Hard News

  "Some countries you do. Some all you need is a birth certificate."

  "How would I tell?"

  "Maybe what you could do is buy a guidebook. There's a bookstore up the street. You make a right at the corner and it's right there."

  "Now there's an idea."

  "You might want to think about Hawaii. They got beaches there that're just as nice as the Islands."

  "Hawaii." Boggs nodded. That was a good thought. He could just buy a ticket and go and sit on the beach for as long as he wanted.

  "Find out what those tickets cost, wouldya?"

  As she typed information into her computer he hesitated for a moment then quickly asked, "You be interested in having dinner with me?"

  She blushed and consulted her computer terminal. Immediately he wanted to retract his words. He'd stepped over some line, something that people on the Outside-- people who stay in Hyatt hotels and buy airline tickets-- instinctively knew not to do.

  She looked up shyly. "The thing is, I sort of have a boyfriend."

  "Sure, yeah." He was as red as a schoolboy's back in August. "I'm sorry."

  She seemed startled by his apology. Then she smiled. "Hey, nothing's harmed. Nobody ever died from being asked out." As she looked back to her terminal Randy Boggs thought, This being out in the real world ... it's going to take a little time to get used to.

  SAM HEALY, SITTING ON HIS COUCH, LOOKED OVER HIS lawn as he hung up from the phone call that had delivered the terrible news. He told himself to stand up but his legs didn't respond. He stayed where he was and watched Courtney playing with a set of plastic blocks. He took a deep breath. When Healy was a kid blocks were made of varnished hardwood and they came in a heavy corrugated cardboard box. The ones the little girl was making a castle out of were made of something like Styrofoam. They came in a big clear plastic jar.

  Castles. What else would Rune's child build?

  Magic castles.

  Sam Healy stared at the colored squares and circles and columns, wondering not so much about the toys of his childhood as about the human capacity for violence.

  People'd think a Bomb Squad detective would have a pretty tough skin when it came to things like shootings. Hell, especially in the NYPD, the constabulary for a city with close to two thousand homicides a year. But, Healy'd be fast to tell them, it wasn't so. One thing about bombs: You dealt with mechanics, not with people. Mostly the work was render-safe procedures or postblast investigations and by the time you got called in the victims were long gone and the next of kin notified by somebody else.

  But he wasn't on the job now and he could no longer avoid what he had to do.

  He stood up and heard a pop in his shoulder--a familiar reminder of a black-powder pipe bomb he'd gotten a little intimate with a couple of years back. He paused, glancing at the little girl again, and walked to the TV. Some old Western was playing. Bad color, bad acting. He shut off the set.

  "Hey, that dude was about to draw on three bad guys. Sam, you're a cop. You should watch this stuff. It's like continuing education for you."

  He sat down on the ratty green couch and took Rune's hand.

  She said, "Oh-oh, what's this? The-wife's-coming-back-to-roost speech? I can deal with it, Sam."

  He glanced into the living room to check on Courtney. After he saw she was contentedly playing he kept his eyes turned away as he said, "I got a call from the ops coordinator at the Sixth Precinct. It seems there was a shooting on the pier where your boat was docked."

  "Shooting?"

  "A girl about your age. Shot twice. Her name was Claire Weisman."

  "Claire came back?" Rune asked in a whisper. "Oh, my God, no. Is she dead?" Rune's eyes were on Courtney.

  "Critical condition. St. Vincent's."

  "Oh, God." Rune was crying softly. Then, her voice fading, she said, "Somebody thought it was me, didn't they?"

  "There are no suspects."

  She said, "You know who did it, don't you?"

  "Boggs and the other guy, the fat one. Jack Nestor."

  "It has to be them. They came back to kill me." Her eyes were red and miserable. "I--" Her hands closed on her mouth. "I never thought Claire'd come back." Rune's gaze settled on Courtney.

  Healy held her then said, "I'll call it in to the detectives. About Boggs and Nestor. For a shooting they'll do a citywide search."

  "Please," she whispered, "please, please ..."

  "Claire's mother's on her way. She's flying down from Boston."

  "I've got to go see her."

  "Come on, I'll drive you there."

