Kill The Story Read online

  Hammond Hollister had a good smile, and he used it, grinning at all those angry faces. The sound that rolled forth from the demonstrators was a roaring mix of cheers, chants, screams and boos. No words were audible. Instead, the mingling of protests and cheers made a sad, moaning sound – the last gasp of a dying dinosaur.

  Hollister nodded as if he understood it all perfectly. He was tall and lanky, like Jimmy Stewart in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, but with a fraction of Stewart’s charm and none of his humanity. Hollister did have an updated version of Stewart’s 1950s image, though, and it worked for him. To his supporters, he was Father Knows Best in a world gone mad. A world where little kids grew up with two mommies or two daddies and the nuclear family was on the endangered species list. Hollister held out hope that the past was still possible.

  To his critics, he was just an evil jerk who was playing the role of sex police in the Senate by trying to legislate what could and couldn’t go on behind closed doors among consenting adults. He was a human chastity belt. The anti-Viagra. A guy who truly believed all that shit about choosing one’s sexual orientation and the myth that homosexuals could resist the temptation of being gay if they tried hard enough.

  Hollister wasn’t about to speak, not yet. Not with the crowd still roaring. Then a young aide with a haircut identical to the senator’s approached and whispered something in his ear. Hollister turned stage right as someone fiddled with the sound system, endeavoring to jack up the amplifier and boost the volume. Hollister leaned down to the bank of microphones.

  “Thank you,” he said, raising his arms for quiet, or at least a low roar. “Thank you all for coming today. I just came from a great prayer service. We prayed for all of you. We prayed for Pennsylvania. And we prayed for this great country of ours.”

  Protestors were still booing, but overall, the crowd had quieted some. Even Hollister-haters wanted to hear what he had to say. That was the thing about the senator. You never knew what would come out of his mouth next.

  I had to give it to Hollister for standing up and facing the firestorm he had created. Some politicians would have tried to maneuver their way out of the controversy by issuing a flurry of cleverly crafted statements and scheduling a few carefully scripted interviews with reporters handpicked for their sympathetic leanings. Not Hollister.

  “Love is what brings me to Harrisburg today,” he proceeded. “Love of God. Love of this great country. Love of our fine institutions, like marriage and the family. And love of our fellow man.”

  I shifted my weight on now-numb feet, silently rebuking myself for standing out in the cold for this drivel.

  “Some of us see things differently,” the senator went on. “Some have labeled me intolerant.” To which someone in the crowd shouted, “You’re a homophobe!”

  Hollister looked in the direction of the voice. “I have no problem with homosexuals,” he corrected. “I do have a problem with homosexual acts. To say two adults have an absolute right to do anything they want as long as it’s behind closed doors is a slippery slope.”

  The voice of the opposition was growing louder now. Perhaps some critics came expecting an apology -- one they surely would have hurled back in Hollister’s face. It was becoming increasingly clear they weren’t going to get that satisfaction.

  But Hollister was on a roll. His staff had cranked up the sound system, and the senator’s words echoed off of the tall buildings lining Market Street. I raced to scribble them down in my notebook.

  “Every society throughout history has held marriage as a sacred union between a man and a woman,” he said. “To do otherwise would be at our great peril. It would lead to the destruction of the American family. And it would hurt children. Children are our future, and they need fathers and mothers. I can’t deny I said what I said. And I will not deny it’s how I feel. But to call me intolerant is wrong. I am a defender of marriage. I’m a protector of the family. And I am looking out for the best interests of our children. That’s something for which I will never apologize.”

  That last line was fuel for the flames. Chants resumed and the signs waved.

  “Gay-bashing is not a legitimate public policy,” screamed someone from behind me.

  “Defend marriage,” countered another.

  Meanwhile, reporters were moving in on Hollister pointing microphones and armed with questions. Wayne Dykstra led the charge. I could see him shouting something and Hollister cupping his ear. But it was too noisy. The crowd had gone crazy. Perfect cover for a politician looking to dodge tough questions.

