Bingo (19 page)

A hush fell over us. Louise’s eyes bugged out of her head. Mr. Pierre’s mouth hung open. Regina’s hand flew to her face and David was coughing from the smoke.

As soon as he could breathe, his first words were “Jesus H. Christ on a raft.”

Mutzi giggled. The giggling turned into uncontrollable laughter.

Mr. Pierre dryly commented, “A little more to the left, David, and you can take out Rife’s offices too.”

Mutzi was now rolling on the ground. “You know that T-shirt: ‘First, we kill all the lawyers’?”

The law firm of Falkenroth, Spangler & Finster had suffered
an eclipse on the South side of Runnymede. Those of us in Maryland used Brown, Moon & Frost, while those on the Pennsylvania side used Falkenroth, Spangler & Finster. You might say no love was lost on either side.

“Except it’s Sunday. Nobody’s in there,” Aunt Wheezie blurted out, then bumbled on. “I didn’t mean that the way it came out.”

David was fast sobering up. Jackson, our mayor, stepped forward. “David, I’m afraid there will be legal repercussions.”

In the distance we could hear Bucky’s siren. Father Christopolous, in his vestments, hurried down the steps of Saint Rose’s. He observed the situation and ran toward the offices to see if anyone was hurt. At the sight of him, Mr. Pierre started off to join him.

“Wait a goddamned minute, Pierre!” David growled at the fifty or so of us crowding around. “You all, every one of you, just stand still. Here’s the drill. Ain’t no one telling what happened. You tell and you will get parking tickets and speeding tickets until death do us part. Got it? Mutzi and I were cleaning the cannon and it went off.”

Jackson, perplexed, raised his hands for silence because the murmur of the crowd became a roar. “Ladies and gentlemen, let us review the facts.”

“No facts to review, Jack.”

“What you’re suggesting is a lie.”

“I’m not suggesting. I’m telling!” The veins bulged out on David’s neck.

“At the very least you are distorting evidence.”

“They do it in Washington all the time.” David’s belligerence was accelerating and so was the sound of the siren.

“If Oliver North can lie and get away with it, why can’t David?” Mother’s voice carried over the burst of chatter.

“Right.” Mutzi, still on the ground, agreed, but Mutzi would have agreed with anybody at that point.

“I’m defending my country by fair means or foul.” David had
the bit in his teeth. “That asshole with the gift of speech, that jerk—and I refer to Bucky Nordness, who is so bad he could screw up a wet dream—that Yankee had the gall to celebrate our surrender at Appomattox this week. I won’t stand for it!”

“That was 1865.” Jackson wanted to get David out of there before Bucky and company pulled up in front of Falkenroth, Spangler & Finster.

“Tell that to Nordness. He’s rubbing our noses in it!” David shouted. Then he turned to me. “Nickel, you promise not to write the story?”

“You mean I can’t use my headline: ‘War Not Over’?” I smiled and it relaxed David a little. “I shall use discretion, David.” You bet I would or he’d beat my ass then and there.

“What about the rest of you?” David scanned the crowd.

“Oh, we won’t tell,” Aunt Wheezie vowed. “Why see David put through the wringer because he got sloshed?”

“I am not sloshed, Mrs. Trumbull,” David vigorously defended himself, referring to my aunt by her married name.

The crowd talked but a consensus was brewing. We wouldn’t give Bucky Nordness the satisfaction of a big stink and possibly lawsuits flying like confetti. David should not have gotten drunk and Mutzi should not have jammed down a real cannonball, but they did. Best for them quietly to pay the repair bill of Falkenroth, Spangler & Finster and be done with it. David’s dislike of Bucky exceeded that of the rest of us but it was felt that Bucky did become overzealous in his duties and it was also felt that his jubilation each and every April ninth was in poor taste. As the squad car careened around the Square, coming down from the Hanover Road, the crowd dispersed. Jackson had David firmly under the elbow. David shook his arm off but did leave. Regina and I pulled Mutzi out of there with the help of Randolph and Winston Frost. Mom, Louise, and Mrs. McConnell walked three abreast behind Regina and me so that no one on the other side of the Square could see exactly what we were doing. We dumped Mutzi in his shop and figured he could sober up by himself. His wife was out
of town—a good thing, because she was more to be feared than Bucky Nordness when it came to Mutzi’s drinking.