  "I'M SO SORRY," RUNE SAID.

  The woman must've been in her early fifties. She didn't know how to respond to the grief and did the only thing she could think of--put her arm around Rune's shoulders and told her that they all had to be brave.

  Claire's mother was heavy, wearing a concealing blue-satin dress. Her hair was a mix of pure black strands and pure white, which made it look disorganized even though it was sprayed perfectly into place. She held what Rune thought was a crushed bouquet but what turned out to be a thin white handkerchief, the kind Rune's grandmother called a hankie.

  Rune looked at the bed. It was hard to see Claire. The lights were very dim, as if the doctors were afraid that too much brightness would give her life a chance to get away. Rune leaned forward. Claire's left shoulder and arm were in a huge cast, and the left side of her face was a mass of bandages. There were tubes in her nose and several others led from a dressing on her neck into jars on the floor. A monitor above her head gave its alarming messages about heartbeats or pulses or breaths or who knew what. The lines were erratic. Rune wished the monitor faced the other way.

  Mrs. Weisman kept her eyes on her daughter and said, "Where's Courtney? Claire said she was staying with you."

  "I left her with the nurse outside. I didn't think it was a good idea for her to see Claire like this."

  There was the dense silence of two people who have nothing in common except grief.

  After a few minutes Rune asked, "Do you have a place to stay?"

  The woman wasn't listening. She stared at Claire then a moment later asked Rune, "Do you have any children?"

  "Other than Courtney, no."

  Mrs. Weisman turned her head toward Rune at this answer. "Did you tell her anything? Courtney, I mean. About what happened."

  "I said her mommy was sick and she was going to see her grandmother. She's okay. But she should get some sleep pretty soon."

  Mrs. Weisman said, "I'll keep her with me."

  Rune hesitated. "Sure."

  "Does she have her things with her?"

  The clothes I bought, she's got. The toys I gave her. Rune said, "Claire didn't leave her with much."

  Mrs. Weisman didn't respond.

  Rune said, "I've got some things to do. Could you call me if she wakes up?" She wrote Sam Healy's name, address and phone number on the back of a restaurant receipt she'd found in her purse. "I'm staying here for a while."

  She nodded and Rune wondered if she was hearing the words.

  "Who'd do such a thing?" Mrs. Weisman asked vacantly. "A robber? Claire didn't look like the kind of girl who'd have a lot of money. Do you think it was like what you hear about in California? You know, where they shoot people on the highway just for the fun of it?" She shook her head as if the answer didn't make any difference.

  "I don't know," Rune said. Her mother would find out soon enough what happened. No sense in long explanations now.

  But there was something Rune wanted to add. She wanted so badly to turn to this poor woman and tell her exactly what she was thinking right now. Which was that she didn't give a shit about the news story anymore, she didn't give a shit about the Lance Hopper murder. She cared about one thing, and that only: finding the two of them--Randy Boggs and his fat friend, Jack.

  She'd get into the Network somehow--Bradford would help her--and steal her tapes and notes, get all the details on where Randy'd lived over the past ten years, where h
e liked to go, what he hoped to do in the future. Somewhere in that material would probably be a clue as to where he was running to right now. She'd find him and Jack and make sure they both went to Harrison prison.

  But then, when it occurred to her that Claire might die and her mother would take Courtney back to Boston, she thought she might not turn them over to the police at all.

  She'd kill them herself.

  chapter 30

  BRADFORD SIMPSON WAS UNEASY.

  "The word is Piper wants you drawn and eighthed. Quartered isn't good enough."

  "Look, I just need to get into the newsroom."

  "If I were you I wouldn't be in the same city as Piper Sutton," the young preppy said. "The same building is a very, very bad idea. Very bad."

  They were at Kelly's, a bar on the southern end of Columbus Avenue, around the corner from the Network. The shabby place couldn't make up its mind whether it wanted to be the home base for yuppies who traded insider information or for IRA sympathizers who argued politics.

  Rune ordered Bradford another martini, a reporter's drink. And one calculated to make him agreeable. She asked him again to get her inside the Network and appended a heartfelt "Please."

  "What for? Tell me what for."

