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took time away from the main investigation. Which was why he didn’t often get a day off.
    He went into the building and was chilled by the air-conditioning. It wasn’t a bad feeling after standing in the hot parking lot. The concealed fluorescent lights overhead reflected off the polished floors. The doors to the classrooms were closed, but Rhodes could hear the low hum of voices. He looked up to see if there were any security cameras in the hallway. There were, but there hadn’t been any outside. The college had been planning to install some for a while because of the battery thefts, but Rhodes had put a stop to those, and the cameras hadn’t been installed, as far as Rhodes knew. Saving money was always a consideration in the academic world, or so Seepy Benton had told Rhodes on several occasions when his salary was mentioned.
    Rhodes’s first stop was the dean’s office. The administrative assistant told him that the dean was on the telephone but that she wanted to see Rhodes. He said he’d be back later and went on up to the second floor to see Seepy Benton.
    Benton’s office always looked as if a tornado had blown through it. Papers and books were piled on the desk, on the chairs, on the floor. The shelves might once have looked orderly, but that had been long ago. A guitar case leaned against the desk, with a guitar beside it. Benton was at the desk, tapping away on his computer keyboard. A new addition was a white dry-erase board. It was covered with equations that looked like something from a cartoon drawing. They were meaningless to Rhodes.
    “Uploading a new song video to YouTube?” Rhodes asked Benton from the doorway.
    Benton thought of himself as the greatest singing and songwriting math teacher to come along since Tom Lehrer, a major difference being that Lehrer played piano and Benton allegedly played guitar.
    “No,” Benton said.
    He’d taken off his straw hat, and Rhodes noticed that he’d had a haircut recently. That and the neatly trimmed beard indicated that dating Ruth was having a good effect on him.
    “I can show you a video of my latest composition if you’d like to see it,” Benton said. “It’s a surreal country-western song called ‘Drowning in a Stream of Consciousness.’”
    Seeing it wasn’t the bad part. Hearing it was, so Rhodes said, “Not now. We have more important things to do.”
    “I’ve been doing some of them already,” Benton said.
    “Like what?”
    “Wellington and I are Facebook friends. I’ve been looking at his Facebook page.”
    “I got the impression that you didn’t care much for him.”
    “Being friends on Facebook doesn’t have anything to do with being real friends. It’s completely different. But sort of the same.”
    “Thanks for clearing that up. Did you find anything?”
    “No. Most teachers have learned to be discreet on Facebook, or not to have pages at all. Or to have one under a fake name.”
    “You think Wellington did that?” Rhodes asked. “Used a fake name?”
    “I can’t say. If he did, we won’t be likely to find it. His Facebook page is useless anyway. He never posted anything.”
    “What about a Twitter account?”
    Benton looked at Rhodes with feigned surprise. “Wow. You’re learning about this computer stuff, aren’t you.”
    “Slowly,” Rhodes said. “Very slowly.”
    “In this case, it doesn’t matter if you’re slow. I can’t find a Twitter account for him.”
    “Unless he used an assumed name,” Rhodes said.
    “It’s always a possibility, but it’s doubtful. I can’t really see Earl as a fan of social media.”
    “Why didn’t you like him?”
    Benton changed the subject. “Have you searched his office?”
    “Not yet. The dean was on the phone when I went by, and I didn’t get the key.”
    “I’ll call and see if she’s off the phone,” Benton said. “I’m sure she’d like to talk to you.”
    Benton didn’t wait for Rhodes to respond. He picked up the phone and punched in some