  Hollister raised his palms and shook his head -- the universal sign for, “I can’t hear you.” It was a page from his mentor’s playbook. Ronald Reagan feigned deafness for eight years, blatantly but genially ignoring the shouting media with a hand to his ear.

  Wayne Dykstra wasn’t about to let Hollister off that easy. The reporter moved closer to the podium, straining the rope line. He brought both hands to his mouth to amplify his voice.

  Just then, a piece of the wooden podium splintered off. Hollister looked up, his eyes focused on a distant point. Then people around the senator started to scramble. One of Hollister’s aides grabbed for the senator, both of them leaping from the platform.

  Others were scattering now, too. I heard something that sounded like a car backfiring in the distance. I saw Wayne Dykstra’s hands fly up.

  Then someone slammed into me hard. I lost my balance and went down on the cold, hard concrete. The tumble put a fresh rip in the knee of my best pants. But whoever pushed me had done me a favor. As I lay prone on the ground, I realized what was happening. Some lunatic was taking potshots at the senator.

  I was in the middle of a political assassination attempt.

  I didn’t hear any more shots, but I wasn’t taking any chances. After all, I hadn’t heard the first shot, the one that put a hole in Hollister’s podium, sending splinters flying. I stayed down and crawled for cover. Meanwhile, the crowd ran in every direction, some bumping into each other accidentally and others knocking people over with force.

  I crawled amidst scampering feet, hoping I wouldn’t get trampled. I made it to an outdoor dining area covered by an awning and encircled by a concrete wall. I hugged the wall and peeked back at the scene.

  The vast plaza that had been filled to capacity by demonstrators was nearly deserted now. Fallen signs and windblown papers littered the area. City police on duty for crowd control now had their guns drawn. They kept low, their heads on a swivel, looking for suspects. But few people remained. One man crouched behind a tree far too skinny to provide any real cover. A couple of others lay face-down on the concrete, their hands over their heads, either too frightened or too injured to move.

  On the periphery, still photographers and TV cameramen panned the scene from their knees. Reporters who had taken refuge inside the hotel lobby peeped from windows. A couple of the more industrious journalists and photographers had fled to the hotel’s second floor for a panoramic view of the plaza.

  I looked for Hollister but couldn’t see him anywhere. His staff was gone, too. Later, I learned they had raced him through the hotel lobby, out through the back of the building and into his Chevy Suburban for the ride to safety.

  I turned my gaze to the bullet-ripped podium and saw a figure sprawled in front of it. I recognized the overcoat, made of only the finest cashmere. The tan fabric was darkly stained with blood.

  It was Wayne Dykstra.

  * * *

  I walked in a crouch, staying close to a hotel wall. As I neared the foot of speaking platform, I could see Dykstra lying face-down in a widening pool of his own blood. I screamed out.

  “Help. We need an ambulance here.” Just as I shouted, I heard the wail of sirens growing closer.

  I looked up at the buildings that formed the canyon of Market Square. I didn’t see anything suspicious, but I feared everything I saw. Every window was a potential assassin’s perch. The shots could have come from anywhere. I decided to crawl to Wayn
e anyway.

  His blood was already growing thick and tacky on the cold concrete. I called his name, but there was no response. In fact, there was no movement at all. I reached into my pocket for a cloth handkerchief that I hoped was clean.

  I didn’t want to move him, but I knew he was losing too much blood. Not knowing if it would do any good, I laid the handkerchief on my palm and gently pressed it to his forehead. It was sodden in seconds. I felt warm, sticky fluid oozing between my fingers. My stomach clenched.

  I glanced up as cop cars, ambulances and a SWAT truck converged on the square. Two cops in riot gear wielding assault rifles gave cover as men wheeled a gurney my way.

  I raised my free hand and shouted, “Hurry! He’s hurt bad!”

  But I already knew it was too late.

