Butterfly Knife

by Larry Matthews

Chapter Nine

  Sid was pissed off, there was no getting around it, even though that is exactly what Dave was trying to do. Sid was banging his fist on his desk as he glared at Dave and his face was red. He was breathing hard and there were sweat marks under his arms. “Has it occurred to you that you’re letting this damned story get away from you?”

  Dave sat down on the small sofa that occupied a spot across from Sid’s desk. He looked at his hands while Sid worked himself into what his staff referred to as “one of his moods”. Finally, Sid sat down and stared at his desk. “So, let’s review the bidding.” Sid was a weak bridge player who used card jargon to season his rants. “You’re doin’ a story about homeless people when a priest gets killed right in front of you. You get some information from the head of homicide. You decide to go home and get some sleep before you file on this story, even though you know the cops think there’s a serial killer out there who’s most likely a religious nutbag.

  Then, just to make it interesting, somebody sends you the dead priest’s Rosary, which you finger a little bit and hand over to your friend the police captain. Then, you get tape, against your deal with this guy, about how other cops and this Warriors of Mary group may be tied up in hunting down this sick fuck killer. Then, to put a cherry on top of this wonderful saga, some homeless guy hands you a bloody book, which you then hand over to the captain. Finally, you do a bullshit q-and-a with Chicago and they, accidentally, you say, hear the above mentioned recording and use it, scooping the shit out of us, meaning you. Does that about sum it up so far?” Sid was in full bloom rage.

  “May I say something?” Dave was convinced he was about to be fired.

  “Oh, by all means, say something.” Sid sat back, pulled out his bottom drawer and used it as a foot stool. “I’m all ears.”

  “O’Neil is playing me. He gives me things and takes them back. He drives me around, shows me a body or two, and feeds me something he says I can’t use, then he wants something in return. The priests killings appear to be part of something bigger but I can’t tell you what it is right now. And I’m freaked out by the Rosary and the book. I think somebody’s watching me.”

  “You think?”

  “Here’s how it looks to me. Somebody, one guy, probably, is out there with a knife saying his prayers as he cuts up priests. I need to look at why these particular priests are being singled out. This guy is part of the Warriors of Mary in some way. They have something to do with police. These guys are more interested in getting to him as a priest killer than in bringing him in to face charges. If that’s the case, they’re after him to kill him. Either that, or I’m full of shit and I’m nowhere outside the press releases we’re getting from Indiana Avenue.”

  “Well, you need to get on that angle but you need to get your cop friends to find out who’s sending you these presents. They know where you live. Why do you think this guy Peppers gave the book to you? You think he’s just nuts or did somebody tell him to find you?”

  “Who knows?” Dave was nervous and he tried to keep his fear from showing.

  “I need you to file three stories before you leave the building. We need to get back on top of this thing. Give me something in the two to three minute range on all of what we know or what you’ve been told by sources. Then I need two others in the minute range, one on Warriors of Mary and cop angle, the other on the Rosary and the book. Use whatever tape you can but I want everything we have on the air. We’ll get clearance on every station on the system and my guess is somebody out there will call you with something after they hear what you’ve got. And I want updates on this every damned day. If Captain O’Neil keeps jerking you around you can drop him as a source. My guess is he needs you more than you need him right now. Whoever’s doing this is making contact with you, not him. Now go.” Sid waved at the door.

  Gabriel was on the phone, as usual, using his polite voice to persuade the person on the other end to consent to a recorded interview. It sometimes required reassurance that the interviewee would “sound great” and would contribute to the story. Most people want to be on the radio or television but they worry that they won’t sound or look good, so a dose of reassurance and ego massage can get them to consent. Once the interview is over these same people will phone everyone they know to announce their forthcoming airtime. In this case, it was a local attorney who was happy to lend her talents and knowledge to a story about problems in the mortgage business. “Okay, I’m going to put you on hold. The next person you talk to will be Elena. She’ll be asking you a few questions for air. Thank you again .” He put the line on hold and pressed a button. “Elena, your phoner’s ready on line two.”

