Free Blood Foam: A Lewis Cole Mystery (Lewis Cole series) by Brendan DuBois Page B

him.
    I knocked on the door, and in a few seconds the man—Dave Chaplain—opened it up. With his coat off, I saw that he was wearing a blue uniform shirt with his name stitched on one side, and the name of a service station/mini-mart chain on the other. He appeared to be in his mid-forties, reddish-blond hair tied back in a small ponytail, and light green eyes. The scent of sugar and old coffee came through the open door.
    And he looked exhausted. “Yeah?”
    “Sorry to bother you, Mister Chaplain,” I said. “My name is Lewis Cole, I’m a freelance writer, used to be a columnist for
Shoreline
magazine.” I passed over my business card and pressed ahead. “I’m working on an article about the disappearance of your neighbor, Mark Spencer.”
    He examined both sides of the card and said “A writer?”
    “Yes.”
    He grinned. “I’m a writer too. Come on in.”
    His unit was identical to Mark’s, except he had more books in the living room overlooking the parking lot. Lots and lots of books. Enough books to set up a small-town library somewhere in a rural town in this state. He sat down at a small kitchen table, stretched out his legs, sighed. “I’d offer you a cup of coffee, but I don’t have the strength to make it, and even if I did, I need to go to sleep.”
    “I’m sure.”
    He put his hands behind his head, stretched again. “All those hours, on your goddamn feet, and you really can’t take a serious break, ’cause thewhole store is under video surveillance, and if you’re caught slacking off . . . that’s all she wrote.”
    “Where do you work?”
    A shrug. “Up on Lafayette Road, at the mini-mart. Eleven P.M. to seven A.M. shift, Wednesday through Sunday. Hell of a career choice, isn’t it. But like I said, I’m a writer too.”
    I kept an engaging smile on my face, having heard this story plenty of times before in my previous job at
Shoreline
. Everybody thinks they can write, and once they find out that you make a living putting words to paper, they’re eager to share their dreams, their aspirations, and their ideas with you.
    Especially if you agree to hear their ideas, agree to write what they want, and split the money, “fifty-fifty.”
    But I was quickly and ashamedly put back to earth when Dave said, “I have an outline for a nice history of post-Revolutionary New Hampshire, if I ever get the time, and I’ve sold two articles over the years to
American Heritage
magazine.” He pointed to the mini-mart’s logo on his shirt. “See what a doctorate in history gets you?”
    “Excuse me?”
    “Sure, Lewis,” he said. He plucked at his shirt again. “What, you think this was my career choice? Really? Nope, worked and studied and struggled to get a doctorate in American history, had a plan to get a nice college gig, write articles and then books. . . .”
    “Then reality struck.”
    “Hah, yeah, a good way of putting it. Oh, I taught here and there, strictly as an adjunct professor, working year to year, never getting a permanent position, never getting on a tenure track. If I had been born ten or fifteen years earlier, boy, would I have had it made. . . .”
    “Colleges have changed a lot, haven’t they.”
    “Certainly have. Since medieval times, universities and colleges were designed to be a little oasis of knowledge, where students get a good grounding in education, humanities and philosophy. Now it’s all career-and-employment track, setting up ‘partnerships’ with corporations, so our little conveyor belt of knowledge can pop out ready-made technocrats or consumers after four or six years of schooling.”
    “You sure don’t sound bitter.”
    He laughed. “Good one. You’d think the so-called higher institutions of learning would help us future professors along, but nope. Those who had tenure stayed at the top of their ivory tower, after pulling the ladder up, and the college administrators . . . as long as they got their new buildings, and new layers of deans and