  Chapter 4

  On most Saturday mornings, the newsroom is like a ghost town. The top editors and reporters and even most of the geeky on-line crew work Monday through Friday. The majority of the thick Sunday newspaper is put to bed by Friday night. Only sports and metro get live news holes on Saturdays, when a second-string crew rolls in at about 3 p.m. to put out the paper.

  But by the time I got back to the Herald, the place was a beehive. All the top editors had cancelled Christmas shopping plans, begged off holiday socials and put a hold on dinner arrangements to shepherd the shooting story onto the front page.

  The paper had received quick confirmation that both Hollister and his staff were unhurt in the incident. Still, it was a hell of a story. And reinforcements of reporters had been called in to follow the various angles -- the latest on the hunt for a suspect; the reaction in both the conservative and gay communities to the attack on the senator; and, last but not least, the preparation of Wayne Dykstra’s obituary.

  All of the basic facts already were posted on the newspaper’s Web site, where corporate types in their infinite wisdom insisted upon giving away all of the newspaper’s content for free. But this amounted to little more than a string of facts. Information without context. I was determined to tell a story, the real story of what happened on the square.

  No sooner had I settled in at my desk and City Editor Bill Sharps was upon me.

  “Jesus, Telly, I thought you’d never get back,” he said, relieved. “We gotta a lot breaking here. We’re ripping up the front page for the shooting story. This is huge. An assassination attempt right in our back yard.”

  “Just our good luck,” I mumbled, deadpan. I didn’t like it when my editor was high on someone else’s misfortune. Sharps was slight and short, and he appeared almost impish, especially when he was salivating and rubbing his hands over death and destruction. There was nothing like a good tragedy to get Sharps’ adrenaline pumping. For the most part, though, he was a good editor and a straight shooter. He merely allowed macabre excitement to get the better of him sometimes.

  “Woulda gotten here sooner, but the city police didn’t want to release witnesses until the FBI showed up,” I said. “They’re following the book to the letter on this one. One of the Feds wanted to confiscate Wally’s film. They were harassing the TV guys, too. Luckily, one of my friends on the city force talked the FBI guy down. Wally should be back any minute. I promised we’d give the city cops copies of all the images. I want my cop buddy, Langhorne, to have first dibs.”

  “I get first look,” Sharps corrected me. “We pick what we want for the front page, then we talk about what we show the cops. I believe in cooperation and all that, but not if it means losing control of our best images. Next thing you know, our pictures are showing up on some other news organization’s Web site before we’ve had the chance to run them in the paper.”

  I nodded. “You’re the boss, you deal with it. I’ll get started on the story. I assume you’ll want something on Dykstra, too. He worked in the Capitol bureau for one of the news services back in the day. Wasn’t there long. Nothing more than a cup of coffee in the 80s, but it’s a local tie. Not to mention that big-shot column he had at the Inquirer.”

  “I know all about the late, great Wayne Dykstra,” Sharps frowned. “He was the type who never went unnoticed. We’ll have to have something, but you won’t be writing it. You’re the political reporter; start acting like it. Macy can handle the Dykstra send-off.”

  “I can do both, Bill. Really, I want to. I knew the guy. We went back a ways. We talked just before the shooting.”

  Sharps shook his head. “No. You bang out the main. I want all the color you can give me. You were there. The bullets were whizzing over your head. I want all that in the story and I want it fast. I have another assignment for you.”

  My blank expression begged the question.

  “I need you to get an interview with Hollister,” Sharps instructed. “He was the target so he’s the story. He’s the one our readers want to hear from. He made those controversial remarks that resulted in a political shitstorm. Now someone’s made an attempt on his life. Politically, it might prove to be the best thing that’s ever happened to him. Think about it. Assassins target leaders. Bold leaders. Symbols. Hollister has become a symbol. But he’s also got to be a little scared. Anyone with a target on his back has got to be scared. Go find out what he’s thinking, what he’s feeling. That’s the story, Telly.”

