Boling’s narrative was animated and ordered. He’d be a great professor, she reflected.
“Now, before Nine-eleven,” Boling explained, “blogs were mostly computer-oriented. They were written by tech people for tech people. After September Eleventh, though, a new type of blog appeared. They were called war blogs, after the attacks and the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. Those bloggers weren’t interested in technology. They were interested in politics, economics, society, the world. I describe the distinction this way: While pre-Nine-eleven blogs were inner-directed—toward the Internet itself—the war blogs are outer-directed. Those bloggers look at themselves as journalists, part of what’s known as the New Media. They want press credentials, just like CNN and Washington Post reporters, and they want to be taken seriously.
“Jim Chilton is the quintessential war blogger. He doesn’t care about the Internet per se or the tech world, except to the extent it lets him get his message out. He writes about the real world. Now the two sides—the original bloggers and the war bloggers—constantly battle for the number-one spot in the blogosphere.”
“It’s a contest?” she asked, amused.
“To them it is.”
“They can’t coexist?”
“Sure, but it’s an ego-driven world and they’ll do anything they can to be top of the heap. And that means two things. One, having as many subscribers as possible. And two, more important—having as many other blogs as possible include links to yours.”
“Incestuous.”
“Very. Now, you asked what could I tell you to get Chilton’s cooperation. Well, you have to remember that The Chilton Report is the real thing. It’s important and influential. You notice that one of the early posts in the ‘Roadside Crosses’ thread was from an executive at Caltrans? He wanted to defend their inspection of the highway. That tells me that government officials and CEOs read the blog regularly. And get pretty damn upset if Chilton says anything bad about them.
“The Report leans toward local issues but local in this case is California, which isn’t really local at all. Everybody in the world keeps an eye on us. They either love or hate the state, but they all read about it. Also, Chilton himself’s emerged as a serious journalist. He works his sources, he writes well. He’s reasonable and he picks real issues—he’s not sensationalist. I searched for Britney Spears and Paris Hilton in his blog, going back four years, and neither name came up.”
Dance had to be impressed with that.
“He’s not a part-timer, either. Three years ago he began to work on the report full-time. And he campaigns it hard.”
“What does that mean, ‘campaign’?”
Boling scrolled down to the “On the Home Front” thread on the homepage.
Http://www.thechiltonreport.com
WE’RE GOING GLOBAL!
Am pleased to report that The Report has been getting raves from around the world. It’s been selected as one of the lead blogs in a new RSS feed (we’ll call it “Really Simple Syndication”) that will link thousands of other blogs, websites and bulletin boards throughout the world. Kudos to you, my readers, for making The Report as popular as it is.
“RSS is another next big thing. It actually stands for RDF Site Syndication—‘RDF’ is Resource Description Framework, if you’re interested, and there’s no reason for you to be. RSS is a way of customizing and consolidating updated material from blogs and websites and podcasts. Look at your browser. At the top is a little orange square with a dot in the corner and two curved lines.”
“I’ve seen it.”
“That’s your RSS feeds. Chilton is trying hard to get picked up by other bloggers and websites. That’s important to him. And it’s important to you too. Because it tells us something about him.”
“He’s got an ego I can stroke?”
“Yep. That’s one thing to remember. I’m also thinking of something else you can try with him, something more nefarious.”
“I like nefarious.”
“You’ll want to somehow hint that his helping you will be good publicity for the blog. It’ll get the name of The Report around in the mainstream media. Also, you could hint that you or somebody at CBI could be a source for information in the future.” Boling nodded at the screen, where the blog glowed. “I mean, first and foremost, he’s an investigative reporter. He appreciates sources.”
“Okay. Good idea. I’ll try it.”
A smile. “Of course, the other thing he might do is consider your request an invasion of journalistic ethics. In which case he’ll slam the door in your face.”
Dance looked at the screen. “These blogs—they’re a whole different world.”
“Oh, that they are. And we’re just beginning to comprehend the power they have—how they’re changing the way we get information and form opinions. There are probably sixty million of them now.”
“That many?”
“Yep. And they do great things—they prefilter information so you don’t have to Google your way through millions of sites, they’re a community of like-minded people, they can be funny, creative. And, like The Chilton Report, they police society and keep us honest. But there’s a dark side too.”
“Propagating rumors,” Dance said.
“That’s one thing, yes. And another problem is what I said earlier about Tammy: They encourage people to be careless. People feel protected online and in the synth world. Life seems anonymous, posting under a nym or nic—a screen name—so you give away all sorts of information about yourself. But remember: Every single fact about you—or lie—that you post, or somebody posts about you, is there forever. It will never, ever go away.”
Boling continued, “But I feel the biggest problem is that people tend not to question the accuracy of the reporting. Blogs give an impression of authenticity—the information’s more democratic and honest because it comes from the people, not from big media. But my point—and it’s earned me plenty of black eyes in academia and in the blogosphere—is that that’s bullshit. The New York Times is a for-profit corporation but is a thousand times more objective than most blogs. There’s very little accountability online. Holocaust denials, Nine-eleven conspiracies, racism, they all thrive, thanks to blogs. They take on an authenticity some weirdo at a cocktail party doesn’t have when he spouts off that Israel and the CIA were behind the Trade Towers attack.”
