Catch a Falling Knife

that.”
    “I can understand why she did it.”
    Maybe Mark was too understanding. But I didn’t have to be. I would have a talk with Sandra. But for right now he needed a place to stay until this could be resolved. He had buddies at UNC who would undoubtedly put him up on a temporary basis, but I didn’t want him separated from our family. He was too good a catch to let him get away, even if Sandra didn’t realize it.
    My son, Albert, Sandra’s father, had plenty of room on his farm a few miles from here, but of course he couldn’t show favoritism toward Mark, even though I knew he liked him. Rules like that didn’t apply to me, though. I said, “You can stay with me and sleep on my spare bed.”
    Mark protested, but his heart wasn’t in it. I’m sure he saw the wisdom of keeping in contact with the family. I emphasized that and the convenience of my location, between Sandra’s condo and Albert’s farm. He had to agree with me. I glanced at the back seat of the car. It was filled with his personal belongings.
     
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    From my seat in the corner of the front of the lecture hall I turned and looked up to watch the young men and women file in through the doorways in the raised back of the room. A goodly number of students were taking beginning physics. As a retired mathematics professor I was glad to see that. It boded well for the future of our country. Of course, if you looked and listened more closely you could tell that some of them had come to the U.S. from other countries to attend college, but many stayed after they graduated.
    I wore my blue pantsuit and hoped I looked like an observing professor, but I suspected from the dress of the students, which had deteriorated from my days at Duke, that I needn’t have worried about my clothes. Mark, however, looked sharp in creased slacks and a sweater.
    I spotted Mark’s accuser as soon as she entered the hall, even though my eyesight isn’t as good as it used to be. Mark had said he didn’t know whether she would show up, but I hadn’t been able to think of any reason why she wouldn’t, since if he said or did anything to her he would probably be fired on the spot.
    I had no doubt that it was she. Although Mark hadn’t told me her name, and thus hadn’t violated his gag order, he had given me enough information to recognize her. He and I had communicated in code before. We were attuned to each other’s thought processes. I glanced at Mark, who was already standing at the podium, but he was going through his notes, or pretending to, and he apparently hadn’t seen her.
    She took an aisle seat in the very top row. She wore jeans and a jacket, like many of the other students, women and men alike, but the combination of her delicate face, luxurious dark hair and slim body set her apart. Would she also have the audacity to attend the next Physics lab, which was in a much more intimate setting, if Mark still had his job then?
    The raised seating in the small auditorium reminded me of a story I had heard several times in my teaching days. Male architects, the story went, designed most buildings and they made the angle of ascent in these raised classrooms such that the male professors had the optimum opportunity to look up the coeds’ skirts. This was probably an urban legend, but in any case it didn’t take into account today’s relaxed dress code. Most of the students, female and male, wore jeans in winter so there wasn’t much leg for Mark to see.
    Mark started the lecture promptly at eight. Before he had a chance to say many words, a young woman in the middle of the front row raised her hand. Mark recognized her. She stood up and said in a loud voice, “Dr. Pappas, I just want you to know that a lot of the students support you. We believe that you have been wrongly accused. We will do everything in our power to help you.”
    She sat down and applause broke out. Mark looked flabbergasted, the way I felt. Wasn’t this Star Chamber proceeding supposed to be secret? I looked at the audience; about half of the students were applauding. I craned my neck to see Mark’s accuser in the back row. Her eyes were cast down. One curious thing: I was the only one looking at her. Could it be that they knew about the charges but not who had made them?
    Mark continued with his lecture, stumbling a few times before he got a rhythm going. My heart went out to him.
     
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