by R. Jean Reid
“You and your damn evidence. I’d like to see it myself. But I know you don’t have any. You’re just telling lies to spook the election.”
“The public records of property transfers from fifty years ago are all lies?” Nell sardonically questioned him. “You give us proof and we’ll print it.”
Her taunt only caused his face to redden further. “Goddamn it, you keep this up and you’re going to get your tit caught in a wringer.”
“Me and Katherine Graham,” Nell replied.
His beady eyes showed no comprehension, and no inclination for enlightenment. He spun on his heel and strode out of the office as fast as he could, his girth making it more like the walk of a short, angry penguin.
Mostly for Pam’s sake, who had been in diapers when Watergate was making news, Nell explained. “Katherine Graham was the editor of the Washington Post, and John Mitchell, the Attorney General, made that same comment about her when they were investigating Nixon.”
“And look how that turned out,” Dolan commented. “Seems that we have ruffled some feathers.”
Nell was silently gratified to hear him use “we.”
Dolan got up and locked the door, saying, “At least until lunch is over. My stomach can only take so much indigestion.”
After lunch, he unlocked it and an uneasy calm prevailed the rest of the day. No more blustering threats, save for one irate subscriber who claimed the paper boy deliberately aimed for his rosebush.
The calm before the storm, Nell thought as she delivered her children, this time for a change in routine, to the bike shop. Kate was willing to let them hang out, even going so far as to mention she was going to have some friends over for a cartoon marathon and Josh and Lizzie were welcome.
“You can keep them the whole week if you like,” Nell responded. Josh was happy at the thought, but Lizzie answered with her usual “Oh, Mom!” as if more than a few hours away from email was a trial too great to bear. Nell agreed she’d pluck them out of cartoon land no later than nine.
She headed back to the office, but all was calm there, even to the point of Carrie sitting at her desk typing away on the mayoral candidates.
When Marcus returned, she learned his accomplishment of the day had been to find decent pictures of the three slain young people. This time he didn’t knock on Nell’s open office door, just walked in and placed the photos before her.
Ella Carr was a stunningly gorgeous young woman, her delicate features fine-boned. She had chiseled cheeks and wide eyes in a heart-shaped face that wouldn’t make you think she had the purpose and strength to be the one in her family to fight back. Nell looked again at the eyes, this time seeing, in their direct look, the steel the pretty face kept hidden.
Dora Ellischwartz seemed raw-boned and big compared to Ella, her face holding a wide smile that only accentuated how her mouth was a little too large. But there was also a happy, open aspect to her. Nell wondered if she was seeing it there because of what she’d learned about Dora, reading it into a woman she already knew to be a free spirit. Her hair was blond and long, in the style of the time; also in the style of the time, her eyes were outlined in mascara, but even with that, her eyes were her best feature, happy, laughing eyes that seemed to sparkle even in the black-and-white photo.
Michael Walker had a sensitive face, and his smile had a sad knowingness to it. He was slim, with sharply etched cheekbones that only seemed to highlight eyes looking off from the camera as if seeing something in the distance. He was a handsome man, Nell thought, then realized the arch of his brow reminded her of Thom. Like Thom, he seemed a man whose finest tool was his brain, not his hands.
Nell felt a bolt of sorrow course through her. For the boy who reminded her of the man she had lost and for the three of them, two girls and one boy. They were so young, only on the cusp of adulthood, walking on a short road.
“It makes them real, doesn’t it,” Marcus said softly. He gently placed his hand on Nell’s shoulder.
“They are real. It just makes them almost too human to bear,” Nell replied. Then, steadying herself, she said, “This is great work. How did you find these?”
“By asking question after question after question. One answer led to someone who knew someone who knew someone whose father had a camera who took pictures back in those days. I spend a couple of hours with his widow looking through old boxes in the attic.”
“Good work. The dental records will identify Dora, but these pictures might really help with the other two.”
“A good reason to spend all those hours in that dust.”
Nell glanced at her watch. “Hey, guess what, I’m temporarily kidless.”
“Sounds like an invitation I can’t refuse. Let me hit the keyboard for a bit while I still have my sobriety, and then we can make a wild night of it.”
“At least until nine, when I turn into a mom again,” Nell amended.
“Which is about the bedtime for an old man like me.” He headed off into the main room and took over the computer on Jacko’s desk.
A little after that, Carrie placed her story on Nell’s desk. “Tell me what else I might need,” she said, then added, “I know you won’t approve, but I did some major flirting with one of the TV guys who’ll cover tomorrow’s debate. He’s going to ask some of those questions.”
“Feel free to expense the condoms. Just make sure they’re latex and not lambskin,” Nell said smoothly. She was gratified with the look on Carrie’s face. Probably thought I didn’t know what a condom was. “Tomorrow night will be past deadline for us, but the real issue isn’t so much what the mayor’s answers are—unless he has something truly unusual to say—but that the questions are asked. It was a good idea to put some extra pressure on him.”
“But it means the TV guys will scoop us.”
