Run Away(58)

“Do you mind if I walk with you?”

She said that would be fine, but she said it grudgingly.

Simon read the class list as they headed for the door. “Does anything jump out at you?”

“Not really. Most of the classes were pretty big. I don’t think the professors will really remember her. The only exception would be Professor van de Beek.”

They started across that bright, green quad.

“What did van de Beek teach?”

“That genetics class I told you about.”

“Where can I find him?”

Still walking, Eileen pecked something out on her mobile phone. “Here, this is him.”

She handed him the phone.

Professor Louis van de Beek was young, probably not yet thirty and—not to be that father—he looked like the kind of professor that made young co-eds swoon. His so-black-it’s-blue hair was a touch too long, his skin a little too waxy. He had good teeth, a nice smile. He wore a tight black T-shirt in the picture, his toned arms folded over his chest.

What the hell happened to professors with tweed sport coats?

Under his portrait, it read “Professor of Biological Science.” It also listed his office address at Clark House, his email address, his website, and finally, the classes he taught, including Introduction to Genetics and Genealogy.

“You said he was an exception.”

“Yes.”

“Why?” Simon asked.

“For one thing, Genetics and Genealogy was a small class,” she said. “So we got to know the professor pretty well. But for Paige, he was something more.”

“Like what?”

“Professor van de Beek ran that Family Tree club I told you she got obsessed with. I know she visited him during office hours. A lot.”

Simon frowned again. Eileen must have spotted it.

“Oh no, nothing like that.”

“Okay.”

“When Paige got here, she didn’t know what to major in. Like the rest of us. You knew that, right?”

He nodded. He and Ingrid had encouraged that. No need to lock yourself down, they’d told her. Explore. Try new things. You’ll find your passion.

“Paige talked a lot about her mom and her job.” Then she quickly added, “Not that she didn’t talk about you too, Mr. Greene. I mean, I think she found your job interesting too.”

“It’s okay, Eileen.”

“Anyway, I think she sort of hero-worshipped her mom. Professor van de Beek is also the freshman counselor for students who want to go into medicine.”

Simon swallowed. “Paige wanted to be a physician?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

The revelation crushed him anew. Paige had wanted to be a doctor. Like her mother.

“Anyway,” Eileen continued, “I don’t think this has anything to do with her meeting Aaron, but Professor van de Beek was a big part of her life here.”

They crossed in front of Ratner dormitory, where Paige and Eileen had lived freshman year, walking right across the spot where Simon had hugged his daughter goodbye a lifetime ago.

The painful hits just kept coming.

When Eileen spotted some friends in front of the Isherwood building, she told Simon that her class was inside and bid him a quick goodbye. He waved as she left and then headed over to Clark House. When he entered the front foyer, an older woman with a face that had seen it all before the Eisenhower administration sat behind the desk and scowled at him.

A small nameplate read MRS. DINSMORE. No first name.

“May I help you?” Mrs. Dinsmore said in a voice that indicated any help would come very reluctantly.

“I’m looking for Professor van de Beek.”

“You won’t find him.”

“Pardon?”

“Professor van de Beek is on sabbatical.”

“Since when?”

“I’m not at liberty to answer any additional questions on the matter.”

“Is he around or is he traveling?”

Mrs. Dinsmore had a pair of glasses on a chain around her neck. She put them on now and frowned with even more disapproval. “What part of ‘not at liberty to answer’ did you find confusing?”

Simon had Louis van de Beek’s email from that web directory. That seemed the more prudent way to go. “You’ve been a delight, thank you.”

“I aim to please,” Mrs. Dinsmore replied, head down, writing something down.

Simon headed back toward his car. He called Yvonne and heard yet again how nothing with Ingrid’s condition had changed. He wanted to ask a million questions, but an odd memory came to him. Early in his relationship with Ingrid, Simon worried about the overseas markets and political upheaval and upcoming earnings reports—anything that could affect his clients’ portfolios. That was natural enough, part of the job on the surface, but it actually made him a less focused and less effective financial analyst.

“The serenity prayer,” Ingrid had told him one night. She’d been sitting at the computer, wearing one of his dress shirts, her back to him.

“What?”

He came up behind her and rested his hands on his beautiful wife’s shoulders. The printer whirred. She reached for a sheet of paper and handed it to him.

“Put this on your desk,” she said.