Golden in Death(87)
Grange, Eve thought as she headed out. She hadn’t expected the headmaster to let Peabody’s insults go. So they’d deal with it.
In the lounge, Rodriges sat at a table, one battered sneaker tapping nervously. He was a skinny little guy with his black hair tied back in a short, curly tail. A pair of soulful dark eyes looked out of a youthful face as Peabody brought him a fizzy.
He wore a T-shirt displaying the formula for pi, with the caption:
THERE’S ALWAYS AN EXTRA SLICE OF PI!
Eve imagined a personality like Whitt’s had delighted in bullying him.
“Here’s Lieutenant Dallas. Lieutenant,” Peabody continued, and handed Eve a tube of Pepsi, “Miguel Rodriges.”
“Thanks for coming in, Mr. Rodriges.”
“That’s okay.” His smile flitted off and on, never reached those soulful eyes. “My, ah, supervisor said I kind of had to. That you had to talk to me about Dr. Rufty’s husband and Mr. Duran’s wife. It’s … it’s awful.”
“You remember Dr. Rufty and Professor Duran?”
“Oh yeah, sure. I should’ve said professor. He wasn’t when he was at TAG, but … I went to the memorial before work this morning. I didn’t really know Dr. Abner, but I wanted to go, just for a few minutes. I’m going to go to Ms. Duran’s memorial, too. It’s important to pay your respects.”
He took a gulp of fizzy. “I’m pretty nervous because I don’t know why you want to talk to me.”
“You liked Rufty and Duran.”
“Sure. I knew Mr. Duran a lot better because he was there longer. I mean when I went there. English wasn’t my best subject. I was better at math and science, but he really helped me, helped me keep my grades up there. I even joined the Shakespeare Club my senior year because he helped me, you know, get it. I don’t know what that has to do with—”
“Miguel.” Eve interrupted him, waited for his eyes to meet hers. “Relax. We’re just looking for some background.”
“Okay. It’s just when the big boss says go talk to the cops like now, it’s a little scary.”
“Nothing to be scared of,” Peabody assured him. “You were good at chemistry.”
“Yeah, well, I liked it. Chem, biology, physics, calculus, programming, comp science.” This time his smile reached his eyes. “All the nerdy stuff. But I had to keep up with the rest, maintain, right? I was on scholarship. Mr. Duran, Ms. Chelsic, Mr. Flint, they really helped me with my weak spots.”
“You liked the school,” Peabody prompted.
“I’d never have gotten into MIT, never been able to land a job at Roarke Industries without the chance I got at TAG.”
“You had some problems with some of the other students,” Eve put in, and he looked down, shrugged.
“I mostly hung with the other nerds.”
“Miguel, you were physically assaulted, taken to the hospital for medical treatment.”
“We work with Detective Callendar,” Peabody added. “You know her.”
“Sure, sure. We hung a lot back in the day. Still do sometimes, but—”
“She remembers when you got beat up.”
Miguel stared hard at his fizzy. “It was awhile ago.”
“She’s not the only one who remembers,” Eve added. “Mr. Rosalind, your chemistry teacher at Gold, believes you were threatened, assaulted, because you refused to cheat. Dr. Rufty added what he learned of the incident in his records.”
Looking up, obviously surprised, Miguel blinked. “He did?”
“He did. It would help us now if you told us what happened.”
“It was a long time ago.”
“You remember the names of teachers who helped you,” Peabody reminded him. “I bet you remember Dr. Rufty, and went to the memorial for his husband this morning because things changed, for the better, when he took over as headmaster. You remember what happened.”
“We’re gathering information, and information from your last year or so at Gold could help us find the person responsible for two murders.”
Alarm flashed over his face. His nervous foot tapped faster. “I don’t see how.”
“It’s our job to see. Tell us what happened.”
“I don’t want to get anyone in trouble after all this time. I mean, you have to let go, right?”
“They’re not going to get in trouble, with us, for what they did back then. But we need the information.”
“Okay, well … Some of the kids liked to pick on the ones who were at TAG on scholarships. Best thing was to try to stay out of their way. It didn’t always work. Some who got picked on did what they had to do. Wrote papers, did homework or projects, um, let somebody copy their work, or even … Okay, so they had somebody they bullied into hacking into some of the teacher networks for exams, even for changing grades. Everybody knew it.”
“Including Headmaster Grange?”
“She knew. I can’t prove it, and I don’t want to. But everybody knew she knew. I got some pressure, got pushed around some. I was pretty puny. Some of the teachers—like Mr. Duran, Mr. Rosalind—they tried to look out for me, for the ones like me. But they can’t be everywhere, you know?”