Paper Daughter (10 page)

"That's my guess. On the Galinger books it would have looked like the kids' share of any profits was being mailed to a custodian charged with handling their finances while they're minors."

"But why would Garcia take part?"

Harrison shook his head. "Don't know, but money's a good motivator. The amount involved would have to be enough to make risking jail worthwhile." He rubbed his face. "One thing, anyway. With a home in that ritzy a neighborhood, he's not going to just disappear."

He pushed back. "You ready to see Fran and then Sam Braden?"

"Mr. Braden?"

"He's responsible for what we do. He needs to know what we're working on."

"I suppose, except..." I paused. "Harrison, if we're right, then Yeager used his kids, or step-kids, rather. Taking their names, it was like he stole who they are. That was really, really wrong."

Harrison was watching me, waiting. "Yes?"

"I was just thinking about what he did, and how. There are so many ways to lie."

"Yep. Lots of ways. Lots of reasons. Many shades of truth.

Let's go."

***

We had a quick talk with Fran, and then we all headed for Mr. Braden's office, a large, glass-enclosed space on one side of the newsroom.

Harrison ran through all we'd done and then recapped our speculations. "We think that Tobias Yeager, on the city council and chairing the planning committee, might have made sure some iffy Galinger Construction projects got through. In return, Ralph Galinger would have kicked back payments to Yeager by disguising them as profits being distributed to people with an ownership interest in Galinger Construction, three of whom were Yeager's ex-step-kids. Except that the kids and their mother never saw or even knew about the money, because it went to a supposed custodian who handed it over to Yeager, probably in return for a share."

"Those are some pretty major guesses," Mr. Braden said. "And ugly, if they're right."

Fran said, "I hate untangling white-collar crime. Give me a straight-out murder any day!" Then she closed her eyes a moment, murmured, "I didn't mean that," and said to Harrison, "You got into this because of Donald Landin. How does he fit in?"

"My guess is that Yeager was paying him to make sure the planning office didn't red-flag any of the Galinger projects. Maybe Landin got scared and saw whistle-blowing as a way out, and that's when he called me, fudging his name."

Mr. Braden studied the
Herald
logo on his coffee mug. "It would be nice to get into the company books and see where any profit distributions were actually mailed, but that's not going to happen. I want every state record verified, though. And Galinger talked to tomorrow."

***

We discussed the story a while longer, reviewing the material Harrison and I had accumulated. We listed alternate sources where we might double-check what we'd already found. Then Mr. Braden asked if we had anything else on Garcia.

"No," Harrison answered, "but I thought I'd scout out his address before knocking off for the day."

"Can I go with you?" I asked Harrison, who was closing down the computers.

"It's too near quitting time," he answered. "I won't be coming back."

"I can drive my own car and then go home from there."

When I got a nod, I grabbed my bag and started for the side door.

"Hey!" he said. "Where are you going?"

"Around to the parking lot."

"No one's shown you the shortcut?"

***

He led me down a back stairway and through solid doors into an echoing concrete space that smelled of news ink. A beeping forklift backed up with a huge roll of paper. Two men punched switches at a lighted control panel. And beyond them...

Beyond them, on the other side of a long expanse of glass, the
Herald
's massive presses ran, all spin and speed and
whirr
and
clack
and endless, flowing ribbons of paper.

"Oh!" I said, stopping, enthralled. "
Oh
"

Harrison, bending to be heard over the racket, said, "I never get tired of watching."

"I can see why," I said. "But why are the presses going now? The paper won't be ready until tonight."

"Probably printing one of the Sunday sections that get done days ahead." From a pile of discarded pages, some with blurred type, some too light to be legible, Harrison picked up one of the better ones. "Looks like the monthly business roundup," he said.

I nodded, recognizing it. Dad's news agency stories had sometimes run there.

Harrison must have realized what I was remembering, because he said, "Whenever I read one of your father's pieces, I learned something I needed to know."

"Dad used to say a story was worth writing if it made a difference to even one person."

