell you. I don’t really know exactly. But I suspect either the CIA, MI6, SID or maybe all of them.”

“But the Vatican. I thought you had a close relationship? They will protect you, no?” asked Ferrapotti as softly as he could.

“I can’t count on it. I think they are after them as well.”

“I don’t understand. Why the Vatican?” asked Ferrapotti, probing.

“They are, have, you know how they helped before, saved the Corriere Della Sera…”

“But now P2 runs it, no? So you will be protected from the media, at least,” said Ferrapotti leaning back, giving the impression of reassurance.

“Not here in Rome and everywhere else but Milan and even there I can no longer be sure. I may have to get away…” Calvi looked around the room as though looking for a way to escape.

Ferrapotti leaned back on his chair and it squeaked appropriately. “Anyway,” he said, “this is just a way of you avoiding what is really ailing you. Your, shall we say, trysts? Will you be calling upon anyone while you are here close to the seminary for young priests in training?”

“I think I had better be going,” murmured Calvi, looking distractedly around, squirming a little on the couch.

“We have only just begun,” said Ferrapotti, sitting further to the edge of the chair, once again reaching for Calvi’s limp hands and squeezing them tightly.

“Let me go, Franco. I feel better already. It may have been brief, but it doesn’t take long to lift the weight of deeds that have not yet happened.“

“Guilt, you mean?” asked Ferrapotti conveying his incredulity.

“Of course not. What’s done is done. I’m sure you know that. But future acts, if you know of them. They can be pushed away and provide a narrow path to hope. The hope that they will not happen.”

Ferrapotti frowned a little. “Perhaps. But I do not agree entirely with your assumption that the past cannot be changed. There are many ways to cover up, falsify, construct counterfeit histories, perhaps you have indulged in those practices yourself? Some call it disinformation, at least that is what today’s intelligence agencies call it.”

“If you are talking about how my bank advertises itself, its public image. Yes, that is true. But when it is completely damaged, as is about to happen, the bank, even its false front, is beyond repair.” Calvi looked down, his face the picture of calamity.

“And you?” asked Ferrapotti.

Calvi looked back and stared aggressively into  Ferrapotti’s ever-blinking eyes.

“Ok. I completely understand,” said Ferrapotti as he gave a deep sigh. “It’s too bad these things are happening, because I was hoping to help you more with your personal problems of relationships, like we talked about before. My next patient who is due here any minute, was going to help us out.”

 As if on cue, there was a faint knock, and the door handle jiggled. Calvi looked anxiously at the door then to his doctor. He was about to get up and remonstrate, but Ferrapotti quickly rose from his wicker chair and opened the door.

Calvi couldn’t help himself. The young priest was as beautiful as could be. He entered quickly and leaned forward, arms crossed as if to hold himself together.

“Michael. Meet Roberto. Roberto, meet Michael,” purred Ferrapotti, in a soft whisper. He then quickly retreated behind his desk, leaving the two to stare at each other.

“I was just going,” mumbled Calvi.

“Ok, my apologies. I am a bit early,” answered Michael, a happy smile on his very white, Aryan face, his big crop of wavy blond hair dazzling Calvi as he stood rooted to the spot.

At that moment the phone rang and Ferrapotti picked it up immediately.

“Yes, OK. Definitely. Oh..ah..er. Good. Good. I will be right there.” Ferrapotti looked around furtively. “I have been summoned,” he said mysteriously. “One of my sources.”

Calvi looked at him, and had Michael not been there he might have asked what sources. Instead he turned to Michael and said, “well I suppose I should be going too.” He looked at his watch and said, “I need to get back to Milano.”

Ferrapotti already had his briefcase packed and was on his way out. “Pull the door shut when you leave. It should lock automatically behind you, so make sure you don’t leave anything behind.”

A very excited Ferrapotti rushed out and away. He had been summoned to the Ministry of Defense to join a secret and select committee to review the causes and prevention of terrorism in Italy. As Italy’s top criminologist, he would later tell everyone he met, he had been called to duty. However, an important factor that may have contributed to his selection was his membership in P2.

A Language of the Dead

Since Di Napolitano’s kidnapping, the atmosphere at UNSDRI remained tense. Two uniformed militia men, young conscripts, stood at the entrance, their automatic weapons slung over their shoulders. This did not stop them though, from smoking and chatting with each other. The few cars that came by, usually dark colored government vehicles were made to slow to a snail pace and their drivers were questioned. Dennis found it very uncomfortable to come into the office, to be looked up and down by the several guards and various couriers and functionaries, and hangers on, as he bounded up the steps and into the great old building. 

It was the morning of March 16 1978. It was a day that Dennis would remember for many years to come. As he entered the great hall, he heard the voices of his twin bosses echoing down the corridor. They were louder than usual, and he guessed that it would not be long before they went out to Ferrapotti’s car to drive round and round the block arguing. Andrea emerged from her office looking distraught, yet dignified in her carabiniere colors. She turned towards Di Napolitano’s office, but then looked away and came to the Dennis.

“What’s going on?” Dennis asked, “are you OK?”

“Haven’t you heard?”

“What?” The fact was, Dennis never watched the news on TV because he didn’t have one, and generally never even looked at the headlines of the newspapers. The whole world could be coming to an end and he would not know it. He was too much absorbed into the “carpe diem” of Italian life. Enjoy today, tomorrow may never come.

Andrea stepped aside as though to let Dennis pass. “Aldo Moro has been kidnapped!” she cried.

“Who’s he?” asked Dennis, very much the Aussie.

“You don’t know? He’s the most famous politician, was the prime minister of Italy! They cornered him on Via Fani, shot all his guards and drivers and took him away.“

Dennis stepped back into his office. “Oh! That’s terrible. What is the world coming to?” was all he could think of to say.

Andrea hurried towards Di Napolitano’s office. She met Ferrapotti half way.

“I knew this would happen,” he said, “I told them so. They wouldn’t listen to me.”

Dennis came out of his office. “Is there anything I can do?” he asked.

Ferrapotti looked at him with his usual grin. “No…er…ah…” He fumbled in his pocket for a cigarette. “Got a light?” he asked.

“Sorry, don’t smoke,” answered Dennis.

“Oh.. Er… ah… He’s had it. They’ll kill him, you wait, I know those people. It’s a Red Brigade faction. Di Napolitano was just a trial run. This time they’ll kill their victim.”

“You think so?” asked Dennis.

“Oh.. Er.. Of course, they will issue ridiculous demands. But you wait and see. They’ll kill him. They can’t risk keeping him alive. Besides he’s an ardent anticommunist.  Believe me, I know. I have very good contacts.”  Ferrapotti looked sideways and all around as if he were worried someone was eavesdropping.

Dennis looked around too, then realized how silly it was. “Will the carabiniere negotiate with them?” he asked trying to show concern and interest.

Andrea replied, “my father says that they will do their best but that there is a rule that they never negotiate with terrorists.”

“Your father?” asked Dennis in disbelief.

Ferrapotti replied, with his biggest grin, “her father is Director General of the Carabiniere, and a very good friend of mine.”

#

There followed 55 days of negotiations and debacles. As they did in the Di Napolitano kidnapping, the Red Brigade put Moro on “trial” the charge being, generally, that he headed an immoral, unjust and corrupt imperialist party (The Christian Democratic Party), and demanded that Moro be exchanged for a number of prisoners. Moro wrote a letter to the Pope asking him to negotiate on his behalf. In response the Pope gave a speech asking the Red Brigade to return Moro to his family without conditions. Moro took this to mean that the Pope had abandoned him because it meant that the Pope would not negotiate.  Most journalists, especially the Corriere della Sera took a hard line.

Ferrapotti marched up and down the hall of UNSDRI talking to anyone who came by, informing them that the day chosen for the kidnapping was the day on which the PCI (Italian communist party) for the first time would gain an active part in the Italian government. Ferrapotti was so concerned that he had packed his bags and already sent his wife and children to Puerto Rico. He was sure that there would be a major insurrection any time now. As he said, over and over, he had his sources.

Di Napolitano, for his part, stayed away from the limelight, even though he was the most obvious one to consult, having had the personal experience of being kidnapped  by the Red Brigade (though some argued that it wasn’t really the Red Brigade but a different faction). He shrewdly refrained from giving any advice, saying that this situation was quite different from his own, since he was not directly involved in politics or government, as was Moro. Ferrapotti agreed with him, for once, though they differed on whether the government should negotiate. In fact, unbeknownst to any of the UNSDRI staff, including Di Napolitano, Ferrapotti, a psychiatrist after all, had offered to negotiate with the terrorists, since he understood, he claimed, their thinking. When this became public knowledge, Ferrapotti received a hurried phone call from his patient Calvi warning him to stay out of it, that certain parties saw it as a soft way to let the Red Brigade get away with murder, since they had, after all, killed all five of Moro’s guards and drivers. Ferrapotti argued that he was not looking to go light on the kidnappers, indeed, once he got them to give up Moro, the government could do whatever it liked with them. He was only interested in saving Moro’s life. Moro did not deserve the death penalty on any grounds.

In any event, no resolution could be found and the kidnappers whether tired, confused or both, stopped communications. On May 8, 1978, Moro’s body was discovered in the trunk of a Renault 4, in Via Michelangelo Caetani, a tiny street just around the corner from UNSDRI and not far from the building that housed the growing Italian Communist Party. Moro had been shot ten times.

#

“If only they had listened to me,” complained Ferrapotti.

“There’s nothing you could have done, Franco,” cried Di Napolitano. “Believe me!”

“I tell you, there’s even worse to come. Mark my words!” warned Ferrapotti.

“I know, I know, you have your sources,” quipped Di Napolitano.

“No, no. There is also a secret committee, Ugo, that I am chairing, set up by Cossiga, Minister for Interior. We will get to the bottom of this.”

“What bottom could there be? What can you tell them that they do not already know, which is next to nothing?” asked the prosecutorial Di Napolitano.

“We can figure out what will be the next move of the Red Brigade,” countered Ferrapotti.

Di Napolitano looked up from his desk, adopting his serious magistrate’s expression as though delivering a judgement. “What is required is a tough, no nonsense prosecutor and then the courage to administer the required punishment.”

Ferrapotti was about to respond when he suddenly thought that maybe it would be interesting to have a third or even fourth opinion, so he called out down the hallway for Dennis the Aussie and for Andrea to come.

Andrea came running of course, her notepad in hand. Dennis at first did not respond, as he had never before been called upon. So he waited a little until he heard his name called clearly, this time by Di Napolitano, whom he considered not actually to be his boss, but anyway knew that he had to respond.

The two appeared in Di Napolitano’s office standing uncomfortably aside, while Di Napolitano sat back in his large office chair, and Ferrapotti walked up and down in front of the desk.

“Oh..er..ah..should there be a special committee of experts to assess the operations of the Red Brigade in the Moro case?” asked Ferrapotti.

Andrea did not hesitate. “They should all be tried and found guilty and then be shot, just like they shot Moro!”

“You mean,” said Di Napolitano looking a little superior, “that we don’t want a committee, just a trial and its aftermath?”

“In my opinion a trial is not needed. Just take them out and shoot them,” insisted Andrea. “The same way they shot the body guards, three of whom were carabiniere. That’s what my father says anyway, and who could disagree?”

“Oh.. Ah..er..” Ferrapotti turned to Dennis, but just as he did so, a loud explosion, or crack of a gun, sounded throughout the corridor and office, and the noise of shouting followed. Di Napolitano jumped up from his chair, crying, “someone has a gun!” The noise of shouting continued, but there were no more gun shots. Di Napolitano led the way, taking big brisk steps. “The noise is coming from downstairs at the entrance. Someone must have tried to break into the building.”

Downstairs at the entrance pandemonium reigned. The two armed military conscripts stood at the ready with their automatic weapons. They looked very young, blushing perhaps, and very frightened. Just inside the doorway on the cold stone steps lay the body of a well dressed young man, sprawled on his back, blood pouring from his chest, his eyes staring blankly, through the lids slowly flickering.

“What happened?” asked Di Napolitano, the judge, and proper person to take charge.

The official guard stepped forward, gun in hand. “I thought he was trying to sneak in. I told him to stop. He didn’t seem to understand spoke some crazy language.  He put his hand inside his jacket, I thought he was a terrorist pulling out a gun. So I shot him.”

Ferrapotti called out “make way, move back! I’m a doctor. Get back I tell you!” He kneeled down to examine the body and felt his neck for a pulse. “He’s alive, just! Call an ambulance!”

The body’s eyes slowly opened, and mumbled, “Ego te quidem Anglorum…”

Ferrapotti stood back, aghast. He felt inside the body’s jacket pocket and withdrew a letter typed on UNSDRI letterhead.

Di Napolitano took over crowd control. “Come on now, move along. There’s nothing to see here. Give the poor fellow some air.” He turned to the conscript soldiers, “come on now, get everyone moving away.”

Dennis remained in the background, inclined to sneak back to his office where it was safer. But he had heard something of what the assailant had muttered. It was Latin, but he heard not enough of it to translate, though then again, had he heard it clearly there was a good chance that he would still not have been able to understand it.

Ferrapotti looked at the letter, then down to the assailant, whose eyes now remained open, dead.

“Mio Dio !” he muttered, “it’s the Englishman!”

Dennis was aghast. He jumped down the few steps and pushed his way to the front of the onlookers. “Dr. Ferrapotti, did I hear you right?” he asked with timidity.

“Er.. Ah.. Oh.. That’s what this letter says. It’s the letter I wrote a long time ago.”

“That makes sense,” said Dennis. “Those Cambridge types all learn Latin, and that’s what he was saying. He said, if I am not mistaken, ‘I’m your Englishman.’ He probably thought that his Latin was near enough to Italian.”

Ferrapotti looked down at the lifeless body. “Oh.. Er..ah..Well, here is one more innocent victim of the murderous Red Brigade.”

 P2

The Englishman never did show up, so his wisdom and learning at the University of Cambridge criminology school never reached the United Nations. However, the project, as far as Ferrapotti was concerned was well under way, and had no need of the Englishman, given that he had hired a well qualified Australian, who had  taken his class at the University of Pennsylvania when he was a visiting professor there.  In fact it was there that the idea, and subsequent Ford Foundation funding for the project on World Crime had first been explored. A bunch of very bright Ph.D. Students who came there from all over the world took his class.

For his part, Dennis, the scruffy Aussie, who ended up running the project, after what seemed a year or two, though time, he had learned did not seem to matter in this life, was still at a loss as to how to proceed. The Council of Europe meeting had provided little direction or ideas of substance to even begin to design the project. So he sat in his office, shared with a visiting expert from Iran, who did little but talk to him of how things in Iran were done, what a wonderful university he had attended in Iran before he went to Ohio State University, all of this as he laughed and smiled, such a happy person. His main concern was to find a good trattoria for lunch every day, which certainly made Dennis’s life much richer. Lunch, at least for U.N. Experts was a three hour affair. Most often taken in one of the many trattorias or hostarias hidden away in the alleys around Via Giulia, Campo dei Fiori and the like. Iranians were just like Italians. They liked food, that was Dennis’s incisive observation. And as each day went by, so did he.

Yet Rome in the days after Di Napolitano’s kidnapping had taken on a somber outlook. People in the street seemed to be tense. They did not stop and talk to passersby as had been the practice, as far as Dennis had noticed from the first day he arrived. Perhaps this was aggravated, or even caused,  by the garbage collectors’ strike. There was trash lying everywhere, in the gutters, in any corner or crevice where the winds of Rome blew them, piles of trash in plastic bags making mounds in front of apartment buildings covered in graffiti, and especially in the front of restaurants that, naturally, produced large amounts of rubbish every day. As well, carabinieri appeared to be everywhere, on street corners, cruising in their Alphas or motorbikes,

While the kidnapping of his friend and colleague Judge Ugo Di Napolitano shook the entire staff of UNSDRI, Ferrapotti remained his hurried self, constantly stopping to talk with anyone who may pass him in the corridor, darting into offices, looking this way and that. His arguments with Di Napolitano were more frequent, and the Judge’s voice reached crescendos like never before. His most common words that could be heard, maybe even out on the street were, “Franco! Do you know what you are doing? Non fai niente! Next time the kidnappers will kill me, and you too if you keep going on this way.”

It was now almost three years since his kidnapping, and Di Napolitano’s kidnappers had been caught, so to speak, their colleagues had been released, just as Di Napolitano had promised when he was in captivity. So it was a kind of twisted quid pro quo. Ferrapotti stood at the door of the judge’s office.

“Si! Si! But don’t worry! I know what is going on,” Ferrapotti whispered so loudly that surely most of the experts in the UNSDRI building heard it. And as if to demonstrate his superior knowledge, he added, “something’s coming down, and I can tell you it won’t involve you or me.”

“Franco! What are you saying?” cried Di Napolitano.

“Oh… ah…eh… Don’t say anything to anyone else,” responded Ferrapotti in English, looking over his shoulder, then all around.

Flabbergasted, Di Napolitano threw up his arms in alarm. “Ferrapotti! Franco! Basta! “

Ferrapotti grinned and nodded, as if to say, “I’ve got a secret and nobody knows it but me.” He stepped back into the judge’s office. And muttered, “don’t worry. I know what I am doing. Anyway, I have to run. Have a special case in Milano.”

Di Napolitano eyed him distrustfully. If they weren’t such good friends, he would terminate him immediately, except that he wasn’t his boss anyway. “Milano? What’s there? I thought all your cases were in the Vatican?”

“That is true. Mostly, you know priests with, er..ah..oh.. Personal problems.”

“Then Milan?”

“I have a special mission.”

Di Napolitano eyed his friend with a  mixture of amusement and concern. “Franco. I know you. You will get yourself into all sorts of trouble if you are not careful.”

Ferrapotti inched forward a little into the office. “All I can tell you is that the Vatican has money problems, and for reasons I do not fully understand, the chief administrator of the Vatican has asked me to look into the dealings of one of their major bankers who is located in Milan. After all, it’s Milan where all the money is, right?”

“But you’re a psychiatrist. Not an investigator. And I am sure you know nothing about money!” said Di Napolitano trying to keep his voice down.

“True again. But psychiatrists are in a way investigators. We investigate the mind, do we not? And it so happens, I think that one of the Vatican bankers is having such trouble. Or should I say, has already suffered much angst. Then  in English, “Or, ah… eh…oh… that his decision-making when it comes to finances is becoming impaired.”

The perceptive Judge of the Supreme Court leaned forward at his desk.   “I see. Penso di averlo capito. Say no more.”

“Ciao. I will see you in a day or two.” Ferrapotti turned to leave.

