“Really? Why?”

“It’s about Sara Grenthaler.”

His expression changed from friendly to somber, but it was equally enthralling. “How do you know Sara?”

“Well, she’s sort of my client. I mean, Grenthaler Media is. And she worked with me last summer at Winslow, Brown.”

“So you’ve heard what happened to her.” His voice was laced with concern.

I nodded. “In fact, I just came from UHS. I was talking to her roommate, Edie Michaels, and she explained about the letters Sara was getting. I told her I’d come talk to you. She’s anxious that the police know about them, just in case there’s a connection of any sort with the attack.”

“Let’s go up to my office,” Jonathan suggested. “I can fill you in there.” I willingly let him escort me up to the third floor and lead me down a corridor, nodding to various colleagues and staff along the way. He ushered me into his office and took my coat, hanging it next to his own on a peg on the back of the office door. I looked around while he cleared a stack of papers from one of his guest chairs. The walls were lined with bookshelves, and I scanned his collection. It was extensive and varied, ranging from the usual business texts to history and biography. I even saw the familiar double volume of Norton’s Anthology of English Literature, its bindings worn and tattered.

“English 10,” he said, following my gaze.

“I know. I’ve got the same set.” I sat down in the now-empty chair, relieved to no longer have to trust my shaky knees, and he settled himself across from me at his desk.

“I was an Economics major, but I took that course senior year. I loved it. It made me wish I’d taken more English courses, but it was too late.”

“It would be great to go back and take all of the courses that I missed. Well, except for the exams and papers.”

“I know exactly what you mean,” he replied with a rueful smile. “So, now that I think about it, it’s all coming back to me. You know, my roommate had such a crush on you.”

“He did?” I didn’t remember his roommate. I’d had eyes only for Jonathan.

“It was almost pathetic. Clark Gibson. Do you remember him? He would spend every class staring at you and then make me rehash everything you said for the rest of the day. He was obsessed.”

“Oh.” I thought back and dredged up a hazy image of Clark Gibson. He had seemed to stare a lot, but I’d assumed he was staring at Luisa. Most men did. “Why did he never ask me out?”

“Well, you were always with your boyfriend. What was his name? The guy with the dark hair and little round glasses?”

“Who? Oh-you mean Jamie. He wasn’t my boyfriend. He just lived in our dorm room. Because he hated his roommates. You know how that is.” Jamie would invariably sit on one side of me while Luisa sat on the other, each silently rolling their eyes at me when I passed them notes commenting on something Jonathan had said, or what he was wearing that day, or any of the other trivialities that are so important when you have a massive, hopeless crush on somebody who doesn’t know you exist.

“You’re kidding. I’ll have to tell Clark. He’ll kick himself, especially now that he’s married and has three kids.”

“And just think, they could have been mine.” Jonathan chuckled. Little did he know how much time I’d spent dreaming of him and our three kids.

“So, the letters,” I said, once again having to remind myself why I was there.

“Yes, the letters,” he repeated. He used a key to open a desk drawer and pulled out a stack of folded papers held together by a rubber band. “Take a look,” he invited, handing the stack across the desk.

“What about fingerprints?” I asked.

“So many people have handled these-Sara, Edie, me-I doubt that there will be any useful prints. And I suspect that whoever wrote these was pretty careful. They could have been typed on any computer and printed on any standard laser printer.”

I freed the folded pages from the rubber band and opened the one on top, scanning it quickly. Jonathan was right-it was entirely typewritten on regulation letter-size paper.

Darling Sara,

I saw you today, at a distance, your raven hair bent over your studies, a pen grasped in your graceful hand, and my heart overflowed. I wanted to rush to your side and take you in my arms.

I see you and hear the words of the poet:

“She walks in beauty like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies”

You are my night, you are my starry skies. But how can I confess my forbidden love? I cannot. One day, perhaps, but not today.

I didn’t blame whoever had written it for leaving it unsigned-it was awful.

“Yeesh,” I said. “Are they all like this?”

“What do you mean?”

“Nauseating?”

“You think it’s nauseating?”

“Well…” I cast about, trying to find a more appropriate word, but came up empty. “Yes. Nauseating. So gushy and gross.”

“Which one are you looking at?” he asked me.

I handed it to him, and he skimmed it. “Oh. I thought this one was sweet. Romantic, with the Keats and everything.”

“Are you sure it’s not Byron?”

He looked at me for a moment, blankly, and then shrugged and grinned. “I was just an econ major-what do I know? I barely squeaked by in English 10.”

“You could be right,” I said. “It could be Keats.” But I was secretly tempted to get down his Norton Anthology and prove it wasn’t. That’s what Ali MacGraw probably would have done.

“Anyhow,” he continued, “the Dean of Students asked me to coordinate the investigation with the police, and I’m planning on showing these to them. I’m going to make sure they leave no stone unturned. But I doubt that the notes are related to the attack.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“They’re love letters. Whoever wrote them clearly idolizes Sara.”

“Yes, but he’s also been totally invading her privacy. Edie said Sara found one on her bed.”

“But they’re not violent.”

“They aren’t on the face of it. But the fact that they exist, and that they keep showing up in personal places, is pretty scary. It’s sort of like stalking, and stalking tends to end in violence.” At least, it always did on Lifetime Television for Women, which was where I’d gathered what little information I had on the topic.

“I don’t know much about stalking,” he conceded. “And I don’t want to downplay your concerns. That’s why I’m going to make sure that the police take a look at them. It’s just that after having read them all, I don’t get the sense that whoever’s writing them would want to hurt Sara. She’s very attractive but also very aloof. It’s not hard to imagine that somebody would fall in love with her but be too intimidated to actually ask her out. And there’s this entire ‘forbidden love’ theme running through the letters. I don’t know what it’s about, but my guess is that whoever’s writing these is smitten with her and doesn’t know of any other way to express himself.”

“What about Grant Crocker?”

“Grant Crocker?” Jonathan laughed. “I can’t imagine that. Do you know Grant?”

“Sure. He used to work at my firm.”

“I’d have a hard time picturing Grant writing these. He’s not the most poetic guy. And I’m familiar with how he writes, from papers and exams. He sticks to pretty basic nouns and verbs. This stuff is a little more sophisticated.”

Sophisticated was one word for it.

“Besides,” Jonathan added, “the police seem to think that they may have an angle already.”

“What angle’s that?”

“Well, you probably haven’t heard since you live in New York, but there’s been a rash of murders in the area. The detective I spoke to thought there might be some connection. That Sara might have been the next victim, if the attacker hadn’t been interrupted.”

“You mean the guy who’s been killing prostitutes?” I asked.

“How did you know about that?”

“A friend of mine’s a doctor at a free clinic in South Boston, and one of the women who was killed was his patient.”