Deadline by Gerry Boyle Page B

There was more about the company pledging to do everything in its power to retain jobs in Maine, but the “extremely competitive marketplace, the responsibility to the shareholders, the burgeoning environmental costs …”
    â€œWhat’s this say in English?” I said.
    â€œHa, ha,” Curry said. “Always right for the jugular. Well, you want a quick answer, I guess, and if I may paraphrase Haze Gavin, St. Amand and parent firm Quinn-Hillson are both reaffirming their commitment to the community. Gavin knows that you have been making some inquiries about the company’s actions in other contexts, and the company is just saying that each of those actions is taken independently, and we are not in a mode where we make any of these decisions easily. But we are in a mode where some difficult decisions may have to be made if the community, the town, the employees don’t recognize the marketplace we’re working in.”
    â€œSo what does this have to do with me?”
    â€œHa, ha,” he said. “No, Jack, we are serious. We recognize that you have legitimate concerns about the company’s moves and the way they might impact Androscoggin. You have a responsibility to get all the information out to the community, and you are doing a great job of that. But we want to make sure that you do have all the information. So Haze Gavin wants you to look at this statement. Consider it talking points. Then we can get together, do a conference call, and really lay it out for everybody to see. What’s your deadline for this week?”
    â€œDeadline is Thursday morning to make the streets early Friday. But that’s in North Conway at the printer’s. In theory, we should have everything set to go Wednesday night.’’
    â€œHey, I remember deadlines at the college paper. University of Oklahoma. Boy, did we bust some deadlines.”
    Bust some deadlines? Spare me.
    â€œWhen does Gavin want to talk?” I asked. “Tomorrow? We have had some other things going on.”
    I waited. One, two, three …
    â€œOh, yeah, the Arthur Bertin thing. Well, I know, I’ll call you. We can work around that, I’m sure. Terrible thing. I didn’t mean to … No, you take care of that, of course. If there’s anything that the company can do, we’ll—”
    â€œWhat’s down there? Where he died, I mean?”
    Curry’s expression changed, almost as if he’d been asked a real question for a change and could give a real answer.
    â€œNothing, really, Jack,” he said. “A lot of storage. Nothing really. If we put in another paper machine, not that we have any firm plans, but if we ever did expand, that would be the direction we’d head. But nothing. Just … I don’t know, just a lot of junk.”
    Junk and a dead man who had been very lonely.
    Curry finally left and my stomach grumbled. I closed Arthur’s editorial and shut off my machine. I got up and looked out at the traffic, looked at Marion’s note on the community news copy and briefs, with thirty-six inches in the system. Marion was very efficient. It was good to have at least one grown-up in the operation.
    Vern was still on the phone, talking basketball. He was a funny guy, able to talk for hours about nothing or, when he was drinking or hungover, come out with something that cut to the absolute heartof a subject, a verbal stiletto. It was unsettling, as if he thought more than he ever let on, as if the veil was always down. Almost always.
    The shift-change traffic had thinned, which meant there were no cars on Main Street. My stomach grumbled again and I decided to head home, and within minutes I had caught both of the lights on Main Street on green, swung over the bridge, past the park and up the hill. At Penobscot Street, I went left, slowing to let a group of high-school kids saunter across the street. When I got to the house it looked bleak and cold,