Catch a Falling Knife

possible that Donna thought Elise was snubbing her. That could be very upsetting to her.”
    “Eric also said that Donna had better watch out. I wonder what he meant by that.”
    “It occurs to me that the time these people should have watched out was before Elise was killed.” Mark had been glancing around the noisy and crowded room. He gestured with his eyes and said, “Look three tables to your left.”
    Speak of the devil. It was Donna, all right, sitting alone at a small table, eating a sandwich. Her profile was toward us and I didn’t think she had seen us. We studied her for a few seconds and I wondered something I had wondered many times before: How can people recognize their relatives and friends out of the billions of people in the world, many of whom must look like them? In Donna’s case she was very average looking; her features did not single her out and yet I was completely certain it was she from her hair, her head and arm movements, and other cues, however minor, that when taken together, added up to a complete picture. But as easy as it was to spot Donna, I knew it would have been easier to spot Elise, sitting at the same table.
    “Stay here,” I said to Mark. “You’re not supposed to talk to her, but I’m going to.”
    Mark looked concerned. “Be careful what you say.”
    “I’m always careful.”
    I took a circular route to Donna’s table, walking behind her so that when she saw me she would be facing away from Mark. I approached her from her other side and said, “Is this seat taken?”
    “Oh…hi, Professor,” Donna said, startled, as she looked up from a book she was reading.
    “I don’t mean to interrupt. I spotted you across a crowded room and wanted to say hello.”
    “No, please sit down.” Donna had recovered her composure. “It’s good to see you. And I wanted to thank you again for inviting me to Professor Morgan’s…” she laughed, “…the other Professor Morgan’s farm. I had a great time.”
    “I’m glad you could come,” I said. “We all enjoyed having you,” including Mark at least by implication, figuring that his opinion would weigh heaviest with her. “What are you reading?”
    “Oh, this. It’s poetry. Emily Dickinson. It doesn’t have anything to do with any of my classes. I should be reading my physics book. Which reminds me, the class really missed having Dr. Pappas give the lecture yesterday. He makes everything so understandable. The professor who took over the class is an old guy—excuse me, I didn’t mean that in a derogatory way—who talks in long sentences and I couldn’t follow him well enough to take good notes. I hope Dr. Pappas gets his job back soon.”
    I looked over at Mark’s table, but he had disappeared. I said, “So do I. Do you like Emily Dickinson?”
    “Well, as you know, I fancy myself to be somewhat of a poet so I figured I should learn from the greats. But what I really want to be, as I think I told you, is a lyricist. That’s the only way you can make any money as a poet.”
    “But of course that’s a difficult profession to break into. Incidentally, I talked to Eric Hoffman this morning. He said the two of you are friends.”
    Donna looked startled at the mention of Eric’s name. She giggled, nervously, and said, “Yeah, I guess you could say we’re friends. He’s a sweet man.”
    “And someone you can talk to about your dream of being a lyricist?”
    “He’s a good listener.”
    “And he might have had some influence with Elise and helped her to see that you and she belonged in a partnership together.”
    I must have been very witty because Donna laughed again.
    She said, “I didn’t need anybody to speak to Elise for me. We got along just fine.”
    “Did she want to sing professionally?”
    “She was thinking about it. She was talking about singing with the rock group again this coming summer.”
     “And you were going to write lyrics for them?”
    “Well…they are looking at some words I wrote to see if they can put them to music.”
    “When did you decide to disclose your secret identity?”
    Donna looked puzzled so I said, “I read the article about you in today’s Bethany Bugle .”
    “Oh, that.” Donna laughed again and looked around, apparently to see if anybody was listening. “The police knew about it and you knew about it. I figured it would come out, anyway, in conjunction with the investigation, so I decided, what the heck, when a reporter called, asking questions