“Perhaps you are going to Sardinia?” called his friend with a grin.

“No time for that.”

Ferrapotti stepped off the plane and at the bottom of the steps a young man, could have been his son, held up the palm of his hand on which was written UNSDRI. The man nodded towards the terminal and Ferrapotti followed.  Once inside, the young man turned his head slightly towards him and said in a quiet voice, a slight northern accent, “I am Wolfgang,” I will be your assistant for the day. The meeting, or should I say the announcement, will be made just before we break for lunch.

Ferrapotti grinned slightly and looked at his watch, and in English he asked, “oh.. Ah..you are German?”

“Not quite. Swiss, but my father was Italian, from Torino. But either way, we are of the same race, are we not?”

Ferrapotti was not quite sure what this meant, but he just nodded in assent. A deep blue Alpha pulled up at the curb. “Dopo di te,” said Wolfgang as he held open the door.

“Oh.. Ah…er… So you are a journalist for Corriere Della Sera?” asked Ferrapotti in English.

“I was, or actually I am, though for the past several months I have been the personal assistant to Dr. Gelli. He is an amazing person,” answered Wolfgang in almost perfect Oxford English.

“Oh… er…ah..no doubt he is.  And also very brave if I understand correctly what he is up to,” said Ferrapotti.

“I don’t think bravery comes into it. He just knows what has to be done, and he does it, and we all agree with his goal.”

“Of course. It is essential,” said Ferrapotti with a frown. “But there are many road blocks, the Vatican being one. I take it that is why I was invited?”

“Well, probably, though I do not know. I try not to get too involved. I just carry out my boss’s orders and I am so busy I have no time to think about what he is trying to do at any particular moment.”

Wolfgang looked out the window, trying to avoid Ferrapotti’s gaze. Ferrapotti responded:

“Oh.. Ah..You know, I think it is important that the United Nations understands the situation. But there are certain colonne sotterranee that would oppose and undermine all he is trying to do. And that includes the Vatican.”

“Yes, we know about that. But the Vatican has very little power, and, well I probably should not say this, it is running out of money, and Dr. Gelli is the only person who can save it. The banks, you know.”

“Oh… ah..si…I know all about that. One of my clients….”

“Shhh! Never know who is listening,” warned Wolfgang.

The car turned into Via Angela Rizzolli and pulled up at the front of the Corriere Della Sera headquarters. Wolfgang leaned over, annoyed and tapped the driver’s shoulder. “Not here! Go to the back entrance!”

Ferrapotti grinned. As the car pulled up, the door opened and a number of individuals, talking loudly and clearly angry, poured out, gesticulating wildly.

“It looks like we missed the opening,” said Wolfgang. “Never mind. The important thing is that you are here and representing the United Nations.” With that, Wolfgang leaned over and pinned a name tag on Ferrapotti’s lapel, the tag simply saying UNSDRI.

They pushed their way into the building, against the crowd of people exiting.

“What’s going on?” asked Ferrapotti, somewhat annoyed at being pushed and shoved aside.

“Oh, I thought you knew. Dr. Gelli has taken over the Corriere della Sera, and is bringing his own team to run the paper.  Although I think that a good number of the lead journalists will remain.”

Ferrapotti’s eyes immediately darted this way and that. Who was who of those rushing out? And could those remaining behind be trusted? “Is he that much of a threat? That bad?” asked Ferrapotti.

“No of course not. You know as well as I do that he’s not a fascist. He is simply a sensible businessman who understands money, who has it, who should have it, how to get it, and how to spend it,” answered Wolfgang as he pushed through large double doors. “This way. Dr. Gelli is looking forward to meeting you.”

They entered a big meeting room, a large oblong table in the middle, many chairs crammed in all around it, a terrible din of many Italians talking loudly and all at once, and of course, gesticulating wildly.

“Calma! Calma!” called Gelli who now stood at the head of the table, running his hand lightly over his plentiful greying hair. “Those of you who want to stay may do so, and in your current positions. I am simply replacing the top editorial staff. From now on, this great newspaper will report the news without communist bias. The communists must be kept out. You have seen what they have done to our cities, the violence of kidnapping and terrors they bring with them all in the name of  equality.“

Silence suddenly descended. Then it was replaced with murmurs and a buzz of excitement. Gelli continued:

“We have the Vatican and its bankers to thank for their willingness to step up and save this paper, and quite frankly, save this country.”

Quiet applause erupted followed by a light chant of, “P2! P2!” at which Gelli raised his hands and called “Calma! Hush! We in the P2 lodge do not look for loud accolades. We work quietly in the background. Now go back to your families and tell them that your job has been saved and that you will, beginning tomorrow, be reporting all the hews accurately and faithfully and without bias. Thank you! Thank you!”

Gelli left quickly by a side door. Wolfgang managed to pull Ferrapotti close enough to the door so that Gelli could see the UNSDRI name tag. Ferrapotti, thoroughly entranced, thought that Gelli looked at his tag and smiled, but could not be sure. In a flash, Wolfgang had left him and trailed behind his boss Gelli.  Ferrapotti turned and pushed his way into the small throng of chattering journalists, showing his UNSDRI badge. Many were instantly interested in the United Nations and what it had to do with P2. Some disparagingly called the UN a great organization corrupted by communists, others that it was essentially a tool of imperialist countries that was built on the back of slaves, dedicated to maintaining white superiority.

The year was 1977, the year that the clandestine Masonic Lodge known as “Propaganda Due” or P2, infiltrated and took over the failing left wing daily newspaper, Corriere della Sera.

#

Ferrapotti stood in front of the Corriere Della Sera headquarters and hailed a cab.

“Take me to the Banco Ambrosiano and hurry!” shouted Ferrapotti.

“I hope you’ve got plenty of money,” quipped the driver.

“How’s that?”

“They’re going broke, everyone knows that. But then you’re from Rome, I can tell, so you wouldn’t know,” joked the driver again.

“Si, si. I mean I don’t have money in that bank. You think I’m crazy?”

The driver laughed into the rear vision mirror as he wove through the Milan traffic, beeping his horn continuously, waving and yelling epithets at motorists who were in his way.

Ferrapotti grinned and caught the driver’s eye in the rear vision mirror. “Hah! I keep all mine in the Vatican bank, that’s where all the money is,” he joked.

“Si, si, I know. But I heard it’s all going to the Banco Ambrosiano to bail it out.”

Ferrapotti looked shocked. “How do you know that?”

“You’d be surprised what I hear in this taxi,” he grinned.

“I would, you’re right.”

The taxi screeched to a halt, Ferrapotti paid the driver, gave a generous tip, thanked him for his information, and stepped out.

The bank was closed. He pressed and repressed the bell button at front, and after what seemed like an eternity, a small side door opened and an old man, looking well into his eighties, squinted at him through rimless glasses.

“We’re closed. Can’t you see the sign?”

“Take me to your boss, Roberto Calvi. He’s expecting me,” ordered Ferrapotti.

“And you are?”

“The man from UNSDRI.” That’s all you need to know. Go on! Tell him and let me in.” Ferrapotti pushed past the old man and pulled the door closed behind him. The old man had no alternative but to lead the way through a maze of corridors until they came to a very large rosewood door, beautifully carved, and knocked feebly.

“Come!” came a gruff voice.

The old man opened the door and with what strength he had, pushed Ferrapotti through, and quickly pulled the door shut behind him.

“Doctor Ferrapotti of UNSDRI, at your service, Dr. Roberto Calvi, I presume?”

“Ah yes! How good of you to come all this way. I hope Wolfgang managed for you to stop by the Corriere della Sera. Very exciting news indeed!” smiled Calvi, “please take a seat over there and I will sit on the couch. That is what a patient is supposed to do, right?”

“Well, I don’t think we will be doing any deep analysis today. And if we get to that, it would be best if you came down to my consulting rooms in the Vatican,” said Ferrapotti in the best of bedside manners.

“You are the official Vatican psychiatrist?” asked Calvi as he tweaked his small mustache, pulled the knees of his pin stripe trousers up neatly between thumb and forefinger, and sat on the edge of the couch.

“Yes, they trust me. Many of the cases are, one might say, are delicate. Privacy and secrecy in both of my professions are vital.”

“Then let’s get on with it.”

“Tell me when you first had these thoughts,” said Ferrapotti, putting on his most serious expression, a deep frown.

“When I realized that the bank was fottuto.”

“I see. So you have never had such thoughts before?”

“No, never! When you live your life making money, you have to be positive all the time. I always expect to make money, never to lose it, or if the latter, only temporarily, if you see what I mean.”

“Si, ho capito perfettamento. Immediately, I would advise you not to stand by an open window that is more than two levels above the ground.”

“Oh, no. I think you have misunderstood my problem. It is not the loss of money, although it will no doubt affect many people badly, unless the Vatican steps in and saves us, which I think they will.”

“So this is not what is bothering you?”

“Well, not really. You have to take risks if you want to be successful in finance. And with banks, well, I’m just taking risks with other people’s money, aren’t I?” said Calvi, a faint smirk, the moustache rising a little as his upper lip curled.

Ferrapotti crossed his legs, his mahogany chair, though beautifully crafted, was a little high for him and made him uncomfortable. “Then why am I here?” he asked, his perpetual grin breaking out.

“I’m having….” Calvi looked down and wriggled on his seat even further forward to the edge of the embroidered couch.

Ferrapotti waited, raising his eyebrows, his tongue quickly wetting his lips in anticipation.

“… I can’t, I mean, well, my friend…” stuttered Calvi.

“Friend? asked Ferrapotti, suddenly guessing what Calvi was trying to say.

“I can’t…”

Ferrapotti leaned forward from his chair. He tried to look as kindly and understanding as he could. Empathy was what it was all about. “Oh, I get it. You have a male friend…” he said, deliberately not finishing the sentence.

“Yes, that’s why Bishop Marcincus advised me to consult with you. But it’s not exactly that. After all, my preferences in that direction are not at all new.”

“Then…what?”

“I can’t raise one. At first I thought it was boredom or that my partner was no longer of interest to me. But I tried others, and it was the same. A gorgeous young neophyte came on to me when I visited the Vatican last month, but it was no use. I wasn’t up to it.”

Ferrapotti worked hard to hold back a grin. Wasn’t up to it! “Are you having dreams or fantasies of encounters?” asked the good doctor.

“Nothing. Can’t sleep though. Try to think of past encounters, but nothing comes.”

“Yes. Well. I can see what your problem is. It’s depression, pure and simple, but exhibiting itself through sexual dysfunction, rather than in that other major symptom of depression, suicide,” announced Ferrapotti with authority.

“Well, either way,” said Calvi, looking away, “if I can’t have sex, I might as well be dead.”

“There is a new anti-depressant drug under trial that I could prescribe for you. It’s popularly known as ketamine. They’re using it in Vietnam. Very experimental though. It is essentially used as an anesthetic, but in very small doses, can stave off depression.”

“If it’s experimental, I’m not sure about that. Besides, I haven’t had suicidal thoughts as yet.”

“Perhaps it’s not a good idea to wait for the inevitable. Depression is a very serious disease.”

“That’s why I’ve come to you, Doctor Ferrapotti.”

“Then I suggest we meet weekly if possible in my Vatican clinic. It helps you know, simply to have someone to talk to about your problems. Unless you have someone else to talk to? Your priest perhaps?”

“Penso di no. I know these Vatican types too well. All they think of is money. And I do not have a local priest. I will try to see you once a week, but my schedule is so busy.

“Excellent! Here is my UNSDRI card. You can always get me there, even if an emergency,” said Ferrapotti with a happy smile as he stood and reached out to shake hands.

But Calvi did not respond with a handshake. Instead, with tears in his eyes, he embraced his doctor in the Italian way, kissing each cheek. “Grazie mille! Can’t thank you enough!  This talk has helped me already. And if you need any financial advice, don’t hesitate to come to me.”

“Thank you. But I have most of my important finances and transactions done in Puerto Rico. That’s just in case the Communists take over this country.”

“Makes sense. Do you have American citizenship, then?”

“A green card. Just as good, maybe better.”

Ferrapotti turned and departed, the old man was waiting outside the door to show him the way out.

 You be the Judge 

After the fall of Saigon in April of 1975, the cynics and critics of the United Nations, not to mention insiders who were well acquainted with the subterranean antics of Italian counter intelligence, so called, predicted that the United Nations Social Defense Research Institute in Rome, the baby nurtured by various politicians and top bureaucrats of the Italian government (such as it was, though any sensible person would also include the Mafia as part of the top governmental bureaucracy), would be short-lived, most likely a few years when what money it managed to raise from knowing or unknowing member states’ donations, had been milked dry. Few could believe that the giant of the United States of America could have lost a war against a tiny, though as was now clear, dedicated band of communists. Many blamed the US entrapment in Vietnam on the dalliances and incompetence of the CIA, given its pathetic history of failures, such as the Bay of Pigs disaster, and the near self-destruction of the CIA brought about by the incompetence of top spy Jesus Angleton who was convinced the Russians had totally infiltrated the CIA, yet was himself duped by his “best friend” Kim Philby who turned out to be a double agent. Fired by CIA director William Colby  in December 1974, Angleton spent some of his early boyhood in Italy and was certainly closely linked to many influential people in the Italian counter intelligence elite (SID and its various ancillaries). Angleton was anti-communist to the core, and probably fascist as well, given his friendship with Ezra Pound. His role in Italian counter intelligence has never been seriously investigated. But  there is little doubt that he laid the foundation for the CIA in America to establish important ties with the Italian Mafia, upon whose resources it would draw in the assassination attempt of Castro in Cuba, not to mention the assassination of JFK in 1963 by Lee Harvey Oswald, spied on when he was in Russia, cunningly manipulated and fingered by the CIA.

Necessarily, all of this is a long-winded prelude to the memorable day on which Ugo di Napolitano, Supreme Court Judge of Italy, and de-facto expert director of UNSDRI  failed to show up at his office in Via Giulia, on Monday, May 11, 1975. He had not been in the office since Wednesday May 6. At first, no one thought much of it since the directors and experts who moonlighted from their other official positions in the Italian bureaucracy came and went as they wished. On Thursday May 6 the Director General of UNSDRI, who was not often in the office himself because of his “many diplomatic responsibilities” had received a call from the Carabiniere, asking to speak with Judge Di Napolitano.

“It seems that Judge Di Napolitano has disappeared,” announced the Carabiniere.  We just received a call from his wife who says he did not come home last night.”

Director General Supreme, as he called himself when he answered the phone, smiled and said into the mouthpiece, “Oh, don’t worry. I am sure he is on mission, often these are secret you know, as I’m sure you would, being of carabiniere.”

The carabiniere said thank you and hung up. Director General Supreme placed the receiver on its base and reached for his car keys. No sooner had he done so than there was another call. He picked up the phone and said, impatiently, “I have important diplomatic business to attend to, do not allow calls to come to me unless they are urgent.”

“Director General Supreme?” came a loud voice, the sound of typewriters clanging in the background. “This is the Corriere della Sera. I understand that Judge Di Napolitano has disappeared?”

Supreme stood up and snapped his heels together as if saluting his troops. “I do not know who told you that, but it is definitely not true. I know where he is but I cannot reveal his location. He is on mission, as we say in the United Nations.”

“His wife, we understand, called the Carabinieri. She’s worried that he did not come home last night. Are you sure that this is a UN mission?”

“You are Italian, I presume?” asked Supreme, in an impudent manner.

“Well yes, of course I am, I am a top journalist for the Corriere della Sera.”

“Then you would understand that men, especially those of highly respected status among Italians, have their, shall we say, dalliances?”

“You’re sure of that?” replied the journalist, dumbfounded.

“Of course, but you should not print that. It is surely also a well-known fact that such relationships are well publicized Italian secrets, if you see what I mean?”  Supreme joggled on his feet, itching to get out to his Mercedes, but proud of what he thought was his ability to frame in English, nuances and hints that hid the truth, as it were.

#

Next day, there was a small entry on the back of page 1 of the Corriere della Sera, mentioning that the Supreme Court Judge Ugo Di Napolitano was reported missing by his wife to the Carabiniere and that they were investigating. People close to the matter indicated that it was not unusual for Di Napolitano to be on mission for the United Nations for a day or two, probably staying at his holiday house in Fregenae, which was closer to the Rome Fiumicino airport. Of course, people close to Di Napolitano knew that he was with his mistress, Sabrinetta, a buxom beauty from the Sardinian mountains, where, it must be said, kidnapping was a routine affair.

However, over the weekend the Corriere della Sera received a handwritten note that stated:

“Judge di Napolitano is our captive and will be tried in our court charged with corruption and cruel detention of our people, heroes and liberators of the nation. We demand the immediate release of our three compatriots held in Viterbo prison. If this is not done by Tuesday, May 10, if found guilty, Di Napolitano will be executed according to our law.”

The note was signed “NAP” (Nuclei Armati Proletari).  And over the next few days they released manifestos detailing the “trial” of Judge Di Napolitano,  this very much reflecting the modus operandi of the Brigate Rosse (Red Brigade) that reaped havoc throughout Italy in the 1970s. The details of the manifestos were, however, made up. That is to say, they did not accurately report what really happened. This not surprising since the Red Brigade and its various factions had been, as was later to be discovered, or maybe was already known by SID, the brainchild of a well-known publisher and journalist.

#

Just across the river from UNSDRI lies the infamous prison Regina Coeli. It is an unattractive stone building,  as older buildings in Rome go, dating back to the 17th century, facing Via Lungara that runs from the busy Lungo Tevere and the River Tiber. One can see it from the toilet next to Judge Di Naplitano’s office in UNSDRI. Known for its brazen acts of terrorism, the NAP had taken over a small apartment just down the street from the prison, reached from an alley that led off the Piazza Trilussa. It was a one room basement apartment, accessed via a winding stone staircase, recently renovated; that is, everything was painted a bright white. Three scruffy, unshaven, stocky men, obviously from the south, probably Calabria or thereabouts, their demeanor sullen and sour sat at an oblong table, wooden and bare, scrubbed clean, its top soft and rough. Di Napolitano sat tied roughly to a chair, facing them, set back against the whitewashed wall.

“You are responsible for the condition of prisons in Italy, is that correct?” asked the slightly larger of the three, sitting at center.

Di Napolitano wriggled a little. Then spoke in his familiar, sonorous high pitched voice, loud and piercing. “You cannot get away with this. Give up now and I will ensure that you are looked after.” He eyed each of his captors carefully, finding it difficult to hold back a grin. They reminded him of the Marx brothers, Harpo on his left, Groucho, the boss in the middle, and Chico on his right.

