Читать книгу Jericho's Daughters - Paul Iselin Wellman - Страница 21

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The society editors would not come down until nine o’clock, because it was presumed in Jericho journalistic circles that no lady of social importance ever rose before that hour. When they did arrive they would have an item of unusual significance for their columns. Mrs. Wistart Wedge was home from Honolulu. The Sentinel had ignored this news as a matter of policy, and much would be made of it by the Clarion.

It was, as a matter of fact, real news such as the society page rarely carried, for the story of Mrs. Wedge’s return would be read not only by those who usually perused the so-called Snob Sheet—mistresses of fine homes who were acquaintances as well as rivals of Mrs. Wedge, and women of humbler homes and vocations who lived vicarious social existences through following the activities of those in loftier stations—but also by certain persons interested in cold matters of business and finance, to whom this return would have important meaning; and above all by everyone connected, however remotely, with the newspaper business in Jericho. For the whisper of the Big Deal had reached every journalistic level in the city, down to the scabbiest newsboy.

At eight o’clock Samson J. Hudson, the managing editor, came up the stairs from the street. He paused at the city desk.

“Anything doing, Debs?” he asked almost paternally.

Hudson was a graying, burly man, nearing sixty, with horn-rimmed glasses, a loose upper plate, and bowlegs. He was bitter with disappointment because he knew he was on a toboggan ride downward in his profession. Once he had for a time held a position as managing editor of a much larger paper in a much larger city, but he drank himself out of that job. Then, after clinging to various minor posts, he met Wistart Wedge, of the Clarion, two years before at a political convention and convinced him he would be of value in “modernizing” the paper.

It was a job, such as it was, but to Hudson it was a long step down. He despised both the Clarion and Jericho, and he hated Debs because Debs was rising and he was going down, and because he knew secretly that Debs was a far better newspaperman than he, and was afraid that someone else would discover it and put Debs in his place. He still drank, but he did it secretly now, and made great show of frowning on the use of liquor by members of his staff.

Sometimes Hudson assumed the kindly, paternal manner. But from that, at any pretext, he might go the opposite extreme, flinging his frustration in frenzies at his staff, behaving in the manner that non-newspaper folk imagine is typical of managing editors—skating around in his chair, wearing out two or three trousers seats to every coat, yelling, abusing, a bullying tyrant to those under him, but always a sycophant to those above. Behind his back the staff called him Shrieking Sam and cordially detested him.

Debs Dorn bore him patiently, as one of the burdens of life, knowing his hypocrisy and vindictiveness as further obstacles to be taken into consideration in the already rough road of getting out the Clarion daily.

He answered Hudson’s question in the negative.

“How’re you handling the story on Mrs. Wedge?” asked the managing editor.

“Thought I’d just let the society desk use it. It’s their department——”

Hudson exploded.

“Hell’s fire, man! You consider this a routine society item? Good God! Why, this woman’s been to Honolulu! World travel! The best known woman in town, bar none! Everyone wants to know what she did, what she saw, what she thinks! Get a reporter on it right away—have a cameraman out there—put it on page one! Double-column feature head! God Almighty, how can I be expected to get out a paper when nobody—but nobody—knows what’s news when he sees it staring him right in the face!”

The last sentence, addressed to the ceiling in a despairing appeal to whatever gods there be in the Olympus of journalism, was uttered so loudly that everyone in the city room heard it, and everyone knew that Shrieking Sam was working himself up to one of his frenzies.

“Okay,” said Debs, seething inwardly. “I’ll send——”

But Hudson had a new idea. “Forget it—just forget it! I’ll handle it myself! Goddamn it all, if anything’s done decently around this place, I have to do it! Well, I’ll take care of it! But don’t you make any mistake about this—hold a place for that story on page one! Understand?”

Debs nodded without speaking. He knew the direction this was leading. Hudson had seen a really magnificent opportunity to curry favor. The call to the Wedge home would be personal, a honeyed flattery over the telephone; Mrs. Wedge would be informed by Mr. Hudson that he, the managing editor, was devoting his own personal time and attention to seeing to it that she received proper recognition—recognition befitting her station and the wide public interest in everything she did. The story, when it appeared, carefully filled with panegyrics calculated to please her, would be earmarked in Mrs. Wedge’s mind as the work of the alert, the capable, and the faithful Samson J. Hudson, who truly appreciated her importance and worth. And this, when and if certain decisions concerning the Clarion and its staff were made, might very conceivably redound to the credit of Samson J. Hudson.

The staff took due notice. Evidently the Big Deal was very much on Shrieking Sam’s mind also.