4 - Stranger Room: Ike Schwartz Mystery 4 Read Online Free Page B

vicinity, endured as Picketsville’s primary claim to fame and major industry. Its library, while heavily academic in nature, was better than the county’s down on Main Street. If anything was to be found on a subject, it would be down the hall from the president’s office, Ruth’s office, or would require a trip to Richmond.
    “Are you all right?” Agnes said.
    “What? Yes, I’m fine. Why do you ask?”
    “You look distracted. Is something bothering you?”
    The clock on the mantelpiece dinged ten. It had been a present from Ruth’s former department members when she left them to lead Callend College into the twentieth-first century. It was a modern clock set in lexan or some clear acrylic material and seemed wholly out of place on her neo-Georgian mantel. In truth she was not fine. The notion that time had crept up on her nagged at her lately. Her biological clock ticked away in sync with the one over the fireplace and furthermore, Sheriff Ike Schwartz intruded into her thoughts far more than she cared to admit. She sighed.
    “I’m fine,” she repeated and pivoted her chair around, away from the window. She attacked the pile of papers in her in-box and, glancing up, realized that Agnes was still planted in front of her. “That’s it, Agnes, thank you.”
    “May I speak plainly?”
    “What? Certainly. What’s on your mind?”
    “It’s about your…about you and the sheriff.”
    Ruth let her eyelids drop for a moment. “Sheriff Schwartz, you mean?”
    “Yes. I…that is we…well the truth is, we were wondering what you intended to do about that…situation.”
    That situation meant the faculty, for their part, was less than pleased that Ruth and Ike had become, not to put too fine a point on it, lovers. Certainly, they would not admit to anything approaching intellectual snobbery, but in truth, they felt Ruth had become involved in a relationship with someone far beneath her. Curiously, the good people of Picketsville, in turn, agreed with them but not for the same reason. They felt that Ike should stick with his own kind—folks like themselves, folks whom they viewed as akin to the Biblical salt of the earth.
    “Agnes, you are a superb secretary and a very loyal friend, so I believe I can speak frankly.”
    “You would anyway.”
    “Yes, well. You and the faculty cabal that put you up to this should know that what I do with my private life is my business. So to you and to them—butt out.”
    “I didn’t mean—”
    “And furthermore, whether you or they are willing to admit it or not, Isaac Schwartz is as qualified to be a member of this faculty, in the unlikely event that he would ever want to, as well over half the people on our payroll, and some of them in tenured positions at that. So please…no more town-gown crap, okay?”
    Agnes’ face flushed a bright red. “Yes Ma’am.” She turned and left the office.
    Ruth sighed again and turned her attention to the papers on her desk.
    The clock sounded the quarter hour.
    ***
    Ike had Karl drive back to the sheriff’s office while he leaned back and closed his eyes. He had a murder on his hands and it was going to be a dilly.
    “Sometime this afternoon, get back to Lydell’s and interview his daughter.”
    “Daughter?”
    “Yes. She lives with him. People tell me she drinks. I don’t know. Whenever I’ve talked with her she seemed pretty normal, but you can never tell with drinkers. Anyway, she was ‘indisposed’ as Lydell put it, so see what you can find out from her later today.”
    “I got it. Now, explain that lock thing to me again. I don’t get it. The lock is screwed to the door, not set in it?”
    “Right. In the past, locks, like the one Henry knocked open, were as much a part of the décor as the door. The casings were usually brass and polished every day. They were attached to the door, not inserted into it. The bolt fit into a keeper, also brass, polished, and attached to the jamb. Some developers of new houses are