Free Death at Charity's Point by William G. Tapply

staff. Fine. If you’ll follow me, please, I’ll take you to Miss Wolcott.” He turned on his heel and glided away from me. I dropped the cigarette butt, stepped on it, and hurried after him.
    “Who’s Miss Wolcott?” I asked when I caught up to Binh.
    “Latin teacher. Also Greek.”
    “And she knew George Gresham?”
    “We all did. More or less.”
    He led me diagonally across the grassy quadrangle. Dandelions bloomed in clumps here and there, making bright yellow washes of color against the pale green spring grass. Big old oaks and maples and a few surviving elms grew up from the manicured lawn, casting broad areas in shade. Here and there young boys and girls sat or lay, some engaged in quiet, intense conversations, some dozing, and some with their faces close together and fingers entwined.
    Binh stopped by one girl sitting with her back against a thick tree trunk. She wore a long, full dress. Bare feet peeped from beneath its hem. A notebook lay opened on her lap. Her face was lifted to a beam of sunlight which streamed through a hole in the foliage above her. Her eyes were closed. Freckles dotted the bridge of her nose.
    “This is Jenny Wolcott.” The girl’s eyes popped open. “Jenny, Mr. Coyne would like to talk with you about George Gresham. And,” he said, turning to me, “if you don’t mind, I’ll leave you. I’ve got some things to do back at the office, and I’m not sure who else it would be worth your while to talk to, anyway. You can find your way out?”
    I nodded. “Thanks for your time.”
    He shrugged and walked quickly away.
    Jenny Wolcott patted the ground beside her. “Pull up a seat, Mr. Coyne. What can I do for you? And why are you looking at me like that?”
    I laughed. “You know, I imagined you were—well, older. Like Miss Partridge, my old Latin teacher. She had a bald spot on the back of her head and a mustache that she bleached. I do have this unfortunate tendency to make stereotypes.”
    Jenny Wolcott smiled prettily. “Apology accepted.”
    “It wasn’t exactly an apology,” I said. “Matter of fact, it was supposed to be kind of a compliment. You’re very young and very pretty. I didn’t expect that.”
    She lowered her eyes. “Thank you.”
    “How well did you know George Gresham?”
    Her eyes flickered, then met mine. She nodded her head slowly. “I knew him—I knew him pretty well, Mr. Coyne. He was, well, like a father to me, sort of. This is only my first year here at Ruggles. It’s a pretty closed little world, you know, and a public school girl from Des Moines can feel pretty out of place in a dour old New England prep school. You know?”
    I nodded.
    “And George, he was really the only one who made the effort. Oh, there were the men—well, never mind that. You know what I mean. But George, he wasn’t like that. I mean, he seemed to really care if I was happy here. There was nothing sexual or anything. He was just nice to me.”
    “Sure,” I said. “Do you remember anything about the way he was before he died? Anything unusual about the way he acted? Did anything happen to him that you know of?”
    She widened her eyes a little. “I know what you mean. I’ve tried to think about that ever since I heard that he—that he, you know, killed himself.” She shrugged her shoulders and gave me a wan smile. “He was a sad sort of man, anyway. You never knew what he was really thinking, because he always seemed to be focusing on you. He was so concerned about how I was doing that we never really talked about him. I feel very guilty about that. I was so selfish. He must’ve been very unhappy, very lonely, to do that. And I never even thought about him and his problems. Maybe I could have helped him. I could have at least encouraged him more. To talk about himself.” She flapped her hands in her lap. “Anyway, he didn’t.”
    I nodded and smiled at her. I took my cigarette pack from my pocket, hesitated, and offered it to her. She shook her head.