up in a not-to-worry fashion.
“It’s all right. It was just a thought. I’ll see them tonight and thought it might speed things along. You know, save the postage.”
I didn’t know what I was saying but I was already lacking confidence in my decision and wanted to back away.
“Well,” the clerk said, “I don’t really see the harm in it. I’ve got their paperwork in an envelope ready to go. I guess I can trust you as much as the mailman.”
He smiled and now I smiled back.
“The same guy signs our checks, right?”
“Uncle Sam,” he said brightly. “Be right back.”
He disappeared into a back office and I looked around the front desk and lobby, halfway expecting Thorson and Backus and Walling to jump out from behind the columns and scream. “See? We can’t trust your kind!”
But nobody jumped out from anywhere and soon the clerk was back with a manila envelope he handed across the counter to me with my own hotel bill.
“Thanks,” I said. “They’ll appreciate it.”
“No problem,” the clerk said. “Thank you for choosing to stay with us, Agent McEvoy.”
I nodded and shoved the envelope into my computer bag like a thief, then headed to the door.
34
The plane was climbing toward thirty thousand feet before I had a chance to open the envelope. There were several pages of bills. One itemized breakdown for each agent’s room. This was what I counted on and I immediately was pulled to the bill with Thorson’s name on it and began to study the phone charges.
The bill showed no calls to the Maryland area code, 301, where Warren lived. However, there was a call to the 213 area code. Los Angeles. I knew it was not inconceivable that Warren had gone to L.A. to pitch his story to his former editors. He then could have written it from there. The call had been made at 12:41 A.M. Sunday, just an hour or so after Thorson had apparently checked into the hotel in Phoenix.
After using my Visa card to pop the air phone from the seatback in front of me, I slid the credit card through and punched in the number listed on the hotel bill. The call was answered immediately by a woman who said, “New Otani Hotel, may I help you?”
Momentarily confused, I recovered before she hung up and asked for the room of Michael Warren. I was connected but there was no answer. I realized it was too early for him to be in his room. I depressed the receiver button and called information to get the number of the Los Angeles Times. When I called that number I asked for the newsroom and then asked for Warren. I was connected.
“Warren,” I said.
It was a statement, a fact. A verdict. For Thorson as well as Warren.
“Yes, can I help you?”
He didn’t know who it was.
“I just wanted to say fuck you, Warren. And to let you know, someday I’m going to write about all this and what you did is going in the book.”
I didn’t know exactly what I was saying. I only knew that I felt the need to threaten him and had nothing to do it with. Only words.
“McEvoy? Is this McEvoy?” He paused to inject a sarcastic laugh. “What book? I’ve already got my agent on the street with a proposal. What’ve you got? Huh? What’ve you got? Hey, Jack, do you even have an agent?”
He waited for an answer and I only had rage. I was silent.
“Yeah, I thought so,” Warren said. “Look, Jack, you’re a nice guy and all, and I’m sorry how this worked out. I really am. But I was in a jam and I just couldn’t take that job anymore. This was my ticket out. I took it.”
“You fucking asshole! It was my story.”
I said it too loud. Though I was by myself in a row of three seats, a man across the aisle looked at me angrily. He was seated with an elderly woman who I guessed was his mother and who had never heard such language. I turned away toward the window. There was only blackness out there. I put my hand over my other ear so I could hear Warren’s reply above the steady thrum of the plane. His voice was low and steady.
“The story belongs to whoever writes it, Jack. Remember that. Whoever writes it, it’s their story. You want to go up against me, that’s fine. Then write the fuckin’ story instead of calling me up and whining