Adam Canfield of the Slash

by Michael Winerip

  Whenever she thought about that, Mrs. Boland wanted to rip down every last illegal hoop with her bare hands.

  “Mrs. Boland?” said Herb Green into the phone, interrupting her thoughts. “Mrs. Boland? You still there? You want to give us any direction on this accessory structure situation?”

  Did she ever. They were going on the offensive. There would be a major public campaign. They had the law on their side. “Boys!” she yelled. “Red-tag every last one of those freakin’ hoops!”

  She hung up and called Mrs. Marris at Harris. “Marris!” she barked, and then reamed out the principal for letting the basketball story into the paper. Nor did she get any nicer when Mrs. Marris explained that she, too, thought every hoop should be torn down. “Marris, don’t you try to butterball me up,” said Mrs. Boland. “If you can’t control those little monsters, we can find another Harris principal mighty fast.” And she slammed down the phone.

  The following week, Adam was channel surfing when he caught a report on Cable News 12. The anchor said it was the first in a ten-part series, “Zoning Violations: The Silent Scourge.” The one minute and forty-five second report consisted of Peter Friendly and a cameraman walking around poor neighborhoods in the Tri-River’s three big cities, showing knocked-over garbage cans, dilapidated chainlink fences, stray dogs, and boarded-up aluminum-sided houses.

  To provide some perspective on the Silent Scourge, Peter Friendly had interviewed Mrs. Boland.

  The report ended with an ominous warning to viewers at home: “This is what happens when zoning laws are not enforced. I’m Peter Friendly, with another exclusive investigative report from Cable News 12.”

  Adam caught several installments — Mrs. Boland was in every one — but there was never a mention of a basketball hoop.

  That month’s Slash had one other big impact. On a Saturday in late October, after Jennifer got home from basketball practice, but before she left for a cello lesson, the phone rang. Of course, one of the twins grabbed it — they hogged everything.

  It was some grownup lady for Jennifer.

  “Would this be Jennifer, the journalistic savant?” said the woman.

  “I’m not sure,” said Jennifer.

  “Well, I’m just calling to convey my gratitude,” said the woman. “Thanks to you, I have my cow back.” The lady on Breckenridge Road. The plywood cow! It had been returned.

  “Do you have time for this, darling? You’ll enjoy it,” said the woman. “A few days after the Slash appeared, a man called the house while I was having my evening cocktail. Very mysterious conversation, reminded me of one of those pivotal moments in an Agatha Christie novel. The caller said he wished to remain anonymous. How delicious is that? He said he had overheard two boys talking about the cow. He gave me a phone number and a few useful tips on where it might be stashed.”

  Jennifer grabbed the only thing handy, a pile of napkins and a Magic Marker, and started scribbling. “OK to take a few notes?” she asked.

  “Be my guest,” said the woman. “So I dialed the number and a man answered. He said he didn’t know anything about a cow. I asked, ‘Do you think it might possibly be in your son’s room?’ The man said, ‘I don’t know. I’ll get back to you.’ I was surprised. He didn’t seem at all upset by my insinuation.”

  “You didn’t call the police?” asked Jennifer.

  “Oh no,” said the woman. “I always prefer back channels whenever possible. The intrigue is so superior. Well, the next day the man called back, said his teenagers would be by that afternoon with the cow. Sure enough, a few hours later, two young swells in a sporty convertible ride up our drive with the cow in the back seat. They seemed a bit sheepish about the cow and proceeded to tell me a confusing story about getting it from a friend who wanted to remain nameless. I didn’t ask questions. Of course, they lied like they breathed.”

  Jennifer was having trouble keeping up; it was one juicy quote after the next. She was going to use up all the napkins and maybe the tablecloth, too.

  “So my question,” said the woman, “is where do I send the check?”

  “The check?” said Jennifer.

  “The hundred-dollar reward,” said the woman. “I certainly am not going to give it to those hooligans in the convertible. You’re the one who got my cow back.”

  “Ohhhh,” Jennifer moaned.

  “What is it, my dear?”

  “I can’t,” said Jennifer. “It would be like paying the newspaper for a story.”

