Anthony Bera watched the two women with painful intensity, absently answering the questions Wallace Grierson was throwing at him. Then Phil Smith and the brown pancake came up, blocking Bera’s view of Philomena’s chair, and he gave up.
Treaty negotiations must have lasted a good half hour, at the end of which Erica Davenport looked very tired and Philomena Skeps more beautiful than ever. Then Erica slapped her hands on her knees and got up from her perch. She leaned down to drop a kiss on Philomena’s brow, and walked off toward Myron.
“I’m pooped,” Desdemona said, kicking off her sandals as soon as she was in the car.
“Me too, my lovely lady. You looked fantastic tonight.”
“Did I?”
“Yes, you did. Your figure is as good as any Hollywood movie star’s, and that dress set it off just fine.”
“Isn’t it funny? Women are always moaning that babies ruin their figures, but Julian did mine the world of good.”
“How do you think Myron is feeling right now?”
She frowned. “Good question. He’s fathoms deep in love—did you notice the diamond bracelet?—but it must be dawning on him by now that his darling Erica doesn’t relish a party. Sandra would have suited him better, I imagine.”
“I did find out that he hasn’t filed divorce papers yet.”
Desdemona sat up as the Fairlane eased out onto a deserted South Green Street. “Oho! He hasn’t removed his last defense.”
“That’s how I read it.”
She slid across the wide seat and snuggled into his side. “Did you notice the woman in that terrible brown hat?”
Judge Douglas Wilfred Thwaites presided over the Holloman District Court, and was an institution. He had taken both his undergraduate and law degrees from Chubb, and was a Chubber to his bootstraps. Imbued with no ambition to move on to greater jurisdictions, he was a Connecticut Yankee who couldn’t conceive of living or practicing anywhere else. He had a delightful house on Busquash Point from which he could mess around in boats, a devoted wife who thought him deliriously funny, and two children in their early twenties who had escaped his tyranny by seeking higher education on the West Coast, a place he equated with the planet Mercury.
It was probably a fanciful childhood memory of Ichabod Crane that had prompted Special Agent Ted Kelly of the FBI to call him an eccentric, a term that wasn’t fair either to Washington Irving or to Doug Thwaites. His Honor prided himself upon his detachment, which was real enough—provided, that is, that he hadn’t previously formed his own conclusions about a person. Though Carmine knew all this—and a great deal more besides—about the Judge, he was prepared to do fierce battle when he appeared in chambers at ten on Monday morning, April tenth. He needed a warrant to search the premises of Dr. Pauline Denbigh before Dante College politely asked her to vacate the Dean’s apartment, and he was sure he was going to be opposed.
“Granted!” barked Judge Thwaites halfway through Carmine’s preamble. “That woman is capable of anything!”
Oh! Myron’s party! Of course Judge and Mrs. Thwaites were there, and so was Dr. Pauline Denbigh. Their paths must have crossed. How was she to know that Doug loathed all women’s libbers with a passion? He believed ardently in righting their wrongs, but not in the antics of the visible, vociferous segment of the movement. Bra burnings and the invasion of hallowed male portals, not to mention psychic emasculation, were anathema. To him, it was a legislative struggle, and such shenanigans degraded it.
Carmine went away with his head spinning, and kicking himself that he hadn’t been witness to the clash of that particular pair of titans. He’d have to phone Dorothy Thwaites and ask her for the gory details. In the meantime, he had his warrant.
He took four uniformed cops to keep the rubberneckers at bay, and knocked on Dr. Denbigh’s study door.
“Come,” said her languid voice.
“Dr. Pauline Denbigh?” he asked, paper in hand.
“Well, you know that!” she said tartly.
“Please vacate these premises and the Dean’s apartment at once. I have a warrant to search both,” he said.
The color drained out of her face instantaneously, leaving it as yellow as old parchment. She rocked on her feet, then righted herself and stood straight. “This is an outrage,” she said in a whisper. “I challenge your warrant.”
“You are at liberty to do so, but it will be after the fact. Have you someplace you can go, Dr. Denbigh?”
“The small common room. I want my cigarettes, my lighter, my papers, book and pen.”
“Provided you permit us to examine them first, of course.”