  Sharps nodded at his own wisdom. The man had a point. Perhaps the story wasn’t Dykstra. The pushy reporter who just had to be at the head of the pack had caught a bullet meant for a senator. His death was simply collateral damage. A matter of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  “All right, Bill, you sold me,” I said. “There’s just one problem -- finding Hollister. I imagine the Republicans have him stored away in some secure, undisclosed location right about now. Getting a line on him is gonna to be tough.”

  “That’s why you’re the political reporter,” Sharps smiled. “I hear he’s doing Meet the Press tomorrow. That means he’s making the rounds, trying to cash in on the tragedy. I want to make sure we get our shot, so to speak. Better get on it.”

  Sharps turned to leave my cubicle.

  “By the way, Bill, I’m all right. Just so you know, in case you were worried.”

  He looked back. “What?”

  “A man was shot dead in front of me. As you so vividly described, bullets were buzzing my ears. Just wanted you to know, I’m okay. In all your excitement, you never asked.”

  “Didn’t have to,” he said. “I knew you’d be all right. You’re a survivor, Telly. How else do you think you’ve lasted this long at the paper?”

  Sharps set his jaw and nodded. It was the closest he ever came to showing pride.

  “Bill?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Make sure Macy does a good job with Dykstra’s obit. Have him include the Harrisburg connection from the ‘80s, and tell him to dig up a few of Dykstra’s best columns to pull some quotes. The guy may have been an egotistical prick, but he was one of us. He died on the job. Let’s give him his due.”

  Sharps nodded, “We will. I’ll see to it. You just get that interview.”

  Chapter 5

  I spent the better part of the next two hours banging out my story on the shooting, then making phone calls in a frustrating effort to track down Hammond Hollister for an interview. This latter task was all the more difficult because it was a Saturday -- a week and a day before Christmas, no less. Luckily, I had home and cell numbers for most of my better contacts.

  First, I dialed the governor’s chief flack. Gov. Russell Kirkland had personally ordered an army of state police to Harrisburg to help with the investigation and ensure the safety of Hollister. But Kirkland’s spokesman wasn’t about to give up Hollister’s secret location.

  Of course, I called Lt. Dave Langhorne. He was on the inside of the investigation -- as inside as any city cop could get with the FBI calling the shots. His cell phone rang four times. I thought it was going to dump me into voicemail, then his deep, gravelly voice came over the line. “Langhorne.”

  He had the vo
ice of a blues singer but looked like an aging basketball star. He was dark and lithe, with gangly arms and legs.

  “It’s Telly. I have a favor to ask.” I blurted the words, knowing he’d likely be in a rush and most definitely in a foul mood.

  “Funny,” he said. “That’s what I thought I did for you when I got the FBI to release your photographer’s film. By the way, tell that kid with the cameras to tone it down when he’s dealing with the Feds. The anti-government attitude’s gonna get his ass locked up one of these days. And when they put him away, they’re gonna pluck out all that metal he’s got pinned to his body.”

  Langhorne didn’t know the half of it when it came to Wally Greenfield’s quirks. The photographer traveled to most of his photo assignments accompanied by his loyal yet indifferent canine companion, a bloodhound named Marx. Wally never met a conspiracy theory he didn’t accept as gospel and he viewed all forms of authority with suspicion.

  “Yeah, man, thanks,” I told Langhorne. “We owe you one.”

  “One?” he shot back. “C’mon, Tellis. Your math’s better than that.”

  I had won the cop’s trust about a year ago while working on a previous story of another messy political scandal. At first, he was skeptical. But we traded information and I held off on printing certain facts that would have damaged his investigation. We’d built a relationship. At least, I hoped we had.

  “Many,” I corrected myself. “We owe you a lot. I owe you big. I did tell my editors you get first look at Wally’s photos. He’s printing them up now. I promise to personally deliver them soon as I get off deadline.”

  “Gee, thanks,” Langhorne said. “When you do, it’ll be the first thing I’ll have seen on this damn investigation. Feebs got it locked down tight.”

  “Shit,” I said, deflated. If Langhorne was being kept out of the loop, I’d never get to Hollister. At least, not before the senator sat down with David Gregory on Meet the Press.