“Shut up and answer our questions,” growled Groucho. “We  demand that our three colleagues in Viterbo be released.”

“Who are they?” asked Di Napolitano. Though he already guessed who they would be — the threesome whose escape from Viterbo prison had been foiled because of a tip-off from a Mafia confidant inside the prison.

 Groucho responded. “Pietro Sofia, Giorgio Panizzari, and Martino Zichitella.”  If they are not released by the end of the week, you will be sliced up into many pieces and spread out over Rome’s filthy streets.”

One should add that there was a garbage collectors’ strike, the direct result of the incompetent administration of the city by the current occupants of the city’s administration, the Communist Party.

Unperturbed, Di Napolitano replied, “you may well kill me, but that will not get you what you want, will it? In fact, it will more than likely end up with you all going to jail forever. Or, if a fascist party wins the next election, you may even hang, if they bring back the death penalty.”

“Are you in charge of the conditions and treatment of prisoners in Italy’s jails? Yes or no!” demanded Groucho.

“Let’s kill him now to be done with it. He’s not going to do us any good,” muttered  Chico.

“I am not in charge and have no authority over any prisons. I am simply an expert consultant. That is all,” answered Di Napolitano.

Harpo stirred as if coming back from a deep sleep and said, leaning across the table, “if you are such an expert, why don’t you recommend the abolition of all prisons? It’s obvious to all of us that they are brutal, cruel places. Nobody, including terrorists or murderers deserves to be in such places.”

Di Napolitano was taken aback by the  intelligence displayed by this otherwise oaf, his very red face obviously the result of too much wine. “You have been drinking too much wine, my friend,” he said haughtily, “you know that if you were in charge you would put your enemies in prison, that is if you did not kill them,” answered Di Napolitano.

“I am not your friend. And you are right. It is better to kill your enemies than pretend to forgive them by putting them in jail,” Harpo answered. And as if to drive home his point, he reached under the table and brought up a bottle of red wine and took a swig. 

“I see,” said Di Napolitano, “I see, indeed. I see that you lack courage, and find it in the wine. There are many terrorists like you.” Had his arms been free, Di Napolitano would have waved them to drive home his point. As it was, his high pitched lilting voice, and sonorous Neapolitan accent, were enough to carry the weight of his intellect and, perhaps more important, his position in the Italian bureaucratic hierarchy. It angered all three of his kidnappers. They stood up as one, knocking the chairs backwards, and thumped the table.

And so it went on for three days of interrogation and presentation of “evidence” of the judge’s guilt, the proclamations and reports of the proceedings conveyed to the press that hungrily consumed every word and printed them on their front pages.

The authorities, at first the director of Italian prisons, responded with the standard, “we do not negotiate with terrorists.”  But as the proclamations and threats became more and more violent, by the third day the person who ended up responding was the Prime Minister himself,  Aldo Moro.

In the meantime, the apartment was beginning to smell of stale pizza and the toilet, a small closet with a rickety door that would not stay shut. All men were now unshaven and disheveled. The judge did his best to retain his composure as a Supreme Court Magistrate, but it was undeniable that his face was haggard from lack of sleep, which was difficult if not impossible to get, given the constant interruptions and questioning, and the severe discomfort of being tied to a hard wooden chair.  So by the end of the third day, something or someone had to give.

Di Napolitano, his sharp intellect a little numbed, remained continuously alert for an opportunity or advantage to show itself. A sign of weakness was all he needed. Harpo now was frequently dropping off to sleep. Chico remained vigilant and kept muttering to himself to keep awake, stirred and stood from his chair and shouted at the judge, always with threats of violence, even getting so close with fists raised, but never actually attacking him. Groucho slumbered, occasionally grabbed Chico to restrain him from beating the judge, then snoozing, only to wake suddenly and pepper the judge with more questions, then sleep as he awaited an answer.

The resilient judge managed never to sleep, refused to look distressed. He stared at them individually to make strong eye contact. And just as Chico had made another death threat, Di Napolitano raised his head and spoke in his best magisterial voice. “Release me now and I will arrange for the release of your colleagues from Viterbo Prison,” he said as if presenting the verdict of a trial.

Groucho blinked, Harpo awakened after a big snore, and Chico snarled in response. “Liar! Let’s kill him now. I’ve had enough.”

Groucho sat up. “You heard what that filthy piece of shit Moro said. “He will never negotiate with a terrorist.”

Di Napolitano replied with confidence. “That is right. He will not. But I will, and I am now. As my position as expert consultant to the Department of Prisons I can issue an edict for the release of any inmate if I can show cause.”

“But what of Moro? Isn’t he your boss?” responded Groucho, full of suspicion.

“Have you forgotten that this is Italy, and in politics no politician is anyone’s boss. The politicians talk. We in the bureaucracies, the labyrinths of power, the complexities of which you could not even begin to imagine, anything can be done. And I mean anything.”

“I don’t know. What you said, it sounds like bullshit to me,” murmured Chico, clenching his fist and now standing threateningly right beside the judge.

Groucho blinked and fingered his heavy moustache. “You mean you can get them out?”

“Of course,” replied Di Napolitano confidently. “I am very powerful in the corridors of prisons and courts. Is that not why you chose to kidnap me?”

Harpo snored again, then woke. He looked around with his heavy eyes, then stood and muttered more to himself than to anyone else. “Fuck this. I’m leaving.”  And when he opened the door to leave, the cool air of the night breeze and the sounds of people playing around the fountain in Piazza Trilussa wafted into their apartment that had become a smelly, disgusting cavern.

Chico stared at Groucho in disbelief.  “You didn’t stop him? What if he goes off and talks to everyone?” he cried.

“He won’t talk,” said Groucho belligerently, turning to Harpo,  “would you?”

“You know the answer to that, asshole,” growled Chico. “I tell you, if you let this piece of shit live, we’re fucked. I’m leaving. Fuck you all.”

“And we’d be properly fucked if we killed him. And to what end?” answered Groucho, now realizing himself, that their venture had been unrealistic and pointless right from the beginning. They had expected an Italian bureaucrat to plead for his life. Di Napolitano had outstayed them.

Di Napolitano saw his opportunity. “I state on my word as a Supreme Court Magistrate that I will order the release of your three colleagues once I am released from your captivity.”

He was about to repeat his promise when Chico walked past him, pushing his chair backwards, though thankfully it did not tip up, and left the cavern. That left Groucho. He reached down to his leg and pulled out a knife that he kept strapped there, just in case he needed it. Di Napolitano stared at it, then at Groucho. “You wouldn’t,” he said, frowning, pursing his lips.

“I would, if I thought it worth it. But you’re not worth it,” snarled Groucho with disgust.  He threw the knife at the judge and it landed softly in his lap. “You can take it from there,” he said, “and see you keep your word, or someone will pay for it.”

After an hour or so, Di Napolitano managed to grip the knife and cut his bonds. He staggered to the toilet, relieved himself, and splashed a little cold water on his face. It was drawn and haggard. He ran his hands through his copious hair and felt around for his comb, but it was gone. His captors had taken everything from him, including his wallet. With difficulty, he staggered up the steps to the door that led to the street.  It was somewhere around late afternoon, he guessed. He went to look at his watch, but they had taken it.  He sat down on the old stone step to gather his bearings. He could hear laughter and music coming from around the corner. The noise of traffic hummed loudly in the background. Perhaps there was the faint trickle of a fountain. 

#

The famed criminologist Franco Ferrapotti, the co-director expert of UNSDRI along with his friend and compatriot Ugo Di Napolitano went, one hates to say it, haywire. He rushed into the Director Supreme’s office without permission and ranted and raved, while the Supreme sat, cowed, fingering his car keys.

“Oh, ah, er… how could you do that?” Ferrapotti ranted. “Have you no sense?  And all the time he’s been kidnapped? And what did you tell the carabiniere? He was with his mistress? And you leaked it to the newspapers? His wife’s in my office now, crying. Dio! Dio! What if they kill him?”

Supreme buried his head in his hands. “I was only doing my job,” he cried lamely.

“Your job? Your job is to shut up! That’s what your job is!” screamed Ferrapotti in harsh Roman Italian.

Ferrapotti ran out of the office and back to his own. Phones were ringing all over. He picked up his own and immediately walked to the corner of his office and covered his mouth over the hand-piece, looking sideways and beckoning to Andrea, everyone’s secretary, who stood at the door of his office, to close the door, and to take Di Napolitano’s distraught wife with her..

“Ferrapotti here. Yes. I know. Yes, I do know who it was, or at least I have a good idea. No. Don’t know where he is being kept. But don’t worry. I have my sources. Yes. I will find him. The carabiniere? No. They know nothing. Useless. Just remain calm. I will find him. I have my sources. I have my sources.”

Ferrapotti banged down the phone, rushed out of his office, bounded down the steps, and out the  door to Via Giulia, leaped into his Alpha Romeo, which was of course illegally parked right at the door.  In challenging times, he always got in his Alpha and drove it round and round the block wherever he happened to be and sooner or later it would come to him what to do. It was as if his Alpha spoke to him. And many times, when he and his friend-come colleague-come nuisance, Di Napolitano had a serious disagreement, they rode round and round in the Alpha until it was resolved. This created quite a spectacle, since their voices carried far out of the car, though the words and secrets they held were not comprehensible. He drove down Via Giulia as far as Via Dei Pettinari, planning to drive left, past the Casa Palotti, then back on one of the many narrow medieval streets. Normally, he would not bother to look right or left, simply drive where his whim took him. Other cars, this being Rome after all, would have to swerve to get out of his way. It was the unwritten law of the road: first there first served. Every turn or stop or crossroad was a race.  But he was so distracted with worry for his friend’s safety, that he hesitated and looked right instead of left where he had planned to go. And then he saw a figure, stooped, but at the same time trying to hold his head up high, staggering over the Ponte Sisto(Sisto Bridge). He blinked, and stared. Someone behind him tooted an awful horn, others yelled at him to get a move on. He drove left, just enough to get a better look at the pathetic figure. Cars came from everywhere zooming down the Lungotevere, coming up behind him from Via Giulia, others trying to turn into Via dei Pettinari. He drove his Alpha, or maybe it drove him, whatever it was, straight across the Lungotevere, a suicidal act, especially as one could not drive over the  bridge because of a chain stretched across the entrance. It was for pedestrians only. No matter! Ferrapotti stopped his car right in the middle of the road, facing the bridge and leaped out, waving his arms, screaming at the top of his voice, “Consigliere! Ugo! Here! Over here!” Yes, it was his friend and now what a big nuisance he was right this minute. The traffic on Lungotevere was choked to a standstill. Horns tooted loudly, people got out of their cars, shaking their fists, yelling obscenities.

At last, a carabiniere showed up, initially preparing to take Ferrapotti into custody and charge him with any number of crimes.  But Ferrapotti ran, something he rarely did because of his rather corpulent condition, calling, “Ugo! It’s you! How did you do it? Come! Let’s get you home!”

Di Napolitano staggered some more, and with a great effort managed to reach Ferrapotti’s extended arms, and he fell into them, sighing, “Ferrapotti, I never thought I’d get this close to you!” This was Di Napolitano! Even in exhaustion, he sees humor.

“Come diavolo hai fatto?”  cried Ferrapotti, then lapsed into English for no apparent reason,  “Oh…er…ah…How the hell did you do it?”

The astounded carabiniere recognized Di Napolitano. “Judge! I will call for an ambulance. Where are the kidnappers? Tell me which way they went and I will radio for a car. And an ambulance for you as well,. You look like you need attention.”

“Can’t you see he’s exhausted?” complained Ferrapotti. Here, help me put him into my Alpha, and I will take him to the hospital. And get all these the cars out of the way!”

Di Napolitano fell into the car, Ferrapotti beside him. He revved the engine, as if to say, “get out of the way or I’ll run you down.”  The flustered Carabiniere tried to get the cars to back up so that Ferrapotti could turn his car around and move with the traffic. “I need to turn around. The nearest hospital is on Isola Tiburtina.”

“Franco. I’m all right. Just need a good glass of wine and a small plate of pasta. Then some sleep. Let’s go to the office. It’s the closest, and we can send out for something.“

#

Ferrapotti managed to turn the car around and drive back down Via Dei Pettinari, then into Via Giulia. He gunned the Alpha, its front wheels screeching, and drove like a madman, his hand on the horn all the way, the tires skimming over the cobblestoned street. He pulled up in front of UNSDRI and was met by several of the pezzi grossi, as well as the security guard waving his pistol, and two young soldiers, probably no older than 18, their rifles at the ready. 

Ferrapotti wound down the window. “Out of the way! Out of the way! I have the Judge! He escaped! Stand back!”

The security guard opened the passenger door and, annoyed that he had to put his gun in its holster, helped Di Napolitano out of the car. “Call an ambulance!” he yelled to the doorman.

Di Napolitano, with a superhuman effort, stood up straight, indicating that he was the boss. “No! No ambulance! I am good. Tell Eduardo at the Trattoria Giulia to send over pasta fagioli and a bottle of red wine. That’s all I need to recover.”

“And no one is to enter this building without my consent,” added Ferrapotti.

Ferrapotti and one of the pezzi grossi helped Di Napolitano up the steps and down the corridor to his office. Andrea came running, tears in her eyes. “Oh! Consigliere, you’re safe! I will ring your wife immediately!”

Thus ended this troublesome incident. The one who suffered most, probably, was Sabrinetta, who had remained in Fregenae, waiting for her lover who did not arrive, unable to receive any sympathy from anyone, friends or relatives, because her existence was a well-known secret, which in practice meant that she did not exist, except in the imagination of others.

Story 37.
The Spy that Wasn’t
Part 3. Resolution

Next morning, the Council of Europe Debating Chamber.

“I am pleased to open this, our second session, of the United Nations and Council of Europe collaboration to address the problem of world crime,” announced the Rapporteur with greatly affected pride.  “After conversations delegates had at dinner and afterwards, there is a draft of our resolutions now available, and our beautiful administrative assistant Mademoiselle Andrea will now read out the draft of our deliberations.”

Andrea, now dressed in a sleek two piece suit, the top a snug fit and the bottom styled as a miniskirt, always the colors of the Carabinieri, stepped up to the podium that had been specially erected for her.  Dennis was spellbound, both by her amazing composure and by the shock he felt that these people had already drafted a report of deliberations, even though the major aspects of the project had never been addressed. He could —  almost — accept that he was not included in the out-of-meeting deliberations, given his apparent very junior position as accidental director of the research, nevertheless, he had to gulp very hard to swallow the  inferior position into which he had been relegated. So far, he could see no reason why he was even dragged along to this meeting.

Andrea began:

“Considering, that in light of increases in crime worldwide, the World Crime Project will collect crime data from all member countries of the United Nations and the Council of Europe, and…

“Acknowledging the implications world crime has for world order, the project will be carried out in a timely, if not urgent, manner to address the many concerns of world crime for citizens.

“Observing, that the rise in world crime will place a burden on the capacity of prisons of most if not all member nations, particular attention will be given to the numbers of inmates currently residing in prisons.

“Understanding, that the definition of crime varies according to the different procedures and laws of each member country, data will be collected concerning only the general categories of crime such as homicide, assault and theft.

“Accepting the fact that crime also varies according to economic conditions, data will be collected concerning the social status of the offenders, whether rich or poor, the particular measures of these categories to be left to the appropriate technical experts.

“Realizing the importance of this research for the economic and social progress of developing nations, the Director of Research will give special attention to developing countries and their social and cultural problems and differences concerning crime and criminal justice.

“Recognizing that for many member nations, crime and justice are politically sensitive problems, the project results will not be published in any public forum, without the permission of every member nation.

“Accepting furthermore, that this research is highly technical as well as sensitive politically, significant research design decisions must be approved by every participating member nation, before the project can continue forward.

“Approving the general design of this important project will be contingent on the director of the research project presenting a research design and preliminary report to this body one year from now.”

Andrea looked up at her audience, collected her papers, and stepped away as light applause followed her to her seat. The Rapporteur from his supervising chair stood and clapped excessively.

Dennis, however, had shrunk back into his padded seat, angry as he had never been before, or at least since he was a three year old. His immediate impulse was to call them a bunch of nincompoops. In fact, he raised his hand, waved it actually, but the Rapporteur’s eyes had already landed on Der Groot, who responded accordingly.

“May I congratulate you, Monsieur Rapporteur and your very hard workers, for having drafted an excellent report of our important deliberations.” He turned to look at Dennis. “And Mr. Cotter, I congratulate you on your position as project director and urge you to undertake the recommendations of our meeting as soon as you are able. Mademoiselle Andrea has provided an excellent blueprint for going forward. I commend her and thank you all for your insightful contributions.”

Dennis forced a smile, the corners of his mouth quivering with pent up anger. He spied his boss Ferrapotti, grinning gleefully, as he did the rounds of all participants, whispering loudly in their ears. Then, without quite realizing it, he found himself standing in his place, his hand up as though asking to go to the bathroom. “Monsieur Rapporteur!” he called.

“The chair recognizes Mr. Cotter of UNSDRI.”

“What about race? Why is that not included as a variable?”

Immediately he had said it, he knew he was in trouble. It was the way he said it. He should have said simply, “Do you think race should be included along with the other social factors you recommend?”

For once, Ferrapotti stopped his whispering and his persistent grin faded. The Rapporteur’s jaw dropped, and Der Groot, now also angry, rose from his seat. He looked across the cavernous chamber, no more than a dozen people scattered around the front rows, a chamber built to seat several hundred, his lips dripping with pomposity, his countenance so patronizing, informed Dennis of his utterly ignorant mistake:

“I cannot speak for the rest of Europe, but The Netherlands certainly does not collect crime or any other type of social data according to race. That would be a policy of outright racism. It is racial profiling, as your American government even calls it. It is time that the United States learned from Europe how to include its ethnics into its supposed diverse democracy.”

Dennis went very red, his lips quivering, at first unable to make them say the words that lay stuck in his head. He saw out of the corner of his eye Ferrapotti making his way to Der Groot. “I’ll have you know,” he mumbled in a weak voice, “that I am Australian, not American.”

As if this were an excuse or even substantive reply to Der Groot’s powerful observation, indeed, accusation! Der Groot waved Ferrapotti away, who adroitly changed course and made his way to Dennis.

“Did you not receive your Doctorate at the University of Pennsylvania?” asked Der Groot.

Dennis sat down in his seat, an act that helped calm him. Ferrapotti was now approaching him from the aisle, still with his grin, though obviously concerned. 

In response to Der Groot’s question Dennis rose again. He looked at the Rapporteur who was flummoxed and did not know how to intervene in a respectful way. The issue was too controversial. He dare not get caught up in an argument about race.

