“Hey, hotshot, how ya doin’?” Nick Philippoussis sat down on the stool next to Chance. Nick called out to Casey for a Shawn O’—Buttese for a shot and a beer—and a couple of pickled turkey gizzards. Then he turned to Chance and said, “Sorry I had to blow you off yesterday. I didn’t want to keep the medical examiner waiting even an extra second when he was coming back from vacation for us. He’s one hell of a good guy. Plus, I knew he’d want me to stay ’til it was over with.”
Chance grimaced. He had no stomach for the blood-and-guts part of Nick’s job. “How did it go?” he asked and hoped Nick would skip the gruesome details.
Nick downed the shot of whiskey, took a pull from his longneck, and then pulled apart the turkey gizzard while he talked. “Pretty clear that Lowell Austin wasn’t flying the plane. The medical examiner says that pilots who die in crashes sustain particular injuries on their hands and feet, which Austin didn’t have. Still not sure what killed him though. I’m betting drugs.
“They were pulling fluids for the tox screens when I left to cover the Elk Park massacre. They probably won’t know the exact cause of death until the results come back. They’re plenty backed up at the lab, but they’ll put a priority on this one since it involves the Feds.”
“I thought it was weird that whoever left him in the plane tried to make it look like he was the pilot,” Chance said.
“I told you something was sketchy about it,” Nick said. “Why would they do that? As soon as you know who the guy is, you know he wasn’t the pilot unless they’re giving flying lessons in the joint.”
Chance nodded. “Buying time to get away is all I can figure. Even if it was only twenty-four hours.”
“Which, if that’s true,” Nick said, his voice rising with curiosity, “then what was the real pilot needing to get away from?”
Chance sipped on his beer and wondered the same thing.
* * *
Mesa spooned several scoops of the aromatic, black P&G Tips into the porcelain teapot, and then grabbed milk from the fridge for the creamer while waiting for the water to boil. Impatient and chastising herself for it, she searched in several kitchen cabinets before finding the sugar cubes her grandmother always used.
Normally, she loved fixing the tea, one of those quaint English traditions that made her cherish her grandmother. Today she was grinding her teeth. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to be a comfort, but she couldn’t help feeling that’s all she’d become.
Now that she had begun to consider the real possibility that Irita could run the Messenger without anybody’s help, she wondered if Chance hadn’t realized the same thing a month ago. Why then had he applied the pressure to get Mesa to come back to Butte?
The water boiled, Mesa filled the pot, found some shortbread biscuits, assembled the rest of the tea tray, and carried it into the parlor. Nana put down the proofs from the Messenger and smiled at Mesa as she placed the tray on the coffee table in front of the settee.
“I can’t tell you how wonderful it is to have you here at home again. Come sit by me,” Nana said.
As usual, Mesa’s resentment temporarily vanished when she sat next to her grandmother and felt her warm hand on her own. Nana reached for the teapot to pour, and Mesa quickly interceded. “Here, let me do that. Give me your thoughts on this week’s edition.”
Nana folded the galleys on her lap, and then said, “Perhaps I should be asking your opinion. I’m hoping you can elevate the level of our journalism a bit. I’m tired of reading about courthouse squabbles and who’s mad at whom about the blasted animal shelter.”
Nana took the proffered cup of tea with milk and two lumps and said, “I know if a person can write honestly, have a curiosity about the world around them and can keep their facts straight, that should be enough to produce thought-provoking stories, but I think the Messenger needs a bit of a shake-up. Just because we’re small doesn’t mean we can’t be good. The market is out there for us. Not everybody in this town has gone electronic. Plenty of people want to pick up a paper and read about their neighbors. God knows the Standard runs enough canned stories; there’s plenty of good local color that goes unnoticed.”
Mesa knew what she meant. She had worked as a stringer for a daily straight out of college. It didn’t take long to notice the mediocrity, less and less in-depth features, less and less national coverage, twice the space devoted to comics and more coverage of the weather than serious news. And now with the Internet, everybody was scrambling.
