In Plain Sight by Barbara Block Read Free Book Online Page B

scattered here and there the parking lot was empty. Eight girls were clustered on the far side of the grassy verge watching what I took to be the boys’ track team running sprints. Even from the distance I could hear their coach yelling at them to go faster. Half hidden behind a stunted plane tree four scrubby-looking kids were huddled in a side doorway smoking. The jocks, the cheerleaders, and the punks. I shook my head. Some things never change.
    The school building was a rambling one-story affair of yellow brick. I parked right out in front and went inside. The hallway I was standing in had that slightly shabby air that comes from too much use and too little money. Announcements of club meetings and the coming school play were taped over the tile walls. I walked over and read them, wondering as I did what it would feel like to be that young again and if I could be, what I would do differently. Then I followed the arrows over to the main office. The door was closed. No one was inside. It looked as if everyone was gone for the day.
    I lit a cigarette and walked back toward the main entrance. On the way out I heard voices rising and falling. I turned and followed them into a large room that turned out to be the cafeteria. Six kids were sitting at one of the tables. They stopped talking when I came in.
    â€œAny of the office staff around?” I asked.
    â€œThey went home,” a skinny boy with bad skin and a nose ring answered. “Why? What you want? You got a kid in trouble?”
    â€œNo. Actually I wanted to talk to them about Mrs. Pennington.”
    â€œWhat you want to talk about her for?” his friend asked. “She’s dead.”
    A real comedian. “I know. I was a friend of hers.”
    â€œOh.” He seemed momentarily taken back at the news.
    â€œDid any of you know her?” I inquired.
    â€œI was in her study hall,” the one I was talking to said. “She was okay.”
    â€œYeah,” his friend agreed. “Her classroom is right down the hall.”
    â€œCould you show me where?”
    â€œSure.” He got up and took me there.
    Marsha’s classroom wasn’t very big. In fact, I’d seen closets that were larger. A window would have helped. So would a ventilation fan, I thought as I sniffed the stale air. The desks were pushed so close together there was barely space to walk between them. From the looks of things ESL students didn’t rate real high in the priority scale. Of course to be fair, up until recently there hadn’t been a lot of immigrants coming to Syracuse either.
    I sighed and walked over to Marsha’s desk. The top was bare just as I knew it would be. I sat down at her desk and pulled out the middle drawer. Except for a box of paper clips it was empty. I closed it and was just about to try one of the side drawers when I heard a noise. I looked up expecting to see the kids that had shown me the classroom.
    But I didn’t.
    Instead the doorway was filled by a large, glowering man.

Chapter 6
    â€œW hat the hell are you doing?” he demanded, shifting the the you the mop and pail he was holding from one hand to the other.
    â€œPeople ask me that a lot,” I cracked, doing funny.
    He didn’t laugh. Obviously he didn’t think I was very amusing. But then I’ve been told lots of people don’t.
    â€œI asked what you’re doing here?” the man repeated doggedly. “I’m the custodian and I have the right to know.”
    No kidding. I didn’t think I was dealing with the head of the English Department here. But I didn’t say that. Instead I explained as I studied him that I was looking for some papers that Mrs. Pennington had said she was leaving for me. He looked as if he was in his early forties. He was balding and pasty skinned with a broken nose that had never healed properly and the look of an ex-high school football player whose athletic career now consisted of watching the