Receiving the news from a head-hanging Benjamin that there was nothing more he could possibly add to what he’d written, Rodney knew he should kick the bloke out on his ear. He couldn’t explain to himself why he hadn’t done so, and he thought at first he might be getting soft. But then one of his snouts phoned in, passed along a delectable tip, and Rodney reckoned he might not have to sack Benjamin after all.
What the snout had to say constituted an instructive moment, and since Rodney Aronson loved instructive moments nearly as much as he loved anything containing cacao, he sent for the red-haired giant and enjoyed a Kit Kat that he washed down with an espresso from his personal machine, this latter a gift from Butterball Betsy, a wife who knew many ways to please. That most of them were gustatory didn’t bother him.
Rodney had finished the Kit Kat and was making himself a second espresso when Zed Benjamin lumbered into the room. Damn if he still wasn’t wearing the beanie, Rodney thought with a sigh. He had little doubt that the dumbo had yarmulked his way round Cumbria a second time, successfully putting everyone off yet again. Rodney shook his head in resignation. The folly he had to endure as editor of The Source sometimes truly offset its delights. He decided not to mention the headgear again. He’d done so once, and if Benjamin wouldn’t take his advice, there was nothing for it but to let him sink under the weight of his own nonsensical inclinations. He’d learn or he wouldn’t, and Rodney knew which alternative was more likely. End of story.
“Shut the door,” he said to the reporter. “Take a seat. Give me a second here.” He admired the creamy nature of his concoction and turned off the machine. He carried his drink to the desk and sat. “Death is sex,” he said. “I reckoned you’d work that out for yourself, but it seems you can’t. Got to tell you, Zedekiah, this line of work might not be for you.”
Zed looked at him. He looked at the wall. He looked at the floor. He finally said, “Death is sex,” so slowly that Rodney wondered if the man’s brains had gone the way of his footwear because for some reason he was wearing not respectable shoes but instead very odd-looking sandals with tire treads for soles, along with striped socks that appeared to be handmade from remnants of yarn.
“I told you the story needed sex. You went up there a second time and tried to find it. That you failed to find it I can understand, more or less. But what I can’t understand is how you failed to see the moment of potential rescue when it came. You should’ve been in here like a flash yelling eureka or cowabunga or praise Jesus, I’m saved. Well, probably not that last, all things considered, but the point is you got handed a way into the story— and this would be a way to save it and to justify the expense the paper went to in sending you up there in the first place— and you missed it. Completely. The fact that I had to discover it myself concerns me, Zed. It really does.”
“She still wouldn’t talk to me, Rodney. I mean, she talked but she didn’t talk. She says she’s not what’s important. She’s his wife, they met, they fell in love, they married, they came back to England, and there’s an end to her part of the tale. From what I can tell, she’s entirely devoted to him. But everything he’s done, he’s done himself. She did tell me that it would benefit him— encourage was the word she used— if the story featured his recovery alone and not her part in it. She said something like, ‘You need to understand how important it is for Nicholas to be acknowledged as having achieved this on his own.’ She meant his recovery. I did get that the reason for her wanting the recognition to go to him has to do with his relationship with his dad, and I shaded the story that way, but there didn’t seem to be anything more— ”
“I know you’re not completely stupid,” Rodney cut in, “but I’m beginning to think you’re deaf. ‘Death is sex,’ is what I said. You did hear that, didn’t you?”
“Well, yeah. I did. And she’s sexy, the wife. You’d have to be blind not to— ”
“Forget the wife. She’s not dead, is she?”
“Dead? Well, no. I mean, I reckoned you were using a metaphor, Rodney.”
Rodney gulped down the rest of his espresso. This gave him time not to strangle the young man, which was what he badly wanted to do. He finally said, “Believe me, when I use a fucking metaphor, you’re going to know it. Are you aware— remotely or otherwise— that the cousin of your hero is dead? Recently dead as a matter of fact? That he died in a boathouse where he fell into the water and drowned? That the boathouse I’m speaking of is on the property of your hero’s father?”
“Drowned while I was there? No way,” Zed declared. “You may think I’m blind, Rod— ”
“You’ll get no argument from me.”
“— but I would have hardly missed that fact. When did he die and which cousin are we talking about?”
“Is there more than one?”
Zed shifted in his chair. “Well, not that I know of. Ian Cresswell drowned?”
“Yes indeedy doodah,” Rodney said.
“Murdered?”
“Accident according to the inquest. But that’s hardly the point because the death’s nicely suspicious and suspicion is our bread and butter. Metaphor, by the way, in case you’re thinking otherwise. Our purpose is to fan the fire— another metaphor, I think I’m on a roll here— and see what comes crawling out of the woodwork.”
“Mixed,” Zed muttered.
“What?”
“Never mind. Is that what you want me to do, then? I take it I’m to suggest there’s reason to believe foul play is involved, with Nicholas Fairclough the player. I can see how it fits: The former drug addict falls off the wagon of recovery and does in his cousin for some obscure reason and as of this writing, gentle readers, he apparently has walked away scot-free.” Zed slapped his hands against his thighs as if he was about to rise and do Rodney’s bidding directly. But instead of getting up to leave, he said, “They grew up as brothers, Rodney. The original story does indicate that. And they didn’t hate each other. But of course I could make it sound like Cain going after Abel if that suits you.”
“Do not,” Rodney said, “take that tone with me.”
“What tone?”
“You bloody well know what tone. I should kick your arse from here to down under, but I’m going to do you a favour instead. I’m going to say three little words that I hope to God will make your pointed ears prick up. Are you listening, Zed? I don’t want you to miss them. Here they come, now: New Scotland Yard.”
That, Rodney saw to his satisfaction, appeared to stop Zed Benjamin in his self-righteous tracks. The reporter frowned. He thought. He finally said, “What about New Scotland Yard?”
“They’re in.”
“Are you saying they’re investigating the drowning?”
“I’m saying something better than that. They’re sending a bloke up there wearing brothel-creepers, if you receive my meaning. And he’s not a bloke from the IPCC.”
“So it’s not an internal investigation? What is it, then?”
“A special assignment. Completely hush-hush, mum’s the word, and on the big QT. He’s apparently been given the job of making a list and checking it twice. And reporting back when he’s finished.”
“Why?”
“That’s the story, Zed. That’s the sex behind the death.” Rodney wanted to add that it was also what Zed himself would have learned had he put in the effort that Rodney himself would have put in had he been in the same position with his story shit-canned by his editor and, potentially, with his job on the line.
“So I’m not to make something up to add sex to the story,” Zed said, as if he needed clarification. “What you’re saying is that it’s already there.”