A Meeting In The Ladies' Room

by Anita Doreen Diggs

  Leigh Dafoe, our editorial director, was already seated at the head of the conference room table, waiting for us to take our seats. Like the other members of the Black Pack, I was the only African-American at the table.

  The way editorial meetings work is this: all of the editors sit at the table; there are chairs around the wall for the editorial assistants, publicists, and other marketing personnel. Leigh went around the table, giving each editor a chance to talk about the manuscripts they wanted to buy. There were ten of us at the table, and given the fact that all of us had a stack of papers, it looked like the session would last at least two hours.

  Astrid Norstromm, the pasty-faced, stringy-haired white woman who was due to get the job I wanted, sat as close to Leigh as possible. She always did that—I guessed it was to remind the rest of us that the two women were close, personal friends. Astrid had no ass, no tits, buck teeth, and freckles. Yet she carried herself in a regal manner—almost as if she looked in the mirror every morning and saw the late Princess Diana staring back. Astrid had been hired to acquire and edit literary nonfiction for the company and had “a very big interest in Black people.” She was constantly either in my office trying to get me excited about some project that would be of absolutely no interest to African-American book buyers or tying up the editorial meeting for long, agonizing minutes while she stumbled and stammered her way through book ideas about Black life that were so ridiculously off the mark that they would be laughable if it didn’t happen so often.

  I smiled at everyone except Astrid as I sat down.

  Leigh started us off by announcing that she had purchased the American publishing rights to a first novel by a young British woman. The story was a love triangle set in the Victorian era.

  Astrid was next. She tucked her thin, mousy brown hair behind her ears and flashed everyone a smile. “I’ve received a couple of terrific manuscripts over the past week.” She spoke in a whispery voice that made us all strain to hear her and had a habit of placing her hands delicately in the center of her flat chest when she got excited. We were supposed to believe that too much emotion would send her into a fit of the vapors. Her whole presentation was straight-up Melanie Wilkes from Gone With the Wind, and it made the other women at the table exchange angry glances whenever we could get away with it.

  “The first one,” she breathed, “is a fictionalized version of Harriet Tubman’s life that I’m hoping Jackie will take a look at. The author is a history professor at Vassar and she has done extensive research in this area. I really love this project because the professor’s writing is so vivid and colorful that you feel like you are really sitting in the Tubman cabin watching the events unfold.” Astrid paused, her hands went to her chest, and she fastened her blue-eyed gaze briefly on each one of us. “I learned so much! Most people don’t realize that the people in those slave cabins were not just workers. They were real families and behaved like genuine human beings.”

  I tried not to sound angry. “Real families? Genuine human beings?”

  “Yes. Most people don’t see the slaves in that light. Can you read it overnight?”

  I ignored the question. “Is there any other news in the book . . . besides the announcement that Harriet Tubman and her family were genuine human beings?”

  She seemed delighted at my interest. “Yes. The author is a feminist and she takes a look at the misogyny that was rampant among Black men in the slave quarters.”

  Pam Silberstein gasped and shot me a sympathetic look from across the table.

  My throat was closing up and my next question (which I’d already guessed the answer to) squeaked out between my clenched teeth. “Is the author African-American?”

  The stupid fool finally realized that the room was silent and something was very, very wrong. She looked at Leigh Dafoe for help. “The author is white. Does that make a difference?”

  Leigh looked very uncomfortable. “Of course it doesn’t. I’m sure Jackie was just trying to get an overall sense of this book. Do you have anything else to share with us?”

  I glared at Astrid. She glared back.

  “No. That’s it for me but I’d like to make a generous offer on this project and we’ll have to move quickly. The agent already has interest.”

  “We’ll talk about it later,” Leigh answered smoothly.

  We all breathed a sigh of relief as the romance editor launched into a tale of the search for Mr. Right set on the French Riviera.

