Dead Soldiers Read online

  DEAD SOLDIERS

  Bill Crider

  Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press

  Copyright 2013 / Bill Crider

  Copy-edited by: Anita Lorene Smith

  Cover design by: David Dodd

  LICENSE NOTES

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to the vendor of your choice and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Meet the Author

  BILL CRIDER is the author of more than fifty published novels and numerous short stories. He won the Anthony Award for best first mystery novel in 1987 for Too Late to Die and was nominated for the Shamus Award for best first private-eye novel for Dead on the Island. He won the Golden Duck award for “best juvenile science fiction novel“ for Mike Gonzo and the UFO Terror. He and his wife, Judy, won the best short story Anthony in 2002 for their story “Chocolate Moose.“ His story “Cranked“ from Damn Near Dead (Busted Flush Press) was nominated for the Edgar award for best short story.

  Check out his homepage at: http:// www.billcrider.com—or take a look at his peculiar blog at http://billcrider.blogspot.com

  Book List

  Carl Burns Series

  One Dead Dean

  Dying Voices

  . . . A Dangerous Thing

  Dead Soldiers

  Truman Smith Series

  Dead on the Island

  Gator Kill

  When Old Men Die

  The Prairie Chicken Kill

  Murder Takes a Break

  Horror Novels

  (all published under the pseudonym “Jack MacLane“)

  Keepers of the Beast

  Goodnight, Moom

  Blood Dreams

  Rest in Peace

  Just before Dark

  Sheriff Dan Rhodes Series

  Too Late to Die

  Shotgun Saturday Night

  Cursed to Death

  Death on the Move

  Evil at the Root

  Booked for a Hanging

  Murder Most Fowl

  Winning Can Be Murder

  Death by Accident

  A Ghost of a Chance

  A Romantic Way to Die

  Red, White, and Blue Murder

  A Mammoth Murder

  Murder Among the O.W.L.S.

  Of All Sad Words

  Murder in Four Parts

  Murder in the Air

  The Wild Hog Murders

  Murder of a Beauty Shop Queen

  Standalone Novels

  Blood Marks

  Houston Homicide (with Clyde Wilson)

  The Texas Capitol Murders

  Stanley Waters Series

  (co-authored with Willard Scott)

  Murder under Blue Skies

  Murder in the Mist

  Sally Good Series

  Murder Is an Art

  A Knife in the Back

  A Bond with Death

  Western Novels

  Ryan Rides Back

  Galveston Gunman

  A Time for Hanging

  Medicine Show

  Outrage at Blanco

  Texas Vigilante

  Stone: M.I.A. Hunter Series

  (All published under the pseudonym “Jack Buchanan.“)

  Miami War Zone

  Desert Death Raid

  Back to ’Nam

  Short Story Collections

  The Nighttime is the Right Time

  DISCOVER CROSSROAD PRESS

  Visit our online store

  Subscribe to our Newsletter

  Visit our DIGITAL and AUDIO book blogs for updates and news.

  Connect with us on Facebook.

  DEAD SOLDIERS

  Chapter One

  As Carl Burns hung up his phone, he wondered if he’d ever gotten good news in a call from a college dean. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t think of a single time.

  Deans never called to say that the college’s business office had uncovered an unexpected windfall that would result in a ten percent pay increase for the faculty and staff.

  They never called to say that the enrollment had increased by fifteen percent for the fall semester and that the administration attributed that fact directly to the fine work of the school’s dedicated faculty.

  They never called to say that they were going to reduce the course load for everyone in the English Department because the administration had suddenly realized that the instructors were killing themselves by grading so many student essays every semester.

  And they especially never called to say, “Good morning, Dr. Burns. I’m not calling for any particular reason. I just wanted to let you know that you’re doing a wonderful job as chair of your department and as a representative of Hartley Gorman College. Everyone connected with the school appreciates your hard work and dedication.“

  No, more often than not they called to say that some instructor hadn’t posted his office hours and that they’d better be posted within the next ten minutes, or else.

  Or that a student had appeared in the president’s office to complain about an instructor’s outrageous conduct in class.

  Or that they had wonderful news: “You’ve been appointed to the personnel committee. It will be meeting every Thursday at three o’clock, and there are going to be some really delicate problems to deal with this year.“

  But this most recent call had been even worse. It had not even been from the dean but from the dean’s secretary, who had said, “Dr. Partridge wants to see you in her office immediately.“

  No reason given. That was the ominous part. Burns tried to remember what his latest transgression might have been, but he couldn’t think of a thing. His conscience was clear, or at least as clear as it ever was.

  Not that a clear conscience meant anything. He was held accountable for the trespasses of all the faculty members in his department, whether he knew about the trespasses or not, and he was well aware that the sins of the faculty were numerous and grievous. Some of the faculty, in fact, probably hadn’t even posted their office hours.

  Burns sighed.

