Chapter 10

Lunch was catered in the upstairs witness room as the prosecution, Henry and the panel, huddled to socialize and discuss the morning events.

Henry and Frank a.n.u.se excused themselves after the meal and adjourned to the men's room to plan strategy. "We can't say too much to the women now with the other witnesses around but when we get back, you take Esther out somewhere and I'll handle Jane. Annette's no threat, we'll forget her.

Anyhow, explain how all that bulls.h.i.t about the chain of custody doesn't have any bearing at all. Everything rests on the doc.u.ment examiner's evidence.

Nothing else counts. Got it?"

"No problem, Henry. I'll set her straight," a.n.u.se said rea.s.suringly.

"Christ, Diana really stuck it to Lyle, didn't she?"

The defense huddled too. They went as a group to the nearby cafeteria.

Everyone took the trouble to keep the conversation light and encouraging.

They were convulsed at the reaction of the court stenographer which Diana related to them.

"She's probably attended a great many hearings," offered Helen.

"What happens in the cloistered halls of Belmont U. would be a bit foreign to her."

Even though it was practically certain by now that they would not be needed to testify until the next day, they all elected to stay. "Hey," Roz insisted, "we want to be here for you and each other. It's bad enough that you have to face them alone in that hearing room."

"You guys are the best, you know that?" Diana said, fondly.

"After the hours spent in that room its such a relief to hear human voices again."

When the hearing resumed, Henry cautioned Diana about taking too much time and to stick to the issues. We are only here to listen to information directly concerning whether you forged those SmurFFs in question. You have wasted too much of our valuable time talking about non-related issues."

And you, you pompous old windbag, encouraged that witness, Lyle Stone to go on and on for hours on unrelated issues yourself, thought Janet, sneaking a quick, compa.s.sionate look at Diana and flexing her fingers in preparation for the next words.

Diana almost snorted aloud at Henry's admonition. Composing herself, she said, "I'm finished with my cross examination of Lyle."

Frank a.n.u.se immediately asked, "Lyle, if it is demonstrated that a faculty member falsified information concerning another faculty member using SmurFFs, do you consider that to be amoral and unprofessional?"

"Yes. We are a.s.suming that honesty must prevail among peers and co-workers."

"That's all for now."

"I have just a couple of questions on recross," corrected Trenchant.

Henry, caught with his mouth open about to hastily dismiss Lyle glared malevolently at her.

She smiled back at him then turned to Lyle and asked if he insisted that all faculty be honest.

He avoided a direct answer. "Well, no one thinks dishonesty is a good thing, at least I don't think anybody does."

"I just wondered why you didn't take similar action, that is report to the vice president and bring charges, when the recent blatant plagiarism of Ian and Randy was brought to your attention," Diana said.

Henry, forgetting his a.s.sumed role as neutral, quickly snapped off, "we really must keep the testimony on the issue."

Diana smiled grimly. "Thank you. I'm finished."

Henry quickly excused Lyle and announced that the next witness would be the doc.u.ment examiner and rose to get her.

After the door closed behind him, the room was quiet.

Its occupants sitting in silent contemplation.

Chapter 11

Something had to be done. The group gathered in the conference room were all in agreement on that--but what?

The problem was two-fold: what to do about the possibility that Trenchant would bring a plagiarism suit against the department, and how to wipe out years of bad SmurFFs for Ian and Randy.

"You realize that we could just get rid of her by invoking the clause in her contract that designates she's first in the department fired if the department has financial problems?"

"That wouldn't help much, she could still sue for plagiarism.

If we fired her, even justifiably, the papers would play the plagiarism stuff up."

"There is another way--by discrediting her first and making the student evaluations invalid."

"How!"

"During my last trip to New York, I heard about some special services that were available."

"Special services? You mean a hit man? That wouldn't help the evaluations."

"No. Something else, entirely. Give me a few weeks and then follow through with what you are presented with. It may be expensive, though. Can I count on some help in that direction?"

"No problem. You come through on this and we'll give you all the help you want."

The others present nodded in agreement and the meeting ended.

He could hear the phone ringing in Anderson's office. Ah, there he was. "Andy, no names, please. I'm on the office phone.

You recognize my voice?

"Yeah, sure. How they hanging?"

"Remember our conversation where you told me about the special services guy?

"Yeah."

"Can you put me in touch with him?"

"Yeah."

"Thanks, later."