White Collar Girl (37 page)

•   •   •

I
t was half past seven, the local polls had closed and the city room was working itself into a white-hot frenzy. There were runners, who couldn't get through on the telephones, making their rounds to the wire services and the City News Bureau before coming to us and the other papers with updates and counts that the precinct committeemen and election judges had given them. According to the latest counts, Nixon had thirty-two percent of Cook County with more Republican votes pouring in from Will, Lake, DeKalb, DuPage and other counties across the state. The Democrats in Cook County—which was really the only county capable of changing the game—seemed to be asleep. By eight o'clock we were sending out for sandwiches and putting on fresh pots of coffee while the Republicans were whooping it up, thinking they had it in the bag.

We were all working like mad, trying to keep up, when the polls started slowing down. But still the Cook County Democrats were eerily silent. We hadn't seen a runner in the city room for nearly an hour and the phone lines were open. No one was calling in with numbers. I took advantage of the lull in the action and told the others I was stepping out to get some air.

Instead I stopped into a liquor store and headed down to 11th and State to see my old pal Danny Finn.

“Four Roses,” he said, holding the bottle of bourbon. “What's this for? And what the hell are you doing here on election night?”

“You once said that Four Roses was your favorite.” I grinned. “Oh, and I
do
need a favor.”

He smiled. “You know I'd do anything for you. You don't have to ply me with liquor. Though I'm damn glad you did.” He laughed and cocked his head to the side. “So tell me, what do you need?”

“It's—I—It's a . . .” A sense of vertigo welled up inside me. My head went fuzzy. I couldn't focus.

Danny sensed me struggling to get the words out. “What is it?”

I cleared my throat and started again. “Do you remember a long time ago when I asked you about that hit-and-run?”

He squinted as if trying to jog his memory.

“It was a few years ago,” I said. “The accident happened back in ‘53? State and Grand, near the subway stop?”

“Oh, yeah. I think so. Yeah, I sorta remember something about that.”

“Well, I need you to pull the police report.”

“Didn't we already do that?”

“No, because you said it had happened too long ago. There was no point.”

“So why pull it now? Now it's been even longer—we're talking seven years ago.”

“I know. But I need to see the report for myself. Please? It's important.”

He hesitated for a minute and grabbed his pencil and a pad of paper. “Okay. What's the name? I'll go take a look.”

I paused. My heart was tight as a fist.

“The name?”

“Eliot. Eliot Walsh.”

Danny started to write it down and then stopped, set his pencil down and looked at me. “Oh, shit. No.”

I nodded. “The victim was my brother. I've never seen the police report,” I said.

“Oh, Jordan, I'm sorry.”

“They never caught the guy, and I just want to . . .”

“It's okay. You don't have to explain.” He went to a shelf lined with thick binders, papers protruding, jutting out along the tops. He pulled out one with a tattered black cover and leafed through it, searching and turning pages before he closed that one and reached for another. He did the same thing with two other volumes before he found what he was looking for. “Okay. Here we go. Looks like they've got this case in the inactive files.”

“What's an inactive file?”

“Well, it's not closed, but they're not actively pursuing it.” He disappeared down the hall, and I lit a cigarette, drawing in deep puffs to keep me calm. The radio on his desk was crackling about the poll watchers stationed at more than three thousand precincts throughout the city. But the radio was soon drowned out by the commotion at 11th and State. From the open door at the stairwell I could hear scuffles from the floors below, thugs and prostitutes being brought in, shouting at the cops, the cops shouting back. I reached over to turn up the volume on the radio, and my fingertips came away dirty.

Eventually Danny came back with a manila folder. I had already started my third, or maybe it was my fourth cigarette. I set it in the ashtray and opened the file. There was a yellow copy of the police report. I could see places in the corners where the blue carbon had bled through from the original and saturated the tissue-like paper. I reached for my cigarette again and propped it in my mouth while I read. The detective who filed the report was Curtis Norton. I'd never heard of him.

“Do you know this detective?” I asked.

“He's not with the force anymore. He resigned a while ago. Before I started here.”

I continued reading. The report mentioned that pieces of a broken headlight were found, but they weren't able to match them to the make of a car. There were tread marks, too, but they led to inconclusive findings. As I was grinding out my cigarette, I noticed that sections on the second page had been crossed out with a marker so black and thick it was impossible to see what was underneath. “What's this?” I asked. “Why did they cross all this out?”

Danny looked at the report and shrugged. “Probably somebody got some information wrong. It happens.”

I held the carbon copy to the light, hoping to make out some of it. “Where's the original?”

He reached for the folder and leafed through the pages himself.

“I need to see the original,” I said. My voice was getting shaky.

Danny kept going through the file. Finally he looked up at me and sighed. “I'm sorry, but that's all that's in here.”

“They're hiding something. There's something in that report.”

“Oh, c'mon.” He gave off a slight laugh. “That's ridiculous, Jordan. That's just your imagination running wild. You see what a mess this place is. Things—papers, files get misplaced all the time.”

I clasped both sides of my head, vaguely aware of other people in the station looking at me. “How can something like that just disappear?”

“I'm not sure what happened to the original. Maybe it got lost or someone spilled coffee on it, or who knows what happened, but it looks like it's gone. That's why they make carbon copies in the first place.”

“It's got to be here somewhere. I need to see that report. You don't understand. My brother was investigating a story. A big
story that ran all the way to the governor's office. I know you're going to think this is crazy, but I'm telling you, they did it on purpose. They killed him.”

“Shsssh. C'mon, now. You gotta get a grip.” He reached across the table and held my trembling hands. “I'll look again for the original. I'll try to track it down, but . . .” He shook his head.

“But what?”

“But if what you're saying is true, that original report may be missing for a reason.”

