“But it all works out,” Dees was saying. “If you ever get stuck, all you have to do is call us collect and we all take it into the pro-shop together and come up with something. We have the right to anthologize your columns in our yearly book, Inside Views of Things to Come. You're perfectly free to sign any contract you can get with a book publisher, however. All we get is first refusal on the magazine rights, and we hardly ever refuse, I can tell you. And we pay very handsomely. That's over and above whatever figure we contract for. Gravy on your mashed potatoes, you might say. “Dees chuckled.
“And what might that figure be?” Johnny asked slowly. He was gripping the arms of his rocker. A vein in his right temple pulsed rhythmically.
“Thirty thousand dollars per year for two years,” Dees said. “And if you prove popular, that figure would become negotiable. Now, all our psychics have some area of expertise. I understand that you're good with objects. “Dees's eyes became half-lidded, dreamy. “I see a regular feature. Twice monthly, maybe-we don't want to run a good thing into the ground. “John Smith invites inside Viewers to send in personal belongings for psychic examination…” Something like that. We'd make it clear, of course, that they should send in inexpensive stuff because nothing could be returned. But you'd be surprised. Some people are crazy as bedbugs, God love em. You'd be surprised at some of the stuff that would come in, Diamonds, gold coins, wedding rings… and we could attach a rider to the contract specifying that all objects mailed in would become your personal property.
Now Johnny began to see tones of dull red before his eyes. “People would send things in and I'd just keep them. That's what you're saying.”
“Sure, I don't see any problem with that. It's just a question of keeping the ground rules clear up front. A little extra gravy for those mashed potatoes.”
“Suppose,” Johnny said, carefully keeping his voice even and modulated, “suppose I got… stuck for a whopper, as you put it… and I just called in and said President Ford was going to be assassinated on September 31, 1976? Not because I felt he was, but because I was stuck?”
“Well, September only has thirty days, you know,” Dees said. “But otherwise, I think it's a hole in one. You're going to be a natural, Johnny. You think big. That's good. You'd be surprised how many of these people think small. Afraid to put their mouths where their money is” I suppose. One of our guys-Tim Clark out in Idaho -wrote in two weeks ago and said he'd had a flash that Earl Butz was going to be forced to resign next year. Well pardon my French, but who gives a fuck? Who's Earl Butz to the American housewife? But you have good waves, Johnny. You were made for this stuff.”
“Good waves,” Johnny muttered.
Dees was looking at him curiously. “You feel all right, Johnny? You look a little white.”
Johnny was thinking 6f the lady who had sent the scarf. Probably she read Inside View, too. “Let me see if I can summarize this,” he said. “You'd pay me thirty thousand dollars a year for my name…
“And your picture, don't forget.
And my picture, for a few ghostwritten columns. Also a feature where I tell people what they want to know about objects they send in. As an extra added attraction, I get to keep the stuff…
“If the lawyers can work it out…”
“… as my personal property. That the deal?”
“That's the bare bones of the deal. Johnny. The way these things feed each other, it's just amazing. You'll be a household word in six months, and after that, the sky is the limit. The Carson show. Personal appearances. Lecture tours. Your book, of course, pick your house, they're practically throwing money at psychics along Publisher's Row. Kathy Nolan started with a contract like the one we're offering you, and she makes over two hundred thou a year now. Also, she founded her own church and the IRS can't touch dime-one of her money. She doesn't miss a trick, does our Kathy. “Dees leaned forward, grinning. “I tell you, Johnny, the sky is the limit.”
“I'll bet.”
“Well? What do you think?”
Johnny leaned forward toward Dees. He grabbed the sleeve of Dees's new L. L. Bean shirt in one hand and the collar of Dees's new L. L. Bean shirt in the other.
“Hey! What the hell do you think you're-…”
Johnny bunched the shirt in both hands and drew Dees forward. Five months of daily exercise had toned up the muscles in his hands and arms to a formidable degree.
“You asked me what I thought,” Johnny said. His head was beginning to throb and ache. “I'll tell you. I think you're a ghoul. A grave robber of people's dreams. I think someone ought to put you to work at Roto-Rooter. I think your mother should have died of cancer the day after she conceived you. If there's a hell, I hope you burn there.”
“You can't talk to me like that!” Dees cried. His voice rose to a fishwife's shriek. “You're fucking crazy! Forget it! Forget the whole thing, you stupid hick sonofabitch I You had your chance! Don't come crawling around…”
“Furthermore, you sound like you're talking through a Saltine box,” Johnny said, standing up. He lifted Dees with him. The tails of his shirt popped out of the waist-band of his new jeans, revealing a fishnet undershirt beneath. Johnny began to shake Dees methodically back and forth. Dees forgot about being angry. He began to blubber and roar.
Johnny dragged him to the porch steps, raised one foot and planted it squarely in the seat of the new Levi's. Dees went down in two big steps, still blubbering and roaring. He fell in the dirt and sprawled full length. When he got up and turned around to face Johnny, his country-cousin duds were caked with dooryard dust. It made them look more real, somehow, Johnny thought, but doubted if Dees would appreciate that.
“I ought to put the cops on you,” he said hoarsely. “And maybe I will.”
“You do whatever turns you on,” Johnny said. “But the law around here doesn't take too kindly to people who stick their noses in where they haven't been invited.”
Dees's face worked in an uneasy contortion of fear, anger, and shock. “God help you if you ever need us,” he said.
Johnny's head was aching fiercely now, but he kept his voice even. “That's just right,” he said. “I couldn't agree more.
“You're going to be sorry, you know. Three million readers. That cuts both ways. When we get done with you the people in this country wouldn't believe you if you predicted spring in April. They wouldn't believe you if you said the World Series is going to come in October. They wouldn't believe you if… if… Dees spluttered, furious.
“Get out of here, you cheap cocksucker,” Johnny said.
“You can kiss off that book!” Dees screamed, apparently summoning up the worst thing he could think of. With his working, knotted face and his dust-caked shirt, he looked like a kid having a class-A tantrum. His Brooklyn accent had deepened and darkened to the point where it was almost a patois. “They'll laugh you out of every publishing house in New York! Nightstand Readers wouldn't touch you when I get done with you! There are ways of fixing smart guys like you and we got em, fuckhead! We…”
“I guess I'll go get my Remmy and shoot myself a trespasserJohnny remarked.
Dees retreated to his rental car, still shouting threats and obscenities. Johnny stood on the porch and watched him, his head thudding sickly. Dees got in, revved the car's engine mercilessly, and then screamed out, throwing dirt into the air in clouds. He let the car drift just enough on his way out to knock the chopping block by the shed flying. Johnny grinned a little at that in spite of his bad head. He could set up the chopping block a lot more easily than Dees was going to be able to explain the big dent in that Ford's front fender to the Hertz people.