Tabloid City

by Pete Hamill

  He returns to bed, lies there. Today’s my day off. Sunday to Thursday. That’s the gig. He closes his eyes. But what if it’s really all over at the World? The Times is laying off people. Who knows what’s up with the Post and the News? I see their reporters on stories, they’re very worried. Except the old guys, the guys in their fifties. They figure it’s all over. Playing out the string. Hoping to latch on as flacks somewhere, until Social Security kicks in, or Medicare. Worried about paying tuition for the kids’ schools. Feeding the family. Paying the fucking mortgages. The World dies, my father will say, Hey, I warned you, Bobby. I couldn’t explain to him why I loved it. Going to work where every single day it was something new, some new story, where I could learn about people, and sudden death, and human pain. Not reading about them. Seeing them. Then telling their stories. I tried to explain to him, Dad, I don’t want to be rich, I don’t want to be famous, I want to be good. And he said, Why can’t you be good at something like banking?

  Thinking: Dad doesn’t get it. Maybe he never will. And maybe now I can never show him what it means to me. I’m a newspaperman. I’ve got the clips to prove it. I want to be a newspaperman for the rest of my fucking life. But maybe now, it will end. Just like that. At five o’clock this afternoon.

  He thinks: What the hell time is it?

  And hears a key turn twice in the door lock. There she is. Victoria Collins. Who just wants the chance that I got at the World. Her back is turned as she relocks the door. Shorter than I thought she was when she stood above me at a table, taking an order at Nighttown. A hard firm body. Small breasts. Short legs. Thighs that might get fat, but not for a while. She turns.

  –Hey, Fonseca. I went for the papers. And some coffees.

  Cheerful. She lays a paper bag on the table. Hefts about six newspapers.

  –What time is it, anyway? he says, trying to smile.

  She removes coat and hat, drops the newspapers on the foot of the bed. Glances at her watch, tells him it’s four-fifteen.

  –Jesus, Fonseca says. I gotta go.

  –Oh, no ya don’t, she says, in a cheeky growl.

  She starts pulling her sweater over her head. Black bra showing. She picks up the World.

  –Ya got the wood twice, Fonseca. The wraparound. The main paper. Gotta be a record! I bought the last five copies. And guess what? They gave me a credit line!

  He sits up, blanket pulled to his shoulders.

  –But—

  She is slipping off her jeans, uses thumbs to remove her black panties. Then bounces onto the bed.

  –We gotta celebrate, man.

  She carries a copy of the World into bed, folded back to the second page of the wraparound, and slides it under her.

  –Don’t worry about making a mess. I’m gonna carry this paper to my grave.

  She moves a hand under the covers.

  –Oh, Fonseca, you’re ready.

  –I am, he says, and pulls her to him.

  4:15 p.m. Ali Watson. JTTF office, Manhattan.

  He is in his office with Malachy Devlin, Eddie Taylor, Frank Harris, and Mary Prescott. The squad. He feels that he has been given a part in some Off-Broadway play, or an episode of Law & Order. There is no script but everybody knows the lines. The meeting is a performance, even for Ali. The big shots told him he could excuse himself from all this, take a few weeks off. He insisted on being here. They are discussing, after all, his son.

  Malachy has led the briefing. The city police have found the Lexus and are combing it for traces of Malik. That will take a while. There are hairs. Prints. They are examining several different video cameras on the block, one in the parking lot itself, another above the doors of a small repair shop across the street. NYPD is looking at the images, trying to find Malik in them and see how he was dressed. There are advisories ready for release, drawings showing his face with and without a beard. A press release should be ready by five o’clock, after it’s cleared in Washington. Then it will go out to the media.

  –Once that happens, Malachy says, the shit will hit the fan.

  –Yeah, Ali says. Thinking: What the fuck else can I say?

  –The press will go nuts, Mary Prescott says, in her cool thirty-ish way. That would make three homicides and the possibility of a terrorist act.

  –Yeah, Ali says. And we’re looking for a cop’s son.

  They sit there for a silent moment.

  –I’ll have to disappear, Ali says.

