Not a clinician, so no need for a state license. That made checking with the Board of Psychology for disciplinary actions a waste of time. I called anyway. Zero.
I tried a pocketful of area codes for residential listings for Dr. Benjamin J. Dugger. Nothing. Scanning his name on the Internet pulled up only the same abstract of the Cambridge paper, which I reread.
Jargon and numbers and high-powered statistics, the arcane nutrients of tenure. Nothing remotely sexy.
Still, it had been Dugger’s number listed in Lauren’s book, and as much as I disliked de Maartens, that made Dugger the prime candidate for “Dr. D.” And he’d been running his ad during the time Shawna Yea-ger disappeared. Milo was probably right about there being no link between the cases, but still . . .
I thought about it some more. Dugger’s bio was about as provocative as the owner’s manual for a plow.
Weaker than weak. I reread the bio and something shot out at me.
Two time lapses: ten years between his bachelor’s degree and his doctorate, another two between finishing school and taking his first job.
Nice first job. Most new Ph.D.’s enter the job market burdened by debt and are forced to accept temporary lectureships and entry-level slots. Benjamin J. Dugger had disappeared for two years, only to return in an executive position.
Offices in Newport Beach and Brentwood. A company sufficiently capitalized to offer free services. And what did personal-space research have to do with battered women?
It added up to money.
Some college profs are independently wealthy.
Simon de Maartens’s hostility made me wonder about his financial situation. Time to learn more about both Dr. D’s.
The Ovid files at the U’s research library spit out forty-five publications for de Maartens, all on the psychophysics of vision in primates. He was thirty-three, and there were no lapses in his professional life: B.A. at twenty from Leiden University in the Netherlands, Oxford doctorate in experimental psychology at twenty-five, two-year postdoc at Harvard, where he served a three-year lectureship, then assistant professorship at the U and fast-track promotion two years later to associate. The usual society memberships and more than a handful of academic honors, including a grant and a service award from the Braille Institute—perhaps his chimp research offered human possibilities.
Benjamin J. Dugger had been less prolific: five articles, none more recent than two years ago, all in the same dry vein. The last three had been coauthored with Barbara Buffington and Monique Lindquist, the first two had been solos—summaries of Dugger’s first-year graduate research study and dissertation: measuring personal space in hooded rats subjected to varying degrees of social deprivation. The dates allowed me to fix his graduate studies as beginning four years prior to receiving his Ph.D. That still left a six-year question mark between Clark University and Chicago.
Having nowhere else to go, I phoned both institutions and verified his degrees with the alumni associations. So far, nothing suspicious. Why should there be? I was groping.
Thinking about Lauren’s body tumbling out of the dumpster, I calledChicago again and asked for Professor Buffington or Lindquist. The former was on sabbatical in Hawaii, but a woman answered Lindquist’s extension with a high, bright “This is Monique.”
“Professor, this is Mr. Lew Holmes from Western News Service. We’ve come across an article about some work you and your colleagues did on personal space and were wondering if one of you could talk to us about a piece we’re putting together on dating in the nineties.”
“I don’t think so,” she said, laughing. “That research was pretty esoteric—lots of math, nothing about dating. Where’d you come across it?”
“It came up on our database,” I said. “So you don’t think you can help?”
“I think if you wrote about our research your readers would fall asleep.”
“Oh. Too bad. Sorry for bothering you, and I guess I won’t follow up on Professor Dugger.”
“Professor— Oh, Ben. No, I doubt he could help you either.”
“Double too-bad,” I said. “We’re a California-based news service, and our clients are always looking for local sources to quote. With Professor Dugger being out here, it would’ve worked out great.”
“I don’t want to speak for Ben, but I doubt he could illuminate you either.”