David opened a file and started typing. Briley was right. The story was running this week. He could follow it up later. He had what he needed right now. He finished the piece, unnamed source and all (Briley didn’t have his green card yet), and slotted it on the bottom of the front page, bumping the sewer-bed improvement project to the back of the paper. It was three minutes before deadline.
He was scared, but you were supposed to be scared. Steve McQueen smiled down from his motorcycle. Hilts understood—you had to jump the fences, even if you wound up tangled in the barbed wire afterward. It was the effort that mattered. You kept going until they stopped you.
David glanced at the clock. Two minutes. He hit the save button and sent that week’s Shoals to the printer.
He felt pleased with himself throughout the next day, watching the renewed interest in his newspaper, happy to breathe for a moment the recycled air, or perhaps the secondhand smoke, of Woodward and Bernstein and Seymour Hersh. Everything was fine until that evening, when he stopped on his way into the Languedoc restaurant and spoke to Preston Lomax.
He should have paused with Sasha. They were an official couple now, and her ex-husband had designed the Lomax mansion. But he wasn’t sure how to present her. “My friend, Sasha” would sound evasive. “My girlfriend, Sasha,” grotesquely ironic, given the purpose of this dinner. “My partner, Sasha” was an outright lie, and a mealy-mouthed euphemism, even if it was true. “My soon to be ex-girlfriend, Sasha” was the most accurate, but no one was giving points for accuracy. In the end he just pushed her forward gently. She nodded at Lomax and followed the hostess to their table.
“Mr. Trezize,” Lomax called out. David turned and walked the few steps to his table. Lomax was eating with his wife, who seemed to be adding up the thread count in the tablecloth.
“Yes?”
“Interesting issue of the paper this week.”
David shrugged. “I don’t read the Inquirer and Mirror.”
Lomax smiled. Or at least it looked like a smile. Dobermans seemed to be smiling, too, just before they struck. “Mendacious and evasive,” Lomax said. “Like your editorials. Of course you read the Inky Mirror. And you know exactly what I’m talking about.” The force of the man’s personality was overpowering, like the heat from a roasting oven. You pulled back from it automatically. “So? You have nothing to say for yourself? Then I suggest you hire a lawyer. Because I’m suing you for libel.”
David cleared his throat. His voice was somewhere at the bottom of that cough. He hauled it up.
“Truth is full vindication.”
“What?”
“In libel law. Truth is full vindication. At least ten people saw what you did at Topper’s. And your company’s funding the Moorlands Mall will be common knowledge soon. I just ran it first.”
“You also suggested that I buy drugs from policemen.”
“No. We said it happens. No names were mentioned.”
“And how many other Eel Point homeowners used a local contractor? That narrows the field a little, Mr. Trezize.”
“Mr. Lomax, if you don’t use cocaine you have nothing to worry about. And neither do I.”
“Save it for the courtroom. You’ll be spending a lot of time there. With your divorce not final, you could be there fighting for custody over this little…dalliance.” He nodded toward the back of the restaurant, where David’s soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend was studying the wine menu. “The Commonwealth of Massachusetts frowns on adultery. Being ‘separated’ has no meaning in the eyes of the law, as I’m sure you’re aware, with the breadth of your legal knowledge. You’re married, you’re cheating and you’ve been caught.”
“Hold on a second. How can you—”
“A single father is so vulnerable in this state. Why, if someone should call in a report of you engaging in child abuse, for instance, you’d automatically be put on probation by the Department of Social Services, whether you did anything or not. Isn’t that appalling?”
“What the hell are you trying to…?”
“But it gets worse. If the police receive one more anonymous call, the DSS removes Jan and Jenny from the danger and hardship of your home. It makes sense. We have to protect the children, don’t we?”
Lomax knew his children’s names. How did he know their names? “Wait a second! You can’t just—”
“Of course I can. Anyone can. But don’t worry. You’d be able to clear yourself eventually. After the caseworkers have interrogated your children and your visitation rights have been suspended and your reputation’s been wrecked. People would never look at you the same way again. They just love to believe the worst about their neighbors, don’t they? It’s a terrible thing.”
Lomax laughed, a big, guttural guffaw, like a James Bond villain. All he needed was a Nehru jacket and a Siamese cat. David felt a geyser of sheer hate rising from his toes to the base of his spine. His fingers were tingling with the urge to grab that wattled throat and squeeze until the eyes bulged and the grinning red face went blue.
“You make me sick,” he said. “You’re not a businessman. You’re a thug. You scare people for a living. You’re an overfed bully and it’s time someone stood up to you. I’m happy be the one to do it.”
“Oh really? And where will you do that? In the pages of your gossip sheet?”
“You’re damn right I will, and nothing you can do—”
“Nothing I can do? I’ve already done it. It’s done.”
David felt a sudden twist in his stomach. “What are you talking about?”
“I want to go back to my dinner, so I’ll just say this. Men who work at newspapers teetering one advertiser away from going under shouldn’t throw slanders. It’s like the glass houses and the stones. Just as messy, but much harder to clean up. Have a pleasant evening, Mr.Trezize.”
