The voice of Bobby Priest came through loud and relentlessly clear.
"He was born in Clay County, Missouri, in 1847."
The floor under Wanda-Jean's feet split down the middle. Slowly but surely the gap started to grow wider.
"He married Zerelda Mimms in 1874."
The gap was now an inch wide, and Wanda-Jean could see right down into the vat. Bubbles slowly burst, leaving brief liquid craters. It looked like the surface of Jupiter in miniature, just six feet below her.
"During the war between the states he served with Bloody Bill Anderson in-"
There was a loud raucous buzzing. A green light came on beside a red one. Someone had hit the answer button. Wanda-Jean's head flashed around. The anxious face of the blond guy next to her came up on the screen. It was immediately replaced by the beaming Bobby Priest.
"Okay, okay. Paul here thinks he knows the answer. That's Paul Lindstrom, from right here in town. Shall we see if Paul's got the right answer, folks?"
The yell of the crowd agreeing with Priest crashed into Wanda-Jean's booth.
"Okay, Paul, what's your answer?"
"My answer's Jesse James, Bobby."
Pauls tense face came back onto the screen, then gave way to Bobby, leeringly building up the tension.
"Well, Paul…" He consulted a blue card in his hand. "… the correct answer is… Jesse James."
The applause was like a physical buffeting to Wanda-Jean, a punishing slap in the face for not having got the answer. The gap between her feet seemed to beckon oily, eager to claim her. There was a brief shot of the floor under Paul snapping shut, then Bobby Priest was back dominating the screen.
"Okay, contestants, here we go again, and let's see who'll be the first to fall down!"
The mob bayed its eagerness to see someone fall into the mud.
"Are you ready with the answer buttons?"
The contestants nodded again. Nobody could miss the answer button. It was right in the center of the flat shelf-like panel that ran across the front of each contestant's booth. On one side of the button were the lights that indicated that the question had been asked or answered and the speaker that relayed all outside sounds. On the other side was a seven-inch color monitor that showed the contestants what was being broadcast to the hundred million viewers.
Wanda-Jean caught sight of a medium shot of herself enclosed in the pod: long legs, blond hair, and white bodysuit. She looked like a thing in a test tube, something that had been created there, a vat-grown bimbo poised to be tipped back into the primal ooze that had spawned her.
"Okay then, let's go to question number two."
The sound of Bobby Priest's voice booming out of the pod's speaker jerked Wanda-Jean back to the reality of the moment. She had to concentrate. If she didn't answer one of the next four questions, she would drop through the wide open floor straight into the pink goop. If she answered wrongly, the floor would snap wide open straightaway. The only way was to get an answer right. A correct answer made the floor slide all the way shut again.
Question two seemed to confirm all Wanda-Jean's doubts. Paul hit the answer button right away and came up correct. The only consolation was that he came in fairly quickly. One didn't gain all that much headway over the competition if one answered fast. On the other hand, delaying could mean that another player would have the chance to jump in first.
There were five inches of space between Wanda-Jean's legs when Priest started into question three. It was just creeping up to six when Paul tried to score again. With a look of confidence, he gave out his answer. Confidence turned to horror as Bobby Priest gloatingly informed him that it was incorrect. The floor opened all the way. He hit the goop with a loud slap that was picked up by a dozen or more directional microphones around the rim of the tank and probably more submerged in the goop; the sound was amplified and enhanced and fed out over the air like a clap of doom. The audience jumped up in the bleachers, howling and waving fists and making the weird, high-pitched keening that was unique to the audience on "Wildest Dreams" as Paul dragged himself laboriously to the edge of the tank with his bodysuit disintegrating and his body plastered with the garish goop.
With Paul gone it left Nancy and the long-haired farm boy. Wanda-Jean told herself that she was just lucky. It had to end soon. Question four began. Nobody seemed anxious to hit the button. The gap in the floor got bigger and bigger. Wanda-Jean didn't have a clue to the answer. The gap was twelve inches wide before the farm boy made a stab for the button. He didn't wait for Bobby Priest's ritual. His voice was high-pitched and trembling.
"Abraham Lincoln."
Bobby Priest didn't like any hick contestant getting in the way of his building up the suspense. For a fleeting instant his eyes narrowed, then his bland, all-encompassing smile spread across his face. He didn't actually jerk his thumb down like a Roman emperor. He didn't need to. It was there in his smile.
"I'm sorry, Billy…"
So that was his name.
"… It was Rameses II."
Billy hit the goop and the crowd went wild. Bobby Priest seemed to swamp the screen.
"Well! Well! Well! They're sure going down like flies tonight. I guess it's a real fast one. But don't worry. If this game ends before time, we got more fun for you. Meanwhile stay tuned to see the ladies battle it out, after these messages."
There was a pause for the commercials. Wanda-Jean sagged against the back of the booth. It was impossible to relax when the floor of the booth consisted of two six-inch shelves on either side.
Wanda-Jean saw that Nancy was looking at her. Their eyes met, Wanda-Jean looked quickly away. There was no way that they could communicate. It was one or the other of them who would fall.
The floor manager's voice came over the speaker. "Fifteen seconds to air time."
Wanda-Jean straightened up and dragged her face back into the pleasant, eager expression. She avoided even looking at Nancy while Bobby Priest was welcoming back the viewers. The picture cut to a long shot of Wanda-Jean and Nancy standing like specimens in their glass cases. There was something almost sinister about the two empty booths. It reminded Wanda-Jean of some form of execution.
Bobby Priest was off again. "Just Wanda-Jean and Nancy-will one of them make it to the Dreamroad? Maybe question five will tell all.
"Okay, ladies. Are you ready for question five?"
They both nodded. Wanda-Jean saw she was in close-up and forced herself to smile. The smile faded abruptly when she saw the next shot. It was one of the tricky angle shots that were the hallmark of "Wildest Dreams." The cameramen claimed it was what really made the show so big, but who listened to the cameramen?
This particular one was shooting up through the gap of the booth floor and straight between Wanda-Jean's legs. It missed being hard-core by just a fraction. Not that "Wildest Dreams" minded being hard-core, but there were still enough old folks in the ratings for the producers to try and make it look accidental rather than played for, as they did on the youth shows.
Wanda-Jean wanted to look down, but she restrained herself.
"Okay, here's question five."
The red light went on. Wanda-Jean tensed. The floor started to move again.
"He spent the majority of his life in prison.
"His first sentence was at the Indiana Boys' Reformatory at Plainville in 1951."
The remaining ledges of the floor at either side of the booth were becoming alarmingly narrow.
"In 1960 he was convicted of forging government checks and jailed for ten years."