I swiveled all the way around so my back was to him and I was looking out at the newsroom. I wouldn’t miss the place. I would only miss some of the people. Without turning back to Kramer I gave him my answer.
“This morning my literary agent in New York woke me up at six. He said he had gotten me an offer for a two-book deal. A quarter million dollars. It would take me almost three years to make that here. And on top of that, I got a job offer from the Velvet Coffin. Don Goodwin is starting an investigations page on his website. To sort of pick up the slack where the Times drops the ball. Doesn’t pay a lot but it pays. And I can work from home-wherever that may be.”
I stood up and turned back to Kramer.
“I told him yes. So thanks for the offer but you can put me down as number one hundred on your thirty list. After tomorrow, I’m gone.”
“You took a job with a competitor?” Kramer said indignantly.
“What did you expect? You laid me off, remember?”
“But I’m rescinding that,” he sputtered. “We already made our quota.”
“Who? Who’d you fire?”
Kramer looked down at his desk and whispered the latest victim’s name.
“Michael Warren.”
I shook my head.
“It figures. The one guy in the newsroom I wouldn’t give the time of day and now I’m saving his job. You can hire’m back, because I don’t want your job anymore.”
“Then I want you to clear your desk out right now. I’ll call security and have you escorted out.”
I smiled down at him as he picked up the phone.
“Fine by me.”
I found an empty cardboard box in the copy shop and ten minutes later was filling it with the things I wanted to keep from my desk. The first to go in was the worn red dictionary my mother had given me. After that, there wasn’t much else worth keeping. A Mont Blanc desk clock which somehow had never been stolen, a red stapler and a few files containing call sheets and source contacts. That was it.
A guy from security watched over me as I packed and I got the feeling it wasn’t the first time he had been placed in such an awkward position. I took mercy on him and didn’t blame him for just doing his job. But having him standing at my desk was like waving a flag. Soon Larry Bernard came over.
“What’s going on? You have till tomorrow.”
“Not anymore. Crammer told me to hit the road.”
“How come? What did you do?”
“He tried to give me my job back but I told him he could keep it.”
“What? You turned-”
“I got a new job, Larry. Two of them, actually.”
My box was as full as it was going to get. It looked pitiful. Not much for seven years on the job. I stood up, slung my backpack over my shoulder and picked up the box, ready to go.
“What about the story?” Larry asked.
“It’s your story. You’ve got a handle on it.”
“Yeah, through you. Who am I going to get to give me the inside stuff?”
“You’re a reporter. You’ll figure it out.”
“Can I call you?”
“No, you can’t call me.”
Larry frowned, but I didn’t let him swing too long.
“But you can take me to lunch on the Times expense account. Then I’ll talk to you.”
“You’re the man.”
“See you around, Larry.”
I headed for the elevator alcove, the security man trailing behind me. I took a wide look around the newsroom but made sure my eyes never caught on anybody else’s. I didn’t want any good-byes. I walked along the row of glass offices and didn’t bother to look in at any of the editors I had worked for. I just wanted to get out of there.
“Jack?”
I stopped and turned around. Dorothy Fowler had stepped out of the glass office I had just passed. She beckoned me back.
“Can you come in for a minute before you go?”
I hesitated and shrugged. Then handed the box to the security man.
“Be right back.”
I stepped into the city editor’s office and slipped off my backpack as I sat down in front of her desk. She had a sly smile on her face. She spoke in a low voice, as if she was worried that what she said might be heard in the next office down.
“I told Richard he was kidding himself. That you wouldn’t take the job back. They think people are like puppets and they can play with the strings.”
“You shouldn’t have been so sure. I almost took it.”
“I doubt that, Jack. Very much.”
I thought that was a compliment. I nodded and looked behind her at the wall covered with photos and cards and newspaper clips. She had a classic headline from one of the New York tabs on the walclass="underline" “Headless Body in Topless Bar.” You couldn’t beat that one.
“What will you do now?”
I gave her a more expansive version of what I had told Kramer. I would write a book about my part in the Courier-McGinnis story, then I would get a long-awaited shot at publishing a novel. All the while, I would be on the masthead at velvetcoffin.com and free to tackle the investigative projects of my choosing. It wouldn’t pay much but it would be journalism. I was just making the jump to the digital world.
“That all sounds great,” she said. “We’re really going to miss you around here. You are one of the best.”
I don’t take compliments like that well. I’m cynical and look for the angle. If I was that good, why did I get put on the thirty list in the first place? The answer had to be that I was good but not good enough and she was just blowing smoke. I looked away from her, as I do when someone is lying to my face, and back at the images taped to the wall.
That’s when I saw it. Something that had eluded me before. But not this time. I bent forward so I could see it better and then I stood up and leaned across her desk.
“Jack, what?”
I pointed to the wall.
“Can I see that? The photo from The Wizard of Oz.”
Fowler reached up and pulled it off the wall and handed it to me.
“It’s a joke from a friend,” she said. “I’m from Kansas.”
“I get that,” I said.
I studied the photo, zeroing in on the Scarecrow. The photo was too small for me to be completely sure.
“Can I run a search on your computer real quick?” I asked.
I was coming around her desk before she answered.
“Uh, sure, what is it that-”
“I’m not sure yet.”
She got up and got out of the way. I took her seat, looked at her screen and opened up Google. The machine was running slowly.
“Come on, come on, come on.”
“Jack, what is it?”
“Let me just…”
The search window finally came up and I clicked over to Google Images. I typed Scarecrow into the search block and let it fly.
My screen soon filled with sixteen small images of scarecrows. There were photos of the lovable character from The Wizard of Oz movie and color sketches from Batman comic books of a villain called the Scarecrow. There were several other photos and drawings of scarecrows from books and movies and Halloween costume catalogs. They ranged from the benign and friendly to the horrible and menacing. Some had cheerful eyes and smiles and some had their eyes and mouths stitched closed.
I spent two minutes clicking on each photo and enlarging it. I studied them and, sixteen for sixteen, they all had one thing in common. Each scarecrow’s construction included a burlap bag pulled over the head to form a face. Each bag was cinched around the neck with a cord. Sometimes it was a thick rope and sometimes it was basic household clothesline. But it didn’t matter. The image was consistent and it matched what I had seen in the files I had accumulated as well as the lasting image I had of Angela Cook.
I could see now that in the murders a clear plastic bag had been used to create the face of the scarecrow. No burlap, but this inconsistency with the established imagery didn’t matter. The construction was the same. A bag over the head and a rope around the neck were used to create the same image.