“They’ll get an on-camera reaction, which isn’t something we can compete with anyway,” Nell replied. “But this will actually work for us in the shallow waters of scooping each other. They hit him tomorrow night with the questions and get little more than headline news from it. We’re on the doorstep in the morning with all the facts behind the questions. You’ll get your profile raised more by having TV involved than not. Plus, in the area of public good and all that jazz, this will get the story to the public in time to help them vote. There are worse fates than merely influencing civic affairs.”
“So you’re not upset?”
“No, I think it was a very shrewd move on your part. This will be a good story.”
“Above the fold?”
“Probably not,” Nell answered honestly. “It looks like we’ve got positive ID for the bones—they were three civil rights workers who disappeared in the sixties. That’s a major national news story. Just your luck to compete with it for the front page this week.”
Her comment seemed to mollify Carrie. “I’m going to follow the mayor,” she said. “He’s making one more appearance at the fishing rodeo. Should I ask him again?”
“No,” Nell quickly decided. “Just be there. It’ll keep him sweating, and maybe he’ll think he’s ducked the questions until tomorrow.”
“Aaron Dupree is also going to be there. He took a bunch of kids from the city recreation program out to fish on the family boat after school.”
“Ask him about the ways his family seemed to benefit from the crooked land deals,” Nell said. “His father picked up a lot of that land when it was resold. Interesting to see what his answer might be.”
“I hate to ask him mean questions,” Carrie said. “He’s got my vote.”
“We need to be at least in the vicinity of fair with mean questions,” Nell said. “We don’t want it to look like the mayor’s accusations of him buying us off are true.”
“I guess so. Can I come in a little late tomorrow since I’ll be late tonight?”
“Yes, but be here by ten. I may need some rew
riting, plus anything that you get tonight,” Nell instructed her.
Carrie nodded her agreement and headed off for the land of fish.
In a revolving door worthy of a bigger newspaper, Jacko arrived as she left. At Nell’s beckoning, he came into her office. She showed him the pictures.
He looked at them for a long time before finally placing them back on Nell’s desk.
“Did you find anything today?” she asked.
“Nothing other than a lot of dust.”
“It’s like that sometimes.”
“I did find out that the Jones’ gas station was equal to the bail money. Sorry.”
“Thanks for thinking of it and trying,” Nell said, hiding her disappointment. To make sure it was completely hidden she invited Jacko along for a beer. He gladly accepted.
At least I can claim one of them as a chaperone, Nell thought as they locked up the office, although she wasn’t sure which. Jacko was, she realized, about the age of the three civil rights workers when they were murdered. No wonder he’d stared so long at the pictures. Marcus, on the other hand, had that many years plus a few more on the other side of her. Let people think what they want, she decided. Maybe being seen with them would kill any rumors about her and Aaron Dupree.
Marcus led them to Joe’s. They didn’t talk about the stories they were working on. It was, Nell realized a few hours later, a pleasant way to spend an evening. As they left the bar, a glance at her watch told her she had time to get home and brush her teeth before getting her children.
Lizzie couldn’t admit she’d enjoyed cartoons, but Josh claimed a good time. Nell was relieved to notice both of them yawning as she drove home.
Lizzie had to check her email, but there was nothing pressing enough for her to spend copious amounts of time replying. Shortly after she got off the computer, the phone rang. Lizzie snatched it up, with Nell standing by as a reminder that this was late for anything save the most essential—and brief—conversation.
“It’s for you.” Lizzie handed the phone to her.
“Mrs. McGraw?”
Nell didn’t recognize the voice, although it sounded familiar. “Speaking.”
“This is Harold Reed. I apologize for bothering you at home, but I thought you’d like to know. We’ve got a match. Buddy is having a press conference tomorrow at ten at his office.”
“Thank you. I appreciate you calling.”
That was the sum of their conversation. Nell briefly debated calling Gwen Kennedy, but it was an hour later in Boston. It would hold until morning.
seventeen
The first thing Nell did after dropping off Lizzie and Josh was go to the office and call Gwen Kennedy. She answered on the second ring, as if waiting for a phone call.
“Mrs. Kennedy? This is Nell McGraw. The dental records were a match.”
There was silence on the other end, only the sound of breathing. Then Gwen Kennedy said, “I was afraid it would be and afraid it wouldn’t. But after fifty years I can’t believe she’ll come home any way other than this.”
“I’m very sorry,” Nell said. “I know this isn’t easy for you.”
But Gwen Kennedy declined Nell’s implicit invitation to talk about feelings. “What happens now? When can we … claim the remains?”
“I’m not sure. This is a murder investigation,” Nell said. “They’ll have to take every bit of evidence they can before releasing anything. I don’t know how long that may be.”
“Can it really matter after all these years?” she asked with a tired sigh in her voice.
“Can it matter? Of course it matters. Can they find the people that did this? I don’t know. Even if we can identify who did it, they may well be in their graves by now,” Nell admitted.
“How could anyone do that to … ?” For a moment Gwen Kennedy’s feeling threatened to spill out. “Please keep me informed. If nothing else, I’d at least like to spit on their graves.” With that she said goodbye.
