Lady in the Lake(32)

“Take comp time,” he said airily. “I’ll tell Don. You can take an hour a day over three days.”

“Comp time?”

“Compensatory time. It’s okay as long as everyone agrees to it. Oh, strictly, it has to be taken that week, to keep you below forty hours, but nobody worries about those technicalities.”

Maddie was pretty sure that it was management that didn’t worry about such technicalities.

“Overtime is paid at one point five. So shouldn’t I get four point five hours? Otherwise, comp time sounds like a bad deal to me.”

His eyes went cold and what little friendliness he had been able to fake vanished from his face. With his overly sharp incisors, too-white skin, and too-red eyes, Cal looked like a vampire or an albino cat. He was a man of no true authority, Maddie saw. How it must have grated on him.

“Very well, then,” he said. “You’ve earned four point five hours. To be taken by mutual consent. What are you going to do? Enjoy a longer lunch hour? Go shopping?”

“I’ll bank the time for now. One never knows when one might need time. Will you explain the situation to Don? That you asked me to do this for you and I earned comp time?”

“To be taken by mutual consent,” Cal said. “You can’t just announce that you’re leaving early. You’ll have to clear it with Don.”

“Of course.”

She walked away, well aware that she had not answered his intrusive questions about what she intended to do with her time. She had no intention of telling him that she planned to find another way to get into the paper. A real story.

When the Star was published the next day, her piece had been cut to five paragraphs. There was no trace of Maddie’s name and everything she had thought lively or good about the writing, the quotes, had been excised. She didn’t care. She cut it out and put it in a manila folder in her desk, which she titled, after some thought, “Morgenstern, Madeline.” When she did get a byline, maybe that should be the name she used.

She opened the letters she had left when Cal had sent her to the police station. Two of them had potential and she put them to the side to give to Mr. Heath. One was something she could handle. A passerby had noticed that the lights were no longer working at the fountain in Druid Hill Park. She would call the Department of Public Works tomorrow and report the outage. It wasn’t worth space in the column. She had learned to make such distinctions by now and was proud of the initiative she showed. Bob Bauer had warned her that Heath was worried that Maddie was gunning for his job.

Maddie had her sights set much higher, so high that she could not yet see exactly what she wanted. She cosseted and spoiled Mr. Heath, bringing him Entenmann’s cookies or a slice of Sara Lee swirl cake with his afternoon cup of coffee. Soon enough, she was back in his good graces. Four point five hours, hers to use as she wished. But how did she wish to use them? What could one do with four point five hours?

An electrician in a rowboat was about to provide the answer.





Lady Law





Lady Law



I did not want the party. Who has a party in one’s twenty-ninth year of employment? I’m not leaving until I make captain, as I have told my superiors numerous times. Numerous times.

But I understood what was going on, why the department wanted to celebrate me, why there were photographers, even a reporter, although she seemed very green to me, despite her age. I thought, She’s going to need more confidence to do that job, that’s for sure. I have been interviewed quite a bit, for much more in-depth pieces. I did not need to be photographed holding a cake knife.

Confidence is something I have never lacked. My father taught me not to fear death and that is why I have been able to do the work that I do. Not fearing death is not the same as being fearless. It means that I am not worried about where I’m headed, the consequences of death. I have not led a blameless life. But I am a Christian woman who prays to my Lord to lead me through my hard times, to forgive me when I slip from the path, to extend a hand and help me back onto the straight and narrow.

I often don’t like things people think I should like. I don’t like parties. I don’t like being photographed. I don’t like attention. I didn’t really like being on that television show, To Tell the Truth, but at least I was the one telling the truth. Still, there was something undignified about it. The whole point of the show is that one is somehow odd, maybe even freakish. I am not freakish. I am a college-educated woman who cared about children, my own—I have four, two that I birthed and two that I adopted—and all the children of the neighborhoods I patrolled. I was, in some ways, more social worker than police officer. I think, though, I have made more of a difference than social workers. When a social worker comes to a house, she’s the enemy, a meddler. When I visited—usually because of reports of drunken or loutish behavior—the mothers welcomed me, secretly. They knew I understood, that I cared. But I had to put their children first, always.

They called me “Lady Law.” I did like that, especially the first part. I pride myself on my manners, my gentility. In the 1950s, when I supervised several younger women, I stressed the importance of good manners, a civilized appearance. There was no reason that our work had to make us masculine or rough. Sometimes, I had to be the strict schoolmarm, if you will. I would catch the young boys sneaking into the movies, cutting school. I’d tell them that I could take them home or to Cheltenham, it was their choice. They always chose home.