Chapter 8
Fortunately for Ray, his lunch with Deborah had taken place on a Friday. On Thursday, he had turned in his feature for the Sunday paper, and notified his editor he would be out of town on Friday. His initial plan had been to go fishing over the weekend, probably in Lake Okeechobee.
After the wrenching encounter with Deb, however, he felt the need to hole up at home where he felt safe, and where her spirit still somehow lingered. Even after the weekend passed, he did very little for several days beyond cranking out the bare minimum number of articles he was expected to produce in order to collect his paycheck. Once he had done that, he hid out in his house.
His research on Marcella Wilson stalled. He didn't have any other good stories in the pipeline. He was frustrated and bordering on depression. He worked best when he had at least two or three things in varying stages of development. Since he had almost concluded there was no story in the Wilson saga, he found himself, for the first time in his career, with exactly zero stories in the pipeline. That scared him.
He trolled around all the usual haunts where stories might lurk: the police station, a couple of bars where cops hung out, a couple of bars where reporters hung out. Coming up dry there, he cast a wider net, and ventured out into other local establishments, including barbershops, and bait shops. He touched base with all his usual sources of information, a vast network of amazing people he had met over the years including not only the typical bartenders, cabbies and cops, but also a couple of pimps, a caterer to the local Society, the guy who operated the news stand at the courthouse (who was also the biggest bookie in Sarasota) and a nun who ran a shelter for homeless men and a companion shelter for runaway children.
He put the word out to everybody he knew that he was looking for a story. Several people gave him some ideas that seemed worth looking into, but none of the ideas excited him. He had learned to trust his gut reactions to stories. He knew how to excite others with stories that excited him. Everything else was just filler. He pumped out a whole lot of filler articles, including a couple of stories about children drowning in pools, for the benefit of the Yacht Club Auxiliary – meaning, Victoria.
He wrote a lot of straight news stories, hoping to get extra credit for handing in more inches of copy than was required of him. He wrote up a number of short feature articles and put them aside. He could dole those out one at a time to help get past his dry spell if it continued any length of time.
One day, on a whim, he called Victoria. She surprised him by inviting him to come to her house for coffee. He drove to her house immediately. After they chatted for a little while, she said, “You know, Mr. Bailey, it isn't any of my business, but I am wondering if anything is wrong.”
“Why would you ask that?”
She shook her head, “I have no reason, other than I have noticed more articles over your byline in the paper than usual, but none of them are up to your usual standards both in terms of subject matter and, even more noticeably, in terms of writing style. Forgive me. Early in my life I studied to be a school teacher and I'm very picky about writing. My son, who is a newspaperman in Chicago, says I am a frustrated city editor. I do not mean to pry.”
He smiled at her and said, “First of all, I don't consider your concern to be prying. You're right. I've been turning in a lot of crap lately. I have a quota of articles I have to submit. The new ownership of the paper doesn't give a fffff.....fig about quality. They just want lots of articles to stick in between the advertising. I typically try to give them my best simply because I have been used to doing that for my whole career up to now. I guess their lowered standards have tempted me to let myself slide. Thank you for the warning. I'll watch it. Even if the editorial staff of the paper doesn't care, I owe it to the readers who actually do care about those kinds of things to do a decent job.”
He paused, “I guess I've been distracted.”
“With?”
“Partly with my temporary obsession with Marcella Wilson, but I think that's over now. And partly with a personal situation that cropped up.” He paused again, and then decided to see if he could say it out loud without going hysterical, “My ex-wife, from whom I have been divorced for a long time, but whom I apparently never stopped loving, has terminal cancer. She visited me recently to say good-bye, this time permanently. I guess that experience has set be off my game a bit.”
She stirred her tea and put the cup down on the coffee table. She didn't look at him for a long time, but she scooted ever so slightly closer to him on the couch. When she did look up at him, she met his eyes and held them in an eye-lock that all but forbade him to look away. Then she opened her arms, pulled him toward her and hugged him tightly. He sobbed almost uncontrollably on her shoulder for some time. When his tears subsided, he pulled away. She handed him a handkerchief, which he used to wipe his face and blow his nose.
She took his hand between hers, “Before you say anything, I want to tell you that what just happened is private, between you and me. I will never tell anyone. Secondly, I want you to know that I find the fact you are so able to express your grief to be a mark in your favor, not a sign of weakness which many people believe. I am honored that you feel you can trust me that much. I will do my best to merit your trust.”
