Charm City

Athletic. Doesn't like pantyhose or diet soda. How am I doing?'

'Midwesterner,' she replied. 'Corn-fed Protestant, a onetime wunderkind who is still wunder, if no longer kind. Probably plays racquetball-note how he flexes his wrist and rubs his forearm as he speaks, something an athlete might do. How am I doing?'

Sterling laughed. Good, he had a sense of humor about himself. 'Close enough. Only my game is squash, when my back isn't out, and my wrist hurts because twenty-two years in this business have bestowed on me a chronic case of carpal tunnel.'

He began to massage his wrist again, then dropped his hand abruptly, suddenly self-conscious about the gesture. 'Midwesterner? Well, I guess Oak Park, Illinois, is about as Midwestern as it gets. How'd you figure that out? I like to think I've acquired some East Coast polish over the last few years.'

Tess smiled noncommittally. Whitney had given her thumbnail sketches of everyone she would meet today, but she saw no reason to divulge her inside information. ' Baltimore isn't the best place to come if you're looking for polish. In fact, if you're not careful, your nice, bland accent will start adding Rs to words like water and wash.'

Jack Sterling leaned toward her. His eyes were even bluer than the stripe in his shirt. 'Then what is Baltimore the best place for?' Before she could think of a clever reply, the other editors began filing into the room. A little guiltily, as if he had been caught consorting with the enemy, Sterling took his place among them.

They looked more alike than they knew, this quartet. All white. No one younger than 35, nor older than 60. Two suits-gray pinstripes on the shortest man, obviously the publisher, Randall Pfieffer IV, and a flashy turquoise one on the sole woman, managing editor Colleen Reganhart, who had the kind of dark hair-fair skin-light eyes combination that the Monaghan side of Tess's family would call black Irish.

The last man was dressed as Sterling was, but his blue-striped shirt was just a little better made, his red tie heavier and silkier.

'Lionel C. Mabry,' he said, offering a limp hand to Tess. The hair, of course. How could she miss the hair? It was thinner than Tess had imagined, and Whitney had been uncharacteristically tactful in describing it as blond, but it was definitely a mane. Mabry's hair was a dull gray-yellow, the color of diluted piss. Otherwise, he was well preserved, with a vaguely patrician air. But then, everything about him was vague-the mumbled greeting, the clouded brown eyes, the limp-wristed handshake.

'Take a seat, Lionel,' Colleen Reganhart ordered. She gave his name an extra syllable and feminine lilt. Li-o-nelle. He smiled at her, as if thankful for direction, and slipped into one of the large leather chairs alongside the table, Colleen to his left and Jack to his right. That left Tess and the publisher at either end, creating a strangely lopsided table.

Pfieffer's chair, she noticed, was hiked up slightly higher than the others, perhaps to give him an advantage he didn't have on dry land. Behind his back, Randall Pfieffer IV was known as Five-Four by his employees. The nickname, while not affectionate, was generous, granting the publisher two inches above what nature had given him, maybe three. But the thronelike chair was a miscalculation: his feet swung above the floor, drawing attention to his diminutive stature. Fortunately, his high, hoarse voice had no problem filling a room. He had been a cheerleader at Dartmouth, according to Whitney's dossier. ('If it comes up, say yell leader.')

He began the meeting. 'Miss Monaghan, we have asked you here today because we have a job that requires discretion, tact, and a certain sophistication about our business. We've been assured you have all these qualities.'

Whitney had really laid it on thick. 'I'd like to think so, Mr. Pfieffer.'

'I want to stress to you that as far as we're concerned, no crime has been committed here, no errors of fact have been made. We're distressed because we planned to run the Wynkowski piece on Sunday. The…unscheduled publication has forced us to scramble for another page one story on that date. It concerns us our procedures have been…bypassed, creating this dilemma.'

Thirty seconds into the discussion, and the first lie had already clocked in. 'Of course,' Tess agreed, adding from sheer perversity, 'Isn't computer tampering a federal crime? If you really want to find out who did this, I think the FBI is better equipped to solve your mystery.'

