"I thought you might be interested."
Ralph clenched his fists. It was only their respective size and weight that stopped him from hitting Sam.
LOMBARDS, JUST ONE BLOCK FROM THE foot of the CM tower, charged top price for its drinks and catered to the executive trade and, as such, was much frequented by the upper ranks of Combined Media employees during the happy hour. It was a place to see and, on occasion, to be seen to see. It was the place where the crucial, postwork, public-display games, both social and corporate political, were played out for an audience who watched for who was with whom under the dim chandeliers and guessed at the rest with varying degrees of accuracy. Department coups had been started in Lombards, and, at the other end of the scale, so had a large number of office romances. The atmosphere of top-shelf booze and cigar smoke was the favorite medium for the sending of signals, the making of overtures, the conclusion of honeymoons, and the termination of alliances and relationships. If one wanted to make career points in CM, it was vital to drop into Lombards at least three or four times a month and show one's face. It was even expected of the militant nondrinkers that they come by for at least a Perrier and twist at regular intervals.
The power positions in Lombards were along the line of leather upholstered banquettes that ran from just inside the front door clear through to the back wall. Seated in the comfort of one of these, a person could observe the action at the bar and the regular tables without being watched or overheard. Pride of place in the entire prestige row was the banquette just to the left of center, slightly nearer the door than the rear wall. On this particular night, this number one booth was occupied by two men whose status and rights to the booth would never be questioned even by the most inexperienced waiter. Edouard Hayes was the Senior Vice President for Special Projects. The second man, Jack Vallenti, was the number two man in the Software Development Division. The fact that the two of them would place themselves even on discreet display like this indicated to anyone who read between the lines that something radical was brewing. Their respective departments, whose territory tended to overlap in the area of advance planning, had butted heads on a number of occasions, and the seemingly casual meeting for a drink was open to a number of interpretations. The most popular were the two obvious extremes: either a truce or the start of a new round of hostilities.
The meeting started as casually as it was supposed to look. Hayes ordered a martini and Vallenti a Scotch on the rocks. There was some small talk about how Rostov in Marketing seemed to be teetering on the brink of making a damn fool of himself over his secretary and how Madison Renfield had made a damn fool of himself on "The Bones Bolt Show." When Vallenti brought up the subject of Renfield, Hayes sadly shook his head.
"Sooner or later somebody's got to stop him. I mean, what makes that pompous jackass believe that he can be an adequate spokesperson for the corporation on something as wild and woolly as 'Bones Bolt'?"
Vallenti swirled the ice in his drink. "That's the trouble with PR. They can cover most of their screwups by claiming that they were working according to some devious, deep-psych program. According to them, they can never be wrong. It's just that the rest of us don't appreciate the subtlety of what they're doing. We can't see the big picture."
"It doesn't hurt any that Renfield knows where a hell of a lot of bodies are buried. He's hushed up a lot of people's indiscretions in his time, and he's not going to go quietly when the crunch comes. He'll call in all of his markers, and in public if need be, before he allows himself to be deposed."
"I hear that he practically brainwashes his new arrivals these days. Weekly indocrinations in the viewing pods downstairs with the chemical softeners going full blast."
Hayes looked at Vallenti in real amazement. "Sure he does. I thought everyone did. It's hardly the time for loose cannons rolling around or for underlings to be plotting revolution. You mean you don't do that over in Development? ''
Vallenti covered his loss of face by signaling for a waiter. They had arrived at the point in the conversation when the two of them should cut out the third-party gossip and get down to business, and he was furious at himself for having reached it at a distinct disadvantage. Why in hell didn't his department brainwash the newly hired? Anything that kept the help loyal and docile had to be in everyone's best interests. When the waiter brought him another Scotch, he turned the subject around to the reason that he had asked Hayes there in the first place.
"So how are you getting along with Project Superstar?"
It was Hayes's turn to look surprised. "You heard about Superstar."
"Just a whisper."
"I think I'm going to have to make some inquiries as to who's been whispering in the ranks. This thing's supposed to be fully under wraps."
Vallenti smiled. They were back on even pegging. Apparently Hayes's brainwashing was not yielding the results for which he had been hoping. Interdepartmental spying was conducted on all levels, but Special Projects took great pride in being among the least pregnable. Vallenti was delighted to have punctured their smug assurance. He gave Hayes a few moments to recover his composure before continuing.
"Those of us in Development who know about this are, to put it mildly, a little worried."
Hayes raised an eyebrow. He still looked a little worried himself. "How many of you know about Superstar?"
Vallenti held up a reassuring hand. "Don't worry, Hayes, it's really just a handful of us. We've totally respected your need for privacy. It's just that we wonder if what you're doing may be, to put it very bluntly, a trifle misdirected."
Hayes's eyes hardened. "I'd like to hear exactly what you think Superstar actually is."
"The way we heard it, you're planning to wire up a major teen hearthrob during a special live show, and that it will be marketed to the fans as a chance actually to be their idol in a special two-hour package deal. It's going to be the spearhead of a number of short-term forays into the youth market."
"You seem to have heard a great deal."
Vallenti grinned. "We don't know who you intend to use as the first subject."
"That's a relief."
"Why don't you lift the corner of the dustsheet and let me in on the secret?"
Hayes shook his head. "I can't do that. The deal isn't finalized yet and we really can't afford anyone else knowing. Why don't you just tell me what's bothering you all over at Development? What is it about this project that you think is so misdirected?"
Vallenti sipped his Scotch. "To be frank, we have never done particularly well with live recordings of any kind. God knows we tried for long enough. The clients just won't accept reality. It's too damned flat. The computer composites are quite literally a hundred times better."
"I think you're rather missing the point."
"You're telling me that I'm not seeing the big picture?"
"If you like."
Vallenti scowled. "Now you're sounding like Renfield."
"We're not going to market just the live recording. We'll make a tape of this entertainer, but then it will be subjected to all the same processing as any simulated fantasy. Even in those, you do have to use recorded experiences as base material." Hayes grinned. "I mean, where else would you get your orgasms except from a tape of the real thing?''
"So the live experience angle is really just a marketing ploy. You're really paying a fortune to have this guy's name on the advertising. Basically it's very much the same as the Elvis Presley or Michael Jackson experiences that we already have on catalog."
"Except that this guy is alive and current and topping the Billboard chart."