“Still nothing concrete on Burkhardt?”
“The man’s a rapist and a power-mad deviate. Problem is I can’t prove it. Yet.”
The phone rang on McCarthy’s desk. He picked it up. “Hello, Lieutenant.”
“That confident, huh McCarthy?” Fisk replied.
“When you’re hot, you’re hot.”
“I imagine you’d be willing to share with me what Ms. Evers said.”
“If the right words come from your mouth, I imagine so.”
Fisk said tersely, “We have heard a rumor on the street concerning discussions by certain police officers regarding the arrangement of the killing of Carol Alice Gentry. We take the rumor seriously enough that we are actively investigating it. End of statement. You got that, McCarthy?”
McCarthy pumped his fist above his head. “Every word, Lieutenant. Every beautiful word.”
Sex, Satyrs, and Howling Wolves …
NEIL HARPSTER DUG HIS fingernails into the finish on his desk top and stared at the memo he’d found in his mailbox earlier that morning. A letter responding to a query from Ed Tower. Obviously a case of someone in human resources stuffing the wrong memo in the wrong envelope. The letter gave the Editor for Newsroom Operations a full breakdown of what he could expect in income from his pension plan and 40IK.
Harpster’s first thought had been to reseal the memo and send it on to Tower immediately; after all it was personal and confidential. His second thought was to rejoice at his great good fortune. There was no other explanation: The Post’s number two man planned to retire sometime in the next year! Harpster photocopied the memo, then sent on the original, his mind whirling at the possibilities.
Harpster picked away the gobs of varnish under his fingernails. Dramatic upheaval coming soon. Harpster’s moment. He’d been a good manager of the 1990s, studied the writings of William Tecumseh Sherman. He knew that those who act with decisive and ruthless intent often reap great victory. Unless Connor Lawlor did the unthinkable and looked outside The Post for a replacement, he only had one rival for the position: Bobbie Anne Pace. A fashion flake. No real competition.
Now was the time for Harpster to demonstrate his leadership ability. He’d had a chance yesterday when the albino took the pony hostage, but that Ubangi giantess on the city desk, the one with the perpetual attitude, had brushed him off. He was tired, too. Lydia had kept him up to all hours whining about the bastard vandal who was destroying her beloved garden. And then this morning, the final indignity—shut out of the editorial conference on the most explosive story to be broken by a Post reporter in years.
He followed the loops and twirls in Tower’s signature, trying to plot another course of action. But as often happened to the Assistant Managing Editor for Form and Content during times of mental stress, his efforts to assure his long-term future gave way to the need to assuage his short-term physical needs. He tried to deny it, but the demand grew in his gut and spread through his loins until he could think of nothing else. He had to rid himself of the sensation or the day was lost.
He put the memo back in his desk, allowing his attention to wander to the black a-line short skirt worn by Connie Mills as she keyed in the results of his latest reader focus group into the computer. No need for her to know about the memo. It might disturb her concentration and he could feel that he needed her to be extra concentrated today. He picked up his phone and punched her extension.
“This is Connie.”
“I know a motel on State Street,” Harpster whispered.
“Is that a fact?”
“It is. And I know that in about a half hour there will be a brown satchel there in room 11 B.”
“Hmmm, what might be in the satchel?”
Harpster gripped the phone tightly, “Fur leggings with zippers up the back, a pair of little horns, and a flute.”
There was a slight, sharp intake of breath on the other end of the line, then, “I know there’s a big, big bathtub in room 11 B.”
“Is that a fact?” Harpster replied.
“It is. And if you use your imagination that tub becomes a pool off in the woods. Beside it a wood nymph sits, pondering her reflection, unaware that a satyr watches.”
At that, the vision of Mills’ firm backside and plump tits slipping into the warm bath as he cavorted about blowing on a pan flute seized Harpster. He forgot about pension memos and garden vandals and fashion flakes and cops and tattletale hookers. As if in a trance he hung up the phone, walked out to her desk, and said loud enough for half the newsroom to hear, “I’m off to lunch, Connie. If anyone needs me, I’ll be back in an hour.”
