Revised Bury the Lead Ebook Formatting Embedded Cover

by Bury the Lead (retail) (epub)

  “Oh, yeah. I’ve never been arrested before. I just watch a lot of TV.”

  “Hmph. Well, no. Why don’t you just let me get it over with and then we can talk?”

  He rattled off the Miranda warning. I was surprised by his gravity when he settled into the chair across from me, looked me in the eyes, and asked, “Do you understand all that, Jeff?”

  I’d always pictured the Miranda as a hastily-muttered admonition that cops hoped you didn’t really hear. One more life misconception shattered. Learning all the time.

  “I understand, Chief. What can I tell you?”

  “You don’t want a lawyer?”

  I laughed. Did he want me to talk or not? What a good guy the chief was. Always looking out.

  “I don’t need a lawyer, Chief. At least, not yet. Fire away.”

  He pushed a copy of today’s newspaper across the table toward me. A thrill of pride curled in my stomach at the big black letters marching across the top―Body Uncovered In Grand Mesa.

  “I guess I need to know anything you can tell me about this story.”

  “Have you talked to Andy Watson yet?”

  Chief Joe shook his head. “No one’s been able to get ahold of him. Which makes this story all the more interesting. And worrying.”

  I smiled as reassuringly as I could. “Don’t worry, Chief. I imagine he’s still out in the mountains somewhere. It’s early, after all.”

  I could see the chief fighting to maintain his poker face. I couldn’t fault him for the struggle. This had to be confusing.

  “Your story stated that he found a decomposing body out on Grand Mesa. Unknown if male or female.”

  “Sure, sure. But that’s just a story. I haven’t seen Andy all day. Or heard from him. I only say that he’s probably still in the mountains because he mentioned earlier this week that he might try out some of those more remote trails we covered in the paper last week.”

  “Just a story?” Incredulity colored Chief Joe’s voice. I kind of wished Santiago were conducting the interrogation. He had a much shorter fuse than his superior.

  “Yeah, a story. I imagine it’s caused quite an uproar, and I’m sorry for that. I’ll print a retraction right away. Of course, the next edition doesn’t come out ’til Thursday, but word spreads fast around here. Between the two of us, I’m sure we can calm the waters.”

  Chief Joe narrowed his eyes. “I’m confused here, Jeff. You need to explain this to me. Are you saying you ran a false story?”

  @realDonaldTrump: This story is FAKE NEWS and everyone knows it!

  @realDonaldTrump: CNN fake news

  @realDonaldTrump: NBC News FAKE NEWS

  @realDonaldTrump: Don’t let the FAKE NEWS tell you

  @realDonaldTrump: Russia talk is FAKE NEWS

  @realDonaldTrump: FAKE NEWS media knowingly doesn’t tell the truth

  “I’m saying that upon review, Chief, it appears not all of my facts were in order. Not the end of the world. Like I said, I intend to run a full retraction.”

  The chief sighed and changed tactics.

  “If you haven’t even talked to Andy, where did you get the story from?”

  I’d always wanted to say this. Fifteen years in journalism, and this was my first opportunity to say those hallowed words aloud.

  “Now, Chief, you know I can’t reveal my sources.”

  Ahh. It felt just as good as I’d always imagined. Kind of … noble. Enlightened. Like I was acting under the direction of a higher power. Higher than populism, anyway. So maybe not all that high. But high enough.

  Chief Joe clenched his jaw.

  “You know you can go to jail, right?”

  “That’s more of a badge of honor than a threat to a reporter, Chief. You know that. And it’s not like I tried to file a false police report. In fact, as soon as I was questioned, I tried to clear all this up. I admit I relied on a source that was clearly not to be relied on, and now I need to retract a story. Unfortunately, it happened to be a page-one story, but that can’t be helped now.”

  “So you’re saying there is no body at all?”

  I shrugged. “I can’t vouch for that, Chief. I mean, it seems like people find bodies all the time. There might be a body up there. But as far as I know, Andy Watson did not find a body while hiking in Grand Mesa today.”

