Chapter VII (2)

    Avery Borden of Borden, Olson and Mardine (nicknamed Borden's Oleomargarine by the business) arrived with disastrous news. The client had decided to go institutional for the New Year's day broadcast and eliminate the product commercials. Mode Shoes would content itself with wishing a Happy New Year to the American Way of Life in a single middle break, which now threw the entire show out of kilter. It added an extra three minutes to entertainment time, necessitating the insertion of a new number, and worse, it threw out the first and last commercials. Shows are carefully framed around the commercials in terms of tempo and climax, and the break is as essential as punctuation in a sentence.
    It was for emergencies of this sort that the weekly show conference was held on Thursdays. The staff was able to cope with immediate problems as well as post-mortem the previous week's show and plan the one coming up in four weeks' time. They all met in the brain room of Grabinett's office. Presiding was Raeburn Sachs, taking notes was Mrs. Sachs. Present were: The Star, his agent, the producer, his budget, the writer, his partner, the dance director and the music director.
    They post-mortemed the Christmas show. The client, Grabinett reported, was pleased but with two reservations. First: When Oliver Stacy handed each contestant his or her lovely pair of Mode Shoes as a gift for appearing on the show, it was requested that he use a French accent in naming the shoe style. The client felt that Stacy's accent was not sufficiently Parisian.
    Second, Grabinett continued, the matter of prizes. The difficulty over the Grand Prize on the Christmas show made the client wonder if the questions weren't too difficult.
    "Too difficult!" Lennox protested. "For God's sake! We're setting those questions at the kindergarten level now. How dumb do you have to be to win a prize?"
    "It's not as if we're giving away big prizes," Grabinett blinked apologetically. "Aeroplanes and trips to Europe and islands in Canada. For big prizes you got the right to ask tough questions."
    "How small is five hundred dollars?" Lennox demanded. "That's what our prizes average. And it's a lot of money. We don't have to give it by forced feeding, do we?"
    "A man in public is fifty percent dumber than the same man in private," Ned Bacon drawled cynically. "We did a story about that on 'The People Against—'. We—"
    "What about the prize hassle from last Sunday?" Tooky Ween rumbled.
    "We took the heat off," Lennox told him. "It's all over except for one little thing. Mig'll have to say something about it next Sunday."
    "Say what?"
    "Oh, a little apology for the mistake."
    "Not me! I'm not going to apologize for anything," Mason cried. "I didn't make any mistake. Don't turn me into the fall-guy."
    "You want to ruin my property's fan relations?" Ween asked.
    "It was the operator who loused it," Mason said. "That girl on the phone. She got me all mixed up."
    "All right," Lennox said in exasperation. "So blame it on Patsy. Next Sunday announce that the contestant gave the right answer, but the girl made a mistake. Will you buy that?"
    "She's been lousing the phone call every week," Mason yelled. "Every week she's got me worried when I should be thinking about myself. The girl has got to go."
    "Leave her alone, Mig. Will you make the announcement?"
    "If the girl goes."
    "She goes," Grabinett broke in. "She's fired."
    "The hell she is!" Lennox exploded. "That's a damned dirty trick."
    "She goes." Grabinett glared at Lennox. "You want a law suit?"
    "Contestants can make a lot of trouble," Bacon drawled. "We had a Case on 'The People Against—' when—"
    "Listen," Ween interrupted. "My boy makes the announcement if he can say that the girl loused the prize and she's been fired. That's the conditions. We got to keep faith with the public trust."
    "Then let's do it another way," Lennox pleaded. "Leave the girl out of it. I'll take the rap. The writer pulled the boner. Damn it, I'll get on camera and apologize myself."
    "What are you doing, representing her?" Ween rumbled. "No. It's got to be the girl."
    "Be reasonable, Tooky. Patsy's a—"
    "Will you shut up!" Grabinett blinked angrily. "Jesus Almighty Galahad! What do you care about a lousy telephone girl?"
    "I want a fair shake for everybody. That's all."
    "Then go join the boy scouts. The girl's fired. Make the announcement, Mig. We're out of the law suit. Next?"
    They discussed the extra three minutes' entertainment time. Mason wanted to add it to his comedy spot. He was supported by Ween. The staff pointed out that it would overbalance the show. Furthermore, the client had expressed a desire to have Mason's spot kept to six minutes maximum. The problem was how to fake a quick novelty without disrupting the existing show. The entire cast was tightly fitted into the program with barely enough time for costume changes. It would be impossible to hire a good outside specialty act on such short notice.
    "I could let you have our two leads from 'The People Against—'," Bacon suggested. No one was interested.
    "We need something fresh," Sachs murmured wearily. "A different Weber & Fields."
