Coldwater Revenge, James Ross [books for 9th graders txt] 📗

Gauss.” Joe clamped the phone between his shoulder and ear and dumped the contents of a manila envelope onto his desk. “I’m sure you’ve given him my messages, Sister.” He picked up a photograph and held it in front of his face. “Here’s another one. I’ve got a pack of reporters outside my office snarling for meat on that terrorist the State Troopers caught making bio-weapons in Coldwater. If the Monsignor wants to keep his pansy priest out of it, he should come to the phone and give me a good reason.”

* * *

Tom lay in bed mulling Joe’s query. That’s how things work in my world, brother. How do they work in yours? Stifling the temptation to come up with a snappy punch line, he turned his thoughts to the question of what cops and lawyers had in common. Answers came swiftly: bias to action, power, status, the choice to be a wolf rather than a sheep. Fear of losing that power—or worse, being ousted from the pack.

Keep asking questions.

How do cops and lawyers react to opportunities to get what they want? How do they react to threats to what they have? Answer: the same way everyone else does—pursue the opportunities and neutralize the threats using the tools at hand. He looked at his bandaged appendages. What tools do you have left, Tommy?

When the candy striper came by, he asked her to help him dial the Coldwater Gazette. She placed the phone in his hand while it rang. Thompson answered. “Gazette. Wha-da-ya got for me?”

“A Pulitzer. If you’re interested.”

“Morgan?” The newspaper owner sounded harried and breathless. “Can I get back to you on Monday? All hell’s been breaking loose around here this week. I’ve got ten extra pages to get to the printer before midnight.”

“Fairy tales of terrorists foiled? How about an exclusive on the real story?”

He could hear Thompson’s breath. “Look Morgan, you don’t strike me as a nut. But, like I said, all hell’s breaking loose right now. I haven’t got time…”

“Coldwater Hospital, room 203. You want that Pulitzer? Come get it. Otherwise I’m giving it to the Times. They don’t need one more. But they’ll know how to run a story like this so they get one.”

Thompson growled, “This better be for real.”

“It is.”

“Let me just put this edition to bed, then I’ll get over there. 203’s the ICU, right? Who’ve they got there?”

“Me.”

* * *

Thompson’s eyes were bloodshot from pulling all-nighters all week, and his skin was the color of frozen fish belly. “My god, what happened to you?” he asked.

“Sit,” said Tom. “Start taking notes.” While the owner, publisher and everything else of the Coldwater Gazette scribbled furiously on a yellow pad, Tom sketched the theme: foreign exchange student brutalized by racist local toughs grows up to attempt revenge on a town that looked the other way. He added details on who, what, when and where and then presented his terms for an exclusive: “The Gazette holds the story until I give you the green light, probably no more than a few days. When you run the story, you leave the Morgan brothers out of it. Let the state police keep the credit, but for solving a revenge crime, not a terrorist one.”

“Suppose I run the story right now?” asked Thompson.

“You’re a weekly, Jack, and I know where you print. Try to screw me and I’ll give it to the Times. They’ll break it online and print it in the morning. You’ll wind up with bupkis. Play ball with me and you’re a lock for a Pulitzer.”

“You think of everything don’t you?”

“That’s why they pay me the big bucks, Jack.”

His next call was to Silverstein. Miraculously, he got through to the busy litigator on the first try.

“The elusive Tom Morgan!” boomed the deep, radio-announcer voice, as entrancing to juries as it was irritating to prosecutors and everyone else. “For a man who’s in serious need of my kind of help, you’re ridiculously hard to get hold of.”

“I’ve been busy on some family business, Moe.”

“Life and death?” asked Silverstein, bluntly. “What could be more important than keeping your butt from sharing a cell with Bubba?”

Tom moved the phone a defensive inch away from his ear. “I’ve got some ideas on that.”

“Good. We’ll be spending a lot of time together over the next year or so. A fresh perspective can’t hurt.”

“Actually, I’m not sure we need to meet at all.”

There was a moment of silence, then, “Tom, this isn’t bullshit. I mean it is…but if we don’t put up a first class defense, starting last week, you’re going to end up broke and behind bars. Let me be brutally honest.”

“Where I don’t want to be. Agreed.”

“It’s up to you, Tom. But you’ve got to get into the game, or they’re just going to steamroller you. They’ve already started.”

“I know. So let me explain how we stop them.” Tom moved the phone back to his ear. “Have you got a television in your office?”

“What? Look, this can wait…”

“The terrorist stories from upstate New York,” he interrupted. “Have you been watching them?”

“From that Coldwater place? Sure. Tanner mentioned you were up there. But listen…”

“Good. I’m going to give you some information that hasn’t been on the news, and then the phone number of a guy named Johnsen from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.”

“Never heard of it.”

“There’s a reason for that. Now hear me out. When I’m done, I want you to call this guy and explain how we can be of assistance to his agency. And how they can help us.”

“What’s this…?”

“Just listen, Moe.”

* * *

A pale, young seminarian ushered Joe into the Chancery’s wood paneled conference room where the fugitive priest sat waiting at the end of a polished conference table.

Gauss blew a lungful of smoke toward the full-length portrait of Pope Pius XII that dominated the room. “He didn’t know what to do either, when he came face to face with evil. He dithered—and six million people died.”

Joe threw a folder onto the table and took