Nantucket Sawbuck (11 page)

Chapter Thirteen

GoliathWins

For David Trezize, the day of personal catastrophes that he called Black Friday actually started on Thursday night. Or was it the Monday before that, when he decided to run Jared Bromley's
Veritas
article? Or the week before, when he'd run his own editorial? Trying to pinpoint the origins of things gave him a headache. He had been angry about the way Nantucket was changing for a long time. His editorial had been an open declaration of war after years of private griping and sniping. Jared's article had focused everything and brought it into the present. The boy's eagerness to see the piece printed in
The Shoals
was exhilarating. David had thought the boy might be afraid of the repercussions. He wasn't, though. He'd already been censored and framed. He was enjoying the battle. Which made sense: Jared was a kid, he had nothing to lose. He wasn't trying to run a newspaper on the edge of bankruptcy, raise a family, and maintain a reputation as a solid citizen. But David was. And David should have been afraid. Things were moving too fast, deadlines were too close, and the excitement of the chase was overpowering. If there had ever been a chance for a moment's sober reflection, it was gone the moment Derek Briley walked into his office, at forty minutes before deadline on Monday.

There were reporters at every desk. The place smelled like toner ink and burned coffee. Sandra and Bea in the business office were typing in the last classifieds. Byron Chadwick was pecking away at his Board of Selectmen report, which David knew in advance he would rewrite from scratch. He hoped there'd be time this week. He touched the big man's shoulder.

“Finish up,” he said.

“Almost there.”

“Good.”

He let himself into his office and shut the door. It was a cramped ten-by-ten cubicle with just enough room for his desk. The window looked out into a tiny graveled strip in front of a retaining wall, five feet below street level. The one decoration was a blown-up still of Steve McQueen in
The Great Escape,
skidding to a pause on his stolen Nazi motorcycle, assessing the line of barbed-wire fences. Patty had always laughed at that. David wasn't Steve McQueen's Hilts; he was more like the Donald Pleasance character, Blythe—mild mannered and ineffectual. But determined, at least.

And handy with a pen.

Derek Briley appeared at his office door a few minutes later. The wiry Englishman strolled in without knocking, sat down, and lit up a forbidden cigarette.

“Thought you might like to know where the money's coming from for that Moorlands Mall you've got your knickers in a twist about,” he said. “It's your old friend Preston Lomax.”

“What?”

“Preston Lomax. He's the one behind it.”

“Excuse me. Who are you?”

“Name's Derek Briley. Housepainter. Steadiest hands on the island, and sharp ears, too.”

“All right…so, you're saying that Preston Lomax—”

“Right. You thought he was just another rich bloke mucking things up small time. Having his tantrums and whatnot. No such luck. He's taking over, mate. Talking to Kmart and Marshalls. Bidding out the parking lot grading job. Putting real roads in the moors, civilizing it, like. You can't stop him, his boys have the Planning Board in their pockets. He said for once someone's going to pave a street on this stinking rock that doesn't flood when you get a drizzle. It's a whole off-island professional attitude. He's going to shape us up proper. Thought you might like to know, after that bit you wrote last week.”

David stared at him. Someone poked their head in the door, thought better of it, disappeared.

“How do you know this?”

“Overheard it, mate. The big shots don't mind talking in front of the sub-humans. You're invisible, aren't you? Far as they're concerned. So I say, take advantage. I mean, if it's there to be taken, right? It's how you get ahead in the world.”

“Yeah, I guess it is.” David stood. Briley got up also and they shook hands across his desk. “Well—thanks for coming in. I'll be following up on this over the next few weeks.”

“The next few weeks? Do it now, mate. You've got the story in your hand. Start as you mean to finish, that's what I always say.”

David sat down and rolled his chair back from the desk. He believed Briley. The story made sense; he probably should have put the pieces of it together for himself. And it revealed Preston Lomax for what he was: an enemy, not just to the occasional waiter who happened to cross his path, or a kid who wanted to blow the whistle on his cocaine habit. No, he was an enemy to the whole island and everyone who lived here. He was a profiteer, an amoral mercenary who was well on the way to desecrating one of the last wild and beautiful places on the Eastern seaboard, just for a chunk of money he didn't even need.