  “Is anything wrong, Dr. Burns?“ Bunni asked.

  Bunni was Burns’s student secretary. She had long blonde hair and blue eyes, and she was an excellent student. Burns had recently learned that her sister would be attending Hartley Gorman in the fall. Her sister, to Burns’s distress, was named Sunni. He was sure there was a good reason for the name, besides the fact that it rhymed with Bunni, but he thought it better not to ask.

  “Nothing’s wrong,“ Burns said. “I have to go over to Dean Partridge’s office for a minute.“

  “Oh,“ Bunni said, nodding understandingly.

  Bunni had had her own problems with Dr. Partridge, or rather with some of the policies that Partridge had introduced to HGC with her ascension to the dean’s office. Most of those policies had by this time been either rescinded or become honored more in the breach than in the acceptance, for which Burns was secretly grateful. Being publicly grateful was a mistake Burns didn’t plan to make.

  “I’ll be back later,“ Burns said. “If any students come by, tell them that they can wait if they really need to see me.“

  “Yes, sir,“ Bunni said. Students at HGC still said that sort of thing.

  As Burns walked down the shabbily-carpeted stairs of the Main Building, he tried again to think of what Partridge could want from him. He had plenty of time to think because his office was on the third floor and the ceilings were eighteen
feet high. Walking down the stairs was fairly easy, however. Walking back up them was another story.

  Maybe Partridge was finally going to have the elevator installed. That would be bad news indeed for Burns, whose office was in what appeared to be an unused elevator shaft that ran up the side of the building. It was the right size and shape for an elevator shaft, at any rate. But he’d hate to be moved out of his office, even if it was slightly cramped, not to mention cold in the winter and hot in the summer. It was far from perfect, but he’d gotten used to it, along with the ivy that clung to the outside walls and scratched at his windows when the wind blew, the pigeons on the wide stone window ledges, and the sparrows that nested in the ivy. He’d even gotten used to climbing the stairs.

  While Burns could negotiate the stairs fairly easily, however, not everyone could. There was no way that anyone with even the mildest physical disability could get to the third floor classrooms. There had been a couple of “nontraditional“ (translation: older) students, very out-of-shape, who had been forced to spend several minutes panting on the landings before proceeding upward to the next floor. One of them had even threatened to file suit against the college, and he was incensed when Burns, in a move that did not endear him to the administration, suggested that the student might either start for class somewhat earlier or work out on the college track every day until his endurance increased.

  Maybe the student had filed suit. Maybe that was it. Burns tried to remember his name, but failed. It was getting harder every year for him to remember student names. He had convinced himself that his failure was not a function of age. It had more to do with the fact that by now he had taught something like four thousand students at HGC. He couldn’t be expected to remember all their names, could he?

  When he got to the first floor and started to open the door, he saw that Rose, the woman who cleaned the building, had taped a note to it. The note said:

  Please! Do not!! Throw!!

  Alunimum Cans in trash!

  Please use!! Recycle Bin!!!!

  Rose’s spelling and capitalization were a little weak, but she made up for that fault with her fondness for exclamation points. No matter how many of them she used, however, she never seemed to be able to get everyone to behave in a satisfactory manner. Burns thought guiltily of the Dr Pepper can sitting on his desk. He promised himself that he’d put it in the recycle bin as soon as he got back.

  That is, he would if he got back. For all he knew, Partridge might fire him on the spot and have him escorted off the premises by Dirty Harry, the school’s security guard. Or have him dragged to the football field for summary execution. For some reason or another, Burns wasn’t one of the dean’s favorite people.

  He was pretty sure he knew why, but while some of the things resulting from the late Tom Henderson’s murder had an adverse affect on Dean Partridge, none of them had been Burns’s fault.

  And while he had been involved in several other harrowing episodes during his tenure at HGC, Burns liked to think he’d been instrumental in solving problems rather than in creating them. Besides, Partridge hadn’t even been here when those other things had happened.

  But Burns had discovered through long and difficult experience that deans didn’t always look at things the same way that he did.

  That was one of the things that was wrong with them.

  Chapter Two

  Burns walked under the tall pecan trees that surrounded Old Main (or HGC I as a former president who was fond of numbering things had called it) and entered the Administration Building (HGC II). The college’s current president had asked that the buildings be referred to by their names, not their numbers, which Burns thought was a fine idea. But for some reason he couldn’t get the numbers out of his head.

  By-passing the elevator, Burns walked up the stairs to Dr. Partridge’s office. Melva Jeans, the dean’s secretary, greeted him when he entered. Then Melva, whose blonde hair was at least half a hive high smiled and said, “You can have a seat, Dr. Burns. Dr. Partridge will be with you in just a sec.“

  So that’s the way it is, Burns thought. After asking for him to come immediately, the dean was going to make him wait. It was a cheap trick, but it didn’t surprise Burns. Maybe Partridge held it against him because he’d been the person more or less responsible for her introduction to Boss Napier, the Pecan City chief of police.