I left 11th and State with my head spinning, like the cyclone of dead leaves on the sidewalk formed by the wind. My mind was swirling, wondering who or where I could turn to next. That's when I thought of Susan Hirsh, the girl Eliot had been seeing at the time of his death. I wondered if I could even find her. I wondered if she still lived in Chicago. What if she'd gotten married and had a new name?

All this was heavy on my mind when I went back to the city room only to find a sudden influx of Democratic votes pouring in from Cook County. Now the scales were tilting toward Kennedy. Still, though, they hadn't called the election. We waited up half the night while more Democratic numbers came in, mostly from Cook County precincts.

Morning came and Americans still didn't know who their new president was. It wasn't until almost noon on Wednesday that it became official. John F. Kennedy had won. Illinois—more specifically, Chicago—had turned the tide. But within an hour the Republicans were whispering and then outright crying foul play.

While my colleagues were covering the post-election roundups, I went to the telephone directory and looked up Susan Hirsh. I was shocked by how easily I found her. She lived at Fullerton and Clark, not far from my apartment. Susan and Eliot hadn't been dating for all that long when he died, and my parents
and I had met her for the first time at the funeral. None of us had seen her since. She was understandably surprised to hear from me but agreed to have lunch with me the next day.

I almost didn't recognize her when she first came into the Blackhawk. She actually spotted me first, hovering near the bar and cigarette machine.

The first thing she said was, “You look so much like him.”

I smiled. People always told me that.

The maître d' showed us to our table, a booth toward the back. Susan and I made small talk about the elections. Then I asked how she was, and she told me she was a secretary for an executive at an insurance company. Until I mentioned it, she'd had no idea that I was a reporter.

Susan Hirsh was a striking woman, meticulously dressed in a smart suit. She had glossy brown hair and pronounced dimples. I could understand my brother's attraction to her. She seemed a bit fidgety though, worrying her strand of pearls while gazing about the restaurant. The waiter at the next table was preparing their signature spinning salad bowl, and she seemed captivated, watching the server turn the bowl on a bed of ice while pouring in dollops of each ingredient with a showman's flourish. After he presented the salad, Susan focused her attention back on me, and I got to the point.

“So I've been thinking a lot about Eliot lately,” I said. “You know they never did catch the guy who hit him.”

“I'm sorry to hear that.” She went back to worrying her necklace. “I always wondered . . .”

“I know this is going to sound crazy,” I said, picking at my food, “but I don't think it was an accident.”

Her fingers froze. “What do you mean?”

“I think he was murdered.” The words stuck in my throat. It would never be easy to say that.

Her eyes grew wide. She didn't speak.

“I know he was working on an important story and I think that had something to do with his death. And I'm wondering if there's anything you remember that—”

“Me?” Her fingers started twitching against her pearls again.

“Did he say anything to you about the article he was working on?”

She set her silverware across her plate and dabbed her mouth with her napkin. “Eliot didn't talk to me about his work. You know we weren't seeing each other all that long. Honestly, I didn't even know him all that well.”

“But you were together for four or five months, weren't you?”

“Like I said, Jordan, I didn't really know him all that well. It wasn't like he confided in me.”

“Are you sure? Are you positive he didn't mention something about someone threatening him or if—”

“Listen, I can certainly appreciate what you're trying to do, but I don't know anything that would help you.” She reached for her handbag and took out her wallet. “Let me get this,” she said as she placed five dollars on the table even though we hadn't gotten our check yet. “I'm sorry I can't help you.” She got up and rested her hand on my shoulder. “I know you want answers, Jordan, but sometimes there's no explanation for what happens. Sometimes an accident is just an accident.”

•   •   •

I
was disappointed that nothing more came of my lunch with Susan, and I didn't buy what she'd said. Maybe an accident was sometimes just an accident, but I was more and more certain that wasn't true in this case.

I sat at my desk and contemplated my assignment. Now that people were questioning the election results, I was looking into
the voting machines that had recently been introduced. People were coming forward, saying they were confusing and difficult to use. I made some calls, talked to some election judges and poll watchers. Some claimed their voters, especially in the poorer precincts, were actually afraid they'd get stuck inside the booths.

While I was waiting for some callbacks and confirmations, I opened my attaché case and pulled out the list of names and numbers I'd jotted down after going through my brother's notes. I made some calls, getting one wrong number, one hang-up, one deceased. Finally I reached Dale Merkin. Merkin was a former meat inspector with the Department of Agriculture. Now he ran a dairy farm over in Rockford. He agreed to see me.

The next day I borrowed my father's car and drove two hours west of the city to meet Merkin at his dairy farm. He was wearing a plaid peacoat over his bib overalls, along with thick rubber boots. It was cold that day, and I wished I'd dressed a little warmer. He walked me through the dairy farm, with its silos and big red barn, the pungent scent of manure in the air. A wooden fence enclosed an endless pasture that I imagined was lush and green in the summertime. The cows occasionally stuck their heads through the wooden slots, straining at the grass on the other side. I'd never seen so many cows before, and he had all different kinds—red and white Ayrshires, brown and white Guernseys, and the black and white Holstein-Friesians.

“So you say you want to talk about horsemeat being pumped into the system. Well, I'm afraid you're a little late.”

“What? What do you mean?”

“That was going on back in the early 1950s. 1951, '52, even up to '53. But not anymore. Not since Governor Stratton took office seven years ago. His hands are clean. But Stevenson”—he laughed as he reached through the fence to give one of the Holsteins a
rubdown—“his office knew what was going on. We called him
Adlai Horsemeat
. Yeah, his office was in on it. And they weren't alone. And you can quote me on that.”

“Who were they working with?” I was writing as we walked, trying my best to avoid the piles of cow dung.