She added, “I remember Deborah Richardson. She was a lovely woman and, I thought, a very decent reporter. I met her a few times and liked her. Actually, I remember when you got married. I didn't know you at the time, but Deborah was covering a Daughters of the Confederacy event and she kept messing up her intro. She finally turned to me and laughed, saying, 'I'm so sorry. I'm just too distracted for this. I'm about to be married to just the most wonderful man and I can't seem to concentrate.' We talked for a while. She babbled on about how wonderful you were and I listened, amused. I was sorry to hear she left and you stayed here. I suppose I understood why you stayed here. What I never understood was how she could have left if she felt that way about you.”
Ray blurted, “You and me both.”
They were quiet for a while, and then Victoria continued, “She's from a different generation than me. In my day, women hitched their wagons to their husbands' stars. Ms. Richardson was cut from a different cloth. She wanted to make her own way.”
Ray nodded. “You're absolutely right. I guess I come from somewhere between the two of you. In my head I think that women should have their own careers and their own lives. In my heart, I wanted us to move forward in life together, but I couldn't bring myself to sacrifice my career.”
Victoria patted his hand, and poured him more coffee, “Those two things are not incompatible. They are just difficult.”
“I think both Deborah and I came to that same conclusion independently. Unfortunately we arrived at that realization long after our marriage crashed and burned. We could have done it differently, but we didn't because it would have been difficult. I guess that's a huge regret I'll always have to bear.”
Victoria put her hand over his as he reached for his cup, “I think she forgave you, or she would not have made the effort to see you. I also think it was her way of apologizing for her part in the breakdown of your marriage.”
He nodded and swallowed with great difficulty, “I think you're right.”
After a very long pause, she cleared her throat and said quietly, “Losing the person you hold dearest in the world is the hardest thing there is.”
Ray knew her husband had died more than twenty years before. People said that she had never so much as gone out on a dinner date with another man. It was Ray's turn to take her hands between his. Her bejeweled fingers trembled slightly for a moment. When she pulled away and picked up her teacup, however, her hand was perfectly steady.
They drank their tea and munched on scones together. After a while, Victoria said, “This is changing the subject, but I'm wondering why you have abandoned the Marcella Wilson story.”
He shook his head. “I haven't so much abandoned it as I have run up against a dead end. I'm supposed to have
dinner with Marcella when she comes back from a trip, and I intend to keep that date, partly because I have nothing better to do and partly in the hope she'll tell me something I can use. I'll need to get it from her because I've come up with nothing in my research.”
She was quiet. It seemed to him she was contemplating whether or not to continue. Eventually she decided to forge ahead. She said, “You said you have turned up nothing on Mrs. Wilson. Don't you think that's odd?”
He nodded and breathed deeply. He was glad she had switched gears. He was back on familiar turf. He chewed his scone slowly, with appreciation. “Yes, I do. There are a lot of weird things about it. Internet searches do not come up with anything about her other than stories related to her marriage. I have found no references to her maiden name. Ray thought that was odd. Most women, even those who do not routinely use their maiden names after their marriage, use those names occasionally. Google 90% of married women and within a few minutes you'll come up with a maiden name and/or place and time of birth. I have spent hours running searches on her and have come up with absolutely zilch.
“Typically I don't used the people and background search engines that cost money, but I tried a couple of them and still came up with nothing. It's as though she did not exist before her marriage. It seems to me she, or somebody, must have gone to some trouble to make sure her maiden name and place of birth is never mentioned in any of the articles about her. People generally don't go to all that trouble. At least, not unless there's something they want to hide.”
“What did you think of her when you met her? You said you had lunch one day after your introduction at the Yacht Club.”
He thought about it for a while. “She struck me as a lot more classy than the typical corporate wife, at least the few that I've met. She reminded me of you and the women in your circle. I took her for a real lady.”
She smiled and poured more tea, taking her time to get the milk and sugar portioned out just so. She pursed her mouth and said, “I thought so, too, at first. The first couple of times I met her, I took her for a strictly upper crust Southern Lady. Her accent sounds like North Georgia. I assumed she was from Atlanta. Since my husband is from Atlanta and we lived in Atlanta for a number of years after our marriage, I mentioned the names of some of the old denizens of Atlanta society. She didn't seem to know any of them.
“When I asked her where she was from, she told me she is from North Carolina. I don't believe that. She doesn't have a North Carolina accent, for one thing. For another, a very dear friend of mine lives in Winston-Salem. She's an old society battle-axe like me and her husband is a big shot in a tobacco company so she moves in both society and money circles. She knows everybody in inland North Carolina, and most of the piedmont as well. I called her and asked if she had ever met Marcella. She had not. I told her that Marcella claimed to be from North Carolina.
