Private affairs : a novel (74 page)

Watching Matt's face, Rourke knew he had made a mistake. "Listen,

son," he said, and Matt heard the echoes of that phrase go back over the years. Rourke walked around the desk so that nothing stood between the two of them. "We tend to get overexcited about issues that aren't as important as our relationship. A very special relationship. We both went too far in some of the things we said; I think we ought to exchange apologies." He paused, but Matt was silent. "I'll talk to Chet; no question he touched on subjects and people, a person, he had no right to touch; no question he went too far. But so did you, my boy. We all have to follow orders, you know; you think I don't hop on a plane when the President of the United States calls and tells me to come to Washington?" He chuckled. Matt remained silent. "All right, that's enough, we don't have to wring this turkey's neck long after it's dead. We know where we stand and there's no reason to go around again. All I want is to hear you tell me you're part of Rourke Enterprises, and that you understand that means teamwork and no indulging in sentiment."

"It isn't sentiment. It's a question of justice."

"I don't know what that word means, and neither do you. Your wife got treated roughly in a newspaper story; we all regret it, but if there are errors in it, I'm sure she'll correct them. The story was written from the best motives, and as far as I'm concerned that's all that counts. And it ends there."

"Not for me. That wasn't a news story; it was a smear. It was written by someone who's had a grudge against both of us for years, and I'm not going to allow him to get away with it; I'm not going to let that story stand without correction—"

"You're not going to let it stand? I thought I made it clear who owns that paper, and I'm telling you there will be no retraction, no new story. / decide what's in my papers. Matt, this has gone on far too long. We had no trouble before this came along; if your wife weren't involved we wouldn't be having any trouble now."

"We're having 'trouble,' as you call it, because a pack of lies was published in my—in a newspaper with my name on the masthead. But in one way you're right: I compromised in the past, on Andy Greene and dozens of other issues, but I won't compromise on Elizabeth. I won't see her name dragged in the mud. She's been through a lot lately, largely because of me; she's made a brilliant reputation on her own and I won't be a party to anything that damages it." He walked toward the door. "I'm a journalist, you know. I'd almost forgotten it, I was so busy being an executive, but it's coming back to me, and I'm going to find the truth behind that story, and write it the way it should have been written the first time."

"Stay right there!" Rourke's face was dark; in contrast, his silver hair

and eyebrows had a metallic sheen. "If you write one word on that story, you're through. Your career is over. You'll never work for this corporation again and I'll see to it that you don't get a job on any other paper in the country. In the world, damn it! I have connections! Is that clear? Did you hear me?"

Matt paused, but all that came through the pounding thoughts in his head was a sick feeling of betrayal with every word Rourke flung at him. Almost automatically, he went on toward the door. "I'll send you an advance copy of the paper when the story comes out."

"Sit down! You fool, you're not walking out of here! Where would you go? You're bluffing; trying to make me bend. You ought to know by now that I don't bend. I gave you the dream that's dominated you all your life; you wouldn't walk away from it. Listen to me! I'm giving you one more chance to become the most powerful publisher in America! All you have to do is say you're with me! That's all—your word that you won't fight me. There are so many things we can accomplish, Matt; you don't even know yet all the uses of power; there's so much I still have to teach you. But only if I'm sure of you! Matt, my boy. . . . Do you hear me?"

Matt had opened the door. "I hear you more clearly, Mr. Rourke, than I've heard you for two years." Very gently, he closed the door behind him and walked through the reception room, down the spiral staircase, and along the hallway to the office at the end, with the brass plate beside the door that read, "Matthew Lovell, Publisher."

It was after six; everyone had left. The corridors were empty, the offices silent behind closed doors. Matt sat at his desk, looking through his own door, left open, down the hallway lined with offices of the other vice-presidents of Rourke Enterprises—all of whom, he surmised, understood exactly where the center of power was and never made assumptions about control over their own departments.

