ten

It was Abba this time that rolled through the empty corridors of Albatross Hall's fifth floor. The treble-sharp, crisp disco-pop of "Super Trouper." Morgan followed the music to Valentine's office.

He was wet and unhappy. His feet were bricks of ice.

This late in the evening, he hadn't really expected the strange professor to be in his office. Morgan didn't exactly know what lured him up the stairs, up through the building's dead floors to seek the bizarre reclusive poet who haunted the vacant offices.

He approached the door, prepared to knock, but stopped when he heard voices. Several voices. Cheerful and occasionally boisterous voices all simmering on the other side of Valentine's door.

And the door opened.

A nice-looking woman in a deep blue cocktail dress almost ran into him, stopped short, delicate hand going to the plunging V of her neckline. "Oh. Sorry, didn't see you there." She was small, blond, handsome, makeup only slightly too heavy

It occurred to Morgan to say, "Uh..."

"I'm just looking for the little girls' room." She slipped past him. "Go ahead on in." And she glided down the hall.

Morgan stepped into the din.

Valentine's office was crowded with people. A few looked young enough to be students. He recognized at least three professors from his own department. One bumped into him and spilled beer on his sleeve.

It was Dirk Jakes.

"Morgan! Didn't expect to see you here, you old gypsy prof," Jakes said. "Sorry about the spill there, chief." Jakes dabbed at Morgan's sleeve with the tip of his tie.

Dirk Jakes was the loudest man Morgan had ever met. A blowhard, a self-promoter, and a merciless hack. He was squat, red-haired, red-nosed, and fit poorly into expensive dark suits. He puked out three pulpy crime novels a year and made Mickey Spillane look like William Faulkner. He taught fiction writing for the university.

"What is all this?" Morgan asked.

"A party. You've never seen a party before?"

"Why here?"

"Valentine's idea. All the stress builds up from the semester. Good to blow off steam."

"The semester's only a week old," Morgan said.

"You don't want the stress to build up," Jakes told him. "Gets you all tight in the bunghole."

"I see."

"You're not a tight in the bunghole type of guy, are you?" Jakes was clearly gearing up for a colossal drunk.

"I try not to be," Morgan said.

"That's swell, fabulous." Jakes nodded, pushed him on into the depths of the party. "The bar's over there someplace. Go loosen up your goddamn bunghole, for Pete's sake."

"Good idea." Morgan moved into the mass of partygoers, glad for an excuse to get away from Jakes. The party writhed around him, seemed to breathe in and out like a living thing.

He tried to spot Valentine but didn't see him.

Somebody grabbed his arm, and Morgan turned.

It was Dirk Jakes again.

"Listen, I forgot to tell you." Jakes wouldn't let go of his arm. "Don't mention to anyone that Valentine's back. Make like he's still in Prague, you get it?"

"I get it."

"Don't let the cat out of the bag, eh? The old man doesn't want the dean putting him on some goddamn bullshit committee or something, so he's lying low, capische?"

Morgan pried his arm loose. "I won't say a thing."

He made his way to the little fridge where he'd found a bottle of beer his last visit, but it was empty. A curtain on the back wall was pushed aside, and he saw that the wall had been knocked through into the next office. He ducked through, found another crowd of people on the other side. They stood around a keg of beer, a stack of yellow plastic cups on a sideboard.

Morgan took a cup, poured beer. Too foamy.

"You have to tilt the cup." The high-pitched voice belonged to a petite, raven-haired girl about twenty years old. "You have to tilt it. I know because I tend bar down at Peckerwood's, the sports bar across town. You know it?"

Morgan shook his head. "I'm new in town."

She took the cup out of Morgan's hand, dumped the foam, and tilted the cup. "See, like this." She poured the beer, smooth.

Morgan watched her pour. She was barely five feet tall, twig of a thing. Tight denim shorts, pink T-shirt a size too small. Flip-flops, toenails painted lime. She must've had boots around somewhere. He thought of his own freezing feet.

"You're a student here?" Morgan asked.