The Montana Standard publisher’s main concern had to be the bottom line. Keeping the payroll to a minimum, hiring young reporters fresh out of college and boosting coverage with wire stories and editorials were tried-and-true strategies for every daily from Massachusetts to Montana. Unless you were the Washington Post or the New York Times, the only thing that was cutting-edge at newspapers was their accountant. “To tell you the truth, Nan, I think the Messenger is doing just fine.”
“Now, Mesa, you don’t have to worry about hurting my feelings. You wouldn’t have left that paper back east just to come to Butte to be with me. I know you’re a professional now, and I want you to take over completely. My name can remain as publisher on the masthead, but I don’t want to come back to the office.”
Mesa almost spilled her tea but recovered before Nana noticed. She took several sips to buy time while she thought about just how much to say. This was a well-intended offer, and the last thing Mesa wanted to do was offend her grandmother, the person who had been the one true anchor in her life. But she couldn’t find it in herself to reveal her Portland plans.
Instead, for the moment, she decided to counterpunch. “But Nana, I thought you enjoyed working on the paper. Why do you want to give it up all of a sudden? Your recovery is progressing well. The staff wants you back.”
“I’d been thinking about it even before the heart attack. Chance and I talked about it a while back. Butte’s economy is making a comeback. The Messenger has the potential to be more than just a neighborhood paper, but it needs an experienced journalist like you who understands both print and electronic media.”
There was Chance’s hand in this again, Mesa thought.
“I’m not sure I’m ready for all this responsibility, Nan. Let’s not make any rash decisions.”
“Actually, I was quite surprised when Chance suggested calling you,” Nana said. “I rather thought you might be too involved with that young banker of yours.”
Mesa poured her grandmother more tea and leapt at the opportunity to take the conversation in another direction, even toward her muddled love life. Nana’s heart attack had put her out of the loop as far as Mesa’s love interests were concerned. The banker had been pre-Derek. “The banker lost interest some time ago,” Mesa said with a smile.
She saw a slight grin budding on Nan’s face. “Now that doesn’t mean you should start any matchmaking,” Mesa said. “I can make my own company.”
“Wouldn’t think of it, dear, but I had hoped to meet Philip for dinner tomorrow night. He wants to go to The Derby, something special for my first night out, you see. Of course, I really shouldn’t drive. I suppose Shane could pick us both up and then come back for us. Reminds me of when your mother was a teenager.” Her voice trailed off as she realized she was thinking out loud.
“All right,” Mesa said with a smile. “I’ll go along. But no more matchmaking, promise?”
“I’ll call Philip straight away,” Nana said and picked up the phone next to her on the lamp table. Mesa shook her head and wondered if Shane Northey knew Hardy Jacobs.
Chapter 7
By the time Mesa had walked the eight blocks to the Messenger office on Tuesday morning, she had decided she would come clean. Chance would have to face the fact that she did not intend to spend the next thirty years running the Messenger. At the very least, she would have to figure out how to pull that “new editor” story.
Irita appeared at Mesa’s desk and placed a double latte in the middle of it even before Mes
a sat down. With an air of deference to the new boss, Irita said, “Anna Takkinen has deemed to grace us with her presence this morning. I told her to bring you a copy of the annual budget like you asked.”
Mesa nodded and sipped the coffee. Irita was still standing by her desk. “And?” Mesa said.
Irita looked as if she were seriously contemplating what to say next. “Anna’s a hard worker,” she said finally. “Her old man was the last owner of the Helsinki Bar. She grew up in Finntown, so she knows what it’s like to keep your nose to the grindstone.”
Mesa leaned back in her chair and tried to dredge up whatever she could recall about the Finnish part of Butte—photographs of lanky, taciturn Nordic miners in front of the gigantic boarding houses that had dominated the east end of Park and Broadway Streets. All that remained now was a single building that had housed the Helsinki Bar, a faded monument to the once bustling neighborhood, which the Anaconda Company pit mining operation had gobbled up forty years before.
