He pauses, then his tone changes. Very cagey. “I understand police think it was suicide. Have you heard anything?”
Oh, right, Mr. CEO, you’re my best friend now. You’re pumping me, trying to find out what I know. That means there’s something to know. I just don’t know what it is. Yet.
“Oh, goodness, no, I don’t know anything about that.” Where the hell is Walt? I can’t really vamp much longer. “Anyway, let’s see…” I pretend to flip through my notes.
“Rolling,” I hear from behind me. The return of Walt. Saved.
“Anyway, Mr. Rasmussen, we’re taping again.” I gesture to him that we’re beginning. “Let me ask you about the lawsuits filed against Aztratech….”
His eyes go icy. He does not like this question. And that means it’s a very good question.
“Ms. McNally, I have no idea what you’re referring to.”
“The whistle-blower suit which charges—”
“If there were a lawsuit,” he interrupts, “I would not discuss it. Hear me now, I’m not saying there is a lawsuit. But if there were, I would say nothing about it. And if your colleague had been honest enough to tell me the real reason you wanted this interview, I would have certainly said no.”
He shakes his head in infinite disdain. “Television,” he says, sneering at me.
I can take it. “Well, let me show you this, Mr. Rasmussen.” I bring out a copy of the lawsuit, placing it in front of him. “In this complaint against your company, a whistle-blower claims to have invoices that prove—”
Rasmussen stands up, the microphone cord yanking down the lapel of his jacket. I love this. If he rips off the mike and storms out, it’ll be great TV.
Do it, Wes.
He doesn’t.
“Let’s just turn off the camera, shall we?” he asks, sitting back down.
Here we go again. Clearly I’m hexed by some sort of journalism jinx.
I turn to Walt and slash my neck with a finger. “Cut,” I mouth the word silently.
“Good.” Rasmussen regains his composure, leans back in his chair. “Now, Ms. McNally, this is one hundred percent off the record. But let me assure you it’s for your own good.”
He steeples his fingers in what he probably imagines is a power gesture. “These so-called whistle-blowers,” he says, “are simply con artists. Blowing whistles? I say they’re blowing smoke.” He smiles, at his own clever wordplay, I guess.
“Allow me to give you some advice, Ms. McNally,” he says conspiratorially. “I admire your work, and I don’t like to see you wasting your time, let alone being misled by some crackpot lawsuit. Anyone can pay some lawyer to file a stack of papers in court, but if some number cruncher says we’re in any way involved in improper pricing procedures, well, hear me now, he’s wrong. Dead wrong.”
Rasmussen unclips the mike from his lapel and puts it on his desk. Smart guy. He knows Walt’s camera is still off. This time he stands up and stays up. “We’re done here, Ms. McNally.”
Chapter Seven
T
he entire dayside crew has gone by the time I return to Channel 3, but faithful Franklin is waiting for me, standing at the video screening machine outside our office. I’d filled him in on the interview from the car, including my suspicions about the wily Mr. Rasmussen. Now I slide in the interview tape and push Rewind. Numbers on the digital counter fly by in reverse as the videotape rolls back. At zero-zero-zero, I push Play.
“Wait a minute.” I squint as an unexpected scene pops into view. “I didn’t know Walt shot this. Must have been when I was hanging up my coat.”
The camera pans Rasmussen’s entire office, the glass door, the monolith of a desk, the sleek paneled walls. We see the piercing blue light illuminating the glass-encased sailboat. As the boat comes center screen, the camera movement stops.
“Shit. Son of a bitch.”
Franklin and I look at each other. The room on tape is empty. And neither of us has said a word. Then it hits us simultaneously and we burst into laughter.
“It’s Walt,” I say, still giggling. “He forgot the camera audio was recording.”
“Son of a bitch,” we hear again. Walt’s behind the camera, of course, so we don’t see him. Then we hear something unzip, some bumping noises, then a zip again. “Well,” the voice says, “she’ll just have to talk fast. I’m sure as hell not going to go all the way back down there to get another battery.”
“I can’t stand it,” I moan. “He knew, he knew all along he didn’t have another battery.”
