The Most Beautiful Girl in Cuba - Chanel Cleeton Page 0,35
he was beaten. Prisoners in the surrounding cells heard him screaming and crying the night of his death. His body is being kept at the jail in Guanabacoa outside of Havana. As the top-ranking American in Havana, Consul General Lee has the power to investigate this further, to order an autopsy to determine the cause of death. If Ruiz was murdered, this could be just the thing to push for General Weyler’s recall.”
“And what’s your interest in this? I thought you said you weren’t involved with the Cuban cause.”
“I told you my motives. Just trying to help a friend. There’s no need to be so suspicious. Give that story to Will, and it might open some doors for you.”
“And see Mr. Ruiz avenged, of course.”
“That, too.” A gleam enters his gaze. “Weyler is a problem. He is hell-bent on destroying the island to win this war, and he’s doing a damned good job of it. He needs to be recalled to Spain. Maybe this is what it will take to do it. You and I both know the press needs a good story. Give Will this one.”
“You’re a terrible cynic, aren’t you?”
“No, Grace, just a realist.” He looks at me for one long moment, and then with an incongruously jaunty, “Enjoy your date,” leaves me standing in front of Delmonico’s private dining room, staring at his retreating back.
* * *
—
Joseph Pulitzer is already waiting for me when I finally enter the private dining room, and he frowns for a moment while I offer a poorly mangled apology for my tardiness.
“What news do you have for me?” he asks without preamble.
For as much as I know this is normal practice in the newsrooms, and Hearst certainly wouldn’t hesitate to use me in the same manner, the subterfuge of this arrangement with Pulitzer feels wrong. At the same time, an opportunity to be taken seriously at the World isn’t a chance I’m likely to get again. Despite Hearst’s attempts to close the gap between them—their circulation battle continues with Pulitzer nearing an audience of a million Americans, and Hearst not too far behind him—there are many, including me, who hold the World’s journalistic standards in higher regard than Hearst’s more dubious ones at the Journal.
I offer Pulitzer some tidbits, stories we’re working on, a few that I have a feeling are pilfered pieces from Hearst’s spies in the World’s newsroom.
“And what about Cuba?” Pulitzer asks. “What has Hearst learned about the situation down there? They’ve arrested one of my correspondents—Sylvester Scovel—for communicating with the insurgents. He’s being held in a prison in Cuba. He’s in grave danger.”
I’ve read the World’s stories on Scovel’s imprisonment; the degree to which General Weyler seems ready and eager to punish American journalists in the country has become alarming, highlighting the importance of an independent press. And if what Rafael just told me about Ricardo Ruiz is true, it sounds like the Spanish have no problem killing American citizens they deem to be a threat.
“Mr. Hearst is concerned about the safety of his correspondents as well,” I reply.
Ricardo Ruiz is exactly the sort of story I imagine Pulitzer would love for his paper, and yet, I can’t bring it upon myself to share the information with him. Seeing the story in the World would make Rafael suspicious, and I can’t square the violation of his trust.
Not to mention, I want it for myself.
“We’ve also heard troubling things of Weyler’s treatment of the press,” I add.
It’s a bland statement, and an obvious one considering the number of journalists Weyler has expelled from the country and the lock he’s kept on outgoing wires, but it seems to satisfy Pulitzer, who does indeed look concerned about his reporter’s fate.
“Is that all then, Miss Harrington?” he asks, the displeasure in his voice clear.
The feeling that I’ve disappointed him again is overwhelming. It’s been drilled in me since I started working at the Journal: you do what it takes to get the story, to get ahead. For all that Hearst has given me a job on his staff, I’ve yet to truly be taken seriously as a journalist, to have the chance for my writing to stand on its own merit rather than whatever “stunt” angle Hearst can exploit. Now it feels like I’m losing my chance with Pulitzer, too.
“I confess, I thought I saw a bit of myself in you when we met that day in my office,” Pulitzer says. “When you told me how badly you wanted to be a