Preview First Chapter of                   Man In Shadow

             by    Russell Thomas

First Edition
Copyright © 2007 Steven Russell-Thomas
(aka Russell Thomas)
All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A.

No part of this book may be reproduced by any mechanical, photographic, or electronic process, or in the form of an electronic recording, nor may it be stored in a retrieval system, transmitted, translated into another language, or otherwise copied for public or private use, excepting brief passages quoted for purposes of review, without the written permission of the publisher.

Published in the United States by
GLB Publishers
P.O. Box 78212, San Francisco, CA 94107
www.GLBpubs.com

Figure art for cover by
Keith Dolney, Vancouver, Canada
Cover Design by GLB Publishers

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental

Library of Congress Cataloguing Control Number
2006909608

ISBN 978-1-934203-00-2
1-934203-00-9
First printing Feb. 2007

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
I'd like to acknowledge the
hundreds of men who stood
in the shadows while I knelt
before them, sharing the
incredible intimacy of
anonymous sex in public places

DEDICATION

For Langsley

Chapter One

            Career Ladder

Peter Trefoyle Davidson was awarded a PhD in English, with all the rights and privileges pertaining thereunto, from a solid, second tier university in the American Midwest. After a couple of short-term appointments that introduced him to the life style of the academic gypsy, he got a tenure-track appointment at a somewhat less solid second tier college in the American Midwest. He let the social upheavals of the mid and late sixties largely pass him by, instead concentrating on his career as a junior faculty member trying to make a place for himself. The big draft call-ups of 1968 passed him by as well, leaving him with a card marked "Not eligible for enlistment or induction." The war was unpopular enough that he never had to reveal to anyone why he was draft exempt. Most of the people he knew just thought he was lucky, if they thought about it at all. Instead of going to Viet Nam in 1968, he accepted the position of Assistant Professor of English at Claris College.

The English department at Claris College was neither the largest nor the smallest department in the College, but it was composed of cliques, and the back-biting among faculty in the department was legendary. Peter fit right in. He earned the immediate enmity of several senior professors when Hannah Garr, the department chair, allowed him to teach only two freshman composition courses, instead of the customary three. This allowed him to teach two sections in the literature sequence.

Accusations of favoritism that were whispered in the English faculty lounge were well-founded, because Dr. Garr did indeed favor Dr. Davidson. She liked the young man's soft-spoken demeanor, and his earnestness. He would one day become a bespectacled, leather-patch-jacket wearer with graying at the temples. Hannah Garr was in her mid-sixties, and wouldn't be around to see the metamorphosis of the English professor into an American Mr. Chips, but she was happy to be able to set him on the first steps in that direction.

Davidson proved reasonably popular with his students during the first semester. In addition to his two composition courses, he taught an elective in Victorian novel, and a required course in Chaucer.

"How's Chaucer?" Kitty Smart asked him one day in the faculty lounge. Kitty had taught Chaucer prior to Peter's arrival, and she had been glad to be relieved of the responsibility; abandoning that course had allowed her to undertake a new course in women's literature, which had become her real academic passion over the years.

"It's going well," he replied non-committally. "I only have twelve students," he added. "I thought there'd be more since it's required."

"We don't have that many majors," said Liz Daniels from across the room. "I've only got nine in my Senior Readings class."

"Well, a little class in Chaucer sure beats having to teach an evening comp course," said Mike Potter, whose resentment of Peter persistently simmered.

"But it means an extra preparation." Kitty was willing to put up a defense for Peter, since she had benefitted from his arrival.

They let the conversation lag by tacit consent. Liz Daniels looked up from the magazine she was scanning. "The Provost's reception for new faculty is tonight, isn't it, Peter?" she asked.

"Yes," he replied. "Seven to nine."

"Oh, God," Liz moaned. "Wine, cheese, department chairmen, and newbies. And, of course," she added sardonically, "Dr. Grant herself."

"Well, it's something we all have to go through," Mike said. "Like when freshmen used to have to wear beanies in the first week. New profs have to make nice with Dr. Grant."

"It's only for a couple of hours," Peter said.

"It's gonna seem like an eternity," Liz predicted ominously. She put her magazine down and got up. "Well," she said to Peter, "better you than me."

"You're the only new guy in English," Mike said. "But I hear there's an interesting new math professor." Liz shot him an angry look.

Kitty said, "I'm sure you'll have a good time, Peter." She was often in the self-assumed role of peacemaker.