  The others look at him. His jacket hangs behind him on the back of his chair. His tie is unknotted. His cuffs are unbuttoned and folded above his wrists.

  –Suppose it’s not him? Mary says.

  –It’s him, Ali says.

  He stands. Inhales. Breathes out.

  –We have to figure out the target, he says.

  Ali turns his back.

  –The target will mean something… personal… to him. That’s what Patchin Place was. Something personal.

  He faces them again. Groping for a few more lines in a script that doesn’t exist.

  –Leave me alone for a while. Maybe I can remember something.

  They all stand. Malachy clears his throat.

  –If anyone calls for you…

  –Lie. Tell them I’m mourning.

  4:35 p.m. Sam Briscoe. City room.

  He hears them when he is still in the hall, passing by the cartoons and the typewriters, hears the low rumble of many voices, meshed into one growling atonal baritone chorus, punctuated by stabs of high laughter and an occasional surprised yelp. Then he smells them: the odor of burnt tobacco, like a fog from the past. He turns into the corridor leading to the city room, and there they are: faces creating a blur, like a mural splashed and daubed in a fierce rush, from a palette of pink, ivory, black, brown. From some distant part of the city room, Sinatra is singing “Come Fly With Me.” “If you can use some exotic booze, / There’s a bar in far Bombay.”

  Someone spots him.

  –Sam!

  And others yell his name, and they are coming forward to embrace him, blocking his passage. Then he hears applause. Sees some of them clapping soundlessly, with glasses in one hand, bumping their wrists, and more coming forward. He removes his coat, holds it. He sees steam on the windows overlooking West Street. A dark late afternoon.

  Hey, Sam… Hey, where’s the Fucking Publisher?… Drink, Sam? What the hell!

  His sense of dread vanishes. They are all here. From the Queens and Brooklyn bureaus; from the police shack; Warren up from Washington; the old photographers and the young; Heidi and Albert from the library; four old printers from the days when the World had a composing room; the techies who tend the computers; the whole damned crew from advertising. Across the room he sees the tall balding man who designed the World. There’s Scott Gellis, the sports editor, and what looks like his whole goddamned team, sitting on desks in the sports department, bottles on the desks. Gellis is smoking a plump cigar. Now Sinatra is singing “You Make Me Feel So Young.”

  Here comes Matt Logan, pushing through the crowd, flapping a hand at the pale blue nicotine fog. Briscoe remembers: Logan never smoked. One of the few. They embrace.

  –It’s all yours now, Matt, Briscoe says, and chuckles.

  –Yeah. Goddamn it.

  –It could be fun.

  –That remains to be seen. Is the F.P. coming?

  Briscoe laughs.

  –Never. He doesn’t want to land on his back on West Street.

  Logan smiles.

  –Thank God. One hug from him and I’d never be forgiven.

  Then he motions with his head.

  –This lot here, Sam? Logan says. We could put out a hell of a paper.

  –We already did, Briscoe says.

  One of the older photographers, Barney Weiss, is moving around with his Nikon. Some of the younger reporters are using cell phones as cameras. Others reach over to tap Briscoe on the shoulder or exchange fist bumps.

  –Whatever you do, Matt, don’t pick your nose. You’ll en
d up on YouTube.

  Logan laughs, and angles away, and Briscoe sees Janet, making a secretarial face that demands his attention. He nods to her. Slowly he pushes through, smiling, explaining that he has to get rid of his coat, hears an outburst of laughter, sees a Mexican pizza delivery man looking baffled, holding at least five stacked pies. No sign of the Fonseca kid. I hope he’s getting laid. He sure earned it. Here comes Dorfman, the city hall guy, smoking a pipe left to him by Murray Kempton. He says something that is lost in the general chaos of words. Sam, hey, Sam, let’s… No deadline tonight, baby… Who’s got a bottle opener?… I’m not shittin’ ya. The Iverson deal is… Where’s Helen? Anybody seen Helen?

