“If I promise never again to use the F-word against you, would you please let me have four Excedrin on a pair of Tums?” Might as well take some calcium with my caffeine.
She handed me the pills but the face didn’t change. This time there was no offer of a cracker.
“Is there a phone in the big conference room?”
“Yes.”
“That’s where I’ll be.”
I’d written up a shot list for Ainsley to run down at his convenience, by tomorrow morning. I needed pick-ups logged, library materials, things we needed to review before next week’s story. My main thought was to keep him out of my hair, give me time to think. Luckily, I had a two-hour conference call ahead of me.
Part of the fun of working in television is learning to break down the world’s constant stimulus. I can block out the sight of six monitors and focus on one. I can hear both a speaking voice and the hum of an air conditioner that might ruin the audio track. To do the job right, I have to be able to see all the parts, separately, before reassembling them into something meaningful.
Having a flexible attention span is critical. Which is exactly what made conference call time so productive.
“Maddy O’Hara, this is the operator. Are you on the line?”
“Here.”
“You are the last caller being connected. Everyone is present. Your conference may begin.”
There was some opening bullshit where everyone pretended to be so glad I was “on-board,” and I had to say something cheerful. As soon as that was done, I clicked on the phone’s privacy feature and took out my cell phone.
“This is Maddy O’Hara. I need to speak to Corporal Curzon-Nicky Curzon, please.”
Ainsley pushed the AV cart with the HD8 through the door. “Where do ya want it, lady?” He made a face when he realized I was engaging in teleconference bigamy.
“Park it where I can reach it,” I told him. “Yeah, I’m still holding,” I said to the woman at the police station. “College, I’ve got a new to-do list for you.”
The speakerphone called for me and I shot Ainsley a finger
“We’ve got a suggestion on the table for theme weeks, set in advance that you’d customize a story for in your market. Can you get behind that, O’Hara?”
“Who decides the themes?”
“Good question,” New York answered.
“Ms. O’Hara? Are you still there?” the police operator asked.
I popped the mute on the conference speaker. “Here!” I answered and then rotated the cell phone one- hundred-eighty degrees on my ear. “Plug me in would you, College?”
“Transferring you to Corporal Curzon at extension 2-2-8.”
The speakerphone crackled. “All the producers participating will agree on themes. New York has the final say.”
Typical. I hit the voice button. “As long as they don’t ream us during sweeps with crap like Sexual Perversion in the Vatican, I’m in.” There were a few grumbled affirmatives. Somebody decided to bear witness on the topic. Mute on.
“I’m in, too,” Nicky answered. “What’s going on?”
Ainsley held up two cassettes.
“Run the stuff we shot this morning.” I twisted the cell phone down in front of my mouth. “Hey, Nicky. Thinking about something you said yesterday, that I forgot to follow up on-do you mind?”
“Shoot.”
“Is that safe to say in a police station?”
“Funny. Don’t quit your day job.”
The speakerphone called my name. “O’Hara? You with us?”
Press a button. I chided all the fellas at once. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Local and long distance-they all grumbled.
Ainsley was the only one who fully appreciated the show.
The conference call continued with the mute on, topic-satellite problems-while I continued speaking to Nicky Curzon. “I heard you say you ‘did some checking’ before you sent the letter on Jost. I haven’t found anything to support the freaky image of Jost that the magazines suggest. Can you help me out?” I left it hang for a second. “Who’d you talk to?”
“I talked to the guy’s partner at the fire station. Friend of the family knows him.”
“Really? What’d he say?”
“Said Jost was a closet kink, hiding mags everywhere, all the time. Also said he’d had girl trouble before. Jost told the guys in the firehouse he’d left the Amish community over a girl.”
Ainsley hit Play on the stuff we’d shot earlier.
“What the hell? You kidding me?” I said, mostly to my college boy. He’d played with the angle, zoom and the registration. I had the doctor in black and white as well as colorized like a bad hallucination.
“No, I’m not kidding,” Nicky said. His voice dropped. He didn’t like me getting excited about something he’d said. “Look, I gotta go, Maddy.”
“Transfer me to the sheriff, would you? I got questions for him, too.” I went into transfer limbo.
On the conference call, a sales himbo was stroking himself over the marketing pre-sales.
“College, didn’t I tell you to quit screwing around with the artsy-fartsy shit?”
“It’s only the early stuff,” Ainsley assured me. “I was experimenting.” He hit the FF button until the picture was recognizable.
“Well, cut it out. You’re making me nervous.”
“If I’m making you nervous, why would I cut it out?” Jack Curzon asked.
Shit. I hadn’t heard the pick-up. “Hello, Sheriff. How’s your day?”
“Fine. Very open over the lunch hour. My appointment didn’t show.”
“Really? Listen, Jane Citizen would like to ask a question about Samaritan law in this fair county. How’s it work?”
“That’s state law, actually. Protects a citizen who tries to help from legal action. Requires anyone who is licensed as fire, police or medical personnel to assist if they see a person who needs help.”
“And that’s all?”
“Yep.”
“Ah.” So Tom Jost wasn’t trying to get his father in trouble for being a “bad Samaritan” by providing him that timely set of binoculars.
“Why does Jane want to know?” the sheriff asked.
“Jane likes to be informed.”
“Jane needs to get her ass in here to make a report if she wants to get any more cooperation from the sheriff’s office.”
If SUV-guy was trying to scare me, the last thing I wanted to do was look like I was running to the cops. Running encourages a bully to chase you.
It’d be nice to hang the whole thing on Schmed. I figured I better throw Curzon a bone to get him off my back about the reckless driving report. “Yeah, about that-I’m fairly certain the driver was a guy from the office.” Ainsley gave me a sharp glance over the shoulder. “I’m re-thinking the whole situation. Maybe I should try and resolve it in-house. I got to work with the guy every day, you know what I mean? I’m sure we can come to some kind of peace pact.”
Curzon remained silent.
Ainsley paused the audio on the interview. The conference call expanded to fill the dead air. Voices droned on about local issues, each market forecasting inevitable success. The bullshit factor was ten-plus.
“Fine.” Curzon blinked first. “I’ll let you slide. For now.”
“That’s all I got for this week,” said the guy in Boston.
I hit the speaker button and answered them both. “Great.” New York still had to give a report, so I hung in there with Curzon. “Jane’s got one more question for you, Sheriff.”