He pulled a sheet of his personal stationery from his desk and unscrewed the top of his pen—Mont Blanc, heavy, black, successful-looking; a gift from Nicole—and swiftly wrote a single-sentence letter of resignation from Rourke Publishing and Rourke Enterprises. His pen stuck briefly on Publishing —the dream of a lifetime, as Rourke had put it— then moved on, finishing the sentence. Without reading it over, he put it in an envelope, wrote Rourke's name on the front, and placed it precisely in the center of his desk, beside the wrinkled page he'd ripped from the Miami paper.

What now?

You mean this minute? Tomorrow? Six months from now?

All of the above.

Irresolute, he looked about the plush office so skillfully decorated by Nicole. Then he shrugged. He wanted to get away from there before he began to doubt himself, and that meant he had to clean out his desk.

It was surprisingly easy; he hadn't realized how few personal items he had brought to that office. Two photographs in a hinged frame: one of Peter and Holly at Peter's graduation almost a year ago, the other of himself and Zachary in front of the printing plant, Zachary grinning widely because he was alive and out of the hospital, with his son beside him; an antique silver letter opener Matt had found in Zachary's desk after his death; a brass pen holder with a quill pen that Elizabeth had given him the first time the Chieftain showed a profit. He put them in his briefcase and opened the top drawer.

Automatic pencil, pocket calculator, business cards, a Kundera novel he hadn't finished, a Ross McDonald mystery he hadn't begun, personal stationery, private address book, a bottle of aspirin. And a note he'd scrawled in early January, when he'd returned from Saul and Heather's wedding: "Send Elizabeth Chet's report on resettlement help for Nuevo residents."

He'd never sent it, because he'd never found it. And Chet had never responded to his requests to get him a copy. Suddenly the report seemed too important to ignore: another example, like Artner's story, of something that should have been in his control, and wasn't. He riffled through his files, clearing out personal letters and memoranda as he looked once more for the three stapled pages headed "Nuevo: Compensation and Resettlement." He remembered it, remembered the map of settled valleys within fifty miles of Nuevo, remembered the budget showing moving and resettlement costs, farming start-up costs, even an amount for replacement of damaged equipment.

It was not among his papers. The only other material on Nuevo, that he knew of, was in Chet's office. He found a box in the closet, crammed it with files and records he intended to keep, and the possessions from his desk, set it beside the door, and walked down the hallway toward Chet's office.

The cleaning crew was working in Rourke's office upstairs; Matt heard the rattle of miniblinds being dusted, the clatter of objects moved about— and then Rourke's voice, raised in anger, drowned out almost immediately by a vacuum cleaner starting up.

What the hell, he thought; I saw him leave an hour ago. But the voice came from down the hall. Frowning, Matt walked on, past closed office

doors, until he came to Chefs, where he heard, beneath the hum of the vacuum cleaner, Rourke's voice—and then his own.

"You'll never work for this corporation again and I'll see to it that you don't get a job on any other paper in the country. In the world, damn it! I have connections! Is that clear? Did you hear me?"

There was a pause. "I'll send you an advance copy of the paper when the story comes out."

"Sit down! You fool, you're not walking out of here! Where would you go?"

The voices went on. Matt stood outside the closed door, his hand clenched on the doorknob, shaking his head in disbelief. The little son of a bitch! The loyal employee of twenty years—gopher, righthand man, advance man, Rourke-worshipper—bugging his boss's office! And no one suspected; not a rumor, not a word of suspicion, in all the time Matt had been there. Clever Chet: covering his tracks like the weasel that he was.

And now he sat behind a closed door, listening to a tape of Matt and Rourke's conversation after Rourke told him to leave. And this is what he does every night, Matt thought grimly. Sits in his little nest, listening in on the day's events so he can plan tomorrow. A worried, frightened little man. Even after twenty years, unable to trust himself or his revered chief, stockpiling information in case he ever needed to blackmail someone to keep his job.

A frightened, dangerous little man. And Matt remembered that Elizabeth had seen that the first time she met him.

He listened to the last few moments of the conversation, heard himself on tape open and close the door of Rourke's office, and then, tight with anger, he thrust open Chet's door and strode in.

Chet was hunched over his desk, reaching out to turn off the recorder. He froze when he saw Matt bearing down on him, then leaped to his feet. "What the fuck do you think you're doing—coming in here without knocking—spying like a goddam peeping Tom—?"