“You are right, professor doctor Der Groot,” noted Dennis sarcastically, “but may I point out that, if you do not have valid data on the racial component of crime, and especially of those who are in prison, how will you ever determine whether the criminal justice system is racially biased? Without such data, there is no empirical evidence on which to develop policy that guarantees racial equality.”

There, he had said it. True, what he had said was a paradox of sorts. In order to show racial prejudice, especially systemic bias, you must be able to show that in actual fact the bias exists, and for that you must collect data that profiles — dare one say the word — the race and other  attributes of those who commit crimes, who are victims of crimes, who are processed through the criminal justice system.

Der Groot did not offer a retort. He assumed that all present would see that everything the young man had said revealed his racist view of the world. The Americans, the Australians, everyone knew that.

“Oh, er, oh,” Dennis heard, in loud whispers in his ear, and smelled Ferrapotti’s stale nicotine breath, “of course you’re right. But you can’t say it to these people.”

Dennis turned to reply and thank his boss for the support, but Ferrapotti had already left and was on his way to whisper to Der Groot.

Buoyed by the support of his boss, Dennis stood again, and addressed the chair. He was learning how to make himself seem civilized.

“Monsieur Rapporteur,” he said, “may I speak again? This is such an important issue in our times.”

The Rapporteur, glad of a way to be included in this difficult exchange, replied, “the Chair recognizes Mr. Cotter.”

“I have one small question to ask Professor Doctor Der Groot. Does he know how many ethnic Indonesians are in Dutch prisons, and are they over-represented according to their portion of the total population of the Netherlands?”

Der Groot stood stiffly. “As I have said, we do not collect such information. It is racist to do so.”

“May I?” asked Dennis again respectfully addressing the chair.”

“You may.”

Ferrapotti was now hurrying back to Dennis with more whispers, this time no doubt to tell him to shut up.

“Do you collect data on sex of the offenders or inmates of prisons?”

Der Groot pretended to busily write something down and did not respond.

“Does the delegate from The Netherlands wish to respond?” asked the Rapporteur.

“I do not,” replied der Groot, clearly sulking.

“Of course you do,” said Dennis, now feeling a rush of adrenalin that comes with winning. “According to your argument, collecting such data would be sexist.”

Dennis smelled the nicotine breath. Ferrapotti was panting, no longer whispering. He squeezed Dennis’s arm quite strongly. Dennis’s cheeks were still flushed with the feeling of winning, though none present perceived the incident as such. But he then thought of the wonderful last lunch he had in Rome with his colleagues and new friends before departing for Strasbourg, and decided that such a life was much more important than winning a small argument. He grabbed Ferrapotti’s hand that gripped his arm and whispered. “O.K. I’ll shut up.”

 Carpe diem? 

The Spy that Wasn’t
Part 2. The Council of Europe

The combined UN-Council of Europe meeting occurred as scheduled. A total of twelve “experts” as they were all called, plus supportive staff to warm the seats for the experts,  take notes, and pass to them special handwritten notes conveyed to them from the Rapporteur, assembled in the cavernous Council of Europe Debating Chamber. Dr. Ferrapotti, Andrea and Dennis attended and sat to one side, though during the entire meeting Dr. Ferrapotti rarely sat, but constantly paraded about the hall, stopping and chatting with whoever was in his path, a look on his face as though he were indulged in some great conspiracy, a smirk of superiority, his eyes dancing around as if to scan the great hall for hidden spies.  On the other side were various representatives of the Council of Europe, though it turned out that the only country sending its representatives was the Netherlands, and there was one country represented by an “observer,” a representative who sat at the far back of the hall, a very large suitcase sitting in the aisle beside him. This man with a ruddy complexion, lined face and very red cheeks, head shaved, was the observer from East Germany, who, as it turned out, spoke only Russian. He had, however, been invited to observe at the special request of Dr. Ferrapotti, as a sign of good will.

The Rapporteur called the meeting to order and made a special plea that all participants come down from their seats perched way back from the dais, so that all could hear each other speak, and besides as an act of international friendship. Without thinking, Dennis, an obedient person who wanted to please everyone, got up and moved and, surprisingly, others did as well, mumbling and joking as they did so. The Rapporteur, Professor of Law from the esteemed Sorbonne, a veritable Napoleon look-alike,  addressed the members in English, with a sonorous French accent that seemed to issue from his large nose:

“Good morning,” he tapped the microphone, “I regret the lack of simultaneous translation, but with our small numbers, we did not we did not qualify.  Esteemed members, experts and observers. I am honored to serve as rapporteur for this important meeting in which we will develop the necessary protocols for the collection of crime statistics worldwide and will, we very much hope, result in the construction of not only a World Crime Index, but establish a framework for universal transparency in criminal justice. This is a pioneering study, a giant first in collaboration between the Council of Europe and the United Nations.”

The delegates and experts all clapped lightly in response to these uplifting remarks. The Rapporteur smiled and raised his hands as if to accept the applause. Dennis was spellbound. He was probably the only person present whose native language was English. How privileged he was! He looked around the chamber and could hardly believe that he was here, among such illustrious people, and most amazing of all, he was going to direct the first ever study of world crime statistics. He was himself clapping. He could not remember having ever before clapped in a meeting of any kind, when he felt a touch to his arm. He turned and looked up to see Dr. Ferrapotti staring down at him, his usual big grin. Ferrapotti leaned over and with his hand cupped over his mouth, whispered loudly, “Oh, ah, this guy is trying to get the Turks into the Council of Europe and the EU. He’s a lawyer and they are writing a new criminal code that excludes the death penalty. You know, it’s a requirement of the EU that all member states abolish the death penalty. Keep this under your hat.”

Before Dennis could answer, though he had nothing to say except some kind of in-awe grunt perhaps, Dr. Ferrapotti had gone to some other delegate to pass on  another piece of top secret information. The Rapporteur continued:

“And with those short introductory remarks, I now welcome you all to the Council of Europe and ask that you briefly stand and introduce yourselves.” The Rapporteur did not call on anyone to start, because as a skilled Rapporteur he did not want to give any impression of who he thought of first. All must be treated equally here in this illustrious place.

A quintessential European, silver haired, tall and straight, arose and announced, “I am Professor Dr. Der Groot, University of Amsterdam, and Director of Research, Supreme Court of Netherlands.”

The mysterious man who had remained at back, stood and said, in broken English, “I observer East Germany, not tell department.” He sat down with a bang and then noisily opened his suitcase, retrieved a bottle of vodka and small glass, which he filled, gulped it down, and cried “За встречу” (to our meeting!).

Dennis waited for other delegates from other countries to announce their presence. None came forward. His boss, that was how he had come to think of him, Ferrapotti made no attempt to announce himself because he was too busy talking to the Rapporteur, his hand cupped over his mouth almost touching the Rapporteur’s ear. Dennis rose slowly. “I am Dennis Cotter, and will be leading the project for Professor Dr. Ferrapotti and Professor Dr. Di Napolitano, for the United Nations Social Defense Research Institute.” All stared at this scruffy individual, dressed in cheap pants and open neck shirt, no tie. His accent, the words rolling inaudibly from his mouth to his chin, revealed his obvious nationality. The East German, greatly excited, immediately reached into his suitcase and pulled out a bottle of beer. “You want?” he called with a big grin.

“Thank you Mr. Cotter,” said the Rapporteur with a forced smile. “And are you able to tell us anything of your preliminary design for the project?”

Dennis, deeply embarrassed, still standing, had started to sit, then nervously stood again. “Like what?” he asked with a touch of belligerence.

The Rapporteur looked away and directed his gaze at the man from Holland, who quickly stood and responded.

“It is our considered opinion that we should start by collecting information only on the numbers of persons in prison throughout the world. This would be phase one. After that, we should then collect information on the crimes that have been committed in every country.”

“Oh, er, ah,” interrupted Ferrapotti, having taken his seat in the front row, “it should be the other way around. First we count the crimes, then count the prisoners.”

Dennis raised his hand and, seeing that the Rapporteur was not looking his way, he stood and coughed loudly. “In America we count crimes by number of crimes reported to the police. It is the most valid, front line measure, unsullied by the complexities of the criminal justice system.”

“You are not Australian?” asked the Rapporteur rudely.

“No, I mean I am an Aussie, but I graduated from the renowned criminology program at University of Pennsylvania.”

“That explains it,” announced Der Groot, full of his cultured superiority. “You are not a lawyer, so you know nothing of the definition of crimes or for that matter criminality.”

Dennis sat back in the padded seat, thoroughly embarrassed, and very angry. “What a pompous asshole,” he mumbled to himself. His boss came to the rescue.

“Oh, er, ah, as a psychiatrist I can support Dr. Cotter’s observation. One does not have to be a lawyer to know what a crime is.”

“Mr. Cotter is a psychiatrist?” asked Der Groot imperiously.

Dennis, motivated by his boss’s support rose quickly and raised his hand. The Rapporteur pretended not to see him and looked back to Ferrapotti. But Dennis was not to be dismissed so easily. “I am a sociologist,” he said proudly, “and we know much more about the entire criminal justice process, the behavior of police who collect the initial information of crimes and who have a well-established procedure for recording and counting them. You have to look at the whole process from the initial report of a crime through to the end result, the punishment, depending on the seriousness of the offence, the final prison term served by the offender.”

“Yes, of course,” ceded Der Groot, “but what you have described would require a lifetime of research and is simply not practical, to collect information of the entire criminal justice system of every country in the world. Besides, many may not even have a criminal justice system as you Americans seem to assume.”

“I am not an American,” snarled Dennis again, deeply offended.

The Rapporteur abruptly stood up. “I see that our morning break is upon us. We shall retire for a  tea or coffee as you prefer, and return in half an hour.”

As they made their way up the steps to the exit of the great debating chamber, Dennis tried very hard to catch up with his boss. But Ferrapotti was already busily talking in very loud whispers to the Rapporteur, then to the Dutchman, ignoring the East German, who in any case, remained in his seat with his suitcase, and beckoned wildly to Dennis as he passed, to join him. But Dennis hurried outside, eager to get away from these most obnoxious Europeans, all of them seemingly ignorant of the simple basics of crime statistics. He walked towards the barred and flagged entrance to the Council of Europe compound, when he realized that he should have gone to the toilet. He did not want to return to the chamber, for fear he would meet one of the delegates and would say something he would regret. He looked around for a convenient place. Hardly a tree in sight, but plenty of green grass, and no significant buildings behind which one could hide. Maybe if he simply stood between a couple of the flags, facing away from the building, no one would notice. But of course someone would. He had a feeling of being spied on all the time. And there’s nothing worse than that feeling when one wants to pee.

Eventually, Dennis found a bathroom in another part of the building and was able to return to the chamber, ready for the next round. His boss caught up with him just as he was entering the chamber, nudged his elbow, whispered in his ear, his lips almost touching. “Oh, er, ah,” he whispered, “keep going. It doesn’t matter what they say. We will do what we want. We have the money, they don’t.” He hurried off to accost some other member, probably Der Groot.

All were assembled, but as yet the Rapporteur had not arrived. Dennis looked around, caught Ferrapotti’s sly glance, and maybe a nod towards the door at bottom of the chamber. And there, he saw Andrea emerge, her cheeks rosy, her hand touching her hair as though it were blowing in the wind. In a few moments, the Rapporteur tried impossibly, given his Napoleonic stature, to walk as upright as Charles de Gaulle, his pin striped suit fitting so snuggly that it accentuated his protruding belly, a great match for Andrea’s simulated Carabinieri attire.

“Now esteemed delegates,” announced the Rapporteur, “we appear to have something of an agreement, or should one say a compromise. Statistics on those convicted of crimes will first be collected. This takes into account the legal definition of when a crime is a crime, which is defined by a conviction. There can be no doubt about that. At the same time, our sociologists will collect information of the number of offenders in prison.”

Dennis could not help himself. “After trial or before trial?” he asked.

His boss looked back and frowned. He should shut up. That was the message. The Rapporteur also scowled and shuffled some papers.

“Yes, we know that France has the highest rate of incarceration awaiting trial of any modern country,” noted Der Groot with a touch of glee.

“Though an important measure that statistic is not available from French authorities. Besides, this assertion is based on rumor, not fact, and cannot be accepted as true without the relevant data,” answered the Rapporteur, looking over his glasses at the rest of the audience, avoiding Der Groot’s pompous stare.

The Rapporteur looked at his watch. “It is time for our lunch break. It will be served in the Council of Europe dining room for delegates. Follow our event coordinator, the beautiful Andrea, and she will show you the way. I am told there will be five courses, as there should be, with the best quality French wines. We will reconvene in three hours.”

Immediately all rose and made their ways to Andrea. The East German had understood well enough and was already by her side, grinning and licking his lips.

The afternoon session was cancelled for reasons unknown, though Ferrapotti had whispered to Dennis that all was well, and that a solution to the difficulties would be reached by the next morning. He, Der Groot and the Rapporteur would meet for dinner. Dennis was not invited. It was a chance for him to get to know Andrea, Ferrapotti had said with a wink.

To be continued…..

The Spy that Wasn’t

Part 1. Rome

In 1966 the United Nations Social Defense Research Institute (UNSDRI) was established to conduct research into the international aspects of crime and criminal justice. It was the brainchild of Aldo Moro, on-again-off-again Prime Minister of Italy. Moro, former law professor at the University of Rome, was the unstoppable head of the Christian Democratic Party, full of confidence, grand master of the endless subterfuges within which decisions were made, and where money, especially money, was acquired and distributed. 

The institute was located in Rome, on the beautiful Via Giulia, in a medieval building that was once a prison, and directly opposite one of the ancillary buildings of the Italian Ministry of Justice.  With much fanfare, Moro managed to allocate 500 million lire startup money to pay for the UNSDRI director general, a large man of African descent from Somalia or maybe the Congo, and a fledgling staff, all Italian of course, of three secretaries, one administrator, and several doormen and couriers. Moro pointed out to the UN directorate in New York, that Italy was donating the entire building as office space, and expected that other nations of the UN would contribute their fair share. The matter was urgent. Operating money, especially travel money which was an essential food for all UN officials, without which they withered away at their desks. And the defense of societies against crime and insurrection was surely the utmost role for the United Nations to deliver, especially for developing countries where insurrection and terror had become the rule, when even the Director General of the United Nations, Dag Hamarskjold was assassinated as he tried to engineer peace in the Congo in 1961. Italy, a former colonial power would do its part. The office was always busy. The Director General Supreme of UNSDRI had many diplomatic missions to attend to, endless meetings with important figures of Italy’s foreign ministry, and frequent visits to the Commissary at its sister U.N. Organization in Rome. the FAO (Food and Agricultural Organization), located in a massive building, one of Mussolini’s monstrosities, built to administer Italy’s colonies.

In 1969, the arrival at UNSDRI of an English speaking intern from Cambridge England was expected any day, a newly minted Ph.D. from the Cambridge University’s renowned criminology program. He would head up the Institute’s first research study, funded copiously by the Ford Foundation, to collect international crime statistics from around the world, collate the findings, and recommend to the United Nations General Assembly ways to combat world crime. As the Americans repeated many times over, there was no sense developing policies, local or worldwide, if they were not informed by data. Data, data, data, that was the rant. That said, it was an Englishman who was expected to take charge, for the Italians could not quite bring themselves to acknowledge the superior empirical research capabilities of the Americans.

Professor Franco Ferrapotti, renowned psychiatrist, the University of Rome, and Procuratore Ugo Di Napolitano,  Supreme Court Magistrate,  were seconded from their important positions to supervise the research, approve of its design, and ensure that the results were accurate and infallible. It was their signatures that were on the lucrative contract signed with the Ford Foundation. Ferrapotti, an ebullient, rotund Roman, balding, a veritable look-alike of Mussolini, saw himself as the true director of the project, indeed of the whole institute. His partner, Judge Di Napolitano, was a man of Naples as his name implied, a tall, upright gentleman, spoke in a high-pitched, loud voice, a voice rather like that of the Godfather in the movie of that name, only louder, one that penetrated every crack in the old building. His English was heavily accented, drawing out the wonderful vowel sounds of southern Italy, speaking in long legal clauses, as though pronouncing even the punctuation. In contrast, his colleague Ferrapotti, spoke English with a distinct American accent, smooth, monotone, rambling, like a car running idle. 

The great halls of the institute were therefore full of the echoes of these two directors, constantly arguing (or seemingly so) with each other. Ferrapotti, having served as a visiting distinguished professor in various American Universities, pointed out that there was no American in the institute and that, if the project were to be conducted successfully, its results accepted by the world scientific community, it would have to be carried out by an American. Di Napolitano demurred, somewhat, though he thought that there was no problem that could not be solved by clear, rational, logical thinking. The “facts” he treated as data (if he must use that ugly word)  to be used and interpreted as needed by the policymaker. And since it was the policymaker who interpreted the data, there was no real necessity to demonstrate that the data were “valid” or “accurate” or whatever the social scientists said made their findings “facts.”  In contrast, Ferrapotti, thought of “facts” as something that he found out when he examined a patient (he had many referred to him from the Vatican), got answers from his probing questions, formed hypotheses about the patient’s problem and prescribed the treatment forthwith. Without these “facts” concerning his individual patient, he obviously could not make the appropriate diagnosis, and thus prescribe the correct treatment. It was, for him, as it was for the great father of psychiatry, Sigmund Freud still dominant in the 1960s though slowly being undermined by young radical psychiatrists, a great leap from the analysis of individual cases, to diagnose crime on a mass scale as the project envisaged, dare to prescribe steps to solve the problem of crime at the world level.

Thus, the compromise was to appoint an Englishman.

And now our story begins.

As Di Napolitano and Ferrapotti mounted the few big steps to the Institute, at Via Giulia 52, arguing incessantly, Ferrapotti felt a tug on his leather jacket. The guard on duty stepped out from his glass-enclosed post, pushed past Ferrapotti and grabbed a scruffy looking young man, dressed in shorts, the sign of either an American or Australian, shirt hanging loose, leather sandals, like those worn by many of the neophyte students of the Vatican.

“Halt!” shouted the guard, “non entrare qui!”

The scruffy young man grinned and stepped back. “Doctor Ferrapotti!” he cried.

Ferrapotti stopped in mid-sentence and turned to face this person who spoke English in an accent he had heard only once before, of an Australian he had met in one of his classes when he was a visiting professor at America’s prestigious University of Pennsylvania.

“Doctor Ferrapotti! Remember me? I was in your class…”

Ferrapotti looked this scraggly fellow up and down. Short in stature, thin, nothing of him. “Oh.. Er..ah..You need a good meal of Italian pasta,”  said Ferrapotti with a grin. “What can I do for you?”

