Details at Ten

by Ardella Garland

  I had even called Detective Eckart hoping to coax something out of him. It would be a long shot, but I can’t count how many times nagging a long shot has ended up helping me turn a tough story.

  I pictured Detective Eckart each time I called—handsome, gruff, but caring. I couldn’t help but find him interesting, especially after those flirtatious looks. But don’t you know he didn’t return any of my calls? I stared at the phone on my desk. Should I try him again? After a few minutes of indecision, I decided to call him just one more time. I reached for the phone just as it started ringing.

  “Uggggh-huh-huh . . .” was all I heard when I picked up. Two things I could distinguish immediately—one, it was a woman’s voice, and two, she’d lost it.

  “Hello?” I asked. “Who is this? What’s wrong?” I got focused because whoever was on the line was very afraid and very on edge. “Take a deep breath and pick your words carefully. Speak slowly.”

  “My baby . . . is . . . miss . . . ing . . . she gone.” Emotion forced the woman’s words out in a misshapen sentence.

  Oh God, some poor woman whose child was missing. I thought of my three-year-old nephew, Satch, Peaches’s boy, and thought of how upset we would all be if he were missing.

  “Ma’am? Ma’am!” I said, trying to calm her. “Take deep breaths. Now wait and just listen. Let’s start over. First, what’s your name?”

  “Kelly Stewart. My baby missing and she don’t be going off by herself no time and won’t nobody—”

  “Kelly, Kelly! Stop a sec. I need you to try to calm down. I know it’s tough. Here, try this: Just answer my questions and that way I’ll be able to get all the facts, okay?”

  “Oh-oh-oh- . . . kay.”

  I grabbed a pen. “Now, Kelly, where do you live?”

  “Fifty-fifteen South Hedge.”

  She lived in the neighborhood where the drive-by happened two days ago.

  “What’s your daughter’s name?”

  “We named her Kelly, afterah me, her last name is Johnson, afterah her daddy, but ev’rbahdy call her Butter ’cause she love bread and butter sammiches.”

  “How long has Butter been missing?”

  “Since yes’day evening and I called the police but they ain’t wanna come out here and do nothing. Won’t nobody help me and then the kids say you was out here the other day and was real nice so I thought . . .”

  “How old is Butter?”

  “She six.”

  “Are you married, divorced, or a single mother?”

  “Single mother.”

  “Could Butter be with her father? Maybe he stopped by and got her and didn’t ask—”

  “No, he’s in the army, stationed overseas.”

  “Could Butter be at a friend’s house, with another relative, something like that?”

  “All her friends live in the neighborhood and they ain’t seen her, and all our relatives in the city live right here, in this house—my mama, my sister, her son, me, and Butter. We done searched everywhere. She ain’t been to see her daddy’s people in the South but twice and Butter don’t know nothing about getting down there.”

  “Okay, who did you talk to at the police station?”

  “Sergeant . . . uh-uh . . . Reynolds, then I talked to a Sergeant McGuire . . .”

  I knew McGuire. He was a bit moody but always straightforward. I had talked to him a couple of times today when I called about the drive-by.

  “. . . and nobody wanted to help me! Butter is a good girl, too. Butter gets awards in school and in church. Spelling champion. Perfect attendance. Damn, don’t y’all get it? My baby is a good girl and she’s missing!”

  This kid, Butter, didn’t sound like a runaway. “Okay, Kelly? Kelly, hang on. I’m with you. Let me go talk to my managers here at the station about coming out to do a story—”

  “Thank-you-thank-you-thank-you!”

  “I’m not making any promises, Kelly, but I’ll do what I can and I hope everything will turn out okay. Give me your number and I’ll call you back.” I wrote down the number and hung up the phone.

  I walked over to the assignment desk where the managing editor and the assignment editor usually sit. It’s the hub of the newsroom and it’s set off with maps, police and fire scanners, computers, and things needed to make quick decisions on what to cover, who to send, and how to get there. My managing editor and assignment editor are both white men. They were sitting there with Bing, also a white man, discussing a special project for next month. The top decision-makers at WJIV are all white men.

  “Hey, guys, I just talked to a woman named Kelly Stewart. Her daughter is missing.” I relayed the facts I had, which included where the family lived. “I want to do a story.”

  Bing, the senior manager, scoffed, “Well, I say no, kids like that are always getting into trouble and running away.”

  “Kids like what, Bing?”

  “You know, kids that live there. We can’t do a story every time some kid in the ghetto runs away from a bad home.”

  I wanted to go upside Bing’s head. How cheap. How insulting. Instead, I inhaled and exhaled sweetly. “So, you’re assuming because this is a poor black child that she’s in trouble or she’s a runaway? That’s . . .”