Mr. Pierre offered an impromptu party, and Mother, Louise, and Mr. and Mrs. McConnell, about half of the BonBons, Jackson and Regina and David crammed into his house. No one would allow David any more alcohol but he was becoming good-natured. Mr. Pierre shot me hot stares every now and then. I weakly smiled and tried not to stand too close to Jackson because I’d want to touch him.

Mother came over. “Are you going to write about it?”

“I’ll use David’s story. I guess that makes me corrupt but Aunt Wheezie’s right. Speaking of which, I was surprised when you said what you did about Oliver North.”

“He’s lying and people think he’s a hero.”

“Wait until he testifies.”

“What difference will it make?”

I said. “Maybe we’ll get the truth.”

“If Oliver North were your friend and told you to write a false story to protect him and you believed in what he was doing—would you?”

“No.”

“You’re doing it for David.” Mother knew how to get me.

“Oh, come on! That’s such a little thing and David would get dragged through the mud. We’re not talking about violating the Constitution or lying to the American people about foreign policy.”

“The principle is the same.”

Mr. Pierre was now standing next to Mom, having overheard the conversation. “Integrity is built on many small things.”

“Thanks a lot!”

“Don’t get peevish, Nickie,” Mother warned. “You’re always ready to point out to me, God, and everybody what’s right and what’s wrong. Now you get a taste of your own medicine.”

“I do not go about telling people how to live their lives.”

“You do in your column,” Mother said.

I certainly didn’t think my column was as proscriptive as she was making it out to be, and furthermore this grilling was unfair even if they were right—in principle. To make matters worse, Mr. Pierre kept treating me, nonverbally, of course, as though my life were a heterosexual extravaganza. When Jackson came over to join the argument—excuse me, discussion—I wanted the floor to open so I could drop through it.

“What’s going on over here?” Regina came up behind Jackson.

“These two are giving me rat week.”

Mother pounced. “I am not and neither is Mr. Pierre. I asked her about Oliver North—”

“Actually, I heard the whole thing.” Jackson saved her her breath.

“So?” Now Mom was on guard.

Regina came to my side. “Why are you getting on Nickel’s case? We’re all complicit in this, as I see it.”

“But she represents the press. If the press doesn’t tell us the truth, how can we make sound judgments about our community?” Mr. Pierre didn’t sound hostile to me but I still didn’t like being under attack.

“Well, I’m the mayor and I’m covering up. What about me?”

“Jackson, we expect our politicians to lie. We don’t expect it of the press.” Mother cut to the bone—mine and Jackson’s.

Jackson’s face went white. “Julia, do you think I lie to you?”

“Not you. But you’re the only politician I do have faith in and maybe it’s because I can watch you. I can’t watch those slick toads in Washington. I don’t know them.”

“Somebody knows them. Their families. Their communities,” Regina said.

“Yes, and if they got in Dutch, I bet their families and their communities would cover up for them.” Mr. Pierre was on a tack.

Nobody said anything for a minute. We didn’t know what to say.

I finally broke the silence. “You’re right. I am violating my
own ethics as a reporter. But David’s my friend and I have to balance the story with its effect on his life. Nobody was hurt, thank God. David used poor judgment but who hasn’t at one time or another? Maybe I’m using poor judgment now but if the story comes out in the paper there will be repercussions all the way to Baltimore and to Harrisburg. Then we won’t have the opportunity to correct this ourselves. The state legislators could conceivably get in the act, since this problem involves two elected public servants. What purpose does that serve? And I get to watch the team from Eyewitless News make an ass of my friend, of us in general? I guess if I have to pick between a professional code of honor and my friend, I’m going to pick my friend, at least this time, and I’m going to try and solve this mess among ourselves.”

