Queen of the Underworld by Gail Godwin

was more to come. With his typical acumen for planning the next treat, Paul had got us here just in time for the first edition’s press run. He activated the button to let down the window on my side, then switched off the ignition and let the close, balmy night invade the air-conditioned darkness of the car. As though we were royalty and the performance could now begin, a bell went off inside the tall ground-floor windows. Men wearing hats made out of newspaper moved among the big presses—some were up on the catwalks—and the huge press cylinders began to roll, slowly picking up speed to the chop-chop of the folder knives. The folder spewed forth the first complete paper; the foreman gave it a fast page-through to make sure the plates were installed in the right order, then gave the high sign for the presses to accelerate to full speed. The chop of the folder knives got faster and faster until it merged with the roar of the presses into a frenzied blur of sound. There was something erotic about a press run, with its increasing tempo of excitement, its acceleration toward full speed and no return.
    “Seventy thousand newspapers an hour,” crooned Paul softly, his hand lightly cupping my knee. “Just think, by this time tomorrow your byline may be hitting the streets seventy thousand times.”
    3.
    I SUPPOSE I EXPECTED more fuss when I stepped off the elevator into the noisy
Star
newsroom on Monday morning. Nobody even looked up. Men with rolled-up shirtsleeves assaulted typewriters, smoke rising above their heads. The pervasive odors were of tobacco, coffee, and the pulp copy paper Mother in her reporting days used to bring home from the
Mountain City Citizen
for me to scribble on. Segregated inside a glass cubicle, some middle-aged women in colorful dresses were clustered over fashion layout pages or prancing around in high heels or clacking out copy. All of them were puffing like dragons as well. A lanky, deeply tanned one with close-cropped silver curls caught my eye and smiled. I smiled back coolly and proceeded on to the managing editor’s corner. My acceptance letter had said “general assignment reporter” and I had no intention of getting corralled into the women’s department.
    At least Lib, the managing editor’s secretary, who guarded his office, was expecting me. I had made sure to write down her name after my Christmas interview. She said Mr. Feeney would be out to welcome me shortly. She asked me what I thought so far of the South Florida weather, and before I could answer said not to judge it by all the rain we’d been having, meanwhile giving me the female-to-female once-over and appearing satisfied with my neat French twist and forest green shirtwaist. (“Dark dress, hair out of face, and
stockings,
no matter how hot”—my grandmother Loney’s career-dressing advice.) Lib herself wore a navy dress with a white collar, and her black hair was smartly sheared at earlobe level.
    Supertall Mr. Feeney bounded out in his shirtsleeves and with an avuncular bow escorted me into his office. He was a gent, from the category of men I knew how to handle best. Gents tended to idealize bright young women and tried to smooth their way, shielding them from unpleasantness and strife whenever possible.
    Since my Christmas visit, another executive desk facing Mr. Feeney’s had been moved into his office, making the room look cramped. A solid, dark-haired figure in an uncannily white shirt was in the act of rising from this desk.
    “Emma, this is my new assistant managing editor, Lou Norbright.” That he presented the assistant manager to
me
indicated that Mr. Feeney was indeed of the old school. A lady ranked higher than her corporate superior. Then, in typical self-effacing-gent style, Feeney went on to praise us to each other as if that were his only role in life.
    “Lou here came to us six years ago, Emma, all the way from North Platte, Nebraska, as a general assignment reporter for the
Star,
and before we