Fletch's Fortune Part 11

"Hy, you know you have. Time after time you've said to me the networks give maximum exposure to acts of terrorism in progress because it gets the ratings up."

Hy Litwack said, "They make for good drama."

"People tune in, especially, to see if the hostages or whoever have gotten machine-gunned yet. Or had their heads chopped off. You know you've said this."

"Yes," Hy Litwack said. "I've said this. To you."

"You didn't say it tonight. In your speech. An ongoing act of terrorism and the whole network news department comes alive. You rush to the studio, day or night. People switch on their TV sets. Audience ratings go up."

"I said they make for good drama."

"The advertisers' commercials get more exposure," Carol said. "Here some little nut out in Chicago, or Cleveland, is holding twenty people hostage to protest the establishment in some way, and in boardrooms all across the country the establishment is cheering because the poor little nut is helping to sell the establishment's products to all the other nuts and thus make the establishment richer!"

"Everything makes the establishment richer."

"You've said that. To me. Why didn't you say it in your speech tonight? Are you so establishment yourself you can't say what you really think, as a journalist?"

"No," said Hy Litwack. "But I'm a good enough journalist to keep my cynicism to myself."

There was what seemed to Fletch a long silence. He was waiting to hear where the marvelous machine would switch next.

He was about to experiment, to see if he could run the machine manually, when he again heard Carol Litwack's voice. "Oh, Hy. You don't know what I'm talking about."

"I guess not," said the famous voice, now sleepy.

"This afternoon you rushed down here to Virginia early, and immediately taped that phony eulogy on Walter March for the network evening news. 'The great journalist, Walter March of March Newspapers, is dead,' you intoned, 'shockingly murdered at the convention of the American Journalism Alliance, of which March was the elected president.'"

"I never said 'shockingly murdered.'"

"You even put on your tight-throat bit."

"You can check the tape."

"Whatever you said."

"Whatever I said."

"You didn't even know Walter March. Really."

"No man is an island."

"The few times you met him you told me the same thing about him. He was a cold fish."

"Carol? Would you mind if we went to sleep now?"

"You're not listening."

"No. I'm not."

"Just because all you famous newspeople are here, because it's a cheap story, cheap drama, because you're competing with each other between martinis, you're giving Walter March's murder more publicity than World War Two!"

"Carol!"

The famous voice was no longer sleepy. It sounded as if someone had just declared World War Three.

"You still don't know what I'm saying."

"Do I have to sleep in the living room?"

"You don't know what you're doing," Carol said. "You can't"

"Carol...."

"Giving March's murder all this publicity-all you're doing is inciting some other kook-maybe hundreds of publicity-hungry kooks-to see if they can stick a knife, or scissors, or whatever, into the back of some other quote great American journalist unquote."

"Carol, for G.o.d's sake!"

There was another long silence.

Then Carol Litwack's voice said, "I just hope the next quote great American journalist unquote murdered isn't you."

Fletch switched to Station 22, and heard only one "Errrrrrr" in three minutes of snores.

He discovered that if he depressed a station b.u.t.ton, and shoved it up a little, it would catch and remain on that station.

On Station 23 he heard the shower running and Fredericka Arbuthnot singing a little ditty that apparently went, "Hoo, boy, now I wash my left knee; Hoo, boy, now I wash my right knee...."

Fletch said, "Hoo, boy. Nice knees. Treacherous heart."

Fletch scanned the other stations.

There was conversation on Station 8, in syndicated humorist Oscar Perlman's suite.

"... like this and five dollars and you couldn't even get a good dollar cigar."

"There's a good dollar cigar now?"

"I'm in. Two."

"Three little words. Make 'em nice."

"Nice? One, two, three. Those are nice?"

"You're asking? You dealt 'em."

"I deal without prejudice."

"... Litwack."

Oscar Perlman had written a play and a few books and had been on television often and his was the only voice Fletch recognized.

Listening, Fletch could not even be sure how many men were in the room.

He presumed they were all Washington newspapermen.

"f.u.c.kin' phony."

"Who's talking about Litwack?"

"You recognized the description? I'm out."

"He's just good-lookin'," said Perlman.

"He's no journalist. He's just an actor."

"All us plug-uglies are jealous of him," said Perlman, "'cause he's good-lookin'."

"He's no actor, either. Anybody see him jerking himself off over March's death on the evening ersatz news show?"

"Ersatz? Wha's'at, ersatz?"

"There's no business, like show business,' that's news...."

"How much of Litwack's income comes from his face, Walter?"

"His face and his voice? Thirty percent."

"Ninety percent, Oscar. Ninety percent."

"He looks like everybody's father. As last seen. Laid out in the coffin."

"Whose deal?"

"Something all you guys are too jealous to recognize," said Oscar Perlman, "is that Hy Litwack is a good journalist."

"A good journalist?"

"Don't bother. I'm folding right now. Your dealing has driven me to drink."

"s.h.i.t."

"Oscar, I thought I saw you sitting downstairs listening to Hy Litwack's speech. In fact, I thought I saw you sitting next to me?"

"I was there."

"You heard that speech and still tell us you think Hy Litwack is a good, honest, no-bulls.h.i.t journalist?"

Someone else said, "That speech was written for some afternoon ladies' society out in Ohio. Not for his colleagues, Oscar."

"That's true. Hit me once, and hit me twice, and hit me once again, it's been a long, long time."

"f.u.c.kin' superior b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

"So?" Oscar Perlman said. "He's not the first speaker who misjudged his audience. What are you going to do, wrap a coaxial cable around his neck and turn on the juice?"

"At least he might have asked one of his three thousand staff members to write a new speech for us."

"Another reason you're all jealous of him," said Oscar Perlman, "is because Hy Litwack has a big, six-figure income."

There was a momentary silence.

Someone said, quietly, "So have you, Oscar."

"Yeah. But you b.a.s.t.a.r.ds have figured out a way of taking it away from me-over the poker table."

There was a laugh.

"Oscar's defending Hy because they're both establishment. The two richest men in journalism."

"That's right," said Oscar. "Only Litwack's smarter than I am. He doesn't play poker."

"You going to do a column on Walter March's death, Oscar?"

"I don't see anything funny about getting a pair of scissors up the a.s.s. Even I can't make anything funny out of that."

"You can't?"

"Pair of deuces. Pair of rockets."

"And the devils are up and away, Five-Card Charlie."

"No," said Oscar Perlman. "I can't."

"How much money has Walter March cost you, Oscar?"

"It's not the money. It's the grief."

"Sizable bill. First, when you were working for him in Washington, for years March refused to syndicate you. He wouldn't even let your column run in other March newspapers."

"He said what was funny in Washington no one would think funny in Dallas. He was wrong about Dallas."

"Then when the syndicate picked you up, he sued you, saying you had developed the column while working on his newspaper, and he had the original copyright."

"No one ever got rich working for Walter March."

"How much did all that cost you, Oscar?"

"Nothing."