The Fall-Down Artist (25 page)

How far would you have to dig, Dorsey asked himself, to find the connection between these lawyers and P. I. Stockman? Maybe just through the topsoil. Stockman could have his name on each of these notices and it would mean nothing. What would it prove? A high-powered lawyer like Personal Injury can pick up fourteen new clients on a slow day. The man could use a turnstile for an office door. Stockman's connection, without testimony, means nothing. Dorsey was reminded of how valuable Claudia Maynard could have been, and how, short of a subpoena, he would never speak to her again.

Of the thirteen remaining files, Dorsey was easily able to eliminate nine: workers in their mid-fifties, some with children and grandchildren. And all nine had undergone a series of back surgeries: disc removals and fusions. None met the Movement Together stereotype.

Unable to disregard any of the remaining four, Dorsey wondered if Claudia Maynard had helped eighteen workers to file fraudulent claims, not seventeen. The remaining claims were those of young single men with less than two years on the job. Two back strains, one cervical injury, and a worker claiming an acquired seizure disorder.

“Just a little off,” Dorsey said, watching the door open. “You look a little off for most people. But considering your usual appearance, you look like hell. You sleep in the park last night?”

Sam Hickcock slipped into the first chair to Dorsey's left. His tie was slightly loose at the throat and his moustache was wet with hangover sweats. His hair, which normally showed the results of careful blow-drying, was slick and combed straight back, obscuring the usual neat part line. Slumped in his chair, Hickcock tried to rub away the redness from his eyes.

“You came alone?” Dorsey searched the main floor for a cameraman. “How'd you know I was here? There was no tail on me this morning, I'm sure of it.”

Hickcock pulled closer to the table. “I was told you were here. Don't ask by whom. Privileged information.”

“Really?” Dorsey knew he would get nowhere by pressing. “Then
why
are you here? Let's try that one. Expecting a release for the media?”

“No, nothing like that. Just want to talk.”

It's not just his appearance that lacks its usual flair, Dorsey decided as he studied Hickcock. There's no command in his voice, none of his famous sense of urgency. And he has yet to try to startle me; he's not trying to put me on the defensive. “So talk to me. And take some of this.” Dorsey pushed the Styrofoam coffee cup across the table to Hickcock.

“I turned forty-five over the weekend.” Hickcock sipped at the coffee. “And I have reached the conclusion that life does not start at forty or forty-five. In fact, for me, it's the kiss of death.”

For a few moments, Dorsey allowed Hickcock's words to hang in the air. “You know I have nothing to say. My work is confidential.”

“I've been on your ass. I apologize.” Hickcock wiped his palms on a handkerchief. “Let me make it up to you.”

“How and why?” Dorsey asked. “Begin with why. If it's not good enough, you can ditch the how.”

Hickcock played at his tie knot before speaking. “Turned forty-five on Sunday. That's a milestone in my business. If you're not with the networks by forty, forty-five on the outside, you don't get in ever. So I'll never get in, right?”

“If you say so.”

“And I've been trying,” Hickcock said. “About two months ago I got my last rejection. You send demo tapes to New York, that's how it works. Most of the stuff I sent recently was coverage of Movement Together. I figured with the national interest, it was the way to play it. Figured I was in. But it was no good.”

“I feel bad for you.” Dorsey skimmed through the file folder in front of him. “What's this have to do with me? You'll stay in Pittsburgh and be a big frog in a little pond.”

“That's not all of it.” Hickcock nervously went through his pants pockets, as if searching for something. “A demotion of sorts came my way last Friday. Father Jancek, even with competition from the other stations and the papers, has been my story. The public thinks of the two of us together.

“Friday changed all that. I was pulled into the news director's office, and in there with him was the station manager. They started telling me what a great job I was doing, which is always a bad sign. So, as a reward for hard work, they were giving me an assistant, someone to split the duties with. Then we watch a demo tape of this girl they're bringing in from Cincinnati. Early twenties, blond and good-looking, with one of those tougher-than-a-guy stares they all have these days.”

So he's on his way out, Dorsey thought. Eased out of his job and soon out the door. No chance of getting anything better, and what he has is being pulled out from under him. You have the why, now see what he has to sell.

“So you're on thin ice. Tell me, how do you plan on saving your sweet ass, and how do I come out ahead?”

“From what I see, Movement Together has crossed the line.” Hickcock's words were pressured, showing signs of being rehearsed. “When your friend was killed, I mean. The other stuff they pulled, dead fish in bank vaults and stink bombs in department stores, those were attention-getting pranks. With the priest's popular support, and the harmless nature of the pranks, I had to slant the news their
way. Now something serious has happened, I can take a wider view of events, give both sides a little credit. And I can make you look good.”

“You, criticize Movement Together?” Dorsey asked. “Jesus, Hickcock, you invented these people. You're the one who first brought me to tears with all those poor folks out of work. You're in the middle of the race. How in hell can you change horses now?”

“Bit by bit. Until the new girl gets settled in, the priest is all mine. I'll shift my outlook a little, each night, at six and eleven. Put a little distance between us. By the time the girl gets here she'll have to fall in line.”

Dorsey rose from his seat and walked to the partition. Drumming his fingers against the glass, he watched a young secretary as she walked from desk to desk distributing memos. She wore a tight black skirt. Did she make Corso chomp down that much harder on his pipestem?

“Cut the shit,” Dorsey said, returning to his seat. “You're about to get canned. Some hot blonde is moving you out. It's only natural in your line of work, you being forty-five and not nearly as pretty. The best you can do is catch on as the noon weatherman. And you want to help me for all the trouble you've caused.” Dorsey's eyes zeroed in on Hickcock. “I have no fucking idea where this conversation is headed. What is it you want from me? Now or never.”

