I hadn’t planned on going to this particular “Meet the Candidates” night, but just at that moment I saw Stacee cross the room to the City Desk, and I got a flash of inspiration.

“No, Brady, but we’re sending someone else there.”

He sounded a little disappointed, but I didn’t owe him anything.

“Sorry you’re clamming up on me, Brady. I thought by now – well, call me if you change your mind, okay?”

I hung up. So some kind of hit piece was planned. But they were definitely keeping it under wraps. I tried calling a couple of other people who were close to the campaign. Nothing.

I started plowing through the mass of paper that had accumulated on my desk since yesterday. I was making some headway when I noticed a shadow across my desk. I looked up to see who was darkening my reading light. It was Stacee.

“It’s not polite to read over people’s shoulders,” I said.

She blushed and said, “I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to. I guess I’m just curious.”

“Not bad to be curious. Just practice reading things on people’s desks when you’re outside the newsroom, and you’ll make more friends here.”

“I don’t seem to have many.”

My heart was breaking. Gee, Stacee, I thought to myself, don’t you wonder why? But aloud I said, “Sit down. I was going to try to talk to you later today anyway.”

She sat there dutifully, mooning at me. Christ Almighty, I thought – it won’t work with me, kid. I tapped my pencil. What was I going to do with Wrigley’s little princess?

“I understand you want to work on political stories.”

“Yes, I do.”

“What makes you think you can cover politics? Have you done it before?”

“In college, I covered student elections.”

I looked up at the little holes in the ceiling tile above me. The answer to my prayer for patience was not there.

“I mean,” she said, in a meek voice that made me want to kick her, “I know it’s not the same thing.”

“No,” I said. “Just tell me why. Why political stories?”

Why me? I thought, but I didn’t say it.

“I really want to work on something that’s important.”

I looked over to the City Desk, where a group of general assignment reporters were gathered around Lydia Ames, assistant city editor and a friend of mine since grade school. She was busily handing out the day’s less glorious assignments.

“Who do you know around here who doesn’t want to work on something important?” I said.

“I know I haven’t had much experience. But how am I going to get any experience if somebody doesn’t give me a chance?”

“Same way the rest of us got it – pay some dues.”

She looked crestfallen. I felt a little twinge – I refused to believe it might be guilt.

“Look, if you expect me to hand over a major story to someone who’s as green as-”

“I don’t expect that,” she protested. “I don’t mind hard work. It’s an honor just to be helping you. I’ve always admired your writing, Miss Kelly. I want to be like you.”

Where are the hip-waders when you need them? On second thought, she was laying it on so thick, it was more than hip-deep. I needed a steam shovel. She must have seen my doubts, because she grew very serious and said quietly, “I mean that.”

That twinge again. “Well, if you mean it,” I said, “then thanks. But understand that I’m doing this as a favor to John. I don’t know you well enough to have picked you out to work with me.”

“I understand. But I still appreciate the chance.”

“We’ll see. Here’s what you can do for starters. Go down to the morgue and read issues from June on – anything you can find related to local politics. When you’ve got at least that much background, we’ll go from there. And tonight there’s a meeting of the Las Piernas Coalition for Justice. All the major candidates will be speaking there. Go to it.”

“Tonight?” she said, looking uncomfortable.

“Yes, tonight. You do want to cover politics, don’t you?”

“The Coalition for Justice will be meeting on Halloween?”

“Yes,” I said, and I pulled out a flyer to prove it to her. “You weren’t expecting nine-to-five hours when you got your degree in journalism, were you?”

“Oh, no.”

“Well, I can see this isn’t going to work out,” I said, trying to keep the glee out of my voice. “You’ve obviously got a hot date or something. I’ll ask Lydia to put one of the more experienced general assignment people on it.”

“No – please. I’ll go. I’m sorry – I’ll cancel my other plans. Thanks for giving this to me.”

Maybe she would last a week, I thought. “No problem. Try to read up on the candidates before you get there.”

“I’ve been reading all of your stories – I clip them out.”

“What?”

She looked sheepish. “Like I said, I admire you. I’ve clipped out all your stories since you came back to the paper. I used to read your columns when I was in high school and college. Then you left the paper. When you came back, I didn’t know how long you were going to stay, so I started clipping them. You know, starting with the ones you did on Mr. O’Connor.”

I must confess I was flabbergasted. And embarrassed. And, yes – well, flattered. “Really?” I managed to choke out.

“Really.” God, she looked so sincere, I wanted to believe her. But I thought about what was going on with Wrigley and fell back to earth.

“Well, you still need to reread anything you’ve read about local politics – any story by anyone.”

“Okay.”

“Take this flyer. And let John know if you can’t make it for some reason – he may want to send someone else.” That was baloney, of course. This meeting was only one of a hundred, and whatever would be said tonight would be repeated at ten or twenty other meetings this week. The candidates were running around to every civic group they could get their hands on. Oh sure, they’d tailor tonight’s speeches along the more liberal side, to fit the coalition. Tomorrow, at the Veterans of Foreign Wars meeting, they’d tailor to the more conservative side. If she was serious, seeing them in each camp would provide good experience.

Before she left my desk, I told her about the VFW meeting and she noted the time and place. She thanked me again and I waved it off. I was going to be furious with myself if I started trusting all of her gratitude and flattery at face value. I reminded myself again that she had been crawling into Wrigley’s bed to get what she wanted. I shivered and went back to work on my pile of papers.

Afternoon rolled around and I called Casa de Esperanza to make sure there wouldn’t be any problem meeting there with Sammy and Jacob. The woman who answered wavered a bit, even though I told her I wasn’t planning on writing anything about the shelter. She wasn’t moved to commitment by my saying I had once worked at the shelter, either. Finally, I dropped Mrs. Fremont’s name as a reference and doors opened – suddenly I was a welcomed guest. “Mrs. Fremont should be here any time now,” the woman said brightly. I thanked her and told her I would be there in about twenty minutes.

I tidied up a few things, still feeling like it was unnatural for this desk to be so clean – O’Connor had always covered it in mountains of loose papers. As I made my way out to my car, I was concerned about going into this meeting without having spent at least a little time trying to get some background on witchcraft or on any previous news of local cults. Hadn’t I just given Stacee a big speech on being prepared?

And all I knew about witches came from a little background on what went on in Salem three hundred years ago and a few episodes of Bewitched.

“Eye of newt and toe of frog; Wool of bat and tongue of dog,” I mumbled, drawing a look of apprehension from a passer-by. I doubted the incantations from Macbeth were going to be of any help either.

Oh well, I thought, climbing into my car, I’d just have to keep in mind that I was meeting with Sammy to confirm Jacob’s purpose for being at a certain gathering – a political story. Not a witchcraft story.