Jeffery Deaver - Hard News

"That you, miss?"

"You out of the infirmary?"

"Kicked my butt out yesterday. No pain to speak of, unless I stretch. I read that story. In the book you give me. I like it. Don't think I look much like him, though, and if I ever stole fire from the gods I sure don't know a fence who'd handle it…" He paused and she laughed, like she knew she was supposed to, thinking he'd probably spent a good amount of time thinking up the joke. Which he had.

"Guess what?" she asked.

"Don't know."

"I found a new witness."

"New witness?"

"Sure did."

"Well, my, tell me about it."

She did, from start to finish, all about Bennett Frost, and Randy Boggs didn't utter a single word the entire time she was speaking. In fact, not a single syllable or grunt or even, it seemed, a breath.

When she was through there was silence for a long moment.

"Well," she said, "you're not saying anything."

"I'm grinning, though, I'll tell you that. Damn, I can't believe it. You done yourself something, miss."

."What's going to happen now is I'm going to try to get the program on the air next week. Megler said that if he gets his name and picture on the air he'll do the motion for a new trial for free."

"Mr Megler said that?"

"It hurt him to. I could see the pain but he said he would. He said if the judge buys it, and grants the motion, you could be out right away."

"The judge might not grant it, though, I suppose."

"Fred said that having the program onCurrent Events would really help. The judge'd be like more inclined to release you, especially if he was up for reelection."

"Well, damn. Goddamn. What do I do now?"

"You just take care of yourself for the next week. Don't go getting knifed anymore."

"No, ma'am… One thing… What you did…?"

Silence.

"I guess I'm trying to say thank you."

"I guess you just did."

After they hung up, Randy Boggs, the grin still on his face, left the administration building to go find Severn Washington and tell him the news.

As Boggs left the building, another prisoner, a short Colombian, followed, then overtook him. Prisoners like this were what used to be called trusties in the prisons of the forties and fifties and were now generally known as pricks or assholes or scum. He'd just had a short conversation with the guard he worked for, the guard who randomly monitored prisoners' phone conversations. The prisoner smiled at Boggs, said,"Buenos dias" and walked ahead, not hearing what Boggs said in reply. He didn't particularly care what the response was. He was in a hurry. He wanted to get to Juan Ascipio as soon as he could.

Rune decided she'd found a great new drug, one that was completely legal and cheap. It was called "awake," and you didn't even take it. All you did was not sleep for thirty hours straight and it sent you right on the most excellent psychedelic trip you could imagine.

Gremlins climbed out of the Sony, dragons swooped down from Redhead lights and trolls had abandoned bridges and were fox-trotting on the misty dance floor of her desk. Weird amoeba were floating everywhere.

It was sixp.m. on Tuesday and the reason for the hallucinations – and sleeplessness – was a small plastic cassette containing a one-inch videotape master of a news story to be shown in a few hours on that night'sCurrent Events program. The story was called, "Easy Justice." The voice-overs were mixed, the leads and countdown added, the "live" portions of Piper Sutton's commentary added.

The tape, which ran the exact time allocated for the segment, rested somewhere in the bowels of the Network's computer system, which acted like a brilliant, never-sleeping stage manager, and would start the segment rolling exactly on time, at 8:04:36p.m. The system would then automatically broadcast the Randy Boggs story for its precise length of eleven minutes, fourteen seconds, which was the Network's version of a quarter hour – a bit shorter than in Edward R. Murrow's time, but back then each additional minute of advertising didn't mean another half-million dollars in revenue the way it did today.

Rune squinted away a few apparitions and sat back in her chair.

The last few days had been a nightmare.

Piper Sutton had been satisfaction-proof. "What's this? What do you call this?" she'd shouted, pacing back and forth behind Rune, who sat terrified, willing her hands not to shake as she typed. "Is this supposed to be fuckingpoetry! Is it supposed to beart!"

Sutton would walk another ten feet, leaving behind a wake of cigarette smoke and Chanel No. 5.

Nothing she'd write could please Sutton. "Is that a fact? Is it supported? Who's your attribution?… What the fuck is this? A figure of speech? 'Justice is like a lumbering bear'? Sure, I know alot of

lumbering bears. Our audience is really going to relate to lumbering bears. Just look out on Broadway, Rune, you see many bears? Come on, babes…"

Rune would write some more then Sutton would lean over and look at the word processor screen, focusing on the words like a sniper.

"Here, let me…," Sutton would say and practically elbow Rune aside.

Tap, tap, tap… The delete code would chop another dozen sentences. Sutton's nails never chipped. They were like red Kevlar.

But finally the story was finished.

Sutton and Maisel approved the completed script Monday night (the twenty-eighth draft). Sutton had recorded her on-camera portions and sent those to editing, along with the clips from Rune's interviews and atmosphere footage. As she was leaving the studio Tuesday morning at onea.m. Rune asked her, "You, like, always spend this kind of time with producers?"

"No, I don'tlike spend this kind of time. Most producers can spell."

"Oh."

Now, though, Rune had nothing to do but try to stay awake and watch the show itself while she fought the sensation that she was levitating. There were a couple options. Her first choice: She wanted to be home watching it with Healy. But he'd gone to investigate a package sitting in front of an abortion clinic in Brooklyn. Another possibility: There was a bar not far from the houseboat – Rune was a regular there – and everybody there would be glad to watch her program (fortunately this was Tuesday so no Monday night sports programs would create difficult choices for some of the regulars).

But that involved standing up and walking somewhere. Which at the moment was a feat Rune believed she was incapable of.

So, she sat where she was – at her desk. There was a nice color monitor in front of her and maybe

– just maybe – Piper and Lee would come and join her. They'd all watch the show together and they'd tell her what a good job she'd done then take her out for a drink at some fancy bar afterwards.

Her thoughts shifted and she found she was thinking of Randy Boggs. She hoped the guards were letting him watchCurrent Events. That thought sounded funny -lettinghim watch, like when she was a kid and she'd begged her parents to let her stay up to read more fairy stories or watch TV.

"Hey, Rune."

She looked up, thinking the hallucinations were getting stranger: Some heavyset guy was disattaching himself from a camera and coming toward her. How did he do that? Like the monster inMien, climbing out of the pipes to eat Sigourney Weaver.

"Rune," he said again. She squinted. It was Morrie Weinberg, the chief engineer of the show. He wore engineer clothes – blue jeans and a black shirt and a tweed jacket.

"Morrie," she said. He was frowning – the first time she'd ever seen him do this. Engineers are usually Rolaids-poppers but Morrie didn't understand the concept of stress. She had an image of him as a lumbering bear and she wanted to laugh out loud.

"What's up?"

"Your segment."