In the time between her call and Buddy Guy’s press conference, Nell worked on corralling everything that would go in the paper. It had to go to press by the afternoon. When Pam arrived, she gave her some things to lay out. Pam liked the work, and more importantly, was good at it. Nell also read over the story Carrie had left with her. It clearly showed her hurried style of writing, which was a good thing, as when she hurried she kept it closer to bare bones reporting. When Carrie spent time on a story, Nell usually edited out her writerly embellishments. And in the past, she’d had Thom to smooth any ruffled feathers.
She didn’t think she’d find out much from Buddy Guy’s press conference, but she wanted to be there anyway.
Despite the late notice, the conference room at the DA’s office was packed with TV cameras jockeying for good angles. Nell found a place on the side, close to the front. She never quite had the temerity to ask Buddy Guy if that was his real name or if he’d taken a poll to pick what was most likely to get him elected. Rumor had it that he was a much better politician than a lawyer, with just enough sense to hire people like Harold Reed to do the real work.
Buddy Guy was of medium build, with a stomach starting to spread from middle age and a lifestyle that included too many glad-handing dinners. He had good hair, blond going silver and still thick, that he kept barely needing a haircut, as if flaunting it to the other men his age with their receding hairlines. The perfect picture of a hard-charging district attorney. Rumor also had it that he’d invested time and effort in classes on how to appear on TV.
Wanting to make sure he made all the deadlines, Buddy started the press conference on time. As Nell had guessed, he did little more than confirm what she already knew about the match. However, he did it with visuals, comparison x-rays, something for the TV cameras. He didn’t give much information beyond that, claiming they were still investigating who the other two sets of bones might be. He also ducked declaring directly that all three had been murdered, merely saying, “We’re looking into that.” Nell wondered how he would react when she published the names and photos tomorrow in the Crier. She decided she’d wait until then to find out.
Harold Reed stayed silent in the background. Nell suspected he was there to literally lend color to the pictures of Buddy Guy. The political impact couldn’t be lost on such an astute creature, of having a black man visible during the investigation of murders of civil rights workers.
Nell caught up with Harold afterward in the hallway outside his office. He was content to leave Buddy the follow-up schmoozing. Yesterday, she’d had several copies made of the photographs Marcus had found.
“Thought you might like these,” she said, handing him the envelope with one set of copies in it.
He opened it up and looked.
“Ella Carr, Dora Ellischwartz, and Michael Walker,” Nell said unnecessarily.
“Where did you get these?”
Nell gave him a quick rundown of Marcus’s methods, with a promise that she’d have Marcus himself give Harold the exact details.
He nodded, then slipped the photos back in the envelope. He cleared his throat and said, “J.J. Jones’ lawyer has put in for a continuance. He claims he needs more time to research the case.”
“Damn it!” Nell burst out. “Sorry, but I don’t like that bastard running around loose.”
“Quite frankly, neither do I. I’ll do my best to get it denied, or at least kept to a minimum. We were hoping to get it to trial next month, but this might take it into next year.”
“While he runs around free on bail.”
“I didn’t think this would be good news.”
“Is there anything I can do? Get a restraining order?”
“If he’s threatened you.”
“I think his brothers have, but the police have little interest in looking into it.” She gave Harold a brief recap of what had happened to Josh.
He k
ept his professional demeanor, but Nell saw a flash of anger in his eyes as she told her tale.
“A fingerprint or two might have been helpful,” he said acerbically when she’d finished. “Okay, I’ll lean hard on the judge not to change the trial date. At least we’re getting rid of Whiz ‘Do Nothing’ Brown soon.”
“Soon enough?” Nell asked, but it was rhetorical. She said a quick goodbye to Harold as several other people came to claim his attention.
“Damn, damn, and damn again,” she cursed softly as she made her way back to the car. The trial date had been a talisman, something she had to get past before she could go on to … she didn’t even know what, but the date had loomed so large that nothing save the day-to-day plodding along seemed possible. To change it to several months later—especially with J.J. Jones out on the streets—was infuriating. Maybe Marcus and I will have to make weekly vandalism runs, Nell thought as she headed back to the Crier office.
The rest of the day was spent in a flurry of getting the paper out, everything from mundane birth announcements to checking and rechecking the facts on the main stories.
Carrie had indeed shown up at ten and added a few extra paragraphs to her story, all in her hurried style so Nell had little editing. She even volunteered to get lunch for everyone, since, with her story turned in, she had less to do than the others.
Marcus had managed to gather a few more details of the lives of the young civil rights workers. Ella was nineteen when she was killed, Dora was twenty-three, and Michael was twenty-two.
Nell read the front page stories over one more time as Dolan was standing in the door waiting to take the paper to press. With a glance at her watch—and deciding she could squeeze in the trip without endangering her children—Nell handed him the disk, than grabbed her jacket. They ended up going en masse, leaving only Ina Claire and Pam to handle the office. Dolan’s car, the biggest, was used, with Jacko, Carrie, and Marcus crammed into the back seat and Nell riding shotgun with what would turn into tomorrow’s newspaper cradled in her lap.
When they returned, she had to jump out of Dolan’s car and into hers to get Josh and Lizzie. They both grumped at the idea of the library, so Nell brought them back to the office.