Never Play Another Man's Game by Mike Knowles

Author:Mike Knowles
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Mystery, Suspense
ISBN: 9781770902091
Publisher: ECW Press
Published: 2012-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The World’s End was a pub for reporters. It was heavy on print, but some of the TV reporters slummed there too. I found the bar on the web when I looked up the newspaper softball team. The bar was the team’s sponsor, and they put their name on the back of the cheap jerseys.

At one in the afternoon, the bar was running on fumes. Whatever business came with the lunch crowd had gone back to work. I sat at the bar and ordered a Coke. The bartender rolled his eyes at me and slowly walked away, dragging a rag down the bar, to get my drink. Reporters drank more than cops, so a Coke was a sign that I wasn’t one of their kind. When my drink came back, I noticed it was in a short glass without ice — a hint that I wasn’t welcome.

The World’s End was dark and everything had some kind of dark wood on it. It was a dim hole where the rest of the world could be forgotten — a place where secrets could be told. I drained the Coke and people-watched. In a booth, three men spoke loudly about LeBron James and argued about his move to Miami. Anothertable had a man and a woman sharing a conversation that looked like it might erupt into a make-out session at any moment. I guessed it was an office romance. Three other tables had solitary men with hard liquor in front of them. I watched the three men closely. I wrote off the one closest to me when he began nodding off. The chubby man with the beard went next. He was spending too much time on his booze. The last man was reading through a file folder, pausing only to make a note or to have a sip of the drink he kept at the far end of the table. The man was in his fifties with a white moustache and a long bald runway on top of his head. He was wearing leather shoes that had thick athletic soles. He was a guy who was on his feet a lot and was starting to feel it.

I ordered a second Coke and took it over to the man’s table. I took a seat across from him; he didn’t look up. His hand reached over, picked up his drink, and he took a sip without lifting his eyes from what he was reading.

“Who the fuck asked you to sit down?”

“My drink was getting warm waiting for you to offer,” I said.

The man sighed and looked up from his papers. “Excuse my fucking manners. How can I help you today, sir?”

“Television or print?”

“What?”

“You television or print?”

“I’m a newsman.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“The hell I didn’t. I told you I was a newsman and any journalist worth his pencil knows that the papers are the only real news. Television is just window dressing. Top story followed by some fucked-up American socialite’s latest escapade. No time is ever given to the real issues because real life doesn’t buy ratings or sponsors.

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