3 EMILY STRAUSS


'Mr Pulitzer, sir, you have a visitor. A very insistent one. And she's female.'
It was just after twelve and Joseph Pulitzer was taking a break, in anticipation of his lunch and afternoon nap.
Seated in a vast wicker chair in his conservatory, a glass of water before him, neat piles of books and papers on a table nearby, he turned towards his secretary. His left eye was dull and half closed, his right was bright blue and seemed to see, though in fact it did not.
'What does she want, Mr Butes?' he said.
Arthur Butes was one of Pulitzer's four male secretaries. He was English, discreet and well-spoken with just that combination of learning, quickness and subservience that the great man liked. He hesitated briefly and then said, 'Well she hasn't much English, but as I understand it she insists she is a relative of the distant sort ? the daughter of Mrs Pulitzer's niece ?'
'Let Mrs Pulitzer see her then,' his employer said, turning away.
Butes was unruffled. 'She has specifically requested to see you sir,' he continued with calm assurance. 'Indeed, she refuses to budge without doing so.'
The afternoon was a bright one after several days of rain and though it was cold outside the sun made the conservatory pleasantly warm. Joseph Pulitzer sat thinking awhile, the light emphasizing the striking contrast between his thick brown hair and the red of his beard.
'Chatwold', his rented home at Bar Harbor, had fine views over the sea where his yacht, Liberty, was anchored. Joseph Pulitzer could see neither, but close up things were easier. The touch and aroma of his plants pleased him and the fresh sea breeze at open doors and windows helped if his throat and lungs were troubling him, which they often were.

He liked nothing worse than idleness. His great wealth had brought him no contentment, no peace: he was as he looked - restless, hungry to be doing, always imminently bored, permanently dissatisfied.
Butes had judged his employer's mood right that afternoon but it was no surprise that before proceeding any further Mr Pulitzer wanted some hard facts.
'So, Mr Butes, what exactly does her card say?'
'It says she's a Fraulein ?. Eva Berger, of ...'
'Repeat that, Mr Butes. You're mumbling.'
'Berger, sir. Of Mulheim.'
'Address?'
'Ponitz Strasse, number 10.'
Pulitzer frowned.
'I don't believe it,' he said matter of factly.
'I'm inclined to agree, sir. She says she's just arrived from Europe, but she doesn't look like she has to me.'
'What's she look like?'
'Tall, fair-haired, handsome I would say. Perhaps twenty-two or three.'
'Intelligent?'
'Possibly. Bold certainly. She's not the kind of lady who will go easily sir.'
'But she speaks real German?'
'Well, I'm no judge of the German tongue, Mr Pulitzer, but it strikes me there's a certain oddity about her accent. ?'
'You'd better show her in then. But if she looks as if she's going to cause trouble, remove her immediately!'

Out-of-work journalist Emily Strauss had spent the last six fruitless days learning the ways of New York journalism fast. It was harder, meaner and a deal more ruthless than anything she had ever experienced on the Pittsburgh Daily Echo in her past twelve unhappy months as a cub reporter - a job from which she had been fired a month before. New York promised much more - or had seemed to until she started tramping Newspaper Row in search of a reporter's job and had received nothing but a score of rejections.
So she stopped, right there on the sidewalk, and asked herself a simple question: what would Mr Joseph Pulitzer, the top newspaperman in the world, have done in her situation when he was first starting out as a news reporter?
The answer was obvious: beard the lion in his den. In fact it's precisely what he did do if she remembered right. So she would do the same. Heading straight for the rail depot, she spent her last few dollars on getting from Manhattan to Ellsworth and then a hack out to Bar Harbor and Mr Pulitzer's house. Time enough to work out how to con her way past the gateman.

