Stork Raving Mad: A Meg Langslow Mystery (A Meg Lanslow Mystery)

be noticed.
    Didn’t Ramon realize he shouldn’t be talking to these two by himself? I had to do something before he got even deeper in trouble, but the brain wasn’t cooperating.
    “Wait!” I shouted. They all turned to look at me, and boththe jackals took a step back. Ramon merely looked anxiously at my protruding abdomen. In fact they were all staring. I glanced down to see one of P’s feet outlined perfectly against the tautly stretched fabric of my maternity blouse.
    I shoved him back into a more comfortable position, while frantically trying to think.

Chapter 4
     
    “Is there some problem?” Dr. Wright asked.
    I couldn’t come up with anything to say that would rescue Ramon, so I decided to stall. I grabbed the back of a chair and tried to look faint. It wasn’t a stretch. I started breathing as shallowly as I could, trying to keep the perfume reek from triggering a sneeze.
    “I hate to interrupt your discussion, but I’m feeling unwell,” I said. “I need someone to help me. I—I—
achoo
!”
    Both professors flinched.
    “If you have an infectious disease,” Dr. Wright said, “it’s highly inconsiderate to expose others to the possible contagion.”
    I wanted to tell her that it was equally inconsiderate to wear so much perfume that you polluted every room you entered, but I decided that wouldn’t be politic.
    “What I have isn’t contagious,” I said. “I’m sensitive to strong odors. Side effect of pregnancy. I must be reacting to all the seafood Señor Mendoza is cooking. Mr. Soto? Would you mind helping me?”
    Looking even more anxious, Ramon gave me his arm. I leaned on it heavily and steered him back to the kitchen.
    “Should we call a doctor?” he asked, as I sank into a chair in the kitchen. The noise level dropped as at least half the people in the kitchen turned to stare at me.
    “I’m fine,” I said. “Or as fine as anyone can be when she’s swollen to the size of a Panzer tank. You, on the other hand, are in deep—um, big trouble. You shouldn’t be talking to these people by yourself.”
    “You mean I need a lawyer or something?” he said, sounding incredulous.
    “It might come to that, but right now—quick, someone find Professor Waterston!”
    Several people ran in search of Michael.
    “Did you know they were looking for you?” I asked Ramon.
    “Not exactly,” he said. “I knew someone from the English department had been trying to reach me, but they never said what it was about and I figured it was just some kind of bureaucratic thing that could wait until after the show was over.”
    “Well, the show is over for now, unless we—unless Professor Waterston can fix this,” I said.
    Something suddenly occurred to me. I’d been calling Wright and Blanco “doctor.” They referred to Michael as “Professor Waterston.” So did I, usually, when talking about him to anyone from the college. But why? As far as I knew, Caerphilly College had no rule, official or unspoken, that you only called tenured professors “doctor.” I knew adjunct professors in several other departments whom everyone called doctor. As far as I could remember, there were only three Ph.D.s at Caerphilly College that everyone always called “professor” rather than “doctor”—Michaeland his drama colleagues, Abe Sass and Art Rudmann. Maybe I was imagining things or being oversensitive, but this felt to me like a deliberate slight. From now on, I was going to fling Michael’s doctorate in their faces at every opportunity.
    Dr. Michael himself appeared at my side.
    “You wanted me?” he said. “Time to head for the hospital?”
    “Not yet,” I said. “Though if Dr. Wright and Dr. Blanco continue to annoy me, you may need to take them.”
    “Annoy you? Wright and Blanco? How?”
    “They say I can’t do my dissertation on Señor Mendoza, and the play is canceled,” Ramon said.
    Michael’s reaction was lost in a sudden outburst of exclamations and oaths in two languages from the crowd of students.
    “Down with the English department!”
    “Those jerks!”
    “Censorship! Censorship!”
    “Discrimination!”
    I wasn’t up to deciphering what was being said in Spanish, but I assumed the gist was about the same.
    “Professor, can they do that?” one student asked.
    “
Qué pasó?
” Señor Mendoza ask. “
Qué pasó?
”
    Three of the students began explaining to him, simultaneously, in rapid-fire Spanish. At first he looked confused, then he seemed to catch