The signs reminded me of the Free Speech Movement in Berkeley in the sixties, but the words on these signs were intensely personal. Did they have constitutional protection here at Crescent Heights College? Was it only Mark who didn’t?

Mark clearly wanted to get away from this. I said, “Go on. I’ll see you later.” He gave me a questioning look, but I said, “I’ll be all right.” I didn’t think the students would attack me, but I didn’t have the same confidence in regard to Mark.

He left the scene at a fast walk. Some of the students followed him, but they had to practically run to keep up. The number thinned and when there were only a few left he stopped and confronted them. He talked to them for a few seconds. Apparently, whatever he said made an impression because when he went on and disappeared around a building they came back to the group.

The others had stopped chanting now that the object of their wrath was gone. I went up to the sumo wrestler and said, “What’s going on?” She looked at me suspiciously. I didn’t know whether she associated me with Mark because we had come out of the hall together. I said, “I’m Professor Morgan.”

“Hi, Professor,” she said. “Dr. Pappas has been charged with sexual harassment.”

“How do you know that?”

“Everybody knows it.” She waved her hand in a big circle, indicating the whole world.

“Do you know the specifics of the charges?” I asked, trying to sound professorial.

“Uh…no, but harassment is harassment.”

“Who preferred the charges?”

“That information is confidential.” She looked shocked that anybody would even ask. She obviously didn’t know.

I wanted to ask her why the name of the harassee should be confidential if the name of the harasser wasn’t, but that would just get me tied up in my underwear. Instead, I said, “To summarize, you know that a charge has been filed against Dr. Pappas, but you don’t know who filed it. You also don’t know the nature of the charge. You have no idea whether Dr. Pappas is guilty of the charge. And yet you have the right to harass him with your obscene shouting and obscene signs.”