Mudwoman. Joyce Carol Oates
of course not. You are free to write about this—to write about anything—of course—but—”
“But—what?”
Calmly M.R. continued. Calmly if a bit tightly she smiled. In the Quaker Meeting the ideal is clearness—clarity—out of confusion and dissension an infusion of the Light will prevail. Without ever having quite examined her beliefs M.R. seemed to believe this, or wished to believe it.
Not in her analytical/skeptical mode as an academic philosopher but in her mode as professor/president, she wished to believe in a vision of humankind as evolving toward light, truth, compassion like a gigantic flower opening—otherwise, one’s compassion, like one’s naïveté, was an embarrassment.
“—for the present time, while the investigations are going on—isn’t it wiser just to wait? It really isn’t a good idea, as you must know—to write something prematurely. Especially if you don’t want to tell your family—they would surely discover it, and be upset….”
Stirk shifted excitedly in his chair. As if M.R. had tossed a lighted match onto flammable material, immediately Stirk began speaking in a rapid stammer. “So this meeting is about—censorship! Censoring me! Threatening me with telling my family—worrying my family! Like—like this is—blackmail! Trying to censor the voice of the conservative movement on this campus! Already the leftist-liberals control the media—already you control the majority of universities—now, you are putting pressure to silence—censor—a victim—Trying to censor me—with the pretense of ‘helping’ me….”
“Alexander, please! There’s no need to raise your voice. I am just pointing out that—”
“‘Pointing out that’—vicious, immoral behavior is condoned on this campus—sexual promiscuity, drunkenness—infanticide—but revealing to the media what has happened to me—is ‘not a good idea’?”
Stirk’s voice was raised. Stirk was both incensed and gloating. M.R. was stunned by the sudden outburst.
“Are you—recording this? Our conversation? Is that what you are doing?” Suddenly M.R. knew this must be so.
But Stirk shook his head quickly—no. As if M.R. had leaned across the desk to touch him—to touch him improperly—he recoiled in his seat with a look of childish guilt, insolence. “No, I am not. I am—not—‘recording’—our conversation, President Neukirchen. Maybe you’d like to—frisk me? Call in your security cops—maybe a—strip search?”
Laughing Stirk lurched to his feet. In the commotion the aluminum crutch clattered to the floor and Stirk snatched it up as if in fear it might be taken from him. Astonished and mortified M.R. understood that, of course, this devious young man had been recording their conversation. Some sort of recording device was in a pocket of that bulky corduroy jacket.
Probably, Oliver Kroll had encouraged him. For this was our war, an early skirmish.
M.R.’s face flushed with heat. She hoped she had not spoken recklessly—said something incriminating—during the course of their conversation. In a mild panic she wondered—could her remarks to Alexander Stirk be broadcast, posted on the Web? Without her permission? Weren’t there laws regulating unauthorized tapings of private conversations? Was this in fact a private conversation? Had the University president a reasonable expectation of privacy, in such an exchange with a student? Her heart was beating painfully and her face throbbed with heat as if she’d been slapped.
Stirk said impudently, “And what if it is being recorded, President Neukirchen? I’m only trying to protect myself—no one can expect fair treatment—‘justice’—from their enemies. I will have to build my case using the weapons I can.”
M.R. was on her feet behind the massive presidential desk. M.R. who had never been known to raise her voice, to betray upset or agitation, still less anger or dislike, staring at the smirking boy as if she’d have liked now to hit him.
“You weren’t really ‘attacked’—were you? You’ve fabricated the entire incident—you injured yourself—filed a false report to the police—”
Hotly Stirk protested: “I did not. How dare you—insult me—slander me! How dare you accuse me of—‘fabricating’—”
“Well—did you? You did.”
Never once in this austere presidential office—not once in her months—years—at the University—had M. R. Neukirchen spoken in so uncalculated a voice, with such vehemence; never once had her face betrayed any emotion so extreme as annoyance, still less dislike, repugnance. The effect upon Stirk was immediate—his pinched little boy’s face contorted with rage and in a sudden tantrum he overturned the chair in which he’d been sitting.
M.R. cried angrily, “Stop! Stop that! You aren’t a child!”
M.R. cringed as Stirk lifted the crutch to strike at the desk, or at her—he swept a stack of documents onto the floor—a small ceramic bowl containing pens, paper clips—M.R. tried to grab the crutch, to wrench it from Stirk’s fingers—Stirk gave a loud yelp as if she’d struck him—a yelp as of surprised pain—“Hey! Jesus! What’re you doing—that hurts”—for the benefit of the recording device in his corduroy jacket.
“But I didn’t—I didn’t—”
“Didn’t what, President Neukirchen? Hit me? You didn’t—hit me?”
As M.R. stared in astonishment the gloating boy stuck his tongue out at her. His tongue! Within these swift and irretrievable seconds the conversation M.R. had believed so forthright had shifted to farce, and President Neukirchen was the butt of the farce. Quivering with mischief Stirk fitted the crutch into his armpit and turned to limp out of the office just as the door was being opened by the president’s secretary whom he pushed aside with the crutch, laughing—“Here’s a witness! Another female! Expect a subpoena, lady!”
Limping noisily and conspicuously through the president’s outer office Alexander Stirk departed historic Salvager Hall like a sequence of mallet strokes against a just barely unyielding hardwood floor.
So it would be shortly charged: not only had M. R. Neukirchen tried to “censor” Alexander Stirk, the woman had actually—in some sort of “scuffle” in the president’s office—struck him.
In some versions of the lurid story, she’d struck him with the injured undergraduate’s very crutch.
Should have known. Hadn’t she been warned.
This is a war. There are enemies.
Her heart beat in her ears. Barely she could hear the man addressing her, in an air of scarcely concealed exasperation.
Lockhardt had been chief counsel for the University for more than thirty years. Presidents of the University had inherited him as they’d inherited the presidential office itself—its austere furnishings and leather-bound books, the portrait of grim Reverend Charters above the fireplace mantel. Lockhardt’s manner was unapologetically patrician—he had virtually no presence in the consciousness of the University faculty but his presence was essential to the board of trustees who looked to him as the president’s key adviser, beside whom the president could seem but a temporary and expedient hireling.
Before taking office M.R. had imagined that she might encourage Leonard Lockhardt to retire and in his place she’d hire a younger attorney of her own generation and liberal convictions but as soon as she’d become president M.R. had known how she needed the man, his experience, his influence with trustees and “major” donors. He’d graduated from the University with a degree in classics in 1955 and he’d gone to Harvard Law and like most graduates of his generation he’d been opposed to the appointment of a female president at the University, though M.R. wasn’t supposed to know this.
He was a bachelor. His long lean cheeks were clean-shaven and he exuded an airy sexless good cheer in all weathers. He wore suits tailored for him in Bond Street, London, long-sleeved