Sara Paretsky - Blacklist

The station showed a photo of the youth in the white shirt and tie Mr. Contreras and I had seen last night. “The Justice Department claims he fled to his terrorist cell’s hideout. They want to examine all school records to see if these might shed some light on his disappearance. The First Freedoms Forum is trying to intervene to keep the justice Department out of school files. We spoke to lawyer Judith Ohana before the meeting. Judith, what’s at stake here?”

A tall, slim woman took the mike with practiced ease. “This is basically a witch-hunt, Beth. If one of the children from this school was in Cairo, and the army came in to confiscate books and papers and computers because of a rumor about a missing dishwasher, everyone in America would

be outraged. That’s what’s happening here: a few parents are fanning the flames of mob hysteria. Do they really want their children’s private thoughts to be the bedtime reading of FBI or INS agents?”

Beth then took us inside the school so we could watch the parents discuss what they wanted school administrators to do. People were screaming at each other with the hearty venom of a hockey game. An angry man came to the center mike to say his daughter was a student at Vina Fields. “My child’s safety is paramount. I won’t have the school sheltering terrorists because of some First Amendment gobbledygook that puts my child’s life at risk.”

Other parents jumped into the fray, then Renee Bayard came to the mike. She was still wearing the red dress, which stood out vividly against the gray suits and ties around her.

“We all want our children to be safe in school, at home, on the streets, in the air. When our children are at risk, we don’t care about law, or justice, or abstractions, we only care about their safety. I’m the same way. And that’s why I don’t want police agents meddling in my granddaughter’s school records. I don’t want some private opinion my daughter put in an essay scrutinized by the FBI to see whether she’s a security risk. Adolescents think in extremes. It’s their nature. If they have to second-guess everything they write or read, then pretty soon we’ll have a country of robots. We won’t have the freethinking, creative young people who have the zest for experiment, even for risk, that makes American business lead the world.”

The camera cut away during another angry salvo from the man who objected to First Amendment gobbledygook. “That was Renee Bayard, CEO of Bayard Publishing,” Beth said. “Her husband Calvin, a leading First Amendment advocate, fought memorable battles with Chicago lawyer Olin Taverner, who died today at ninety-one. Stay with us after the news for Chicago Talks, when we’ll be discussing Olin Taverner’s life and career. Renee Bayard will describe her husband’s clashes with Taverner in the House of Representatives. For now, I’m Beth Blacksin, live at Vina Fields Academy on Chicago’s Gold Coast.”

A battery of commercials came on; Lotty muted the sound. “Could the FBI really have put that kid in custody without telling his mother or anyone at the school?” Max was troubled.

I grimaced. “Morrell just did a story for Margent about a Pakistani

immigrant who vanished from his Uptown apartment last October. His family searched frantically for him, but it was only after the guy died out in Coo’ hs prison that the Feds told his sons they’d been holding the father for eleven weeks. I did the local legwork for Morrell on that-it seems a neighbor had reported seeing a suspicious-looking van pull up on September 15 with a large box: turned out to be a new toilet, but by then the FBI had moved on, and INS didn’t think that bit of information was relevant.”

“And this boy? They could do that to a child?” Lotty demanded.

“He’s sixteen or seventeen. If he really is a terrorist, that’s plenty old enough to be planning something.”

“So you believe the FBI or whoever it is has a right to turn the school upside down looking for him?”

“I didn’t say that. Just that in the context of terror, kids younger than he is are making and using bombs. As to whether the Feds have the right-I don’t know what rights this Patriot Act gives them. If he’s an undocumented immigrant, the kid doesn’t have any rights under the new lawbut whether that extends to the place where he worked, well, I guess that’s why First Freedoms jumped in here. To test the act’s limits.”

Max and Lotty looked at each other. They’d met in London as child refugees from Nazi Europe, where they’d seen their own families and friends arrested and killed without being charged or tried. Neither of them spoke, until Lotty quietly said she’d make me a hot drink to help my cold. When I started to follow her, Max shook his head at me. By the time she came back, with a mug of something soothing and lemony, the interminable weather report and endless commercials were over.

Lotty returned as Dennis Logan gave his provocative introduction to his interview with Renee.

“I didn’t realize this was a gossip show, Dennis:’ Renee responded. “It’s been many years since my husband saw Olin Taverner except to say hello. Of course, they grew up in the same milieu and knew the same people; you don’t walk out of a meeting with a senator or a governor just because you don’t like one of his other guests.”

“But your husband must have felt strongly about seeing the man who tried to ruin him accepted at many of the same political and social gatherings you attended.”

Renee leaned forward, her heavy brows meeting above her nose. “You know, Calvin and I were so busy building up Bayard Publishing, and then the foundation-looking after the First Amendment shouldn’t have to be such a full-time job, but it is-that we didn’t have time to think about Olin Taverner. Of course, we used to see him at the Symphony or the Chicago Club, but, once he moved into his retirement apartment, he stopped coming into the city. I hadn’t thought about him for a long time.”

“You didn’t think about him even though some commentators-including your own son-have been urging us to revisit the McCarthy era and see people like Taverner, or Congressman Bushnell, as American heroes, trying to protect the country from internal enemies?”

Dennis looked as earnest as if he knew or cared what he was talking about: what he really wanted was to provoke Renee into some on-air reaction. But she had her advice to Catherine well in hand: rise above it.

“I think it’s dangerous when we start to turn people who want to subvert the Constitution into heroes. We need to think especially carefully about that these days, where we’re making it hard to hear any dissent from our current government’s policies. But unlike some of our talk-show hosts and editorial writers, I don’t believe those who disagree with me should be jailed, or hounded out of the country. All I want is for them to respect my right to hold differing views from theirs.”

“Even though your own son has been among those leading the charge?” Renee Bayard’s smile grew wooden. “Edwards’s essays in Commentary and the National Review haven’t been leading a charge, Dennis. He takes a different tack on the issues than his father and I might-but at least I know that we raised a child who can think for himself. Child-of course, he’s a grown man now, with a daughter Calvin and I are incredibly proud of. She insisted on joining me in the studio tonight.”

Dennis looked a little sour as the camera moved away from him to a glowing Catherine seated at the corner of the studio. He started talking to force the camera back to his face. “Speaking of jailing people who disagree with us, Renee, people have often wondered how your husband walked away from those hearings without either a contempt citation or a sentence.”