  "I can't. It's just really, really important."

  "Give me a clue." He speared the olive expertly. Connecticutians are good with martinis.

  "You know, that might not be the best question to ask. I don't think you really want to know."

  "Now that's an honest response. I don't like it but it's an honest response."

  "What's the worst that could happen?" she asked.

  "I could get fired, arrested and sent to jail on Rikers Island."

  "If anybody asks I'll tell them I snuck in. I promise. I wouldn't jeopardize your career. I know what it means to you. Please, help me out. Just this once."

  "You're very persuasive," he said.

  "I haven't even started trying yet."

  He looked at his watch. "What am I supposed to do?"

  "Nothing serious."

  "Just distract the guard while you slip in?"

  "No, it's a lot easier than that. All you've got to do is deactivate the alarm on the fire door downstairs, open it up and let me in. Piece of cake."

  "Oh, Christ." The young man looked worried sick at this assignment. He poured down the last slug of martini. "And look at it this way," Rune said. "If you do get arrested and sent to Rikers Island you'll be able to do a great expose on what life's like in prison. What an opportunity."

  IT DIDN'T GO QUITE THE WAY SHE'D PLANNED IT.

  She got in okay, thanks to Bradford. She even managed to get to her old desk unseen.

  The problem was that someone had beat her there.

  Everything about Boggs was gone.

  Rune went through every drawer, every shelf of her credenza, every wadded-up Lamston's and Macy's bag under the desk. But there was zip about Randy Boggs. All the files, the background tapes, the notes--gone.

  Who'd done it? she wondered.

  Rune sat at the desk until six P.M., when the first live Network newscast began. Everyone's attention was on the far side of the studio and not a soul noticed Rune walk up to a gaffer, a heavyset man in jeans and a white striped shirt. He wore a Mets cap. He was sipping coffee from a cardboard cup, watching the attractive Asian anchor-woman deliver a story about the mayor's press conference.

  "Hey, Rune," he said, then looked back to the set. "Welcome back."

  "Danny, I need some help," she said.

  "Help?" he asked.

  "You're on set here every day, right?"

  "Yep. Working overtime to buy my boat."

  "Somebody went through my desk recently. You see who it was, by any chance?"

  He sipped more coffee, avoiding her eyes. "I'm off shift."

  "Danny."

  "Thought you were fired."

  "I am. But I need your help. Please."

  He stared at the newscaster, whose short-cut hair shone under the lights like a blue-black jewel. He sighed. "I saw."

  "Who was it?"

  "Oh, brother ..."

  RANDY BOGGS HADN'T BEEN ON AN AIRPLANE IN YEARS but he was surprised to find that they hadn't changed much. Seemed there were more men flight attendants and it seemed the food was better (though maybe that was just because of what he'd been eating off metal trays for the past thirty-three months, fifteen days).

  He remembered what the United Airlines clerk who'd sold him this ticket had said about no one ever dying from getting asked out and he kept up that attitude on the plane, practicing a bit of flirting with the female flight attendants.

  He'd dozed and had had a dream that he couldn't remember now and then the weather got rough and the seat belt sign came on. He didn't mind flying but he hated the insides of airplanes. For one thing, the dry, close air bothered him. But they also cheated you. Here you were moving at five hundred miles an hour! But what did the airlines do but try their best to fool you into thinking you were in a restaurant and movie theater. Randy Boggs wanted the planes to have picture windows. Man, what a thrill: seeing the clouds go past like they were trees on the interstate!

  Thinking too about his hundred ten thousand dollars. His nest egg. What his father called a "stake" (Randy used to think the old man meant "steak"). And now that he had one he was going to do something with it. Something real smart.

  Boggs wondered if he should invest the money in a clothing store in Hawaii. He'd really enjoyed going into that place in Atlanta. He liked the smell--he figured it was aftershave--and he liked the even rows of clothes on the chrome racks. He liked the way the men who worked there stood with their arms folded in front of the shiny counters. If it was slow you could wander outside into the forever warm weather and have a cigarette while you paced the sidewalk under palm trees. He wondered how much it would cost to open a clothing store in Hawaii.

