Cover Story

by Brenda Buchanan

  “The Peabody sisters have been telling me about her. They think the world of your mother.”

  Mick’s face went red. “Those damn biddies can’t keep their mouths shut. I told my mom not to talk to ‘em. But she thought they could be trusted.”

  “Trusted with the knowledge that you killed Frank O’Rourke to protect Corrine from him?”

  “No! I didn’t kill that asshole. I wish I had. That’d be better than this shit.”

  He was screaming, the veins in his big neck bulging. My hyper-alert mind made the leap. It wasn’t Danny Boothby, or Corrine, or Jackson Harrison, who killed Frank O’Rourke. It was Dolores, the mother Mick revered, and Corrine’s most committed protector.

  “I’m so sorry, Mick. I understand you’re trying to look out for her. The Peabody sisters didn’t tell me anything other than what you’re saying. Your mom is strong, she’s brave, and she’s suffered a lot. Don’t make her suffer more by losing you.”

  Mick’s eyes were overflowing with tears. He was lowering the gun when the door slammed open, hinges screaming as screws were wrenched from the wood frame. Mick jerked his head toward the door but I kept my focus on the gun. Powered by unadulterated adrenaline, I launched my battered body at his arm. Before I could knock the gun loose, he yanked it up in the air. A shot exploded in the confined bathroom and struck an overhead pipe, causing pressured water to gush from the ceiling. A second shot ricocheted off one of the stall doors and shattered a mirror over the sink.

  Four uniforms charged through the door. Three of them converged on Mick. The other one pushed me into an open stall and barked “Stay there!”

  There were thumps and grunts as bodies crashed to the tile floor.

  “Ow! You don’t have to break my fuckin’ arm.”

  “You keep kicking and I’ll break more than that,” one of the cops said.

  I leaned against the stall, feelings of relief and impotence flowing through my body.

  “Gale, you okay?”

  Detective MacVane was standing in the middle of the room, the downpour from above plastering her blond hair to her scalp. Mick LeClair’s big body was facedown on the tile, his hands cuffed behind his back. He was trying to hold his head out of the growing puddle on the floor. Two cops stood over him, one with a drawn gun pointed at him.

  I nodded, leaned over, hands on my knees, and took a couple of deep breaths.

  The cop with the gun put it back in its holster. Taking Mick’s left arm while his partner grabbed the right, they hauled the bodybuilder to his feet.

  Mick screamed at me, tears running down his face, as the cops led him out the door. “Why couldn’t ya have left it alone?”

  I walked over to a sink that was clear of the deluge. While Rose MacVane watched, I rinsed the taste of vomit and fear out my mouth and splashed water on my face.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said.

  The hallway had been cordoned off. Open doors and empty chairs indicated those who worked nearest the men’s room had been evacuated in a hurry. To escape the swarm of cops, we stepped into the County Commissioner’s office.

  MacVane wasted no time. “Did Mick admit to assaulting you?”

  “More or less. But that’s the least important issue at the moment. I need to call my office,” I told her. “My editor’s going to have a fit if she hears about this little altercation from somebody else.”

  * * *

  Leah almost lost her cool when I told her what happened, but when she stopped hyperventilating, I heard pride in her voice.

  “How soon can you get me something for the web?”

  “I’m going to have to dictate. My laptop’s gone, remember?”

  “Dictate? Who the hell do you think you are, Paulie Finnegan?”

  “Yup. The man himself, reincarnated.”

  “Then collect your thoughts and call back in five minutes?”

  “No other press is here, so I’m not going to tweet that it’s coming.”

  “The full retro,” she said. “Dictating with no Twitter teaser. Finnegan’s dancing a jig in his grave.”

  When I tuned back in to what was happening around me, I learned that a cop and lawyer convention was about to begin in Justice Herrick’s chambers. Unsurprisingly, I was not invited, but Cohen was on the guest list, meaning unless he was sworn to secrecy, I’d find out what transpired.

