I had to laugh. ‘How about Lakshmi Singh?’ I added, ‘Or, what’s her name, the NPR business reporter, Snick Paprikash.’
Paul snorted. ‘You mean Snigdha Prakash.’
‘Her, too. Or Ofeibea Quist-Arcton.’
‘Simple always worked for Larry King,’ Paul mused.
I raised an index finger. ‘Ah, but King’s real name is Lawrence Harvey Zeiger.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘I am a font of all wisdom,’ I said, hooking a thumb in the direction of my iPhone.
‘Squiggles,’ Paul repeated with amusement. ‘Men have been hung on less evidence.’
‘Well, I’m not planning on hanging Mr Chandler,’ I said. ‘I have no interest whatsoever in the man’s sex life.’ I paused.
‘Do I hear a “but?”’
‘But, if Chandler can tell me where I can find Lilith Chaloux, no questions asked, I’d be really grateful, and I think she would, too.’ I reached out for Paul’s hand. ‘If these were your letters to me, I’d certainly want them back, bad poetry and all.’
Paul squeezed my hand. ‘Roses are red, Violets are blue, If I had some chocolate, I’d give it to you. How’s that?’
‘Thank you, Mr Longfellow!’ I kissed him on the forehead. ‘Tomorrow, I’ll just take a ride into DC and pay a call on Lynx News.’
I shot my husband an anxious glance, hoping that since my little New York adventure had gone off without a hitch, he’d not pout and get all stroppy with me about a short hop, into the District of Columbia.
Paul squinched up his face. ‘On the Metro?’
I pulled the duvet up to my chin. ‘No, I’ve temporarily retired my SmartTrip card. I don’t think I’m ready for the Metro yet. Not tomorrow, not the next day, maybe never.’
‘Just be careful.’ Paul searched out my hand under the covers and gave it a squeeze.
‘I always am.’
The next morning, I was sitting at the computer in our basement office working on my second cup of coffee when Paul staggered down from the kitchen, rubbing sleep out of his eyes. ‘You’re up early.’
‘I couldn’t sleep, so I decided to do a little snooping around on the Internet.’ I handed him my empty mug. ‘Fetch me more coffee, pretty please, and I’ll tell you all about it.’
Paul returned several minutes later bearing mugs of steaming coffee, pulled up his office chair and sat down on it.
‘Look what I found in the photo archives at Time magazine,’ I said after he’d gotten settled. I handed him a printout hot off the printer. ‘The photo’s credited to Annie Leibovitz and is captioned “Jann S. Wenner and Hunter S. Thompson at a Rolling Stone party held for the Jimmy Carter campaign staff, New York, 1976.” The same picture shows up on Jann Wenner’s webpage,’ I added, ‘but it’s been cropped.’
‘I know who Hunter Thompson is – that gonzo reporter – but who the heck is Jann Wenner?’ Paul asked.
‘How soon you forget. 1967? The Summer of Love? Rolling Stone magazine?
Paul still looked puzzled.
‘Wenner founded Rolling Stone.’
‘I knew that,’ Paul said, with a grin that told me that he hadn’t a clue.
‘Anyway. Check out this larger version of the photo. Who is that, there, in the background?’ I tapped the image.
Way in the background, her face turned slightly away from the camera, was a young woman with her hair cut in a Dorothy Hamill-style wedge, whose profile looked very much like Lilith. She held a wine glass aloft, as if toasting someone outside the frame.
‘Looks like Lilith Chaloux.’
‘I’m almost positive it’s Lilith. And who is that standing next to her, that long-haired guy, looks a bit like John Lennon, cupping a cigarette like it’s a joint?’
Paul leaned forward, squinting. ‘Could be a joint.’
I bopped him on lightly on the head. ‘Be serious.’
‘Looks like the guy in those other pictures – Zan,’ Paul admitted.
‘Yes indeedy-do. And I found another picture, too, in the photo archives of the Jimmy Carter Library and Museum.’
‘My, my, you do get around, Mrs Ives. And still in your pajamas, too.’
I ignored the jab and passed Paul a streaky, monochromatic printout. ‘It’s a photo of Zan standing in front of a green and white Carter/Mondale “Leaders for a Change” poster, wearing a chocolate brown “Gimme Jimmy 76” T-shirt. Or it would be if your stupid printer hadn’t run out of magenta toner.’
Paul handed the printout back. ‘Interesting, but what does this tell you that you don’t already know?’
‘What I said last night? That was all conjecture, speculation based on Zan’s letters, Chandler’s bio and a handful of pictures. Reading those letters is like wandering around Planet Zan in a spacesuit, Paul. I often found myself wondering what was real and what wasn’t. But here it is!’ I waved a hand at the screen. ‘Independent confirmation. And if you can’t believe Rolling Stone, who can you believe?’
‘Zan himself?’
‘Stay tuned for the next exciting episode – A Man, A Plan, A Canal, Panama. Or, I’m dreaming of a wide isthmus,’ I said, quoting either Rocket J. Squirrel or Bullwinkle the Moose. ‘And speaking of iconic cartoon characters, if I don’t want to greet John Chandler while wearing PJs, I better get cracking.’
THIRTEEN
I may have been OK with Amtrak, but the thought of stepping on another Metro train at New Carrollton made my stomach heave. Even though it was raining cats and dogs, I let New Carrollton fade in my rear-view mirror and, with windshield wipers set to frantic, drove all the way into Washington, DC. I parked in the garage at Union Station, retrieved my umbrella from the trunk and hustled through the rain the few short blocks to the Lynx News headquarters building at New Jersey Avenue and C Street, NW.
At the information desk in the ultra-modern lobby, I shook out my umbrella, propped it up in the corner with several others to dry, and asked to see John Chandler.
‘Do you have an appointment?’
‘No, but tell him it’s important. I have a story for him.’
‘And your name is?’
I told her.
The receptionist looked me up and down, as if checking for explosives. I must have passed muster, because she picked up the phone and punched in a few numbers. Speaking softly, so that I could barely hear her, she said, ‘There’s a Hannah Ives here, asking to see Mr Chandler.’ After a moment, she nodded, hung up, and said, ‘Sign in here.’
After I showed her my driver’s license and entered my name in her logbook, she gave me a visitor’s badge and demonstrated how to clip it to my jacket. ‘Someone will be right down.’
I was adjusting my badge when an elevator dinged and a fresh-faced young man sporting a layered do with fashionably shaggy bangs emerged, dressed in khakis, a pale blue tie and a white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up. ‘Hannah Ives?’
‘Yes.’ I shook his hand.
‘I’m Jud Wilson. I work for Mr Chandler. Let me take you somewhere where we can talk.’
Jud and I rode the elevator up to the sixth floor where he led me on a circuitous route through a maze of eye-level, fabric-covered office cubicles, eventually escorting me into a small, glass-enclosed conference room. Scrawled in a rainbow of colored markers on a whiteboard mounted on the wall were odd notations connected by dotted lines, circles and arrows. Perhaps they’d been discussing football plays at an earlier meeting.
‘Can I get you some coffee? Tea?’
When I declined, Jud indicated a chair at the head of the table. He sat down kitty-corner from me, folded his hands and leaned forward, preparing to do triage. Is this woman worthy to speak to the great John Chandler?
‘So, you said you have a story for Mr Chandler.’