David opened a file and started typing. Briley was right. The story was running this week. He could follow it up later. He had what he needed right now. He finished the piece, unnamed source and all (Briley didn't have his green card yet), and slotted it on the bottom of the front page, bumping the sewer-bed improvement project to the back of the paper. It was three minutes before deadline.

He was scared, but you were supposed to be scared. Steve McQueen smiled down from his motorcycle. Hilts understood—you had to jump the fences, even if you wound up tangled in the barbed wire afterward. It was the effort that mattered. You kept going until they stopped you.

David glanced at the clock. Two minutes. He hit the save button and sent that week's
Shoals
to the printer.

He felt pleased with himself throughout the next day, watching the renewed interest in his newspaper, happy to breathe for a moment the recycled air, or perhaps the secondhand smoke, of Woodward and Bernstein and Seymour Hersh. Everything was fine until that evening, when he stopped on his way into the Languedoc restaurant and spoke to Preston Lomax.

He should have paused with Sasha. They were an official couple now, and her ex-husband had designed the Lomax mansion. But he wasn't sure how to present her. “My friend, Sasha” would sound evasive. “My girlfriend, Sasha,” grotesquely ironic, given the purpose of this dinner. “My partner, Sasha” was an outright lie, and a mealy-mouthed euphemism, even if it was true. “My soon to be ex-girlfriend, Sasha” was the most accurate, but no one was giving points for accuracy. In the end he just pushed her forward gently. She nodded at Lomax and followed the hostess to their table.

“Mr. Trezize,” Lomax called out. David turned and walked the few steps to his table. Lomax was eating with his wife, who seemed to be adding up the thread count in the tablecloth.

“Yes?”

“Interesting issue of the paper this week.”

David shrugged. “I don't read the
Inquirer and Mirror.”

Lomax smiled. Or at least it looked like a smile. Dobermans seemed to be smiling, too, just before they struck. “Mendacious and evasive,” Lomax said. “Like your editorials. Of course you read the
Inky Mirror
. And you know exactly what I'm talking about.” The force of the man's personality was overpowering, like the heat from a roasting oven. You pulled back from it automatically. “So? You have nothing to say for yourself? Then I suggest you hire a lawyer. Because I'm suing you for libel.”

David cleared his throat. His voice was somewhere at the bottom of that cough. He hauled it up.

“Truth is full vindication.”

“What?”

“In libel law. Truth is full vindication. At least ten people saw what you did at Topper's. And your company's funding the Moorlands Mall will be common knowledge soon. I just ran it first.”

“You also suggested that I buy drugs from policemen.”

“No. We said it happens. No names were mentioned.”

“And how many other Eel Point homeowners used a local contractor? That narrows the field a little, Mr. Trezize.”

“Mr. Lomax, if you don't use cocaine you have nothing to worry about. And neither do I.”

“Save it for the courtroom. You'll be spending a lot of time there. With your divorce not final, you could be there fighting for custody over this little…dalliance.” He nodded toward the back of the restaurant, where David's soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend was studying the wine menu. “The Commonwealth of Massachusetts frowns on adultery. Being ‘separated' has no meaning in the eyes of the law, as I'm sure you're aware, with the breadth of your legal knowledge. You're married, you're cheating and you've been caught.”

“Hold on a second. How can you—”

“A single father is so vulnerable in this state. Why, if someone should call in a report of you engaging in child abuse, for instance, you'd automatically be put on probation by the Department of Social Services, whether you did anything or not. Isn't that appalling?”

“What the hell are you trying to…?”

“But it gets worse. If the police receive one more anonymous call, the DSS removes Jan and Jenny from the danger and hardship of your home. It makes sense. We have to protect the children, don't we?”

Lomax knew his children's names. How did he know their names? “Wait a second! You can't just—”

“Of course I can. Anyone can. But don't worry. You'd be able to clear yourself eventually. After the caseworkers have interrogated your children and your visitation rights have been suspended and your reputation's been wrecked. People would never look at you the same way again. They just love to believe the worst about their neighbors, don't they? It's a terrible thing.”