  “Really?” said the woman.

  “No offense,” said Jennifer, “but if newspapers took money from people to do stories, pretty soon only the rich people would have stories.”

  There was silence on the line, and Jennifer was nervous. Had she offended this nice lady? It was a real pain in the butt, being Miss Journalism Ethics. Why did she always have to be the responsible one?

  “Jennifer,” the woman said finally, “you remember how I found you? Through your mother at the garden club? You probably don’t know this — your mother’s hydrangeas are legendary. But I see now, she has raised something even more extraordinary than those magnificent violet flowers. You, my dear! No one knows better than a rich old lady like me all the cheaty things people will do for money. It is so encouraging to know that you and the Slash cannot be bought. Tell me this — would it be a violation of anything to write you a check for a mail subscription to the Slash?”

  “Oh no,” said Jennifer. “That’s perfectly legal. But we can only charge for postage; the paper’s free.”

  “A deal,” said the woman. “I can’t remember the last time I so enjoyed a Tremble newspaper. Since that awful Boland man bought the Citizen, the Gazette, the Herald, and the Advertiser and merged them into one paper, there has not been an ounce of real news in Tremble. And this should make your day — did you know that Cable News 12 is following your story? They’re coming by this afternoon to do a special report on my cow.”

  Jennifer gathered up all the paper napkins. Some had just three or four words. She’d used most of the bag; putting them in the right order would take forever. It was worth it, though. Adam would be impressed. They could run a photo of the returned cow in the November issue. She could see the headline superimposed on the back half of the cow: “A Happy Ending!”

  Sitting alone in the kitchen, a rare quiet moment on a weekend afternoon, Jennifer was hoping maybe happy endings were contagious. Maybe they’d get a happy ending for the story on Marris stealing the seventy-five thousand dollars. They sure needed one.

  They skipped lunch and ducked into 306. Adam ripped a sheet of lined paper from his science binder, and together he and Jennifer made a list of what they knew and what they still had to nail down for the Miss Bloch story. They felt certain about what had actually happened — that Marris had pocketed the seventy-five-thousand-dollar gift for her own greedy purposes. But as the two of them drew up their list, Jennifer shook her head more and more. “We don’t have every bit of proof,” she kept saying. “We need more sources.”

  They knew the gift was supposed to be for kids. In his notebook Adam had highlighted the neighbor’s quote in yellow and read it out loud to Jennifer, banging his fist on the sofa for emphasis. “The money,” he read, “was supposed to be used to ‘generally improve the life of deserving children who do not have an easy time of it.’ Those are the exact words. On the record.”

  Even Jennifer agreed that the neighbor was a superb source. She was Miss Bloch’s only friend and was letting the Slash print her name.

  Also very important: everything the neighbor said could be checked with the lawyer who drew up Miss Bloch’s will, and Adam had the man’s phone number.

  So they felt sure they had enough information to write about how the money was supposed to be used.

  As to how the money was actually being used — what Marris did with the loot — this was the part where things got murky and Jennifer kept mumbling, “We haven’t nailed it yet.”

  They could find no evidenc
e that the money had been spent on kids; Jennifer had snooped around but had not heard of one new project or scholarship that seemed to be what Miss Bloch had wanted.

  They knew that Marris had twisted Miss Bloch’s words, claiming the money could be used for “general improvements.”

  “General improvements” was just the sort of vague phrase that could justify anything, including Marris’s own new bathroom, custom shelves, and electronic equipment.

  “General improvements” set off the alarm in their coeditor brains that flashed COVER-UP! COVER-UP!

  “General improvements” sounded really lame.

  But how to prove that the money was actually used by Marris for her own purposes? How could they prove those were the very same dollars Marris had spent on the Bunker projects?

  To Adam, it seemed obvious. “Come on,” he said, “it has to be true.”

  “No, it doesn’t have to be true,” said Jennifer. “How do we know that Marris isn’t using her own money for the Bunker work or some special school fund and still hasn’t decided what to do with Miss Bloch’s money?”

  Adam’s mouth opened, but nothing came out. There were times when he just hated Jennifer the editor. She could take the tiniest hole in his reporting and blow it up until it looked like the harvest moon.