She shook her head, handed Morgan his cup. "I walk Professor Valentine's dogs."

"He has dogs?"

"Two Irish wolfhounds. Huge, but very gentle. I keep them for him ever since the problem with his house."

"I was looking for Valentine," Morgan said.

"I haven't seen him in a while." The girl's attention immediately whipped to a newcomer at the keg. "You have to tilt it or you'll get foam," she said.

Morgan drank half his beer and drifted back through the hole in the wall, where he found a couple of familiar faces, two more professors from his department.

They seemed to be in the middle of an argument, both very drunk.

"It's a ridiculous book and you know it, Pritcher. You Irish folk have been skating on Joyce for too long. Finnegans Wake is bullshit. Everyone knows it's bullshit. Joyce knew it was bullshit when he wrote it. Now get out of my face please, you ridiculous little tit."

Professor Louis Reams was a lanky, storklike man. Morgan had spoken casually with him a few times and seemed to remember he'd done his dissertation on the complex prosody of Sri Lankan poetry in translation. Morgan suspected Reams had an inferiority complex from having to explain all the time just exactly what his specialty was.

He towered over the much shorter Pritcher, jabbing a finger at his face as he spoke.

Professor Larry Pritcher looked uninterested, dismissed the ranting Reams with a wave of his small, pale hand. Early in grad school, Pritcher had hitched himself to the James Joyce bandwagon and never looked back. He fully enjoyed the massive safety of James Joyce studies and relentlessly needled "fringe" scholarship as new wave, multicultural carnival acts.

"Put a cork in it, Reams," Pritcher said. "You're drunk."

"You have no concept of what it's like to follow an original thread of thought."

"This again."

"Fuck you with bells on." Reams gave him the up yours gesture.

Pritcher turned to Morgan. "Can you believe this guy? I'm just trying to have a goddamn drink."

Morgan blinked. He hadn't expected to be drawn into it. "Well..."

"Exactly," Pritcher said. "Nobody wants you here, Reams. You're bringing the party down."

Morgan noticed that the bulk of the party appeared to be pressing on unhindered.

"The hell you say?" Reams scowled. "That true, Morgan? I'm somehow some kind of party pooper?"

"I don't think anyone wants to have an argument," Morgan said.

"So you do think I'm a party pooper."

"I never said-"

"Fine." Reams finished his beer in one angry gulp, threw the empty cup on the floor. "Screw you too, Morgan. Easy for you to judge. You're just passing through. I have to work here for Christ's sake."

Reams jostled his way through the crowd for the door, partygoers frowning after him.

"What a prick," Pritcher said.

"I think he took me wrong," Morgan said.

"He takes everything wrong. He's just wrongheaded altogether."

"Have you seen Valentine?" Morgan gulped beer, liked it, gulped some more.

"Not for a while." Pritcher cleared his throat, leaned in close to Morgan, spoke low in conspiracy tones. "Look, don't mention to anyone about Valentine's being back. He doesn't want-"

"I know," Morgan said. "Mum's the word."

Dirk Jakes surged out of the party crowd, landed on swaying legs in front of Pritcher and Morgan. "All the goddamn broads at this party must be dykes."

"Do tell," Pritcher said.

"Buncha damn lesbos," Jakes slurred. "You catch what I'm saying there, Morgo-man?" Jakes brayed laughter, yanked Morgan's sleeve.

Beer splashed over Morgan's cup. "Dammit. Again?"

"Jesus, sorry, Morgan." Jakes threw himself in reverse, stumbled back to have a look where he'd spilled the beer. "What the hell? Are those slippers?"

"Forget it," Morgan said. "You were telling us about the lesbians."

"Yeah. Every bitch here a damn rug-muncher."

"Striking out again, eh?" Pritcher's lips curled into a smug grin.

Morgan thought about the woman in the blue cocktail dress, the one who'd almost plowed into him on the way into the party. He craned his neck, scanned the party for her. Nowhere. Too bad.

