It took Lennox eleven hours to struggle through the script for the
January 15th "Who He?" show. He consumed one ream of paper, half a
pound of coffee, two quarts of ice cream, and answered the phone a
dozen times. All of the calls were for Cooper. They were from unknowns
who appeared to be phoning from the vicinity of juke boxes and spoke in
hoarse underground voices. They used a jargon that was incomprehensible
to Lennox and they seemed to be torturing Cooper.
"They want material," he groaned.
"You've got a trunkful stashed away. Submit it."
"I can't. My old stuff stinks."
"Then write new material."
"I can't."
"The hell you can't. You've arrived, son. Cash in."
"Arrived? Sure, at the wrong station. I'm a fluke." Cooper was
miserable. "You heard about the party Suidi's throwing for me?"
"I'm coming. You'll hear me cheering in your corner."
"Cheering. My God! They'll all be there.... Looking me over. Sizing me
up. Me. A nothing. Making a fool of myself."
"Stop that, Sam. You're loaded with talent."
"Not me."
"They'll size you up and their eyes'll pop. What the hell is the matter
with you? You deserve success. You've earned it. Don't you want it?"
"No, I don't want it. I just want to be left alone," Cooper shouted.
"Leave me alone, for God's sake. I wish to Christ this'd never
happened." He flung out of the house.
Hot and uncomfortable, Lennox stacked his manuscript neatly, placed it
in a manila envelope and went out for a walk to worry about Cooper's
misery and his own.
The Rock has an emotional as well as physical geography, and Lennox
was unconsciously drawn to the neighborhoods that reflected his moods.
On this morning he went through his customary cycle from despair to
exhilaration never once remembering that he had been through the
identical cycle and the identical walk countless times before.
He started at low ebb. He was confused and frightened and automatically
began to wander back and forth through the cross-town side streets
that always reflect the slack tide in men's souls. What was happening
to Sam? Why wasn't Sam happy? What was happening to himself? Could
he really be receiving the threats? Was he scheduled for violence on
Sunday? The side streets were a dismal prelude to disaster.
Lennox searched his memory for guilt and enemies. He went all the way
back to his small town boyhood and was drawn to Lexington Avenue, the
great prototype of every Main Street in America. He could remember
nothing and was overcome with sorrow for himself. He was alone ...
crucified ... and he was driven south and east to the Bowery, the
boulevard of self-pity. There he trudged despondently, identifying
himself with the tattered vagrants, with poverty and failure.
From sorrow, his mood changed to anger. He was outraged with himself
for whining. He was furious with the world for attacking him unfairly.
Hostile and contemptuous, he found himself walking up Broadway, glaring
at the crowds, declaring war on a world that revealed itself so
squalidly from Times Square to Columbus Circle. In his anger he flatly
rejected any possibility that he could be the person described in the
letters. The ferment within him increased until he was recharged with
hope, and the cycle ended in elation.
He had nothing to fear. Nothing was falling apart. He would hold
everything together ... his delicious, wonderful world. He turned
east to Madison Avenue to savor his world. He admired the women, the
handsomest of all time; the men, the most successful; the shops, the
richest. Fifth Avenue is as rich and beautiful as Madison, but Fifth
Avenue is for dreaming. Madison is the bustling culmination of Now. It
has no past or future, only the immediate Present.
"Existentialist," Lennox said to himself.
To climax this explosive surge from despair to assurance which was his
main strength and weakness, he turned north and walked to a particular
spot that he loved in lower Central Park. It was on a slight hill
overlooking the pond and the Plaza. It was his own Exhilaration Point.
There were thousands like it ... private mastheads where the pirates
stood alone and exulted over the plunder before them. As Lennox walked
up the path, he was annoyed to see that his very own lookout was
already occupied. He resented the intruder until he looked closer and
saw that it was Gabby Valentine.
When he finally let her go, he bent down to pick up her hat and purse
and his script. "Have you got a jack-knife?" he asked. "I want to carve
something appropriate on a tree."
"I can just see you cutting lovers' knots," Gabby laughed.
Lennox winced.
"What's the matter?" she asked quickly.
"It was the idea of lovers' knots. Mawkish. I was thinking of something
really impressive, like: D. Boon cilled a Bar on this tree year 1760."
"You're the bear," Gabby said, feeling herself tenderly. "Don't come
near me again. I've got a gun."
"But what were you doing here, darling?"