Dance returned to her desk and lifted her phone. “I think I’ll put all your research to use, Jon. Let’s see what happens.”
JAMES CHILTON’S HOUSE was in an upscale area of Carmel, the yard close to an acre, and filled with trimmed but hodgepodge gardens, which suggested that husband, wife or both spent plenty of weekend hours extracting weeds and inserting plants, rather than paying pros to do it.
Dance gazed at the outside décor enviously. Gardening, though much appreciated, wasn’t one of her skills. Maggie said that if plants didn’t have roots they’d run when her mother stepped into the garden.
The house was an expansive ranch, about forty years old, and squatted at the back of the property. Dance estimated six bedrooms. Their cars were a Lexus sedan and a Nissan Quest, sitting in a large garage filled with plenty of sports equipment, which unlike similar articles in Dance’s garage, actually appeared well used.
She had to laugh at the bumper stickers on Chilton’s vehicles. They echoed headlines from his blog: one against the desalination plant and one against the sex education proposal. Left and right, Democrat and Republican.
He’s more cut-and-paste . . .
There was another car here too, in the drive; a visitor, probably, since the Taurus bore the subtle decal of a rental car company. Dance parked and walked to the front door, rang the bell.
Footsteps grew louder, and she was greeted by a brunette woman in her early forties, slender, wearing designer jeans and a white blouse, the collar turned up. A thick David Yurman knotted necklace, in silver, was at her throat.
The shoes, Dance couldn’t help but identify, came from Italy and wer
e knockouts.
The agent identified herself, proffering her ID. “I called earlier. To see Mr. Chilton.”
The woman’s face eased into the hint of a frown that typically forms when one meets law enforcers. Her name was Patrizia—she pronounced it Pa-treet-sia.
“Jim’s just finishing up a meeting. I’ll go tell him you’re here.”
“Thank you.”
“Come on in.”
She led Dance to a homey den, the walls covered with pictures of family, then disappeared into the house for a moment. Patrizia returned. “He’ll be just a moment.”
“Thank you. These are your boys?” Dance was pointing at a picture of Patrizia, a lanky balding man she took to be Chilton and two dark-haired boys, who reminded her of Wes. They were all smiling at the camera. The woman proudly said, “Jim and Chet.”
Chilton’s wife continued through the photos. From the pictures of the woman in her youth—at Carmel Beach, Point Lobos, the Mission—Dance guessed she was a native. Patrizia explained that, yes, she was; in fact, she’d grown up in this very house. “My father had been living here alone for years. When he passed, about three years ago, Jim and I moved in.”
Dance liked the idea of a family home, passed down from generation to generation. She reflected that Michael O’Neil’s parents still lived in the oceanview house where he and his siblings had grown up. With his father suffering from senility, his mother was thinking of selling the place and moving into a retirement community. But O’Neil was determined to keep the property in the family.
As Patrizia was pointing out photos that displayed the family’s exhausting athletic accomplishments—golf, soccer, tennis, triathlons—Dance heard voices in the front hall.
She turned to see two men. Chilton—she recognized him from the pictures—wore a baseball cap, green polo shirt and chinos. Blondish hair eased in tufts from under the hat. He was tall and apparently in good shape, with only a bit of belly swelling above his belt. He was speaking to another man, sandy-haired, wearing jeans, a white shirt and a brown sports coat. Dance started toward them but Chilton quickly ushered the man out of the door. Her kinesic reading was that he didn’t want the visitor, whoever he was, to know that a law enforcement agent had come to see him.
Patrizia repeated, “He’ll just be a minute.”
But Dance sidestepped her and continued into the hall, sensing the wife stiffen, protective of her husband. Still, an interviewer has to take immediate charge of the situation; subjects can’t set the rules. But by the time Dance got to the front door Chilton was back and the rental car heading off, gravel crunching under tires.
His green eyes—similar to her shade—turned their attention her way. They shook hands and she read in the blogger’s face, tanned and freckled, curiosity and a certain defiance, more than wariness.
Another flash of the ID. “Could we talk somewhere for a few minutes, Mr. Chilton?”
“My office, sure.”
He led her up the hall. The room they entered was modest and a mess, filled with towers of magazines and clippings and computer printouts. Underscoring what she’d learned from Jon Boling, the office revealed that indeed the reporter’s game was changing: small rooms in houses and apartments just like this were replacing city-desk rooms of newspapers. Dance was amused to see a cup of tea beside his computer—the scent of chamomile filled the room. No cigarettes, coffee or whisky for today’s hard-edged journalists, apparently.
They sat and he lifted his eyebrow. “So he’s been complaining, has he? But I’m curious. Why the police, why not a civil suit?”
“How’s that?” Dance was confused.