  And then it was my turn. But before I could speak, Leigh’s assistant rushed in and whispered something in her ear. Whatever it was caused Leigh to turn ashen and rush from the room without a word.

  We gossiped and chitchatted among ourselves for almost twenty minutes.

  By the time Leigh came back, we were beginning to run out of small talk.

  Leigh’s face was completely devoid of color. She looked somber. Just as our rustling and whispering stopped, Leigh burst into tears. “I don’t know how to say this . . . it’s just too awful,” she said.

  Astrid patted her on the back. “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m . . . um . . . all right,” Leigh sniffled and stuttered. “There is . . . um . . . no easy um . . . way to . . . um . . . say this.... Annabelle Welburn . . . um, oh, God . . . has been murdered!”

  7

  I’M NOT LOOKING FOR THAT

  Cries of grief, dismay, and disbelief ripped through the crowd but I was too astonished to react in any way until I saw Pamela Silberstein sag in her chair with tears running down her face. Although I had friendly relationships with all my colleagues with the exception of Astrid Norstromm, Pam was my hands-down favorite person on the staff. She was a tall white woman in her mid-fifties with shocking red hair and a razor-sharp wit who had been in charge of the health books for the past two decades.

  I managed to reach her on legs that felt wobbly. I leaned down and asked the same stupid question that one always asks in these situations. “Are you all right?”

  She looked up at me, her green eyes filled with pain, and said, “Never felt better, Jackie. How about you?”

  How about me? It had been fourteen years since I’d received such stunning news. During the summer between high school and college a neighborhood girl named Carmen Rivera had been thrown from the roof of a dinky hotel over on 46th Street. According to pedestrians, Carmen screamed as she fell and then pretty much exploded when she hit the unyielding concrete. Her boyfriend was on the roof with her when it happened but, even though the Rivera family pressed the police to arrest him, nothing was done because he said they’d been sniffing cocaine together and she lost her balance. Carmen was known to dabble in drugs and there was no one left to contradict his story, so he went free.

  Would Annabelle Murray’s killer also get away with the crime?

  Carmen had been a sweet, peaceful girl who had shared her candy necklace with me one day in kindergarten. Although we weren’t friends after elementary school, her terrible death left me feeling miserable and wracked with pain, long after the funeral was over.

  What were we supposed to do now?

  Leigh asked us not to talk to the media and said we could go home if we felt like it.

  Pam rose from her chair, we hugged briefly, and then, like cattle in a herd, followed our stricken colleagues out of the room.

  I parked myself in Pam’s office, which was so crammed with manuscripts and books that it usually made me claustrophobic after five minutes. Today was different. I was too traumatized to care about the untidiness surrounding me. It seemed impossible that Annabelle was not going to pop in on the marketing meeting that afternoon, lead the pre-sales conferences next week, secure a publishing deal for Craig, give me the raise, or . . .

  “Poor little girl,” I said aloud.

  Pam’s head was resting on her hand. “Dora?”

  “Yes, life is hard enough without losing your mother.”

  “What in the world happened?” Pam sighed.

  “When I saw Annabelle this mornin
g, she was already dressed for work. Maybe she got mugged outside the park. She would definitely have resisted if someone tried to snatch her bag.”

  “You saw Annabelle this morning?”

  Uh-oh. Annabelle had sworn me to secrecy on the Moms Mabley project and I wasn’t about to betray her trust, especially now. “Yes, I was campaigning for a promotion.”

  Pam’s eyes were riveted on me. “Oh, my God! Where was she? How did she look?”

  I told her what Annabelle had been wearing and that I’d seen her at The Dakota but omitted the fact that she looked as though she’d been crying.

  It was time for me to leave before I ended up putting Annabelle’s business in the street. I stood up. “Pam, I’ll see you later. Are you going to be okay?”

  Her green eyes welled up with tears again and she nodded.