"You told me about your favorite spot. I had to see it."
"Go ahead and shoot," Lennox said, but this time he was gentler.
He was right when he told Robin that this love affair was backwards.
Most people meet, get friendly, turn serious and become intimate.
Lennox and Gabby had started intimately and were working their way
back. They'd already been serious enough for a violent quarrel. Now
they were getting friendly. They spent an hour together in that
blissful past tense of all couples who are exploring each other....
"Did you?" and "Were you?" and "Had you?" They agreed, they compared,
they disagreed. They matched experiences, tastes, habits, friends.
Gabby asked about Cooper and Lennox tried to describe what the
friendship meant to him. "Sam's a whole man," he said. "Most men are
only part men ... like sections of a tangerine. All split up. You have
to put a lot together to get a whole."
"Do you mean F. Scott Fitzgerald's ideal? The entire man in the
Goethe-Byron-Shaw tradition?"
"I don't think so. Fitzgerald was obsessed with the idea that a man
had to explore all his potential for good and for evil. I think he was
trying to justify his own evil. I won't buy that. There's never any
excuse for being bad."
"There's being human."
"That's an explanation, not an excuse."
"Tell me more about Sam."
"Well ... most men are overspecialized, only interested in one thing.
The friend you like to fish with is a nuisance on a date. The friend
you double-date with is a noodnick about ball games. The friend you go
to ball games with can't understand books. And so on and so on. You
have to make a dozen one-twelfth friends."
"Maybe you demand too much."
"No. I've got a legitimate beef. Art and music, for instance.
Butch-type guys stay away from them like the plague. What happens? The
fags have inherited, and that puts me in a hell of a spot. If I want to
go to the ballet or the opera or an exhibit, it has to be with a fag or
alone. And I hate fags worse than Squares."
"Why can't you go with girls?"
"Sweetheart, I love ladies, but I like men too. Men and women think
differently, and sometimes I like to be with a man's point of view."
"I'll punish you for that," Gabby said.
"What I do?"
"Not now. Sam isn't a one-twelfth friend, is he?"
"No. He's twelve-twelfths. Whole."
"How did you meet him?"
"At Princeton. We went down for a fencing meet and Sam was host for the
visiting team. You should have seen him ... the fencer's dream. All in
white except for black stockings."
"Did you really work your way through college?"
"Yes Ma'am. I was a telegrapher. I was a telegrapher my last year in
high school too."
"Were you friendly with Sam right from the beginning?"
"No. Not until much later." Lennox frowned. "I was jealous at first.
Princeton was elegant. Society. And I was trying to climb up from a
clam-shack. I hated Sam."
"That's not nice," Gabby said.
"I was a kid from the wrong side of the tracks. That's an explanation,
not an excuse. Then I met him again in the business, and we got close."
"Had he changed?"
"No. I changed. There's nothing like making money to discharge the
venom in you. Sam was always the same. A whole man." Lennox smiled
gently.
"I like the way you look when you talk about him," Gabby said. "It
shows how much you love him."
"Love him?" Lennox was startled. "My God! Don't say that. Men aren't
allowed to talk like that nowadays."
"But you do, don't you?"
Lennox nodded. "You know how I feel about you. If you were turned into
a man.... That's how I feel about Sam." He stopped suddenly and faced
Gabby. "I've got you both, Gabby. Help me hold on to both."
"I'm not jealous," she said honestly.
"I know that, but don't do one thing. If he's got faults that I can't
see, don't point them out to me. You and Sam can sit in a corner and
make fun of me all you like. God knows, I'm a prize noodnick. You can
take my noodnickery apart and I won't care. Just let me love both of
you."
"Why did you flinch when I said lovers' knots?" Gabby asked.
He looked at her in awe. "Gabrielle, you're a great woman. I thought I
covered perfectly."
She shook her head and smiled.
"Talking to you's like turning a corner in March. You never know what's
going to blow into your face."
"What were you remembering?"
"A Quaker, a blonde, and a knot."
"I don't understand."
"I did a bad thing Christmas Eve. I got dirty drunk. I imagined I was
somebody else.... A Quaker from Philadelphia named Fox."
"Why Fox?"
"I don't know. I picked up a blonde named Aimee Driscoll. A-I-M-E-E."
"I don't want to hear about her."
"I don't want to talk about her."
"And the knot?"
