Page 93 - Just Deserts

PIVOT

send you a photo.” He clambered to his feet and smoothed down his
clothing. “Now I must get back to my laboratory. Goodbye.”
The two men shook hands perfunctorily and left the faculty
lounge in opposite directions, each apparently satisfied by the
outcome of the interview.

* * * * *

The editorial offices of the ‘Journal of Experimental Genetics’
were, in fact, the department of biology at the University of Eastern
Kentucky, and its editor the chairman of that department, Dr. Euell
Skinner. Articles submitted to the prestigious journal for publication
in one of its quarterly issues were parceled out to various academic
members of the university for peer review. The editor, in turn, met
with his readers for a final judgement on the merits of the article they
had analyzed, generally two months prior to the journal going to
press.
Dr. Skinner called one such meeting late on a wintery afternoon.
His colleagues straggled in muffled and buffered in heavy woolen
garments against the blustery weather. They shed these outer
wrappings on chairs next to the secretary’s desk and entered the
department’s small conference room. First to take a seat was Walter
Wahl, professor of biochemistry at EKU; he bore an
uncharacteristically sour expression along with his briefcase. Next,
muttering imprecations against the elements, was Persephone Ruffin,
professor emeritus of biology; she shook her wiry gray hair like a
terrier after a bath and plumped down unceremoniously into the
largest untenanted chair. Finally, after an interval uncomfortably
endured by the prompter attendees, Humphrey Campbell, assistant
professor of vertebrate physiology, stumbled in and tossed his
attaché case on the table with a spasmodic flourish.
Dr. Skinner glared at Campbell and called the meeting to order. “I
know it’s late and another blizzard is on the way, so let’s make short
work of this agenda. First and most pressing item: Frederick
Kingswater’s astonishing paper on genetic manipulation. If we accept
his work, it will shine an unaccustomed spotlight of publicity on the
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