Josh sighs, then looks down at me skeptically.
I try for earnest. “Soul of discretion.”
Josh points across the room, defeated. “You see Dorothy? Just coming out of the other room. Holding what looks like scotch. That’s Alethia Espinosa with her. Dean of girls.”
“Are they sisters?” I ask. “They’re like fluttery little wrens.”
“Hardly. Like I said, don’t get in their way,” Josh replies. He puts down his brandy. “And Dorothy has a real sister, who lives with her.”
I feel a touch on my elbow.
“Miss McNally, I have some members of our Bexter family you must meet.” The Head has two more men in copycat blazers in his wake, both half a step behind him. Their posture verges on obsequious.
“May I present Harrison Ebling, our new development consultant, and our bursar, Aaron Pratt.”
The moneymen. The fundraisers. I almost smile. They think I’m making the big reporter bucks and are gunning to put the hit on me for a donation. But this may be a plus.
Josh had told me the bursar knew about the calls. Maybe this development person does, too. I plot strategy, wishing for my notebook.
“How nice to meet you,” I say. “We’re so eager for Penny to start next semester. How long have each of you been with Bexter?”
Josh’s foot goes on top of mine. And it’s not a mistake.
I move my boot away, resisting the urge to add a tiny kick indicating I’m just delicately probing, and keep my eyes charmingly fixed on the two newcomers. “And do tell me what you’re each working on. I’m so eager to learn everything about my new Bexter family.”
It’s a private school. But I bet nothing stays private for long.
“J
ust look at me, not at the camera.” I smile encouragingly at Declan Ross. We’re in his living room, sitting knee to knee on the spindle-backed chairs Franklin and I moved out of the dining room and placed in front of the fireplace.
I knew today’s interview would make our story. Put a real face on the problem. When I called from Channel 3 earlier this morning, giving the accident victim the tried-and-true “it could help other people” tactic, he’d agreed. Happily, this time it’s actually true.
“Rolling,” J.T. says. “I have speed.”
Franklin, notebook in hand and sitting out of camera range on a flame-stitch sectional couch, performs an over-dramatic cough, complete with eye-rolling. “I have speed” is movie jargon, because film cameras have to rev up before you can start shooting. Our video camera is at the proper speed instantly. J.T. just says it to sound hip and Hollywood. Franklin isn’t going to let him get away with it.
I throw him a cool-it look and turn to Declan Ross.
“So, Mr. Ross,” I begin. I adjust the skirt of my new and somewhat risky aubergine wool suit. “How did you feel when you got the recall letter, saying your car’s brakes could fail, and that most likely, a failure would happen at high speed?”
“How can carmakers get away with it?” Ross says. He holds out both hands, supplicant, illustrating the depth of
his concern. “They manufactured vehicles that were defective. Thousands of them. They should never have left the factory. I could have been killed. My family could have been killed. It’s a nightmare, not just for me, but for every driver on the road. I’m enraged.”
I pause for a beat or two. Truth is, we’re done. In thirty seconds, Mr. Ross has given me all we need: anger, disdain, fear for his own family and outrage for others. We could take down all our equipment and walk out of here right now. I glance at Franklin again. We don’t need to exchange a word. He shrugs, smiling, then rolls a finger, pantomiming, “It’s a wrap.”
But suddenly I’m not sure.
“Couple more questions,” I say. It’s rude to take your sound bites and run. Plus, I just thought of something. “Back to the accident. When you were driving the rental car. The air bag on your side didn’t go off, did it? Did you ever find out why? Did the police ask about that?”
“Hardly.” Declan Ross is dismissive. He pushes up the sleeves of his navy turtleneck and blinks, briefly, after looking directly at the megawatt light pointed at his face. People only do that once.
“The cops couldn’t get out of there fast enough as soon as they saw we were all okay. Once they realized I hadn’t gotten the license plate—how could I? They were like, ‘Well, we’ll be in touch.’”
“Have they been?”
“Nope. And they sure didn’t seem too optimistic about finding the guy. Now I check out every car that goes by, trying to find him myself. Bastar—I mean—oh, I shouldn’t say—” Ross, suddenly flustered, looks at me.
“It’s just tape,” I say, waving off his embarrassment. “Not live television. You can start over, no problem. And I understand you’re upset.”
“Upset that we’ll never find who did this,” Ross continues. “Cops don’t seem to care.”
“Well, it’s an unfortunate reality,” I say. “If no one was hurt, it may not be worth their time to charge someone with driving to endanger. A trial could be tough. Because the other driver, forgive me, could say it was your fault. Or that it happened because of the icy road.”
Declan Ross shakes his head. “It’s just not fair. It was a rental car. And I didn’t get the extra insurance. So now, I take the hit. And my insurance premium does, too. Someone should find that car, you know? Find that damn driver and take his license. Force him to pay. He could have killed my children.”