"That's the part I still can't remember. I lost the night from
Christmas Eve to Christmas Day. The knot must be part of it. I don't
know what or how. All I know is that it terrifies me every time I think
of it."
"Is Lennox an English name?"
"I think so. From way back. What's that have to do with it?"
"Puritans," Gabby explained. "You're so moralistic. Always feeling
guilty ... like something out of 'The Scarlet Letter.'"
"Moralistic," Lennox repeated slowly. "Am I loud?"
"Deafening."
"And fancy ... elegant?"
"Not the phony way you say it; but you have style, Jordan. Yes, you're
definitely Edwardian."
"Jesus," he muttered and was silent.
"Stop feeling guilty. I like big loud men. And elegance is charming.
I'm going to make you brocade waistcoats with silver buttons."
After a long pause, he said: "Audibon isn't loud."
"Oh Jordan...."
"I shouldn't bring it up, but I've got to know. What's between you?"
"Nothing."
"What was?"
"Nothing. There never was anything."
"Then why did you--?"
"Is that kind?"
"No. It's jealous. Forgive me. And I do understand. He's strictly the
network dazzler."
"I wasn't dazzled. I was sorry for him. That's why I thought I loved
him."
"Sorry for him? Audibon? He's got everything."
"He has nothing ... nothing inside. He's lost."
"Is that why he won't let you go?"
"One of the reasons. Another is that he hates to lose."
"How is he stopping you?"
"I'm active ... politically. If I try to get a divorce he says he'll
ruin me."
"That Communist routine?"
"Yes."
"Christ, what a club that's become for dirty fighters. Are you a Party
Member?"
"No, Jordan."
"Tell the truth, sweetheart. If you're lying you'll give yourself away
anyhow."
"Suppose I said yes. Would it make a difference?"
"It would."
"Why?"
"Because most of them are the dedicated type. Lunatic fringe. They're
one-sided, and I told you I like whole people. Are you a Party Member?"
"No, I'm not."
Lennox searched her face, then nodded. He was beginning to learn how
transparently honest she was. "All the same, I wish you'd quit the
politics, Gabby. There must be other things for you to do."
Her eyes flashed angrily. "What other things?"
"I don't know. Lady things. Take the long view. We've got a whole life
to plan together. Go vote at the polls like an honest citizen and let
it go at that. You and I are more important than--"
"Have you any idea how offensive you're being?" Gabby interrupted.
"Offensive?"
"I suppose you want me to quit working too, don't you?"
"You won't have to work."
"I see. You've got it all planned, haven't you? Doesn't it occur to you
that I like my work? Doesn't it occur to you that I've got political
beliefs? There must be other things for me to do. Lady things. Men and
women think differently. You male chauvinist!"
"Listen. I want my wife home with me because writing's the loneliest
work in the world. What the hell's chauvinistic about that?"
"You not only look Edwardian, you think it. A woman's place is in the
home. Cross-stitched on a sampler by loving hands at home."
"All right, Susan B. Anthony, where else is it?"
"Where she wants it to be, not where it's convenient for you!" An angry
outburst trembled on Gabby's lips. She controlled herself. "We're
fighting again. I don't know what it is you do to me, but we're always
tearing at each other."
"What I do to you!"
"Be quiet, Jordan."
"Listen, Gabby--"
"Be quiet."
They walked in uneasy silence for a few minutes. Then Gabby stopped and
faced him. Her dark eyes were severe, and her body, usually so relaxed
and easy, was very straight. "You're destructive," she said. "You like
to destroy people."
"The hell I do."
"Yes. It didn't just happen that time at Princeton. You haven't
changed. You're still that boy from the wrong side of the tracks,
jealous and envious of everybody. You can't feel equal to anyone unless
you've torn him down first."
"You're wrong. I'm fighting to hold everything together."
"It's what you think, but it isn't true. You tear everything apart. You
attack. You destroy. You may not realize it, but you do. You must have
many enemies."
A chill numbed Lennox. He fought it off. "I can't bring any to mind
off-hand."
"Of course not. You don't realize what you're doing. But you're
not going to do it to me, Jordan. I won't let you." The look of
consternation on his face made her relent. She took his arm again and
hugged it affectionately. "Don't be frightened. It's just a part of you
that we've got to heal. Don't you see, darling? The danger isn't for
other people; it's for yourself."
"Myself?"
"Because if you attack and destroy others, you end up destroying
yourself."
