Compulsion
By Julian Winslow
Part 9
Sitting at her desk, Dr Robbins contemplated the envelope she held in her hands. Behind her, the computer screen showed an array of e-mails. Only one had been opened; the others, patiently waiting her attention, had been ignored. She paid no further attention to the computer, or to much of anything else, as she studied the envelope: square, cream-colored heavy paper, with her name written on the front in black ink. An invitation of sorts.
When Lydia Wyngate had been talking to a secretary as she opened the cream-colored envelope. The woman was amazed to see Professor Wyngate’s monologue abruptly cut off as her eyes scanned the piece of paper through her half-glasses. She stood stock still, and her face went pale, her features drawn into a dazed look. It was an invitation, from that man—Marcus Wolfe. The wave of disgust and indignation that rose up in her was abruptly swamped by an exciting surge of deep-seated pleasure.
Jamie McDonough collected her mail from her campus mailbox, and noticed the thick creamy envelope with her name on it. She would open it with the rest of the mail when she got home. She stuffed the lot of it into her backpack, and didn’t give it a second thought. It lay waiting for her, tucked in her backpack as she climbed on the bus. It would not be ignored.
Hillary DeWitt was puzzled to find a hand delivered letter in her mailbox. It bore no stamps, nor address—just her name, written in black ink. It was clearly an invitation of some sort. She was curious, and couldn’t resist tearing open the envelope right then and there.
Maddie Fox was supposed to be getting her notes together for class, but anyone looking into her office would have found the young professor sitting at her desk, staring vacantly ahead, as if paralyzed. An opened invitation lay before her on the desk. She had been invited to Marcus Wolfe’s place in the country! She remembered thinking: It was rubbish, ridiculous, some sort of joke. She didn’t know it, and she would have vehemently denied it had she been told, but it was an invitation she couldn’t refuse.