    "Here's a gimmick," Lennox said. "Sam Cooper's tune is turning into a hit. Mig brought it out on the show two months ago."
    "Great! Sensational!" Mason said. "Diggy and I'll do a reprise."
    "You're already doing a duet," Lennox answered. "You can't do two. Besides, you need that three minutes to change. Here's my gimmick. Let Sam do the duet with one of the dancers. We'll introduce Sam as the rehearsal pianist on the show who wrote the tune that Mig made famous. Then let 'em guess Sam's name for a hundred bucks."
    "That stinks!" Mason snarled.
    "Why? It's cute. It's in the family, and it's great promotion for everybody. What do you think, Tooky?"
    "We'll take it under advisement," Ween answered.
    Which was tantamount to an okay. Lennox nodded to Ween, then turned to Grabinett. "Mel, can you budget us for fifteen hundred extra Sunday?"
    "A yard and a half extra!" Grabinett blinked in horror.
    "Ray's got a sensational idea for the Nolan. Tell him about flying the 3."
    Sachs told Grabinett, first demonstrating the shot from the overhead grid and then from the stage underneath. His genius was defeated by the budget and the overhead camera disposed of.
    "If that finishes next Sunday, let's get on to the twenty-second," Grabinett said.
    "One more thing about Sunday," Lennox said. "The most important.... The letters."
    "Jesus Almighty!"
    "I want to make a last appeal. You all know about the threats for the New Year's show. I've been around to see each of you and shown you the threats."
    "Y-Your police f-friend's been around t-too," Johnny Plummer stammered softly.
    "Fink? The detective? What'd he ask?"
    "Lambkin, it was about the stage hands and camera crews mostly," Charlie Hansel said, "Fink's a deep one, he is."
    "He's the smartest shamus in plainclothes," Bacon told them. "We did his biography on 'The People Against—'."
    "Well that proves this isn't for laughs," Lennox said. "I think we're in for trouble. Bad trouble. I want to appeal to all of you for the last time. If you know anything about this ... anything at all that can help us out ... please don't cover up. We'll be discreet. We'll keep it quiet. But at least give us a fair shake. Help us protect you and protect the show."
    "Discreet will we!" Grabinett shouted. "I'll fire the lousy crook. I'll kick the Judas out so fast he won't feel it on his Almighty pants. And I can do it. I got moral conduct clauses in every contract."
    "Mel! Please!"
    "I ain't gonna have the name of Melvin Grabinett associated with the louse who's let us in for this trouble. And I'll sue. I got indemnifying clauses in every contract."
    "That's lovely. Lovely. That's the sure way to make a man admit he's in trouble and needs help."
    "I don't want to help him. I'm warning him. This goes for anybody. If you're gonna make trouble for the show, out you go." Grabinett blinked passionately and then continued in the same hysterical voice. "Now let's get going on the 22nd. Just remember what I tell you every week. The client wants a family show. A sweet show that makes a family feel better after they've seen it."
    Out came the portfolios, the briefcases, the pads and notes. Lennox took out his gimmick book and began turning the pages looking for the ideas underlined in red pencil, which were those earmarked for "Who He?." He had production numbers, drama spots, song spots, novelty questions and various related gimmicks neatly listed in his meticulous handwriting. At a distance one of his pages looked like a leaf from a Gothic bible.
    "I've got a tentative program worked out for the 22nd," Lennox said. "It's in the envelope with the finished script for the 15th, Ray. On your desk."
    Sachs handed the envelope to his wife who opened it and handed him Jake's program. Sachs read it, frowned, and shook his head.
    "No," he said. "No. It's all off-trail, Jake."
    "I was expecting that," Lennox growled. "And I'm just nervous enough about next Sunday to throw it in your teeth."
    The others looked up, startled at Jake's anger.
    "I've kept a record of our show discussions for the past thirteen weeks," he went on, flipping the pages of his gimmick book. "Ten out of those thirteen you started out rejecting every one of my suggestions and ended up suggesting them as your own idea. Why don't you relax, mastermind? Who are you auditioning for? Or do you want to think you're the only man on the show who can—"
    Suddenly Lennox stopped and stared at his gimmick book. His face turned white and the deep lines on it showed up grey. He swallowed once or twice, then closed the book and returned it to his pocket.
    "Excuse it, please. I've got to take five," he muttered. "I'll be in the john."
    He left the brain room and locked himself in the office john. He took out the gimmick book and with trembling fingers opened it and turned the pages until he found what he had seen at the meeting. In a large space between two neat paragraphs, a stranger had written a message to him in a familiar hysterical hand. The line was:
    "Be killing you New Year's. Knott."