"Sit down!" Matt's voice lashed across the desk. "I want to talk to you and I want you where I can see you."

"You can't order me around! You don't even work here anymore! You've been fired!"

"Sit down!" Matt stood over him, six inches taller and thirty pounds heavier, lean and muscular to Chet's pudgy softness. Chet looked at him, tried to look past him, failed, and sat. Matt looked down at him, his hands at his sides, and watched him begin to squirm as the silence lengthened.

Except for the faint hum of the vacuum cleaner, the office was very

quiet. It was sparsely furnished, with a teak desk, a black swivel chair, two black leather armchairs, three black file cabinets, and a single picture on the wall, of Chet and Rourke. It was cold and cheerless, lacking any identifiable personality. Exactly like Chet. "You're a busy fellow, Chet," Matt said at last, still looming over him. "And you're going to tell me all about the things you do. The hatchet job you assigned to Artner; using my name to give orders in Albuquerque; bugging your leader's office—"

"It's not true!"

"What isn't true?"

"That I . . . any of it! Cal. Artner. Cal dug up his own information. He was very unhappy about it because it was your wife, but wrongdoing is wrong whoever does—"

"You puny sanctimonious bastard!" Matt thundered. "Who the hell do you think you are to pass judgment on my wife? You spoonfed that story to Artner and he had a ball with it; the two of you probably sat up all night giggling over it. You've been pals since you dredged him up from Graham's old chain and added him to your collection, the way you add tapes of Rourke's conversations. You stinking little scavenger—"

"Goddammit, you can't talk to me like . . . listen, you son of a— Wait!" he cried as he saw the look on Matt's face. "Don't you touch me! You don't work here anymore; you can't—you have no right—"

"Keep your mouth shut! From now on, the only time you'll open your mouth is to answer my questions." Matt leaned against the desk a few inches from Chet. "Why did Artner write that smear?"

"It wasn't a smear—it was a straight news story—!"

"Damn it, I told you I want answers! I flew in today to get the truth, not your usual bullshit, and you knew it the minute you saw me. That wasn't a news story; it was a lying piece of—"

"Every word in that story was true! I made sure of that before—" He stopped, then struck the desk with his fist. "I told him to check his facts! They're all true!"

"They're a pack of innuendoes. But you're not answering my question. I'll ask it again: Why did you order that story?"

"I didn't! I keep telling you! I wasn't even there!"

"You were in Albuquerque; you told the editor of the Daily News I'd fire him if he didn't print the story." Matt looked him up and down. "I could beat you to a pulp," he said softly, and those soft tones were more terrifying to Chet than shouting. "God knows I've wanted to often enough. But right now I need answers." He leaned forward and, so casually Chet was slow to realize what he was doing, he opened the tape

recorder, removed the cassette, and dropped it in his pocket. **Why did you order that story?"

Che ltd "Give that bad

"I asked you a question,"

"Give it back! Jesus Christ, do you know what you're doing?"

"Did you. when you made it? There are always dangers in bugging an office, Chet. Being found out is one of them, I'm still waiting for your answer and I'm getting goddamned tired of asking."

Chet licked his lips: he chewed the inside of his cheek. In the silence, they heard the high-pitched whine of the cordless vacuum cleaner a worker was using on the spiral staircase as she made her way a step at a time to the lower floor. The whine stopped; there was a knock at the door. "CleanersT a woman's voice shouted

Matt went to the door and opened it, "We won't be long. Can you do the other offices fin

The woman shrugged. "Sure, but v-c':e fast. We'll be back in maybe half an hour."

We'll be out of your way by then." He closed the door. "Rourke and I kept you later than usual tonight, didn't we" AH right. \t: "s wir.c this -; Why was the story written

"WiD you give me that taf

"I'll consider it. Why was it writta

Chet let out a long breath. "I tried to protect him," he said to the ceiling. "I'm not sure why: lately he hasn't been very nice to me. He even had Terry report to him from Santa Fe after he told me I'd be the only one reporting, after he told me he trusted me. That wasn't honorable."