  I paused. I started to say “racist” but that word would set Bing off on a defensive pattern that I didn’t want to deal with right now. And it was clear that the other two managers sitting there were not going to help me. As usual, there was a big gap in understanding between me and the white boys, a gap as wide as a crater left behind by an earthquake.

  “. . . that’s a common assumption and surely you all are above that in this wonderful, fair, and impartial newsroom in which we work.”

  I could tell from their looks that I hadn’t drawn blood. I had to make a decision: throw a fit or try another angle. “The point is, guys, that the family lives in the same area where the drive-by was two days ago. If I go cover this story, that gets me points with the people in the neighborhood, which builds contacts and sources for future stories. I’ll need that help because Detective Eckart told me off camera that he thinks a major turf war is about to erupt.”

  I got them where they live.

  “Well,” Bing said, “maybe we’ll run the kid’s picture with a description. Maybe a sound bite, if it’s good. Just do a quick hit on the story and not a long package. Yeah, check it out.”

  Believe, receive, and run!

  I got out of that newsroom as fast as I could. I stopped only to call Kelly. I told her three things:

  One: I was on my way.

  Two: I needed photos of Butter and I wanted to interview as many members of the family as I could.

  Three: I would do my best to keep her story on the air, in the public eye. Heat like that would help solve Butter’s disappearance faster.

  I was overjoyed. The roller-coaster ride of news was on the upswing. What I didn’t know was that it was headed down—quick and in a hurry—as soon as I got the next phone call.

  F I V E

  The phone began ringing in the truck; Zeke and I were in the express lane headed south on the Dan Ryan. Zeke was trying to beat the sleek el train that runs between the multilanes of traffic stretching north and south. We were smokin’ the race when I answered the phone.

  “Hi.” It was Nancy. “There’s a change in plans. We’ve gotta package this new missing kid story for the six o’clock, plus a live shot and package for the ten o’clock.”

  “That’s great, Nancy. That’s what I wanted to do all along. I really have a gut feeling about this little girl Butter—”

  “Not her. There’s another missing kid. In Hyde Park. You’re closest. The other missing kid story is dead.”

  “Oh, c’mon!” I shouted. “You’re not going to pull this!”

  “Don’t jump on me,” Nancy said in a slow and deliberate voice. “Bing and the guys asked me to call and tell you because obviously they knew you’d be upset. But listen, this kid missing in Hyde Park is apparently
the eight-year-old son of a University of Chicago professor, a Nobel Prize–winning chemist. It’s a big deal. The police are already at the family’s house.”

  “So how long has the boy been missing?”

  “Five hours.”

  “Five hours,” I said, gritting my teeth. Then I asked a question that I knew the answer to: “Is he white?”

  Nancy didn’t say a mumbling word.

  “So, this little white boy comes up missing for just five hours and we automatically deem it a story, and a lead story no less. But when this little black girl is missing we don’t want to do the story because black kids allegedly come up missing all the time. I guess little Butter has the wrong skin color, lineage, and zip code. Three strikes and little Butter is out, huh?”

  “Don’t beat me up, Georgia. All of the other stations are hot on this U of C missing kid story. It’s the lead. And you gotta hustle because we can’t get beat, either.”

  An idea flashed through my head. “Nancy, why not do both stories? A double lead.”

  “I’m tight on time. I just don’t have room in my show for both. Besides, Bing said he told you the story was weak but go ahead and check it out just to build up your contacts in the neighborhood. With the little information you have, it just doesn’t hold up as a double lead.”

  “Of course not. A double lead would be too much like right. God, Nancy . . . this woman is going nuts about her little girl. I already called her and said that I was coming. What am I going to tell her, huh? What can I possibly say to that girl’s mother?”

  “I know,” Nancy said soothingly. “I know.”

  I was sunk. I had no out. I got the address and more info on this new story from Nancy. I moved the phone away from my ear and told Zeke, “Head to Hyde Park.” Then I dialed Butter’s mother. I had the foul task of telling her I wasn’t coming.

  “Why?” Kelly moaned over the phone, emotion bubbling to the surface. “I got the pictures. And we’re all here ready to talk. Please come!”

  What could I say to her? How could I explain the mechanics and prejudices of how news is covered? In a thirty-minute newscast, there’s only about sixteen minutes of real news. Weather and sports get three minutes apiece, the commercial breaks add up to five minutes, chat and cutesy stories eat up the rest. Then the stories picked are either tragic, or scandalous, or affect a wide group of people like big layoffs, blizzards, school strikes, or tampering cases, stuff like that. Missing people were always low on the list but sometimes families with money or fame or contacts can get instant airplay. It’s difficult to admit that today this kind of crap is still going on.

  I promised Kelly that I would try to help in some way. She called me a “low-down bitch” and hung up. I didn’t say a word for the rest of the drive to Hyde Park. Zeke just glanced over at me periodically. Luckily the good Lord had blessed him with enough common sense to know that I was pissed off and not to mess with me about it.