Lomax cut into his steak. David was dismissed.
Who had Lomax talked to? What had he said? What was going on? What had he done? Could it be stopped? Could it be fixed, somehow? David turned away and stumbled to his table. Sasha smiled up at him.
“I ordered champagne. Is that all right?”
“What?”
“I thought it would be festive.”
He stared at her in frozen panic. Who was she? What was she talking about? What world did she come from? Apparently things were festive enough there to justify sitting around in fancy restaurants, ordering champagne. But that was absurd, there was nothing wrong with Sasha, she had no idea what was happening, she was just trying to have a pleasant night. Which was funny enough since he had come here to break up with her. She was about to be dumped, and she hadn’t figured that one out either. So sure, why not? Bring on the champagne! Let’s celebrate! I’m being framed for child abuse and my newspaper is being destroyed! You’re annoying and unattractive and I can’t stand to be with you! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Let’s all get drunk and puke on ourselves.
She was watching him. He had to say something. He needed an exit line. He had to get out of here, check his messages, start making phone calls.
“I have to go,” he said. “I don’t want any champagne. I took you here to break up with you. Sorry, I should have said something, but I was going to tell you and let you yell at me or cry or whatever, make a scene—but I don’t have time now.”
Sasha reared back a little in her chair as he babbled on, her face pulled tight. “David, what are you—?”
“It’s over!” He was shouting. He got his voice under control. “We’re finished and I have real problems to deal with. So…goodbye. I have to go now.”
“Are you okay…?”
“Sure, I’m okay. I’m fine, Everything’s great. Can’t you tell?”
He fled the restaurant.
He couldn’t remember where he had parked his car. India Street! That was it. He scrambled into the Escape, gunned the motor and peel
ed out. He barely managed to stop at the stop sign on Federal Street. A couple with two kids stared at him balefully as they crossed the street. Parents always looked at you that way when you pulled up to intersections, as if they knew you were planning to run down their children and only the force of their will was stopping you.
He glanced in the rearview mirror. There was a cop behind him, probably running his license plate, trolling for violations and infractions, checking to see if his registration sticker was up to date. Well, it was, he had nothing to worry about. Maybe a parking ticket or two, left over from the summer. Would that be enough to pull him over? Sure, if they felt like pushing someone around. They didn’t really need an excuse, just a mood. They could do pretty much whatever they wanted, they could mess with anybody.
“Not me,” David heard himself say aloud. “Not tonight.”
The cop kept going on Orange Street when David turned right on Cherry. But he still had to deal with that bitter spike of adrenaline. He had read somewhere it was the “fight or flight” hormone. Which was great for cavemen being chased by saber-toothed tigers. What he supposed to do with it? He had no way to fight against Preston Lomax. And flight was impossible. He lived here. In some ways, he would have preferred the saber-tooth tiger. At least it would be quick. All the adrenaline had done was make his hands shake. That was useful. Modern man needed a better drug than these homemade glandular potions. Maybe that’s why they invented alcohol.
When he got home, he poured himself a little vodka over ice, squeezed some lemon into it, and took a sip. The effect was instantaneous. He shoots, he scores. He took one more swallow, set the glass aside and picked up the telephone.
It didn’t take long to find out what had happened. His third call was to Elaine Bailey. He could tell from the tentative way she said, “Hi, David,” that he had guessed right.
“What’s going on, Elaine?”
“I was going to call you. But it’s just been so frantic at the office. We had to let Teddy go and Doris is out on maternity leave, so…well, it’s been a madhouse down there.”
“You probably made a million dollars this month. So don’t complain. It’s unseemly.”
“I’m not complaining, I’m just saying. We’re way behind with everything right now.”
“Are you pulling your ads?”
“David—” The apologetic whine told him everything.
“The insert, too?”
“I don’t really have a choice. We do a lot of business with the LoGran corporation. A lot of business. And not just sales, though the sales have been huge. They refurbish these houses and rent them out to corporate customers at premium rates and we have the leasing contract also. We’re the sole agent for an enormous project I really can’t talk about right now.”
“The Moorlands Mall.”
That stopped her. “No one knows about the mall.”
“Now they do. Didn’t you see the paper today?”
“No, I didn’t, I haven’t had time to do any—this was in your newspaper, David?”
“It’s news.”
“It’s a secret.”
“How long have you lived here? Thirty years? And you expected to keep a secret?”
“Who told you?”
“I don’t reveal my sources.”
“I could force you to tell me. I could sue you. It’s a new era. You can’t cover up for people anymore. People get arrested for that now. And they get convicted. That WikiLeaks soldier is cowering naked in solitary confinement as we speak.”
David took a deep breath and another swallow of vodka. The last thing he needed to do was antagonize Elaine Bailey.
“Listen, Elaine. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have mentioned the Moorlands Mall project. I’m certainly not going to write anymore about it in the paper.” He was lying and he knew it, but the lie just squirted out. He didn’t care, he wasn’t thinking about ethics. He just hoped she’d believe him.
