The Motion of Puppets(30)
Theo missed her most on Tuesdays and Thursdays. During the fall semester at the small college upstate, he had only two days of classes teaching both French language and literature, more than enough to keep him busy, what with the unfinished Muybridge translation loitering in the background. In years gone by, the long train ride up the Hudson Valley had offered him a chance to read or write, but now he spent most of the trip looking at the passing landscape, his thoughts filled with Kay. Rocking, in constant motion, he dozed and dreamt of her in his arms, the warmth of her skin, the scent of her body, her hair, the taste, the sound, the touch—until he roused himself from slumber, embarrassed if someone happened to be sitting next to him. Then he would turn away, press his forehead against the window, and try to forget for the rest of the trip. “Not her, not her,” he whispered along with the rhythm of the train rolling on the track. And a bump would jolt him, bang his skull against the glass, and he would dig in his briefcase, find a book, grade a paper, set a lesson plan in his lap.
The first week back at college was marked by sheer awkwardness. His colleagues offered perfunctory greetings, a few words of consolation from the more kindhearted who had heard the news, but mostly the staff and faculty avoided him as though grief were contagious or they, too, suspected him of foul play. Even his comrades in the Modern Languages wing were cold to him. Frau Morgenschweis would not look him in the eye. Se?ora Martinez said how sorry she was on his first day back and then went silent. Only Dr. Mitchell, who knew seven languages and taught Greek and Latin, was the same as ever, blithely unaware of gossip and office politics.
“Dr. Harper.” He nodded when their paths crossed at the communal coffeepot. “You were away this summer, eh? How is that new bride of yours?”
The question stunned him. “Ah, Dr. Mitchell, you haven’t heard? My wife has gone missing.”
“Missing?” Behind his wire-rimmed glasses, Mitchell blinked his eyes in confusion and empathy.
Theo shook his head and tried to keep his composure. “Literally, actually missing. She disappeared in the middle of a night in June, and we haven’t seen her since. Not a trace.”
“Jesus, I’m so sorry.” His voice cracked. “The police are looking for her?”
“Yes, since she vanished. Up in Québec, where she was performing for the summer. I was there to keep her company and work on my translation.”
“My dear.” Mitchell gripped Theo’s arm and hung on tightly. “Have you asked the chair for a leave of absence?”
The touch of another human, even such a small gesture, filled him with a profound lonesomeness. He knew that he had to free himself or risk a breakdown in the faculty lounge. “I looked for her all the time, called the detectives every day, but she just seems to be completely gone. I thought that work might help me deal with it better. I’m surprised you hadn’t heard. I understand there was a memo—”
“I never read the memos.” Mitchell leaned his head close enough so that the pink of his scalp shone through the thatch of his thinning hair. “If you need anything, even just a sympathetic ear…”
Loosening his grip, Mitchell patted him on the shoulder and went away, talking quietly to himself.
The classroom offered Theo refuge from his sorrows. If they knew, the students had the sense or apprehension not to bring up the matter. For the first few weeks of the semester, Theo busied himself with the new freshmen, sorting those who had decent instruction in high school from those who had only the rudiments of French. Another class of six students commencing their second year worked on enriching their understanding of grammar, the study of sentences, irregularities, idioms, and style. Most of all he loved his seminar on Flaubert, where he could almost lose himself in the discussions, but even in the middle of a conversation with his bright and curious students, his thoughts drifted to Kay.
One young woman interrupted one such reverie by snapping her fingers to gain his attention and wake him from a trance. “Dr. Harper, professor, excuse me. But I was just wondering why this novel is called Madame Bovary if we have to wait so long for Emma to arrive? I mean, initially you think it is a book about Charles, and then his mother. And then there’s Heloise. I mean, isn’t it all way too convenient that his first wife just ups and dies?”
He blinked. His voice seized up, the words went dry in his mouth. Of course, Kay could be dead. He had been open to such a possibility, as early as the day they showed him the body of the drowned woman, but until that moment in the classroom, he had not considered it as a twist in their story. The student’s question hovered in the air, but she herself evaporated from view, as did the others around the table. Everything was going away and leaving him resolutely alone in the room, and the only sound that reached his ears was the ticking of the cheap clock on the wall above the door. The student cleared her throat.
“Mademoiselle Parker, is it?” he asked. “Convenient? That’s one way of looking at the death of Heloise, but I would say inevitable. From the moment Charles first sees Emma and is smitten, the whole story is set in motion. And it becomes her story. Emma’s.” He looked at the clock again, finally noticing the time. “And I’m afraid I’ve kept you all late.” He dismissed them and sat at the table while they filed away.
Later that afternoon in the student union, he was puttering around with his Muybridge in a corner when a clutch of students came in and sat in a group of easy chairs overlooking the quad. They were loud and disruptive, and he recognized two or three from his Flaubert class, including the skeptic Parker. Hidden from their view, Theo could eavesdrop on their conversation with a modicum of effort.