"Jesus Christ, will you look at this sorry pair?"
"You fuckers can go home now."
"If you got homes."
Ralph got up with difficulty. He lurched a couple of unsteady paces and yawned. "You took your fucking time."
Ali, the biggest of the three and the one who normally took control, squinted at Ralph. "You drunk again, you sick bastard?"
Ralph stuck out his chin. "What if I am?"
"Just don't take it out on us. It ain't none of our business."
"Damn right it ain't."
Sam, by now, was also up on his feet. He looked around blinking.
"I guess it's time to go."
Ali glanced at Sam and then turned back to Ralph. "Don't he ever change?"
"Never."
Ali shrugged. 'I'll call in, then you guys can go."
"Just hurry it up, will you?"
Ralph's drunken aggression was starting to get on Ali's nerves. His lip curled into a sneer. "You had a heavy day or something?''
"Just cut the crap, and make the call."
Ali put his hand on the wall phone and then stopped. He turned and faced Ralph. "One of these days I'm going to lose patience with your bullshit and just blow the whistle on your drinking."
Ralph took a step back and made vague fending-off motions with his arms. "Lighten up, will you?"
Ali turned to Bob and Dave in outraged amazement. "Did you hear that guy? He's telling me to lighten up."
Bob shrugged. "What do you expect from a lush?"
Ralph advanced drunkenly on Bob with clenched fists. "Who are you calling a lush?"
Sam, moving with incredible speed for one with his chemical balance, got between Ralph and the other three. He put a hand on Ralph's arm. "They don't mean nothing."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
Ralph turned and wandered away muttering to himself. Ali picked up the phone and waited. After a while someone at the other end appeared to answer. Ali straightened up.
"This is 5066. We're just changing shift."
There was a pause.
"5066! Why don't you listen?"
Another pause.
"We're changing over shift."
Pause.
"Right, Bob and Dave and Ali coming on and… That's right, this is me, Ali… Okay, and there's Sam and Ralph…"
Sam moved up beside Ali. "And Artie. Tell them 'Artie.' "
Ali's eyes rolled heavenward. "… and Artie are coming off. Okay?" He put his hand over the mouthpiece. "You still covering for that guy?"
"He's our buddy."
"Jesus Christ! What?" He took his hand away from the mouthpiece. "Say what? Yeah, sure, yeah. Sure everything's alright. Listen… No, you listen, just because you got trouble up there, don't take an attitude with me, boy. Okay! Okay!"
Ali banged the phone back into its cradle. Ralph looked interested for the first time in hours.
"Trouble?"
Ali raised an eyebrow. His eyebrows were particularly pronounced and bushy. They reminded Sam of a pair of furry caterpillars he had seen when he was a kid.
"You ain't heard?"
Ralph shook his head. "I ain't heard nothing."
"You had one die on you down here, didn't you?"
"Yeah, so what? It ain't no skin off my back. A stiff's got to die now and again. It stands to reason."
"The way I heard it, it ain't just now and again."
"Huh? We only had one die on us. What's all this about?"
"If you didn't drink so much, you might notice what's happening."
"Yeah, alright, you made your point. Just tell me what's going on."
Ali rubbed the back of his neck. Now that he had Ralph's attention, he was getting in a few licks of his own.
"You must have had these new spot check calls, right?"
"Right."
"But you never wondered why?"
"I thought they were just screwing us around."
"It goes further than that."
"It does?"
"That's what these guys over in 6120 told me. I see them in the cafeteria."
Sam interrupted. "We don't never go to the cafeteria."
Ali sighed. "Maybe you should. You might find out a few things." He turned back to Ralph. "Anyway, these guys-"
"The guys from 6120?"
"Right, these guys told me that there's a full-scale, power-assisted panic going on upstairs."
"So what's causing all this?"
"The stiffs keep snuffing."
"Dying?"
"Dying."
"You're putting me on."
"True as I stand here. 6120 had four croak in the last month. By all accounts the same kind of thing's been happening in all the sections that got lifers."
Sam tugged at his ear. "Seems to me that lifers would be bound to die sooner or later. Nobody lives forever."
Ralph grinned. "He seems to be right for once. We all got to go sometime."
Ali sniffed. "It seems that upstairs is thinking that there's too many of them going sooner, and not enough of them later.''
"You figure there's something wrong in the system?"
"It sounds like it."
For a brief instant Ralph had a vision of glory. He should do something about it. He could blow the whistle on all of it, the feelies, Combined Media, and the whole mess. He was confronted by an image of himself as the little man who brought down the giants, the fearless crusader who cut out the corporate rottenness and held it up for everyone to see. Then the bubble burst. If the corporation had a major problem, there'd be a major cosmetic job before anyone like him could do anything. So some stiffs died. Who would really give a damn, even if they got to hear about it at all?
For the duration of the heroic flash, Ralph had been standing straight and tall. As it faded, his shoulders slumped and he no longer cast a long shadow. He yawned and looked at Ali. "Yeah, well, that's really fascinating, but we're having this conversation on my time. I got to go."
Ali shrugged. "If you don't want to know what's going on, it's your funeral."
Ralph surveyed the rows upon rows of cabinets, each with its corpselike occupant. He grunted. "Yeah, funeral. I'll be seeing you."
"See you, Ralph."
Sam had already climbed aboard the golf cart and was sitting behind the wheel. Sam seemed to be avoiding looking directly at him.
"I think I better drive, Ralph."
"Do what the fuck you like."
Ralph slumped into the seat beside Sam.
"SO THE NUMBERS WOULD SEEM TO confirm what we've already been thinking about Wanda-Jean?"
"Couldn't be closer."
"So we start the program?"
"Absolutely. Build her for the fall."
There were four of them at the meeting. Dan Henderson, the producer of "Wildest Dreams"; Shala Groton, the contestant supervisor; and Paul Nitz, the chief contestant handler. Murray Dorfman served as gofer. The meeting was taking place in Henderson's cluttered office. The desk was littered with used napkins, coffee cups, and plastic containers. They had ordered in an early lunch from the Cuban restaurant down on Ford Street.
Henderson thought for a moment. "How many shows do you think we can run with this bad girl thing before it gets tired?"
Nitz shrugged. "That depends on the tabloids. If Bones Bolt gets his hooks into her, it could run and run. At the most modest estimate, I think we could let her go for four. People are really starting to dislike her."
Henderson nodded. "What are the samplings on this? I mean, let's get real, guys. Dislike don't signify diddley if it can't be built into real hate. What's the base beef?"
Dorfman cleared his throat. "According to last night's nationwides, she is thought of as an opportunist and untrustworthy. They also think that she has designs on Bobby himself, although everyone knows that Bobby's too smart to fall for a cheap slut like her. The analysis indicates that a good deal of the resistance is rooted in a simple visual quirk. There is something about the configuration of her eyes and nose that makes her look shifty on TV."