Liz snorted. "Yeah. Say hello to Dr. Grant for me. Come on, Mike, walk me to my classroom."

"I guess Liz doesn't care much for Dr. Grant," Peter said after they had left.

"No," Kitty said slowly. "They've had some run-ins. I guess they have a difference of opinion about what constitutes good teaching."

"Well, I'd better get ready for the soiree," Peter said.

"Have a good time," Kitty said. And she meant it. She liked Peter, and was indignant at snide comments she'd heard about him from department members like Mike Potter.

Peter went home and showered and changed. He knew a lot depended on impressions made at affairs like this, but he didn't really look forward to the event. His interest was pricked a little bit by the oblique comment Mike Potter had made about the new teacher in the math department.

As he let the water course over him, he reflected on his life to date. He was in his late twenties, and perhaps had an academic career ahead of him if he played his cards right. He'd been torn between medieval studies and contemporary literature, and had finally found a dissertation director who let him combine his interests into working on medieval influences in the war poetry of Edith Sitwell. His dissertation wasn't very inspiring, and was not the sort that could be turned into a university press book. I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled, he thought as he dried himself off. He stood appraising himself in the bathroom mirror.

Thick brown hair, wavy and shiny. Good face, not really handsome, but well proportioned. He stroked his chin. Would he look good with a beard? Maybe just a mustache. Assert his masculinity. His shoulders were broad and his chest muscular. He looked at the tufts of hair around his big nipples. Nice, he thought. His stomach was flat, but not firm. He'd soon be going to flesh, and he knew it. His cock hung down, four inches that topped six when erect. Big hangers. His evaluation stopped at his crotch.

Dressing, he debated the use of an after-shave or cologne for the evening. He was always in a quandary concerning scent. He liked the way men smelled, and he didn't want to cover up a perfectly good body aroma with a scent. However, social dictates were strong, and eventually he dabbed just a touch of cologne under each arm, so lightly that he could hardly detect it.

He wore comfortable slacks and an open-throated shirt. He debated the sport jacket, and decided against it. He drove back to the college, to the building where the Provost was holding her reception. As he went into the lounge, he felt the little pang he always felt entering alone into a room of strangers. When he was younger, doing that was sheer hell for him, and he had said frantic, formulaic prayers to the Blessed Virgin in aid of protection from his crippling shyness.

A year of therapy in the university counseling center had helped him overcome both his shyness and his frantic prayers to the Blessed Virgin. They were both a distant memory. The pang he felt passed quickly as he went up to the Provost to make the evening's greetings. Georgia Grant was a charming woman in her mid-fifties. When he had first met her, Peter had wondered if she suffered from anorexia nervosa. She was tall, thin, and bony, but her face was classically beautiful, and she dressed in a style that spoke of affluence subdued by good manners. Her graying hair was swept up like a Gibson girl's. Tonight the focal point was a chunky amber necklace that caught the light of the chandeliers and shot little flashes of its own light back.

"Peter," she said as she extended a warm, welcoming hand. He took it and shook hands, unable to resist the charm of the woman. There was no reason to anyway, he thought. It was Liz Daniels who had the axe to grind. "Nice to see you. How is your first semester turning out?"

"It's fine," he said, and he meant it. "I'm actually pretty impressed with how well my freshmen write."

"I'm so glad to hear it, Peter. I am sometimes in despair, complete despair, over the level of literacy I see here. Even here, where we are at least a little selective." Peter was unsure how to respond to this, so he said nothing. "Get some wine and cheese, Peter," Dr. Grant suggested, and Peter disengaged himself from the winking amber and sauntered over to the bar. A handsome, middle eastern man was bartending for the night. Peter enjoyed looking at his swarthy, attractive features, and asked for a glass of white wine.

Glad of the wine more for the sake of giving his hands something to do than for the consumption of it, Peter turned away from the bar, and, taking a breath, moved into the milling crowd of gray haired persons of stature and security surrounded by anxious younger people, eager to please.

"Hello. You're Peter Davidson, aren't you?" Peter nodded. The man who had asked him that question was large, bald, and pink. A thin line of gray hair surrounded his pink ,shining, domed head. After a moment's hesitation, Peter recognized John Carmody, head of the mathematics department.

"Hello, Sir," Peter said. "Nice to see you."

Carmody laughed a warm chuckle. "Almost didn't recognize me, did you, Davidson?"

