“This is AP Network News. I’m Frank Greshhold.”
Pace was at the dawn of consciousness, the half-sleeping, half-waking time when reality and dreams intermingle and the mind is at peace. He was aware he was in danger of losing the thread of a pleasant dream about Kathy and himself and a child he didn’t know playing with the wind on a catamaran in the middle of a body of water that could have been an ocean, or the Gulf of Mexico, perhaps. He fought to shut out the voice threatening to sever the fantasy.
He was lying on his left side, his head on one pillow and his right arm thrown over another, the covers creating the right degree of soft warmth in the air-conditioned bedroom. The effect was a sense of well-being he would not willingly relinquish. He thought he had fifteen minutes to listen absently to the world and national news. But the opening story smashed his reverie and left his dream as splintered as if the imagined catamaran had shipwrecked on a rocky shore.
“The New York Times reports today the crew of ConPac Flight 1117 apparently tried to take off using only its left engine after the engine under the right wing suffered catastrophic failure. The effort to get the crippled Sexton 811 into the air was doomed because whatever destroyed the right engine set off a chain reaction that also destroyed the right wing, something the crew could not have prevented, according to the Times. Although officials of the National Transportation Safety Board unofficially attributed the accident to a bird strike, the Times’ report raises new questions about the structural strength of commercial aviation’s newest aircraft. The Sexton Corporation had no immediate comment on the story, nor did the NTSB. The accident at Dulles International Airport northwest of Washington, D.C. last Thursday, killed 334 people, making it the worst in U.S. aviation history. More after this…”
Pace’s fist hit the off button as the first notes of a familiar jingle for a popular headache remedy drifted from the speaker. He stared at the radio in disbelief, his body shocked by a rush of adrenaline and awash in perspiration. He could feel disappointment knotted high in his stomach.
Justin Smith had passed him on a straightaway and taken the lead, with sources someplace deep inside the NTSB. He’d lost his advantage without even feeling anyone brush by him. How could that information be around the agency without Eddie Conklin knowing about it, and if he knew, why hadn’t Eddie alerted him, especially if he knew the Times had the story? Or was Eddie the Times’ source? Had he pushed Conklin so hard that he pushed him right into the Times’ arms? Or did the Times have a source inside the go-team? Elliott Parkhall, head of the power-plants group, or Vernon Lund? Pace had a dozen questions. He lacked even a single answer.
He sank back on his pillow. What had he missed? He hadn’t spent enough time talking to sources at Sexton or Converse. He’d alienated Cullen Ferguson when he should have been stroking him. He hadn’t cultivated enough sources on the go-team. Mike McGill couldn’t be everywhere. Eddie Conklin had invited him to call when things quieted down, and he hadn’t done it. It was one of the things he’d planned to do today. If he’d done it last night instead of going to dinner, instead of chasing some wild theory about a conspiracy, he might have been able to match the Times’ story. While a tie wasn’t as good as a win, it was a damned sight better than an outright loss.
“I blew it,” he said softly. “I totally fucking blew it.”
Pace could read his colleagues’ reactions in their body language when he walked into the newsroom at 9:15. He could feel them watch as he walked to his desk; he could see them glance up from their newspapers and look away as quickly. A few made eye contact, their expressions running the gamut from sympathy to accusation. Paul Wister’s back was turned. He believed Paul knew of his presence but deigned not to turn around.
Pace saw that someone had put a copy of the Times on his desk, the same edition he had bought on the way to work. Now he had redundant reminders of his failure. He tossed one of the papers aside and started reading the other. Justin Smith’s story was centered on the front page under a subdued two-column headline. Typical of the Times. It never shouted. The headline in the Chronicle would have been six columns, bold and black.
The intercom on Pace’s telephone beeped softly, but still he jumped.
“Pace.”
“Come in the office.” Schaeffer’s voice was soft and calm; Pace wondered at the editor’s control. He expected outrage, and he was prepared to accept it. A pound of flesh for an unforgivable error. It wouldn’t even the score, but it would close the gap.
As Pace passed Wister’s desk, the national editor rose to follow. Double-teamed. Double trouble.
Pace stopped inside Schaeffer’s office and allowed Wister to duck past him and sit in an occasional chair on the right side of the editor’s desk. The reporter took the sofa.
Schaeffer looked up from the newspapers on his desk. He had the Chronicle, the Post, and the Times. Pace wondered what the Post had written.
“What happened?” Schaeffer asked. Nice. Clean. No preliminaries. No trying to hide the reason for the meeting.
Pace cleared his throat and looked straight into his editor’s eyes. “I honestly don’t know, Avery. I talked to my source in Hangar Three as late as last night, and he didn’t say anything about this.”
“Would he, if he had known?” Schaeffer asked.
Pace was honest. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe he didn’t know,” Wister suggested. “The NTSB probably got onto this from data in the black boxes, and Smith’s source probably is inside the NTSB.” He turned to Pace. “I thought you knew somebody at the lab.”
“I do,” Pace acknowledged. “He was first on my list to talk to today.”
“A day late and a dollar short,” Wister snorted. His voice became hard. “The Times didn’t have this story in the first edition. That means one of two things: Either Smith didn’t get it until later, or they held it for later editions to prevent anyone else from catching up. I suspect the first and doubt the latter. You don’t hold an exclusive for a tactical advantage. That means the story developed late, and Smith was around to sweep it up. Where were you last night?”
Pace felt a hollow spot develop in his stomach.
How’s this sound? I was with a rookie suburban reporter and a cop, chasing unicorns.
He answered the question, and he pressed his story even as Wister tried to interrupt, determined to make them understand there was a police captain out there who was getting ominous vibrations about the car accident, too. During the telling, he saw Schaeffer listening intently. Wister kept shaking his head.
“Damn it, Pace, we told you to follow up on dead time,” Wister exploded. “Obviously, last night was not dead time!”
“I had no way of knowing that, Paul,” Pace insisted.
“Then you haven’t got the right sources,” Wister snapped.
Schaeffer finally stepped in. “Okay, we’re not going to get anywhere chewing each other to pieces. It’s plain that I’m not happy about being so far ahead and then losing the momentum, especially to an out-of-town newspaper.”
Involuntarily, Pace glanced at the Post on Schaeffer’s desk.
“The Post was beaten, too,” Schaeffer said, picking up on Pace’s glance.