Butes came back through the door with Emily.
Joseph Pulitzer stood up to offer her his right hand, and then, after a brief exchange in English, they both sat down.
Emily eyed him nervously, wondering how long she would be able to keep the game up. Joseph Pulitzer was altogether more intimidating than she had expected: he was taller, his presence was powerful, his supposedly blind gaze was - or seemed - penetrating and his face bristled with intelligence.
She decided to let him take the lead.
'Von Mulheim?' he said, his emphasis conveying general skepticism about her story.
Since he spoke in German she replied in it. It was, she guessed, about her only trump card. The rest were all poor ones rubbed up to look good.
'Ja, Herr Pulitzer, ich ...'
'Von Ponitz Strasse, im nord der stadt?'
'Jahrwohl, ich bin ?'
She stopped, taken unawares at her own sudden inability to keep the pretence going. Not that she couldn't speak fluent German; no, her father had insisted she always speak it at home. It was just that now she had finally made it into the great Joseph Pulitzer's presence, her nerve was failing her. Her stunt felt cheap and tawdry. There was nothing for it but to come clean and hope he was indeed the man his own newspapers said he was, that he would listen to what she had to say, weigh it on its merits and give her the assignment she craved.
Pulitzer immediately picked up on her hesitation.
'Let's talk English, Miss Berger. Only that isn't your real name is it? And you're no relative of my wife's, newly arrived from Germany either, are you? Your German's good but it has an American twang. Even Mr Butes here, and he's English, picked that up. How long have you lived in America?'
'I was born here sir,' she admitted after a pause, looking at the floor, 'in Pittsburgh. My father was a steelworker.'
'Was?'
'Died last year.'
'In the Homestead strike?'
'Yes, sir.'
She studied his face, but expressive though it was it looked inscrutable now.
After a pause he said, 'I reckon I'm a pretty good judge of character.'
'I expect you must be, Mr Pulitzer.'
'And I would say, on the strength of this brief acquaintance, which is not going to last much longer, that you're a willing liar when you need to be, as stubborn as a mule, and you don't give up on anything, which must be trying for those who know you. Am I right?'
'Pretty much sir. But from the descriptions I've read of you in your own newspapers, sounds to me as though you've just described yourself.'
He looked surprised at her audacity rather than amused, eying her in that strange, disconnected way of his and reached out unerringly for his glass of water, from which he slowly took a sip or two.
She waited, judging he was a man who liked to set the pace. She would have liked to put on her most charming of expressions for his benefit but knew it would have no effect.
'So why are you really here?' said Pulitzer, beginning to sound bored.
'I wrote to you, I ...'
'Lots of folk write to me, lots.'
'I telegraphed ...'
'Folk do that too. Lots of them.'
'I visited the offices of the World and ...'
'How far did you get?'
'Not very.'
Pulitzer nodded and smiled.
Emily paused and decided to take a different, more direct, tack. Her time was running out and she'd better get to the point fast.
'I just wanted a try-out,' she said simply.
Pulitzer let out a groan and turned toward Butes.
'If she's what I'm beginning to fear she is, Mr Butes - a cub reporter from out of town - you're going to get fired.'
He turned back to Emily.
'Well?'
'I am from out of town but I'm no cub. I've done twelve months on the Pittsburgh Echo and I've just finished a stint in Chicago, working women's angles at the World's Fair. I resigned. Mr Coombs wouldn't give me a raise or a by-line.'
It was her turn to pause. Then she added, a smile in her voice, 'I reckon that all adds up to Mr Butes here maybe having his pay cut but keeping his job.'
Pulitzer laughed aloud. Then he leaned forward and his expression turned mean.
'You know that one word from me can ruin your journalistic career forever?'
'I do. But I also know that one word from you can give it the kind of leg-up no-one else can,' Emily replied coolly. 'I thought it a risk worth taking and that if you heard me out you might agree!'
Pulitzer settled back in his chair, scowling.
Emily's heart thumped. She knew she was about to be either given her chance or thrown out but she couldn't guess which.
'You better make it good,' he said with a scowl.
She tried but she could see he wasn't listening, not really. He nodded, scowled, put the tips of his fingers together and sighed. She poured out her ideas to him but he reacted like any editor on any paper.
'You know what?' she said finally.
He sat up, paying attention.
'This is a waste of my time and it's a waste of yours. What I say won't convince you. But what I write, and how I write it, will. I know it.'
'So what do you suggest?'
'Give me a try-out. Right here and now. Choose a subject and I'll write about it . . .'
Pulitzer raised a hand and turned to Butes.
'Where's the latest post from readers?'
'Right here, sir.'
'Give it to the lady.'
Butes handed Emily a pile of twenty or so letters from the table nearby.
'I like to stay in touch with what my readers have to say and they like to stay in touch with me,' growled Pulitzer. 'Here's the latest batch. I'm going to take a little walk around my garden for about a quarter of an hour or so. That's the time you've got to go through these letters and come up with something worth writing. Let's see if you're as good as you think you are.'
As he got up and headed for the door into the garden on Butes's arm, Pulitzer called back at her:
'A quarter of an hour. After that I expect you to leave.' 'Thank you, sir,' she responded demurely.
'By the way,' he added, 'you never told me your real name.'
'Emily Strauss,' she said.
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© William Horwood & Helen Rappaport