  Chief Joe stood up. I suspected his decision to cut the interview short had more to do with maintaining his composure than exhausting his questions.

  “Here’s the deal, Jeff. I can’t cut you loose until two things happen. One, Andy Wilson reappears safe and sound and confirms what you are saying. Two, I send my guys to the spot described in your article and confirm there is no body there.”

  I nodded tolerantly. “I completely understand. Do I have to stay in this room? Handcuffed?”

  He sighed. “No, you know good and damn well we have a holding cell, Jeff. Come on and we’ll get you moved and out of restraints.”

  If I was hoping for more drama, the holding cell quickly divested me of that notion. I have never been in a more boring place in my life.

  Sharks Found In Australian Floodwaters

  Dingy gray walls scratched up with singularly uninventive graffiti. A thick, square window with frosted glass that offered no view at all. A heavy steel door. Blank, blank, and blank.

  I wondered if they would feed me. They had to, right? Eventually? That would break up the monotony at least a little bit.

  I hummed for a while.

  I ran through the USA Today crossword clues in my mind.

  One across: four letters, sound from the shocked

  Five across: five letters, ranchers’ legging

  Ten across: four letters, fellers’ tools

  Fourteen across: four letters, Fed. Workplace monitor

  Too easy. I didn’t even need to see the puzzle to get these.

  I tried out the steel bed affixed to the concrete wall. A paper-thin, plastic-covered mattress accounted for its luxury. Not bad, but not great. A pillow would help.

  It took me all of five minutes to concur with Tom Sawyer that all incarcerations could be improved by a rat. Any sort of companion or diversion would be preferable to this awful nothing.

  Okay, well, this experiment had yielded results faster than expected. Prison was not an option. I’d be picking fights with burly tattooed men within a week just for the sake of having something to do.

  A thought occurred to me.

  I put my mouth against the edge of the door. “Hey! Hey! Don’t I get a phone call?”

  I listened. A long sigh sounded from across the hall.

  I knew that sound of exasperation. Santiago!

  “Por favor! A phone call! Don’t I have rights? I’ve been cooperating, haven’t I?”

  I heard Santiago’s boots crossing the hall and the rattle of keys.

  “You really do watch too much TV, Jeff. The answer is no. I don’t have to give you a phone call. But I will. Just to shut you up. I have to lock the lobby door first. I’ll be right back.”

  Victory!

  A few minutes later I was staring at the phone, nonplussed. Bonnie Mac was still determinedly head-down at the desk behind me. Santiago stood beside me, fake-relaxed and all-too-hopeful for an escape attempt.

  “What are you doing, Jeff?” he asked impatiently. “I’m not pulling you out of that cell again. I have work to do. If you want to make a phone call, do it now.”

  I spread my hands. “Pardon, señor. I’m just trying to decide who to call.”

  “Jeff.” The word was a growl.

  “Okay, okay, I got this.” I picked up the wall phone and dialed the only number I knew by heart. Besides Ada’s, of course. No point in calling a voicemail recording.

  Porn A Public Health Crisis In Three US States

  “Hello?”<
br />
  “Hi, Dad. How’s it going?”

  “Jeff. What’s going on? Have you been arrested?”

  “What kind of crazy way is that to start a conversation?”

  “Not that crazy. The caller ID says you are calling from the Brisby Police Station.”

  “Oh.” I hadn’t thought of that. “Well, you know I’m here all the time following up on stories. I thought I’d call and check on you while I’m here. As if you wouldn’t be the last person I’d call if I needed bailing out.”

  He harrumphed. That peculiar sound all fathers seem to have perfected. I could picture him shifting in the rocking chair that faced the front porch. He considered the Denver streets far more entertaining than a television screen. He was probably right. “Why didn’t you just call me from your cell phone?”

  “I dropped it in the toilet.”

  “Ah.”

  “So how have you been?”

  “Staying busy. Have to, you know, since my only son hasn’t been to see me in six months or more.”