Wallace Stegner had once written that more than half a place is memory. In the case of Butte, Mesa thought it was more like ninety-nine percent. Everything and everybody in Butte had a history that had significance to somebody. But she still couldn’t figure out what Irita was trying to tell her. “So?”
“Well, just keep in mind she would never do anything she wasn’t told to do, okay?” With that caveat, Irita backed out of the room, quickly replaced by a tall, gray-blonde woman clutching a set of hanging file folders to her bosom like they were a flotation device and she was on the Titanic.
Anna seemed paralyzed, feet and eyes fixed to the floor. Mesa finally had to ask her to sit down. “I’ve been meeting all the staff. No big deal, just wanted to put a name to a face.”
Anna said nothing, still clutching the files. Surely, this was more than Scandinavian reserve, but Mesa wasn’t sure what the problem was. “What’s that you brought with you?” Mesa asked and resisted the urge to reach out for the files, lest her movement result in Anna’s fainting.
“Irita said you might want to take a look at the budget. I made you a copy,” Anna said with a slight stutter. She opened the top folder on her lap. “There are the spreadsheets for the projected budget and then a monthly breakdown.”
Mesa smiled and nodded. One thing Stu Friedman, her managing editor at the Current, and she did agree about was a newspaper’s finances. No matter what size the budget, he would say at their quarterly meetings, make sure more money comes in than goes out. “Why don’t I take a look at what you’ve brought me, and then if I have any questions, I’ll get back to you. Okay?”
Mesa shuffled the few papers on her desk and made several other “meeting’s over” gestures. She thought sure Anna would fly out of there like a shot.
Instead, Anna moved to the edge of her seat, handed the copy of the budget across Mesa’s desk and said, “I think I should explain a few of the entries under advertising. I have pleaded with Chance, but it just doesn’t do any good.”
* * *
Chance took a seat at the counter of the Copper Pot, where the counter girl brought him a cup of coffee. He didn’t recognize her. The owner, Lars Schogren or Shug, short for Sugar, earned his nickname in toddlerhood when he had routinely stuck his fingers in the sugar bowl. Shug now had six kids of his own—four of them daughters. Maybe this was one of the younger ones who had grown up without Chance noticing.
“Is Shug around? I want him to look at this week’s proof,” Chance said, opening a manila envelope and removing the galley for the restaurant’s upcoming ad in the Messenger.
The counter girl had retreated to take a customer’s money. Chance went back to a quick study of the menu and wondered what was keeping Shug.
“Pops says you should leave the ad,” the girl said when she returned moments later. “Our cook didn’t show this morning. Pops says to say he’s busier than a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest.” The girl blushed and chuckled at the same time.
The Messenger had run numerous ads for the Copper Pot since its grand opening two months before. Shug had asked if Chance could sit on the bill through Labor Day when the restaurant was sure to be on its feet.
Rose Ducharme had a soft heart, and an iron pocketbook. But she knew that nobody who did business in Butte could avoid carrying somebody sometime. She condoned the practice on a rare occasion when a local business really needed a helping hand. In this case, Nan had been in the hospital when Shug Schogren had asked for some slack, so Chance decided the Copper Pot qualified.
“Oh, and he says to give you one of these Danishes.” She lifted the glass cover on a mound of icing-covered confections that made Chance’s mouth water.
Chance sighed inwardly then grabbed the top Danish, cherry, gulped the rest of his coffee and said, “I’ll be back at lunchtime to pick up the galley. And tell Shug my sister’s running the paper now, so I need him to pony up.”
Chance trotted outside. He had to make three more stops, all at businesses like Shug’s that were behind on their accounts. In Mesa’s world, the word “behind” didn’t exist unless it was followed by “the eight ball,” which was where he would be if he didn’t collect what was owed.
* * *
Mesa flipped through the monthly balance sheets for the past four months and wondered what went through her brother’s head sometimes. The actual number of new advertisers was up over the last three months. That was the good news. The bad news was that ad revenues were half what they had been this time last year, with three particular accounts overdue to the tune of nearly seven thousand dollars. That might be peanuts in Pittsburgh, but in Butte, that was more than half of Erin O’Rourke’s salary.