  Emma was standing outside the door of my hideaway. She threw her arms around my neck rather than my body, sparing my ribs. “I am so glad you are okay,” she said into my ear, then stepped back. “I was terrified.”

  “I’m fine. Really. Need to find a place to write.”

  “I know. We’ll talk later.” She gave me a second hug, just like the first.

  The hallway was full of people pretending they weren’t gawking at me, star of the morning’s drama. I ducked into the DA’s office, hoping someone had a key to the law library. My pal Shirley did. She smiled at me with tears in her eyes, as though I were her son home for Christmas.

  “We all heard you got jumped last night, and word went through this place like wildfire that it was you locked in the men’s room with Mick LeClair. When we heard the gunshot, well...” Shirley’s eyes filled again behind her bifocals. It took a moment for her to get her mojo back.

  “We haven’t lost a reporter yet,” she said. “Didn’t want to start now.”

  She let me in to the tiny library, which provided the quiet I needed. Despite a major caffeine-deficit headache, the words flowed out of my pen like the rising tide. In ten minutes I’d constructed six tight paragraphs, enough for the first report.

  Leah must have been sharing her gibe around the newsroom, because the assistant editor who picked up the phone got his licks in before I said hello.

  “Rewrite,” he barked. “I understand we’re on an old-school kick today, so I want you to know I’m wearing my green eyeshade. Ready when you are.”

  He transcribed my words as I spoke, helping to smooth the lead and pressing me for details I’d neglected to mention. Because the police had put out an all-points on Mick LeClair there was no obstacle to naming him. Though I explained his connection to Danny Boothby, I didn’t speculate about what caused him to go berserk. I described the chaos in the courthouse when the shots rang out, and the noise and confusion inside the water-soaked men’s room. I didn’t recount the past week’s litany of harassment, but made reference to the statement that summed up Mick’s beef with me.

  “LeClair indicated he was unhappy with press scrutiny of his family, saying the media was wrong to write about anyone but his brother-in-law. ‘You should have left us alone,’ he said. Seconds later, police stormed the restroom.”

  “Damn, Gale. You’re a magnet for crazy guys with guns,” my colleague said when we were finished. “Time to put a new banner on your Facebook page: Joe Gale: The Reporter with Nine Lives.”

  “Let’s hope it’s nine. Seeing how I’m now on number three.”

  A text from Emma chimed as I was disconnecting the call.

  Where r u? Judge coming back now.

  She’d already staked out space in the front row next to the Peabodys, who’d guarded my parka since I left on my fateful trip to the men’s room. In turn they each took both of my hands in theirs and squeezed, the proper lady’s version of a hug.

  “Emma told us you were unhurt,” Trulette said. “We’re so relieved.”

  Her sister chimed in. “We had no idea Michael was after you.”

  “You couldn’t have known. Dolores didn’t know.” And if I’m right about your friend, her need for your support is just beginning.

  Neither Dolores nor Claude LeClair was in the courtroom, but Jackson Harrison was, looking as peeved as ever. Mansfield was sitting at his table, head bent toward his assistant, shoulders hunched almost to his ea
rs. The O’Rourke brothers were nowhere to be seen. Cohen stood next to his seat, almost at attention. The court officers escorted Danny into the courtroom, but before Cohen could say two words to his client, the court officer announced the judge.

  Justice Herrick made short work of thanking the jurors and releasing them from their service. I looked up from my notepad and watched their faces as she announced that a number of factors required the case be declared a mistrial. A few couldn’t hide their relief. Others looked puzzled and several were clearly irritated, probably because they’d spent more than a week in a boring motel—including a claustrophobic weekend with a blizzard roaring outside—only to be dismissed without an actual explanation.

  As the jury filed out for the last time, Emma, the Peabodys and I watched Cohen tell his client what had transpired while he’d been cooling his heels in his jail cell. Danny clutched his head between his big hands and lowered his forehead to the table, resting it there while Cohen patted his heaving back.