"He was right," Harrison said. "You must have been pretty proud of him."

"I was."

The presses were moving so fast, pulling paper over rollers, pulling on my feelings.

"I was proud of my dad," I repeated. "I guess I still am."

Harrison's eyebrows went up in a question.

"I've been thinking a lot about him lately. Wondering who he actually was."

"I suppose kids don't ever really know their parents," Harrison said. "Certainly they don't know what their parents' lives are like outside their family."

"I used to think I knew him," I said.

Chunk, chunk, chunk, chunk, chunk,.
Blades sliced, folding metal arms flew up and down, and the streaming lines of paper became sections of the
Herald.

I said, "Ever since we started tracking down the Galinger thing, Dad has been on my mind, sort of hovering in the back."

"Maybe because you've gotten a taste of the kind of hard digging for stories that he did," Harrison said.

We continued to watch the hypnotizing presses. "He loved this," I said. "Newspapers, I mean."

"I do, too," Harrison said. "But they're changing. They've already altered in ways few people would have imagined a decade or two ago. Fewer, smaller pages. Shifting revenue streams."

"Because people are going to the Internet and things like wireless delivery," I said, thinking about how Mom already got her magazines on an electronic book reader that fit into her purse. "But the
Herald
's doing both, putting out a paper and an online edition."

"Yes. And nobody knows whether it will be a good partnership or one will kill the other."

I glanced at him quickly. "You don't mean that? That you think newspapers might truly go away?"

He looked serious and sad enough that I knew he did, but he answered, "Not really. I hope not. Hard copy serves functions that cyberspace just can't, not the least of which is giving readers the pleasure of holding a physical newspaper. Though," he added, "that can be a mixed pleasure." Grinning, he showed me his hands, which were smudged from the over-inked, discarded page he'd picked up.

I laughed with him, but the conversation left me uneasy. It added, actually, to a different uneasiness that had been increasingly nagging at me ever since I'd thought how the Munez kids were possibly being hurt. As we started walking again, I asked, "Harrison, what if we're wrong?"

"About?"

"About this story we're working on. What if we're so focused on digging up a crime that we're putting together a picture that's not real? That's just going to make trouble for people who haven't actually done anything wrong."

"If we don't find wrongdoing, we won't write a story."

I nodded. I knew that. But it didn't really answer my question, because I hadn't asked exactly what I meant. I tried again.

"Say we do find that Landin, Galinger, Yeager, and Garcia all did a lot of illegal things. They'll deserve getting found out. But there'll be other people who'll get dragged into it. Their families, who might not know anything about the illegal stuff."95

Harrison shook his head. "It's a good thing to keep in mind—to have an awareness of who's going to be touched by any story you write—but you can't let it stop you. Innocent people do get caught up in bad things."

His answer wasn't very satisfactory, and we didn't say any more as we made our way through a newspaper bundling area, across a loading dock, and finally to a small door that opened directly onto the employee parking lot. As Harrison opened it, I said, "What you told me about how the news business is changing. Maybe if my dad somehow could see it in a few years, he wouldn't know it anymore."

"Oh, I think he would," Harrison said. "How journalists do our jobs might change, but what we're doing won't. A country like ours—a democracy—depends on a population that knows what's going on, and people depend on us to find out and tell them."

Then, looking a little embarrassed, he said, "Enough of the civics lesson. You make me talk too much."

Still holding open the door, he, too, looked back toward the speeding, noisy, magical presses. He said, "Let's both hope those run a long, long time."

The address the phone book gave for Garcia wasn't a proper house at all, but an abandoned-looking, made-over garage facing a side street. I said to Harrison, "That doesn't look like a place where somebody's financial custodian would live."

"Nope," he agreed. "But the house that goes with it..."

That house was big and looked expensive. It faced a wide tree-lined street and had a
FOR SALE
sign anchored in the front lawn. And we both knew who had owned it.

"So now what?" I asked.

"Well." Harrison surveyed the neighborhood.

A commercial lawn crew was finishing up a job next door. Farther along, a teenager with a basketball practiced jump shots. On the corner opposite, a woman walked a terrier.