Di Napolitano looked annoyed. It was beyond his comprehension that Ferrapotti, or any Italian for that matter, would bother to acknowledge any foreigner, especially an English speaking one, who came up to him in the street. Besides, it was a security risk.  But this did not deter Ferrapotti. He looked for every moment to be flattered. To be recognized by a former student or anyone else for that matter, he welcomed.

The Aussie looked up, pushed the guard’s hand away from his arm. “This is an amazing coincidence,” he said, “I’m here for a two day stopover on my way home to Melbourne. I thought you were at the University of Rome.”

Ferrapotti looked at him, and without any hesitation asked, “oh.. Er..ah..do you want a job?”

“I, I…” stuttered the Aussie, taken aback.

Di Napolitano turned away and sprinted up the steps leading to the Institute, calling back over his shoulder, “basta, Franco. Non fai niente stupido!”

Ferrapotti grinned at the Aussie. “Oh.. Ah.. Don’t mind him,” he said, “he’s a  judge so he’s used to giving orders.”

“I, I don’t know what to say.”

“Yes or no? Oh.. Er.. It’s a great opportunity to work for the United Nations. On the frontier of international criminology,” urged Ferrapotti.

“But I, I’m on my way back to Australia. I have a research assistant position lined up there…”

“Ah.. Er.. Come on!” Ferrapotti grabbed him roughly by the arm. “Come see your new office! Beautifully frescoed ceilings. Just like the Vatican library!”

The Aussie allowed himself to be pulled up the steps and past the pezzi grossi, the several doormen and couriers, through the double doors, the well-armed guard staring at his log book, trying not to notice, dialing a number on the intercom. The long corridor, expansive and frescoed from top to bottom appeared before them. The sounds of Di Napolitano’s lilting voice echoed from his office at the far end. Ferrapotti’s office was right next to his.

Overwhelmed and confused, the Aussie struggled along, his knees weak, his eyes of course taking in the wonders of Italian faux Renaissance frescoes. They were half way down the corridor when a door opened, a very large glass door, revealing the biggest of all offices, two secretaries typing away at their Olivettis, one each side of the massive carved door to the Director General’s office. Ferrapotti dragged the Aussie in.

“Is the Supreme General in?” he asked, looking at one of the secretaries then to the other. None looked up. One, or possibly both, murmured, “he’s in, but does not want to be disturbed. Very important business coming in from the UN Secretariat in New York.”

Ferrapotti of course ignored the response and barged right in, pulling his Aussie charge with him.

“Er, ah, Professor, Doctor Supreme Secretary General, I want you to meet our project director for our new Ford Foundation grant, er…”

The director general of the Institute lounged back in his heavily padded office chair, beautifully crafted with leopard skin, taken from a leopard that he himself had shot on his recent trip back home in Somalia, or maybe the Congo.

“Ah, yes. The Ford foundation. Pity it was not the Mercedes Foundation. But  I suppose, beggars can’t be choosers,” said the general in his very deep voice, and a big smile, one that was required of all African UN Staff members. And what is this you have brought me?” He looked at the small, overly tanned young white male, his hair too long and poorly combed.

Ferrapotti grinned and replied, “Ah.. Oh.. This is er…”

“Dennis Cotter,” put in the Aussie. “My name is Dennis Cotter and I’m from Melbourne Australia.”

“Yes, that’s right. Dennis. One of my very successful students from the greatest school of  America the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, where I taught on their request the history of criminology, which of course you know, is one of Italy’s main claims to academic excellence. We pioneered the science of criminology, Lombroso and others,…”

“Yes, yes,” said the general, fingering his many medals impatiently.  “But if you will pardon me, I must leave on an urgent mission. There is a meeting in Strasbourg…”

“Strasbourg? But that’s where the Council of Europe meets, isn’t it?” asked Ferrapotti.

“Yes, that’s right. I have offered our services to the COE.”

“Oh well done! And congratulations!” said Ferrapotti, knowing full well that if Di Napolitano found out, he would raise hell.

The director general left, carrying his diplomatic pouch, walking cane, and a set of car keys, with a very large key ring made of ivory, the Mercedes logo carved into it. Ferrapotti looked at Dennis, and said in his usual blunt way, “ah.. Er.. oh.. don’t mind him. We need him as our face to the UN, an organization that takes seriously only those from developing countries. We allow them to occupy all top administrative positions because we know we can easily bribe them into doing whatever we want. Did you notice his key ring? The first thing he did when the foreign minister announced his appointment as director of the institute, was to go out and buy a black Mercedes.”

Dennis was taken aback, and should have taken this rant as a warning. But the fact was he saw only the promise of being paid while he indulged in a year or so in Rome, the most beautiful place on earth. It was an opportunity that he could not pass up, no matter how crazy and surreal it seemed. To be offered a job, by a world renowned professor who could not remember his name, to work in a beautifully frescoed medieval building. What  more could one ask for? So, without even asking how much the job paid, he instead asked, “so what is the project I will be working on?”

Ferrapotti appeared not to hear the question. “Oh.. Ah.. Come along,” he said. “I’ll introduce you to my good friend and illustrious judge, Di Napolitano. We call him the Consigliere. Without him, this Institute could not function.”

Di Napolitano stood up from his desk and walked around to shake Dennis’s hand. “Very pleased to meet you,” he said, his voice always loud, no matter where or with whom. “If you are recommended by Dr. Ferrapotti, I know you must be outstanding!”

Dennis managed to release his hand from Di Napolitano’s iron grip, and replied, “well thank you sir, but I don’t know, I haven’t really…”

Ferrapotti looked Dennis in the eye. It was his psychiatrist’s look, one meant to penetrate the facial veneer of his subjects, to make them think that he was looking right inside their mind. “Oh.. Er.. Young man,” he said, “this is an opportunity that will never come again. It will make you famous. It will be the very first study of world crime. And conducted under the auspices of the United Nations, and more important, with the scholarly imprint of the great legacy of Italian Criminology, where criminology was first established as a science.”

Dennis felt the small slap of Ferrapotti’s hand on his shoulder.  How could he refuse? “OK. I’ll do it. But I need a few details.”

“No problem! Just step in here and I will introduce you to our administrative director and she will take care of all your immediate needs.”

Ferrapotti stepped away and hurried to Di Napolitano’s office, just as a glass door opened and there stood a dark headed young lady, dressed in what appeared to be a kind of female designer simulation of a Carabiniere uniform, with a red stripe running down the side of tight pants, and black jacket, stretched across the fulsome chest, collar and cuffs braided with silver, everything edged in scarlet. Her skin was the pale white of a Northerner, her jet black hair, though, flowing in careful waves over her shoulders. All this and more Dennis took in with a gulp of air.

“I am Andrea. Come, please take a seat by my desk and we will get your details,” she said in broken English, though very business-like.

Dennis was, understandably, most confused and not a little concerned. He had a plane to catch the next morning back to Melbourne. He had nowhere to stay beyond this one night. He had no money to extend his stay at the pensione he had found just around the corner from Campo dei Fiori.

“Well, I don’t know. I mean,  I was only walking by. It was pure chance I ran into Doctor Ferrapotti. And I don’t really know what he wants me to work on.”

“Oh, don’t worry!” said Andrea with a big sigh. “È il modo in italiano, sai? You’ll get used to it.”

“Modo what?”

“Oh, sorry. It’s the Italian way, especially in Rome. Take every day as it comes. Lo sai?”

“OK. Maybe easy for you. But what will I do about my plane ticket? And where will I stay if I take on the job? I mean, there’s so much to do. And my family are expecting me to arrive home day after tomorrow.”

Andrea just smiled and began writing on a form. “So, your full name, please?”

“What for?” asked Dennis, defensively.

Andrea looked at him impatiently. “Now, let’s get this done so I can help you find a place to stay and take care of your plane ticket. Hopefully you are on Alitalia?

“Yes, I am.”

“Then there’s no problem. We will get you a refund. Now, your name?”

And so it went. Andrea filled out what she called a “Special Service Agreement” with the United Nations. When she came to the amount that he would be paid, Andrea frowned. “Did they tell you how much you would be paid?”

“No. But I haven’t really agreed to do his yet, have I?”

“Once you sign this form you have. You should ask them for more money. This is not enough to live on,” Andrea said.

“Seriously?”

“Yes. Seriously.”

Dennis found an “apartment”  right beside Piazza Navona. an incredible find, for just 10,000 lire a month. It consisted of a small space under a stairwell with room for a bed and a toilet, a hand basin and an electrical outlet with a small table on which there sat an electric kettle. The apartment had been described as “fully furnished,” which technically Dennis supposed was accurate. Never mind, Dennis imagined himself a top researcher living in splendor in Rome, the most beautiful city in the world. Lygon street near Melbourne University where his research assistant position awaited him, could hardly compete.

The trouble was, though, he had no idea what he was supposed to be doing in his new prestigious job, except that, since the The Englishman from Cambridge had not arrived, he had been called into Ferrapotti’s office and told that he was to be the sole director of the project and given an extra 40,000 lire a month to make up for the added responsibility. Dennis tried to ask in a roundabout way what he was supposed to be doing, what the project was all about, but had received no information from Ferrapotti, who was constantly talking through the wall to his colleague Di Napolitano, laughing and joking in Italian, dictating letters to his (everyone’s) secretary, Andrea who continued to wear her Carabiniere uniform look-alike. But never mind, it was enough for Dennis to walk to his office each day, down the glorious Via Giulia, stopping at a crowded bar for a cornetto and morning cappuccino, peering in the windows of plush shops that displayed costly antiques or fine clothing.

After several weeks he discovered the institute’s library, hidden away on the second floor looking out over the Via Giulia, inhabited by a librarian and her assistant. No one had thought to mention this to him, though he was a little embarrassed that he had not thought to ask whether the institute had a library. Of course, being the United Nations, as Dennis was to find out much later, all institutes and branches of the U.N. had a library, crammed full mainly of records and reports of the countless meetings it routinely conducted. The librarian was a middle aged Iranian,  and her assistant, a tiny shy whisk of a person, who spent her days repairing reports that had been torn, writing in catalog numbers, and rearranging the book shelves. Though she appeared insignificant, almost like a piece of furniture, her darting eyes  seemed constantly to take in all that was going on in the library, and at coffee break, she took her espresso with a small group of well-dressed middle aged Italian men in the corner of the small bar that stood conveniently across the street from the Institute. It was rumored (that is, the librarian told Dennis in the manner of a warning) that she was the daughter of the famed Italian politician Giulio Andreotti.

Another month went by, and still Dennis had no idea what he was to do, had been given no instructions by Ferrapotti. So at last, one morning, Dennis, tired of doing nothing, something that he could not believe would worry him, since doing nothing in Rome and getting paid for it seemed like such a great idea, he marched into Di Napolitano’s office determined to find out what his project was all about and what he must do. He wanted to work, damn it! After his few months in Rome, Dennis should have known better than to do this foolish thing. Indeed, he had consulted Andrea as to whether this was a good idea, and she had warned him against it.

Di Napolitano did not look up, but continued with his eyes closed, dictating a letter to his secretary, Andrea (everyone’s secretary), in careful grammatically correct English. Dennis coughed a little and advanced to the edge of Di Napolitano’s desk. Andrea tried to help by asking her boss to repeat a word. This annoyed him as it always did, to be interrupted, even though he was himself the world’s worst interrupter. He assumed, as he was a judge of very high standing, that all must stop when he spoke and he must never be interrupted. But Andrea’s question caused him to open his eyes and it was then that he saw standing in front of his desk the scruffy Aussie, dressed in his usual open neck shirt, and worst of all, again something Dennis had been warned about by Andrea, Aussie shorts.

“What is this?” barked Di Napolitano. “Mr. Cotter, you are not dressed. Please do so before you enter my office, in fact, before you enter this institute.” He closed his eyes again and continued to dictate to Andrea who looked down, trying very hard to hold back a laugh.

Dennis about turned as though he were a soldier and hurried out of the office and the building, then to Campo Dei Fiori where he would try to find a pair of cheap long pants that fitted him.

Dennis could hardly be blamed for concluding that the fiasco of his attempt to consult with Di Napolitano had at last brought about action. The very next morning, Ferrapotti summoned him to his office, all very business-like.

“Er, ah, Dennis. Good. Come. Sit. We are going to Strasbourg tomorrow to begin the project.”

“Tomorrow? But Dr. Ferrapotti, I don’t know what the project is about, so I haven’t done anything on its design.” He squirmed uncomfortably in his seat. He received no direct answer. Instead, Ferrapotti called for Andrea.  Dennis timidly asked, “why Strasbourg?”

“Er, ah, yes. Of course, you wouldn’t know anything about the Council of Europe, coming from where you come.”

Dennis guessed that Ferrapotti was telling him that because he was not a European, he is uninformed, probably ignorant. He simply looked blankly back at Ferrapotti and waited.

“In a first for the United Nations, we are combining our project with the Council of Europe. Ford Foundation has given us its permission, in fact they are very pleased. This will  be a pioneering project. A world first!” announced Ferrapotti grandly.

Dennis, now agitated and losing his cool, asked belligerently, in typical Aussie style, “and what exactly is this project that I am supposed to be directing, all about?”

Ferrapotti grinned, looked at Andrea then to Dennis. “Oh, ah, er, I thought you knew, you’re the director of the project after all.”

“But Dr. Ferrapotti, I have tried to ask you what the project is about, even to see the proposal that you sent to the Ford Foundation…”

“Ah, er. oh, that’s nothing. But if you want to look at it you can. Andrea make him a copy will you? But I tell you, it’s only a very rough outline of what we will really do.”

Dennis looked at Andrea, who excused herself so she could go to the library and retrieve a copy of the proposal. He went to follow her out, but Ferrapotti called him back. “She will get it. Come, er ah, sit.”

Dennis sat.

“Oh.. Er.. The United Nations works very slowly,” said Ferrapotti, gently, or at least for him it was so. “The way we do research in the UN is to have meetings and then we meet again to discuss the reports of those meetings. And then, it will be your job to carry out the recommendations in those reports.”

“But who designs the project?” asked Dennis with a frown.

“Oh.. Those at the meetings do. That way we can be sure that everyone is on board and nobody’s concerns are ignored.”

“So I don’t have to do a research design?” asked Dennis, almost relieved, but very worried.

“Not exactly. That’s just what they teach you at University. In the real world, especially the complex world of the UN, it’s not the way it works,” prattled Ferrapotti.

“I think I had better go to the library and read some reports,” mumbled Dennis.

“Ah.. Er.. Oh.. By all means,” answered Ferrapotti, amused. “And ask Andrea to come to my office so we can arrange the plane tickets and per diem for each of us. Strasbourg is an expensive place.” 

To be continued……

Who Wants To Be Secretary General?

The Greatest Quiz Show on Earth

 Download the print version from Friday Stories archives

Quite some time ago,  Isaac Asimov proclaimed: “There are no nations!”  Lauded as the greatest science fiction writer of all time, he was, and is, considered by many as a kind of fortune teller, that his novels often turned out to be predictions of the future of society and human kind. His claim that there are no nations was, of course, a statement of his own moral position that all peoples are equal, or at least ought to be equal. At the same time, though, he, and many who have followed in his footsteps (Star Trek and Star Wars for example) also heralded the idea of diversity, speculating on the enormous range of humans and humanoids and whatever living creatures that might exist throughout the universe, as yet unexplored. There appears to be no difficulty in adopting these two contrasting, actually, contradictory moralities  of the future, often confused or blended into the present. If there is diversity — that is,  each individual is different, unique — is not all such differentiation  eradicated by the word equality? Ah, you say, I am playing with words. Indeed, I am, because I want to prepare you for the greatest quiz show on earth, maybe the universe, who knows?

The show is called, “Who Wants to be Secretary General?” and is aired every night at 6.00 pm and On Demand for people around the world on Australia’s amazingly diverse TV channel SBS, that caters to viewers in all of one hundred and sixty-three languages. If you are a seasoned TV viewer of quiz shows, you will recognize that this show is a take-off from the blockbuster “Who wants to be a millionaire?” And in general, it does follow the format, offering contestants the chance to “call a friend” for help in answering a question, or to “ask the audience” for help. But the similarity ends there. For, as the promotional videos show,  this is a real life quiz with real life outcomes. The final winner actually takes up the position of Secretary General of the United Nations. How, you may well ask, is this possible?

Until now, the position of Secretary General was selected by the U.N. General Assembly, subject to the approval of the Security Council. But over the years, after the appointment of nine Secretaries General, those countries not represented on the Security Council got together and complained that it was unfair that their choice of candidate was always rebuffed by the security council, dominated as it always has  been, by the most powerful nations, generally those with an imperialist past, who have fought and won great wars both foreign and domestic. Why should such warmongers dominate the United Nations, an organization that is supposed to be the icon of peace and goodwill to all?

All past attempts to appoint a Secretary General who was brave enough to thumb his nose at the Security Council had been thwarted. It was time for a change, and this change was brought about by none other than Australia, a country not without its warlike blemishes, having also dabbled in imperialism with its close neighbor Papua New Guinea, (the destruction of its own indigenous peoples blamed on its imperialist mother England), but by and large had a tradition of towing the line with the big powers, especially its pacific neighbor, the United States.

It all came about in a raucous meeting of the Security Council, Australia at the time occupying one of the rotating chairs. But the man behind the scenes was none other than Australia’s gruff, ulcerous media mogul, the father of one-day cricket matches, Perry Smacker, and his U.N. Representative (well, Australia’s U.N. Representative) Bevan Mudd, a former Prime Minister, much admired by the Chinese. In fact, Mudd spoke only Chinese in the meeting, refusing to speak one word of English. The very large Smacker, sat immediately behind him, prodding him in the rear constantly, when he thought it necessary.

“Esteemed Members of the Security Council,” began Mr. Smacker. “We are all well aware of the recent impossibilities of electing a new Secretary General. Some five nominees have been rejected, and the last meeting of the General Assembly was in an uproar, verging on bedlam. A number of members were carried off to hospital. Australia proposes an entirely new way of electing the Secretary General. We propose a contest, and the winner of the contest to be automatically appointed to the position, no vetoes allowed. We could argue about the merits of this solution, but we must face up to the fact that all regular methods of making the appointment have failed. We think that a contest, in the form of a quiz show be adopted. It would run for some six months or more, weeding out losers, and end up with a single winner who would be well qualified for the position. The questions would, of course, be asked specifically on the core attributes of the United Nations and its policies and practices. We have already begun to compile the lists of questions, and members of the Security Council as well as the General Assembly will be canvassed for questions. We will distribute the format for questions and answers at the end of this meeting. I thank you for your attention, and now declare this meeting closed.”

