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

conversations, accompanied by flamenco music played on a guitar—no, make that several guitars—and a rhythmic staccato rattle that could only be someone dancing to the music.
    I felt a wave of nostalgia mingled with resentment. Back in the B.P. days—before pregnancy—I’d have been down in the kitchen. I might not have eaten the seafood, but it wouldn’t have bothered me so much. And I could have enjoyed the music, the conversation, the dancing, and the wine.
    And I would again, I told myself, as I carefully descended the stairs. Just not for a while. And there was no reason foreveryone else to do without just because I wasn’t in the mood at the moment.
    But at least they could turn on the kitchen exhaust fan to keep the odors from drifting upstairs with such intensity.
    Just then the doorbell rang.
    I paused on the second step from the bottom. I really didn’t feel like opening the door and having to deal with more visitors, not to mention the cold air.
    “Can someone answer that?”
    The flamenco music continued unabated. They probably hadn’t even heard me.
    “Hello, anyone?” I called.
    The doorbell rang again, twice, in quick succession. Our would-be guests were getting impatient.
    “Hold your damned horses,” I muttered as I waddled to the door.
    While unlocking the deadbolt, I tried to assume a polite, welcoming face. Or at least a neutral face. I’d save the scowl in case the impatient doorbell ringer was someone who really deserved it.
    I swung the door open to find a man and a woman standing outside. Both wore frowns that matched my mood. And instead of saying anything, they both gawked at my protruding belly as if they’d never seen a pregnant woman before. They both had that hunched-against-the-cold look that so many people around campus wore these days, probably because they were only wearing light coats.
    Okay, I understood their impatience, though it wasn’t myfault they’d neglected to dress for the weather. But I wasn’t letting them in till I knew they weren’t trying to convert us or sell us something.
    “May I help you?” I asked. I was polite, though certainly not warm.
    “Is this the residence of Professor Waterston?” the woman said. She was forty-something and might have been attractive if she could lose the scowl, though the lines of her face hinted that it was habitual. She wasn’t wearing a hat over her neatly permed brown hair or gloves on her well-manicured fingers.
    “Yes,” I said. “May I tell him who’s calling?”
    “I am Dr. Wright,” she said. “From the English department. And this is Dr. Blanco, from administrative services.” She indicated the man, who was tall and also fortyish, with a thin, anxious face. He was bareheaded, too, though at least he wore driving gloves.
    “May we come in?” Dr. Blanco asked.
    “Of course,” I said, stepping back from the door. Blanco I’d never heard of before, but I had the sinking feeling I should know who Wright was. The drama department, where Michael taught, was technically an unloved subgroup of the English department.
    They stepped inside with just enough haste to make me feel sorry for them. They both set down slim, expensive-looking briefcases, and the woman carefully set a purse atop hers—a small, sleek bit of leather, probably a designer brand that a more fashion-conscious woman would have recognized instantly. Then they shed their coats and tried to hand them to me.
    I gestured to the coatracks, which still had a few free hangers, and stepped a little farther away. It wasn’t just that I resented being treated like a maid. One of them was wearing an overly strong perfume or aftershave that was making my nose tickle. Hard to tell which of them was the culprit—the scent didn’t seem particularly masculine or feminine. Just unpleasant.
    “If you’ll wait here in the hall, I’ll tell—
achoo!
—tell my husband you’re here.” I fumbled in my pocket for a tissue and gestured at some of the dining room chairs.
    “Actually,” Dr. Blanco said, “we’re looking for one of Professor Waterston’s students. A Ramon Soto.”
    “We understand he lives here,” Dr. Wright added. Her face frowned a little more, as if showing her disapproval of any unorthodox living arrangements. In fact, both of them were wearing the sort of disagreeable expressions my nephews used to call prune faces.
    “Ramon Soto is staying here,” I said. “Until the heating plant is back in order and the dorms are