Mackerel By Moonlight

Description for MACKEREL BY MOONLIGHT by William F Weld: Orphaned as a young boy and haunted by fragmentary memories of his father, Terry Mullally, the hero of Mackerel by Moonlight, nonetheless has schooled himself to success. He makes a splash as an assistant U.S. attorney in Brooklyn but leaves under a cloud of suspicion after some dicey operations in which laws are broken and money changes hands. Once he has escaped to Boston, to the safety of a white-shoe law firm, Mullally is again bitten by the political bug. Backed by a discontented police union and handled by two young politicos -- a labor organizer and a gossip columnist -- he charms and schemes his way to being elected district attorney, where the same combination of luck, smarts, and inattention to the niceties of the moral code brings success and makes him a star. The twenty daily car rides that go with holding office are eased by thoughts of Emma Gallaudette, sweet and saline, brash, brainy, and unfortunately quit