Page 10 of By Any Means

“I do.” His editor blew a smoke ring. It floated up over the frosted-glass cubicle wall to the plaster ceiling. “But that’s all aside. If you ask me, somebody killed the brother.”

“Maybe,” Laurie scoffed. “Why do we care?”

“Why do we care? Your Mr. Wright has the beginnings of any fairy-tale villain ever penned.”

That much… was also true.

There was nothing much in the rags of Chary himself. There was plenty of his late, Lothario younger brother—the brother for whom he’d been passed over.

Out to New York society in 1902, August Wright had been infamous for his wildness, his good looks, and his fast and unlikely friendship with his equally wild, equally rich, equally handsome contemporary: the disinterested heir to Brooklyn Glass, one T. F. Raberding. Laurie didn’t care much for what the society writers called truth, but there was nary a photo of them apart—if Raberding was hands-off the business he’d inherited, he was certainly hands-on here. If Laurie were going to take this story, Raberding would’ve been the first place he looked.

But Laurie wasn’t going to take the story, so it was moot.

Most infamous about August Wright was that after a few short years of inheritance, wildness, and a handful of jam-jar design flubs—Wright’s Improved Jam Jars wouldn’t maintain a seal beyond a fortnight, and Wright Glass had lost every contract with industrial food packers, bar none, nearly leading Wright Glass all the way into the ground—he had promptly snuffed it. Six months before, August had been found face-down dead of the opium, smack between the bosoms of two French demi-mondaines.

Tragedy in excess and wastefulness, the way the elites knew best. And Chary, against his parents’ wishes, had inherited a nightmare of a failing business. Also blueberries.

But was any of it enough to murder a brother for?

“A villain on paper,” Laurie emphasized. “You didn’t meet the man.”

“Ah, yes. You did mention. ‘Circumstances over which I have no control,’” Sam quoted mildly, lowering his voice. “Funny name for a dick, circumstances. From whence have you plucked these sudden scruples, Laurie, dear?”

Laurie scowled.

Sam said, “A good dicking’s never stood in your way before, is what I’m saying.”

“Fuck off. How d’you figure that conjecture?”

“I’m in the business of information. You do leave a bit of a trail of broken hearts.”

Laurie rolled his eyes. Conjecture.

“I’m just not sure I can successfully villainize the man,” he said. “Not to anyone who’s met him.”

Sam waved dramatically over the stack of rags. “Who’s met him? He’s a recluse. He has no real reputation. The public will meet him when you’ve introduced him to them. That’s an unprecedented opportunity.”

Laurie cracked the candy in two. “I don’t want to introduce him to them.” Though hell if he knew why. Since when did he sympathize with rich-bastard, capitalist businessmen? “And I don’t hold with libel. I know you don’t either, Sam Sullivan.”

“There’s always something,” Sam snapped. “Perhaps he did murder his brother; that’d be fantastic. Maybe a rival did him. If there isn’t a story, then make it fiction. A serial. Write yourself a novel; set it in Nova fucking Scotia. I know Doubleday’s been after you for it.”

“It’s a nonfiction column,” Laurie growled. Meant to influence American legislation, he didn’t add. “I don’t do society speculation. I don’t do hit pieces.”

“Pivot! I don’t give a damn.”

So long as it sold.

Laurie gritted his teeth. “Are you pivoting, Sam? You want to scoop readers from the World, is that what this is? I don’t think this is worthwhile use of me or my time. I don’t think the public will care about blueberry pickers any more than they gave a damn about cotton. I don’t want to expose a tiny, unprofitable farm in the middle of nowhere, owned by a man who seems to have repeatedly gotten life’s short end of the stick.”

“Then expand your scope,” Sam hissed. “Expose the whole damn blueberry industry. Fruit-packing. Glassblowing. I don’t care. Figure it out. Find out what makes this Wright man tick.”

Laurie crossed his arms. “No.”

Sam leaned in. His cigarette ashed onto one of the rags, burnt a small black hole through a Gillette ad.

“It’s Wright or nothing. Wright,” Sam grinned sharp, “or else I’m not sending you anything else this year. And if you refuse me this, maybe not next year, either. I shall send Mr. Sumner instead.” He thrust a pointed finger toward the other desk occupying the office partition, currently unoccupied.

“You will not,” Laurie rebutted. Hiram Sumner was a society writer, somewhat freelance, for the Appeal and other papers. He was in the Hamptons, and happily so. Too bad for Laurie, as he was currently owed lunch. “Don’t you threaten me. Hiram ain’t gonna see more than I did: a grieving, rich-boy queer.”