“We could be partners,” Hickcock said. “On a book. We could write one together.”

“A book? C'mon, please.”

“Really, I was in newspapers. Before I started with a station in Buffalo.”

“Good,” Dorsey said. “Good for you.”

Hickcock put his hands to his chest, imploring. “I can do this, believe me. I can do nonfiction.” Hickcock grinned.

“You're something,” Dorsey said. “No shit, you really are.”

“The project is already under way,” Hickcock said.
“For some time now I've been planning a book on Father Jancek and the movement. Nothing very ambitious, but a book on him would sell. Up to now the plan was to make him look like a saint. That's what the research indicated. But you've changed that.”

“Me?” Dorsey asked. “How how did I manage that?”

Hickcock wagged a finger at Dorsey. “Now it's my turn to tell you to cut the shit. You're on to them, and you've got a dead friend to prove it. There's something there, all right. I don't know what, but it's there. Look at it this way. I put together a nice little book about the priest and the poor folks he helps, it'll be published with no problem. But I won't get any recognition from it. It's like writing the biography of the quarterback who won the Super Bowl. In a week it's old news. But if we work together, if you give me what you have, I can put together an exposé that will make the best-seller list. The two of us could split fifty-fifty and sit around autographing copies. And for me the station could go fuck itself.”

Dorsey tipped back in his chair and studied the ceiling. Of course you can't trust him, he told himself, but you can use him. For what he may know about the priest and maybe Stockman too. To get the justice Al may end up paying for, the justice you want.

“Worth thinking about,” Dorsey said, dropping the chair back on all fours. “But that's about the best I can do for now. From you I need something, an act of good faith. Show me your intentions, an example of what I can expect.”

“In the bag.” Hickcock rose to leave. “Catch me on the six o'clock show. You'll be impressed.”

“Maybe.” Dorsey watched Hickcock open the door. “I'm still interested in knowing how you knew I was here.”

Hickcock shook his head and left.

At twenty minutes past six that evening, the news anchor turned to his left and introduced Sam Hickcock, Channel
Three's investigative reporter. The camera panned along the news desk to Hickcock, who looked like his old self, and he and the anchor traded a few seconds of small talk.

Sitting at his office desk, Dorsey pushed away his dinner plate and settled back into the swivel chair, sipping at a mug of coffee. Let's hear it, he thought. Show me the change.

Hickcock quickly recapped Russie's murder and indicated that the police were unable to locate Edward Damjani, who was wanted for questioning. Next, Hickcock introduced a film clip of an interview of Father Jancek held earlier that afternoon. The location was a food bank in Ambridge. As they conversed, the camera swept the room, focusing on blue-collar men and women accepting sacks of groceries from two union reps standing behind the closed lower half of a Dutch door.

To Hickcock's question as to whether or not Movement Together officials would cooperate with the police in finding Damjani, Father Jancek, in an even voice, replied that he and the other steering committee members had already been contacted by the Pittsburgh and Pennsylvania State Police organizations and had shown complete cooperation. “However,” the priest added, “we can only tell what we know. And that, I'm afraid, is very little. Ed is a Movement Together member, but his alleged involvement in any crime is not a matter for my comment. Also, let the term ‘alleged' be stressed. My personal knowledge of Ed leads me to believe there is some mistake.”

Ed, Dorsey thought, his personal knowledge of Ed. Yeah, priest, there's a mistake, all right, and you've made it. Just a matter of my finding it.

Hickcock reminded Father Jancek of reports that Mr. Carroll Dorsey, who had witnessed the killing, was investigating Movement Together. He asked the priest if he knew of any connection between the attack and the investigation. Hickcock also asked Father Jancek to comment on the basis of the investigation.

“Your first question doesn't deserve the dignity of a response;
what it suggests is simply ludicrous. For the second question, I propose you ask that question of Mr. Dorsey. Or to his unnamed employers. As I understand it, that is a matter which Mr. Dorsey is unwilling to discuss.”

Dorsey watched the interview scene dissolve and Hickcock reappear at the news desk. Crap, Dorsey told himself. Hickcock didn't press the guy. Two simple-ass questions and he gets two stock answers, and the priest is allowed to remain serene, his feathers unruffled. This is a change in direction?

Hickcock faced the camera and continued. “Despite Father Jancek's minimizing of Edward Damjani's involvement with Movement Together, Mr. Damjani participated in, or perhaps instigated, an earlier altercation with Carroll Dorsey at a Movement Together rally in Midland. The tape you are about to see was provided by our sister station WPGT. In it you will see Mr. Damjani's actions of a week ago.”

The tape was of the Midland Union Hall rally, and Dorsey watched an image of himself angling through the crowd. Jeez, TV does make you look heavier, he thought, squeezing an inch of fat at his hip. The camera angle was from the rear of the room, and Damjani could be seen closing in on Dorsey in slow motion, Damjani's head and shoulders above the throng. Watching the tape, Dorsey felt a tingle run up his spine and rooted for the taped Dorsey to get away. Shoving his way down the center aisle, Damjani pushed people aside, adding to the sense of menace. Damjani reached across several heads and took hold of Dorsey's collar. As Dorsey began to struggle, the tape froze and the camera closed in on Damjani's face, twisted in rage.

“This,” Hickcock said as the picture dissolved, “is Edward Damjani.”

Choreography, Dorsey thought, paced well for dramatic effect. The camera as image maker. You should hire this guy for a publicity agent, he told himself.

Hickcock returned to the screen to make some more
small talk with the anchor, who now captured the camera's attention.

“Well,” Dorsey said to the television, “you were impressive, just like you promised. But I still don't trust you.”