Fraser grinned. “It was quite a hype, but a hell of a piece. We took out the political references and got it on the national wire this morning. And the Chicago desk didn’t even try to jazz it up.”
I was numb. “OK, Lew, to hell with Wes. I didn’t write the piece that way, but I’m damned if I’ll explain that to him or any other of those hacks. Let me tell you something—I think we’re going to see stuff in my paper from now on that will make that story look like a Sunday school exercise. The new M.E. is starting to take control and it looks like it’s going to get weird.”
I dialed the governor’s press secretary, Phil Goldberg. His secretary told me in a very small voice that she’d see if he was in.
“You shmuck!” (He was in) “You bastard. Haven’t we always played ball with you? What kind of cheap shot was that? Are you just trying to make this administration look stupid? The governor’s so pissed he gave up his golf game after nine holes this morning.”
“Can I talk to him? To explain.”
“Negative, kiddo. He says he ain’t saying anything to anyone from the Daily Crapola today or maybe forever.”
“The piece didn’t knock him.”
“No, but it made his Capitol cops look like the Keystone brigade and so far he’s concerned, that’s a crack at him. Jimmy McGrath and the governor have been through some thick together, and I’m surprised you didn’t know that.”
“Well, I can explain what happened if I can talk to him. I’ll only need five minutes, tops.”
“Sorry, he’s not in.”
“Come on, Phil. Not in to me or really not in?”
“Not in. Really. Out of town. But even if he was, I doubt he would be to you for a couple of days.”
For some reason, probably because I thought it would serve him right for hyping my story, I phoned Swift to tell him that the governor was not talking to the Register & Press now or for the foreseeable future. Besides, he was out of town.
Surprisingly, Swift took it well. “So that’s his game, eh? Well, we have more than one arrow in our quiver, old boy. For tfyday, that will be all we’ll require. But I want you to call Schmid’s office every morning until further notice, and I want you to begin keeping a log of his absences from the Capitol. I’ll notify you later what we will do with that information.”
I found out—from Lew Fraser—that Swift didn’t give up that easily. He called the National Press Bureau and, as a client, requested National Press to seek a comment from the governor on the dog story. Lew, of course, had the request bucked to him, and got the same reply minus the vituperation from Goldberg. The governor was out of town. He didn’t say where.
Given that answer, Swift called the bureau chief at Amalgamated News, who had come sniffing around the Capital Register & Press after the change of ownership hoping to sell his service. Swift told that worthy that his competition had failed on a request and asked him if AN would like to show what it could do. So Park Withers, Fraser’s competition, got to try Goldberg. He had the presence of mind to ask where the governor was. Upstate was the answer.
All of this produced an unusual amount of traffic on the service wires of both NP and AN, and several wire editors around the state noticed it and got curious enough to phone their Capitol reporters. So it was that Wes Johns was pulled, protesting, from his hearts game, to the telephone. I could hear him protesting that it was strictly a Cap & Reg furor, but agreeing after more argument to try to get a comment from the governor. Goldberg was scared of Wes and told him the governor was out of town, visiting Oakdale to inspect some soil conservation work, but he would call there and ask the governor to contact Wes as soon as possible.
Two hours later, Wes got a call from Oakdale and a no comment from the governor.
The next day, after being reminded by Grace that Swift still wanted a follow-up from the governor on the dog story, I called Goldberg again. “He’s still not in, Bob. He went from Oakdale to West Adams last night, and he’ll be touring daycare facilities all day.”
“Did you give him my request for a comment on that story?”
“Sure. He said to tell you to ask Wes Johns for his comment.”
“You mean the no comment he gave Wes?”
“No, something special he gave Wes for you.”
I asked Wes.
The dean of Capitol correspondents looked over his half-glasses and announced, “I’m a deacon of my church, Wartovsky. I won’t repeat what he told me to tell you. But I can tell you it had something to do with you having sexual congress with a web-footed waterfowl.”
The next day, I called Goldberg and got yet another dodge.
“Just missed him, Bob. He was in town overnight—came by the Capitol early this morning and was off to the city for the rest of the week. He’s got appointments with bankers on the state bond issues, and he’s going to look in on a couple of juvenile halfway houses. I know he’ll be in Chicago during the weekend, but I don’t know the schedule for next week.”
“Phil, this sounds like a runaround. Is he really doing this much traveling or are you diddling me?”
“Swear to God, Bob, he’s on the road. With the legislature out, he figures he can get out and around and listen to people and see what is happening away from this town. He figures nobody here tells him the truth about what is going on in the state.”
“Can you get me the schedule for next week before the weekend?”
“I’ll try, but if it’s like this week, he’s been making it up on the fly. You know, it’s his chance to be a little less schedule-driven. But I’ll try.”
The whole thing sounded odd to me, and when I told Swift about it, he was even more skeptical.
“Tell me, does this fellow normally spend a lot of time away from the capital?”
“No,” I said. “In his first term he hardly left town at all, and he’s done very little traveling since he started his second. If he wasn’t already serving the last term he’s allowed or if a Senate seat was coming vacant next year, I’d guess he was lining up the ducks for a campaign. And the places he went this week don’t make any political sense. It’s like he picked them out of a hat.”
The partial schedule Goldberg produced late that week was even more mysterious. Monday and part of Tuesday in the state’s biggest city visiting social service centers for the elderly and Wednesday and Thursday in the medium-sized towns of Morrow, Severs, and Manville checking out water treatment facilities and a state highway bridge project. Friday, he was scheduled to conduct pardon hearings in Water-town at the state penitentiary.
These all were certainly plausible and proper activities for any governor, but Schmid was making this round of the state without any press hoopla—even in the towns he was visiting. Goldberg said the media of course was welcome to cover his activities, but we would have to handle our own travel and lodging arrangements because the governor’s office was making no provisions for a press contingent to accompany him. Odd, odd, odd.
Swift, who by this time had apparently forgiven me, or forgotten that he was mad at me, appeared fascinated by my report on the latest word from Goldberg.
“I agree with you, Bob. This is entirely uncharacteristic of the governor in light of what you have told me. I want you and Tandee to pick him up Monday in the city and tag along all week. Just look and listen and maybe you’ll run across something. And if nothing else, you’ll come back with a feature on the governor meets his subjects… uh, the voters.
“I’ll call Mr. Shiu and arrange for you to get expense advances later today. I think he’ll go for it on the basis of a demonstration that we are a statewide paper that doesn’t just cover the capital.