  Justice Herrick’s declaration of a mistrial didn’t mean he’d be allowed to go free, but based on what Mick blurted during our chat in the men’s room, I assumed the charge against Boothby would be dropped very soon. Though her face remained as hard as a piece of Stonington granite, the judge allowed him to compose himself before signaling the court officers to escort him back to jail.

  I texted Leah that a mistrial had been declared and left it to her to blast the news out on Twitter with a link to my story. Before writing a fleshed-out version at the library, I needed to cajole someone into telling me what happened in chambers.

  Emma zipped into her parka and wound her scarf around her neck, saying she was headed to Cherryfield to see Corrine. “Try to relax for a few minutes. Get your adrenaline level back into the normal range.”

  “Like the great Warren Zevon said, I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”

  “Not funny,” she said. “Not funny at all.”

  Detective MacVane collared me before I could find Cohen. I told her I had work to do but agreed to answer a few preliminary questions about what Mick said during our heart-to-heart in the men’s room. We walked together to the Machias cop shop, where she steered me into an interview room so timeworn and uncomfortable it was a cliché. I motioned at the tape recorder she’d plunked on the table. “Before you turn that on, what the hell happened in chambers?”

  “The gunfight in the boys room was the main topic of conversation. The jury room is two doors away. The judge said there was no way she’d get a good verdict after all the ruckus. The side that lost would claim the incident tainted the jurors’ objectivity.”

  “Was that it?”

  “There was some other back and forth, including her granting a motion made early this morning by Marcus Cohen, asking to examine the actual tape of sheriff’s department phone traffic from the day O’Rourke was killed. Apparently he believes the transcript he was provided won’t match the tape.”

  I did my best to look surprised. “What did the judge say about that?”

  “She glared at Mansfield when she announced she was granting the motion, leaving no doubt there’ll be hell to pay if Cohen turns out to be right.”

  “How did Mansfield react?”

  “Didn’t say a word. Sat there and looked at his lap.”

  “If the transcript doesn’t match the tape it’ll be a big deal, but based on what Mick told me, I’m betting the state will be dropping the charges against Boothby anyway.”

  “This is what I want to hear about.” She reached over and turned on the tape recorder. “Tell me what the hell went down before we saved your life.”

  “When I woke you up this morning, I’d pretty much convinced myself Mick was Frank O’Rourke’s killer. He’s apparently got a serious drug and booze problem, and his attacks on me smelled like someone desperate to beat a rap. But when he was waving that gun at me, I figured out that he was trying to protect someone else.”

  MacVane’s face was impassive. She gestured for me to keep talking.

  “He started out acting like a tough guy, but quickly became an emotional mess. When he accused me of making trouble for his family, I realized he meant my stories that cast doubt on the state’s case against Danny were somehow causing trouble for another of his relatives.”

  I paused before jumping, listening for a moment to the snick-snick of the tape recorder.

  “I think it was Dolores who put that knife in O’Rourke’s chest.”

  MacVane blinked several times, but didn’t interrupt.

  “Mick didn’t say it in so many words, but he launched into an almost tearful defense of his mother, saying I had no idea how great a mother she’d been to him, how important she was to everyone. At the time it seemed like a non sequitur. I mean, he’s trapped me in the men’s room so he can finally beat the hell out of me face to face, and all of a sudden he’s telling me about his mom? That’s when I realized he thought I knew it was Dolores who stabbed O’Rourke to death.”

  “But he didn’t actually say that.”

  “Right. But if you’d been in that bathroom, you’d have come to the same conclusion. I’m guessing a thorough investigation will find Dolores was at the Boothby house on May 22, and witnessed O’Rourke threaten her granddaughter.”

  I thought of the pain in scrapper64’s voice.

  “I believe the threatening behavior may have been sexual in nature.”

  “Does this belief have a basis in something your friend Emma told you, something Corrine has told her in the course of therapy, perhaps?”

