“In their rooms, I guess,” Bill answered. “Not getting anything to eat. At the mayor’s dinner, not getting anything to eat. Betsy is at the 4-H Club dinner, trailing Walsh. She’s probably getting something to eat. Solov’s in his room, watching cable television.” Bill grinned. “He’s not getting anything to eat, either.”
“Does that guy ever take off his overcoat?” Fletch asked.
“No, no. He was born in it. You can tell he grew up inside it. Each time Pravda sends him out of the country his managing editor just moves the buttons for him.”
“Time they moved the buttons again.”
Dr. Thom entered. He put his black bag on the bar beside Fletch.
“Here’s a doctor now,” Fletch said brightly.
“Best bedside manner in the country,” Bill said. “If you don’t have a temperature when Dr. Thom arrives, you will when he leaves. Good for business, right, Doc?”
“Journalists,” Dr. Thom said. “If any journalist ever spoke well of me, I’d instantly overdose on a purgative.”
“Looks like you already have,” Bill said.
“It’s a medical fact,” Dr. Thom said to Fletch, “that all journalists are born with congenital diarrhea. Double Scotch, no ice,” he said to the bartender.
“I’m a journalist,” Fletch said.
“I trust you vacated yourself before you entered the bar.”
“Mr. Fletcher?” A woman was standing at Fletch’s elbow.
“At least a journalist has to empty himself,” Bill Dieckmann burped. “Doctors are born vacuous, and vacuous they remain.”
“Yes?” Fletch had turned to the woman.
“Are you Mr. Fletcher?”
“Yes. But you can call me Mr. Jones.”
“If only,” Dr. Thom intoned ever so slowly, “journalists would vacate themselves privately.”
“I’m Judy Nadich,” the woman said. “Feature writer for Farming-dale Views.”
“Great stuff you’re writing,” Fletch said. And then laughed. “I’m sure.”
Judy grinned. “You liked my last piece? On how to repair cracked teacups?”
“Thought it was great,” Fletch laughed. “Read it several times.”
“I knew that one would get national attention,” Judy said.
“Sure,” Fletch said. “Everyone’s got cracked teacups.”
“Hey,” Judy said. “Seriously. I’m trying to get an interview with Doris Wheeler.”
“I think you’re supposed to see Ms Sullivan about that.”
“I’ve asked and asked and she says no.”
“Why?”
“She says there’s no time on Mrs. Wheeler’s schedule for a full, sit-down interview. What she means is that the readership of the Farmingdale Views isn’t worth an hour of Mrs. Wheeler’s time. She’s right, of course. But it’s important to me.”
“ ’Course it is.” Despite her brown hair tied in a knot behind her head, her thick sweater, her thick skirt, her thick stockings and shoes, Judy Nadich was sort of cute. “What do you want me to do?”
“Get me an interview with Mrs. Wheeler,” Judy said. “In return for my body.”
“Simple enough deal,” Fletch said. “Tit for tat.”
“Tits for that,” Judy said.
“I’ve never met Ms Sullivan. Never laid eyes on her.”
“You could try.”
“You want me to call her?”
“Yes, please. She’s in Room 940.”
“Would you be content with a follow-along?”
“What’s that?”
“You just follow along with Mrs. Wheeler for an hour or two, you know? Up close. You don’t really interview her. Report what she does and says to other people. ‘An hour in the life of Doris Wheeler’ sort of thing. Done right, makes damned good reading.”
“Sure. Anything.”
“Okay. I’ll call Ms Sullivan. Watch my beer, will you?”
“Sure thing.”
Dr. Thom was saying “… journalists are the only people on earth asked not to donate their remains to science. It’s been discovered that journalists’ hearts are so small, they can be transplanted only into their brethren mice.”
“Keep these guys separated, will you?” Fletch asked Judy.
“Sure.” She climbed onto Fletch’s barstool. “Bet you guys don’t know how to repair a cracked teacup …”
“Ms Sullivan? This is Fletcher.”
The first few times Fletch had tried Room 940 he had gotten a busy signal.
“What do you want?” Her voice was surprisingly deep.
“Hello,” said Fletch. “We haven’t met.”
“Let’s keep it that way. As long as we can.”
“What?” Fletch said. “No camaraderie? No esprit de corps? No we’re-all-in-this-spaceship-together sort of attitude?”
“Get to it.” Her voice was almost a growl.
“No simple cooperation?”
“Yeah, I’ll cooperate with you,” she said. “You stay on your side of the fence and I’ll stay on my side. Okay?”
“Not okay. There’s a young lady here, a reporter from the Farmingdale Views. She’s spending tomorrow morning with Mrs. Wheeler. Just observing.”
“Over my dead body.”
“That can be arranged.”
“She’s a stupid, soft, little local bitch. Who are you to make arrangements for Doris?”
“I’m giving her a press pass to spend tomorrow morning with Doris Wheeler, close up, with photos. You don’t like it, you can stuff it up your nose.”
“Fuck you, Fletcher.”
“Yeah, you say that,” Fletch said, “but what are you going to do?”
Dr. Thom and Bill Dieckmann were gone from the bar. Judy Nadich sat over an empty glass.
“What happened to my beer?” Fletch asked.
“I drank it,” Judy said.
“Was it good?”
“No.”
He handed her the press pass he had written out and signed on a piece of note paper. “Here,” he said. “You’re spending tomorrow morning observing Mrs. Wheeler close up. Don’t get too much in the way.”
“Thanks.” Judy looked dubiously at the handwritten note. “Sullivan was nice about it, huh?”
“Sure. Why not? Mrs. Wheeler will be very glad to have you with her.”
Flash Grasselli had come over from a table at the back of the bar and was standing behind Fletch.
“Do I get to give you my body, now?” Judy asked.
“What town am I in?” Fletch asked.
“Farmingdale, dummy.”
“Next time I come through Farmingdale,” Fletch said.
“You rejecting me?”
“No,” Fletch said. “Just don’t believe in prepayment.”
“Mr. Fletcher, may I buy you a beer?” Flash asked.
“Sure,” Fletch said. “Hope it’s better than the last one. Judy here says my last beer wasn’t very good.”
“Why are you called Flash?”
Flash Grasselli and Fletch had taken two fresh beers to Flash’s small table at the back of the dark motel bar. Judy Nadich had left with her tote bag to prepare herself for her morning observing Doris Wheeler.
“From boxing.”
“Were you fast?”
Flash seemed to be chewing his beer. “I’m not sure.”
Flash had the eyebrow cuts of a boxer, but his eyes were steady and his nose had been born pug.
“They’re always kidding me, the reporters,” Flash said. “They come to me for real information about the Wheelers, and I never give them any. I just talk about the old days.”
“What kind of things do they ask you?” Fletch asked.