"That bimbo at the keg was the worst." Jakes was still at it. "I know how to pour a fucking beer."

The party music segued into "Folsom Prison" by Johnny Cash.

Pritcher wrinkled up his whole face like somebody had taken a dump in his cup. "Country music? You must be joking. Who'd put that on?"

Jakes looked stunned. "Are you fucking kidding?"

"What would I kid about?" Pritcher asked.

Morgan wiggled his toes within the damp slippers. They were just getting dry when Jakes had splashed the beer on them. His feet were cold and wet and he was sick of Pritcher and especially Jakes.

"It's Johnny Cash, man." Jakes waved his cup in the air like that explained it. "Johnny fucking Cash."

"So?"

Jakes snorted. "You're an idiot."

"Okay, just forget it," Pritcher said. "I've had enough of these drunks, Morgan. I've got to get up early anyway."

"On a Saturday?" Morgan asked.

"I ride my bicycle in the mornings. Good night."

Morgan waved as he left.

"What a dink," Jakes said. "Can you imagine not liking Johnny Cash?"

Morgan didn't say anything.

"I'm going to find some pussy," Jakes said. "There must be some scratch at this party that isn't lesbo." And he was off to it again.

Morgan looked in his cup. He saw no beer and that made him unhappy. He threaded his way back to the keg.

The sports bar girl had moved on. Morgan elbowed a fat guy out of the way and refilled his cup. He wasn't sure when he might be able to make it around to the keg again, so he threw back the beer fast and filled up again. He took his fresh beer back into the crowd.

The noise and the beer and the party were crowding out thoughts Morgan didn't want to think. He was starting to feel good, a nice glow in his belly. He even forgot about his wet slippers.

A tap on his shoulder.

He turned and looked down into the soft eyes of the woman in the blue V-neck dress. She looked good.

"You're Morgan?" she shouted over the music.

He smiled, nodded.

"This way." She grabbed his elbow, pulled him along.

Morgan followed gladly.

She led him from the party, down the hall. She turned, walked, turned again, walked more, turned a few more times. The building didn't seem big enough for this. Surely they were going in circles. Morgan couldn't keep track, but he wasn't trying too hard.

And he didn't wonder too hard where he was going. It was good not to make such hard decisions for a change. He allowed himself a brief fantasy, like in Penthouse Forum. She'd take him to a secluded room, where she'd lift her skirt, tug aside her panties, and offer herself to him.

That didn't happen.

She pushed open a door and led him into a smoky room lit by candles. A man he didn't know sat deep in a cushy armchair. Valentine sat at the far end of a long, low sofa.

"Ah, good. It's Professor Morgan." Valentine puffed savagely on his bong. "Brad, this is Bill Morgan. Bill, Brad Eubanks. He's the custodian here."

"It's Jay, actually." Morgan shook the man's hand.

"How do," Brad said.

"I'm afraid I never got your name," Morgan said to the woman.

"Annette Grayson." She offered a slim hand.

Morgan shook. It was soft and cool. He let go reluctantly.

"We teach in the same department," she said. "I manage the Writing Lab and oversee Freshman Composition. I'm surprised we haven't run into each other before now."

"I'm sorry it's been so long."

She pointed at Morgan's beer cup. "You don't actually want that, do you?"

"Don't I?"

"Let me fix you something for a grown-up."

She produced a bottle of vodka from thin air. Where had that been, between the couch cushions? Tonic next and a lime. Morgan was still reeling from the sleight of hand, when Annette pushed the vodka tonic at him. He took it, drank. Made the whole thing disappear presto chango.

Valentine was on about something, but Morgan only considered the bottom of his empty cup.

"A refill?" Annette was already pouring.

She reads minds too. Good woman.

Valentine went on about the state of poetry and academia, all the time puffing at his bong like some kind of homemade life-support system. Morgan's cup never seemed to get empty. His face warmed, and he floated through the hazy conversation with eyelids heavy, head bobbing in eager drunken agreement with the random conversation.

The night didn't really end. It trailed off like an ellipsis.