"Set the clock, Professor."
Walsh's smile grew. He thought he had won. He pressed the button. The red digits lit up: 30.
He did not know that Whitney had already seen the answer. She had seen it the moment she walked up to the board. She had not picked up the chalk yet because she wanted Walsh to keep talking. She wanted him to dig the hole a little deeper.
What had Whitney seen on that blackboard that the professor with twenty years of authority had missed?
Whitney did not move toward the chalk. She stood at the blackboard. Her eyes traced the equation from left to right, then back again. Then she paused on a single symbol on the third line.
The clock dropped to 29... 28... 26...
Walsh folded his arms. "Tick-tock, Miss Tate."
She did not respond. The room began to murmur. A student in the second row checked his watch. Sullivan looked down at her hands again. In the back, Dr. Whitmore did not move at all; she was watching Whitney's eyes.
The clock hit 15, then 10.
Walsh started smiling. The smile grew. "This is what I expected. Let the record show—"
The clock hit five... four... three...
Whitney stepped to the side of the blackboard. She walked the length of the equation slowly, like she was reading a sentence she had read before. The clock hit zero. The buzzer sounded.
Walsh raised his arms. "There it is, Miss Tate. By the terms you accepted, you are now formally—"
"Professor."
It was the first word Whitney had spoken since she'd accepted. Walsh stopped.