The video continues, but I push Pause. “Look right there,” I say. “Hard to see, but there’s a closet hidden in the wall. Rasmussen hit a button on his desk, and it opened right up.”
“Neat.” Franklin takes off his glasses to look closer, then pushes Play again.
The camera continues around the room, and lands on the sailboat again.
The camera goes infuriatingly out of focus.
“Even with the rotten video,” he says, “you can tell that boat’s a beauty. Expensive, too. You know, I’ve seen some articles about this—social-climbing corporate execs buying elaborate boats. Apparently yacht racing is the new polo.”
“You think it belongs to Rasmussen?” I ask, an idea slowly coalescing. “If it does, where’d he get the money to buy it? Or listen, what if he’s actually the whistle-blower himself?”
“That’d be a cool twist,” Franklin agrees. “Great story, too.”
“Okay, look,” I say. “It’s easy enough for us to run down the ownership trail of this beauty, right? And then who knows? Is the name of the boat visible?”
Franklin puts his nose up to the screen, then pulls away. “It’s just too fuzzy. But you’re right—if we could track down who owns it, that could be a gold mine.”
“Hey, yo.” I hear a voice behind me as the doors to Special Projects click open.
Teddy Sheehan, Red Sox cap turned backward on his head and wearing his usual coffee-stained khakis, lumbers toward us. He’s the morning producer, but Franklin thinks he never goes home. I think he may be so in love with TV news, he’d rather live at the station. I’ve never been here when he isn’t.
Teddy sets down the black plastic box of videocassettes he’s returning to our archive shelf, and steps closer to the screen. “Cool,” he says. “The Miranda. Video sucks, though,” he assesses. “Don’t bring that junk into the edit booth, dudes.”
“The—are you saying you recognize this boat?” I ask.
“Hell, yeah. The Miranda. Sleek and fast as hell. Cost millions. She almost won the America’s Cup last go-round. Got beat in a close heat by the Australians.”
“You sure?” Franklin persists.
“Watched start to finish on ESPN,” Teddy assures us. “What else can I do you for?”
Franklin and I exchange glances. We’ve gotten an answer, I guess. Not that we know what it means.
“Well, you’re certainly a full-service producer,” I say, giving Teddy a thumbs-up.
He turns his cap around, putting the bill in the front, and then tips it at us. “No prob,” he says. “TV is my life.”
As he picks up his batch of file tapes and heads to the library shelf, I pop our yellow cassette from the viewer and hand it to Franklin.
“First thing tomorrow, we’re doing Miranda research,” I say. “But now, I vote we head out. I’ve got a date with some leftover Chinese food.”
Not again.
Even though I’m pretty sure it’s a false alarm, my heart flutters in fear as I arrive home. There’s a lineup of fire trucks, scurrying firefighters, swirling red lights. They’re in front of my building on the flat of Beacon Hill, a graceful but quirky brownstone tucked behind the old fire station where they filmed the old Spenser: For Hire TV show.
I scan for smoke. Flames. Nothing.
I hurry to join the cluster of my evacuated fellow condo dwellers gathered behind the fire trucks converged on Mt. Vernon Square. Most are focused on the building, others are trying to keep th
eir kids off the gleaming yellow ladder truck, one teenager struggling to control a squirming puppy.
No firefighters are running. Good sign.
Still, this is when it would pay to know your neighbors by name. My mental Miss Manners jabs me with a reproving elbow as I approach—I think it’s the woman in 2B, Mrs. Milavec?
“’Scuse me,” I say. “I just got home. Please tell me it’s the—”
“Yeah,” she replies, looking annoyed. “Again.”
I can’t take it. Every time our astonishingly oversensitive smoke alarm blares the building into panic, I frantically grab all that’s precious—Botox, my photo albums (including the one existing snapshot of my wedding, which I can’t bring myself to destroy), Gramma’s jewelry box and Cinnamon, my battered little stuffed pony, faithful friend since age three and crucial good luck charm. If they don’t fix this thing, I’m going to store all my valuables in a box by my front door.
“All clear, folks.” A white-helmeted deputy signals we can go back inside, as the firefighters clamber onto their trucks and the engines rumble away up Charles Street.
