Regina’s Song. David Eddings

      “Up yours,” Charlie told him.

      “Always nice talking with you, little brother,” Bob said with a faint smile. Then he glanced at his watch. “Oops,” he said. “Running late.” He stood up.

      “Say hi to Eleanor and the kids for me,” Charlie said.

      “Right. Stop by once in a while, huh?”

      “I’ll make a point of it,” Charlie promised.

       CHAPTER FIVE

      Ivolunteered to drive Twink to Lake Stevens on Friday of that week, since I was free. All my scurrying around to get settled in for fall quarter might have been too efficient. Everything was in place, and I didn’t really have anything important left up in the air.

      Oddly enough, Friday was all bright and sunny, and I didn’t even have to turn on my windshield wipers as Twink and I went north on Interstate 5.

      Dr. Fallon spent the customary hour with Twink, and he seemed to be fairly satisfied with her progress. At least he didn’t put her in a padded cell.

      After the session, Twink and I went back to Everett for dinner with Les and Inga. It seemed to me that those weekly visits might not be a bad idea, and since Twink had to go north every Friday anyway, it fit together smoothly.

      The following week really dragged on. I was ready to start classes, but the university wasn’t quite up to it yet. I did a lot of puttering around with my bookshelf project and hit the library several times, but I didn’t accomplish much.

      The fall quarter began on Monday, September 29th, and I finally had to come face-to-face with John Milton. You don’t walk into the Ph.D. exams in English unless you’ve got graduate seminars in Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Milton under your belt. Shakespeare and I get along fairly well, and Chaucer’s a good buddy, but Milton seems a little silly to me. “How soon hath time, the subtle thief of youth, stol’n away my three and twentieth year,” seems ridiculous coming from a guy who didn’t shave regularly yet. Besides, Milton was wall-to-wall puritan, and puritans set my teeth on edge.

      The Milton seminar was one of those early-morning things—seven-thirty to nine-thirty—and the first session was largely taken up with bookkeeping. Full professors generally prefer to ease themselves into harness. After class I drove back to Wallingford to have a word with Twink.

      I didn’t want to wake Mary, so I went around to the back door and tapped on the window. Renata opened the door, touching one finger to her lips. “She’s still asleep, Markie,” she whispered.

      “No kidding? Gee, the day’s half-over.”

      “Quit trying to be funny. Do you want some coffee?”

      “Thanks, Twink, but I’ve had four cups of Erika’s already, and that’ll probably keep me wired until about midnight.”

      “Is her coffee that strong?”

      “Industrial-strength. I just came by to tell you that I’ll pick you up about twelve-thirty. Our class starts at one-thirty, and that’ll give us plenty of time to get there.”

      “You don’t have to do that, Markie. I’ve got my bike.”

      “Yes, Twink, I know all about the bike. This is the first day of class, though, and I want to show you exactly where Padelford Hall’s located, where my office is, and how to find the classroom. After you’ve got the lay of the land, you can pedal around in the rain all you want.”

      “Oh, all right.” She sounded peevish about it.

      “What is your problem, Twink?”

      “Everybody’s treating me like a baby. I’m a big girl now.”

      “Save the declaration of independence, Twinkie-poo. I just want to make sure you’ve got the lay of the land before I turn you loose to roam around campus by yourself.”

      “Twinkie-poo?” she said. “Are we going back to baby talk?”

      “Just kidding, Twink. I know most of the trees on campus by their first names, so I can save you a lot of time by showing you shortcuts and places where the traffic piles up at certain times of day. Let’s just call this ‘show Twinkie the ropes day.’ I’m not trying to insult you or infringe on your constitutional right to get hopelessly lost down in the hard-science zone. Just humor me today, OK?”

      “Yes, Master,” she said with a vapid expression. “Yes, Master.”

      “I thought we’d gotten past that stuff, Twink.”

      “The old ones are the best, aren’t they? If you want to baby me, I suppose I can put up with it for a day or so. But don’t make a habit of it.”

      “Oh,” I said then, “as long as I’m offending you today anyway, let’s get something else off the table. Don’t get too carried away with how you dress. The kids here are pretty laid-back when they go to class. Blue jeans and sweatshirts are just about the uniform of the day—every day. You probably wouldn’t want to wear fancy clothes in the rain anyway, and it’s always raining here in muck and mire city.”

      “Aww,” she said in mock disappointment. “I was going to make a fashion statement.”

      “Save it for a sunny day, Twink. A lot of freshman girls try that on their first day of class, and they get pretty embarrassed when they find out that they’re overdressed.”

      “What books am I going to need?”

      “I’ll give you some of mine. I’ve got lots of spares.”

      “I can afford to buy my own books, Markie. I’ve even got my very own checkbook. Les made a big point of that. There’s oodles of money in there, and someday I might even be able to make it balance.”

      “Never turn down freebies, Twink—particularly when you’re talking about books. I’ll see you about twelve-thirty, then. I’m going back to the boardinghouse now to start rummaging around in Paradise Lost, and I’m not looking forward to it very much. I don’t think Milton and I are going to get along well at all.”

      “Aw,” she said, patting my cheek, “poor baby.”

      “Oh, quit,” I told her. Then I left and drove back to the boardinghouse to dig into Milton. John-boy irritated me right from the git-go. He was such a show-off. All right, he was gifted, he was intelligent, and he’d been a member of Cromwell’s government. Did he have to keep rubbing my face in it? Writing sonnets in Latin is probably the height of exhibitionism, wouldn’t you say?

      I hung it up about eleven o’clock and went downstairs to slap a sandwich together. Erika was there, brewing another pot of coffee. “Hi, Mark,” she greeted me. “Coffee’s almost ready.”

      “Thanks all the same, Erika, but I’m still trying to shake off the four cups I had at breakfast.”

      “Suit yourself.” She was wearing a heavy-looking pair of horn-rimmed glasses that made her look older and more mature. They seemed to complete her. That deep auburn hair and golden skin had made her seem somehow almost unreal to me.

      “Are the glasses something new?” I asked her.

      “No, they’ve been around for years. I’m just giving my eyes a rest from the contact lenses.”

      “Trish says you’ve got an outside job,” I said, rummaging in the refrigerator.

      “At a medical lab,” she told me. “It’s not challenging, but it pays the bills. What are you looking for, Mark?”

      “Sandwich makings. I’ve got the munchies.”

      “Go sit down. I’ll fix you something.”

      “I