Authors: Jonathan Gash
The TV station proved sceptical at first, until Lottie’s formidable number of tapes of Bray’s lectures and his broadcasts finally convinced them that they might have a gem on their hands. She hired a lawyer to accompany her, and gave Mr Pawler instructions to sit quiet, offer nothing, merely record what was said. Jim had hired the old lawyer from Condennahy forty miles away.
“The conditions,” Lottie said firmly, “are that my client decides everything.”
“No way.” the outside broadcast director said. “We know the business. No way your client says what happens. We want a re-shoot, we do it.”
“Thank you, then. Goodbye.” She rose and made for the door, Mr Pawler following. It was a feint, but a good feint.
Ben Maker, the OBD, scruffy in frayed shorts with tousled hair, watched curiously to see how far she would go, and only relented when she didn’t stop.
“Okay, okay.” But she was gone.
“I said okay!” He trotted after, catching her in the corridor. Two minions followed, one taking notes. “We can compromise here.”
“Wrong, Ben.” Lottie didn’t slow, kept going at the same pace. “I have three hours to fix it with your rival KZ3-P2. Goodbye.”
“Okay! I agree, for Christ’s sake!”
“You certain?” She walked out into the full hot sun. “Complete compliance?”
“I agree.”
“No tricks?” She let him digest that. He eyed the lawyer. Mr Pawler stayed silent. Lottie recognised the tactic. “You see, Ben, things might occur that you don’t, won’t, can’t know about. I’ve been around TV long enough to know that you’ll ruin everything, including your chance of a national TV award, if you as much as belch. Be a fly on the wall, or get zapped.”
“Jesus,” he groaned. “What
is
this?”
“It’s yes or no, Ben, that’s what.”
“Okay. I agree.”
“Mr Pawler has the contract. Do it now and I’ll summarise what I know.”
“Contract?” Ben Maker yelped. “To shoot an OB?”
“I misunderstood, Ben. You
said
yes, but you meant no. Bye. Come, Mr Pawler.”
“Okay, okay!” Maker stared at Lottie. “You want a job?”
“Total compliance will do, thank you. Sign here, and we’ll go ahead.”
He obeyed with ill grace, the assistants witnessing, Mr Pawler taking forever confirming identities.
“It’s only a goddam competition, Chrissakes.”
“Ben,” Lottie said sadly, “you are an ignorant man. I hope your camera work is better than your comprehension. Be ready in one hour.”
“You haven’t said where or when.”
“Correct.”
“You won’t tell us who?”
“No. You make no calls, no Chinese whispers. It’s in the contract. You wish to renege?”
“No!” Ben Maker yelped, seeing Mr Pawler checking his recorder. “No! But where’s the harm?”
“Ben. I’m your golden godsend. Believe it. Do everything I say, and you’ll bless the day I walked in. Do it wrong, you’ll be the TV OBD director who had the best chance in the universe and blew it.”
“Can’t I go set it up?”
She smiled sweetly. “No. I don’t trust you.”
“Then why’d you —?”
“I’ve noticed your work.” It was a lie, but media functioned on frank deceptions. “You come highly recommended.”
“Right, right.” He liked that.
“I can see your mental cogs whirring, Ben. You’re thinking how many places there are within a three-hour radius. You’re trying to work out the location. It’s sixty miles away. Be ready.” She gave him her look. “Don’t even think about it, Ben.”
“Who the hell
are
your clients?”
“Strong people. Still yes?”
“You got it.”
“I provide transport. Your footage will be yours exclusively. That’s my guarantee.”
She saw from his sideways glance at his helpers that he understood the implications. She felt real aggression.
“Which means, Ben, that if rival TV camera crews turn up, or gaggles of newspaper reporters, it’s you who have betrayed the whole thing. The consequences will be fatal for you and yours. Mr Pawler will stay with you at all times. Understood?”
“Right, right.” He nodded slowly, darting a suspicious look back into the foyer. The receptionist’s desk was nearly within earshot.
“Two camera units will be required, Ben.”
“Jesus, I only got one camera crew!”
“If you can’t provide two, the deal’s off. It’s in the contract. Total silence as events unfold. No calling your pals saying what you’re doing.”
“Exclusive?” he asked, chewing his straggling whiskers.
