“We could trade,” Rachel said. “Trade vehicles. I’m in the Audi with Danica. It just feels so comfortable I don’t think I’m in the wilderness.”

“Well, I don’t know.” Hilary looked at me.

I hoped she could see that I was begging her to turn down the offer. I didn’t want to make an issue of it by inserting myself into the discussion.

“Danica is in your section anyway, Professor Gill, and I know she’d like to get to know you better,” Rachel said. She was sounding pushy, if not desperate.

Hilary caught my eye for a second and then said, “I need to stay in the Jeep. Professor Wells and I have to discuss our lectures.”

“Oh, okay.” Rachel left us.

“Thank you,” I said.

“Someone has an admirer.”

“You think?”

“So, how do you handle something like that?”

I looked out the window at Rachel leaning against the Audi, chatting with her classmates. I was afraid to imagine what she might be saying.

“Does it worry you?”

“It happens. You just ignore it and it goes away. I can’t imagine what’s going on in that brain of hers. I realize that I’m a beautiful specimen of a man with a dazzling intellect, but I’m twice her age.”

“Exactly,” Hilary said.

“Now, see, I just don’t get that. Are you talking about daddy issues?”

“Some call it that.”

“In six years my daughter will be that student. Six years. What do you think I should do?” I asked.

“You could kiss her and scare the hell out of her.”

“You’re joking, right? Yeah, you’re fucking with me. Can you imagine what would happen if I let her kiss me? What would you do?”

Hilary looked at the tray of candy bars on the counter, handed one to Man Pat. “I’ll take this,” she said. Then to me, “I’d do what you’re doing, pretend it’s not happening. But sooner or later you’re going to have to say something.”

“Well, let’s get these people moving.” I thanked the Pats.

Everyone paid up and we were on the road again, this time as a convoy, moving slowly behind the bus on the gravel road. Thirty minutes later we were standing in the harsh midafternoon sun erecting the awnings for shade.

Hilary called for everyone to “get hydrated” before the afternoon’s short hike under the sun and before her lecture. As I watched her, I appreciated her youth and thought she was, in fact, pretty good with the students, better with them than I was in many respects. So she wasn’t going to shake up the world with her research and scholarship. I’d published many articles and hadn’t shaken much of anything. Rachel was near my Jeep talking to one of the football players in the class, leaning close to him in a flirtatious way. For a moment I felt a bit of relief, and then I caught her stealing glances at me, and when she caught my eye she leaned closer to the kid. The athlete was taken in. It was quite sad.