“She laughed and said, 'She's not from Winston-Salem society, I can tell you that without any doubt. To my knowledge neither she nor her husband ever visited here. They moved in the kind of circles I would have known about. Let me do some checking in other towns and see what I can come up with.' She called me back a few days later and said the nobody she knew had ever met Marcella or known her (or her husband) to even visit North Carolina.”
Ray laughed and said, “Miss Victoria, you should have been a reporter!”
She put down her cup and joined in the laughter, “That's what my son always tells me. In fact, he says it was my tendency to investigate things I found interesting that taught him how to run down a story. Nobody but he and I know that the story he wrote in college that won him a journalism prize and got him an internship with the Chicago Tribune was actually something on which I had done the preliminary research. I mentioned it to him one Sunday at dinner. He said he had an assignment to do an investigative piece and he asked if he could use it. He did a lot more research in addition to what I had done and he truly made the story his own. He has always told people I inspired him to become a reporter. He usually winks at me when he says that.”
Ray smiled at her, then leaned back and closed his eyes. “What have we got? Mystery woman marries Atlanta millionaire. About four years later he founds Techtron. I seem to recall they supposedly met at some kind of charity ball somewhere. Maybe we can start there. How did they meet?”
“Roland Wilson was from Atlanta. He lived there his entire life. His family was an old Atlanta family. They were blue bloods, at least on his father's side, but not exactly top tier, if you know what I mean. My husband was Roland Wilson's father's stockbroker. The elder Wilson was an attorney. He did well, but his success paled in comparison with his son's.
“When Roland started in business he came to Henry on his father's advice. Henry handled his investments for a few years. When Roland started to make a lot of money, he moved his account to a New York stockbroker who was known to be much more aggressive than Henry. After that we sort of lost touch with him.
“Roland's mother was not from a society family, but she was, of course, a member of the Junior League and very active in other charities in Atlanta, which is what you would expect of a woman in her station. The entire Wilson clan was expected to show up for her charity events. I know a lot of the older Junior League Sustainers, so I should be able to check out the when and how of their meeting -- that is, if they met at a charity function in Atlanta.”
“Okay, you check that out. If we can find out how she came to meet Wilson, maybe we can backtrack and find out who she knew before she met him.”
He continued, “What do we know about her after they met? We know that she was sort of with him all the way. They traveled together marketing his products and meeting with government and educational officials in a lot of countries. She seemed to be always at his side. Did she speak foreign languages? Had she traveled abroad before?”
Victoria made a face. He went on, “I'll check that out.”
They continued to run down the short list of what they knew and make a much longer list of what they didn't know. They divided up assignments.
As Ray prepared to leave, Victoria laughed, “I just had an idea. I need a haircut and my regular hairdresser recently informed me that he plans to retire. I need to find a new salon. Where did you say Marcella went to have her hair done?”
He gave her the name of the salon at St. Armands Circle. She made a face, “Pricey, but they do have an excellent reputation for color. I may just make an appointment.”
Ray laughed, “Don't stylists operate sort of on the same rules as priests? What women say to their stylist is confidential, isn't it?”
She nodded, “Generally, that is true. The stylist who does a woman's hair will typically not gossip about her if he or she knows on which side the bread is buttered. If you want to find out dirt, you need to talk to a stylist whose chair is nearby. Overheard information is often circulated.”
He started to shake her hand. She responded with a hug and a peck on the cheek. She said, “Plan to come by one morning next week. We'll touch base. Take care.” She paused and added softly, “And, please do not hesitate to call me if you need to talk.”
He kissed her cheek and whispered, “You may be sorry you made that offer.”
He headed straight for the morgue at the newspaper, and spent the rest of the day reading articles from the society pages of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. That world was a mystery to him even though he had covered many stories about society in Sarasota. He appreciated the wonderful charity work the women did, and he had always rather enjoyed the charity events he attended, perhaps by virtue of a sort of vicarious pleasure at being around the movers and shakers in his community, not to mention the terrific food.
As he pored through the articles, a general picture of Atlanta Society seemed to emerge, which he understood because a smaller, less complex version of it existed in Sarasota. The cities of the South had their own social pecking order which, at their core, harked back to generations past. In old Southe
rn cities like Atlanta, the social hierarchy stretched back into the antebellum period. The true Southern aristocrats could trace their ancestry to various Confederate officers and gentlemen. The Social Registers of the South were maintained by those aristocratic families; admission was based on complicated rules that rested fundamentally on bloodlines.