  It had all come about during the investigation of Thomas Henderson’s murder, when Burns had discovered that Partridge collected toy soldiers and Lincoln Logs. He’d known at once that Partridge and Napier were kindred souls.

  Not in every way, of course.

  Napier was a manly man whose idea of political correctness was tithing to the National Rifle Association, whereas Partridge had introduced and tried to enforce strict rules of Politically Correct conduct for the HGC community.

  And of course there was the fact that Napier, as a representative of the law, was just the kind of person that Partridge, former member of what at one time was known as the counter-culture, had spent years distrusting.

  Finally there was the fact that Napier’s tastes in women ran to green-eyed redheads, like Elaine Tanner, the HGC librarian. As a matter of fact, Burns’s tastes ran in precisely the same direction, which was one reason he’d been so eager to tell Napier about Partridge’s collection. Partridge wasn’t a redhead, nor did she have green eyes. She was attractive in her ageing-hippie way, but Napier hadn’t been interested, not until he heard about the soldiers. And the Lincoln Logs.

  The last Burns had heard, the two of them were quite an item. His spies had spotted them at the movies one evening, and several times they had been seen eating at the Pizza Delight, one of Pecan City’s fine dining establishments.

  As far as Burns was concerned, it was a match made in heaven. He hoped nothing had happened to break it up. He didn’t relish the idea of having Napier back in competition for Elaine. Not that Napier had a chance with her with Burns in the field, of course.

  Burns sat in an uncomfortable red leather chair across from Melva’s desk and looked through the stack of magazines sitting on an end table. There wasn’t anything really interesting, so Burns picked up an old copy of The Chronicle of Higher Education. There were no articles he wanted to read, but he had to do something. He couldn’t just sit there and stare at Melva’s hair.

  He was halfway through an article on tenure policy when Dean Gwendolyn Partridge opened the door of her office and looked out. She wore rimless glasses, and her straight brown hair had more gray in it than Burns had remembered.

  “I’m sorry I kept you waiting, Dr. Burns,“ she said. “I was discussing a curriculum change with Dr. Miller, and I lost track of the time.“

  Dr. Miller was the college president, and Burns was pretty sure that he had no interest at all in curriculum changes. But he thought he might as well give Partridge the benefit of the doubt.

  “I didn’t mind waiting,“ he said, holding up The Chronicle as he stood. “I was reading.“

  “Ah,“ Partridge said. “You weren’t looking at the job vacancies, were you?“

  “No,“ Burns said, though he had glanced at several of the advertisements. He wasn’t planning to leave HGC, though there were probably plenty of reasons for doing so. “I’m happy where I am.“

  “Good,“ Partridge said. She looked at Melva Jeans. “Hold my calls while Dr. Burns and I will be in conference.“

  In conference? Burns thought. What does that mean?

  “Please come in, Dr. Burns,“ Partridge said, standing aside so that he could pass by her and into the office.

  Other administrative offices on the HGC campus, notably the president’s, were hung with photos of famous people. Dean Partridge, on the other hand, preferred prints of Georgia O’Keefe paintings. Burns had to admit they were colorful, but he would have hated having to explain to a psychiatrist what they seemed to him to resemble.

  Partridge went behind her desk and told Burns to have a seat, which he did in another u
ncomfortable leather chair, gray instead of red.

  “How are things going in the English Department this fall?“ Partridge asked when Burns was seated.

  Burns wasn’t sure just exactly what she was asking. Did she want to know about the student who had written a paper on The Scarlet Letter and said that Hester Prynne wondered about Chillingworth’s “where-abbots“?

  Maybe, in the interests of Political Correctness, she’d like to hear about the student in Clem Nelson’s class who had described Othello as “an African-American.“

  Or maybe, considering last spring’s Thomas Henderson affair, she just wanted him to say that so far no one had been murdered.

  On the other hand, it would probably be much safer simply to say, “Things are going very well this semester. No problems at all so far.“

  So that’s what Burns did.

  Partridge said, “That’s wonderful. And how is the new technology working out?“

  Ah-ha! Burns thought. The new technology. Over the Christmas break, computers had been installed in all the faculty offices. This was a big breakthrough for a perennially cash-strapped school like HGC. Everyone now had access to the Internet and to e-mail, and there was a lot of exploration going on as people discovered the capabilities of the electronic marvels.

  Burns had a suspicion that quite a few people were using their new equipment to do something other than engage in scholarly debate with faculty members from other institutions or to do research that aided in their class preparation. So maybe that was all there was to this little visit. The dean was simply checking up.

  Burns began to relax. “The computers are really great. I’ve joined an English composition discussion list, and the two Darryls have become real computer nerds. They’ve put up an English Department home page that’ll knock your eye out.“