  “We need Eddie the janitor,” said Jennifer. “He did the Bunker work — he must know where the money came from. Eddie can break this story wide open. And you know who our ‘in’ with Eddie is.”

  Jennifer jumped up. “I’ll send her a note through the twins.” Unfortunately, it was getting harder and harder to hook up with anyone at Harris. They were all getting busier, as impossible as that seemed. Marris had added two extra classes a week of before-school/after-school voluntary/mandatory. The principal had warned that without these extra sessions, Tremble would fall behind seven other Tri-River suburbs in the number of state test prep sessions per student per week.

  “We’ll meet tomorrow, before school,” Jennifer called out, and disappeared out the door.

  Adam sunk back into the couch. He was envisioning how bad he was going to feel asking Phoebe for a favor.

  After school Adam leafed through his notebook and found the phone number for the lawyer who had drawn up Miss Bloch’s will. The law firm had an office in downtown Tremble, over a bank. Adam explained to the woman who answered the phone that he was a reporter for the Slash and then asked to speak to the lawyer.

  “Sorry,” said the woman. “He’s deceased.”

  “Wow,” said Adam. “How diseased is he?”

  “Deceased,” said the woman. “He’s totally deceased.”

  “Whoa,” said Adam. “Anyone totally diseased must be totally contagious. Is it safe for me to talk to him on the phone?”

  “Not diseased. D-E-C-E-A-S-E-D,” spelled the woman. “I should have known better than trying to be subtle with a newspaper reporter. He is completely and irrevocably stone-cold D-E-A-D. Is that a word you can spell?”

  Adam gasped. “Oh, my gosh,” he said. “I am so sorry. I feel like an idiot.”

  “Well,” said the woman. “You sound like an idiot. What rag did you say you’re from?”

  “The Slash,” said Adam.

  “Never heard of it,” said the woman. “That another Boland publication?”

  “Oh no, ma’am, nobody owns us,” said Adam. “We’re the student newspaper of Harris Elementary/Middle.”

  The woman was quiet, then softly said, “My word. The paper that did the basketball hoop story? What’s your name?”

  “Adam Canfield.”

  “Adam Canfield of the Slash!” she said. “I can’t believe it’s you. Every lawyer in this office was talking about your basketball story. We got five new clients thanks to you. They’ve hired our zoning specialist to fight that accessory structure nonsense.”

  “Really?” said Adam.

  “Really,” said the woman. “Tell me, how can I help you, sweetheart?”

  Adam explained about the Minnie Bloch story and how he was hoping to verify the gift she left to Harris.

  “Well, the lawyer may be dead,” she said, “but the will is public record. All wills are in this state. You can get a copy at the county courthouse in the probate office.”

  Adam didn’t say anything; he was thinking about taking three buses to the courthouse. He was thinking he would never get to play another game of manhunt for as long as he lived.

  “We might have a copy here,” she continued, “if the will was filed in the last two years, we’d still have it. Like me to check?”

  She put down the phone. When she returned, she said, “Your lucky day. I’ll make a copy and mail it to you. Normally we charge a dollar a page, but since it’s for the Slash,” she said, “I’ll do it for free.”

  Adam was excited.

  “Now I want something in return,” she said. “Can you get me a mail subscription?”

  Oh, could he. Before hanging up, he thanked her a million times.

  “No,” she said, “I should thank you. Truth is a mighty precious commodity. Adam Canfield of the Slash, you keep up the good work, you hear?”

  He couldn’t wait to tell Jennifer, but she didn’t stop by 306 that afternoon.

  When he got home, he went into the garage and grabbed his basketball. He needed to practice foul shots. His coach had told them that many a game was won or lost at the free-throw line. Coach said they ought to be making six of ten every time. Coach said there were no shortcuts, just lots of hard work.

  The wind was harsh off the river, and his hands turned red and ached after a few minutes, but he needed to be out there. He pulled his sweat-shirt hood over his head, taking several shots from the outside to warm up. And then he noticed. There, on the beam that supported the backboard, was a red sticker, about three inches square. He assumed some kid had put it there. Once when he’d ridden his bike to school, he’d come out and found a sticker on the seat that said, In case of nuclear attack, stick your head between your legs and kiss your butt goodbye.

