He waited another minute while she digested this, her eyes wide, calculating.
“You want to do the interview we should go to your office, not sit in a bar. Tape it, if you want. On the record. I’ve got some paperwork, too. So you won’t be nervous about using any of it. Do you want it? Part one?”
“Part one.”
“There’s more, but we don’t want to throw everything out there right away. It’s all page one, milk it. In fact, that’s part of the deal, you saying there’s more. Even more sensational. What Danny was doing beside feeding Minot. Exclusive from me. I’ll help you write it.”
“But you’re not going to tell me what it is.”
“I will.”
“How do I know?”
“Because I’m promising you. Or another story, just as big.”
“What?”
“A murder.”
“Yeah? Whose?”
“Mine.”
She blinked, then took up her glass. “Ha ha.”
“Don’t worry. I’m good for it. One or the other.”
“You’d better be. You hang me out to dry and I’ll kill you myself.”
“So we lose the Rosemary story?”
“There’s just one little problem with that. I gave it to Kelly. Not all of it, but enough to get him some space.”
“Then pull it back.”
“That doesn’t leave him with much.”
They met each other’s eyes, holding their glasses as if they were looking over cards.
“Dick Marshall and Liesl. Inside the romance. Pictures at her place, by the pool. Exclusive.”
She nodded slowly, still looking at him. “I remember that train. You’re a quick study.”
“It’s an easy place to read.”
“Yeah, I guess,” she said, finishing the drink. “Union Station. And now here we are at the Formosa. They all go that way, don’t they? All the stories here.”
“Not all of them,” Ben said.
Polly worked for the afternoon paper so Ben spent the morning waiting, trying to keep busy. When he started stacking papers and arranging them in piles he realized that all this methodical make-work was simply a pretense, putting things in order while his stomach jumped, restless with nerves. He checked the gun in the drawer. Somewhere, miles away, paper had streamed through inked drums and been baled, thrown onto trucks. They’d have to come now. How long before they wondered what else Ben would say?
Bunny was already at the gate when Ben went down to check on the afternoon delivery. He glanced up briefly from the paper, then went back reading, handing Ben another copy from the pile.
“The phone’s been ringing,” he said, an explanation.
Lasner had made the front page with the picture of Minot looming over him, but so had Polly, the left lead. MINOT DUPED BY RED INFORMER. STAFFER WORKED FOR COMMIES SAYS BROTHER. Two columns with a jump to page eight, the entire story Polly had filed, including the more to come.
Bunny read through to the end, then folded the page under his arm. “My, what a big tongue it has,” he said.
“Minot had it coming.”
Bunny looked at him. “Every time I think we understand each other-we don’t.” He turned, Ben following. “There’ll just be another one. Maybe worse. It’s not going to stop.”
“It will for a while.”
“At least you kept Liesl out of it. Family feeling?”
“It’s about Danny, not her.”
“She was married to him.” He paused. “If anybody remembers. I gather you promised Polly some pictures. She’s already been asking. I didn’t realize you were running Publicity now.”
“I had to offer her-”
Bunny waved his hand. “Save it. I’m going to move up the release date. Before anybody remembers. So a spread will come in handy. By the pool, wasn’t it?”
“The picture’s ready?”
“Just the prints. I can pull a booking at the Egyptian.”
“Not Rosemary’s.”
Bunny looked over. “No, not Rosemary’s. We haven’t booked that yet.”
“You can. There’s not going to be any trouble.”
“Is that what this is all about? The girlfriend? Not both of you. Double dunking? You don’t find that a little tawdry?”
“I just said-”
“Like one of those loops where they leave their socks on.”
Ben just looked, waiting.
“As a matter of fact, we haven’t booked it because we’re doing some retakes. I think we can fix it.”
“No other reason.”
“No other reason. Now that you’ve chased all the storm clouds away. What else are you going to do for us? Just so I’m ready.”
“Mr. Jenkins?” A secretary came up to them. “The union’s here. About the musicians.”
“Right there,” Bunny said.
“Musicians? I thought Continental didn’t do musicals.”
“We didn’t have Julie before. She’s good. And we signed her cheap. It’s worth a shot.” Already head of the studio.
“Sam’ll be happy.”
“Well, there’s that, too,” Bunny said, dismissive, moving away. He opened the paper again, then shook his head. “No more stunts? Please.”
“He lied to you.”
Bunny handed Ben the paper. “Everybody lies to me. Mr. L will be pleased anyway. Like a one-two punch team, aren’t you?” He looked up at him. “Fay said you saved his life.”
“She’s exaggerating. I was just there.”
“He’ll be grateful,” Bunny said, his voice flat.
Henderson turned up an hour later.
“Everywhere I look, what do I see?” he said, tossing the paper on Ben’s desk. “You all over the page.”
The paper had landed with the bottom half faceup. A picture Ben hadn’t noticed before, pushed below the fold by the Minot story: Kaltenbach at a press conference in Berlin, surrounded by men in bulky suits.
“I didn’t know you guys read the papers,” Ben said.
“You’ve got a mouth for brains, anybody ever tell you? Let’s take a walk.”
“You can give me the lecture right here. Don’t worry, there isn’t any more. The Bureau isn’t going to come into it. If that’s what-”
“Give me a preview. Tomorrow’s edition.”
“This is it.”
“That’s not what it says.”
“We don’t need any more. Once they see this, they’ll come running. Look how fast you got here.”
Henderson stared at him. Ben picked up the paper, scanning the Kaltenbach piece.
“So he made it.”
“You didn’t see it? He denounced Ostermann. A real German would come back, build a new Germany. Ostermann’s a ‘cosmopolitan.’ Not even a German anymore.”
“They made him say it.”
“They’ll make him say a lot of things. Drove himself to Mexico. Funny, isn’t it, since he couldn’t drive.”
“Couldn’t he? Who told you that? Danny?”
Henderson motioned his head toward the door. “Show me the lot.”
Ben took him past the sound stages to the New York street, empty today, the brownstone fronts as silent as a ghost town.
“You’re trying to get yourself killed,” Henderson said.
“That was the idea, wasn’t it?”
“The idea was to find your brother’s mailman. Make him come after the list. Not after you.”
“When did you get all protective? They’ve already tried once. We both knew how this was going to work.”
“Not by going to the papers.”
“What are you worried about? That I’m going to embarrass the Bureau? Give away state secrets?”
“What state secrets.”
“That’s right. There is no list.”
“It’s classified,” Henderson said evenly. “It has to stay that way.”
“It will. You think I’d tell Polly? I’m that crazy?”