I pause, leaving a beat of silence so that juicy sound bite is easy to edit. And he’s right. Someone should find that driver. Maybe Franklin and me. Maybe there’s a bigger story we’re missing.
“Mr. Ross?” Franklin’s voice. “Sorry to interrupt. You said you ‘check out every car that goes by.’ So did you see something recognizable? Even just the color of the car might prove helpful.”
“Daddy?” a voice comes from somewhere behind me, then the squeak of rubber on hardwood floor. Gabriel, in gigantic rubber-soled running shoes, runs to his father’s knee. “Can I be on TV?”
Ross wraps one arm around Gabriel, then in one motion lifts him up and deposits him on his lap. In his floppy New England Patriots T-shirt, all ankles and knees and ears, the little boy looks a lot less scared than he did by the side of the road.
I decide to play along. After all, we have all we need. “So, Gabriel, who’s your favorite football player?”
Gabe looks dubious. Football is not why he’s here.
“It’s was like I told you. Like I told Daddy,” he says,
stolid and serious as only a five-year-old can be. “It looked like my blue Matchbox car.”
I’m silent. Franklin is silent. Behind me, almost in a whisper, J.T. says, “Still rolling.”
“What kind of a car is that? Do you know?” I ask. I’m interviewing a five-year-old. How reliable can he be? Can I even use this on the air? But he’s on his father’s lap and his father isn’t stopping me. I keep my voice gentle.
“Did you see the car go through the toll booth on the highway? You know the toll booths?”
“Yes. I saw it going. It went fast. Then our car went bang.” His lower lip begins to pooch out, his long eyelashes cobwebbing with tears. “And Sophie was really crying. And Daddy wasn’t talking.”
Forget the camera. In one motion, I’m off my chair and crouched in front of him, eye to eye.
“Gabe? Can you go get your Matchbox car for me?”
The uniformed factotum at the guards’ desk is barricaded behind a chin-level Formica fortress strewn with black vinyl ring binders I know are sign-in sheets. His back is to an array of tiny TV monitors, some flickering grainy black-and-white video of unrecognizably blurry figures waiting at elevators and walking down the institutional hallways of the Park Plaza state office building. As the three of us approach, the guard reluctantly puts down the greasy-looking paperback he’s reading. He’s curled the cover around to the back to hide the title.
“We’re going to the Mass Pike offices, room 1504,” I say, filling my voice with confidence. I don’t tell him we have an appointment with Massachusetts Turnpike mogul David Chernin. Because that’s not true. We have no appointment at all. We’re just attempting to insinuate ourselves upstairs. If we fail, we’ll be escorted to the down escalator and out into the overpriced food court.
An hour ago, Gabe showed us a tiny blue Mustang. Here’s where we might track down the real one. We’ve got to at least try.
“Synneer,” the guard says. His plastic name tag says Bill Bevan. With a stubby finger, Bevan spins one of the notebooks in our general direction. “Idees.”
“Sure, of course.” I give the guys a surreptitious thumbs-up, and flash my driver’s license instead of my station ID. If this guy is the slacker he seems, we may be able to keep people from confirming we were here. I sign on the next available line, although I write Tina Marie Turner instead of my real name. Franklin, nodding his understanding, signs Don Ameche. J.T. signs an illegible scrawl, keeping his camera low and out of sight.
Bevan “analyzes” our signatures without a blink. So much for security.
Just as I’m certain we’re in the clear, the guard, whose pinkish scalp is attempting to burst through his invisible hair and whose neck flab is encroaching on the collar of his blue uniform, narrows his eyes at me. Unfortunately, I then get to see his teeth.
“You that TV girl,” Bevan says. The smile evaporates and he begins to reach for an enormous phone console covered with push buttons. “Maybe I should call.”
“Hey, man, cool setup,” J.T. interrupts. He unzips his black parka, hoists his camera onto the desk, then points toward the monitors. “You got surveillance video there? You got tape, or digital? How many eyes? Is it a VTR-54B? How do you recon the scenes?”
Apparently, the security guard isn’t much of a multitasker. He abandons the phone and focuses on J.T. My photographer, I’m willing to bet, is talking complete nonsense.
But J.T.’s suddenly a team player.
“Show me your setup, dude,” J.T. says. As the guard
turns back to his monitors, J.T. cocks his head at us. In the direction of the elevators. “Go,” he mouths.
David Chernin owes me big and he knows it. When he and his wife got some horrible stomach bug on their tenth-anniversary cruise a few years ago, he called me to do a refund battle with their uncooperative travel agency. Companies get very nervous when they hear “This is Charlie McNally from Channel 3.” I managed to get all their money back. Although I never expect a quid pro quo for just doing my job, that fact places Franklin and me in a very nice negotiating position.
When he’s not on a cruise, Chernin is the computer guru of the Mass Turnpike’s toll enforcement division. After we promised not to tell where we got the info, he agreed to show us photos he probably shouldn’t.
