I hadn’t forgotten, but I had been considering pretending to have forgotten. I wandered over to his office, where his secretary was posted outside the door.

“Mr. Magnuson wanted to see me?” I said.

His secretary said, “And you are?”

This is always encouraging, when the secretary to the guy who runs the newsroom where you are employed has no idea who you are.

“Zack Walker?” I said. “I work here?”

She buzzed him, spoke so quietly into her phone that I could not make out what she was saying, and when she was done, said to me, “He’ll be with you in a moment.”

I cooled my heels for about five minutes, standing around Magnuson’s closed door like a kid waiting to see the principal. Finally, it opened, and Magnuson himself gestured for me to come in.

He was a slight man, a bit round-shouldered, thinning gray hair atop his head, immaculately dressed, even with his suit jacket off and hanging over the back of the leather chair behind his broad oak desk.

“Mr. Walker, what a pleasure,” he said. “I don’t think we’ve actually spoken since you joined us.”

“No, Mr. Magnuson, I don’t think we have.”

“Have a seat.”

I took a chair in front of his desk as he got back into his behind it. He tossed a red binder across the desk at me. There was a sticker on the front that read “Editorial Policy Manual.”

“Did you get one of these when you were hired?” Magnuson asked.

“Uh, I believe I did.”

“I’m going to have to rewrite it,” he said.

“Really? Why is that, Mr. Magnuson?”

“I left something out. I should have thought of this before I had it drafted. I can’t believe how neglectful I was.”

I didn’t want to ask, but felt it was expected of me. “What, uh, did you leave out?”

“The part that says Metropolitan staffers are not supposed to be involved in shootouts.”

“Mr. Magnuson, that’s not exactly correct. I was in a car with someone who was doing the shooting, but the only thing I was doing was holding the steering wheel so he could get off a few shots.”

“Oh, I see,” Magnuson said. I didn’t get the impression that this made everything okay. “You used to work for the competition, didn’t you?”

“Several years ago, yes. I worked at The Leader.”

Magnuson nodded thoughtfully. “Did the reporters over at The Leader get involved in shootouts, Mr. Walker?”

“Not regularly, sir, although there was one night when two guys from sports who’d had a bit too much to drink started shooting at each other over a Leafs-Sabres game. I don’t know where they got the guns, exactly.”

Magnuson cocked his head, squinted at me. “Is that an attempt at humor, Mr. Walker?”

I swallowed. “If it was, sir, it was evidently a very weak one.”