The editors exchanged glances. Jack Sterling began to speak, only to be cut off by Reganhart.

'As Randy said, we stand by the story, although we won't be surprised if that asshole Wynkowski files a lawsuit. Let me stress, he has no fucking grounds for a libel suit. No errors have been brought to our attention to date, and we think he meets the test for a public figure. He'd have to prove actual malice. Still, we prefer the general public not know the story ran by-ran early. It could erode readers' confidence in our product.'

Product. Colleen Reganhart had definitely gone over to the other side. When you were a reporter, it was a story, an article, your life's blood on the page. The higher you went in the organization, the more it resembled canned ham.

'Of course, if you called the FBI, or even the Baltimore police, you couldn't control what happened to the information they uncovered,' Tess said innocently, as if thinking out loud. 'If it got out the story ran by mistake- excuse me, that the story ran early-and there are any in accuracies in the story, Wink Wynkowski may be able to prove actual malice, which is essential to a public figure who wants to bring a libel suit. Certainly it would be an interesting test case, probably the first of its kind.'

Reganhart raised her eyebrows, dark, straight lines that made her look as if she were constantly frowning. 'Perhaps. Our lawyers tell us he could prove negligence in our security system. But that's all. We stand by our story. In fact, we're quite proud of having exposed this fucking charlatan.' With her raven black hair, bright blue suit, and salty tongue, she brought to mind the infamous mynah bird who had been removed from the Baltimore zoo for cursing out visitors.

'So why did you hold such a hot story to begin with?' Tess asked. 'I know you don't have any real competition, but I think you would want to run this story before Wynkowski signed a letter of intent with an out-of- town basketball team. It would have been heartbreaking to report that the city was getting a team, then announce the owner was never going to survive the NBA's scrutiny. And what if the city had gone ahead and started on the new arena, only to find out Wink was already entertaining offers for his team?'

Mabry seemed to come into focus for a second, like an autistic child enjoying a moment of clarity. 'News judgment is not a science, Miss Monaghan. Interests must be balanced. Men do outrun their pasts. It was not our role to judge Mr. Wynkowski's fitness as an NBA owner, or to shape the decision the league will make. We do not wish to be ‘players' in that sense. We had to ask ourselves, what is relevant? What is fair? Is it really necessary to reveal Mr. Wynkowski's unpleasant but largely trivial past? In the event we do so, shouldn't he have the right to know who his accusers are? That, most of all, was the real issue here. It is still the issue that concerns me.'

His piece said, Mabry retreated back into his private world. Pfieffer hadn't spoken since his opening remarks, but he was paying careful attention, watching the interplay among his top editors with great interest. Colleen glared at Lionel, while Jack Sterling doodled on a legal pad before him.

'So the story is fine and everyone lives happily after-except, obviously, Wink. What am I supposed to do?'

Again, Colleen Reganhart and Jack Sterling began speaking at the same time. Again she cut him off.

'Tomorrow, our assistant managing editors, Marvin Hailey and Guy Whitman, will walk you through the normal procedures here and give you a list of people to interview. We don't expect you to find the person responsible, but we assume you can eliminate the majority of the people who were in the building at the time.'

'Can't your security system at least narrow down who had left for the night?'

'Unfortunately, we put in a new security system last fall, after the old system was, um, breached. The new one breaks down all the time, and has been down for two weeks now, forcing us to prop open the doors with trash cans. But I'm sure you'll find most of our employees were home with their families the night this happened.' Reganhart made 'families' sound more profane than any of the expletives she had used. 'All we ask is that you interview all relevant newsroom employees, tape the conversations, then turn the tapes and transcripts over to us. Anything you discover is the property of the Beacon-Light. Your contract also will have a confidentiality clause, forbidding you to discuss this matter with other news organizations-or anyone else. Your information belongs to us.'

Tess wanted to ask about the movie rights, but thought better of it. 'Do you want me to work out of this