“Come in, Ameera,” I shout. I have to shout to be heard over the RAs voices and also Carl’s drilling.
Rashid steps quickly out of her way. As he turns, I see that his face has gone almost as pale as hers. He can’t seem to take his eyes off her.
Ameera steps across the threshold, looking shy (and thin) as a young doe. She’s wearing a white print sundress, brown leather sandals, and no jewelry except for the gold pendant with interlocking rings she’d been wearing the last time I saw her. She looks around the office uncertainly, but finally focuses her attention on me, since I’m the person behind the most centrally located desk.
“I got a letter,” she says in her polite, British-accented voice. I can hardly hear her above the din, she’s speaking so softly. “You wanted to see me?”
Rashid hasn’t budged from the doorway. He’s still staring at her. Even his normally voiceless bodyguard looks uncomfortable. He lays a hand on the prince’s shoulder and says softly, “Your Highness? I think we should go now.”
But Rashid ignores him, staring at the girl.
“I do want to see you,” I say. “You and the prince, whom I think you know. Am I right about that?”
Ameera barely glances at Rashid. “We’ve met,” she says, in the same shy voice.
“So you wouldn’t mind talking with me for a couple of minutes,” I say, getting up to unlock the door to Lisa’s office with my master key. “In here, privately, both of you.”
It’s Rashid who responds first.
“Of course,” he says eagerly. “I’ll be happy to.” He barrels across the office, elbowing through the clusters of RAs, practically knocking Carl’s ladder over in his haste to get into Lisa’s empty office to meet with Ameera alone—well, not quite alone, since I’ll be there.
But he’s apparently willing to take whatever he can get, as I’d suspected when I’d heard from Mrs. Harris how desperate he was for a few minutes of the girl’s company.
“Your Highness,” Hamad cries, attempting to follow the boy. “No!”
I hold out a hand to halt the bodyguard.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “This is a residence hall judicial meeting. It’s private. Only Rashid and Ameera may attend. You’ll have to wait outside.”
Hamad was traveling so quickly to protect his prince that he walks straight into my hand. I don’t know if touching an unmarried woman is against Qalifi law, but the bodyguard sure acts like it is. He leaps back about three feet, looking shocked.
“No,” Hamad practically spits. “You cannot! You cannot . . .” Then he seems to remember himself, and declares, “You cannot meet with the prince alone! It is not done.”
“Hamad,” the prince calls from Lisa’s office. His voice is steady and self-assured. “It’s fine. I’ll be all right. Do as Miss Wells says, and wait outside.”
Hamad looks more enraged than I’ve ever seen him. His dark-eyed gaze is practically crackling with fire. I reach instinctively for my purse handles. Of course I have no intention of going for the pistol Hal insisted I bring to work with me . . . but suddenly I’m awfully glad he did.
“All right,” Hamad says, throwing himself down upon the couch Rashid has recently vacated, with the ill grace of an angry child who’s been given a time-out. “I will wait. But for five minutes only.”
“I can’t imagine it will take longer than that,” I say, relaxing my grip—but only a little—on my purse handles. “Ameera?” I look questioningly at the girl. “Will you come with me?”
Ameera is holding her shoulders so tensely, you’d think she was going to her execution, not a meeting in the residence hall director’s office with the young heir to the throne of Qalif.
Still, she doesn’t demur. She nods, and says faintly, “I will,” and walks into Lisa’s office like Joan of Arc on her way to the stake.
Now that I have the two residents I’ve most wanted to question since Jasmine’s death exactly where I want them, I turn to the RAs in the outer office and say, “As you can see, I’m about to have a very important meeting. I understand how frustrated and upset all of you are, but you’re not going to accomplish anything hanging around here. Lisa’s not going to be back until noon. I suggest you go visit President Allington’s office now that it’s open. One word of advice before you go, though.”
I pause to take a sip of my coffee—thank goodness I’ve fortified it with extra whipped cream, because I really need it.
“One thing I’ve noticed is that not a single one of you has said the words ‘I’m sorry.’ When you get over to the president’s office, if you do manage to get an appointment with him or any other administrator, that’s something you might want to consider doing—taking some responsibility for your actions. A girl died, you know. I’m not saying her death was your fault, or even that she died as a result of the party, but the whole reason residence halls exist is to help students transition safely into adult life. The whole reason RA jobs exist is to assist them in doing that.”
I take a deep breath. I have their full attention—even Hamad’s. It’s a bit like when I used to perform onstage, only instead of touching the audience’s hearts with a tender love ballad, I’m giving the RAs the speech they should have had before they were hired. Unfortunately, Simon Hague, the director of Wasser Hall, hired them, and he knows as little about responsibility as I do about nursing—real nursing, not below-the-sheets nursing.
“But you guys not only failed to do your job, the night of the party you actually encouraged young people to behave irresponsibly. So a nice ‘I’m sorry for violating New York College student code and setting a terrible example’ might go a long way with some of the people you talk to today. It might have gone a long way with me, or with Sarah, or even Lisa, if you’d also said, ‘I’m sorry for deeply disappointing you guys after all the hard work you did training us and making our rooms so nice before we moved in.’ It definitely would have gone a long way with me if you’d said you were sorry for making Lisa cry, because you did: you made Lisa cry. For that alone, I have no more time for any of you. So get out of my building.”
All of the RAs blink at me in astonishment. I don’t think any of these particular students have ever been rebuked by an adult in their lives. Because these are the type of kids who, in the words of Detective Canavan’s irrepressible probie, always got awards simply for participating.