Free Angel Food and Devil Dogs by Liz Bradbury

furious, he called Bart names, he moved to hit Bart, but others restrained him. Professor Harmon walked out of the meeting and called out that they must cancel the entire performance."
    Huh, quite a shadow on Jimmy Harmon. I asked, "Have there been other people...?"
    "Yes, many. It is Bart's job to provide each of the departments with enrollment data to project costs and apply for state reimbursement. Every Department Chair has had strong words with Bart due to serious mistakes in his data. You see, these mistakes make the Department Chairs look inefficient. Most produce the data themselves, now."
    "Can you tell me if any of the other Tenure Committee members have had problems with Bart Edgar?"
    "Ms. Gale, he irritates everyone."
    "How does he irritate you?"
    She paused looking at me, then said honestly, "He volunteers for jobs he does not have time to do and then either does not do them, or makes a mess of them. At the same time, he excuses his poor job performance by saying he was busy doing the things he volunteered to do. Frankly, I think his best choice would be to claim disability from these recent injuries."
    I nodded. "What can you tell me about Carl Rasmus?"
    "Dr. Rasmus did his work, he was pleasant, but just a few months ago he began to change. He became rude and I guess you would say paranoid. Then he would calm down again. He yelled at people and accused them of odd things. He sent very rude emails."
    "Was any of this directed at you?"
    "No... well, one mass email he sent to everyone in Administration and the Tenure Committee. Very bitter. That was just a day before he killed himself."
    "How well did Carl type, I mean, was it possible that some of the email he sent or received was just poorly written or had typos...?"
    "Yes, that can happen. Someone writes I can go, when they mean to say I cannot go... but the tech department set up a voice translation system for Dr. Rasmus. He could talk into the machine and it would write his words and read them back to him. Quite amazing, really. He had the technology to know just what he was writing. The words were not mistakes. They were from a very angry and sad man."
    "Do you know anything about his personal life?"
    She paused searching her data bank brain, "Not really." She seemed disconcerted that she hadn't been able to answer a question fully.
    "Do you remember where you were when Carl killed himself?" I was planning on asking everybody this question.
    "Oh... I..." she reached for the desk calendar and flipped to the previous week. "Yes, I was in Becks County, arranging for the production of the next College Catalog at the printer in Doonestown. I left at 12:30 and returned at 6:00. I went directly home, as it was so late."
    This was not a great alibi for her. If indeed Carl was murdered, she had a window of time.
    "The drinks Connie Robinson brought in on the tray, what was the procedure for that?"
    Miranda Juarez was unfazed by the change of subject, she said, "President Bouchet has just started that. He feels that the personal attention makes people feel valued. Everyone who regularly attends a meeting has already indicated what his or her beverage preference is. We have a small refrigerator in the storage room next to my office. Connie gets the list and fills the tray with the choices of those attending."
    "What's your preference?"
    "I usually have water in a bottle but I left it on the tray. I'd just had coffee," she added as an after thought, "the President drinks iced tea."
    "President Bouchet told me there had been witnesses near Carl Rasmus's office on the day of his death..."
    "Two students and a graduate assistant," said Miranda Juarez. "I have their contact information here."
    I glanced at the sheet she handed me. The undergrads were: Caitlyn Zale and Mike Jacobsen. The grad assistant's name was Jack Leavitt.
    "I'd like to look at the top floor now."
    She gave me the keys. I left the well-lighted office and climbed the stairs to what was now a burned-out