He was silent until they left the park. As they parted, Gabby to return
to her office, Lennox to go down to the rehearsal of "Who He?" on
Broadway, he said: "I have something serious I want to ask you. There's
an outside chance one of those invisible enemies is catching up with
me. I want your opinion."
"What do you mean? What's happened?" Gabby was concerned.
"Later. I'll pick you up at five for Sam's party. If we can find
a corner in the Rox Studios we'll talk it over. I'm hoping you'll
exonerate me. I know you will, but I'd like to make sure."
"Exonerate you from what?"
"From a lunatic on Sunday. More later. Can I have a kiss now?"
"Of course you can. Why do you ask?"
"I thought I might be in disgrace."
"Disgrace or no disgrace," Gabby said firmly. "Always kiss a man when
he asks. That's one of my basic political beliefs."
Lennox went down Broadway to the Joydream Ballroom where "Who He?"
rehearsed. No longer a taxi-dance joint, the ballroom had been
struggling along since the war as headquarters of a lonely hearts club
giving dances three nights a week for its discriminating clientele (all
religious faiths). Now, television's frantic search for rehearsal space
had restored Joydream to solvency.
In the Women's Lounge, the dancers in black rehearsal leotards were
lined up before a wall of mirrors, headed by Charlie Hansel who was
short, ebullient and graceful. They were watching their reflections
intently as they memorized Charlie's new routines, and complaining
chronically as only dancers can complain. Cooper was at the piano with
Johnny Plummer's score, working out the beats for Hansel.
"You're taking it in four bar sections," Cooper was saying. "And that's
throwing your rhythm off."
"Lambkin, it's written in fours. That Johnny Plummer! He's a
four-cornered one, he is." Hansel spoke without taking his eyes off his
reflection. None of the other dancers did either. This is not vanity.
Like the complaining, it's an occupational disease.
"You don't understand," Cooper explained. "The music's in phrases,
not bars. Johnny's written two longs, a short and a medium. Count ten
twice, then four and then eight. You'll come out right."
"Samkin, there's no arguing with the composer of 'We're The Most.' He's
a genius one, he is. Ready, kidkins? And!--"
They went into the routine, counting and complaining. Cooper scowled at
the compliment and began playing. Lennox backed out of the lounge.
On the main ballroom floor, the sets for the show had been chalked and
Raeburn Sachs was directing Mig Mason and the rest of the cast in the
"Man Without A Country." Sol Eggleston, the network camera director,
was prowling around the scene, framing it in his hands and making
notes on his camera plot. This is a minute by minute schedule of the
placement and occupation of all three cameras for the duration of the
show, including lens settings and time allowance for changes of setting
and position.
When Eggleston saw Lennox, he motioned sharply and brought him over to
a table covered with blueprints and light plots. Eggleston was fat,
efficient and asthmatic. Lennox liked him. He liked all the technical
men. They knew their business and never wasted time promoting delusions
of genius.
"We're in trouble," Eggleston wheezed. "Camera trouble."
"Oh God! Don't tell me I've asked for crossed cameras again."
"No. It's Sachs. He's got an idea for a trick shot on the Nolan."
"Something fresh and different, no doubt. What?"
"He wants to fly the 3. Hang it from the grid over the stage and shoot
straight down on the courtroom scene."
"Damn him! It isn't a bad idea."
"Sure, but can we shoot the rest of the show with two cameras?"
"How do you mean?"
"It'll take an hour to fly the 3. It'll take another hour to get it
down."
"Why so long?"
"The grid is practically inaccessible at the Venice. You have to go up
a ladder from the fly-gallery, and there's no catwalk on the grid bars."
"I see."
"So do you want to immobilize the 3 for one shot? You want to shoot the
rest of the show with two?"
"We can't do it."
"Tell Sachs."
"Can we get an extra camera for the shot?"
Eggleston shook his head. "The network hasn't enough to go round as it
is. Talk Sachs out of it."
"We've got the meeting for the January 22nd show this afternoon. I'll
do my best, but there's no arguing with Sachs. He's got a talent nobody
else has. He's never wrong."
Eggleston wheezed cryptically.
"Wait a minute, Sol. Here's a gimmick. If the network did give us an
extra camera, how much would it cost the budget?"
"About a yard and a half."
"Then don't worry. Blinky'll talk Sachs out of it. Still, I have to
hand it to him. It's a nice idea."
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."