The robot dog made a raspberry sound. “Hey, this is show business we’re talking about,” he reminded. “Hardly the place for sentimental guff.”
Clunky leaped up onto the big oval conference table, landing with an echoing thunk. He rose on his hind legs and executed an expert cakewalk. “Greetings, ladies and gents,” he said to the three executives seated at the table.
Gilby came hurrying across the domed satellite room after the robot dog. “You’ll have to excuse Clunky,” he said, making a grab at him. “He’s excited about the possibility of returning to—”
“Howdy, Burtie.” The dog eluded his creator, skidded across the tabletop and landed in the lap of the youthful Burt Farr. “You’re a lot better looking than you were as a kid actor. Although that’s not saying much.”
“Good to see you again, Clunker,” the thin blond Farr said as he pried the dog off his lap and deposited him again atop the table.
Clunky took a couple of steps, then executed a bird-dog take. “Wellsir, if it isn’t Rowland Hemerson,” he said, nose aimed at a large, wide man of fifty. “Haven’t seen you since—”
“You’ve never seen me, you odious little mutt.” Hemerson pushed his chair back several inches.
“I get you.” When Clunky’ winked, his metallic eyelid produced a loud clicking sound.
The thin black woman sitting on the opposite side of the table cleared her throat. “I’m terribly afraid, Mr. Gilby, that you’ve had to make the shuttle trip up here for nothing.”
“How’s that, Mrs. Leandro?”
“Burt was a little premature in what he told your wonderfully well-preserved agent,” she said. “We’ve decided—unfortunately too late to prevent you from making the journey here—that we won’t be able to make an offer on My Pal Gunky.”
“I’m still very enthusiastic,” put in young Farr. “Probably within another year or so—”
“Boss,” suggested Clunky over his silvery shoulder, “why don’t you go out and join your former missus in that gaudy reception room?”
“I don’t intend to leave you alone with—”
“Scram and trust me.”
Mrs. Leandro said, “There’s really no need for either of you to remain any longer.”
Ignoring her, the dog said, “Chief, please. Scoot.”
With a lopsided shrug, Gilby made his exit.
The suite they had on the Earthbound shuttle was twice the size of the one they’d occupied on the trip up to the satellite.
“OK,” Gilby was saying as he paced the thermocarpet, “now explain what exactly you did.”
Clunky was stretched out on a settee. “I simply persuaded that trio of dimwits to sign us up.”
“But instead of twenty-six shows, they’re going to do fifty-two,” said Molly from the doorway to the pantry. “That’s, my lord, $104,000,000 for the first year.”
“It is,” agreed the robot dog, allowing his silvery tail to wag a few times.
Gilby said, “But, according to Mrs. Leandro, they’d decided not to hire us at all.”
“I had a short, private chat with Rowland Hemreson.”
“And?”
“He cast the deciding vote, since Farr was already on our side.”
“Yeah, but how’d you convince Hemerson to do that?”
Clunky chuckled. “I wasn’t kidding when I mentioned having met the gink before, boss,” he explained. “Nope, Rowland was a frequent customer of the bordello during my months of servitude. I happened to use my built-in vidcamera to take some interesting footage of his more ambitious activities and—”
“You don’t have a built-in camera.”
“I added that myself,” said the dog. “Even by Hollywood moral standards, Rowland’s performances aren’t acceptable. He was happy to further my career in exchange for my promise of discreet silence.”
“Blackmail,” said Gilby.
“Right, and a basic negotiating tool,” said Clunky. “I’ve got quite a library of footage stored inside me. We’ll be able to use it to persuade other important bigwigs to smooth our path back into the mainstream of world entertainment, chief.”
“How can you store pictures?” Gilby stopped in front of the dog. “I didn’t design you to—”
“You really haven’t been paying sufficient attention,” Clunky told him. “I’ve used my time away from you to improve myself.”
“Even so, I—”
“I also taught myself to write scripts. And I’m damned good at it.”
“Write scripts? But that’s w’hat I do on My Pal Clunky.”
“No, that’s what we do,” the dog told him. “Sit down and I’ll tell you some of my ideas. OK?”
