The Angel and the Jabberwocky Murders by Mignon F. Ballard

grinned and shook his head. “Ah, well, that’s all right. One of my nieces gave me that old toy a few years back, said it would help me stay on key.” He laughed. “Reckon she thought I needed it.”
    He turned as if he meant to go and I walked along beside him. “Wait, please. If you have a minute, maybe you can help me…” How could I word this diplomatically?
    â€œYou were here at Sarah Bedford when that girl fell from the Tree House, weren’t you?”
    Londus closed his eyes. “Lord, that were a long time ago.”
    â€œNot that long. About eight or nine years.” I stopped at a water fountain. My mouth felt dry. I could be standing here talking with a murderer in this great hollow hall and my guardian angel seemed to have abandoned me.
    â€œYour job takes you all over the campus, so you must have a pretty good idea of what goes on. Do you know if the girl who drowned and the one who fell from the Tree House had anything in common with D. C. Hunter?”
    He shook his head. “I wouldn’t know nothin’ about that.”
    â€œWhat about boyfriends? Were Rachel Isaacs and the Martinez girl seeing anybody in particular?”
    Londus frowned. “Martin who?”
    I repeated the name. “The newspaper account said you found her body beneath the Tree House. Remember?”
    He nodded, shoving his handkerchief in his back pocket. “She fell. That girl fell. Sure were a sad thing.”
    â€œSome people think she might’ve been meeting somebody that night—a boy, maybe. And what about the girl who drowned? A pretty girl like that must’ve had a boyfriend.”
    Londus clutched his mop with both hands. “I didn’t pay no mind to them,” he said. “But that girl they found in the shed—what’s her name, B.C.?”
    â€œD. C. Hunter.”
    â€œYeah, her. I’m real sorry for what happened to her, but I seen what she was doin’, and she weren’t no better than she oughta be, sneakin’ out and meetin’ that man thataway. And he weren’t neither.”
    I nodded solemnly. “I guess you must notice a lot that goes on here.”
    Londus cleared his throat and blew his nose as if he could get rid of all the bad things at Sarah Bedford College. “More than you’d think,” he said. “More than you’d ever believe.”

    â€œI wonder what he meant by that,” I said to Augusta, who waited on the stairs. I knew she’d overheard every word.
    She paused briefly to glance at her reflection in the mirror that hung on the landing. “It seems to me that Londus Clack knows more than he’s letting on,” she said.

    I repeated the question to Celeste and her roommate, Debra, later that afternoon, after telling them about my conversation with Londus. The weather was mild and the three of us sipped Cokes on the sunny steps of Emma P. Harris Hall.
    â€œLondus doesn’t miss much,” Celeste said. “He not only sees who you go out with, he knows what time you get in, if you keep your room neat, or if you’ve sneaked beer into the dorm.”
    â€œWell, if he knows anything, he’s not telling,” I said. “Another student died several years ago, apparently from a fall from the Tree House, and Londus was the one who discovered the body. I asked him if the three girls had anything in common, but I couldn’t get to first base with him. Claimed he didn’t know anything about that.”
    Debra frowned. “I never knew there was another death. Do they know what caused her to fall?”
    â€œAre they sure she fell? ” Celeste wanted to know.
    â€œThat’s what everybody thought—still do, I guess,” I said. “The three girls who died were all new to the campus. Two of them were freshmen and D.C. was a junior, but she’d been to school in England until this year. That’s the only thing I can see they