Of course, the show was not open to just anyone. We could not have unsavory sorts participating.  We must have individuals of high moral standing and who are comfortable working in a setting that is devoted to diversity in its extreme, which defines the United Nations, an amazing organization that seeks to understand, promote, and develop the ethnicities, cultures and economies of all nations, the ultimate aim being that all the nations of the world, all the ethnicities, come together as one.  That one day there will be no super power or a few nations with huge economies. That all nations, ethnicities and cultures are unified into one nation, that no nation monopolizes military might, economy, or politic.

Finally, and perhaps the most pressing, is that no person who works or has worked in the employ of the United Nations is eligible for the position. This also includes the many consultants used by the United Nations. We are of the opinion that we need a fresh mind to steer the United Nations on a clear course, one that is not sullied by the deadening bureaucracy that the United Nations has become.  We therefore have developed a check list of attributes that we seek from quiz contestants.

Of course, the obvious attribute that any candidate must have to be successful in our quiz show, is that they must be proven quiz show performers. Thus we have made a list of all those who became finalists in the world wide quiz show Who wants to be a Millionaire? and will use these obviously successful quiz contestants as the basic pool from which we will draw our candidates. That show is aired in over one hundred countries and many more languages. Indeed, the show is a wonderful example of bringing nations and languages together into one format, shared, and diverse. Every single version of that show features the now well-known final question, “Is this your final answer?” though, of course, each language has its own way of expressing this question. Each of these finalists was invited to try out for our quiz, the initial screening done by a check list of attributes, that the contestant had to answer, truthfully, of course. The check list is as follows:

1.     Are you any of LGBTQA? Yes= 1 point

2.     Are you white? No= 1 point

3.     Are you fat?  Yes= 1 point

4.     Are you a gang member? Yes= 1 point

5.     Are you or have you ever been a terrorist? Yes=1 point

6.     Are you a rape victim? Yes= 1 point

7.     Is your primary language English? No= 1 point

8.     Is your primary language European? No=1 point

9.     Is your primary language African ? No= 1 point

10.  Are you or have you ever been an illegal immigrant or refugee? Yes=1 point

11.  Are you married? No=1 point

12.  Are you a university graduate?  No=1 point

Candidates scoring above 8 are automatically accepted as quiz contestants.

The obvious choice for host of the first episode of Who Wants To Be Secretary General? was Eddie Squire, famed  former president of the much loved and hated Collingwood Football Club, and perennial host of the  Australian TV hit, Who Wants To Be a Millionaire?.

After many preliminary rounds conducted by hosts in the different countries in which qualifying candidates competed, the grand final was at last scheduled in Melbourne, Australia. The show opens with a door on which is inscribed a large old fashioned clock, the hands racing round and around to the dramatic sound of Beethoven’s 5th, the ominous door knock. The door opens and out of the mist emerges Eddie Squire. He walks to the center of the stage and with his devilish smile in his most resonating voice says:

“We are excited to announce our grand finalist, multi-sexual, Francois Malkovsky II, from the Euronat permanent nudist community of France. If he answers the final question correctly, he will be appointed Secretary General of the United Nations, a position he will retain for the standard period of seven years, or less should he choose to retire, or be fired if he says or does anything that violates the equity and inclusiveness policies of the United Nations. We apologize in advance that Mr. Malkovsky is not black. He is, however, classifiable as “brown” all over, a result of his sun tanning regimen at the Eurostat resort. Also, I give those of you watching at home fair warning that because Mr. Malkovsky is from a famous and most respected nudist community, he will be appearing naked. Squire would have appeared naked himself out of respect for nudists everywhere, but our diversity and inclusion consultant advised us that it might be misinterpreted as his mocking nudists, cultural appropriation, as they say. After all, if Mr. Malkovsky were black, it would be shocking for him to color himself “black.”

The music repeatedly blasts the first two measures of Beethoven, and Mr. Malkovsky steps through the door, all smiles. There are gasps from the studio audience as it gapes at the rather ugly naked overly tanned body of a middle aged man, somewhat over weight, his breasts somewhat enlarged, and his hips covered with a roll of fat.

“Welcome, Francois Malkovsky, may I call you Francois?” says Eddie as he offers his hand and Malkovsky shakes it.

“Thank you!  I am very excited to be here.”

“And Francois, I understand that you had a great deal of difficulty getting down here to Australia to participate in this first ever quiz grand final that furthers the spirit of One Nation World Government.”

“Yes, it is difficult for we nudists to travel. We are forced to cover ourselves which is very intimidating. People gawk at us, you know, and some even make insulting remarks about our bodies.”

“Well I’m sorry to hear that,” says Eddie  with his mischievous grin,  “but let’s look on the bright side. If you win and become Secretary General of the United Nations, you will be able to oversee world legislation that will allow nudists to go naked wherever they like.”

“I look forward to that very much,” says Malkovsky.

Eddie leads the way to the two seats suspended as though in mid air. He ushers Malkovsky into his seat, then steps up to his own,  suspended a little higher than Malkovsky’s. “Are you ready to play, Who Wants To Be Secretary General?”

“I am.”

“We have four questions. You will have thirty seconds to answer. You have two life lines in which you may ask for help either from a friend or from the audience. Is that clear?”

“Yes, perfectly clear.”

“All right then. Here is the first question. U.N. General Assembly Resolution A/RES/217 A (III) Human rights addresses what issue:

A. Disabled people

B. Gender conversion

C. LGBTQA name tags

D. None of the above”

Malkovsky wriggles a little in his seat. For reasons of hygiene, the seat is hard and shiny. Certainly no cushion.  “None of those,” he answers.

“That was a quick response, Francois. Are you sure you want to go with that?”

“I am sure.”

Eddie grins and frowns. “Is that your final answer?”

Malkovsky looks Squire in the eye. “It is my final answer.”

Eddie leans back in his nicely cushioned seat. “Your are right! D, None of the above was the correct answer!”

The audience cheers and claps. Eddie continues. “You can stop now, if you want, and take up the lower position of deputy under secretary general of the U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization.”

“No, thank you Mr. Squire. I want to be Secretary General.”

“All right then. Let’s go to the next question, this one for you to qualify as clerical assistant grade one, to the secretary of the current deputy under secretary general of the International Court of Justice. Here is the question: The General Assembly Declaration of Imperialism Erasure is addressed in what document?

A. 1514 (XV) A/4494, Supplement No. 2.

B. A/RES/9 (1) of 9 Feb. 1946

C. A/RES/1514 (XV) of Dec. 1960.

D. All the above.”

Malkovsky nervously crosses his legs and replies immediately, “all of the above.”

“Now take your time, Francois, you have all of thirty seconds, you know.”

“Thank you. But I spent a lot of time researching U.N. Documents. I know the answer is all of the above.”

“You’re quite sure about that?

“Quite sure.”

“Then it’s your final answer?”

“It is.”

Eddie looks around to the audience. He then looks back slowly to Malkovsky. “The answer is… D, all the above! You are right once again, Francois. You are on your way to Secretary General.”

Malkovsky uncrosses his legs. “Let’s get on with it,” he grins.

“You can stop now, if you want,” says Eddie, looking serious. “A position at the U.N. F.A.O. Is quite a good appointment. And it would be for life, so I am told.”

“No, Mr. Squire. I want to be Secretary General. No good settling for less.”

“All right. Then let’s proceed. You are now two questions away from becoming U.N. Secretary General. Are you ready, Mr. Malkovsky?”

“I am ready.”

“One Nation World Government is addressed in which of the following documents:

A. Secretary-General’s remarks at the World Government Summit with Q&A.2017.

B. Eichelberger: World government via the United Nations. 1948.

C. World Government Summit hosted by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum. 2017.

D. All of the above.

Malkovsky takes his hands from his lap, where they had been most of the time, and runs them through his greying hair.

“Thirty seconds starts now!” says Squire.

“I think I would like to ask my partner,” says Malkovsky.

“Are they in the audience or do you want to phone?” asks Squire.

“My partner could not join the audience because they would not let them sit in the audience naked. I would like to phone The U.N. Vienna, where Sheehee is sitting hidden in the U.N. Archives kept there.”

“As you wish!” says Eddie. He presses a button, an image of a phone is projected on a screen behind them, then someone answers. We do not see an image of the recipient of the call. Just a shadow.

“Oui allo ?"

“Is this SheeHee?” asks Squire.

“Qui appelle s'il vous plait Yes, it is. Who is this, please?”

“This is Eddie Squire from Who Wants to be Secretary General.  Your partner would like your help.”

“Allo? Sheehee?” asks Malkovsky. “Are you watching?”

“Oui. sur mon téléphone.”

“I think the answer is D All the above,” says Malkovsky. “The trouble is I can remember no official U.N. Documents that refer to these topics. They must be speeches or other unofficial documents,” says Malkovsky with a  frown, clearly worried.

“Mr. Squire. Must the answers be in official UN documents?” asks Shehee.

“I am sorry, but I am not allowed to add or answer any questions directly bearing on the various answers,” says Squire in a most formal manner.

“I am inclined to D,” says Malkovsky, “because ABC are all similar.”

“But it might be none of them,” says Sheehee, in highly accented English.

“If it were, then that would be an option, wouldn’t it?” muses Malkovsky.

“Je m'excuse. Je ne sais tout simplement pas quelle est la meilleure réponse,” says Sheehee.

“Five seconds to go!” interjects Squire.

“Then D, all the above,” says Malkovsky, head in hands.

“That’s your final answer?” asks Squire, grinning and frowning.

“Yes. That’s my final answer.”

Squire looks down, the smile on his face gone. Silence intensifies. The audience shuffles. He looks up, then announces:

“The answer is D. You are right, and you are now qualified to be appointed personal secretary to the under secretary’s deputy assistant of the UN representative to the World Trade Organization.”

Relieved, Malkovsky leans back in his hard seat, the surface sticking uncomfortably on to his naked bottom.  Eddie Squire continues.

“You may stop now and enjoy a wonderful career as the United Nations representative dealing with the World Trade Organization, or you may go on to the final question.”

“Let’s go for it!” says Malkovsky, shaking his fist, and jumping up and down on his seat.

Squire turns to the audience. “Audience, are you ready?”

The audience cheers and claps in response.

“All right, then. Here we go. Are you ready, Mr. Mal­kovsky?”

“I am ready!”

“Which of the following policy topics is NOT essential to world governance by One Nation?”

A. Inclusion

B. Diversity

C. Happiness

D. Inequality

“Mon Dieu! What is this One Nation? Did you not mean United Nations?” cried Malkovsky.

Eddie Squire remains silent. He looks down, then out to the audience. Then he says, “You have one help left. You could ask the audience. You have thirty seconds, starting….”

“OK. Ok. I will ask the audience, please,” says Malkovsky running his hands through his hair, and crossing his legs.

Squire looks out to the audience. “Mr. Malkovsky, the next secretary general of the United Nations needs your help. Audience, your remote answer box is activated. When I say ‘Answer” press A, B, C, or D button to send your answer to Mr. Malkovsky.”

The audience stirs excitedly, and loud thumping music plays as the lights flash on the big board hanging above the heads of Malkovsky and Squire. The results were not helpful. Twenty five percent for A, same for B, Twenty eight percent for C, and twenty two percent for D.

Eddie Squire looks at the audience and then to Malkovsky. “You have thirty seconds starting now!”

Malkovsky uncrosses and crosses his legs nervously, “I don’t know, it could be D inequality, but I’m sure that the U.N. favors equality. I’m going to have to guess. Happiness. What is that? Maybe the audience knows better than do I. OK. Happiness it is.”

“Is that your final answer, Mr. Malkovsky?” asks Squire, a serious frown, and still that small grin.

“Yes, C, happiness. My final answer!” Malkovsky pushes back on his chair and uncrosses his legs. The audience titters as it gawks at the contestant’s nudity. He appeared at that moment, incredibly vulnerable.

Eddie Squire, enjoying the suspense, surveys the audience and tries not to look at Malkovsky’s male body. “Would you like to change your mind?”  He asks with his devilish grin.

“No! No! I have made my decision!” cries Malkovsky. The audience titters once more.

“The answer is…” Squire hesitates for effect, “…C,  Happiness! You have won the grand prize and will become immediately we close this session tonight, the tenth Secretary General of the United Nations!”

The audience erupts into cheers and applause, Malkovsky jumps up and raises both fists, and dances around the stage, prancing full on to the audience. Fortunately, the show was not aired live, so there would be time to insert a warning to the viewing audience that the show included partial and complete nudity.

France hailed Francois Malkovsky as their greatest international achievement ever. Statues were erected in many towns, and an outsized one in Paris right next to the grand Egyptian Obelisk on the Place de la Concorde. This turned out to be a mistake, and probably marked the beginning of an underground movement to remove Malkovsky from office. The huge nude statue of Malkovsky was placed in such a way that, viewing it from the East the obelisk appeared as Malkovsky’s giant erection. This was, of  course, not by design, but either way, came to represent all that Malkovsky’s administration stood for. Besides, the U.K., still bruised from its crazy Brexit, blaming especially France for making it so difficult, began a not so secret campaign to replace Malkovsky with Boris Johnson, as soon as he stepped down as Prime Minister.  

Nor was the third world happy with yet another imperialist in the top U.N. job. However, those rising and emerging nations continued to squabble among themselves, so were unable to mount a successful campaign to unseat Malkovsky. Besides, they had never had a Secretary general who was stark naked, just like many of the third world’s ordinary, oppressed citizens. The Russians and the Chinese also made feeble attempts to make Malkovsky’s life difficult, beginning a campaign to move the United Nations Headquarters to a much colder climate in  Mongolia. As it was, people everywhere marveled at how this new Secretary General tolerated the cold winters of New York. It was rumored that he in fact, during the entire winter in New York, never stepped out of his office. This was not true, of course. But what was true, and struck a chord with the many developing nations that happened to inhabit areas of the world that were temperate and hot, was that Malkovsky had begun an immediate effort to move the U.N. H.Q. to Fiji somewhere in the Pacific. Besides, Malkovsky argued, he wanted the United Nations to reside in peace, thus his choice of the Pacific Ocean.

But what Malkovsky failed to sense was that, even though he had made great efforts to promote inclusiveness and diversity in the United Nations, it was not enough. On his first day in office he proudly announced that his administration would be completely open and transparent, and ruled that from that day on, all workers and consultants to the United Nations (which meant just about everyone, since it was by consultants that the U.N. conducted most of its everyday activities), would be naked, the only dress allowed was tattoos and painted nails. Many hailed this as a brave and exciting edict. But it soon became apparent that those who embraced this policy were those with beautiful bodies, or so they thought. When this awkward fact was brought to Secretary General’s attention, he quickly announced that the words “fat” and “ugly” were never to be used and must be replaced with “shapely” and  “gorgeous.” Many other difficult, really just small details, but for some reason seemed overwhelming, bothered and annoyed his administration. All the seats in the meeting rooms and the general assembly had to be redone, so that people’s bottoms did not stick to the shiny surfaces. They also had to be heated, because many complained that the hard shiny seats were cold. But by far the most difficult problem for Malkovsky’s administration lay more deeply in the subconscious of his staff and consultants.

Meetings mark the manner in which the life of the United Nations had always gone forward. Meetings, large and small, assemblies, all of these require lots of people in one place, all drafting policies and statements, all arranging further meetings to consider the accomplishments of previous meetings. It was the small meetings, however, that marked the eventual downfall of the 10th Secretary General. These meetings occurred in small rooms, all seated around tables arranged usually in a rectangle, sometimes in a circle.

The U.N. Security Council had been quietly taken over by the gender dis-advocates, as they called themselves. And while the Security Council still held a veto power over the General Assembly, it was in fact through that council’s manipulations and sheer brutality of language, that the important decisions of the United Nations were made. The important fact was — and this  is an amazing eventuality that is completely in line with the grand ideals of the United Nations, that all nations put aside their differences and be united into One Nation — that gender differences be eradicated, or if not possible, be treated as  small and inconsequential matters. People in the U.N. therefore were no longer to refer to each other by gender. Because English was the only language that had the flexibility of using pronouns in reference to people of gender — but that did not imply their gender —  it was ordained by the Secretary General, that English was the only official language of the United Nations, and the languages of all other nations unacceptable until they had erased all gendered pronouns, nouns and matching adjectives, from their languages. A new United Nations Language Board of Control was set up to receive applications of languages that had been revised according to the U.N. Guidelines. In most cases, however, the Language Board strongly recommended that the easiest and simplest way to solve the gendered language problems was to simply adopt English as the national language.

 You can imagine how outraged the French were when they heard of this new edict, coming from one of their own, no less! He had to be dealt with, and severely. They may not be able to cut off his head according to tradition, but maybe there was another way, given the modern techniques of personal destruction now available to all.

As is usual in clandestine operations, various competing, indeed, infighting, factions arose among the gender dis-advocates. In the name of transparency, many meetings passed motions of diversity and inclusiveness that required surveillance cameras to be installed in every nook and cranny, wherever there were meetings, formal and informal. The French undercover agents saw this as a perfect opportunity to take down yet another corrupt French sovereign, to whom they referred as King (yes, the strongest gendered term in the English language) Malkovsky II. To think that one of their own would destroy their country by blithely abolishing its language!

The opportunity inevitably arose in a small meeting chaired by Malkovsky, in the  anteroom next to his office on the 38th floor of the United Nations building that offered a stunning view of  the East river. He had called the meeting of his immediate staff, planning to inform them that he was so pleased by their performance that they would be receiving a ten percent increase in their salaries. There were twelve staff, including his personal driver, the only one who had complained directly to him, that he caught a very bad cold having to get out of the warm limousine to open the door for him when there was a blizzard. Malkovsky had ignored him.

Yet the first move was not made by the driver. Instead it came from one of his secretaries, Philomena, a sweet little thing, by Malkovsky’s standard, with a most inviting body, and a wonderful sweet smile. He liked it especially when she spoke, which was constant, she was a real talker, from Rome after all, wagging her head from side to side, a bright smile on her face. Always happy. Or so it seemed. He should have known, however. She was Italian, that much he knew. And the Italians were incensed at him also, because their language was thoroughly debased by his edict that there were to be no gender pronouns or nouns. All were to be abolished. It left the Italians without any names or basically any nouns, unless all agreed on a word ending that was neuter. Already several governments had fallen in Italy because no agreement could be found as to the neuter endings of nouns.