  “Elena?” Dave’s shocked expression amused Gabriel.

  “Guess who’s back.”

  “What’s she doing here? I thought she moved to New York.”

  “New York didn’t work out, I suppose. Maybe she just missed D.C.” Gabriel was trying to hide his smile. He and everyone else in the room had wondered how long it would take for Dave to notice she was back.

  “I’m so screwed. Things didn’t exactly end well.” In fact, things with Elena had ended in a shouting match over her decision to leave Washington. Dave had known where her buttons were and he pushed them all, reducing her first to tears and then to rage. His black eye had been an office joke for days.

  “Too much information, my boy. Whatever went on with you two is your business, not mine. I hear you’ll be filing a few stories for us today.”

  Dave went to a computer station and logged in. He pulled up the wires to kill some time while he got his thoughts together and was reading a story about a budget bill in Congress when his top-of-the-line message signal beeped. It was an in-house system of communicating between computers. This one had Elena’s name. “Fuck you!” it said.

  “Welcome back,” he responded.

  “Eat shit!”

  “You know they monitor these messages,” he replied.

  “Fuck you!”

  The fact that she swore like a man had always attracted him. He smiled at her messages and thought about provoking her to send more but he thought better of it and closed out her line. He opened a blank page on his computer and began to type the first of the stories he would file. He was a fast writer and within thirty minutes he had written all three reports. He did not use any sound because he had decided to call O’Neil “a source with knowledge of the investigation”, which allowed him to use the information he had on the tape without, technically, violating his agreement with the captain. He chose to ignore the implications of the Chicago station’s use of the recording.

  Elena was at a computer station editing the interview she had conducted with the lawyer. She wore headphones and ignored him when he walked past her to a booth to record his pieces. He was finished half an hour later, his pieces placed into the appropriate audio file for producers to access for the feeds to stations across the country. He had cut and edited in a few custom closes that used station call letters for the bigger outlets in cities like Chicago. Smaller stations would make do with the generic close, “Dave Haggard, Washington.” These reports would also be up on the Now News website.

  She was waiting for him when he left the booth. He opened the door and looked into her face and it took his breath away. Her black hair fell to her shoulders, her brilliant brown eyes glared at him. Her perfect skin was the color of copper and her Mayan heritage had given her a warrior goddess’s bearing. She stood like a stone in the door. Every face in the newsroom was turned their way.

  “Hi,” he said, feeling like a seventh grader at a dance.

  “You prick,” she whispered.

  “You’re giving me a hard on,” he said, hoping it was a joke.

  “You know where to stick it. Not one call? Not one goddam email? I’m in fucking New York and you don’t even say hi, how’s it going up there?”

  “You told me to fuck myself when you left! You said I was worse than dog shit and you never wanted to see me agai
n.”

  “You’re an asshole, you know that.” She turned to face the others in the room. “I want to make an announcement. Dave Haggard is an asshole.” She turned back to him. “We had a fight. You were supposed to come after me. What about that do you not get?”

  He looked at the faces looking back at him. “Okay, she’s right. I’m an asshole.” He leaned over and whispered, “Can we talk about this someplace else?”

  “Not yet.” She walked to her computer, sat down, and put on her earphones.

  He was supposed to go after her? Dave was confused in the way a six year old wonders why his parents are yelling at him. He thought he should say something but he had no idea what that might be, so he offered a weak smile to the faces looking up at him, grabbed his coat and left the newsroom. He went to a coffee shop and sat down, watching the well-dressed and busy professionals hurry by, wrapped against the cold. He and Elena had dated for nearly a year before the dustup over New York. She wanted something permanent and he wanted to be able to spend his time as he wished, chasing street stories and staying out all night. He had to admit to himself that she was the grownup in their relationship but that didn’t really change anything. He also had to admit that he loved her. Did he love her more than he loved the street? Was he ever going to grow up?