Murder at the Washington Tribune - Margaret Truman [12]
“That’s right,” she finally said.
“Look, I know I’m intruding into your turf, but I’d really appreciate knowing what she told you.”
“Dad, I—”
“I know, I know, I’m out of bounds here. But—”
“She told me that her daughter had said she was seeing someone at the Trib.”
“She said that? I mean, Jean told her mother that?”
“Yes.”
“Did you report it? I’m sorry, but I don’t catch every one of your newscasts.” He laughed. “Some father, huh?”
“About dating somebody at the Trib? No, I didn’t. She didn’t have any names so there wasn’t anything to report. The MPD spokesman had already said they were focusing on her coworkers.”
Wilcox heard her say to someone, “Hey, get your hands off the cookies.”
“Roberta?”
“Sorry. I baked a batch of peanut butter cookies, Mom’s recipe, to take to the cop whose mother died from that botched operation last week. You heard about it.”
“Yeah, sure. You’re baking cookies for him?”
“My secret weapon. Amazing how much information a few cookies will buy.”
“I don’t wonder,” Wilcox said, barely audible.
“Dad? You okay?”
“Oh, sure, Robbie. Just checking in with my daughter, the crack reporter. If anything comes up—I mean, I’m getting a lot of pressure here and—”
“I’ll keep you in the loop,” she said. “Have to run. Covering an MPD news conference this afternoon, and got to deliver these goodies before the cookie Mafia cleans me out. Love you. Bye.”
He hung up, sat back with his arms behind his head, and smiled. Roberta’s enthusiasm was palpable, uplifting. There’d been a time when he attacked each day with that same zeal, the world something to be conquered, obstacles no more than minor bumps in the road to be easily vaulted. Age had something to do with it, of course. Roberta, like so many other wide-eyed young professionals, awoke each morning with a sense of immortality and youthful superiority bordering on arrogance. Like the smug, ambitious Gene Hawthorne sitting three cubicles from Wilcox, whose appreciation of experience and history, of the Trib’s founders, leaders, and outstanding newsmen whose photos lined the corridor walls, was nonexistent.
Roberta’s zest was replaced by the unpleasant realization that Morehouse had been right—he hadn’t asked the right questions of Kaporis’s mother, actually her stepmother. He’d asked only about young men Jean might have been dating, which elicited a denial by the mother of knowing anything about her daughter’s social life. Why hadn’t he followed up with specific questions about her life at work, about whether she’d ever mentioned dating a coworker? He would have done that automatically a few years ago. Silently, and emptily, he pledged to get his act together.
He made two other calls that morning, the first to see whether a friend from the Associated Press, John Grant, was free for lunch. He was, and they arranged to meet at noon at the Press Club. His next call was to Mary Jane Pruit, Jean Kaporis’s roommate.
“Hello, Mrs. Pruit, it’s Joe Wilcox from the Trib.”
“Hello, Mr. Wilcox.”
“I was wondering whether I could grab some of your time later today.”
“Why?”
“To go over a few things, some loose ends.”
“I have nothing else to say,” she said in a sleepy voice. “I told you and the police everything I know.”
“I’m sure you did, but there are a few issues I’d like to clarify. I won’t take much of your time. Promise.”
“What time?”
“Your call. Whatever works for you.”
“Three would be okay.”
“Three it is. Your place?”
“Uh huh.”
“Great. See you then.”
He thought about the interview he’d done with Mary Jane Pruit the week following her roommate’s murder. He’d asked her about men in Kaporis’s life and basically received the same response he’d gotten from the mother. But while he’d accepted the mother’s denial of knowing anything, that answer didn’t ring true in retrospect coming from a roommate. He was chewing on that thought as he entered the National Press Club at Fourteenth and F Street, NW and went directly to the Reliable Source Bar. Grant was sitting with other members at the bar, a drink already in front of him. Wilcox