For the next twenty minutes they combed the files for any reference to Culhane. Brolan felt a giddy exhilaration born of exhaustion and desperation.
Culhane.
The man was always trying to prove his manliness. He swaggered around the offices. Whenever anybody gay appeared, he immediately started an undertow of innuendo. He gossiped with fat Shirley more than any other person-man or woman-in the shop.
Culhane.
My God, he was a wonderful suspect.
In all there were three more references to Culhane, each about the same. He had asked her if she would take his belt and work him over before they had sex. When she refused, Culhane got vaguely threatening. Then he'd calmed down and had sex with her. She noted that he never once kissed her or was tender in any way. He'd wanted anal intercourse, but when she'd refused, he settled for backdoor. It was as if he didn't want to look at her at all.
Brolan's mind was already racing ahead to his confrontation with Culhane the next day. Brolan thought again of how he'd given the executive post to Culhane's assistant. Culhane and his bitchy tongue were just too divisive to be in any position of real authority. He could easily imagine Culhane hating him enough to…
For a long stretch there was no more mention of Culhane or anybody familiar. Brolan decided to go to the bathroom and splash water on his face. Exciting as the news about Culhane had been, Brolan was getting groggy.
Like the kitchen, the bathroom had been cut to scale so that the four feet nine Wagner could reach things easily. In the mirror Brolan stared at himself. Once again a feeling of unreality came over him. Not even of nightmare. Just… an unlikely and harrowing turn of events. There were even comic aspects to it at certain times. A beautiful woman in a freezer. A man with a file full of scandal on various Twin Cities residents. A man (Brolan) so in love with a woman (Kathleen) that even in the midst of the worst crisis of his life he'd found time to plead and wheedle. At such terrible points in your life, you found out a lot of things about yourself. Brolan did not like very much of what he had found out these past forty hours or so.
When he came back to the computer, Wagner said, 'Didn't you mention a man named Cummings?'
'Richard Cummings?'
'Yes. Richard Cummings.'
'He's on there, too?'
'Right here.' By then Wagner sounded as if he, too, was caught up in the whole process. He seemed happy that he'd been able to find another useful name for Brolan.
Brolan read the next four pages quickly. Cummings was just as kinky as he would have guessed-and just as violent. He'd twice slapped Emma and once, infuriated that she wouldn't do what he wanted her to, had dumped her off in the rain. Emma noted, with one of her rare flashes of anger, that her 'friend,' John Kellogg, forced her to continue seeing Cummings because Cummings was 'so important' and could recommend both John and Emma to other important advertising people.
'How do I get hold of this John Kellogg?' Brolan asked.
Wagner smiled. 'He lives over near Hennepin and Lake. He's under the impression-or at least he tries hard to give the impression-that he's an artiste and not a pimp all. He's a real piece of work, Brolan.'
Brolan laughed. 'I look forward to meeting him.'
Brolan went over to the couch, and picked up his suit coat. He shrugged it on tiredly. He'd go home and catch a few hours sleep, then plod into the ad agency. He had a long day ahead of him. There was a good chance that one of the three men they'd talked about that night-Culhane or Cummings or Kellogg-had killed Emma and put her in the freezer.
'Anything you need?' Brolan said.
'No, thanks. I'm pretty self-sufficient.'
'You make great scrambled eggs.'
'You can thank the chicken for most of the work.' The humour died in Wagner's eyes. 'I want you to work closely with me on this. It's our deal, remember?'
'I won't forget.'
'And when you catch the right one…' He let his voice trail off.
'I don't want you to do anything you'll regret,' Brolan said. Wagner just stared at him. 'Let me know how things are going.'
Brolan nodded and left.
12
Thursday Morning
While advertising people are no better or worse than any other group of professionals, they've developed a reputation, largely through the media, of being less than hardworking. God only knows how this got started. Walk into virtually any ad agency at any time of night or day, and you'll find demons at work, people obsessed and possessed by their jobs. Ask the art director who worked until three because a client changed his mind on a certain layout and wanted to see a new version by 9:00 a.m. the following morning. Ask the media buyer who's just been given an additional three hundred thousand to spend on TV, only to learn that the targeted states are Utah and Wyoming (not a lot of fun to buy, given their population, their demographics, and their scarcity of stations). Or ask the account executive who's just sat through a very mean-spirited client meeting, the client accusing the agency of being lazy, too expensive, and greedy (But other than that, you sort of like us, don't you? the account exec wants to say); and now said account exec must come up with a new presentation to mollify this puffing dragon, and he's got (he figures) maybe two days maximum to do so. Such execs have been known to sleep on their couches and exist on Domino's pizza for as long as forty-eight hours. So let's put that 'lazy' canard to rest. While ad people may not be budding Mother Teresas-but then, look around and ask who is?-they certainly know how to work, and how to work hard.
Two meetings required Brolan's attention. One dealt with a thirty-second commercial one of the account executives was having trouble with. The client had thought it was too slow-moving. After the agency had re-edited it, the client felt it was too fast-moving. At the top of the meeting this morning the account executive, a plump, well-dressed man named Baines, said, 'Why don't we get down on all fours and look at it from the client's point of view?' It was the oldest gag in advertising. It never failed to get a laugh.
So, Brolan had Baines show him both versions of the spot. The product was a local restaurant chain. In the first version the people in the spot all looked as if they were having a ten-course meal. The scenes went on too long for the message the tagline was trying to convey-'Fast food prices for real-food meals.' True, 'real food' implied the old tablecloth and the old personal service and the old well-balanced meal… but did it have to be presented so boringly? With Mantovani strings in the background? And with table candles that you wouldn't actually find in the place? Brolan could see exactly why the client would object to this version.
The second version looked like a fast food spot. No sense of sit-down, leisurely dining at all. So many scenes cut so quickly that the place looked like McDonald's with table candles. No atmosphere at all.
As with most things there was room for a happy medium. As he watched, Brolan made notes on a long yellow legal pad. When the lights came up in the screening room, he turned around and gave his quickly considered wisdom to Baines, noting that some scenes and techniques from number one could be merged with scenes and techniques from number two in order to get a better product.
'You agree with our esteemed client?' Baines was one of those guys who disliked clients on principle, forgetting, apparently, who the hell was paying his salary.
'I do.'
'I kinda liked number one.'
'Too funereal.'
'Too what?'
'Too slow; too sombre. We want them to come to one of our restaurants and have good food. We don't plan