  But this sticker was no joke.

  It said:

  N O T I C E !

  STRUCTURE VIOLATES LOCAL ORD. 200-52.7A.

  REMOVE AT ONCE!

  YOU HAVE 7 DAYS!

  NONCOMPLIANCE MAY RESULT IN $500 FINE

  PER DAY AND IMMEDIATE REMOVAL PER ORDER OF

  TREMBLE COUNTY ZONING BOARD.

  Adam had been red-tagged.

  Adam, Jennifer, and Phoebe met so early the next morning, three of their six eyeballs still had sleepy bugs. The school wasn’t open yet, so they walked to the West River Diner, where they took seats in the rear. Jennifer had once read in a biography of Thomas Dewey that when great investigators eat in a restaurant, they sit with their backs to the rear wall so no one can sneak up from behind and shoot them.

  The waitress was upset because they had taken a booth during the morning rush and just ordered hot chocolates. But the three news hounds did not notice; they were all business.

  In voices barely above a whisper, the coeditors gave Phoebe the high points of the Miss Bloch story.

  “You mean you’re going to write an article saying Mrs. Marris is a common low-down crook?” asked Phoebe.

  “Shhhhhh,” they shushed her.

  “Whoa,” said Phoebe. “Not a bad little story. That’ll probably make the front page, huh?”

  “Probably,” said Adam, “if we live to tell it.” They explained that they needed to talk to Eddie to see where Marris got the money for the Bunker work.

  “Wait until you see the bathroom,” said Phoebe. “It has gold handles on everything. It’s got a sauna. It’s got this weird thing Eddie said they have in Europe, I can’t remember the name, something like a biddy — rich people use them to wash their . . .”

  “You saw the bathroom?” asked Adam. “Gold fixtures?”

  “Sure,” said Phoebe. “Eddie showed me when I followed him around — it was my fourth or fifth interview. After everyone was gone, he took me
to the Bunker to see the work he was doing.”

  “So you think you can get Eddie to talk with us?” asked Adam.

  “No problem,” said Phoebe. “Eddie’s my guy. He’ll do what I ask. We are so tight.” She paused. “You know, I was just thinking — I was right about Eddie, wasn’t I? Did I say he was the guy who knew everything at Harris? Remember that day when you yelled at me?”

  “Yeah, yeah,” said Adam.

  “Remember, you said Eddie was going to be so boring?”

  “Yeah, yeah,” said Adam.

  “And you told me —”

  “PHOEBE,” yelled Adam. “I give up; I surrender. You were right; I was wrong. You are king of the universe and I am a blackhead on the butt of a lowly warthog. Once again, you have proved —”

  “Easy,” said Jennifer. “Let’s calm down . . . Phoebe, we know how much you’ve done and we really appreciate it.”

  Phoebe nodded. She had done a lot. She said she would help them on one condition — that she got a byline on the Marris story, too.

  “No problem,” said Adam. “If you want, we’ll put just your byline on it all by itself.”

  “Really?” said Phoebe.

  “He’s kidding,” said Jennifer. “We would never do that to you.” It was almost time for the first bell and they stood to leave. “See you after school?” said Jennifer.

  “Be there or be square,” said Phoebe.

  She spotted Eddie at recess, by the Dumpster. When she explained that the Slash editors wanted to speak with him, he seemed pleased, until he heard what it was about, and then he was plainly nervous and edgy.

  “I don’t know, Phoebe,” he said. “You know how grateful I been, I’d do anything to help, but you are dealing with dynamite on this one.”

  “Come on, Eddie,” joked Phoebe. “Relax. What’s the worst Marris could do?”

  “Child, don’t be ignorant,” snapped Eddie. His voice was so different, Phoebe felt a shiver race through her. “You don’t know how deep this lady’s hate goes,” he said. “Don’t be fooled by her happy-face smiles. If Marris knew I was telling her secrets, she would fire me in a second. That witch would do anything to save her white behind.”