Yesterday's News

you familiar with it?”
    Her accent said central midwest, but she pronounced the seaport like a lifelong resident. Nush-ar-burr.
    “I don’t think I’ve ever seen the paper. Nasharbor’s just south of Fall River , right?”
    “Between Fall River and the Rhode Island border. Population 125,000, most of them conservative, working class, and Catholic. Portuguese fishing poor, Irish industrial poor.”
    Rust spoke in a podium voice, as though she expected me to challenge her demographics.
    I said, “Does the paper figure into this?”
    “Yes and no. Do you know much about newspapers?”
    “Just through Mo—Professor Katzen.”
    “Well, the Beacon is a typical small city daily with typical attitudes about who to protect and expose. It doesn’t like its reporters looking into certain things.”
    “Like what?”
    YESTERDAY’S NEWS “Like pornography.”
    “Pornography. Not pleasant, but also not illegal.” She sucked in her cheeks and said, “How about kiddie porn, Mr. Cuddy. That strikes even the Supreme Court as illegal.”
    “Kiddie porn in Nasharbor. Is this what we’re talking about here?”
    “Look, do you want to hear what my problem is or don’t you?”
    “I’m sorry. Why don’t you tell me without my interrupting.”
    Rust took a deep breath and broke eye contact. “About three months ago, I was covering a Saturday night. They give the younger... the newer reporters the weekends. There was a state police raid just outside the city limits. The staties turned up some videocassettes and ‘photo essays.’ The weekend editor was swamped, and I volunteered to go out on the story. I interviewed one of the men they arrested, and he told me that a Nasharbor cop was on the take and had protected the clearinghouse for all the stuff.” When she didn’t continue, I said, “Did the Beacon ever run your story?”
    She laughed, a bitter edge on it. “Sure. They ran a story under my byline about how the state police had busted up a ring of porn peddlers at the outskirts of Nasharbor and wasn’t it wonderful that all this filth hadn’t penetrated the best little city on the eastern seaboard.”
    “What about the corruption angle?”
    “They buried it. Said they wouldn’t print it unless I revealed my confidential source.”
    That didn’t sound right. “The paper wouldn’t run the story without the name of the guy you talked to in it?”
    “No, no. The editor wouldn’t run the story without me telling him, that editor, the name of the source.” I watched her for a minute.
    “What’s the matter?” she said.
    “I guess I’m thinking that if I’m the editor involved, I might want to know your source’s name before I let fly at the local cops.”
    The cheeks imploded again. “Maybe I’m wasting my time here.”
    “Ms. Rust, I just don’t see where I fit in.”
    She toned down. “He’s dead.”
    “Who?”
    “My source. They killed him to shut him up.”
    “Who killed him?”
    Her eyes glowed fanatically. “The cops, who else?” Uh-oh. “Ms. Rust, cops don’t—”
    “I am wasting my time.”
    “Ms. Rust, hear me out, okay? Reciprocal courtesy?”
    She folded her arms but remained rigid in the chair. Rust was going to hear me out alright. She just wasn’t going to listen. I decided to give it a try anyway.
    “Cops don’t have to kill people like your source to shut them up. Guys like your source are usually involved in action the cops know about. It’s risky to kill somebody, especially when there’s a motive to kill. It’s a lot safer just to pressure the guy, tell him if he rolls over on us, we turn up some new ‘evidence’ and nail him for something that sends him away for heavy time. Like maybe to Walpole State Prison or Cedar Junction or whatever the hell they call it now, where all sorts of bad things happen to guys who rat on other people.”
    She smiled sarcastically. “You said ‘we.’ ”
    “I’m sorry?”
    “When you were talking about cops just now, you used ‘we’ and ‘us.’ You identify with them, don’t you?”
    “I was military police, and I’ve worked with all kinds of law enforcement over the years. I suppose I do identify with them. That doesn’t mean I think they’re all good scouts. It does mean I don’t easily see even the bad scouts doing something stupid.”
    She unfolded her arms and hunched forward. “Look, Mr. Cuddy, I’ve gotten no support on this. None! From anyone! My editor thinks I’m a loose cannon, I can’t sleep,