Along side that “Social Register” society was the society made up of upwardly mobile people who had made money, mostly after the end of WWII, along with the huge influx of Yankees that started in the 1950's and reached a flood tide in the 1980's. That society was based more or less on financial position, although some ways of accumulating wealth seemed to be more socially acceptable than others. In addition to all that, the social standing of the families in the place of origin factored in as well. Ray couldn't quite follow all of the rules, but he had the sense that the two “societies” co-existed but did not really intermingle in places like Atlanta, at least not as much as they did in Sarasota, where the entire social circle was much smaller.
He surmised that Marcella Wilson would have been involved in the “rich” society circle as opposed to the social register set. He found very few references to her in the paper. From what he could tell, she and her husband attended certain high-profile events, such as charity balls, during what Ray thought of as their “glory years”. Marcella did not, however, appear to have been involved actively in any of the charities that put on the events. She certainly did not participate on the board of directors of any of the more prominent charities. Her name never appeared in any of the articles profiling the committees that hosted fund-raising events.
The only reference to anything she was involved in was one small article which mentioned that she and her husband joined Peachtree Presbyterian Church when they first moved to Buckhead. He thought that was interesting. According to its website PPC was the largest Presbyterian congregation in America. That would be just the kind of place people who wanted to have a church membership (because being members of a church is, even today, more or less expected of any respectable Southerner) but who did not want to get involved. He intended to check it out, but he surmised the Wilsons probably gave a sizable pledge to the church and only rarely attended services.
He stepped outside and called a friend who worked at the research desk for the Atlanta Municipal Library. She had started out as a reporter, but she was not a very good writer. When it became apparent she would not make it as a reporter, she got a job as a research librarian and was positively the happiet human being Ray knew. She was a fantastic researchser. He loved it when he could come up with excuses to call her because she was also a great gal.
After they chatted for a few minutes, Ray told her what he was doing and asked if she would be willing to look into the Wilson's local involvements. She laughed and said, “I can actually answer your question about their church involvement without any research at all. I am a member of Peachtree Presbyterian and I have been on the finance committee for years. I won't tell you how much money they gave; that would be a breach of confidence. I will tell you your guess about their membership is correct. The word on them was that they were sort of one of our fairly sizable group of 'record only' members. They gave a regular pledge, paid in one installment annually at the time of the annual stewardship pledge drive. They hardly ever attended services.
“The joke was that if somebody important was visiting or there was likely to be news coverage for some reason, we could expect some of those members to show up. Otherwise they did not attend services. The Wilsons did not participate in the congregation in any way whatsoever and they never gave money for any special purpose beyond their pledge except for once. The church needed a new piano for the choir room. They donated a very expensive grand piano.
Ray laughed, “Did they show up when it was officially presented?”
She said, “Actually, they did not attend the dedication of the piano, although an article about it appeared in the newspaper. The church acknowledged the gift in our internal newsletter, but did not issue a press release. We assumed the Wilsons were the source for that article. I thought that was odd.”
Ray asked, “Does the church have many members like that?”
She laughed out loud, “Oh, yeah, all the Buckhead churches have quite a lot of them. Rich people move in to Buckhead and the first thing they do is join a church. It's what people do in the South because, as you know, in social discourse one of the first things people ask is where you go to church. They maintain their membership in good standing by paying pledges (often very large pledges, for tax purposes) and attending just often enough to meet the minimum membership requirements. The other thing a lot of them do is to join a country club.”
She paused. “That's something you might want to check out. A lot of those Buckhead folks are a whole lot more active in their country clubs than they are in their churches. They play golf regularly and eat in the restaurants, schmoozing with the other rich folks. My guess is the Wilsons probably joined a club. Given their money and business contacts, I'm betting they weaseled an invitation to join the Buckhead Club. Let me do some checking around.”
He said, “I'm interested in her, not so much what the two of them did together. What I'm trying to find out is where she came from and what she did before she met him.”
She giggled, “You know how much I enjoy a research challenge. Let me dig around a bit. I'll let you know what I come up with.”
Ray decided to leave the subject for a while. He had Victoria and Karen Thompson looking into Marcella's background. He decided to focus some of his energy and efforts improving his current job performance. The first thing he did was rewrite the feature articles he had set aside for future reference. He realized that, since he no longer had a discriminating editorial staff to write for, he had gotten lazy. He decided to write with Victoria's standards in mind. His writing improved immediately.
For a few days, he followed a breaking story about a dust-up between the city and residents in one of the older neighborhoods concerning the enlargement (or not) of a water retention pond. It was exactly the kind of story he liked to work on when he wanted to show off. The story itself was boring as hell. He added all kinds of local color and polished up his best grammar. He turned in a very good article. He was amply rewarded. The next time he spoke to Victoria, she told him she enjoyed it.
Baiting & Fishing Page 8