"Excuse me," Harrison called, and went over to her. I tagged after. "We're looking for a Mr. Garcia, but..."

"I don't think he lives around here," the woman said. "I know all my neighbors."

Leaning down to pet her dog, Harrison said, "These days most neighborhoods aren't so close-knit that people can say that. But I suppose houses around here don't go on the market very often. Though"—he gestured toward the
FOR SALE
sign—"it looks like somebody's moving."

"I wish it were just a move," the woman said. "That was Toby Yeager's place. Perhaps you read about him in the paper? Poor man—a city councilman, involved in all sorts of good causes—healthy one minute and then dead of a stroke the next."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Harrison said. "I suppose the renovated garage goes with the property?"

"Handyman's quarters," the woman said, "though the handyman cleared out right after Toby died. No loyalty, and the lawn was half a foot high before the real estate agency had somebody come cut it."

"Do you know the handyman's name?" Harrison asked. "Could it have been Garcia?"

"Oh!" the woman said. "I thought you were looking for one of our regular residents. Perhaps that was his name. I wouldn't know."

***

Ralph Galinger was delighted when Harrison called him early Wednesday morning requesting an interview.

"About my application for the vacant city council seat?" Galinger's booming voice carried well beyond the phone. "Sure! Sure! I'll be glad to fill you in on my vision for the town."

"Actually," Harrison said, "I've got a range of things I'd like to ask you about."

"Nothing to hide. I've got to be out your way for a lunch meeting. What if I stop in at the
Herald
about eleven a.m.?"

***

He strode into the newsroom exactly on time.

"You want me to disappear?" I asked Harrison, hoping the answer would be no.

"Why? This is your story, too," he said, rising to shake Galinger's hand and introduce me.

"Glad to meet you, young lady," Galinger said. "Always like to see an ambitious young person."

He told Harrison, "I'm not going to stay, though. I appreciate your wanting to do a piece on me. My first thought was that it'd be good publicity, and any businessman—or potential politician—appreciates that."

He waited for Harrison to chuckle along with him.

"But on reflection," he continued, "I've decided to ask you to hold off. While I'm glad to help out my town, I don't want anyone to think I'm capitalizing on Toby Yeager's death."

"I doubt anyone would jump to wrong conclusions, whatever coverage we give," Harrison said, his voice neutral. "But it would help if you'd fill me in on a couple of things. Please, take a seat."

Galinger sat—reluctantly, I thought. His gaze skimmed the desktop, where a copy of the
Herald
was turned to the sports pages. "You a golfer?" he asked Harrison. "Because anytime you'd like a round at my country club..."

"I'll keep the offer in mind," Harrison said. He picked up a pencil and notepad. "So I gather you did know Mr. Yeager?"

"Certainly. We served together on a couple of nonprofit boards, helped with fundraising efforts for the hospital, that sort of thing. Not that my good works begin to come close to Toby's. Now, if you want to write about someone, a piece on him—"

"We'll consider it," Harrison said. "But getting back to you. I was wondering if you had any other ties to Mr. Yeager. Business ties, perhaps?"

"No, no." Galinger shifted in his chair. "I'm just a builder, while Toby..." He paused, seeming to search his memory. "Why, I don't know that I ever heard what line he was in. Suppose I always assumed he had investments, maybe family money."

Harrison nodded, then said, "I meant to ask you about Galinger Construction. Running it must be a full-time job. You don't think that would conflict with the civic duties you want to take on?"

"Oh, I don't do much hands-on work with the business anymore," Galinger said easily. "And of course, if I do get on the council, I'll step down as head of my company for the duration—wouldn't want to give even the appearance of impropriety."

"Sounds as if you've thought things out," Harrison said. "So, as chair of the city's planning committee, Yeager never gave you special help on any of your projects?"

"No!" Galinger looked indignant. "Special help because he was my friend? Of course not!" Then his expression smoothed. "But I suppose that's a newsman's question you've got to ask."