  “Dad. It’s just now spring. You know how impossible it is to get through I-70 in the wintertime.”

  “Not this year. We hardly had a winter at all.”

  21-Year-Old Murder Case May Get A Second Trial

  This conversation was not quite the diversion I’d been hoping for.

  “How’s Burbank?”

  Burbank was Dad’s beagle, named for the city where he met Mom. This particular edition was Burbank III. If I’d understood the inclination to own a pet, I would still have been baffled by an owner’s willingness to have the creature die on him over and over. I think I’d go for fish, myself. Something decorative and low-maintenance and easily replaced. With no housebreaking period involved.

  But that was me. Dad loved his dogs. And he really did imagine they maintained some sort of connection with his dead wife. Not only had they met in Burbank, but she’d been walking her beagle on the sidewalk when Dad had introduced himself and asked her out.

  A bold move, but then, Burbank was no Brisby. If you missed your chance with a girl there, you’d probably never see her again. So Dad had seized his moment.

  “He’s well. Getting plenty of walks.”

  Santiago was glaring at me. Clearly he had assumed that this conversation would have more of a practical outcome. I was torn between wanting to drag out this conversation to put off returning to the monotony of the cell and hoping that Santiago would blow his top and make me hang up the phone.

  “That’s good,” I offered inanely.

  Silence fell. I summoned up another effort.

  “So how do you feel about Meals on Wheels losing their federal funding?”

  That got a response from Dad and Santiago both.

  “Meals on Wheels? I’m old, not a damned invalid! Why should I care how those people get fed?”

  “All right, that’s enough,” Santiago interjected. “Cut it short.”

  “Who’s that?” asked my dad, suspicion further sharpening his tone.

  “Sorry, Dad, I’ve got to go. It was good talking to you. Give Burbank a belly rub for me.”

  Santiago knifed a hand in the direction of the holding cell, a clear command.

  “Si, si,” I muttered, unable to resist.

  “I can’t believe that’s the phone call you absolutely had to make,” Santiago grumbled as he followed me back.

  Nigeria Perceived As The Most Corrupt Of 80 Countries

  “Have you ever noticed how often your internet connection is interrupted when you’re trying to open articles related to the president?” I asked him. “I’m pretty sure that’s the NSA.”

  “Oh, my God,” Santiago said, exasperated. He pulled open the steel door to the cell and shoved me inside. Gently, though. He’s not an asshole.

  “Think about it!” I called through the crack in the door after he locked me back in. I could hear his footsteps receding to his office. “Try it right now. Try to open an article about Russia!”

  “Maybe that should be your next front page story,” he yelled back. I snickered. I was right. He hits his limit much faster than Chief Joe. “You know, if you ever get out of here.”

  Laughing, I slid down to the floor and eased back against the concrete wall.

  I considered it pretty classic that once he’d established I wasn’t calling him to bail me out of jail, my father had lost all interest in why I’d called. Not one question about me or how my life was going. Even his complaints about not seeing me often enough had been rote. My rare visits were painful for us both. I felt it would be more trouble to sever the connection than to maintain it, though. For his part, he made the cursory overtures for the sake of his dead wife and nothing more.

  He’d loved my mother, that much was certain. A child was just the price he’d had to pay for that. He was never abusive, and he paid the bills, kept me in clothes and shoes. I had no complaints. If anything, losing my mother had taught me that intensely emotional relationships were liabilities. I’d stayed true to that conviction until I met Ada. She was the one person who’d persuaded me, without even trying, that the rewards were worth the risk. Even now I wouldn’t argue she was wrong. But I wouldn’t take the risk again, either.

  Probably the real reason I kept the ties to my father knotted was entirely selfish. He was all that remained of my own origin, after all. Without him, only my own will and breath testified to my existence. That is the appeal of writing, you know, no matter what anyone tells you. Immortality. Anyone who denies that is either lying or not a writer at all. It doesn’t matter how unlikely the possibility is. Even the barest chance of having a word or two, a phrase, persist, for a few hundred years or more, is the sole reason a writer has for breathing.