“To you personally, Ben. Do your own deals. It is global news.” She moved to the waiting car. “My client will have no interest in the film or your scoop.”
“Scoop!” He went with her. “Not heard that since I was a kid. Scoop!”
“Remember it, Ben. Remember something else. In this, your interests come a long, long way ninth. My client’s interests are paramount.”
“You got it.”
“Not a word until it’s over. That’s in blood, capeesh?”
“How many of these have you set up?” Ben Maker asked, curious.
“This is the thirteenth,” she lied with more certainty than she felt. “It is the culmination of your entire career.”
“Right, right.”
He was still repeating it as he stood with Mr Pawler. She drove away.
Bray kept opening his holdall, checking the contents. He wore an old suit, one he’d bought many years previously for a starchy Gilson Mather party. Lottie was with him in the school corridor, hearing the teacher telling the class about something special that was going to happen. They were to come into the main hall, but
only your class
because
you were the winners.
“Ms Donna Curme,” Lottie whispered. “The head teacher’s Mrs Daley.”
He nodded, afraid his stammer would return.
“The camera people know what to do. One camera’s outside by the guards at the gate. The other will enter the back of the hall as soon as you go in.”
“Thank you.”
“Jim and two friends are outside.” She went on repeating the same information, over and over. “Jim will come in when they hear Mrs Daley.”
“Thank you.”
“Jim’s listening on some gadget in my handbag.”
Bray stared round the office as if trying to recall his own school.
“Tell me, Bray?” Lottie feared a last-minute change.
“Everything could have been done so differently.” He said it with such sadness she felt heartbroken. “Even now I think of alternatives. Our consul, anything.”
“We’ve been over it a thousand times. Jim too. This is the only way.”
“And Davey’s…”
Yes, Lottie thought in sudden fury, what could you call them, the people who’d stolen a child, who may have cared, seen to his education, given him a grand lifestyle beyond the means of the real parents? What
did
you call them? And answered herself in rage: You call them evil. They might claim to have the child’s interests at heart, but evil is total. No decimal fractions.
“They’re criminals, Bray. Let me near them and —”
“Lottie.”
She suppressed her anger. God Almighty, she thought; don’t start being reasonable, Bray, not at this stage.
She heard Mrs Daley’s voice, Donna Curme call to the approaching children to be quiet, please, no pushing, everybody in an orderly fashion…
“They’re coming,” she said stupidly.
Jim Stazio had been with her this very morning. They had seen Davey handed over to the teacher in the school playground by the security couple. Davey had waved to guards and gone in happily enough.
“I’ll be with the camera people, Bray.”
Her mouth felt dry. She tried to swallow. Somebody came along the corridor. Donna Curme opened the door, smiling with mild surprise.
“Mrs Gunnell!” she said pleasantly. “How nice to see you again! Has Mr Charleston been telling you about our success?” She beamed at Bray. “The class is ready, Mr Charleston. Will you come through?” She smiled at Lottie. “See you later, perhaps!”
“Yes, of course.”
Bray walked with the class teacher. Lottie gave them a moment, then left the office. Quickly she walked round and glided into the hall, almost bumping into the camera crew. The main lights were off, only the stage area illuminated. Some twenty children were settling down on the floor in lines. The window curtains were drawn, one slit of brilliant sunlight slicing the gloaming.
Ben Maker heard the click of the door as she closed it. He raised his eyebrows at Lottie, made a gesture of flicking a palm as if opening a wallet. She recognised the sign for police. He held up three fingers. Three policemen. He’d identified three policemen outside the school in waiting cars. Probably Jim and his friends? She prayed, let it be so.
She smiled as convincingly as she could, and tapped her
watch to indicate that they were on time. Ben was puzzled, shrugged, turned his attention to the head teacher, on his expression is-this-all-it-is. The camera gave a starting breath.
“We have a very important visitor today, class,” Mrs Daley began. “Because you have been very, very clever. Can anybody guess what I mean?”
There was a babble of answers. The teachers laughed and gestured for quiet.
“Yes, it was a competition. Some of you, I happen to know, were very interested in a television quiz, weren’t you?”
“Silence, class, please!” Donna Curme called. “Mrs Daley is saying something very important!”
