Rebecca isn’t sure what Hoffman means. She isn’t even sure she knows what language he is speaking, although he’s trying to hint at something about Dr. Nye and the reason he’s absent from class. And maybe he’s trying to say it has something to do with Madeline and her disappearance. Hoffman is wrong about something—Rebecca followed the news about Madeline closely when she disappeared, had gone to the trouble of buying herself a canister of pepper spray and taken a self-defense class at the university health center. But nothing else happened in town, and before too long, the police and the media stopped talking about Madeline.

Rebecca remembers that Hoffman was at the reading at the library. Had he seen Madeline too? Whatever he is trying to convey, he looks pleased to be saying it, and his thumbs continue their perpetual motion against his belly.

“Is something going on with Madeline’s case?” Rebecca asks.

“Madeline?” He says the name like he’s never heard it. Like he hadn’t just brought her up a minute earlier. “I don’t know anything about that. She was an excellent student. Very talented. In so many ways. But that’s all I know.”

“Okay,” Rebecca says. “So Dr. Nye isn’t directing my thesis anymore. I just met with him about it yesterday. Is he okay? I mean, should I be doing something for him?”

“Can you bake a cake with a file in it?”

“What’s that?”

“He can take care of himself,” Hoffman says. “He can use all his royalties to hire a good lawyer. But if you’re worried about your thesis, I can direct it for you.”

Rebecca feels relief replace some of the rigidness in her spine. “Really?”

“Sure. It’s all about the students. What kind of thesis is it?”

“I’m writing a series of linked short stories,” Rebecca says. “It’s the same character during a few different periods in her life.”

“Fascinating,” Hoffman says. “But poetry tends to be my strong suit. Have you ever written any?”

“Not for a long time. I don’t really—”

“If I were you, and you want to work with me, I’d seriously think about writing some poems. Maybe you can write them in various forms about this character you’ve dreamed up. I’m sure your fiction is delightful, but under the guidance of Dr. Nye, it might tend toward the commercial and the jejune. But if you stretched yourself and wrote some poetry, that would really be something. The thing I really feel I excel at is taking a student’s work and enhancing it. Providing advice, help with form and structure and language. Finding the right concrete detail for the right moment. Do you see what I’m saying?”

“I guess. . . .”

“Madeline was a student who was equally adept at poetry and prose. Were you close to her?” Hoffman asks.

“Not close. We took one class together. . . .”