Mills nodded dreamily and ran her finger lazily on the top of her desk as if she were dipping it in the waters of a cool, sylvan stream.
One hundred feet away, Bobbie Anne Pace glanced up to see Neil Harpster hurry out of the newsroom red-faced, clutching a brown satchel. She studied him for a moment as one would a dread enemy then returned to the memo on her desk describing what could only be the impending retirement of Ed Tower.
She picked up the phone, punched in an extension, and said, “Will you come to my office? I have a change in fashion to discuss.”
Two minutes later, Margaret Savage closed the door behind her. Pace slid the memo across the desk without expression. The P.C. Oracle read the letter twice, crossed her legs, and said flatly: “It’s come finally, what we’ve waited for. From the managing editor slot, you can effect needed change in the domination of this institution by Eurocentric white males. You can bring a female warrior’s sensibility to The Post. Bobbie Anne, if we act well in the coming months, you will run with wolves.”
The Assistant Managing Editor for News and Information glanced at the framed photograph of herself and Savage that had appeared in Vanity Fair. Hovering in the air over Margaret’s head she imagined the headlines that would eventually come her way:
“Swashbuckling Editress Lays Waste to Old Boys’ News Network.” “From Fashion Scribe to Information Trendsetter, Bobbie Anne Sets the Pace.”
And dare she think it?
“Lawlor Retires. Names First Female Editor-in-Chief in Southern California.”
Pace did not allow herself to smile at these imaginings. Savage would see any indication of pleasure before attaining their goal as a sign of weakness. And she needed the columnist’s creative mind to chart the typhoon waters ahead.
“Neil Harpster,” Pace said simply.
“You must get by him,” Savage responded.
“But how?”
Savage did not blink. “I do not know him well enough yet. But flaws in character will reveal themselves to the careful observer.”
Pace shifted uncomfortably. “I’m uneasy using dirt to get ahead. The Aikido classes have taught me that confrontation is not the way to achieve harmony.”
“The hell with Aikido,” Savage said. “That’s martial art for art’s sake. This is a street fight. To become the Alpha bitch, you must lay bare the necks of your rivals.”
She said this last with such frigid conviction that Pace shivered. Pace thought of the alternative: having to listen to Neil Harpster tell her what to do the rest of her newspaper career. She returned her attention to Savage. Her features sharpened. She drew back her lips and bared her teeth. She growled.
At that the P.C. Oracle’s expression softened perceptibly. She leaned forward in her chair, echoing Pace’s growl with her own low-tone howl.
Prentice LaFontaine cocked his head: “Is there a dog in here?”
Isabel Perez peered up from behind her computer screen where she was working on a list of people to call for a story about the media tactics planned for Mayor Portillo’s gubernatorial bid. “What are you talking about?”
“A dog, a pooch,” News said. “I swore I just heard one … make that two pooches barking. Ahh, well. No matter. Tell me some good gossip.”
“Nothing to tell.”
“Please, Isabel,” he whimpered. “After the scandalous antics of Ralph Baker yes
terday, I’m coming down hard. I’m a frantic snoop junkie in need of a defamation fix.”
“Sorry, News, the well is dry,” she said. She looked back at the lead she’d been fashioning. “As you can see from the front page, I’ve been terribly busy.”
An angle! He took two steps back to appraise her with arched eyebrow. “Already assuming the status and arrogance of chief political reporter, I see.”
Perez reached involuntarily to her collarbone. She wore a navy turtleneck cotton sweater under which lay the badge the badge-sniffers longed to sniff. Since she’d started wearing it to bed at night, fate had gone her way. Now she regarded the press pass as a sacred talisman capable of warding off all evil in her path.
“It’s not like that,” she said.
“It certainly is,” said someone behind LaFontaine.
News turned to find Kent Jackson with his thumbs looped in his paisley suspenders. “Ask and ye shall receive,” LaFontaine said, delighted at the prospect of a showdown.
Jackson ignored him and turned to Perez. “I’ve been … distracted. But I’m not about to let Patti’s obvious bout of insanity ruin my career. I’m back, Isabel.”