Malkovsky sat at his seat at the middle of the oblong table.  He surveyed his staff, all of them of course naked as was his edict. And on this day, his eyes briefly settled on Philomena as she lowered herself, chatting away to her friend next to her, smiling and happy. As she sat, she leaned forward a little and her smoothly shaven breasts seemed to stand out, the nipples he was sure were calling to him. He quickly sat down and tried to focus on the bodies of others around the table. But it did not help. His eyes came to rest on Philomena. He looked down at his notes, hoping that it would go away. His driver coughed a throaty cough, he was still getting over his cold. The pandemic was not quite over. All stared at him. Malkovsky gave his boss a disapproving look, and took his leave.

The meeting proceeded as planned, and all staff were most pleased at the promise of an increase in their salaries.

No sooner had Malkovsky returned to his office, than the computer screens of all those whose position in the U.N. qualified them to have their own computer in their office, were lit up by a surveillance video. Immediately he saw it, he knew he was done for. Right there, on the screen was the image of his very own penis, gradually raising its beautiful head. The surveillance cameras installed under the table had caught him in his moment of weakness. And immediately his very own engendered undercover agents entered his office, unannounced, followed by his favorite little secretary Philomena. And even then, he felt a little twinge between his legs.

Philomena stood just inside the door. “That’s him! She shouted! He raped me! It happened in our meeting just minutes ago! You can see the evidence for yourselves. Look at his disgusting erection! I saw him looking at me. It was awful! I felt like a piece a meat! And I just had to sit there while he looked at me and raped me!”

Malkovsky was read his rights of which there none, as the U.N. had legislated that there was no defense against an accusation of rape. Besides the evidence was all there on the video.

However, the story does have a happy ending, of sorts. Malkovsky was not tried in a criminal court. He had insisted that all infractions were to be dealt with as mundane administrative infractions, the punishments to be appropriate to the “crime.” In his case, once the U.N. had settled down into its old routine, his “punishment” was that he was never again to appear in public (defined broadly) naked. He must be fully clothed for the rest of his life. And as a side-effect of this scandalous behavior, all surveillance cameras were removed throughout the United Nations offices. The arguments about official languages and the degenderization of languages did not go away, however.  All U.N. meetings everywhere and every minute of the day were taken up with this vexing and most complicated problem.

The hit quiz show Who Wants to be Secretary General? continued, and became an annual hit. However the guidelines for its format were rewritten forbidding nudity of the slightest amount of any contestants and show host, though the studio audience and those viewing at home were excepted from this regulation.

Moral: It’s the thought that counts.

Couples

 Download the print version from Friday Stories archives

Damascus and his scribe vet entrants into Noah’s Ark.

To be honest, the true story of Noah’s Ark has never been told. At least, that is what we now know after the finding of more fragments of the Dead Sea scrolls announced in March of 2021. After many hours of deciphering and putting together the jig-saw puzzle of the fragments, we slowly began to realize that the fragments we found were in fact a retelling of the story of Noah’s Ark. In a retelling, we admit, there may be some embellishment. But we ask you to bear with us while we reconstruct the story to the extent that the fragments allow. Carbon dating, by the way, suggests that these fragments date well before the bible, old testament that is, as we know it. This story predates the bible, probably by several thousand years. But the measurement of time so distant remains malleable, something like a time fog. We walk into it at our own risk, arms extended, eyes lost in time, feeling our way with each uncertain step. 

A further -- embarrassing to some -- difficulty is that there is much argument over what the ark looked like, how big it was, and, horror of horrors, there is no way such a boat could fit all God’s species. Not to mention that the pundits of history insist that the number that got off the boat after the terrible flood subsided, was the same number as got on. Are you kidding me? Especially as they were on the ark for whatever number of years, how is this humanly or earthly possible?

The preoccupation of experts with the size, structure and building of the ark blinded them to what is by far the most impossible, certainly hugely challenging problem, of how to actually select and process the candidates for entry into the boat. Here are just a few small details. We know that there are countless species of life in our world, from plants and insects, to birds, animals and humans, not to mention microbes. Indeed, we can assume that in biblical times they had not yet discovered microbes as individuals, but rather only knew them as plagues sent by Gods of one kind or another, to punish humans for their existence. Just imagine the chaos. Every living thing learns of the impending disaster of the biggest flood ever to occur (in the past or future what’s more), so wouldn’t they all be clamoring to get on the boat? 

Indeed, they were. And that is why Noah in his wisdom (obviously guided by God) immediately hired the best bureaucrat he could find, whose name was Damascus, who founded the city of that name. That’s right, who begat, and begat, and begat after many thousands of years, the eventual progeny John Damascene, who became the Chief financial officer to the Caliph of Damascus. 

And Noah said to Damascus: “I need you to select as many couples up to about three hundred, as I will be able to fit on my boat.”

“How big is the boat?” asked Damascus.

“I won’t know until I’ve built it,” said Noah, impatiently.

“You must have some idea,” complained Damascus, looking at Noah, trying to discern what was going on in that head, ninety percent of which was covered by hair, whiskers and a beard growing in all directions.

“Honestly, I don’t know yet. I’m waiting on instructions,” said Noah impatiently.

“From whom, may I ask?”

“You may not,” snapped Noah. I prayed last night, and I usually get an answer after a few years.”

Damascus rubbed his closely shaven chin. “You must have some idea, even a rough ballpark figure would help.” Damascus wanted to tell his boss to get his hair done and have a shave. But he resisted. He was beginning to regret having taken on this impossible task.

“All I can say is that there have to be couples, male and female couples, all from different kinds,” muttered Noah, annoyed by this fastidious bureaucrat.

Damascus turned away, grumbling, “All right, I’ll see what I can do. But you better hurry up with more information, or I’ll…”

“You’ll what?” asked Noah, shaking his hammer, clearly a threat.

“Never mind,” called Damascus as he hurried away into the small town, if that is what it was, more like a honeycomb of caves. 

Noah dropped his hammer and fell down onto his rough, leather-like knees, to pray yet again. Surely he must get an answer soon.

In fact, no sooner had he dropped on his knees than a huge flash of lightning struck the rock beside him, accompanied by a few drops of rain.

“Count the drops and you will have your answer!” came a voice from somewhere inside his head.

And so Noah counted. And counted. And counted. He made it up to one thousand and sixty nine, but then had to stand up because his knees were hurting, then lost count and had to guess where he was up to. 

Damascus hurried to the caves, looking inside, trying to see how many beings were in there, asking any couples who were there to come forward. All he found were scruffy humans, a snake or two, though no snake couples. This was going to be a challenge, he could see. It would require expert organization and most of all, an effective way to communicate the availability of a free ride on the only boat that will be afloat when the great flood arrives. And who would believe that the flood will be so big that it will drown everyone and everything? Was that really going to happen? Damascus decided that he needed another information gathering interview with Noah, whose communication skills seemed wanting.

After doing the rounds of the caves, followed by a scribe he had hired on the promise that he would be allowed on the boat when the flood came, so long as he was accompanied by a partner making an acceptable couple. He described the couples to the scribe and their rough location identified by an X he had made on a rough drawing of the cave locations. He could see that this was not a sensible way to record this information, so he immediately set about numbering all the caves and giving names to the inhabitants. Many did not have names, they just referred to each other as “this,” or “that” and pointed. The snakes kept biting at his heels until he stamped on one and warned that if they did not behave he would not select any couples from snakedom. That had an immediate effect, and to his amazement, the snakes quickly proffered up a few couples of different looking snakes, pythons, tigers, adders etc. Those are the names Damascus gave them. But he had heard that there were many more strange animals, big ones with four legs, some with long noses, or long necks, striped, and of course there were birds, some of them he had seen roosting way up the top of the cliff, eagles or something like that he called them, huge things that swooped down on the snakes and gave them a terrible life, living in constant danger of being grabbed up and eaten. 

Damascus turned to his scribe. “You need to go off to the jungle and see what else you can find. Spread the word that Noah is prepared to take legitimate couples only — that is, male and female couples — no hermaphrodites or whatever. Just keep it plain and simple. And if anyone argues, strike them off the list.”

 “What if they don’t want to come? I mean, who would want to get on a boat for who knows how long, maybe several lifetimes if what you say Noah said is true?” asked the scribe.

Damascus looked at his scribe, now well washed and shaven, according to his orders. “You have to tell them all that a huge flood is coming, so big, according to Noah, that it will drown everyone and everything in its path. That should scare them.”

“But if what you said Noah said that he hasn’t got room for everyone, only one couple of a kind, we’ll have a riot on our hands with everyone wanting to get on the boat,” complained the scribe.

“Scribe,” sighed Damascus, “please do as you are told, and let me worry about the rest.”

The scribe, hunched over and frightened of his boss, trotted away mumbling, “all right, all right, I was only asking.”

*

“Noah! Are you there? Where are you?” Hearing nothing except hammering, Damascus cupped his hands to his mouth and yelled again. “Noah? Noah?”

A faint voice came from somewhere inside the almost complete boat, somewhere deep  in the bottom of the tremendous structure, nearly as big as an aircraft carrier, a huge monstrosity. “Come down here. I can’t come up right now. Lining the hull with bitumen,” came the muffled cry.

“I’m coming,” answered Damascus as he carefully picked his way through the timber planks, some laying loose, others nailed (wooden nails of course) in place. He descended a long ladder down to the bottom of the boat and there was Noah, filthy with bitumen all over him, applying it to the cracks between the boards of the hull. It was hot and steamy. A dreadful place, like Hell, thought Damascus.

Noah put down the wooden bucket of pitch, and said, obviously annoyed, “well, what do you want this time?”

Damascus stepped carefully off the ladder and stood in the one spot he could find that was not covered in tar. “Just need a clarification. You said two of everything. Do they have to be perfect couples?”

“There is no such thing as a perfect couple, ever since Adam and Eve. You should know that,” growled Noah.

“By couple you mean…?”

“Don’t you know anything? Male and female, of course. What else is there?”

Of course, Noah could not possibly know what we know today, that there are at least six variations on the idea of coupling. So he should have accepted six by six instead of two by two species representations.

Damascus bowed his head. “I’m sorry, Noah. I will have my scribe look for the closest to perfect couples he can find. Male and female. It’s just that I thought…”

Noah interrupted him impatiently. “It’s not your job to think. It is your job to find and count what you have been told to do. Now, off you go, and don’t come back until you have your selections all lined up and ready to board.”

Damascus bowed his head even more. “I apologize, sir, great one…”

“And none of that great business. You think I’m God or something? Don’t be so blasphemous, or I will not allow you to join us on the boat when we set sail.”

Damascus retreated, but could not help asking one more question. “Noah? May I ask, when is the flood coming? How much time do I have?”

Noah took a large handful of bitumen and sploshed it on the boards of the hull. “It will be ready when you have them all lined up, and not before. The flood will come only after we have loaded the boat. Stop your worrying. It’s my job to worry. Yours to get the species all lined up. Now get out of here and do your job.”

Damascus retreated up the ladder, thoroughly confused. He had received no real answers to any of his questions. But at least if something went wrong, he could blame it on Noah. He came away from Noah feeling humbled, actually worse than that. He feared Noah’s wrath, and resented that such a bully was so close to God. It did not seem fair to him. But, a job was a job, and he was prepared to put up with the abuse if it meant that he was assured to have a spot in the ark, along with his extended family. They would be the only humans on the boat. 

And so the years went by, who knows how many. Noah was supposed to have lived for some 950 years, so you can imagine the challenges Damascus faced ferreting out and lining up his couples, supervising his scribe, recording every species and its couples, lining them up. Then there was the superhuman challenge of keeping the couples all in line, well fed so they would not start eating each other, entertained and engaged. All in all, the species behaved themselves. After all, they were promised a spot on the ark, all the rest of their species doomed to drown in the coming flood. 

Unfortunately, there was just one problem. A species, just a single, not a couple, showed up and insisted to the scribe that it must be included. The scribe looked it up and down. “Can’t you read?” he asked impatiently, The sign says Couples Only, No Exceptions.”

“What?” asked the single again, ‘read’? What’s that?” 

“No wonder Noah only wants couples,” thought the scribe to himself, “if singles are all as ignorant as this one, the world would be better off if they went down with the flood.”

The scribe repeated, “you have to be a perfect couple,” said the scribe, “step aside” and he scratched away at his enormously long scroll of papyrus. 

The single species refused to budge. “I am a perfect couple,” it said. 

“You can’t be,” said the scribe looking up and around. “There’s only one of you.”

“I should be at the head of the line,” complained the single. “I’m super special. There’s nothing like me anywhere.”

“I’m not surprised,” mumbled the scribe, writing away. “In any case, even if the boss let you in, you’d have to be at the back of the line. No pushing in allowed. You have to wait your turn.”

The single stood (it had legs, body and arms, looked suspiciously like a human) and refused to move. “I demand to see your supervisor,” it ordered.

“He’s busy counting the couples right now. Has to have the count by sundown, and ready to board at dawn tomorrow.”

The single grabbed the scribe’s stylus and threw it away. “I demand to see your supervisor!” it yelled, hands on hips, a most threatening manner.

The scribe stood up and stepped back, frightened. “All right! All right!” But I can tell you it will be of no use. He’s around the other side of the boat. But don’t blame me if you don’t come back.”

The single pushed his way past the scribe who fell back on the rock he usually sat on, and the first couple (foxes) kindly retrieved his stylus for him.

The single hurried around the side of the boat, an immense construction, walking towards where he heard hammering. 

“Hey, are you the boss around here?” it called.

Noah continued hammering. He was putting up a welcome sign on which were carved ten principles for behaving on the boat. 

“Are you deaf or something?” yelled the single. “Haven’t you got any manners? Answer me when I call you.”

Noah had certainly heard this grossly indecent individual. He continued hammering.

The single impatiently ran up to Noah and grabbed the hammer just as Noah’s arm was at the top of its swing. But Noah, a very strong man if ever there was one, his tough muscles well formed from the years of building the ark, easily shook the single off and swung the hammer so that it just grazed the chin of his assailant. The single fell back, and found itself sprawled on the rocky ground, trying to push itself up on its elbows.

“This is species abuse!” cried the single in a pathetically thin voice. 

Noah at first ignored the single and turned his back, but then thought better of it. The individual was clearly an unsavory type and should not be trusted. 

“Who are you and why have you jumped the line? And why are you not a couple?” asked Noah, swinging his hammer to and fro.

“Because,” said the single, “I am a couple, but my other is inside me. I am really two. Actually, more than two, potentially.”

“You speak gibberish,” said Noah. “Get away and be damned! I’m surprised you even made it this far. You can’t get on the ark unless you have been checked in by Damascus. And since you are clearly not a couple, you are not welcome here.”

“You mean I’m doomed?” asked the single, now contrite, starting to sob.

“I wouldn’t put it that way. But yes, you’re doomed, both of you, if what you say is true.”

“But have you no pity? Mercy even?” cried the single.

“I do,” replied Noah, “but such decisions are up to God.”

“Then can’t you at least ask Him?”

“No, I can’t. I’ve only been able to speak to Him a couple of times in a few hundred years. Anyway, He speaks to me. I don’t get to speak to Him. Now get out of here, and let me get back to my work that will save all of humanity and animality.”

Noah returned to his hammering and the single, crushed, retreated. He would have to find another way. So he went back and as he turned the corner at the bow of the boat he ran into Damascus.

“Oops, sorry” said the single.

“What are you doing here? Only couples should be behind the boat. Who gave you permission?”

“I don’t need permission. I’m special,” answered the single.

“Couples are special, singles are not,” said Damascus impatiently.

“And I suppose you’re a couple?” asked the single, sarcastically.

“My wife and I. Of course we are,” answered Damascus. 

“So where is she, then?” asked the single cheekily.

“None of your business. Anyway she’s with our children.”

“And they are all couples?” persisted the single.

Damascus looked him up and down. “Who are you, anyway?” asked Damascus, “why should I waste my time talking to you? Get away from here, go back to where you came from.”

“I will not leave. I insist I have a right to get on the boat. Just because I’m special, different that is. I am a couple in myself. There’s nothing else I can tell you.”

“That doesn’t give you the right. The rules are the rules, and they’re made by God.”

“But I have a right.”

“Says who? I’m the boss here, and I say get to the back of the line where you belong.”

The single now became very cross. “I have every right. I’m a human. I have every right.”

“You can’t be human, because if you were there would be two of you.”

“There are.”

“I see only a single. Where’s your other? How can you procreate if you have no other?”

The single looked away. There was no answer to this. Damascus continued, seeing that he now had the upper hand in this silly argument. “I’ll tell you what.”

“Yes?” asked the single full of hope.

“Find a partner, and when there’s two of you, I’ll let you join the line.”

“But I am two, even possibly more.”

“Let’s not start that again. You are obviously one, otherwise you would be two. And Noah said that no hermaphrodites were allowed. Now go!”

The single reluctantly withdrew and slouched towards the end of the line, though it snaked away to the horizon, where the end was, maybe.

*

“All aboard!” called Noah. He stepped back to peruse his sign with great satisfaction. The sign said in large letters:

NO COPULATION ALLOWED ON DECK

COUPLES MUST STAY TOGETHER

NO CROSS-SPECIES INTERMINGLING

HUMANS MUST NOT STRAY INTO ANIMAL QUARTERS

SINGLES WILL BE THROWN OVERBOARD

“Don’t all rush at once, now!” called Damascus, “keep in line, there’s room for everyone.” At that moment, he felt a small drop of rain. He looked towards the horizon. How on earth would all these couples fit? Damascus and the scribe stood at the entrance, making sure that all the couples were perfect couples, the scribe checking each one off as they entered.  But then out of nowhere, the single appeared tugging at the scribe’s elbow, jostling to the front of the line.

“I’m back, and we are a perfect couple” announced the single with much satisfaction, almost cocky.

The single had found a mate, who looked like it had come from the ice age, some kind of prehistoric thing, maybe a human. Now the rain came down in torrents. Damascus squinted through the rain at the single and its partner and pointed in the distance, “then get to the back of the line and wait your turn,” he ordered. They were hardly visible through the torrents of rain, accompanied now by frightening thunder. 

“But I was here before a lot of the others,” whined the single, “it’s not fair.”

“Go to the back of the line,” ordered Damascus once again, with a very tired sigh. “You may be different, but that doesn’t make you special. Go to the back of the line and wait your turn.”

As the end of the line appeared, the scribe, exhausted, but still checking off the passengers, hardly noticed the unpalatable couple shimmering through the rain that poured into his eyes and down his face. He was overjoyed that it was the last couple. Too tired to bother questioning them, he simply entered into the ship’s manifest, “couple, species unknown.” Damascus was so tired he fell asleep, and unbeknownst to him, the scribe with the assistance of the last couple dragged him on to the boat just as it broke away from its mooring. 

