Finally. Augustus Manning moaned as he answered the bell and let in his guest. “Shall we to the library?”

Smugly, Pliny Mead chose the most comfortable place to sit, in the center of the Mannings’ molehair settee.

“I thank you for agreeing to meet at an evening hour, Mr. Mead, away from the College,” Manning said.

“Well, sorry I’m late. Your secretary’s message said this is about Professor Lowell. Our Dante class?”

Manning passed his hand over the bare ravine between his two cresting tufts of white hair. “Right, Mr. Mead. Pray, did you speak with Mr. Camp about the class?”

“Guess I did,” said Mead. “For a few hours at that. He wanted to know just about everything I could tell him on Dante. He said he was asking on your account.”

“He was indeed. Yet since then it doesn’t seem he wishes to speak to me. I wonder why.”

Mead crinkled his nose. “Now, how should I know your business, sir?”

“You shouldn’t, my son, of course. But I thought perhaps you could help me nonetheless. I thought that we could marry our information and understand what he might have come upon that would prompt such a shift in his behavior.”

Mead stared blandly, disenchanted by the fact that the meeting held little benefit or enjoyment for him. A box of pipes sat on the mantel. He cheered at the idea of smoking at the fireside of a Harvard fellow. “Those look A1, Dr. Manning.”

Manning nodded pleasantly and prepared a pipe for his guest. “Here, unlike at our campus, we can smoke openly. We can speak openly as well, our words coming out as freely as our smoke. There are some other strange happenings of late, Mr. Mead, that I would like to bring into the light. A policeman came to see me and started asking questions about your Dante class, then stopped himself, as though he had wished to tell me something important but changed his mind.”

Mead closed his eyes and puffed out luxuriously.

Augustus Manning had been patient enough. “I wonder, Mr. Mead, if you’re aware what a dead slide your class ranking has taken presently.”

Mead bolted upright, a grammar school child ready to be ferruled. “Sir, Dr. Manning, believe me it is not for any reason other—”

He interrupted. “I know, my dear boy. I know what happens. Professor Lowell’s class last term—that is to blame. Your brothers have always been first scholars in their commencement classes. Haven’t they?”

Bristling with humiliation and anger, the student looked away.

“Perhaps we can see to it that some adjustments are made to your class number to bring your standing more in line with your family honor.”

Mead’s emerald green eyes came to life. “Truly, sir?”

“Perhaps I shall have a smoke now.” Manning grinned, rising from his chair and scrutinizing his beautiful pipes.

Pliny Mead’s mind raced to find what it was Manning might be after to make such a proposition. He relived his meeting with Simon Camp moment by moment. The Pinkerton detective had been trying to collect negative facts about Dante to report to Dr. Manning and the Corporation, to boost their position against re-forming and opening the curriculum. In the second meeting, Camp had seemed excessively interested, now that Mead thought of it. But he did not know what the private detective could have been thinking. Nor did it stand to reason that Boston policemen would ask questions about Dante. Mead thought about recent public events, the insanity of violence and fear that had enveloped their city. Camp had seemed particularly interested in the punishment of the Simoniacs when Mead mentioned it in a long list of examples. Mead thought about the many rumors he had heard about Elisha Talbot’s death; several, although details differed, involved the minister’s charred feet. The minister’s feet. Then there was poor Judge Healey, found naked and covered in…

Why, darn them all! Jennison too! Could it be? And if Lowell knew, wouldn’t that explain his sudden cancellation of their Dante class without real explanation? Could Mead have unwittingly prompted Simon Camp to comprehend it all? Had Lowell concealed his knowledge from the College, from the city? He could be ruined for that! Damn ‘em!

Mead sprang to his feet. “Dr. Manning, Dr. Manning!”

Manning succeeded in lighting a match, but then put it out, suddenly dropping his voice to a whisper. “Did you hear something from the entry?”

Mead listened, shook his head. “Mrs. Manning, sir?”

Manning hooked a long, crooked finger to his mouth. He glided from the parlor to the hallway.

After a moment, he returned to his guest. “My imagination,” he said, locking eyes squarely with Mead. “I only want you to be assured that our privacy is complete. In my heart, I know that you will have something important to share tonight, Mr. Mead.”

“I might indeed, Dr. Manning,” taunted Mead, having organized his strategy in the time Manning had taken to prove their privacy. Dante is a damned murderer, Dr. Manning. Oh yes, I might indeed share something. “Let us talk about class rankings first,” Mead said. “Then we can move on to Dante. Oh, I think what I have to say shall interest you greatly, Dr. Manning.”

Manning beamed. “Why don’t I fix some refreshment to accompany our pipes?”

“Sherry for me, if you please.”

Manning brought over the requested stimulant, which Mead downed in a single gulp. “How about another, dear Auggie? We’ll make a wet night of it.”

Augustus Manning, hunching over his sideboard to prepare another drink, hoped for the student’s sake that what he had to say was important.

He heard a loud thump, signifying, he knew without looking, that the boy had broken a precious object. Manning looked back over his shoulder with irritation. Pliny Mead was sprawled senseless on the settee, his arms hanging limply off either side.

Manning spun around, the decanter slipping out of his grasp. The administrator stared into the face of a uniformed soldier, a man he had seen almost daily along the corridors of University Hall. The soldier had a fixed stare and chewed sporadically; when his lips parted, soft white dots floated on his tongue. He spat and one of the white dots landed on the rug. Manning could not help but look; there seemed to be two letters printed on the wet bit of paper—L and I.

Manning rushed to the corner of the room, where a hunting rifle was posed decoratively on the wall. He climbed a chair to reach it, but then stuttered, “No. No.”

Dan Teal plucked the gun away from Manning’s trembling hands and pummeled his face with its butt in one effortless motion. Then he stood there and watched, watched as the Traitor, cold to the core of his heart, flailed and crumpled to the floor.

XVII

Dr. Holmes scrambled up the long staircase to the Authors’ Room. “Hasn’t Officer Rey come back?” he asked, panting.

Lowell’s knitted eyebrows expressed his frustration.

“Well, perhaps Blight…” Holmes began. “Perhaps he does know something, and Rey will come with good tidings. What of your return visit to the University Hall records room?”

“I’m afraid we might not have one,” Fields said, sighing into his beard.

“Why not?” Holmes asked.

Fields was silent.

“Mr. Teal has not shown himself this evening,” Longfellow explained. “Perhaps he has taken ill,” he added quickly.

“Not likely,” Fields said, crestfallen. “The books show that young Teal hasn’t missed a shift in four months. I’ve called some trouble down on the poor boy’s head, Holmes. And after he volunteered his loyalty again and again.”

“What folly…” Holmes began.

“Is it? I oughtn’t have involved him! Manning might have found out that Teal helped us break in and had him arrested. Or that blasted Samuel Ticknor might have taken revenge on Teal for stopping his shameful games with Miss Emory. In the meantime, we’ve been talking with all my men who fought in the war. None admit to ever using a soldiers’-aid home, and none reveal anything remotely worth knowing.”