I join the muttering crowd trudging into our building and hear the slamming of doors closing each of us back into our separate lives.
Finally.
Once inside, I scoop up the latest pile of bills and junk from the floor, and make today’s contribution to the expanding mountain of mail and New Yorkers on my dining room table. As I toss my coat over a dining room chair, I wonder again why I spent so much money on furniture that I now only use as a spare closet and junk-mail storage.
My living room’s gorgeous, too.
Deep-cushioned navy leather couch. Cozy. Sexy. Voluptuously upholstered wing chairs. Casually elegant glass coffee table placed perfectly in front of the fireplace. All artfully arranged to create the perfect backdrop for a woman-about-town. That’s what Decorator Don told me, at least. And it’s even possible that someday, that’ll all be true. Botox loves the chairs, at least.
I pad back to where I really live—my combination study and bedroom. Double rows of books crammed onto the shelves, more stacks of magazines, an array of framed photographs covering one wall—Dad when he was a cub reporter, Mom’s sorority, Gramma and Grampa’s Gatsby-looking wedding, a few Baby Charlies, a chubby adolescent gap-toothed me with a pony and grown-up me with a couple of movie stars, a general and two presidents.
I stop to examine me with the general, calculating it was taken, what? Five years ago? I analyze my jawline, my waistline, the lines in my face. Why didn’t I realize I looked fine back then? I always thought I could look better tomorrow. Now it’s tomorrow, and I forgot to be happy yesterday. Today, I’m realizing, there’s apparently some sort of “use-by” date stamped on me. One that seems to be rapidly approaching.
I punch my code into the speakerphone on my desk as I peel off my sweater and toss it in the dry-cleaner pile. Messages.
“Beep. Message received Tuesday at 7:45 p.m.”
I click my skirt onto its hanger, but before I can put it back into the closet, I stop, midhang, focused on a voice I instantly recognize.
“Hey, Charlie, it’s Josh Gelston. Just checking in about Thursday. Hope we’re still on. You can meet me at Bexter Auditorium, as we planned, and you can sit backstage. There’s a cast party after. See you around seven.”
The machine begins its whir toward the next message, but my mind, swirling with memories, is rewinding to this afternoon. And then forward, to Thursday around seven.
And then, back to reality.
“Beep. Message received Tuesday at 8:02 p.m.”
“Charlie, Angela. The promotion department tells me you haven’t submitted your sweeps schedule. We’re up against a deadline, you know. We’ll continue this tomorrow.”
I sit up and punch the speaker off. I’m home. There’s no fire. I have a date with a real possibility. With a flutter of memory, I dig in my bag for the “Gold-Bug” program Josh gave me, smoothing the cover, then scanning for his name. Professor Joshua Ives Gelston, I read. Producer and Drama coach—Board Member, Bexter Academy. I feel myself smiling. Maybe we can produce some interesting drama together. Wonder what Maysie will think.
With a flourish, I delete the last phone message. Angela can wait.
Chapter Eight
M
y desk phone is ringing, my pager is beeping and the intern twins from the promotion department are hovering at my office door. Franklin doesn’t take his eyes off his computer monitor as I arrive for work, but he sticks out one arm, pointing toward the hallway. “Printer,” he says. I recognize this as Franklin’s shorthand for “I just printed something interesting and since you’re out there, go pick it up.” This definitely trumps the phone, the beeper and the twins.
I turn to retrieve Franklin’s stuff, but the interns are faster.
“We’re here to get the list of your sweeps story ideas,” says the one in the lavender angora. She runs a tiny hand through her strawberry-blond mop, flipping her too-long bangs briefly out of her face.
I notice the pink peek of skin between the sweater and her low-rider cargoes and wonder if she has a full-length mirror in her dorm room. Her sidekick is resplendent in pale blue nail polish, and with an equally dress-for-access tummy. They’re both wearing sandals. In October.
“They told us to come pick it up?” she puts in. “That, like, you’d have it for us? It was due, like, today?” She looks at me as if I’m supposed to know what she’s talking about.