Perez hesitated, stunned by Jackson’s reappearance. “Of course,” she began. “I was just making sure we didn’t get behind.”
“Come, come, Isabel,” Jackson said, throwing his briefcase onto his desk. “You expected me to dwindle into quivering ineffectual jelly. Just isn’t going to happen. I believe in a higher power. He gives me strength.”
Perez pressed her index finger against the sniffable press pass. “Give me more credit, Kent,” she said. “I understand your talents.”
He grinned. “As well you should. Now, I believe there are quite a few faxes and press releases to go through. I’ll be taking over the media strategy piece.”
Perez bit the bottom of her lip so hard she tasted blood. She opened her mouth slightly, and said, “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
She stood without another word, wiped the blood from her chin, and made her way toward the wire basket where the clerks stacked political correspondence.
She froze when she saw the two-foot pile of political dross. She thought of Arlene Troy’s longing. She became steely and detached. She reached for the first five inches of paper, understanding for the first time just how far she would go to become worthy of the holy fetish that hung about her neck.
LaFontaine was about to return to his desk, when he remembered that Gertie said Jackson was in therapy.
“You seem well rested for a man whose wife just left him,” he said.
Jackson didn’t even bother to look up. “Get out of here, you circling vulture.”
“Placing yourself square within the carrion metaphor,” LaFontaine taunted. “You are suffering.”
“Get out!” Jackson yelled.
The chief political reporter watched the insufferable gossip trot away, wondering with dread what LaFontaine would do if he ever learned that he’d borrowed $56,248 from a loan shark to pay off his Vegas bookies. The loan was for forty-five days, no extensions.
Jackson was betting on a wild anonymous phone tip he’d gotten last night about the relationship between Mayor Ricardo Portillo and Chief of Police T. Lawrence Leslie, something that if uncovered could end the gubernatorial bid.
If Jackson could nail it down, it would serve a twofold purpose: he’d probably get that six-figure book contract to write about California politics his agent had been shopping around. And he’d be putting a death sword in the most liberal politician he knew.
Six hours later, while dusting his collection of Disney Hummels on the mantelpiece, LaFontaine recalled with glee how unnerved he’d made Jackson. He would have to do more research into this gambling problem. It could provide many more delicious moments.
When he’d finished with the porcelains, LaFontaine went through the rest of the condo looking for the slightest bit of dirt. How he hated dust in his personal life.
He paused to watch Brad Perkins do finger push-ups on the rug and glanced in at the movie marquee above the bed. Spartacus was playing. Perfect, LaFontaine thought, bringing his attention back to his new live-in
Out of his General Patton outfit, in blue Lycra shorts, no shirt, News thought Perkins looked exactly like Kirk Douglas in his younger days. His skin was flawless. It popped and rolled and smoothed over the taut musculature of his back. Sweat gathered at the nape of his thick neck. At one hundred, Perkins flipped over and into a set of stomach crunches.
“I’ve already made reservations for the Bull Ring at nine,” LaFontaine announced. “We have a table near the window and an order of Raphael’s famous Tapas waiting.”
Perkins had shifted into cross abdominal work, taking each elbow to the opposite knee. “Not me,” he grunted.
“Are you mad?” News demanded as he untied his housework apron. “Do you understand how difficult it is to get a window table at Bull Ring on such short notice?”
“Too much work to do,” Perkins said. “Besides, Tapas make you fat.”
Perkins relaxed back onto the carpet, his ripped pectorals heaving from the exertion. He grabbed one knee and pulled it toward him in a stretch.
LaFontaine took two steps toward Perkins and tickled his butt with the feather duster. “C’mon, Old Blood ‘N’ Guts, for Sergeant York?”
Perkins lashed out his foot, knocking the duster away. “Jesus, Prentice, I’m trying to stretch here.”
News saw something in Perkins’s reaction, something bordering on the flared rage his father used to display. He felt unsure, scared, and yet pleased with the response.
Perkins returned to the stretch, blowing air long and smooth out through his mouth. In an act beyond his control, LaFontaine reached forward with the duster and tickled the bodybuilder under the nose.
