“Let me have it.”
“I spent yesterday afternoon with the network, and they loved your idea. We’ve got nine to eleven on Saturday nights, starting in September.”
“That’s wonderful, Eddie!”
“There’s more: have you read the papers yet?”
“No.”
“Well it’s in the New York Times; I assume the L.A. papers will pick up the wire reports, too.”
“Reports of what?”
“Congress voted yesterday to void the contempt citation of Sid Brooks.”
“Great news!”
“Amazing what a campaign contribution or two will accomplish, huh? But there’s more.”
“What else?”
“I met with a guy from Red Targets yesterday and, after another contribution, maybe to their fund-raising drive but more likely to a pocket or two, they’ve cleared Sid. That should be in the L.A. papers, too.”
“That’s wonderful, Eddie. The best news I’ve had since we got Radio City for Bitter Creek.”
“Call Hy Greenbaum and make him an offer. Sid may not be back from Washington, yet, but try and have a deal waiting for him.”
“That would be my pleasure.”
“I also looked at apartments yesterday, and I found one I like.”
“Why? You’re not thinking of moving to New York, are you?”
“Nah, I just think we spend too much money on hotels here. I’m going to buy us an apartment in the Carlyle Hotel, so we’ll have a pied-à-terre. Tell Sid he can stay there until he finds a place in New York.”
“I’m sure he’ll be glad to hear that.”
“The network has a big production space on the West Side where we can film our show, and they’ll provide office space for Sid and his staff. You might ask him how much help he thinks he’ll need.”
“Did you say film? I thought we were going to do it live.”
“We are, but we’re going to film it simultaneously. If we don’t, any reruns would have to be Kinescopes, which is basically a film of a TV set, and the quality is terrible. If we spend the money up front to film it, we’ll stretch the reruns out for years. Also, we can shoot film in color; in a few years, we’ll have color TV.”
“That’s a great idea, if we can manage it technically.”
“I want you to go to work on that today. Find a way to shoot some tests, and make sure the scripts allow us to reload the film cameras while we’re shooting live.”
“I think that may be a tall order, but I’ll get on it.”
“That’s all the news I have right now. I’ll see you in a couple of days.”
“Congratulations on a successful trip, Eddie. I’ll look forward to seeing you back here.” Rick hung up and went to tell Glenna the news.
Glenna listened to all of it before she spoke. “Well, I’m happy for Centurion and I’m happy for Sid, but the simultaneous shooting of TV and film is not going to work.”
“Well, I know there’ll be some kinks to work out, but...”
“It’s not going to work. The reason is TV cameras have to work with very high lighting; it’s very, very bright in a TV studio, and that’s not going to work for film, especially in color. The only way you could do it is either before or after the live performance, light the sets for film and shoot the whole thing. You could still shoot it almost exactly like the live performance. Hardly anybody would notice the difference.”
“I see your point, and I think you’re right. I’m not sure that the economics would allow us to shoot the whole show on film on a different day. We’d have to pay the actors for that performance, and we wouldn’t have any income from it until the reruns started at least a year later.”
“You might be able to work out something with the Screen Actors Guild for deferred payment, but I doubt it. I think it’s just one of those glorious ideas that isn’t feasible.”
“Well, I’m going to have to prove that to Eddie; he’s very excited about it.”
“Yes, I know what Eddie is like when he’s excited.”
“Maybe we could fix the simultaneous shooting problem with special film stock that’s graded for high light.”
“Now that’s a thought, but Kodak would probably have to invent it.”
“Yeah, most of their efforts are directed at getting the stock to work in low light, not high.”
Rick wrestled with the problem all the way to work and decided that, barring some technical breakthrough, they would have to shoot the show three times: twice for live performances in different time zones, followed by once on film.
When he got to his office Tom Terry was waiting for him.
“Hi. Rick. I have some news.”
“Come on in, Tom, and tell me about it.”
Tom followed Rick into his office and took a seat. “Ben Morrison called me yesterday about the fingerprints he lifted from Susan Stafford’s car that turned out not to belong to Hank Harmon.”
“Yeah?”
Tom explained about P. J. O’Toole and the eight P. J. O’Tooles living in the L.A. area. “Problem is none of the eight is our guy; they’re too old or have alibis. Two of the P.J.’s turned out to be women. Apparently, some women list their numbers with initials to avoid getting heavy-breather phone calls.”
“Maybe our O’Toole doesn’t have a phone.”
“Ben’s people are working on the city directories now, but there are at least a dozen of them to go through, and every person they turn up who doesn’t have a phone is going to have to be visited, so it’s going to take time. Ben is short-handed, and he won’t accept our help, says it doesn’t look good.”
“Well, we’ll just have to wait for them to grind it out, I guess. At least the guy won’t know the cops are looking for him, so he won’t run.”
“My fear is that he’s already run,” Tom said. “Some guy living in a boarding house who, when he thought about what he’d done, got out of town.”
“Well, they’ve got a name and a description. He’ll get arrested somewhere for some petty crime, and then Ben will nail him.”
Tom stood up. “I wish I had better news to report.”
“Not your fault, Tom. Just let the police do their work.”
Tom left, and Rick tried calling Sid Brooks but got his answering service. He sketched out a rough deal on a pad, then called Hy Greenbaum.
58
Rick was about to go home for the day when his secretary announced that Vance Calder wanted to see him.
“Send him in,” Rick said and stood up to greet the actor.
Vance came in, looking a little somber, shook Rick’s hand and sat down.
“How are rehearsals going?” Rick asked.
“Very well. In fact, I think we’re ready to start shooting the day after tomorrow.”
“Has Hattie caught up with you on the script?”
“She has it down cold. By the way, Sam Sparrow thinks we should shorten the title to Village Girl.”
“What do you think?”
“I like it better.”
“It’s okay with me, then. Will you tell Sam for me?”
“Sure. Rick, I got a letter from Hank Harmon.”
“Really? What did she have to say?”
“It’s two letters, actually: one to me from Hank and one to Hank from Susie.” He took two sheets of paper from his inside pocket. “I’ll read them to you.”
“All right.”
To Vance Calder:
We’ve never met, and, I suppose, we never will, but there’s something I’d like you to hear directly from me. I did not murder Susan Stafford. I returned to my apartment after she had taken her things and left. She had left me a note, which I enclose. I think when you read it, you will realize that I had no motive to kill Susie. I had nothing but love for her. I am ending my life, but I wanted you to know about our relationship.