Sounds of Murder

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

It was getting dark and the wind was picking up when Pamela Barnes roared into the small parking lot on the side of Blake Hall on the campus at Grace University. Barely missing nicking the tail light on Dr. Swinton's old Buick, she found one remaining spot at the far end just minutes before her graduate seminar was scheduled to start at 6 p.m. She was just locking her Civic, when her graduate assistant, Kent Drummond, appeared.

"Hi, Dr. B," he greeted her, his ear stud gleaming in the last rays of sunlight. "Got the last space, I see."

"Yes," she smiled. "Lucky me." She tightened her jacket around her body. The wind snapped her fine blonde hair briskly in front of her face. Kent stepped beside her and the two of them strode purposefully towards the side entrance of the building.

"Those were some hard articles you assigned for tonight, Dr. B," he noted, holding the door open for her as Pamela zipped inside before another gust of wind whipped up her skirt.

"It's graduate school," explained Pamela, laughing. "You don't expect it to be easy, do you?" Kent chuckled weakly in response.

"Come on, Dr. B," he moaned, "Those articles were overkill." Pamela registered his word choice with amusement. Kent's all black outfit with a blood-spattered machete design on the front of his t-shirt would never scream "conscientious graduate student" to the rest of the world, but she knew his "look" was all bravado. He was one of her best students.

"That's material you're going to have to know," responded Pamela.

"If you say so. Oh, Dr. B, I ran that second group of subjects through the protocol. You want me to enter the data tonight?" he asked, his sneakers squishing as he walked.

"You mean they all showed?"

Their footsteps echoed in the high-ceilinged main hallway of the ancient old building.

"Sure thing, Dr. B. That's what extra credit in a hard course like Dr. Clark's will do for your turn-out," he chirped. How true, she thought. Charlotte Clark was famous and with fame came popularity. Students across campus wanted to take her courses on addiction, whether they were Psych majors or not. And Charlotte always made her students participate in research. Too bad she didn't allow them to participate in animal psych research too. Then her friend Arliss, who taught animal psychology, could benefit from Charlotte's largess. However, Pamela was not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. She would use her participants however she got them.

She turned to the young man beside her, saying, "You can hold off on data entry until tomorrow. Then, changing the subject, she added, "Kent, are you sure you locked the lab up properly when you left this afternoon?"

"Sure, Dr. B," he answered, "I'm always very careful with the lab."

"That's good," she replied, sounding a note of caution. "We can't be too careful, really. That lab has some of the most expensive equipment on campus or even in the state. I'm sure there are plenty of people who'd like to get their hands on it." She hated playing campus cop like this, but her Chair had been pounding the faculty lately about lab security.

"Like I said, Dr. B," he repeated, "You can count on me. I always lock it when I leave and I double check to make sure all the equipment is put away and safe too. Don't worry." Kent waved good-bye and trekked across the hall towards the seminar room on the right.

Pamela noticed her colleague Phineas Ottenback coming out of the departmental office across the hallway on the left. He locked the door behind himself.

"Oh, Dr. Barnes," he said turning, eyes popping open as he saw Pamela, "Did you need to get into the office? I'm sorry I just locked it." A shock of wispy, red hair flopped down over his forehead.