Now, God sent great flashes of lightning to indicate that the voyage was beginning. And the ship sailed to who knows where, and to this day has never been found. But we know that it must have survived because couples abound everywhere and in every species all over the world. And the singles, who, having remained silent for thousands of years, have at last come forward and pleaded for their recognition as something special, and continue to demand that they be placed at the head of the line rather than relegated to the end. But as humans have developed the wonderful system of democratic government, there is no line with a front or an end. There is simply a mass within which everyone must find a place; of course, an impossibility.

Moral: Being different might be special, but equity makes no allowances.

32. Civilization

A tribe of cannibals begins the path to civilization

One can readily understand the feelings of revulsion and disgust we felt upon hearing how Ockabunga killed and ate his friend, Doctor Lewis Berger. Indeed, that is how I felt as a longtime friend and student of the great Doctor. But as an anthropologist trained in Doctor Berger's tradition, I must try to see the event from the point of view of Folijot culture, which leads me to conclude that to kill and eat his friend was, for Ockabunga, the supreme act of love; the climax to an intensely intimate relationship. One might even put it in Western terms by saying that Ockabunga took Doctor Berger “into his bosom.” Admittedly, this is a little farfetched because in Western Culture the saying is meant to be symbolic, whereas in Folijot culture the “taking in” is actual.

I anticipate that this observation leaves me open to the charge that I am judging Folijot Culture as “less developed” than Western Culture in the sense that the Folijot are unable to separate the symbolic from the real. I hasten to reply that indeed I consider that they have not made this distinction, but that there is absolutely no basis whatever to claim that the splitting of these two, as has occurred in Western Culture, is either “progress” or desirable. The trouble in Western Culture — and many theorists as well as myself have noted this — is that we have lost contact with the core roots of our existence, the granite of our natures, that our lives have become too abstract, devoid of real meaning. This is the source of our alienation, dis-ease, unhappiness.

One need spend only an hour talking with Ockabunga to see the truth in this assertion. The simplicity with which he sees the world, the clarity of his mind, the almost clairvoyant look in his eyes. He and his fellow warriors suffer no complexes, alienations, guilt. They live at one with nature and each other. The fact that they happen to be head-hunters and cannibals is mostly incidental. In fact, I would argue that in many ways their cannibalism has a most positive effect on their culture. It keeps them tied to the concrete, real meaning of existence which is the cycle of life and death: by eating the corpse, they gain sustenance from death. Life in this sense is brought into direct dependence on death, so that there is no impossible duality between Eros and Thanatos as there is in Western Culture, where we are so infantile in our denial of death, to the point that we deny life as well.

When I first followed Ockabunga to his straw hut, the one in which he and Doctor Berger had lain together for almost three years, my mind was overcome by the terrible anticipation of seeing Doctor Berger's preserved head. In fact, I almost withdrew from the entire expedition because I was so frightened that I would lose control of myself. My mind buzzed with all the possible things that my body could do to me. I might vomit uncontrollably; I might cry; I might attack and kill Ockabunga; or I might direct the soldiers, who were accompanying me, to kill him. I knew, as an anthropologist, that I must not do any of these things.

“Sit down,” said Ockabunga, and I dropped cross-legged onto the straw mat outside the hut; the exact place where I imagined Doctor Berger had reposed many times.

“Thank you,” I said, looking around for the Doctor's head among the others that hung down from the eaves of the hut by thin strands of hair. 

“Doctor Berger was my good friend!” grinned Ockabunga, rolling his eyes. 

“He was my excellent friend also.”

“He teach me very much.” 

“He taught me a lot too.” 

“He teach anatomy, but not understand.” 

“Why not?”

“We try. Nothing there. No electricity.” 

“I don't understand.”

Ockabunga went into his hut and returned with the dried but recognizable head of Doctor Berger. He threw the head to me, forcing me to catch it. To my surprise, instead of reacting with tremor, I was instead fascinated and suffered a compulsion to rub my hands lightly over and over the surface of the Doctor's head. Over and over, I turned it around and around in my hands, feeling the eye sockets, the hard shiny surface. There was something about the touch of it that I couldn't help liking. Saliva even started to run in my mouth, although I was certainly not hungry.

“You see, we make hole, take out brains, no electricity.” Ockabunga reached forward to take the head from me to show where he had opened the cranium. But I wouldn't, couldn't, let it go; had to keep rubbing it. Ockabunga then reached for his spear, and I suddenly came to my senses and dropped the head as though it had become quite hot. He examined the point of his spear.

“This spear kill good Doctor here,” Ockabunga grinned as he pressed his index finger to my chest. I smiled and had to fight the notion that slipped into my mind: that this guy was a goddamned Primitive Savage! A heretical thought I know! But I confess it in order to make known the terrible temptations to which we scientists are sometimes subjected. One of the soldiers stepped forward menacingly. I let him stay there. 

Although I'd learned a lot from Doctor Berger, I've learned a lot more by myself. It's one thing to love these beautiful natives, but it's another to be permissive and protective of them. I wasn't going to let this guy boss me around like he had Berger because the fact of the matter is that I have worked out an unassailable position as regards these different cultures. If you subscribe to the view of the cultural relativists — pioneered by the great Doctor Berger, and now largely adopted worldwide in modern anthropology — it follows that the only thing that counts is how powerful one culture is against another. For example, the Folijot Warriors feast mainly on another neighboring weaker culture; they take it for granted, both the Folijot and the tribe whose members they eat. It's a concrete fact of nature if you understand me. It follows, therefore, that if my culture is stronger, it's only natural that it takes over the Folijot. This is why I came on this expedition with soldiers. It may well be that the Folijot, once very happy, will become unhappy now that they have been brought into contact with the West. This is not to say that the influence of the West is “bad.” It is simply to note the facts of relativism: one's happiness can only be evaluated relative to another. And it is the one whose interests dominate who will be happiest.

It might be argued that this will lead to the destruction of Folijot culture. That may well be so. But who are we as scientists to interfere with the inevitable march of history? To do so is to play God. Dr. Berger in many ways played God by protecting the tribes he discovered because he dared to decide which culture should survive and which one not, while all the time claiming that every culture was as “good” as any other. He was, however, a weak God and suffered a weak God's very ancient fate. I, on the other hand, am a purist. I am determined to allow all events to play themselves out. We must not impose our values on history, and as well, science is a part of history and must be allowed to take its place.

The grant that I received from the A.I.C.F. (American Inter-Cultural Foundation) was substantial. It will allow me to study these natives in far greater depth, and with much greater precision than was ever possible. And, because it will be an open study, my data, in contrast to Doctor Berger's, will be verifiable. Briefly, the research design is as follows.

First, my research assistants will live among the Folijot, participating in head hunting and eating human flesh. We consider this to be absolutely necessary as a preliminary exercise so that we are sure we understand the content of Folijot culture fully. The field workers will then interview (using, of course, a standardized structured schedule) those whose heads are about to be severed, to obtain their attitudes to life and death.

Next, comes the most crucial and innovative step in the research. We will randomly assign members of the tribe into two groups: one group, the control, we will leave alone. The other group, after we have interviewed their potential victims, we will instead provide the potential victim with the opportunity to kill his assailant. (The exact method has not been adequately worked out. We would prefer a gun, which would do the job quickly and cleanly, but the problem with this is that the victims would have to be selected in advance and taught to use the gun, thus introducing an extraneous factor into our carefully controlled research design). Then we will immediately interview the would-be assailant as to his attitudes to life and death. One can see that this experimental intervention creates a situation of crisis which we consider to be very conducive to interview response depth. We have termed it the” generative crisis technique.” After the “victim” has killed his “assailant,” we will then re-interview him to check whether his attitudes to life and death have changed. One can see that the research design is quite complicated, but very rigorous, and, most important, achieves a blend of two heretofore competing approaches to research: the experimental method is applied in a real life setting.

It will be seen that an experimental intervention is also an attempt (unashamedly, I might add) to introduce a distinct change in the dynamic structure of Folijot society. It introduces the notion of reciprocity —that is, if you kill someone else, you must expect to be killed in return. The Folijot, while remaining warriors, become no longer predators, but rather kill with the expectation of being killed. 

Thus we have introduced the rudiments of a just society.

31. A Meeting of Relatives

Famous anthropologist unravels the primitive mind

Dr. Lewis Berger was an anthropologist who became famous in the 1950s for his daring expeditions into the depths of dark continents and other far-away places. He was the first, and sometimes only, white man that many of the lost tribes of his discovery ever knew. Dr. Berger's fame also arose from his great humanism. He was always concerned that, by bringing these Primitive Peoples into contact with Western Civilization, their cultures would be destroyed, their “souls ripped from their bodies.” Therefore, when he judged that a particular tribe was, on balance, living as happily or more happily than the people of his own culture (Oxford, England), he thereby left them alone and refused to give up any information as to where they might be found. Naturally, this led to lots of criticism from his fellow anthropologists, because it required him to conduct many of his expeditions in deep secrecy. There was no way of establishing the “validity of his findings,” as they say in social science. Matters were made even more difficult for Dr. Berger when it came to convincing funding agencies to finance his expeditions since they were simply not courageous enough to risk their money on “some wild safari,” as one evaluator so coarsely put it. And Dr. Berger wrote so colorfully, many suspected that he sat underneath one of those shady date palms, the exciting sounds of the jungle around him, and dreamed it all up. None of these things concerned Dr. Berger one scrap. In fact, they played into his hands since all he wanted was to “lead” lone expeditions, which cost, comparatively speaking, very little money -- just sweat and exertion on his part.

Dr. Berger's last expedition was into the jungles of central Indonesia, where he had heard of a fierce tribe of head hunters that had resisted, indeed repelled, all attempts by explorers and even the soldiers of the Indonesian government, to penetrate the seclusion of their villages. There is little doubt that Doctor Berger, somehow, slipped into this tribe and lived among them for some time.

The full story of his disappearance will never be known because it was three years before anyone became alarmed that something may have happened to him: people had become used to his many secret and solitary withdrawals from civilization. In reconstructing the events that led to the doctor's disappearance, I have had to rely on the rare jabberings of his friend, Ockabunga, who was one of the tribe's young leaders. Snippets of the Doctor's field notes were found sewn into Ockabunga's delicately feathered head-dress, and these have been of inestimable value. For the rest, I have had to imagine it:

Friday, June 14, 1959

After five days tracking around the colorful ghettoes of Djakarta, I at last found a capable native of the Ung Fungo tribe who agreed to be my guide for six pence a day, meals provided. This tribe is thought to have contact with the Folijot warriors. The sun is baking me, the sky seems white hot. But this is the dry season, so at least I'm thankful that the steam of the tropics isn't yet closing in.

Thursday, July 30, 1959

A quick note. Have walked for days and days, chopping our way through grass, 8 to 10 feet high. Snakes, reptiles, all those animals that slink about. The stench from black mud under foot. It's like Hell, the sun's heat penetrates even the thickest cover. My guide Tojo doesn't even sweat. Sings a monotonous tune over and over. I'm getting old. May turn back. Exhausted—

*

No field notes describe Doctor Berger's first encounter with the Folijot warriors, although we are relatively sure that his guide abandoned him in fear, and that he remained alone in the jungle for several days, resting and gathering his strength. In what follows, I have reconstructed what I think may have occurred. 

When he was searching for a snake that he could kill for food, Dr. Berger pushed back a large succulent leaf, and there standing before him was Ockabunga, short and stocky, with fatty breasts, a huge smile on his face; a forehead that reminded Doctor Berger of the pictures he had seen of prehistoric man.

“How do you do, I'm Doctor Lewis Berger.”

“!” replied Ockabunga, laying his spear aside, and extending the other hand out in a friendly gesture. 

Ockabunga was a man of few words, his most common one being a deep grunting sound that came from somewhere in his chest. No English phonics reproduce the sound accurately, so I will use the notation “!” when it is necessary to represent it.

From Doctor Berger's notes, and from what we now know about the Folijot warriors, it remains a mystery as to why the natives received Doctor Berger when they had so violently rejected all others. And Doctor Berger a white man, too! My own theory is that Ockabunga fell in love with Doctor Berger, in the sense that he was fascinated by the Doctor's toothless smile, reddish sunburnt skin, and twinkling eyes. It seems that Doctor Berger moved in with Ockabunga and that they developed, what one might call, an intimate relationship:

*

Tuesday, October 22, 1959

I have been unable to communicate with Ockabunga except on a physical level. He has said, perhaps, no more than 3 different words to me. Physically, however, he is most forthright. Each night after a large meal of juicy meat and vegetables, we sit in front of his grass hut, sipping coconut juice. I talk and talk and talk, telling him of the wonders of our civilization. He nods his head, smiles, grunts. Then, after some hours, he leans toward me, grips my arm firmly and grins widely. We go into his hut and lay on his straw mat together—

December 1959

We talked about medicine last night. Ockabunga seems very interested. I drew diagrams for him, he got excited, pulled me into bed. The Folijot sex and kinship patterns are still a complete mystery. I have so far seen no women or children. This small village of 12 huts, arranged in a circle, houses 24 young men of Ockabunga's age. One of them goes off into the jungle and returns with cooked food each day. I have asked to see the women and children, but Ockabunga pretends he doesn't understand me. Yet I know he does. His eyes are frightening, they are so lucid and penetrating. During our evening talks, he sometimes looks at me as if he knew it all and much more. Very unnerving—

March 1960

— I’m losing track of time. Dates no longer matter. The lethargy induced by tropical heat, and my liaison with Ockabunga, is destroying my soul. He's no longer an exotic native. I hate him. He's kept me, prisoner, all this time, and I've only now understood this. I have resolved that tomorrow, I won't go to bed with him.

*

The remainder of Doctor Berger's notes is scribbled furiously, often both horizontally and vertically across the same page. Most of it is illegible, none of it is dated. I have tried to piece together the remains of his field notes along with my own interviews with Ockabunga to construct the rest of the story.

It seems that the next evening, when Ockabunga beckoned Doctor Berger into his hut, the doctor said, “No!” Ockabunga replied, “!!” and sat down again. He pointed to the doctor's mouth, to his throat, to his own head, then traced a shape on the ground. The doctor quickly recognized that Ockabunga was, at last, communicating positively, he wanted to be educated. The doctor was elated, immediately began to teach Ockabunga to speak English, and in only a few months, Ockabunga was speaking it, “like a native,” as they say.

Then it was Doctor Berger's turn to be educated. He was taken head hunting, taught how to stalk another native, how to chop off the head leaving enough skin on the neck, so that when the head was boiled in special herbs, the skin had room to shrink, and settled smoothly over the hardened flesh of the cheeks.

“When will I see the women and children?” Berger asked.

“When you have cut off your first head,” replied Ockabunga.

Many months went by. The good doctor could not, of course, bring himself to kill someone and cut off his head. He wanted to leave this tribe and get back to civilization. The more he learned about their language and lifestyle, the more he began to hate them, Ockabunga especially. This upset him because he had never felt this way about the many tribes he had previously discovered. He had always felt a special kind of love for them. He never judged them, he always accepted them for what they were. His role was not that of judge, but of scientist and humanist.

One day, Ockabunga touched his arm gently — the first time he had touched him since the doctor's loud rejection — and smiled:

“Today you will see your first child,” he said. “And as well you may have your own hut and may take in your own companion. We will have a feast to celebrate.”

The doctor was both pleased and worried. He had waited so long to see this child. But he was being moved out from under Ockabunga's protective wing.

The feast began. Two natives emerged from the jungle carrying a large wooden dish, garnished with big banana leaves, and in the middle, the still sizzling, dark brown child, the legs trussed up under the chin, roast yams spaced around the dish, a paw-paw slice wedged into the mouth. Cheers of approval went up from the tribe.

The doctor feigned illness, which was not so difficult under the circumstances. He emerged from his hut several days later, weak and emaciated from lack of food. Ockabunga approached him.

“Come back to my hut,” he said. “I don't think you are ready yet.”

And the Doctor gathered up his things and moved back in with his host. The days passed, the doctor regained his strength, and with it, his resourcefulness. He had realized that many bodies were going to waste. He looked around Ockabunga's hut and counted 63 heads of all shapes and sizes, as well as 37 skulls. The bodies could be made use of. He would teach Ockabunga some anatomy.

That evening, they sat in front of Ockabunga's hut, as they had done now every night for over two years. It was hot, steamy, and the insects buzzed around the little camp fire. The soft smell of the straw mats on which they sat oozed upward, mixing with the odor of their bodies. Ockabunga had one of those all-knowing looks in his eyes.

“!” he said.

“Have you ever taken the time to look inside these corpses that you throw away?” asked Doctor Berger.

“We want only the heads. They have the spirit.”

“That may be true.” Doctor Berger paused, realizing that perhaps he should begin his anatomy lesson with the part of the body in which the Folijot were most interested. “Now take the human brain,” he continued, pointing to his own head, “it's the most amazing part of our bodies. “Yes, it is the spirit,” nodded Ockabunga, looking wise.

“It's more than that, Ockabunga. Do you know that it's made up of millions of tiny little cells that turn on and off, and talk to each other in electricity? You remember what I told you about electricity, don't you?”

“Yes.”

“The brain controls all the rest of the body, you know. It receives electrical impulses, processes them, then sends messages back. You see? When I raise my hand, my brain has told it to do so.” The doctor tapped his head with his finger to emphasize the point.

“Different parts of the brain control different parts of the body. The front part here, for example, controls speech, and the amazing thing is that the right side controls the left side of the body, and the left the right, isn't that amazing?”

Then Doctor Berger broke his rule never to make an advance to a native. He reached across and stroked Ockabunga's cheek with his open palm. “Tomorrow, or the next time when you bring in a head, we must cut it up, and I'll teach you what is inside. What do you think of that?”

“!” said Ockabunga, and he rose up, stretched his hand down and softly felt all over the Doctor's head. Then he walked over to his long spear which was leaning against the hut. Their eyes met, and the Doctor was frightened by the all-seeing clarity of Ockabunga's gaze. There was no silly grin. “No simple savage this,” thought Doctor Berger, as Ockabunga raised the spear carefully, then thrust it deep into the Doctor's heart. He died with his eyes open, according to Ockabunga who explained, “he had seen the truth.”

The next day, the women and children of the tribe were invited to the feast of the white man. Ockabunga severed the head, then very excitedly explained to the rest of his tribe what was inside. They carefully opened a cavity in the back of the skull and scooped out the brains. They found no electricity, just a thick pulp which, when lightly fried in the fat of a wild pig, and sprinkled with jungle herbs, has an exquisite taste.