Perkins jumped up. His hands curled into fists. His nostrils quivered in anger. Inside News felt nice and wanted.
Reaction …
BY SEVEN O’CLOCK THE next evening, Gideon McCarthy was on his second beer at the Slotman’s Bar and Grill. He waited on a stool bar for Prentice LaFontaine, who’d called him from home.
“I needed a mental health day off,” News had said. “But let’s have a drink tonight to celebrate your Virgil-like ascent from hell. I’ll bring Brad for you to meet.”
McCarthy declined at first, wanting to be with Carlos and Miriam after the endless days of work, but Estelle had insisted he go for a little while. He didn’t have much of a social life. The kids would wait up for him.
He sipped at the beer, knowing he should be ecstatic at breaking the biggest story of his career, but he wasn’t. Several of the events of the past twenty-four hours nagged at him. He sat there trying to block out the Slotman’s irritating Muzak, thinking about it all.
Carlos and Miriam woke him early, jumping on his bed with the paper. The headline over the copyrighted story said:
Cops Heard Arranging Murder of Prostitute
All hell had broken loose. Mayor Ricardo Portillo and Police Chief T. Lawrence Leslie called a press conference at 11:00 A.M. in city hall to handle the media clamor.
McCarthy sat front row center with Isabel Perez and Kent Jackson. They were all loving the way Paul Fairbanks and the other television reporters held up the front page of The Post to the cameras as they did their stand-up introductions.
Even better was Karen Rivers’s reaction. Her normally olive-tone skin had paled considerably. Her eyes were puffy, probably the result of a 3:00 A.M. wake-up call from The Beacon. She bit at the quick of her fingernails. No doubt about it: she evinced all the signs of making her first trip to the hot seat of the missed big story. Better to give than receive, McCarthy thought.
Mayor Portillo, a handsome man, some would say an elegantly handsome man, in a navy blue suit and matching tie, strode to the podium. He was ordinarily a consummate politician, cool under pressure, articulate without appearing slick, forceful but not a tyrant. This morning he fumbled with the pa
per his statement was typed on. Arlene Troy, who was flitting in the background with a sheaf of papers, stepped forward. Before she could reach the podium, Chief Leslie, a tall man with a deep tan that spoke of weekends on the tennis court reached over and found the mayor the correct page. Fisk leaned against the wall well behind the chief and the mayor, obviously annoyed. Next to him stood Steve Cohen, the district attorney’s right-hand man.
“I have a brief statement and then we will open the floor to your questions,” Portillo said. “Two of this city’s police officers were arrested this morning on charges of conspiracy and first degree murder. Officer David Patrick, a patrol officer assigned to the Boulevard precinct and Lt. Diego Blanca, a shift supervisor in the same precinct, will be arraigned later today in connection with the slaying of Carol Alice Gentry.”
Perez leaned over and whispered to McCarthy, “You got ’em.”
McCarthy nodded and kept writing as fast as he could. Behind them Fairbanks whispered to his cameraman to get a close-up of Leslie, who stood with his head bowed.
Portillo continued, “This is a sad day for the city and, I think Chief Leslie will concur, a very dark day for the police force.”
Portillo went on. “Shortly after the arrests were made, Chief Leslie offered to resign from his position as manager of my campaign.”
Jackson broke in, “Did you accept his resignation?”
“I did not,” Portillo said firmly. “I still believe that Chief Leslie is the best man to run my campaign and the best man to run the police force. That is not to say that I minimize the gravity of the arrest of these two officers. But this city employs more than four thousand full- and part-time police. In any organization, there may be bad apples.”
Jackson followed up, “Frankly, Mayor, you’ve made crime a major issue. Your opponent, Larry Barnes, says having Chief Leslie run your campaign indicates you’re wishy-washy about keeping California’s streets safe.”
Portillo shook his head. “Larry Barnes is a high-technology executive, with no public experience. Chief Leslie is a man of integrity and a committed public servant. I think the fact we are here now, announcing these arrests, says a lot about our dedication to rooting out criminals no matter what they do for a living.”
Hard News Page 21