The energy of the room suddenly goes dark, and I see the twins scoot closer together, huddling like delicate forest creatures sensing danger. Franklin looks up, questioning. And then, without a sound, Angela appears in our office.
“I’ve come from the meeting,” she says quietly. She says it like “THE MEETING.” The forest creatures cringe farther into the corner.
“We’re all wondering,” she goes on, her voice brittle with power, “about your sweeps story ideas.” She looks down at her clipboard, apparently ticking off some list. “Healthcast sent in their proposals, so did Sports, Envirobeat and Dollarwise. But we can’t plan our ratings book schedule until we hear from you, Charlie. I paged you. I called you. Is there—a problem?”
She looks as if she hopes there is.
“I, um, we’re…” I know I can finish this sentence. I just have to decide on my tactics. And fast.
Thank goodness Franklin is faster.
“Printer,” he says again.
“As I was going to say,” I continue, praying I understand Franklin’s shorthand, “we’ve just finished with the story list, and it’s on the printer.”
“Ten copies,” Franklin adds.
The news bunnies perk back into life, puffing up their angora and tossing their hair.
“We’ll—” one chirps.
“Get them,” says the other.
They’re gone, leaving only the faint scent of some trendy perfume behind.
Angela’s curls briefly turn to serpents, just long enough for me to notice, then back to her ordinary tangle.
“Thanks, Charlie,” she says. “I’ll let you know what we decide.” She turns to go, then turns back, with what apparently is supposed to be a smile.
“We’re counting on you, you know,” she says. “If your stories are good enough, we could have a solid win this time. No pressure, ha-ha.” Angela waves her clipboard and gives her patented exit line. “Ciao, newsies.”
I flop into my chair and deflate in frustration. My stories? They’re making me responsible for the ratings of the entire TV station?
“Wow, Franko,” I say, remembering my manners. “Great move.”
“No problem,” he says, waving me off. “My job.”
“But listen,” I say. “What did you put on that list, anyway? Stories we can actually do?”
“Definitely,” Franklin replies. “You had most of the ideas, as usual. Trucking safety, off-campus housing, those newsbreak stories you were talking about the other morning, rememb
er?”
“Good work,” I tell him. “Did you include the whistle-blower story?”
Periwinkle Toes is back at our door. She’s carrying a piece of paper, looking back and forth between me and Franklin.
“Like, um, here’s some other stuff that was on the printer? For you guys?”
“I’ll take it,” Franklin says, holding out a hand. He glances at the paper and smiles. “This is what I was trying to tell you before storylist-gate. I think there may be something going on at Aztratech. Something Brad Foreman may have latched onto.”
“What? How? How do you know? Can I see? Show me the…” I begin. Then there’s a little tap on our open door.
“Um, Miss McNally?” The intern is still hovering. “I’m Hayley Coffman, I’m a senior at BU?”
Of course you are, dear. Majoring in what, Abs 101?
“Yes?” is what I actually say, looking up at her. Ten seconds, she’s got ten seconds.
“I hope I’m not taking up too much of your time, but I was wondering if I might interview you. For a paper I’m doing on how successful women journalists began their careers? Like what obstacles they had to overcome, that kind of thing. You’re so—like, I mean, I’ve watched you ever since I was little. Professor Shaplen shows your tapes in class all the time.” She gives a little gulp. “And I want to be just like you.”
Franklin swivels out of the conversation, and I feel my eyes—and my heart—go a little soft.
Hayley wants to hear about obstacles. She doesn’t know it, but she just encountered her first. And I’m responsible for it. I’d written her off, based only on her toes and her tummy.
She’s certainly intelligent enough, confident enough, to ask for advice. I’ve been whining about how unfair it is that your TV face dictates your TV future. So what do I do? The same thing in reverse. If I can do it to her, why am I surprised when they do it to me? What’s even more disconcerting—have I become what I fear?
“Of course I’ll do an interview,” I tell her. “I’m flattered and honored you would think of me.” This rings disarmingly true, and somehow bittersweet. “Here’s my direct phone number,” I say, handing my card to the younger generation. “I’m happy to help.” This is true, too.
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