Into the whispers the head teacher continued, “I happen to believe that our visitor has some really thrilling news. He has come a long way, and has an important announcement.”
“We won the quiz!” a child called.
“Did we win the money?”
“Quiet, please! We all want to make a really good impression, don’t we?”
Lottie saw Davey’s bright hair moving. He was in the second row, leaning to talk to a little fair girl, then to a dark-haired child on his right.
Bray looked pale in the lights, almost grave in his suit. She noticed his holdall was unbuckled.
Behind her the door creaked. Jim Stazio stepped quietly in, making Ben Maker frown. Lottie gave Ben a reassuring nod, pointed to herself to indicate that the newcomer was hers. The camera hummed gently.
“The parents are on their way,” Jim whispered.
She moved aside to give Jim room.
The head teacher said brightly, “Now, children, shall we applaud our visitor?”
Teachers led the applause as Bray stepped forward. He was smiling, his eyes screwed up against the light. He held a coarse old garment daubed with colour.
“Hello,” he said quietly. “I’ve come to tell you that you’ve won. That means you will get the prize. It is worth a lot of money.”
A hubbub rose from the children, some clapping, all talking excitedly. Bray smiled against the light and spoke over them.
“The prize is a very special and old piece of furniture. It was made a long time ago.” He looked along the two rows below. “Everybody else tried to win it, but it will come to your school because you are the only ones who got everything right. All four answers. Nobody else in the whole of the United States of America. You were right every time.”
“Isn’t that marvellous?” Mrs Daley cut determinedly in, wanting the party to go with verve. “Shall we give ourselves a special clap?”
Bray waited for the applause to die.
“There were thousands and thousands of answers,” he went on. At the rear of the hall Ben Maker fidgeted and signalled to the sound man, who irritably nodded that he was on the button, got the volume.
“Does anybody remember,” Bray asked, his voice dropping still further, “what the first question was? I know it’s some time ago.” And prompted, “The question was, What are the kites made of? The answer was leaves, wasn’t it?”
A few children murmured, looking at each other in spite of Donna Curme’s plea for silence.
“The second one you also got right: What are the clouds made of? That answer was sawdust.” Bray fumbled in the pouch of the old garment he carried, and brought out a handful of wood shavings.
“Question Three was —!”
“Carlson! Please be quiet!” the teachers called together.
A boy in the second row subsided muttering, but his hand was raised.
“I was extra pleased when you got the third answer right,” Bray went on. “It was, What game do they play? Answer: balloons!” He smiled. By now the children were talking excitedly, turning to look at Davey. Carlson was fisting the air, grinning.
“But the really excellent answer was your last one. I think it was Carlson who actually sent it, wasn’t it?”
“Us! Us!” Carlson yelled. “We got it!”
“Children! Carlson! No more interruptions or —”
“The answer,” Bray continued, raising his voice, “was excellent. The question was really hard: What is the score in the balloon game?”
“Twenty-nineteen!” Carlson and three others cried out, clapping in the chatter.
“So you are the winners. The prize is worth a lot of money to your school. Over a million dollars.”
Voices were becoming audible outside in the playground. Two sets of car tyres squealed, but the noise diminished in the children’s excited babble. Lottie made placatory gestures to Ben Maker’s silent interrogation. Jim Stazio menacingly pointed a finger at the television man to stay put, keep filming, not one word.
Bray held up the stained canvas garment to show the children.
“Would you like to know why I did the competition and gave the prize?”
“Yes,” the children chorussed.
“I did it because I knew that only one little boy in the whole world really did know all the answers. Because
he
wrote those television stories. And the books. Before he got lost. He is the only one who knows what KV actually stands for. It stands for…?”
Bray cupped a hand to his ear, smiling as if it was one huge shared joke.
“Clint knows!” Carlson stood, dancing with impatient delight. “Clint knows!”
“It stands for…?” Bray repeated, and saw his grandson turn and say something to the boy next to him.
“Kevvy Vol!” Carlson shrieked.
The little girls next to him stood, jumping with excitement and clapping as Bray said, “Yes! Right again!”
Lottie saw Donna Curme’s smile suddenly freeze. The teacher stared at Bray, at Davey, at the camera crew at the back of the hall. She made to say something. The head teacher’s smile became a ghastly rictus.