Page 56 of The Botanist's Assistant
She eats dinner at the kitchen table, the wind picking up in intensity and making pine branches brush against the back wall of her house. The lilac bushes rustle, the roses bow their buds. Last winter, a storm blew in from the northeast, sending a large gray pine falling across the driveway and blocking her exit as she headed for work. She’d gotten out her chainsaw, cut the tree into rounds and rolled them off to the side. She arrived late to the lab with her boots muddy and a few wood chips stuck in her hair.
“Your talents are endless, Finch,” Dr. Deaver said after he’d commented on the wood chips and she’d told him about the tree. “Remind me never to doubt you,” he said.
And, yet, now here she is doing exactly that to him.
She takes her plate and water glass to the sink and washesthem along with the cat’s bowl. She sweeps the floor, noting the small tangle of cat hair (nothing like what Gordie and his friends used to shed), then sits down with her book. She has five chapters to go.
The cat leaps up and curls next to her on the couch. She excuses herself and returns with a towel, which she lays on the cushion. “Let’s keep the cat hair off the upholstery,” she tells it. The little animal seems not to object.
It’s while she’s sitting in bed noting the day’s final entry in her data notebook that an image arises: a navy-blue sweater she’d noticed a certain person wearing in the breakroom yesterday. Did it have all its buttons? She writes:
9:45 p.m. March 27, Rachel Sterling, biochemistry, possible mistress JMD? Blue button, visit to grief counselor? How to find out?
She sets her alarm four minutes earlier than normal. Enough time to feed the cat and send it off, which allows her to arrive at work precisely at seven forty-five the next morning. It’s Friday. She wears a dark skirt and her California poppy blouse.
At eight thirty-five Calvin limps in.
“I may have done too much,” he groans. “I could barely get out of bed this morning.”
“You went for a run?”
“I don’t know how people do it. All that sweating and pounding the pavement just to wind up where you started. Plus you wouldn’t believe the chafing. I—”
“That’s enough, Calvin.”
“I’m not sure I can sit down.”
“Why don’t you do the dishes, then we’ll do the final confirmatory tests for Dr. Deaver’s paper. You can do all that standing up.”
“Thanks, Mags.”
“Margaret, please,” she corrects. What did she do to deserve such an abbreviation? She is not a type of flashlight or theMultiagent and Grid Systemsjournal.
“Sorry,” Calvin says. “I think all this nicotine is making me woozy.”
“All this nicotine?”
“Two patches plus nicotine gum. I chewed three pieces on my way to work. Do you think that’s too much?”
“I think moderation may not be your strong suit. Perhaps cut back a little on the nicotine. Perhaps jog a shorter route too.”
At ten, she heads for the breakroom, where she downs a quick cup of coffee from her thermos—the new Mr. Coffee seems to do its job more efficiently and properly than her old brewer—then heads for Purdy’s desk.
The assistant is dressed in a silky blue blouse and tight skirt with a long silver necklace that dives into her cleavage. A stack of pink phone messages is fanned in her hand.
“Wait outside,” she mouths and goes into the dean’s office, closing the door behind her. Is Purdy’s desk even morecluttered than it was before? One must wish to break a habit before even a small crack can appear.
Margaret checks her watch. She has seven minutes before her break ends. She goes outside and sits in the bench by the front door, her hands folded neatly in her lap. She is not a fidgeter, a foot tapper, a squirmer. Controlled patience is the secret to scientific discovery.
When Purdy comes out the building’s front doors five minutes later, Margaret starts to rise, but Purdy gives a slight shake of her head. “Count to ten, then follow me around the corner,” she mutters as she passes.
Margaret counts out ten seconds just to be sure. Purdy’s request didn’t specify a fast or a slow count.
“We can’t be seen talking together,” Purdy says when Margaret arrives.
Students walk past, some hurrying, some looking as if they just stumbled out of bed. Margaret is pretty sure one young man is still in his pajamas. Nobody even glances at them, even though the sight of two women—one very large and one small—huddled near a Leyland cypress might be notable.
“Why can’t we be seen together?” Margaret asks.