  “Hell, no. Emma is as professional as they come. She’s scrupulous about ethics. I’m speculating here based on other knowledge I’ve gathered about Frank O’Rourke.”

  “I’d like to hear about that.”

  “I’m sure you would, but my head feels like it’s about to split in two, and I’ve still got to file a story before I can lie down.”

  Both were true, but I also thought a little consult with the newspaper’s lawyer would be a good idea before I started telling the cops things anonymous sources had told me about Frank O’Rourke. I closed my eyes and leaned forward until my head was touching my knees. “I’ve really got to go. There’s no rush, is there?”

  She took down my contact information and asked for a contact in my local PD.

  “The chief’s Barb Wyatt. She can vouch for me.”

  “A cop vouching for a reporter? That’ll be a first.”

  * * *

  Mansfield had vanished, but I reached Cohen by phone. He invited me to come by his house for dinner, declining to comment for my story but promising to talk with me on the record once he was sure it wouldn’t hurt his client.

  No one was using any of the public computers at the library, so I spread my notes on the communal table and wrote like a madman. While I couldn’t say that Dolores killed Frank O’Rourke, I said the day’s events suggested new evidence would exonerate Danny Boothby. I didn’t need the newspaper’s lawyer to tell me it was premature to write about the suspicion that Frank had been making sexual advances toward Corrine Boothby, so I left that out. Because Cohen had gotten the hapless DHHS supervisor to recount the details of O’Rourke’s past transgressions, that was fair game.

  I called Leah as soon as I finished and we went through the story paragraph by paragraph. Once she’d transmitted it to the copy desk we talked about second-day coverage. I was happy to let the reporters in the office do more digging on Frank O’Rourke’s background and related issues. I was out of gas.

  I returned to the inn, stretched out on the bed and called Christie, who was giddy when she heard my voice.

  “You need to keep Emma in your life,” she said. “She didn’t want me to hear about a hostage situation at the Machias courthouse on the news. She called to tell me the hostage was you, but the crisis was over and you were the
hero.”

  “Tell me they’re not reporting it as a hostage thing.”

  “Oh, yeah.” She deepened her voice to a male register. “Joe Gale, award-winning reporter at the Portland Daily Chronicle, emerged unscathed from an armed standoff at the Machias courthouse today in which he was held hostage by an East Machias man.”

  “Shit.”

  “The Rambler was buzzing about it all through the lunch hour. You’re going to have to sign autographs when you get back.”

  I groaned.

  “How’s your physical self?”

  “Last night’s mugging and today’s altercation left my body a bit worse for the wear, but it’s nothing a little rest won’t cure.”

  “When are you coming home?”

  “As soon as I can. There might be too much wrap up here for me to get back tonight, but I’ll try.”

  “Stay on the road this time, okay?”

  “No worries. I’ve seen enough of the Black Woods.”

  After two hours of dreamless sleep and a long hot shower, I felt almost chipper. I walked over to Cohen’s, slow and steady. Emma showed up with a bag from the Chinese restaurant. Cohen’s wife was still out of town with the kids, so we commandeered the kitchen table and dug our chopsticks into the best moo shu chicken money could buy in Machias, Maine.

  Cracking open a beer, Cohen confirmed that even though the judge had declared a mistrial, it was clear from what he’d learned later in the day that the charges against Danny would be dropped. Lawyer and client had spent the entire afternoon together in a tiny conference room at the jail, where Danny finally spilled the whole story. To cover his ethical bases, Cohen got Danny’s permission to share the details with us and recounted their whole conversation after extracting a promise from me that the entire tale would remain off the record until the case officially was dismissed.

  Danny said O’Rourke had shown up at the house on several occasions as Corrine was getting off the school bus. Corrine told Danny he was nosing around, asking questions, but after the killing, Danny found out that Corrine had told Dolores that O’Rourke did a lot more than that. He flirted with her, told her if she was a few years older he’d throw over his girlfriend for her. And he put his hands on her. More than once. But instead of being seduced by it, Corrine was creeped out.