  85-Year-Old Woman And Cat Survive Five Days Stranded In Snow

  Lunch turned out to be a cold croissant sandwich from Crumbly’s and a cup of coffee. Better than what I had anticipated for jail food. But then, they rarely had anyone in the cell long enough for a meal, so amenities were few.

  I considered the likelihood that Santiago had waited for the sandwich to get cold before giving it to me.

  I tried getting him to chat with me a few times, but he remained steadfastly unresponsive. After my first couple of yells, I heard his office door snick shut. I yelled louder, but the subsequent strains of country music I heard emanating from the hallway convinced me my efforts were fruitless. And I didn’t want to drive Bonnie Mac crazy. None of this was her fault.

  So I reluctantly subsided.

  That day was interminably long. I had no one but myself to blame for it, though. I wished I had a book.

  Happily, Randolph makes sure I have plenty of books nowadays. I honestly don’t know how people survive without them.

  Oklahoma Worst State In The Union For Women

  Chief Joe’s lecture when he finally released me rivaled that of any disappointed father. I did my best to keep my expression placid and understanding. After all, he probably could have come up with something to charge me with if he really wanted to. As he told me―several times―a great deal of money and resources were expended checking out the veracity of my story.

  Or its lack thereof.

  I started to protest that I had done my best to convince him that no resources were needed as I’d realized too late that my story’s sources were faulty, but I quickly acquiesced at the harsh glare delivered beneath lowered brows. After that, I sat back and let him do the talking.

  It was nearly eight in the evening by the time I made my way out of the police station. Bonnie Mac was long gone. I felt a little guilty on her behalf. I knew how adamant she was about not working Sundays, and I was pretty sure that my little story was the sole reason she’d had to come in. From my little enclave down the hall, I’d heard her fielding phone call after phone call. I’d have to up my game if I was going to wheedle my way b
ack into her good graces anytime soon.

  McCain’s “Crazy Fat Kid” Comment Considered Act Of War By North Korea

  I have to admit, I found it somewhat preposterous that of all the stories in the news this week, mine was the only one that landed an editor in jail. Just think … if I’d been telling the truth, I’d probably still be behind bars. A lie set me free. Probably happens more often than we realize.

  On the other hand, what had made the story false? Chief Joe arrested me assuming only the murderer could have known that a corpse lay on the trail, awaiting discovery. He later assumed that no discovery meant no corpse meant no murderer. Or was he just biding his time, waiting for a misstep? Maybe all the assumptions were my own.

  I checked my phone. No messages this time because the battery was dead after all day in one of the drawers of Bonnie Mac’s desk.

  I could charge it at the office. It was late, but I’d promised the chief that I’d print out a notice of retraction and hang it in the office window in addition to putting it front and center in our online edition Monday. I could afford to be accommodating. I was free, after all.

  Bears Emerging From Hibernation

  Can’t wait ’til our president succeeds in his effort to change the libel laws. I’m not sure what he means by that, but presumably articles will no longer have to contain actual, defaming untruths in order to be subject to liability. The best part about removing truth as a standard is that it goes both ways. If something doesn’t have to be false to be repressed, then it doesn’t have to be true to be printed. Frankly, at this point, if Chief Joe had tried to prosecute me, I’d have probably gotten my lawyer to call the president as a witness in my defense. I didn’t think that would have been a problem. He’s already going to have to testify in how many lawsuits? He can spare a moment for the First Amendment, right? Or its deconstruction?

  I whistled as I unlocked the office door and flipped on the lights.

  Mother And Son Shot To Death After Being Told Not To Call 911 Again

  So much of our lives are spent in darkness. It is in the brief flashes of light that our world and our selves are illuminated. Like little squint-eyed opossums, we scrabble through the night toward the scent of survival and freeze in startled terror when a sudden brightness reveals our surroundings for an instant.