Starting a serialization of a novella, Mahoney & Mills, today. Look for it to continue in the weeks ahead.
Phil Mahoney didn’t like the feel of this. He had been a big time newspaper columnist, and he knew when someone was trying to set him up. The old guy sitting across the table was up to something.
“What’s going on here, Reuben?” he asked.
Reuben Hartman had the elder statesman thing working: Navy blue suit, crisp white shirt, red and blue striped tie and white pocket square. His silver hair was short and neat, and his sleek, wire-rimmed glasses gave him a dignified, almost regal look.
“Nothing going on, Phil. Can’t an old friend take you out to lunch to catch up? You know, see how you’re holding up.”
Mahoney smirked and said, “Come on, you don’t do anything without an agenda.”
“Wow.”
“I mean that in a good way,” Mahoney said.
“Guess I’ll take it as a compliment then,” Hartman said.
Mahoney grabbed a piece of the warm bread, stabbed a little square of butter on it, and looked around. They were at Il Rosa, little Italian place on Fifty-first, just off Second Avenue. It was a small, quiet dining room, and he again wondered why he was called to lunch.
Hartman never did anything without an ulterior motive. He was one-half of Hartman & Evans, the city’s top crisis management and public relations firm. When some dim-witted celebrity, executive, jock or politician got himself messed up, it was Hartman they called to fix things.
“So, I’m supposed to believe you just want to check on me, huh?”
“It’s never easy losing a job, Phil,” Hartman said.
“Appreciate the reminder,” Mahoney said, talking as he chewed.
“I just wanted to see if I could help with your transition,” Hartman said.
“Transition? Hell, you make it sound like I’m having some gender change thing, or something. How ‘bout we take it easy with the transition talk, okay?”
Hartman shrugged and gave a placid, little smile. “You know what I mean.”
“Well, I got some things going on job-wise, Reuben. Nothing solid, but I’ve been talking to a few people. Been on a few interviews. You know how it goes,” Mahoney said.
He watched as Hartman reached for his glass of club soda, and took a slow deliberate sip. Everything the man did was slow and deliberate, and Mahoney could understand why people in a storm went to Reuben Hartman. It was that, calm in the middle of the storm persona.
“Phil?”
“Yeah?” Mahoney said.
“When did the Herald buy you out?”
“I don’t know, like a few months ago.”
“It’s almost a year,” Hartman said.
“Yeah, that sounds right, so what’s the issue?”
“Marty called me the other day,” Hartman said.
Mahoney slammed his fist on the table, startling the few diners around him and drawing the attention of the maitre’d.
“Son of a bitch,” he said. “That’s where this is coming from. I knew something was going on.”
“Marty tells me you still show up in the newsroom. He’s worried about you.”
“Yeah, well tell him he doesn’t need to be. He’s got no right poking his nose in my business. Besides, they still pay me. I’m entitled to visit the newsroom. I still got a lot of friends there. They haven’t gotten rid of everyone.”
“No, but they bought you out, Phil, and that means you’re done. The checks run out in a week. Then what are you going to do?” Hartman asked.
“How the hell do you know this?” he asked.
“That’s not important,” Hartman said.
“So what, you got a job lined up for me?” Mahoney asked.
“No, I don’t have a job for you,” Hartman said.
“Good, ‘cause you know there’s no way I’m going into PR. I was nominated for a damn Pulitzer in commentary. No way I could go into PR. What a friggin’ step down that would be.”
“Phil, I didn’t take you out to lunch to offer you a job,” Hartman said. “At least not exactly.”
“Huh? Not ex-” The waiter showed up before Mahoney could press Hartman.
“Ready to order?” the man asked.
“Not yet,” Hartman said. “Someone else will be joining us.”
“Who else is–” Mahoney started to say before Hartman cut him off by talking to the waiter.
“I’ll let you know when we’re ready,” Hartman told the man.
The waiter sighed and walked off, and Mahoney said, “Who else is coming?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Hartman said.
“You gotta tell me what’s going on here, Reuben.”
“Yes, I guess I do,” Hartman said, sighing. He took another drink of his club soda and said, “I have a problem, Phil. And you have a problem. And I’m thinking there may be one solution to both.”
“I don’t have a–”
“But let’s talk about your problem first,” Hartman said, interrupting him. “You’re going to be unemployed when your severance checks run out. You’re fifty-four, if I’m not mistaken. And you have a wife, and a child.”
“Two,” Mahoney said. “Kids, not wives.”
“And by all indications, you still seem to be operating under the illusion that you can somehow land a columnist position with one of the other newspapers, or what’s left of them. But I’m here to tell you that it’s not going to happen. Those days are over.”
Mahoney sat back, his hand holding his glass of beer. He tapped his finger on the glass and his wedding band made a ding-ding-ding sound. He looked across at Hartman, shook his head and said, “That stings, Reuben.”
“This isn’t twenty-five years ago, Phil. You realize what the job market is for a fifty-something guy who made his living in print? You’re officially a dinosaur.”
“Holy crap, Reuben. You can’t talk to me like this. I mean, what the hell is this, some kind of career intervention?” Mahoney asked. “Or is this you getting even for all those times I nailed one of the dirtbags you represented. That’s it, right? Now that I’m down, you’re just going to kick away.”
Mahoney gulped the last of his beer, put the glass back on the table with a thump, and threw his napkin next to it and got up. “Thanks for the uplifting pep talk. But I got to go.”
“Really?” Hartman said. “Where do you have to go Phil. A job interview? What do you have lined up?”
Mahoney froze right there in the middle of the dining room. He didn’t see the people around him staring at him. He didn’t see anything but the calm Reuben Hartman looking up at him. The truth was, he had nowhere to go, and Hartman knew it. There was no newsroom to go to. No other appointment. He was going to get on a train and leave the city, and go home and stare at the bills, and check his bank account.
He knew his career was over, and he didn’t need Reuben Hartman to tell him. He knew it three months ago when some clown at a crummy Internet news site offered him a job as a content editor. The kid was thirty, maybe. Was walking around in pull-ups when Mahoney was taking down politicians. Now he’s offering him a job at sixty grand a year as a content editor. Hartman’s voice cut through the clutter in his mind.
“So, who you going to talk to, Phil? Maybe I know him and can put a word in for you,” Hartman said.
Mahoney pulled his chair out and sat back down. “I got nowhere to go, Reuben. You happy? You broke me.”
“I apologize if I was harsh,” Hartman said. “But you’re too stubborn to listen any other way. The only way to get through to you is to hit you over the head.”
So, this was the way things were going to be now. No job, and one of the city’s power brokers making him feel like garbage.
“Talk to me, Reuben,” Mahoney said.
“We already know about your problem,” Hartman said. “Now, let me tell you about mine.”