Lomax laughed, a big, guttural guffaw, like a James Bond villain. All he needed was a Nehru jacket and a Siamese cat. David felt a geyser of sheer hate rising from his toes to the base of his spine. His fingers were tingling with the urge to grab that wattled throat and squeeze until the eyes bulged and the grinning red face went blue.

“You make me sick,” he said. “You're not a businessman. You're a thug. You scare people for a living. You're an overfed bully and it's time someone stood up to you. I'm happy be the one to do it.”

“Oh really? And where will you do that? In the pages of your gossip sheet?”

“You're damn right I will, and nothing you can do—”

“Nothing I can do? I've already done it. It's
done.”

David felt a sudden twist in his stomach. “What are you talking about?”

“I want to go back to my dinner, so I'll just say this. Men who work at newspapers teetering
one advertiser away
from going under shouldn't throw slanders. It's like the glass houses and the stones. Just as messy, but much harder to clean up. Have a pleasant evening, Mr.Trezize.”

Lomax cut into his steak. David was dismissed.

Who had Lomax talked to? What had he said? What was going on? What had he done? Could it be stopped? Could it be fixed, somehow? David turned away and stumbled to his table. Sasha smiled up at him.

“I ordered champagne. Is that all right?”

“What?”

“I thought it would be festive.”

He stared at her in frozen panic. Who was she? What was she talking about? What world did she come from? Apparently things were festive enough there to justify sitting around in fancy restaurants, ordering champagne. But that was absurd, there was nothing wrong with Sasha, she had no idea what was happening, she was just trying to have a pleasant night. Which was funny enough since he had come here to break up with her. She was about to be dumped, and she hadn't figured that one out either. So sure, why not? Bring on the champagne! Let's celebrate! I'm being framed for child abuse and my newspaper is being destroyed! You're annoying and unattractive and I can't stand to be with you! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Let's all get drunk and puke on ourselves.

She was watching him. He had to say something. He needed an exit line. He had to get out of here, check his messages, start making phone calls.

“I have to go,” he said. “I don't want any champagne. I took you here to break up with you. Sorry, I should have said something, but I was going to tell you and let you yell at me or cry or whatever, make a scene—but I don't have time now.”

Sasha reared back a little in her chair as he babbled on, her face pulled tight. “David, what are you—?”

“It's over!” He was shouting. He got his voice under control. “We're finished and I have
real problems
to deal with. So…goodbye. I have to go now.”

“Are you okay…?”

“Sure, I'm okay. I'm fine, Everything's great. Can't you tell?”

He fled the restaurant.

He couldn't remember where he had parked his car.
India Street! That was it.
He scrambled into the Escape, gunned the motor and peeled out. He barely managed to stop at the stop sign on Federal Street. A couple with two kids stared at him balefully as they crossed the street. Parents always looked at you that way when you pulled up to intersections, as if they knew you were planning to run down their children and only the force of their will was stopping you.

He glanced in the rearview mirror. There was a cop behind him, probably running his license plate, trolling for violations and infractions, checking to see if his registration sticker was up to date. Well, it was, he had nothing to worry about. Maybe a parking ticket or two, left over from the summer. Would that be enough to pull him over? Sure, if they felt like pushing someone around. They didn't really need an excuse, just a mood. They could do pretty much whatever they wanted, they could mess with anybody.

“Not me,” David heard himself say aloud. “Not tonight.”

The cop kept going on Orange Street when David turned right on Cherry. But he still had to deal with that bitter spike of adrenaline. He had read somewhere it was the “fight or flight” hormone. Which was great for cavemen being chased by saber-toothed tigers. What he supposed to do with it? He had no way to fight against Preston Lomax. And flight was impossible. He lived here. In some ways, he would have preferred the saber-tooth tiger. At least it would be quick. All the adrenaline had done was make his hands shake. That was useful. Modern man needed a better drug than these homemade glandular potions. Maybe that's why they invented alcohol.