Free An Imperfect Spy by Amanda Cross Page B

quiet, “welcome to our traditional gathering. At least once each semester we join, all of us who teach in this fine institution, in one room to remind ourselves who we are and what our mission is: to pass on the law as our forefathers conceived it, to the young who will defend it after we are gone. The need for defense of that noble law grows greater each year. I lift my glass in tribute to those who honor what time and experience have proven true to our country’s destiny.”
    Kate found Blair at her side. “Who on earth …?” she whispered.
    “The dean, our leader,” Blair whispered back. “You should have met him when you were hired, but he was busy fund-raising. Frankly, I rather pushed you through before his return. He doesn’t believe in law and literature, or in law and anything else whatsoever, including justice.” The dean droned on praising his law school for “maintaining standards too easily abandoned by institutions considered more elite, who had sold out to the demands of those marginal to our great culture, who had no hand in writing our laws or defending them againsttheir enemies. I drink to the wise makers of our Constitution.”
    “Does he consider the Bill of Rights part of the Constitution?” Kate asked.
    “I doubt it,” Blair said. “He would certainly not be in favor of them, were they up for a vote today. He thinks the Second Amendment guarantees his and every American’s right to carry an unlicensed handgun.”
    “My god, Blair, what have we got into, me and Reed? How did you ever decide to join this mob in the first place?”
    “I wanted to be in New York, a city I love. Of course, as you realize, I had no idea what I was getting into. So, instead of leaving, I decided to bore from within. Hence you and Reed.”
    The dean was concluding his remarks to enthusiastic applause. All raised their glasses to drink to their fine school. Kate thought there was a distinct danger that she might be ill; she and Blair made their way out of the room and, eventually, out of the building. Kate took large breaths of air.
    “And to think I might have drunk with them,” she said. “I’m particular about whom I drink with, and it doesn’t include this amazing faculty. Slade actually told me that one of his noble colleagues was shot by his wife when he was sleeping. Is that true? Slade said she shot her husband like a gang executioner.”
    “Gangs execute in the back of the head; she shot him in the chest,” Blair said. “A few times. And yes, of course I know about it and it is true. He doesseem to have been a monster, but as far as the faculty here is concerned, he was the innocent victim of a woman’s wrath.”
    “I begin to think I know nothing about crime,” Kate said. “And she didn’t try to hide the gun or pretend there had been a burglary, nothing like that?”
    “Nothing like that. She called for help. They found her still holding the gun. She never denied killing him; he died before the medics could get there.”
    “Did you know her at all?” Kate asked.
    “No. I’m afraid I rather avoided my colleagues after hours; certainly I didn’t know their wives. Nellie Rosenbusch knew her, though. Said she often had bruises, and cried all the time. Nellie told me she never guessed Betty would have the nerve; she certainly didn’t have the nerve to leave. There were children, of course.”
    Kate sighed. Reed, coming up to them at that moment, suggested to Kate that they proceed uptown. Like her, he seemed eager to place some distance between the party scene and himself. “Will you come with us?” he asked Blair.
    But Blair felt he should return to the party. “I am on the faculty,” he said. “I can’t flit in and out like you two. See you in class anyway,” he told Kate. She and Reed set out toward the subway.
    “Shall we walk to the next stop?” he asked.
    “I’m always ready to walk,” Kate said. “Tell me more about your prospective battered-women clients who killed