Peter was a little embarrassed at the mathematics professor not only guessing right, but making a joke of it.

"I recognized you, Dr. Carmody," he said.

"John. John," Dr. Carmody said. "Call me John."

"All right. John," Peter repeated.

"Fine, fine, Davidson. Now I want you to meet someone." He looked around as if suddenly aware that he didn't know where he was. "Now where could he be? Here just a minute ago." He continued to turn his head to the right and left. Peter had the feeling that he was with Alice in Wonderland, and Dr. Carmody was the white rabbit.

Suddenly Dr. Carmody beamed. "Oh, there he is. Jackson!" Dr. Carmody called across a group of people. "Jackson! Can you come here a minute, please?"

A thin man with a receding hairline and a dark mustache smiled and nodded to Dr. Carmody, said something to the couple he was talking with, and detached himself from their company. He made his way around a group of women talking intensely about feminist theory, and joined Dr. Carmody and Peter.

"Davidson, this is Sam Jackson. Sam's a new assistant professor this year. Calculus. Number theory. Good man, very good man. Jackson, this is Peter Davidson. English. I was on the faculty committee that interviewed him. He's done some sort of interdisciplinary thing. Top drawer, I think." He paused and coughed. "Yes, absolutely top drawer." It remained unclear whether Dr. Carmody thought that Peter's interdisciplinary work was top drawer, or whether Peter himself had earned that encomium.

Just then, white rabbit-like, Dr. Carmody spotted Dr. Grant, and called out, "Provost! Oh Provost. A word." And he was gone, leaving Sam Jackson and Peter Davidson to sort out their first encounter with each other.

They looked at one another appraisingly. "Enjoying the reception?" Peter asked. He was thinking, so this is what Mike Potter meant about an interesting new prof in mathematics. Was it possible that Mike had already pegged him? It seemed unlikely, but why else make that comment in the English lounge?

"More now," Sam Jackson replied. He smiled, and Peter returned his grin. "Met any interesting people?"

"I have now," Peter said, deciding he could play this nuanced game as well as Sam Jackson.

"Dr. Carmody's quite a character," Sam said. "He goes around like a British major who's been mustered out." He laughed. "He ought to carry a swagger stick."

"I noticed he calls everyone by their last name. It does seem rather British raj and all that," Peter said.

"Is your head here?" Sam asked.

"Actually, I don't know," Peter replied. "I haven't seen her." He craned his neck and surveyed the room to see if he could spot Dr. Garr. "I guess she ought to be," he continued, not seeing her.

"What does she look like?" Sam asked, looking around the room.

"Tall. Gaunt. Henna hair."

"I don't see her," Sam said. He paused. "I'm going to say goodnight to John and Dr. Grant. Want to cut out of here? Have you been seen enough?"

Peter laughed. "Yes, I think so. I'm ready to go."

They made their good nights to Dr. Carmody and Dr. Grant. "Capital, Davidson, capital," Dr. Carmody said, in apparent reference to nothing. "See you on campus."

"I hope so, Sir," Peter said, changing it to "John" just in time to avoid a good-natured rebuke.

Dr. Grant said, "Good night, Peter. Good night, Sam. Thanks so much for coming." She actually managed to make it seem that the two young men had had a choice. She's good, Peter thought.

The two men walked out into the late summer evening. As they passed the campus gate, Sam took a pack of cigarettes out of the breast pocket of his jacket and offered one to Peter.

"No, thanks. Don't smoke," he said. Sam lit up. "I'm thinking of taking up smoking a pipe," Peter added.

"A pipe's too much of a pain in the ass," Sam said good naturedly. "All that filling and tamping and sucking." He grinned into the night. "Well, maybe it's not all a pain in the ass," he said.

"I drove," Peter said. "Can I give you a lift home?"

"No, thanks," Sam said easily. "I'm gonna go down to the Rusty Bucket for a night cap. Want to join me?"

Peter considered this, but said, "No, I guess not, Sam. I've got Chaucer at eight thirty tomorrow morning. I have to be ready to tackle the Wife of Bath."

Sam laughed. "I think I'd rather tackle the Knight," he said. "OK, Peter. Good night. See you on campus, as the major says."

They went their separate ways, Peter to his car, telling himself that he was going to drive home. When he drove out of the parking lot, however, he steered his car towards the city park that bordered on the river that divided the town. He had been to the park several times since moving to the town, and knew just where to park.

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