“Why do you joke about it?” “What else can I do?” The waitress set down menus and water glasses, then scurried away before she overheard too much. “Write something Knudson will print.” “ Every once in a while I fail and write something innocuous and Knudson prints it. That’s how he justifies my meager salary. That, and the five or six rewrites I do daily.” The waitress took advantage of the following silence to take our orders. Two coffees. She left a coffee pot so that we wouldn’t be disturbed. “You used to be so good,” you said. “Goodness doth not a reporter make.” I wrapped my hands around my warm cup. “What does?” I looked down at my coffee. The liquid was thick and gritty. I took a swallow and winced at the burned-bean flavor. Courage was the answer to your question. The courage to buck trends, to stand up for the work even if no one else does, the kind of courage you had displayed that afternoon when you had challenged Knudson. I had never had that kind of courage, although those few high points occurred in my career when I let anger act as a substitute. You were still waiting for my answer when I looked up, so I countered with a question of my own: “What made you come back here?” “ I told you,” you said. “ The challenge.” The coffee was beginning to upset my stomach. “ You could find a challenge anywhere.” 66 I ’m Knudson’s cliche. You know, former ace reporter now kept around as a relic to show the cubs what booze and hard living can do to a crack mind.” You studied me again. You had a way of taking in informatioh through your eyes that was slightly unnerving. Perhaps it was the frown of concentration you wore, or perhaps it was the way that you listened without making a sound. But there was something in that look that made me feel as if you could find your way past every single mask I tried to hide behind. “ I’m working on a story,” you said, apparently deciding I was trustworthy. “Actually, two stories. One, for the Milwaukee Journal, looking into some incidents that have been happening up here. And the other for The Progressive on media censorship.” “Small town papers like the Sun are easy to pick on.” “ I’m not just picking on the Sun. I’ve worked in other markets as well.” You took a small sip of your coffee and then wrinkled your nose. Someone turned on a radio in the kitchen. The top-40 rhythms nearly drowned out the drone of muzak. “What does the Milwaukee Journal want?” I asked. You half-smiled and pushed the coffee cup away. Some of the liquid sloshed over the rim. “ Let me tell you a story,” you said. “ About six months ago, a Milwaukee sportscaster was up here attending her niece’s wedding. The hotel she and her husband were staying at didn’t have a restaurant, so she ordered two hamburgers-to-go from the chain restaurant across the highway. When she got there, she found that the waitress had given her some sort of hamburger combo, with fries and coleslaw. She patiently explained that she only wanted the burgers and was not willing to pay for the other food. The manager got into the argument and after a few minutes, called the police. The cops arrived rather quickly. The sportscaster explained her side of the story, but the cops agreed with the restaurant manager. They handcuffed the sportscaster, slapped her around a bit and then threw her into the back of their squad car. From the way they were talking, she doubted that they would take her back to the station right away, and she was terrified. So as they started pulling out of the parking lot she started screaming that she was a reporter and that they had no right to treat her like this.” “Stupid ass thing to do.” “Well, in this case it worked. They removed the handcuffs and threw her out of the squad. She left the city immediately, contacted an attorney who told her that it would be nearly impossible to press charges. The attorney wrote a letter of protest to the department, and the sportscaster went to the Journal.” I was not impressed. Police brutality was an old story up here. The department had cleaned itself out five years ago after a police dog had mauled a suspect to death. “So?” “So that’s not all of it. Other rumors had reached Journal reporters of cops involved in some kind of illegal activity. Apparently the entire department is covering for them.” “ Drugs?” “ No.” “What then?” You watched as the hostess seated another couple across the room. The rock music grew louder and then someone shut off the muzak. I took another sip of the burned coffee. It was cold. “ Do you remember how difficult it was to get a rape crisis center up here?” The question startled me. “ Vaguely. Something about government funding.” “ If you go though the application for state funding, you’ ll find all sorts of letters pro and con. Most of the con come from the police department.” I shrugged. “ They were afraid that someone would usurp their territory.” “That’s what it would seem like until you put it together with the story of some college students.” Even though your voice sounded low-key and controlled, your hands were shaking. You saw me watching them, and clasped