  On the way back to my office I noticed that the atmosphere was hushed and dismal, although there were several knots of assistants standing around whispering about how the crime might have happened. The junior staff had very little contact with the head honchos like Annabelle and Leigh, so they really couldn’t be expected to mourn.

  On impulse, I walked into the bullpen-like area where Asha spent her working hours. She was on the phone but hung up immediately when she saw me approaching her desk. Asha’s face looked just a little sad and confused.

  “Do I have any messages?”

  She handed me a stack of pink slips.

  I leafed through them quickly: Penelope Aaron, a few writers, and Alyssa.

  My line rang again while I was standing there. Asha put the caller on hold. “It’s Paul,” she said.

  “I’ll take it in my office.” In my disoriented state, a chat with a trusted friend would provide a tiny bit of relief.

  “I guess you heard about what happened,” I managed to say before bursting into tears.

  “No. I was just calling to chat. Why are you crying?” He paused for a moment. “Jackie, what’s wrong? Did Victor get married or something?”

  Perish the thought. “Paul, somebody killed my boss this morning.” The words clogged up my throat and the tears continued to slide down my face.

  He gasped. “That’s terrible! I just ran into her at a cocktail party last week. She told me she had just booked a cruise to Bermuda.”

  “I’m not talking about Leigh. I meant Annabelle.”

  “Jesus Christ! What the hell happened?”

  “If Leigh knows anything, she’s not saying.” I filled him in on the morning’s events and then weariness overtook me. “Paul, I’m going to grab some manuscripts to read and go home.”

  Penelope Aaron called while I was packing to leave.

  “Hey, girl, a great proposal came in yesterday. I figured a shout out to you was what time it is.”

  Penelope did not know how stupid she sounded and the shock of Annabelle’s death had left me too wiped out to say anything.

  “Tell me about it,” I said wearily.

  “Is something wrong, Jackie?”

  “Yes, but I don’t want to discuss it.”

  Penelope and everyone else would find out about the tragedy soon enough.

  “Maybe I should holla at you tomorrow.”

  “No, go ahead.”

  She plunged right in. “It’s called Hell on Wheels and it’s a memoir by an ex-gang leader out of Los Angeles. He really gives up the goods. There is murder, rape, extortion, and shady dealings with the police department. Fascinating stuff. I’m telling you, Jackie, it has best-seller written all over it.”

  It was the type of book I hated but Penelope was right about the sales potential. For some reason, tales of Black degradation and depravity usually did extremely well at the cash register and my superiors would chop my head off if I didn’t at least consider it.

  “Sure, I’ll take a look.”

  “Great! I’ll messenger it right over.”

  “Fine.”

  “Hang in there, chile.”

  “ ’Bye, Penelope.”

  It was noon when I stepped out of the building. It seemed strange to see the whole world marching on as though no tragedy had occurred.

  To make matters worse, there was an e-mail waiting for me at home. It said

  Jackie:

  I have my hands full with my girlfriend and career. Thank you for the offer but I’m not looking for THAT.

  If you have any business-related requests, I will help you if I can.

  Victor

  THAT. He had referred to the most precious part of my body as a THAT . . . like it was an old piece of liver, not fit for human consumption. It felt like someone had kicked me in the stomach with a steel-toed boot and, like a fool, I wrote him back and told him so. Now I had no dignity either.

  8

  BAD NEWS

  I tossed and turned all night and woke up feeling exhausted. It was nine o’clock, which meant Richard’s Soul Food Diner was open for breakfast. After a quick shower, I slid into a black knit dress with a cowl neck and knee-length black boots. It was freezing outside and as I turned the corner onto 112th Street, a blast of cold wind hit me in the face, forcing my head down to my chest. The little Spanish man who sold newspapers next to the subway station was doing a brisk business. I paid for The New York Times, the New York Daily News, and the New York Comet.

  A smiling photo of Annabelle was on the cover of each.