The Dumas Brothel and Sex Museum caught Mesa’s eye first. Nana, not wanting to seem old-fashioned, had confided to Mesa about the audible sigh of relief from the country-club end of town when the oldest continuingly run brothel in the country had closed its doors in the spring. Thieves had broken into the museum and stolen most of the antique sex toys. Mesa was sorry the Dumas had finally closed, especially since that meant twelve hundred bucks the Messenger probably wasn’t going to see anytime soon.
But what really steamed her was the Mountain Gallery and Frames whose Messenger account had an outstanding balance of eighteen hundred dollars. She reached for the Standard’s Labor Day insert. She stared at a half-page ad for Mountain Gallery and Frames, offering fine art, supplies, and custom framing. Sure as shooting, the Standard wasn’t handing out free ads.
She went to the door of her office and called for Irita, who was in animated discussion with Anna at her desk. Irita responded with a wave, and Anna quickly turned her attention to her computer screen.
Irita appeared a moment later, shut the door, and sat on the sofa across from Mesa. “Anna feels bad because she knows Mrs. Ducharme carried her dad for several months when the Helsinki Bar was in its last days. Mr. Takkinen went to your grandmother and said his word was as good as the Finnish government, which, as you may know, was the one country to pay their war debt back to the United States after World War II. Mrs. Ducharme figured she could count on Paavo Takkinen.”
“And don’t tell me, he paid off his tab eventually?” Mesa said and rose from her desk to close the slim Venetian blinds, so that the piercing September sunlight didn’t roast them. She was saving that torture for Chance.
“Businesses have been up and down in Butte since the first mine closure,” Irita said. “Everybody does what they can.”
“I know that,” Mesa said. “But I don’t like the Messenger being taken to the cleaners. Just who is it that owns Mountain Gallery, and why have we been carrying them for three months when apparently they can afford to take out ads in the daily paper?” She held up the Standard’s insert and shook it in the air.
Irita pressed her lips together and said nothing. Mesa may not have seen her in six years, but they had quickly bonded. Maybe it was the realization that neither of them minded hard work, or suffered fools. Whatever it was, Mesa
knew she could be candid with Irita and expect the same in return. “I understand that Anna is only the bearer of bad news,” Mesa said. “I don’t intend to shoot the messenger. I’m saving my bullets for Chance.”
Irita smiled nervously.
“So how about evening the odds a bit. Who thinks they can take advantage of us like this?”
“It’s one of those California investors,” Irita said in a burst of stored-up annoyance. “Name’s Adrienne DeBrook, one of those artsy types. For reasons I am not sure of, nor really give a shit about, six months ago she came to town and bought the Imperial Building over on Park for a song.”
Mesa knew the source of Irita’s irritation. She had heard it all from Chance before. In the early 1900s, when Butte’s mining economy supported nearly a hundred thousand people, Butte companies commissioned eminent architects to design their buildings. Their gargoyled cornices, clock towers, and delicately inlaid arches rivaled buildings in San Francisco and Chicago.
Unfortunately, many of those structures had fallen into disrepair. Few local residents could now afford to restore these building themselves, but that didn’t stop the rest of the world. Outside investors from both coasts had begun buying precious but decaying old buildings in the Uptown historic district.
“At least she started renovating it right away instead of mothballing it,” Irita said with some envy. “I have to admit it looks like she’s done a damn good job. She’s opened this framing business on the first floor, and now I hear she’s turned the upper floors into studio loft apartments.”
That still didn’t explain how DeBrook had run up an advertising bill with the Messenger. “So who suggested we cut her a deal?”
Irita shook her head. “Nobody cuts deals around here except your grandmother. Of course, after the heart attack ...” Her voice trailed off. “Maybe Delilah was anxious to support another gallery and talked Chance into it.”
Mesa and Delilah Tate, the Messenger’s arts and entertainment reporter, had yet to meet, so Mesa could make no judgment about her. Chance, on the other hand, although not immune to a sob story, was neither dumb nor careless. He would never let anyone take advantage of the family business.