your fingers together. “ Last spring, they had a party out at the Point, and they had been drinking. Two squads stopped and asked them to leave. One of the girls got mouthy, and a cop dragged her back to the car to teach her a lesson. The squad was far enough away that the group couldn’t see more than the lights. They were preoccupied with the other cops, and with proving that there was no underage drinking going on. Finally the cops left and took the girl with them, or so the students believed. She was discovered later that night down the beach, unconscious, her clothes shredded, but otherwise unmarked. She had been raped. She said the cop did it. He said he let her go back to her friends and one of them must have done it. The story didn't even reach the papers. She decided not to press charges, then she dropped out of school and went down to Madison, where there’s a strong women’s community. That’s where I met her. And I believe her.” You were clasping your hands together so tightly that your knuckles were turning white. I wanted to touch you, but something told me not to touch a woman after she had told a story like that. "I know a lot of cops in that department. They wouldn’t tolerate a rapist.” “ I didn’t say the entire department was in on the cover-up,” you said. “Why would any cop cover up something like that?” “You do it once and you’ re party to a felony. That makes it easier to do it again.” “Yeah. But why cover it the first time?” “You know,” you said, and your face was stiff, your voice cold, “ Knudson stuck me on the society page because I’m female. He didn’t even look at my clips. I wonder how many other out-of- date attitudes there are up here.” “You’re saying that the cops believe she deserved it.” “ He didn’t beat her, after ail. He just showed her who was boss in the most masculine way possible.” I took a deep breath. You were right about the attitudes. There were bars down near the docks that most women wouldn’t even set foot in. Up until a few years ago, the official line was that rapes didn’t occur in the city. Even though the crisis center proved that myth false, it didn’t change the attitude that some women deserved whatever they got. “ If this is true,” I said, “ there are certain authorities who should be in on this with you.” “ I’ ll contact them as soon as I have proof.” “And what kind of proof are you looking for, a confession?” “ No.” You ran your fingers through your hair. “ I’ve started working down at the crisis center. If I can find more women that this happened to, I’ ll have enough information to start an investigation.” “This doesn’t seem like a hell of a lot for the Journal to go on either.” You smiled. “They said I’m on my own. That’s the other reason I went to the Sun. To eat.” I smiled back. Your smile was beautiful, Molly, but it covered many things. “Why you?” You tilted your head slightly as if you didn’t understand me. “This sounds like a story that would have died, but for you taking it so personally. Why give up a good career to come to this backwater place?” The smile disappeared. And those two U p until a few years ago, the official line was that rapes didn’t occur in the city. Even though the crisis center proved that myth false, it didn’t change the attitude that some women deserved whatever spots of color were back in your cheeks. “ It’s personal,” you said. When I realized you weren’t going to say any more, I reached out and took your hand. It was amazing I had ever mistaken you for a teenage girl. You looked tough and competent and extremely fragile all at the same time. “ If you need any help on this,” I said, “ ask me, okay?” You squeezed my fingers tightly. “ Iwas hoping you’d say that.” » W ut you didn’t ask. For the next two months, you didn’t even say a word to me about the rape story. You continued to fill the society page with articles on brunches and teas and anti-apartheid speakers. A few of my columns even saw print. Granted, they were the least cogent of my works, but they were mine, nonetheless. I also found myself spending a lot more time with you. We would go to lunch together or you would invite me to a speech. But most of the time, you tried to turn me back into a real reporter and most of the time, I ignored your efforts. Part of the problem was that I lied to you. You, the crack reporter, would have found my history hard to believe. I wasn’t Knudson’s c liche—not really. It was easier to let you think that I was rewriting junk that came across the AP wire because I had drunk myself to the bottom. But liquor didn’t have a thing to do with it. The problem was that I never should have become a reporter in the first place. Sure, I graduated from Northwestern with a strong flair for language and lots of contacts in Chicago. Those attributes got me a job with the Tribune. And it was my nerves that got me fired. Nerves and conscience. I hated doing interviews. They terrified me. But worse than doing the interview, I hated using them. I could never bring myself to report Clinton St. Quarterly—Fall/Winter 1988 41
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