  Briscoe knows Helen isn’t coming. Or said she wasn’t. She’d love the aroma of this version of a city room. Christ, fourteen years since I stopped cigarettes, he thinks, and I want one now. A whiskey too. Cynthia helped me stop both. There’s a clear spot now and he eases toward his office, where Janet is at the door. He shrugs off his jacket while he moves. Now another voice is playing on the CD player, wherever it is. “Well, since my baby left me, / I found a new place to dwell…”

  And here coming into the city room is Billygoat, followed by a brigade of pressmen. They are all carrying bundles of newspapers. Briscoe stops, turns back into the city room. They plop the papers on desks, cut the cords, and start handing them out. Everybody is laughing. Briscoe sees the wood, and laughs out loud too, reaching for a copy.

  WORLD ENDS!

  And the subhead: Jews, Irish Suffer Most.

  A photo from some apocalyptic movie shows floods, toppling skyscrapers.

  Briscoe scans smaller headlines in a stack on the left, with page numbers, shaking his head, chuckling at them all, guffawing at a few.

  Mexicans Demand New Day of Dead p. 9

  Sharpton: Proves God Is Black p. 3

  Taliban, al-Qaeda Thrilled p. 28

  Health Care Plan Dead p. 11

  Glenn Beck, GOP Blame Obama p. 2

  Palin Applauds ‘Rapture’ p. 5

  Albany Gang Dies in Vegas Debut p. 10

  Two-State Solution in Middle East: All Die p. 14

  In the lower-right-hand corner there’s a box:

  Tomorrow: INSIDE HELL by Richard Elwood, F.P.

  The complete back page shows a slack-jawed Jared Jeffries with a basketball bouncing off his chest and the headline:

  UCONN WOMEN

  BEAT KNICKS BY 23

  Here Briscoe guffaws. Then Billygoat has him by the elbow, pushing him toward the pressmen, and the rest of the crowd, and both face the cameras, holding up the front pages with everyone else, the photographers clicking away. Even the photographers are laughing. Barney Weiss photographs the photographers, from the front and from behind. They will all soon have prints, to hang on walls for the rest of their lives.

  Janet is now beside Briscoe, grabbing his sleeve with a free hand. She has his coat and jacket under her arm.

  –There’s a shitload of messages, she says. But you better call Dick Amory first.

  –Yeah, okay.

  She grabs his arm, waving off people, guiding him to the office. They both know that Amory is Cynthia Harding’s lawyer. In the office, Janet hangs the coat and jacket on the clothes tree, sits down, starts dialing. Then Janet nods to Briscoe as he slides behind his desk, making a phone sign with her hand. He picks up the phone, gestures to her to close the door.

  –Hello, Dick.

  –I’m sorry for your trouble, Sam. For our trouble. Our loss.

  He’s a decent guy, Amory. And a terrific lawyer. Not a Court Street ambulance chaser. That’s why Cynthia chose him.

  –Thanks, Dick. So what do we do?

  –For a service, there’s different possibilities. The Ethical Culture place on Central Park West. They can do it late next week.

  –Nah. It’s a nice place, but it’s not Cynthia.

  –What about a Catholic place? She talked about it a lot. She said she wasn’t religious but she liked the art and the music. Maybe St. Patrick’s—

  –Too grand. Maybe Old St. Patrick’s, down by Little Italy. She sent them money once for a library.

  –Yeah, Amory says.

  –They can have a bigger memorial a month from now, at the library on Forty-second Street.

  –Perfect. You got the name of a guy at Old St. Patrick’s?

  –Hold on… Janet, go find Farrell and ask him if he has a contact at Old St. Patrick’s, downtown, not the cathedral.

  She gets up and moves into the crowded city room.

  –I’ll have it for you in a few minutes, Dick. What else?

  He hears Amory exhale.

  –Big trouble. For you. In her will, she names you as executor. She left you some money too. And some paintings…

  –Fuck. I don’t know a goddamned thing about that kind of stuff. I’m a newspaperman, Dick. Or was.

  –I’ll help.

  –I just want to get the fuck out of town.

  There’s a beat of silence. Then Amory speaks.

  –Look, Sam, none of this has to be done on a newspaper deadline. Go away. Take a break for a month. When you come back—

  Janet returns, hands Briscoe a paper with a name on it.

