“Weinstein,” another one snorted. “Thinks he’s a radical because he wears work shirts and curses capitalism.”
“Yeah,” another agreed. “I was in his class on ‘Big Business and Big Labor.’ He felt the major battle against oppression had been won when Ford lost the battle with the UAW in the forties. If you tried to talk about how women have been excluded not just from big business but from the unions as well, he said that didn’t indicate oppression, merely a reflection of the current social mores.”
“That argument justifies all oppression,” a plump woman with short curling hair put in. “Hell, the Stalin labor camps reflected Soviet mores of the 1930s. Not to mention Scheransky’s exile with hard labor.”
Thin, dark Mary, the older woman who’d been with Gail at the coffee shop on Friday, tried to call the group to order. “We don’t have a program tonight,” she said. “In the summer our attendance is too low to justify a speaker. But why don’t we get in a circle on the floor so that we can have a group discussion.” She was smoking, sucking in her cheeks with her intense inhaling. I had a feeling she was eyeing me suspiciously, but that may have just been my own nerves.
I obediently took a spot on the floor, drawing my legs up in front of me. My calf muscles were sensitive. The other women straggled over, getting cups of evil-looking coffee as they came. I’d taken one look at the overboiled brew on my way in and decided it wasn’t necessary to drink it to prove I was one of the group.
When all but two were seated, Mary suggested we go around the circle and introduce ourselves. “There are a couple of new people here tonight,” she said. “I’m Mary Annasdaughter.” She turned to the woman on her right, the one who’d protested women’s exclusion from big unions. When they got to me, I said, “I’m V. I. Warshawski. Most people call me Vic.”
When they’d finished, one said curiously, “Do you go by your initials or is Vic your real name?”
“It’s a nickname,” I said. “I usually use my initials. I started out my working life as a lawyer, and I found it was harder for male colleagues and opponents to patronize me if they didn’t know my first name.”
“Good point,” Mary said, taking the meeting back. “Tonight I’d like to see what we can do to support the ERA booth at the Illinois State Fair. The state NOW group usually has a booth where they distribute literature. This year they want to do something more elaborate, have a slide show, and they need more people. Someone who can go down to Springfield for one or more days the week of August fourth to tenth to staff the booth and the slide show.”
“Are they sending a car down?” the plump, curly-haired one asked.
“I expect the transportation will depend on how many people volunteer. I thought I might go. If some of the rest of you want to, we could all take the bus together-it’s not that long a ride.”
“Where would we stay?” someone wanted to know.
“I plan to camp out,” Mary said. “But you can probably find some NOW people to share a hotel room with. I can check back at the headquarters.”
“I kind of hate doing anything with NOW,” a rosy-cheeked woman with waist-long hair said. She was wearing a T-shirt and bib overalls; she had the face of a peaceful Victorian matron.
“Why, Annette?” Gail asked.
“They ignore the real issues-women’s social position, inequities of marriage, divorce, child care-and go screwing around supporting establishment politicians. They’ll support a candidate who does one measly little thing for child care, and overlook the fact that he doesn’t have any women on his staff, and that his wife is a plastic mannequin sitting at home supporting his career.”
“Well, you’re never going to have social justice until you get some basic political and economic inequalities solved,” a stocky woman, whose name I thought was Ruth, said. “And political problems can be grappled with. You can’t go around trying to uproot the fundamental oppression between men and women without some tool to dig with: laws represent that tool.”
This was an old argument; it went back to the start of radical feminism in the late sixties: Do you concentrate on equal pay and equal legal rights, or do you go off and try to convert the whole society to a new set of sexual values? Mary let the tide roll in for ten minutes. Then she rapped the floor with her knuckles.
“I’m not asking for a consensus on NOW, or even on the ERA,” she said. “I just want a head count of those who’d like to go to Springfield.”
Gail volunteered first, predictably, and Ruth. The two who’d been dissecting Weinstein’s politics also agreed to go.
“What about you, Vic?” Mary said.
“Thanks, but no,” I said.
“Why don’t you tell us why you’re really here,” Mary said in a steely voice. “You may be an old UC student, but no one stops by a rap group on Tuesday night just to check out politics on the old campus.”
“They don’t change that much, but you’re right: I came here because I’m trying to find Anita McGraw. I don’t know anyone here well, but I know this is a group she was close to, and I’m hoping that someone here can tell me where she is.”
“In that case, you can get out,” Mary said angrily. The group silently closed against me; I could feel their hostility like a physical force. “We’ve all had the police on us-now I guess they thought a woman pig could infiltrate this meeting and worm Anita’s address out of one of us-assuming we had it to worm. I don’t know it myself-I don’t know if anyone in here knows it-but you pigs just can’t give up, can you? ”
I didn’t move. “I’m not with the police, and I’m not a reporter. Do you think the police want to find Anita so that they can lay Peter Thayer’s death on her? ”
“Of course,” Mary snorted. “they’ve been poking around trying to find if Peter slept around and Anita was jealous or if he’d made a will leaving her money. Well, I’m sorry-you can go back and tell them that they just cannot get away with that.”
“I’d like to present an alternative scenario,” I said.
“Screw yourself,” Mary said. “We’re not interested. Now get out.”
“Not until you’ve listened to me.”
“Do you want me to throw her out, Mary?” Annette asked.
“You can try,” I said. “But it’ll just make you madder if I hurt one of you, and I’m still not going to leave until you’ve listened to what I have to say.”
“All right,” Mary said angrily. She took out her watch. “You can have five minutes. Then Annette throws you out.”
“Thank you. My tale is short: I can embellish it later if you have questions.
“Yesterday morning, John Thayer, Peter’s father, was gunned down in front of his home. The police presume, but cannot prove, that this was the work of a hired killer known to them. It is my belief, not shared by the police, that this same killer shot Peter Thayer last Monday.
“Now, why was Peter shot? The answer is that he knew something that was potentially damaging to a very powerful and very corrupt labor leader. I don’t know what he knew, but I assume it had something to do with illegal financial transactions. It is further possible that his father was a party to these transactions, as was the man Peter worked for.”
I stretched my legs out and leaned back on my hands. No one spoke. “These are all assumptions. I have no proof at the moment that could be used in court, but I have the proof that comes from watching human relationships and reactions. If I am correct in my assumptions, then I believe Anita McGraw’s life is in serious danger. The overwhelming probability is that Peter Thayer shared with her the secret that got him killed, and that when she came home last Monday evening to find his dead body, she panicked and ran. But as long as she is alive, and in lonely possession of this secret-whatever it is-then the men who have killed twice to protect it will not care about killing her as well.”
“You know a lot about it,” Ruth said, “How do you happen to be involved if you’re not a reporter and not a cop?”
“I’m a private investigator,” I said levelly. “At the moment my client is a fourteen-year-old girl who saw her father murdered and is very frightened.”
Mary was still angry. “You’re still a cop, then. It doesn’t make any difference who is paying your salary.”
“You’re wrong,” I said. “It makes an enormous difference. I’m the only person I take orders from, not a hierarchy of officers, aldermen, and commissioners.”
“What kind of proof do you have?” Ruth asked.