Chilton rocked back in his chair, removed his cap, rubbed his balding head and slipped the hat back on. He was irritated. “Oh, he bitches about libel. But it’s not defamation if it’s true. Besides, even if what I wrote was false, which it isn’t, libel’s not a crime in this country. Would be in Stalinist Russia, but it’s not here yet. So why’re you involved?” His eyes were keen and probing, his mannerisms intense; Dance could imagine how it might soon get tiring to spend much time in his presence.
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Aren’t you here because of Arnie Brubaker?”
“No. Who’s that?”
“He’s the man who wants to destroy our shoreline by putting in that desalination plant.”
She recalled the blog postings in The Chilton Report critical of the plant. And the bumper sticker.
“No, this has nothing to do with that.”
Chilton’s forehead crinkled. “He’d love to stop me. I thought maybe he’d trumped up some criminal complaint. But sorry. I was making assumptions.” The defensiveness in his face relaxed. “It’s just, well, Brubaker’s really a . . . pain.”
Dance wondered what the intended descriptive of the developer was going to have been.
“Excuse me.” Patrizia appeared in the doorway and brought her husband a fresh cup of tea. She asked Dance if she’d like anything. She was smiling now but still eyed the agent suspiciously.
“Thanks, no.”
Chilton nodded at the tea and charmingly winked his thanks to his wife. She left and closed the door behind her.
“So, what can I do for you?”
“Your blog about the roadside crosses.”
“Oh, the car accident?” He regarded Dance closely. Some of the defensiveness was back; she could read the stress in his posture. “I’ve been following the news. That girl was attacked, the press is saying, because she posted something on the blog. The posters are starting to say the same thing. You want the boy’s name.”
“No. We have it.”
“Is he the one who tried to drown her?”
“It seems so.”
Chilton said quickly, “I didn’t attack him. My point was, did the police drop the ball on the investigation and did Caltrans adequately maintain the road? I said up front that he wasn’t to blame. And I censored his name.”
“It didn’t take long for a mob to form and find out who he is.”
Chilton’s mouth twisted. He’d taken the comment as criticism of him or the blog, which it wasn’t. But he conceded. “That does happen. Well, what can I do for you?”
“We have reason to believe that Travis Brigham may be considering attacking other people who posted comments against him.”
“Are you sure?”
“No, but we have to consider it’s a possibility.”
Chilton grimaced. “I mean, can’t you arrest him?”
“We’re looking for him now. We aren’t sure where he is.”
“I see.” Chilton said this slowly and Dance could see from his lifted shoulders and the tension in his neck he was wondering what exactly she wanted. The agent considered Jon Boling’s advice and said, “Now, your blog is known all over the world. It’s very respected. That’s one of the reasons so many people are posting on it.”
The flash of pleasure in his eyes was faint but obvious to Dance; it told her that even obvious flattery went down very well with James Chilton.
“But the problem is that all the posters attacking Travis are potential targets. And the number’s increasing every hour.”
“The Report has one of the highest hit ratings in the country. It’s the most-read blog in California.”
“I’m not surprised. I really enjoy it.” Keeping an eye on her own mannerisms, so as not to telegraph the deception.
“Thank you.” A full smile joined the eye crinkle.
“But see what we’re facing: Every time somebody posts to the ‘Roadside Crosses’ thread they become a possible target. Some of those people are completely anonymous, some are out of the area. But some are nearby and we’re afraid Travis will find out their identities. And then he’ll go after them too.”
“Oh,” Chilton said, his smile vanishing. His quick mind made the leap. “And you’re here for their Internet addresses.”
“For their protection.”
“I can’t give those ou
t.”
“But these people are at risk.”
“This country operates on the principle of separation of media and state.” As if this flippant recitation skewered her argument.
“That girl was thrown into a trunk and left to drown. Travis could be planning another attack right now.”
Chilton held up a finger, shushing her like a schoolteacher. “It’s a slippery slope. Agent Dance, who do you work for? Your ultimate boss?”
“The attorney general.”
“Okay, well, say I give you the addresses of posters on the ‘Roadside Crosses’ thread. Then next month you come back and ask for the address of a whistleblower who was fired by the attorney general for, oh, let’s pick harassment. Or maybe you want the address of somebody who posted a comment critical of the governor. Or the president. Or—how ’bout this—someone who says something favorable about al-Qaeda? You say to me: ‘You gave me the information last time. Why not again?’”
“There won’t be an again.”
“You say that but . . .” As if government employees lied with every breath. “Does this boy know you’re after him?”
“Yes.”
“Then he’s run off somewhere, wouldn’t you think? He’s not going to show himself by attacking somebody else. Not if the police are looking for him.” His voice was stern.
Hers was reasonable as she continued slowly, “Still. You know, Mr. Chilton, sometimes life is about compromises.”
She let this comment linger.
He cocked an eyebrow, waiting.
“If you gave us the addresses—just of the locals who wrote the most vicious posts about Travis—we’d really appreciate it. Maybe . . . well, maybe we could do something to help you, if you ever needed a hand.”
“Like what?”
Thinking again about Boling’s suggestions, she said, “We’d be happy to issue a statement about your cooperation. Good publicity.”
Kathryn Dance Ebook Boxed Set : Roadside Crosses, Sleeping Doll, Cold Moon (9781451674217) Page 12