The New Black Mask (No 4)

Joseph L. Koenig The Scoop

For the past fifteen years Joseph Koenig has mitten true crime articles for pulp magazines. “The Scoop” is his first published fiction, except for what he describes as “a couple of very short pieces for a pulp that went belly-up”

There are two sources for “The Scoop.” The plot is based on a true story that circulated some years ago involving the female editor of a true crime magazine. The technique was inspired by Ring Lardner’s “Haircut.”

Mr. Koenig’s first novel will be published this year.

So this is the new fella. You’re only an hour late’s what gives it away. Solly mentioned he was sending you up. Must be he still has a soft spot for the Lincoln County bureau, ’cause we get all the eager beavers. Just lift your feet and let me sweep underneath a bit. The newsies don’t usually start dropping by till happy hour’s done.

Bet you didn’t know Solly won his stripes here. Before he got his legs broke he was a real eager beaver himself. If he wasn’t waking the DA for a perp’s middle initial, he’d be snatching some stiff’s picture right off the crate to run in the obits. Else you’d find him down to the sheriff’s office collecting the john list from Maybry’s vice dicks. Judge Walker okayed seventeen divorces the year he done that and in a county the size of Lincoln it’s some kind of record. Lot of folks’d shot him if they got the chance, but Solly passed the blame like shit through a goose. Said it’s a reporter’s job to print all the facts and let the chips fall where they may. Solly’s one fella still has principles.

He put in for cityside during the big to-do what followed and just like that he’s the Tattler’s state editor. So far as I know, he’s only been back once, for the Rheinhold murder case. It was a regular tragedy, that was. Nutty Henry Rheinhold, one night when the folks was asleep he hacked ’em all to shreds, his pa, the missus, his granddad, Becky, and Steve, even the cat. Covered up what he done by torching the place and damned if he didn’t lose the barn and the henhouse too.

The funny thing is Henry was maybe the sanest one of all them Rheinholds. Half the time you’d swear the boy was better’n normal. During the Optimists’ picnic Judge Walker’s granddaughter fell in the Clear River directly above the dam and Henry was the only fella there with presence of mind to jump in and paddle the little tyke back to shore. Walker was so grateful he offered Henry money, a car, anything, you name it. All Henry wanted was a golf ball, so he could crack it open on a rock and play with the liquid center inside.

Anyways, after the big fire at the Rheinholds, Maybry counted up the bodies, and when he seen Henry’s wasn’t none of ’em it didn’t take a genius to figure out what must’ve happened. He scouted around till he found the boy camped out in the sugar bush back of where the barn used to be. Buck naked and baying at the moon, Maybry said. He wrapped him in a blanket and brung him in and booked him for murder, five counts’ worth. Judge Walker got on the horn to the state institution and warned the docs he’d be sending over a live one soon as the legal formalities was out of the way. Keeping him out of the penitentiary was the least he could do, after all.

The Lincoln County bureau was a one-man show back then, and when Pris Johnson, the new gal, heard they’d been an arrest, she couldn’t get to the jailhouse quick enough to see what’s in it for her. Maybry lived in fear of the Tattler, so he give her the run of the place, and Pris had a field day with Henry. The crazy dished out all the poop on how the cherubs and archangels was asking to see the folks and that’s why he’d sent them on up ahead, and then he wanted to know what that old Speed Graphic of Pris’s was for. Pris showed him all right. She went down low with her flash and shot straight up on him, so’s his puss caught the light like he was the devil incarnate. Solly hung the pix over the masthead and circulation topped out for weeks.

When Judge Walker got a look at the Tattler, he like to throw a fit. Had Pris Johnson hauled into court and told her she’d good as got Henry killed. What with all the ink, there’s no way he could sneak the boy off to the laughing academy, where he belonged. The DA’d jump-start the chair before he picked a jury. Pris shrugged and said she was sorry, but she was just doing her job. Walker done the same and give her thirty days for contempt.

Now, it’s no big secret how Solly’d made state editor, and it wasn’t his sunny disposition or that pug-ugly kisser he’s wearing today that done it. What he had going for him was even features and Sue McDonough, the publisher’s old lady, who he was doing weekends and holiday nights on the foreign desk. Sue was real upset over what happened to Pris. Solly told her not to worry; no hick judge was going to clap one of his top legmen in the slammer.

Soon’s he put the Friday p.m. edition to bed, Solly hustled himself up to Lincoln. He moved pretty good before his hips was busted, and by suppertime he was banging on Judge Walker’s door saying, “We gotta talk.”

His Honor’d been looking forward to chatting with Solly, so his answer is, “You bet. Only thing,” he says, “I wasn’t expecting company, let’s do it at the courthouse.” When Solly comes in his chambers, Walker’s got on his robes and he ain’t interested in a lecture about the First Amendment. All he knows is Pris Johnson has just about got Henry Rheinhold legally lynched by the state and someone’s gotta pay.

“I could care less,” Solly tells him right off. “This ain’t Russia; they got freedom of the press in this country in case you ain’t heard. Gimme back my reporter.”

Walker turns up his hearing aid ’cause he don’t believe he’s getting this straight. Only he is, of course, and while Solly’s still warming up Walker tells him he’s holding him in contempt of court, just like Pris. Solly’s trying to top that one when Maybry brings him down to the lockup and takes away his Swiss army knife and his shoelaces.

Solly’s pinching hard to a dime, but Maybry tells him it’s too late to make bond so forget about trying and ain’t it a shame he has to spend the whole weekend in jail, is there anything he’d like besides a cake with a file for the filling. It suddenly hits Solly where he’s stuck at, and he’s feeling so low he just dives on the cot and shuts his eyes. And he don’t open ’em again till he feels a poke in his ribs.

Solly thinks it’s the Tattler’s lawyer come to spring him, but when he rolls over he’s looking at the most wild-eyed creature he’s ever had the misfortune to see. It’s a fella, he finally decides, and sort of familiar looking at that, but it’s hard to say who ’cause his face is streaked with dirt, and his cheeks are running with blood where he’s dug them open with fingernails like daggers, and his hair is matted down over his eyes. Top of everything else, he’s babbling in a whole bunch of tongues, none of which Solly is acquainted with.

Seeing as how they’re bunking together, Solly figures it ain’t a bad idea to make friends. “What’s a nice fella like you doin’ in a place like this?” he tries for openers.

“What’m I doing here? I’m out of my mind, can’t you see?” To prove it he cracks his head against the bars so hard Solly’s begins to throb. “I’m nuts, and if Maybry’d notice he’d take me out of this miserable dungeon and put me in a nice clean hospital where I can play knock rummy and watch ‘General Hospital’ to my heart’s content.”

“Is that all?” Solly says. “Well then, what’s the problem?”

“The problem’s that I brung my folks to their heavenly reward and now the goddamn Tattler’s on my case and I can’t get justice nohow. They’re fixing to give me the hot squat. But I’m cuckoo, ain’t I? If I can only find a way to show ’em.”

Then he cools off just like that and hunkers down on the cot and wraps a paw around Solly’s shoulders. Solly don’t care for the smell, but he don’t push him away either ’cause Henry Rheinhold, I forgot to mention, is one very large boy. And then Henry says in a voice as smooth as a shrink’s, “But enough about my troubles... What brings you here?”

You can put your feet down now.