  We pulled up to the house and the news trucks of the other stations were already there. Obviously I was being sent late to the story. I was behind. I hate getting beat on a story!

  Zeke and I headed up the walkway of this grand mansion, landscaped with expensive shrubs and rock designs. As we got halfway to the door it flew open and the professor came running out, followed by a woman I assumed was his wife. They were tailed by reporters and camera crews from the other stations. “Roll! Roll!” I shouted to Zeke as I instantly reversed direction.

  Zeke backpedaled the way we’d just come, shooting the scene all the while.

  We had great position: the professor had to pass right by me. When he got close, I stuck my mike in his face. “Professor, what’s going on?”

  The man was giddy. “They found my little boy. He rode off on his bike. They have him at the police station at Fifty-first and Went-worth!”

  “Your son’s safe and unharmed?”

  “Yes! Thank God, yes!”

  The professor jumped into his car and we shot more video of him driving off. Now all the crews scrambled to their trucks and headed for the police station to get the reunion picture—the capper to the story, the moment he sees his little boy and hugs him. Everyone would be live from the cop shop. I called back to the station and told them what happened and where we were headed. I felt so much better. Now the Hyde Park kid was found. We’d get the reunion picture, I’d write a short package, go live with it from the cop shop at six. Then I could fight for doing Butter’s story for the ten o’clock news, which is our bigger audience anyway.

  Hey-now, I felt like my luck was changing.

  Everything went as planned. We got the huggy-kissy picture we wanted of the little boy and his dad. We got a shot of the red bike with the high-mounted handlebars; the little boy grinning, two teeth missing in the front, holding his Batman action figure.

  As soon as we wrapped, I saw Detective Doug Eckart. The man actually looked better than he did when I first met him. He was leaning against a corner wall near the front desk reading a report on the counter. One hand was up cupping his head and the other arm was resting on the counter. His sleeves were up, the flat folds of white resting against the tan muscles of his arms. I walked over to him. I needed help.

  I stuck out my hand. “Remember me?”

  “Yes.” He smiled warmly. “I remember my five-minute exclusive.”

  “But you don’t remember to return phone calls?”

  He dropped his head and chuckled. “I’m sorry. I’ve been swamped.”

  “Okay, well why not make it up to me then—”

  “Sorry, I’m not working the professor’s case so I can’t give you an interview.”

  “No, I’m all set on that. Anything new with the drive-by?”

  “No suspects in custody,” he said, and I watched his body posture get a little stiff and guarded. I was talking about his case now. He got super-serious in a heartbeat.

  “But you know who you’re looking for?”

  “I don’t have anything for you right now.” His voice was serious but his eyes were smiling.

  “C’mon, Detective. Did the evidence at the scene turn up anything? Anything at all?”

  “I’ve got some paperwork to do.”

  “Wait,” I said, stepping in his path. He drew back, seemingly amused, and I felt as if he was toying with me, but not maliciously.

  “I need a favor.”

  “I told you,” Detective Eckart said, moving around me, gently touching my shoulder.

  “No, this has nothing to do with the drive-by. There’s another child missing. A little girl named Butter. She’s been missing for about twenty-four hours. Her mother, Kelly, called police and they wouldn’t do anything. Then she called me. She was hysterical. I had promised to cover the story and they blew me out of it to do this one. Butter lives over at Fiftieth and South Hedge.”

  “That’s the hot zone. Bandits’ and Rockies’ territory.”

  “I know. My bosses didn’t want to cover her story because they assumed that a poor little black girl in that kind of neighborhood is a runaway or a troublemaker and it’s wasted air time.”

  Detective Eckart grunted sympathetically.

  “Of course I fought to cover her disappearance, but early on I lost. Now with this case wrapped up, I’m planning to go over to Butter’s house and finally do her story.”

  “You’re a scrapper,” he said admiringly.

  “You bet. If I don’t fight for this story it won’t get done. I’m determined.”

  “Good.”

  “But I need help from you, Detective. I was wondering if you could ask the squads in the area to look around for her? Maybe get a beat cop to talk to the mother? If you ask, they’ll do it. It’s just that we, the media, and you guys, the police, pulled out all the stops for this little boy and no one wants to give the time of day to Butter.”

  “Except you,” Detective Eckart said, his voice relaxing as he leaned against the wall again. “And now me. Sure I’ll alert a couple of the guys. Give
me the name and address of the family.”

  “Thank you, Detective,” I said, writing down the information for him.

  “Doug is fine.”

  “And you can call me Georgia. I owe you one.”

  “I collect all my debts, too.”

  His voice sounded so cute I raised an eyebrow. “Oh you do?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said folding up the paper I’d written the information down on. Doug winked, “See ya.”