Renfield jumped in. "I think the important thing is that we have been extremely successful at keeping even a hint of this from the media-"
Deutsch waved him to silence. "Just relax. This is not a court of inquiry. I am merely conducting an informal review of some of our current problems. All will become clear when, following this review, I make my promised announcement. All I want to do now is to bring some matters out into the open that have previously been the preserve of locked doors and whispered conversations, matters like, for instance, the reason that two of my most senior executives should meet in a public restaurant to discuss the reestablishment of death experience research."
Edouard Hayes went white. His face took on a strangled expression.
Deutsch looked directly at him. "You have something you want to add?"
"I… really must make it clear that Vallenti and I were only discussing the possibilities that some clandestine group might be attempting to start up such research again. After Jonas's research and the resulting prostitute murders when he went insane-"
Deutsch held up a hand. "How many times do I have to tell you that this is not an inquiry?"
He walked slowly down the length of the table. In the middistance, outside the panoramic window, the sky-board was flashing the current Pepsi slogan in red, white, and blue holotype.
"Ladies and gentlemen, it would appear that we are spending too much of our time reflecting on thoughts of death. The death of clients, the death experience, perhaps these are a cover for a deeper unease about the basic philosophy behind what we are doing. It's there in our own vernacular. We refer to our clients as 'stiffs,' to the standard IE unit as a 'coffin.' Could it be that we subconsciously feel that, in marketing a technological discorporate fantasy, we have become vendors of a form of death? That is a question that you may find answered sooner than you think. Before that happens, however, I cannot impress upon you more strongly that this is absolutely the wrong time for this question to be asked. An army that broods upon death through the eve of battle is not going to win any place in history. Unless they are defending the Alamo. Has Combined Media become the Alamo, gentlemen? If it has, I have to warn you. You may have to start thinking of me as your personal Santa Ana."
THE PRIDE OF ERIN WAS STARTING TO fill up, and Ralph's money was definitely dwindling. He had never been the kind who could nurse a single drink through half the evening. He drank up and ordered again. When he couldn't order any more it was time to get the hell out of wherever he was. Also, he was no longer feeling comfortable in the place. There were couples meeting up for dates, junior execs in sweatpants hot from the raquets court, and women who had been working late now, with their blouses unfastened a couple of notches, looking for fun. Ralph knew perfectly well that sitting in his overalls, three parts drunk, he had nothing that represented any approximation of their idea of fun. God, it had been so long since he had been with a woman. He really didn't need the reminder. He finished his drink, nodded to the barman, and headed for the door.
There was nothing left to do but return to the RT and make the ride out to Lincoln Avenue. He had been a damn fool to go looking for that bar. It was starting to get late, and even the monorail would be doubly dangerous.
As he walked through Reagan Plaza, he noticed that a fairly large crowd had gathered in front of the Sanyo-Hyatt. Using any excuse to put off boarding the train for as long as possible, he sauntered in the direction of the big modern hotel to investigate.
It wasn't the usual crowd that he would have expected to find in Reagan Plaza. They were mainly blue collar like himself, welfare cases, even, and a sprinkling of definite oddities. A lot of them carried cameras; he saw autograph books, and a bearded individual in a ragged suit of the executive style of five years earlier was holding up a placard that read YOU ARE DOOMED! There had to be some major celebrity staying inside. He ambled up to a woman in a blue coat who looked very unhappy to be way in the back of the crowd. Ralph smiled at her, doing his best to look every inch the amiable drunk.
"What's going on?"
"I'm not going to be able to see."
"What's there to see?"
The woman in the blue coat looked at him as though he were crazy. " 'Wildest Dreams.' "
"Huh?"
"The contestants are coming out, and I ain't going to see them."
"No shit."
"Would you help me get through?"
"Jesus, I don't know."
Ralph took a closer look at the crowd. They weren't in front of the main entrance to the hotel; police saw-horses and squads of uniformed officers held them back on the sidewalk at either side, so they wouldn't get in the way of the guests coming in and out. The cops controlling the crowd seemed to be treating the whole event as fairly routine, although Ralph did notice that there was a large, black, unmarked armored truck of the kind used by the CRAC squad parked across the street.
"The contestants for 'Wildest Dreams' stay here?"
"Don't you know nothing?"
Ralph blinked. "Apparently not."
"So will you help me through to the front?"
Ralph looked at the woman for the first time. She wasn't really bad-looking in a washed-out kind of way. She really could be quite attractive if one could get past the shabby nylon utility coat. He reminded himself that he was no raving prize. "Maybe we could ease ourselves a little closer. How soon do the contestants come out?"
"It's only the Dreamroad contestants. Bobby Priest himself is with them sometimes."
Ralph was a little bemused. There was a definite light of obsession in the woman's eyes. Even the obsessed could be grateful after the fact. "How soon do they come out?"
"Any minute."
Ralph put a protective arm around her and started easing them deeper into the crowd. The "Wildest Dreams" fans didn't part easily, and Ralph had to use some degree of applied pressure. He received a few threats and curses for his pains. All of the "Wildest Dreams" fans seemed to be equally desperate and equally obsessed. How could anyone get that way about a goddamned game show? There was a definite tension in the crowd, but there was also a lonely, unhappy feeling, as well. These people seemed to take little pleasure in what they were doing. Ralph knew drunks like that. He and the woman in the blue coat did make some progress, though, and came within four layers of the front before they were stopped by the pressure of bodies. He still had his arm around the woman's shoulders, and since she didn't ask him to take it away, he left it there.
There was shouting at the front rows. The woman in the blue coat stiffened.
"They're coming! They're coming!"
She started bouncing up and down, making small squeaking noises. Ralph realized that it was the same thing that contestants did when they won big on the greed shows like "Hundred Thousand Giveaway." And she wasn't the only one. The whole crowd was pushing and jumping. The situation suddenly felt very unstable, and Ralph realized that it was about the last place in the world that a drunk needed to be. He had to fight for his footing as the crowd surged sideways. He still had his arm around her and couldn't get it free. The whole mob was pressing forward as though some very, very stupid collective mind was brutishly determined to push its way through the police lines. Ralph stumbled again. He let go of the woman. There was chaos up ahead. People were screaming. It was hard to tell if it was hysteria or pain. One of the barriers seemed to have collapsed, and people had gone down with it. There were people on the sidewalk. They were being trampled. He almost lost his footing as he stumbled into one of the ones who had fallen. He went down himself a moment later, but was able to struggle up again. The two people who went down in front of him and cushioned his fall were not so lucky. He started pushing backward against the tide, trying to ease over to the wall of the hotel. At least he would have his back to something. He had to get out of this bloody insanity.