“So what brings you to Ms. O’Connor’s neighborhood?”
“Have you heard from Sally lately?”
“Incaveria?” Pace nodded. “I heard from her yesterday,” O’Connor responded. “We talked about a story she’s been hammering.”
“Did she say anything about the fatal on 193?”
“No. Is there something new to say?”
Pace gave her a quick synopsis of his conversation with Clay Helm that morning, and the suburban editor whistled.
“That’s something. God, what a story! Are you going with that tomorrow?”
“I hope so.”
“What do the D.C. cops say?”
“I haven’t called them yet.”
“So what can I do?”
“I’m going to ask for a double byline. Sally should share the credit.”
O’Connor smiled and shook her head. “That’s nice of you, Steve, but you’ll have to send flowers or candy. I can’t let her anywhere near that story.”
“Why not? You were hot for her to have a piece of it a couple weeks ago.”
“Things change. This week she happens to be engaged to that state police captain, which would make any involvement in this story a conflict of interest. Our policy is clear.”
“Engaged?” Pace was dumbfounded. “She’s only known the guy three weeks.”
“I guess he swept her off her feet.”
“Or vice versa. She could do that to a man.”
“So she could.”
“It’s strange Clay didn’t mention it this morning. After all, I’m the one responsible for their chance to get acquainted socially.”
“Well, it’s usually up to the lady to announce an engagement, isn’t it?”
“How the hell would I know, Suze?”
She thumped a finger in his chest. “Maybe you should find out. Information like that could come in handy someday.”
Pace stared at her for a moment. “From your mouth to God’s ear, Ms. O’Connor.”
“Oh?” The editor looked interested. “Somebody I know?”
“No,” Pace said, subdued. “Sometimes I’m not even sure I know her.” He got up and walked away, humming the refrain from Doc Watson’s “Life Gets Tee-jus, Don’t It?” Yeah, Doc, it do.
Wister was just sitting down when Pace popped back into the newsroom.
“Well, you’re certainly feeling your oats this morning, running up the stairs,” Wister joked. “A man of your age should think about getting into exercise slowly. Or is this what a banner headline out front will do to your spirit?”
“It helps,” Pace laughed. “Listen, if you think today was good—”
They were interrupted by Wister’s telephone. Wister motioned Pace to wait.
“Really?” Wister said after listening to the caller for about half a minute. “No kidding? What do you make of it?” He gestured to Pace to sit down in the chair next to his desk. “He’s right here. We were chatting when you called… I don’t know, but I’ll ask him to wait until you get in… okay, Avery.”
When Wister hung up, he was shaking his head. “Incredible,” he said. “Absolutely incredible.” He turned to Pace. “Avery got a call early this morning from Harold Marshall, who was bent totally out of shape, almost incoherent. He was ranting about your story, and then he tried to hype Avery on the idea Ken Sachs opened the new investigation because he has a personal interest in seeing Converse bankrupted.”
“Like what?” Pace asked.
“According to Marshall, Sachs did some lucrative work for MacPhearson-Paige.”
Pace nodded. “I think he did do some work for M-P after he left United, but M-P was only one of his clients. He had a very nice business as a rep for clients who had dealings with U.S. Government agencies and overseas.”
“He did work overseas?”
“For his consulting business, yes.”
“Was he registered as a foreign agent?”
“Oh, yeah. That was the first thing I checked when his appointment was announced. His filings were never even late. He did everything by the book, and as far as anybody knows, including a friend of mine at the Justice Department, there’s never been a hint he abused or misused the regulations.”
“Squeaky clean, huh?”
“To the extent anybody is ever totally clean, I’d say yes. Hell, when Mike and I were debating whether we could trust anybody at the NTSB, Mike said the one guy he’d stake his life on was Sachs.”
“But after Mike was killed, your first instinct was that Sachs was responsible.”
“I was wrong.”
“So now you’re convinced Sachs is okay?”
“It took some pretty convincing proof to get him to reconsider the bird-strike theory. If he wanted to do something to hurt Converse, he’d have done it long before.”
Wister pursed his lips. “I hope you’re right. You’re riding a very fast horse here, Steve. I’d like to see it out front at the finish.”
Schaeffer, Wister, and Pace talked well into the morning, going over facts, probabilities, and suspicions. It was like trying to put together a jigsaw-puzzle picture of a blue sky. All the pieces looked the same, with only slight gradations in shade.
“Sum it up, Steve,” Schaeffer said at last. “What have we got?”
“We have three distinct story lines: the rigged investigation, the three murders, and the mystery of where Harold Marshall fits into it, if anywhere. It still could turn out he’s only trying to come to the aid of a beleaguered constituent.”
“I agree,” said Wister. “And I think we’ll stay out of trouble here if we don’t strain to connect the dots. Let each story play itself out. We’ve got the sources wired. Except for what the NTSB, the Justice Department, or the police choose to confirm officially, I don’t see how we can be bested on this one.”
“Are you satisfied about Ken Sachs and the MacPhearson-Paige thing?” Schaeffer asked his national editor.
Wister nodded. “I think Steve is right on that score. Unless somebody can show us concrete proof Sachs acted inappropriately on behalf of his client, it stinks like an old fish. I think Marshall laid it out there as a smoke screen.”
“I want us absolutely certain of that,” Schaeffer said. “I don’t want to determine it isn’t true simply because we don’t want it to be true.”
“I’ll go back over it,” Pace said. “I think I covered all that ground, but you never know. I could have missed something.”
“For one thing,” Wister suggested, “you should call Marshall and ask him what prompted his call to Avery this morning. That would do two things. It would show Marshall we’re not working only one side of the street, we’re interested in the whole story. It could also give you a feeling for whether he’s got something or he’s bluffing.”
“I think we should do all that, but—”
Schaeffer was interrupted by a knock on his doorjamb. It was Alec Stenofsky, the managing editor. “Sorry to interrupt, folks, but I thought you’d like to see this.”
He handed Schaeffer two sheets of computer paper that appeared to carry the printout of a wire story. “Thanks, John,” said Schaeffer, glancing at it. “Good Lord.”
Wister and Pace waited expectantly. Schaeffer finished reading and handed the pages to Wister and offered a synopsis to Pace.
“Converse is making Marshall’s allegations public and official,” he said. “They issued a statement in Youngstown suggesting the NTSB fabricated the evidence against a bird strike to damage Converse and seed the fortunes of Ken Sachs, former consultant to MacPhearson-Paige.”
“That’s libel,” Pace said.
“Could be,” Schaeffer agreed. “They’re demanding Sachs step aside immediately, and they’re asking the President to fire him if he refuses. They’ve also asked for an immediate congressional investigation, and they quote Marshall as saying he will personally lead the inquiry by the Senate Transportation Committee.”