“Not good enough” she said.
“It’s the best I can do.”
“People always say that when they know they’ve done badly.”
David took a breath. “I’ll be honest with you, Elaine. The paper is hanging on by a very thin thread right now. We don’t have the classified ad revenue because our circulation is too low, so we need every advertiser, every member of the business community who thinks it’s important to have an alternative voice on the island that isn’t afraid to—”
“David. Please. I don’t need to hear your stump speech. If an ‘alternative voice’ really was so important, people would be buying your paper. And you wouldn’t have any circulation problems. Frankly I’d been questioning the value of our financial commitment to the paper long before Preston spoke with me. It’s simply not a cost-effective way to position ourselves.”
“Maybe not now. But the paper is growing, and the idea was, we’d grow together so that we could—”
“I run the largest independent real estate firm in southeastern Massachusetts, David. I don’t need to grow with you. Perhaps you need to find some struggling new firm who can share your adventuring spirit. You’ll have plenty of room in the paper from now on.”
“I won’t have a paper from now on if you pull out!”
The sentence was a high-pitched shriek.
Elaine waited a moment, as if to let the reverberations of his hysteria die down. “Well, perhaps that’s for the best.”
“Elaine—”
“It’s late, David. I have to go. Good luck. And take care of yourself.”
“You’ve already done that, bitch,” he said to a dial tone. Why did people always say “Take care of yourself” when it was painfully obvious that they didn’t give a shit?
He hung up the phone, and leaned back into the frayed sleeper sofa. It smelled like the inside of a laundry hamper. The little apartment was a mess. He closed his eyes. There had to be some way out of this. Bailey Real Estate was his biggest single advertiser. He’d need at least three new accounts to fill the gap. But he’d already been everywhere and tried everyone. They were all very encouraging and supportive. But he didn’t need them to be supportive, whatever that meant. He needed their support. He needed their ad revenues. He needed their money. And he wasn’t getting it.
Bailey Real Estate’s monthly check was due in the next few days. Without it he wouldn’t be able to meet payroll. He could dip into his savings to keep things going, but eventually he’d be broke and in the same situation he was in now. He thought of Orson Welles in Citizen Kane, responding to the fact that his newspaper was running at a deficit, costing him a million dollars a year. “Hmmm,” he said, “At that rate I’ll have to close in just…sixty years.” David could go two months, that was the difference. After that, he’d be bankrupt. He didn’t know what to do. There was nothing to do. He poured himself a second drink. After the third one he managed to shut his mind off and go to sleep.
Patty’s phone call woke him at eight thirty the next morning. He would normally have been up for hours. The vodka must have gotten to him. He felt sluggish. His head ached. He hadn’t woken up with a hangover in years. He reached for the clock, but he couldn’t turn the alarm off. He finally realized it was the phone, and picked it up on the fourth ring, just as his answering machine activated. The call would be recorded, for what that was worth.
“That’s it. I’ve had it,” Patty said into his ear: no greeting, no pretense of civility. “You can flaunt your sex life all over town if you feel you have to, but not in front of my children.”
He sat up in bed. “What?”
“There are laws against this shit, David. We’re still married, technically. You’re traumatizing my children and I won’t stand for it.”
David was waking up. “Your children? You have kids you haven’t told me about?”
“You can turn your life into a porn movie, you can do whatever you
like now, but I won’t have them exposed to it.”
“But exposing them to you and Grady is fine.”
“Oh, so that’s what this is about. If you’re just trying to get revenge on me for Grady, you’re deluded. I couldn’t care less what you do with that disgusting pig. Just don’t tell me she’s the love of your life because we both know that’s ridiculous.”
“I don’t do that ‘love of my life’ stuff anymore, Patty.”
“You should take a good long look at yourself. Grady and I have a real relationship. We have mutual respect and common interests and passion and—”
“And I’m sure the kids find it very uplifting when they catch you smooching in the kitchen.”
“How did you—?”
“Just a guess. But clearly a good one.” He was waking up now. “You know, Patty, you really are the queen of the double standard. Nothing applies to you, nothing sticks to you. Nothing counts when you do it. You make the rules and you’re above the rules. Well, not anymore. You don’t scare me anymore. There’s nothing you can do to me, so stop dancing around making scary faces. You just look like an idiot.”
“I certainly can do something to you, David. I can take the kids away from you. And that’s exactly what I’m going to do. I’m suing for full custody and no visitation rights.”
“Good luck then, because you won’t get it and you don’t even want it. You’re the one who calls me up screaming when you have to have them for an extra night, or I screw up your love nest by having to work through the weekend. In case you’ve forgotten that was three weeks ago, when I was getting out the Christmas Stroll supplement.”
“Fine. I admit it will make things harder for me. There’ll be some sacrifices, but I don’t care.”
“Oh really? When was the last time you made a sacrifice? When you had to settle for just one pair of shoes on sale?”
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