  It was only a two-minute walk from the newspaper guy to Richard’s Soul Food Diner. He was sitting at the counter watching his customers eat and his face lit up when I came through the door. I gave him a quick kiss and climbed onto the next stool.

  “Jackie, I was just thinking about you. Did you know that woman who was killed yesterday morning?”

  “Richard, it was my boss who was killed.”

  His jaw dropped. “The one you went to see on Saturday?”

  “Yes. It’s awful. I’m surprised Paul didn’t tell you.”

  “He called me yesterday but this place was so crowded, I didn’t have time to talk. I heard about the murder on the radio this morning and when they said she worked in book publishing, I figured you might know her, but damn, I never expected this.”

  “Richard, I really want to take a look at the papers,” I answered impatiently.

  “Yeah . . . sure . . . are you hungry?”

  It had been more than twenty-four hours since I’d last had anything to eat. I ordered pancakes and orange juice and opened the Comet. Richard yelled my request to his cook, seized the News, and we buried ourselves in stories of Annabelle’s life and premature death.

  PUBLISHING EXECUTIVE FOUND STRANGLED, read the Comet headline. The paper reported that Annabelle Welburn Murray, publisher of Welburn Books and daughter of the late John Welburn who had inherited the illustrious publishing house from his parents thirty years before, was strangled sometime before nine-thirty Monday morning. Her sister, noted Park Avenue decorator Sarah Jane Welburn, discovered the body, fully clothed, in a bathroom of the sumptuous penthouse. “There were signs of a desperate struggle and Mrs. Murray fought hard for her life,” Detective Marcus Gilchrist of the NYPD was quoted as saying.

  The story went on to say that there was no sign of forced entry and police had no suspects.

  My hands were shaking so badly, the newspaper fluttered to the floor. Up until then, I had assumed that Annabelle was attacked on her way to work, but now it seemed that the killer had struck only minutes after I left her apartment. If I had stayed just a little longer, there might have been two dead bodies in the morgue right now instead of one.

  Richard caught me just as the room began to sway.

  9

  GOOD-BYE

  The torrent of media interest, which accompanies any murder of someone rich or famous, overwhelmed the staff of Welburn Books. Our offices were flooded with calls and e-mails from journalists, television producers, a couple of film companies, and radio news directors. When members of the Black Pack called, I gave them what little information I had, but each r
epresentative of the media who managed to get me on the phone only received a terse “no comment” for their trouble.

  It was only natural that the workers began to panic once the initial shock of Annabelle’s death wore off. Pam Silberstein popped in one afternoon wearing a crisp navy blue suit and black pumps. She closed the door behind her and plopped down into a chair. “I’ve just come from my first job interview in more than twenty years. It was arduous.”

  “Where did you interview?”

  “Can’t tell you that, kiddo, but I suggest you get moving, too.”

  I shrugged. “One of the other Welburns will take Annabelle’s place.”

  “I doubt that. When her father died, she was the only one who had any interest in the company. The Welburns will sell it.”

  After that conversation, I told Paul to start leaking the word that I might be available to speak with interested parties. The week went by so fast that I didn’t have too much time to obsess over Victor’s disinterest in fondling the most precious part of my body—the part he had so callously referred to as THAT.

  Since Annabelle had come to such a terrible end, it was very selfish of me to worry about how the tragedy would affect my own life or career. I should call Craig and ask if he needed me to help him in any way. My feelings about his book weren’t important. He had loved his wife and now had to bury her and raise their bewildered and heartbroken child alone. But every time I called, someone would answer and say that he was not home or too grief-stricken to come to the phone. One morning I turned on the TV while I was getting dressed for work. A stony-faced newscaster said

  “Police are still investigating the murder of Annabelle Welburn Murray at her luxurious apartment in The Dakota last Monday morning.

  Dakota residents interviewed say that they have not seen any suspicious activity in or around the building and officials admit that they have no leads. However, police are reviewing video surveillance tapes of the area.”