  –Dick, I have the name of a priest at Old St. Patrick’s.

  They talk for another minute and agree to meet on Monday. Briscoe hangs up. He sits there gazing into the city room, which is full of rowdy laughter, people slapping fives, shaking their heads, telling lies and war stories and doing anything to hold back tears. A few are wearing the fake page 1 on their chests, held by tape or pins. Briscoe knows what he is seeing. A wake. He notices now that some of them are wearing black armbands. Matt Logan is one of them.

  He turns and stands, his reverie over. Janet waves the messages.

  –There’s others, she says. Including the F.P.

  –If he calls, tell him I’ve caught a boat for Morocco or something.

  –You want the others?

  He takes the cluster of notes and leafs through them. Imus. The mayor’s office. David Carr. Howard Kurtz. Oreskes at the AP. Liz Smith. Matt Frei at BBC America. Howard Rubenstein. NPR. The Columbia Journalism Review. NYU. Morning Joe. To talk about the future of newspapers. Or any news about services for Cynthia Harding. And there: Sandra Gordon.

  Wanting to know about services. About a memorial.

  Sandra Gordon. Remembering again that party in Jamaica when she was a child. Cynthia helping her to education and life. A pretty girl. A proud beautiful woman. He folds the note and slips it into his shirt pocket.

  He gazes out and sees dozens of them eating pizza. A truly New York wake.

  –I guess I have to make a farewell address, he says.

  –You’d better, Janet says.

  –What are they all going to do? he says.

  –Far as I know, every one of them signed up to work on the website. Including me. You gotta reapply, you know. And the F.P. isn’t gonna hire us all. That’s the point. Right?

  –I’m afraid it is.

  Janet is in her forties. No husband. No kids. Maybe no fella. He never asked.

  –What are you going to do, Janet? If the worst…

  –If Matt doesn’t need me, maybe I’ll move to Florida. My sister’s there. Who the hell knows? First things first. I gotta get the stuff in this office packed, and then shipped. To your house or storage or—

  –My house. I can sort it out later. Some stuff goes up to the museum, the stuff in the hall…

  –I know. I got your memo from three years ago somewhere. But we need to seal the office too, so nobody steals anything.

  –Perish the thought.

  –You better get out there. Or they’ll make a citizen’s arrest.

  Briscoe dreads going out to make a speech, but he has to say something. He remembers a guy at the old Journal-American, an editor who used to stand on his desk and wave a pica ruler like a sword, urging his wards to charge the barbed wire. The paper died anyway. But while they la
sted, his speeches caused great laughter in Mutchie’s. He thinks: Above all, I will not stand on a desk. Or wave my last pica ruler.

  –Let’s go, he says.

  Janet follows him into the city room, which now gets quieter. Heads turn to Briscoe. A new song is on the CD player.

  Why, oh why, do I

  Live in the dark?

  And is abruptly clicked off. Briscoe goes to the city desk. Logan is there, wearing his black armband. Briscoe glances at the windows and sees a light snow falling through the purple darkness of West Street.

  Then he faces the dense circle of people that has formed around the city desk, more than two hundred of them, many sipping drinks, chewing pizza, some with arms folded, others with hands jammed in pockets. Men, women, some in the rear standing on desks, photographers making pictures, some old reporters taking notes from the habit of a lifetime. Briscoe clears his throat and begins to speak.

  –As most of you know, oratory is not my thing. So in the tabloid spirit, I’ll try to be short and, uh, sweet. I want to thank every one of you for giving me the best years of my newspaper life. You also gave New York a newspaper that added to this city’s knowledge and intelligence and—for want of a better word—its genius. Not one of us who worked here ever had to apologize for being part of the New York World. And that was not because of me. It was because of you. Journalism is a team sport. And you were the team.

  They applaud. Briscoe hopes they are applauding themselves, not him.

  –Now everything has changed. I don’t have to tell you why. Don’t have to explain that the delivery system is changing by the hour. That the recession has killed too much advertising revenue. You know all that. But I hope every one of you gives everything to the World online—everything that you gave to the newspaper. Make it real journalism, reported, edited, where the facts are beyond dispute.