“Emile always told everyone his unusual hiring practices were designed to promote department stability and help staff retention. but the rest of the faculty doubts that is true. It isn’t lost on the faculty that his practice gives him total control over both husband and wife. That doesn’t sit very well with the rest of the faculty. I can tell you, the faculty in the Biology department have taken to referring to the Languages Department as ‘the Harem’.
“How you decide to collectively manage this crisis will determine how the rest of the faculty responds. If you lock arms and circle the wagons as a group, you’ll probably be able to emerge from the disaster without become a laughingstock.
“My advice to the ladies who have been targeted by the charlatan is that you go to together to HR and submit a group sexual harassment claim. Get this asshole fired, and then work like hell to rebuild the reputation of the department.”
He took the glass of water from Quiara’s place setting and drank that down.
“I have evidence that Emile was bedding a couple of the wives. I debated whether to inform her husbands tonight. I decided that I don’t want to humiliate them. They were clearly clueless about what their wives were doing. I profoundly believe what happened is a matter that only concerns the husband and wife. It is no one else’s business.
“I propose that as a group that we decide collectively that no woman will ever make a public statement about whether they were or weren’t having sex with Emile. Ladies, that means if you are innocent, you are bound by your sacred honor to keep your innocence to yourself. Say nothing so that your guilty colleagues aren’t humiliated and can maintain a shred of dignity. Does anyone disagree?”
The room was silent. Greg said, “Then from now on, let us never discuss who was or wasn’t sleeping with Emile.”
The room was totally silent. Greg decided to address his final subject.
“In a few minutes, I’m going to leave the room and let you discuss between yourselves what you should do. Before I leave, however, I want to address the topic of forgiveness.
“Despite the bullshit I was floating earlier about breaking pair bonding agreements, there are are no ethics or morals in Biology. More often than not, the strongest creatures just take what they want. That’s a terrible and awful thing to contemplate, but it is the only law in nature.
“A young male lion takes over a pride by killing or driving off the previous male. As soon as he does, he kills the cubs or drives them away so that all of the offspring will be his. There is no right or wrong to this. He just does what he wants. If that means destruction of a bunch of cubs, so be it.
“Brood parasites leave their eggs in the nests of a different species. If the nesting pair don’t detect the interloping egg, their brood is doomed. The parasitic egg will hatch before their own. The first thing the newly hatched parasite does is immediately destroy the other eggs or kill whatever hatchlings are in the nest. There is no right or wrong to this. Brood parasites can get away with it, so they do it.