“If everyone does that, then we haven’t evolved beyond tribal behavior.” Mr. Pierre handed around another tray of goodies.

“We haven’t.” Regina smiled, easing the tension. “The United States is a culture but not a civilization. We’re still too new.”

“Well, that’s what Charles Falkenroth says, in a way. He says the United States is an unfinished democracy.” Jackson was enjoying the discussion.

“So, I guess we keep trying,” Mother replied.

It should be noted that my mother has never missed voting, whether in a local, state, or national election. Being born in 1905, she remembered when women couldn’t vote, and a hurricane couldn’t keep her out of the voting booth.

Maybe Jackson was enjoying the discussion but I wasn’t. I was shown up as an unevolved tribal person—an unevolved tribal person standing next to her best friend and her best friend’s husband, with whom she was having an affair. Surely tribal people are smarter.

I
don’t understand how you could be standing right there and not get the story.” Charles Falkenroth stood over me as I sat at my desk playing with my razor-point pen.

“First of all it was Palm Sunday and Aunt Wheezie had her palm frond in front of my face. Second, it was very confusing because it happened so fast.”

“Bullshit, Nickel.” Charles let me have it. “You’re a trained observer.”

“Tell me what Bucky Nordness said when he called you up.” I fudged for time. Surely I could come up with a better excuse.

“He said that David Wheeler, out of pure D meanness, fired a cannonball into the offices of Falkenroth, Spangler, and Finster but he is certain the ball was meant for him.”

“Sorry your cousin wasn’t working that Sunday.” A malicious flicker appeared in my eyes.

“Me too. That son of a bitch is off on another vacation.”

Countless reasons sprang to mind as to why Charles detested his cousin but one reason overshadowed the others. William Falkenroth had contested their grandmother’s will concerning the disposition of 720 acres of good land. This issue took five years to settle and cost Charles many thousands of dollars in legal fees. Through the Falkenroths as well as through Mother and Louise, I learned that a family is a bizarre combination of people with conflicting interests united by blood.

“Here.” I handed Charles the story I wrote Sunday concerning the cannon incident.

He grabbed it from me. “You’ll have this back in five minutes.” Charles walked into his office. Pewter followed. He let her in, then shut the door.

Michelle called out from her desk: “Is he going to run my Passover piece?”

“Yes.” I thought she was enjoying my discomfort the tiniest bit too much.

Roger was out of the bullpen, so I called back to her: “How was your date?”

“Okay.” She sounded noncommittal. “How long has your mother had purple hair?”

“It’s not purple, it’s magenta, and it’s only on the sides.”

“Are they always like that … your mother and her sister?”

“I told you about them and so has everyone else here.”

“But I’ve never seen them go at it.”

“That was nothing.”

“I guess I’ll have to get used to it if I stay in Runnymede. I think I’ll keep going to bingo at least until the blackout game.”

“Did you like it?”

She thought about that. “Yes.”

Charles emerged from his den, Pewter at his heels. He stopped by the AP wire. “Gary Hart declared his candidacy in a speech at Red Rocks Park above Denver. Another one.” He tore off the wire story and put it on Michelle’s desk. “How many have we got now?”

“Biden; Gore, except they haven’t formally announced; Jesse Jackson, who hasn’t stopped running since 1984; Dukakis; Babbitt; Gephardt; and who knows who else on the Democratic side? Cuomo? We don’t know what’s cooking there, even though he said he isn’t going to run,” Michelle answered brightly. “Want the list of the Republicans?”

“No, it’s too depressing.” Charles came over to my desk and
placed the story in front of me. “Well written, Nickel, but I don’t believe a word of it.”

My face burned. “That’s the best I can do.”

“You’d better do better or you’re not fit to own a newspaper.” He twirled and left me in my misery. “Michelle, any of those men got your vote?”

“Only Pat Schroeder would have my vote.”