“Nope,” Chernin says, pointing. “Nope. Nope.”
We’re watching black-and-white images flicker by on Chernin’s flat-screen monitor. We’re hoping to see a Mustang, just like the Matchbox car Gabriel Ross showed us, though of course we won’t be able to tell if it’s blue. Each photo, snapped automatically by the surveillance cameras mounted at all three tollbooths, displays the license plate of a car that blew through the tolls without paying around the time of the accident. If the driver we’re looking for paid the toll, in cash or with an electronic transponder, there won’t be a picture. But I’m predicting he was too freaked out and driving too fast to pay cash.
“Nope. Nope. Nope.”
Each car is on-screen a fraction of a second, just long enough for the three of us to assess whether it’s a Mustang or not. Dozens have gone by. So far, no Mustangs. But to me, each no means a yes is even closer. And I keep wondering. Why aren’t the police using this technology to
enforce the law? How many bad guys are out there, caught on camera but not caught by the cops?
“I understand you’re not going to throw me under the bus here,” Chernin says. His eyes never leave the screen as his right hand clicks the mouse on the Next button. One after another, the photos continue to appear, and his voice goes quiet. “You know as well as I do—this meeting never happened. So how are you going to explain how you found this car? Without implicating me?”
“
If
we find the car,” Franklin says. He’s also staring at the screen.
“When we find the car,” I say. “And when we do, I’m sure we can figure out a way to protect you.”
Chernin turns away from the screen, stashing his wire-rimmed glasses on the top of his head. He runs triathlons and has that gaunt malnourished look some runners cultivate. Cheekbones. Shortest possible hair. He tightens his tie, shoots the cuffs of his shirt. His face is hardening.
“Charlie,” he begins.
We may be in trouble.
“There’s one.” Franklin had picked up the mouse and continued clicking through the photos himself. He points to the screen. “Look. Clearly a Mustang.”
Chernin whirls back and we all lean in closer, focused on the fuzzy but recognizable image. Franklin’s right. And the time stamp says 4:26. Perfect.
“We done now?” Chernin asks.
“You can print a copy for us, right?” I say. My fists clench and I feel my got-a-good-story shivers beginning. I always know. I also know it’s a risk to get too excited too soon. I turn to Chernin, aware we’re on thin ice. My fists become crossed fingers.
“And can we keep looking, please, just briefly? There could have been more than one Mustang.”
Chernin tilts his head, considering. He’s increasingly
unhappy with this. And it is probably a job-threatening breach of something. He looks at the chunky black watch strapped to his emaciated wrist. “Ten minutes. At the most.”
“Thank you so much,” I say. We know the accident was over by then anyway. “We’ll never ask for anything again.”
“You got that right,” Chernin mutters. He goes back to the mouse, clicking faster and faster as the image parade continues. Whatever is going to happen better happen fast.
By the time the time stamp says 4:36 p.m. we’ve seen no more Mustangs. Chernin clicks the screen to black. “Time,” he says.
Franklin and I exchange glances. No question the whole thing is iffy. If little Gabe is right. If this car is blue. And even if so, if this is the right Mustang.
Still. It’s more than we had when we came in. And we may have found the driver who caused the accident. And caused so much expense and fear in the Ross household.
“Again, you’re the best. This could really help us,” I say. “Can you hit Print? And we’ll be out of your life.”
Mission accomplished. I hope. I put on my black overcoat, wrap and tie the belt, and scramble through my cordovan tote bag for my gloves. We hear the photo of the Mustang whir out of the printer. Chernin pulls it from the tray. I hold out my hand, smiling. J.T. is probably waiting for us in the food court. He’ll be psyched that his tactic worked.
“Thanks, David,” Franklin says, zipping on his khaki parka. He takes his carefully folded black gloves out of a side pocket. “Obviously this is just for research. We won’t use this photo in our story.”
Chernin is holding the printed picture in both hands. Then, with one swift motion, he crumples it, shaking his head. He crams the wad of paper into his pants pocket.
“No,” he says. “I can’t let you have it.”
“Seven, four, two, F, Y, six,” I say as the elevator doors close behind us. I dig for my notebook. Of course I memorized the license number. I’m sure Franklin did, too. “Regular Massachusetts passenger plate. With a sticker saying he’s due for a new one next July. Is that what you got, too, Franko?”
“Yes, exactly.” Franklin hits the button for lobby. “And there was a decal for Hallinan Motors. That car dealer. Guess your Mr. Chernin got cold feet.”
“Or maybe he simply figured we’d remember the plate and make a public-records request for it. He knows the number’s all we really need. Now he can deny he gave it to us. Plus, no one can make what’s already happened
un
-happen. That’s a secret no one can keep. Toll violations are clearly public record. And we’re the public. It’s all good.”