board of Galaxy Media. Dick Hickock sat at his desk in his shirtsleeves, his necktie undone, the
“Hello, Dick, darling!” Amanda enthused, walking behind the desk and planting a kiss on his cheek, leaving a smear of cerise.
Hickock had just taken a large bite out of his sandwich, and he struggled to get it chewed and swallowed so that he could speak. By the time he had, Amanda and her lawyer were seated in a pair of chairs to his right.
“You know Bill Eggers, don’t you?” Amanda asked.
Hickock nodded and washed down food with a glass of beer.
“Amanda, what the hell…” he began.
“I do apologize for interrupting your lunch, Dick,” Amanda said contritely, “but I hope you will understand that this just won’t wait.”
“Amanda,” Hickock said, shaking his head in disbelief, “there’s a thirty-eight in my desk drawer, and I would have used it on
“What’s in a Milton Berle, Dick?” Amanda asked, apparently fascinated.
“Corned beef and chopped liver with Russian dressing on pumpernickel, and this.” He held up a huge pickle. “The reference to Berle,” he said, grinning.
Amanda blushed. “Oh, Dick! You are awful!”
“It’s true,” Hickock said to Eggers. “I am awful.”
“It’s about our contract proposal,” Amanda said without further ado.
“Amanda, your contract has another three months to run,” Hickock replied. “What’s your rush?”
“Oh, it’s not me, darling, it’s SI Newhouse.”
Hickock’s face instantly became expressionless. “SI who?” he asked disingenuously, his eyes narrowing.
“Dick, it’s been awful; I’ve spent the whole weekend fending him off.
“Don’t listen to a word he says,” Hickock said.
“Oh, I’ve tried not to – he’s such an awful flatterer – but I must admit, when he started throwing numbers around…”
“That absolute shit,” Hickock said, almost to himself.
“Oh, I don’t want to go with SI, Dick; that’s why I came to see you. He’s practically forced me to have a drink with him later today – God knows, I don’t want to alienate him – and I’m planning to tell him, as sweetly as I possibly can, to go away.”
“Right, my dear,” Hickock said, smiling. “That’s exactly what you should do.”
“But I can’t, Dick darling, not with things just…
“Just say no, Amanda.”
“Well, I can’t very well do that, if I don’t know for sure that I have a deal with you, can I? I mean, my God, I don’t want to leave Galaxy, but when he’s dangling all that money in front of me and all those
“Perks?” Hickock asked, looking alarmed.
“Oh, you know how lavish SI can be when he really wants somebody.”
“Amanda, it’s wrong of you to press me like this.”
“Dick, my darling,
Hickock rummaged in his desk and came out with the contract proposal that Eggers had sent him. He put on his reading glasses and began leafing through it. “You really think you’re worth this sort of money, Amanda?”
Eggers jumped in. “Her numbers support everything in that proposal,” the lawyer said.
“You want five percent more of the syndication?”
“Syndication income is
Hickock seemed to be collecting himself, Amanda thought.
“Tell you what, Amanda, my legal guy is back from vacation next Monday; we’ll get back to you the end of next week, all right?”
Amanda stood up and smoothed her skirt. “Dick, my darling, I can’t
Hickock was on his feet. “Now, Amanda, come back and sit down.”
Amanda and Eggers returned to their chairs. “I’m sitting, Dick,” she said.
Hickock was reading the proposal again. “A Mercedes
“Oh, that’s right, you drive one, don’t you, Dick? Isn’t it such a wonderful car? I mean, the Six Hundred has the burled walnut and the separate air conditioner for the back seat. You know how warm-natured I am.”
“Amanda, be reasonable.”
“Dick, I despise cheapness in a man, I really do.”
“Oh, all right, you have a deal,” Hickock said. “We’ll sign something when my legal guy gets back.”
Eggers instantly produced a small stack of documents. “I’ve prepared a deal memo,” he said. “We’ll work out the final language when your man gets home.”
Hickock read the document quickly and signed all four copies. Amanda signed them, and Eggers left two with the publisher.
Amanda stood up. “I’m so
“We’ll be trading your Cadillac, right?” Hickock asked.
“Oh, Dick, you
In the car, Bill Eggers wiped his brow. “Amanda, I don’t know why you need me at all,” he said.
Amanda patted his hand. “Somebody has to do the boilerplate, dear.”
Chapter 3
Richard Hickock left his office at four o’clock, stopping briefly at his secretary’s desk. “Anybody calls, tell them I’m in the building somewhere for a meeting, you don’t know where, and I won’t be back at my desk by the end of the day.”
“Yes, sir,” the woman replied.
Hickock took his private elevator to the basement garage, where his white Mercedes S600 was waiting. “Ralph, I think I’ll take a walk in the park,” he said to his chauffeur.
“Of course, Mr. Hickock,” the chauffeur replied. “You’ve been walking in the park a lot lately. Good for the heart.”
“Right,” Hickock said, taking one of his magazines, not his favorite, from the leather pocket on the back of the front seat. He leafed idly through it, making mental notes, one of them to fire the magazine’s art director. He wasn’t seeing enough tits in the book these days, and the man had ignored his request for more.
Presently, the car stopped at an entrance to Central Park on Fifth Avenue in the sixties. Hickock opened his own door. “Hover around here, and pick me up in an hour and ten minutes.” He knew from experience exactly how long