  Buying a store. That would be the kind of investment he'd be proud of. Not like those other dumb-ass ideas: like lobster farming and selling amazing water filters and no-money-down real estate and computerized sign painting, all of which he'd tried.

  But then again, maybe instead of a store he should invest the money in the stock market. He felt exhilarated, thinking of himself being driven to work, wearing his tan suit and alligator-skin loafers, riding in an elevator up to some penthouse office on Wall Street.

  The pilot announced they were landing and he looked out the window again.

  Hearing his father's words:

  You listen to me, young man, you paying attention? If you're not I'll tan your hide. Come here, son, come here. You remember this: Don't work for any other man. Don't lien the house. Get paid in cash, not in promises....

  Though the real advice from his father could be summarized much more easily. It was this: Don't be me.

  Just then the plane banked sharply and the engines slowed to a growl. Randy Boggs shut out the overhead light and plastered his face against the window, looking into the night. In the distance he believed he saw a shoreline, he believed he saw water. He definitely saw the runway rising to meet him as if the land were rushing forward to greet him like a lover and welcome him to his new life.

  THE BREAK-IN TOOK ONLY FIVE MINUTES.

  The Network's personnel department was empty. Rune used a letter opener and fire hose nozzle to break the locks off two file cabinets. Inside, she found the bulky file she'd been looking for, examined it briefly then trotted out with it under her arm.

  At an all-night coffee shop up the street she ordered dinner: a Greek salad--extra anchovies--and a large apple juice. (Which reminded her of Courtney and made her feel lonely. She canceled the juice and got coffee-- the caffeine was a better idea anyway, she decided.) She sat at the counter, opened the stolen file and began reading. Her appetite had faded by the time she was halfway through the salad. But she drank all the coffee. Then she looked up, squinting, walked to the phone and got Lee Maisel's number from Directory Ass
istance. She punched the numbers in, noticing only then that it was midnight.

  Wondering if she was going to wake him up.

  She did.

  The producer's voice cracked. "Yes, hello?"

  "Lee, it's Rune. I've got to talk to you. It's an emergency."

  "Emergency? What d'you mean? What time is it?"

  "I've got to talk to you."

  "You're okay?"

  "I'm all right. I found out something about Lance Hopper's killing. It wasn't an accident. Randy and Jack were hired to kill him."

  "What are you talking about?" The voice was sharper now; his mind was in gear. He was a journalist probing for facts.

  "It was a professional hit."

  "But who'd want Lance dead?

  "It was--" Now Rune's voice cracked too and the reason it did had nothing to do with being tired. She repeated in a whisper, "It was Piper."

  chapter 31

  "WHAT?" MAISEL CLEARED HIS THROAT.

  Rune heard the rustling of cloth. She pictured the producer sitting up, putting his feet on the floor, feeling for slippers.

  "Piper hired them to kill Lance."

  Again, a pause. He was waiting. She heard him clear his throat again then cough. "This isn't funny."

  "It's true, Lee."

  "Come on, Rune. Why would she want him dead?"

  "Somebody took all the Randy Boggs files and tapes out of my desk. Everything was gone."

  "Who?"

  "Danny Turner, the head electrician on the set, told me it was Piper."

  Maisel didn't answer.

  Rune said, "And remember, she didn't want to do the story in the first place, she tried to get me to stop? She was going to send me to London? That was to get rid of me."

  Maisel snapped, "What I was asking was why she'd want Lance Hopper dead."

  "Because he was going to fire her. I went through her personnel file--"

  "You what? How?"

  "I just did.... Anyway, you know what I found? That Hopper tried to fire her a year before he died. Piper filed two EEOC complaints against him. They were both dropped but there's lots of memos--it was this huge war."

  "Rune, people don't kill people for jobs."

  "Maybe not usually--but you know Piper and her temper. You told me that her job was her whole life. And how much does she make? A million a year? That's enough to kill somebody for."

  "But how is she going to find professional killers? This is just too--"

  "What were some of her assignments?" She continued, "In Africa, in Nicaragua, the Middle East. She could've met some mercenaries. The fat guy--Jack--he looked just like a soldier. And he probably hired Randy to help him."