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.
“… so he just went blank,” Mlle. Parker said. “And I was all rise and shine, but he just sat there and spaced.”
“You know his story, right? Word is his wife just vanished into thin air this summer.”
“What do you mean she vanished?” Parker asked. “Like ran away on him, ’cause that I could see.”
A third voice chimed in. “No. That’s just it—they don’t know what happened to her. Went all missing person on him. They say she might be dead.”
“Get out. You don’t suppose he killed her and dumped the body?”
They shared a nervous laugh.
“C’mon, guys,” one of them said. “Not nice. But no wonder he’s that way. Seriously lost.”
Parker leaned across the table. “Hey, you never know about the secret life.”
*
Kay’s joints rumbled, her stitches pulled at the seams. The vibrations meant that they were moving once again. On the main roads at constant speed, the hum of the engine and the rolling wheels lulled them to sleep, but a bump or a pothole and everybody was awake and complaining. If the jolt was harsh enough to cause the shocks to spring, her neighbors in the cardboard mausoleum swore and cursed the driver. They had been packed into some sort of van or truck, the puppet box wedged into place by other crates and cartons, shifting only slightly on the steepest of hills or the sharpest of curves. The back of the vehicle was dark, dank, and dismal. Inside her compartment, Kay suffered with the heat. The straw laid down as a cushion made her itch and twist to find comfort and relief. But most oppressive was the dullness of the routine. They would mosey for a few hours and then rest. She imagined that the drivers had stopped for lunch or to use a bathroom or to stretch their legs. And then back in the van and move some more until night fell. One or the other, for both the Deux Mains and the Quatre Mains took a turn at the wheel, would come to the back and open the door, and the stale air would belch out in a rush as fresh air billowed in. After they checked their cargo, the giants departed. Above her, the Sisters yawned like three little kittens. Only when they were all shut in for the night, Kay dared to speak.
“Olya? Masha? Irina?” she called to them.
“Dahlink,” they sang together.