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"Hurt"
by Claude Hall
Chapter 17
Palm trees danced like ghosts around the shopping
center, their moving shadows flung against the wall of
the hospital by the streetlights. A flock of strange
birds--ominous things in the dark of night--struggled
against the growing wind that raced from the direction
of Los Angeles and whipped past my pickup window and
swept away to the northeast in the direction of
Mesquite, Nevada. After an immense effort, the birds
came across the moon and disappeared somewhere beyond
the roof of the hospital. That's what I needed.
Wings.
Tonight, the hospital building looked like some demon
out of a horror movie. Two windows on the seventh
floor glowed through gauze curtains like the
half-closed eyes of a cat. But the emergency entrance
was, as always, open and a weak, yellow light spilled
out onto the driveway.
As I watched, two attendants dressed in white came out
of the lounge doorway off to the side. One of them
opened the door to the ambulance and got inside and
started the engine. The other attendant shook his
head then turned and went back inside the lounge. The
ambulance sat there, engine running.
Suddenly, a red glow flickered in one of the top
windows of the hospital like a bizarre wink then that
window and all of the others on the top floor fell
black. I'd never been on the top floor of the
hospital, but always assumed that it, like several
other higher floors, existed for serious long-term
patients.
Of course, this hospital had not treated many
patients--and fewer still these past few months. Even
those didn't stay longer than their insurance firm
allowed. Whether cured or not, well or not, when the
insurance company said your time was up, you left the
hospital.
It was strange to sit there, trying to be calm,
knowing that two of the closest friends I'd ever
had--J.D. and Amanda--were held captive somewhere in
the depths of that place, now suddenly eerie to me.
For a moment, I felt like starting up the pickup,
throwing it into gear, and driving headlong through
the front entrance. Just like the actor who kept
saying "Make my day." For some reason I couldn't
remember his name at the moment. After a while, it
came to me. Clint Eastwood. Clint would have driven
this pickup into the lobby of that hospital, got out
of the pickup, and shot them all.
Wouldn't have done any good, of course. I had a
suspicion that the dervish couldn't be killed with a
mere lead bullet. No, it wasn't a suspicion, it was a
growing fear. You needed something else.
Just then, the attendant returned and went around to
the passenger side of the ambulance and climbed in.
No sooner than he closed the door, the ambulance
pulled out of the driveway and quickly sped across the
parking area of the shopping center and out onto the
main highway. It went north, lights blinking like a
Christmas tree, making noises like a hunting cat.
I started my pickup and raced after the ambulance.
The ambulance, of course, could easily have sped away.
My pickup was much too old and it didn't have the
horses under the hood that an ambulance has.
On the other hand, I was desperate. And a desperate
man, especially one in a hurry, will pull some
dangerous stunts on occasion. Also, the ambulance
attendants didn't know I was chasing them. When they
turned right on Desert Inn, I was right behind them.
I saw the accident several blocks ahead. You couldn't
miss it. Two police cars were already on the scene,
roof racks lighting up the night like a circus.
Before the ambulance could build up speed after
turning the corner, I whipped my pickup in front,
blocking the way. The ambulance screeched to a stop.
The driver jammed the gear into reverse, but he wasn't
quick enough.
I jumped from my pickup and ran to the doorway of the
driver of the ambulance. I didn't know him, but the
driver tried to say my name. He wasn't quick enough
about that either. I reached through the open window
and grabbed his collar and jerked his head against the
jam of the ambulance window.
While the other attendant was screaming all kinds of
clichés about me not being able to do what I was
doing, I opened the ambulance door, tossed his
unconscious friend over the seat into the back of the
ambulance, and took his place under the steering
wheel.
When the attendant began yelling for help, I cracked
him across the jaw with a fist and flung him, too,
into the rear of the ambulance.
I thought about dumping them on the street curb, but
didn't. First, I didn't want to waste the time; time
was very precious to me at the moment. Second, the
police at the accident scene were going to be puzzled
enough. I didn't want to give them a reason to chase
after me. Later, I figured out that's exactly what I
should have done. But at the moment I was sort of
making up things as I went along.
I whipped the ambulance around in the middle of the
street and, sirening screaming to clear a path in
front of me, headed back to the hospital.
The instant I pulled under the overhang at the
emergency entrance, two attendants rushed out with a
rolling stretcher. I got out of the ambulance and
walked around to the back and grabbed one in each hand
and banged their heads together. Then threw them into
the back of the ambulance.
All of this attracted absolutely no attention. No one
came rushing to the defense of the attendants. But
that didn't surprise me. Several weeks ago, I'd
reached the conclusion that the attendants were more
than likely expendable. Normies. People who needed
jobs. Men hired to fill no real vacanies and used
more than likely on the occasional whims of Braun to
meet his ghastly quotos. People disappear all of the
time in Las Vegas and very few questions are ever
asked. If three or four attendants had rushed out of
the door, I still wouldn't have been concerned. The
attendants were not my big worry. My concern was that
Gertrude might have been watching from her office
window.
Then, just as if I'd been invited, I walked in the
door of the emergency entrance and across the lobby
and down the hallway to Gertrude's office. I don't
know why I did this. Maybe she had put a spell on me.
My original intention--if nebulous--had been to storm
up the stairs to the top floor where I suspected that
J.D. and Amanda were held captive, bash a few skulls
in my best immitation of Sylvester Stallone in one of
the Rambo films, and rescue both of them. With J.D.
to help me, I figured we could just about handle most
of the hospital staff. With the possible exception of
Braun himself. And maybe even Braun, depending, of
course, on what he was. I hadn't figured that out
yet. If he was actually the devil, as I'd once
suggested half in jest to J.D., then I was definitely
in trouble.
Gertrude was in her office. And she had no doubt seen
my arrival in the ambulance because she was on the
phone screaming a few choice words, at least one of
which was my name. However, not even she had thought
I would come directly to her office. She was still
looking out the window as she talked on the phone, the
phone dangling in her left hand, her right hand
jamming the receiver of the phone against the side of
her head. At first, she didn't see me...didn't even
know I was in the room.
Then, suddenly, the "comb" in her hair came to life
and became a small little animal with crooked teeth,
little red horns, and bright yellow eyes. It began
dancing around on top of her head, tossing her hair
into a frenzy, squeaking in piercing whistles that
hurt my ears.
Gertrude, as if she understood everything the tiny
gremlin said, spoke one more sentence into the phone,
then walked over and placed the phone on her desk and
hung up. She turned to face me.
"You're not very bright, are you?" she said. "If
you
had any intelligence at all, you certainly wouldn't
have come barging into this office."
I realized, of course, that it had not been really a
question.
"That's probably true," I said. I stood just a few
feet inside the doorway of her office. Every muscle I
ever thought about having wanted to run. But I stood
there wondering what I'd planned on doing once I'd got
this far. Surely, I'd had a plan of some kind!
Surely, I'd be able to remember it in just a moment!
She pointed a finger in my direction.
The gremlin suddenly leaped from the top of her head
at me, but I dodged and it whirled and, furiously
flapping whatever it had for wings, attacked again.
At the same time, Gertrude charged from around her
desk. The gremlin darted at my eyes just as
Gertrude's clawed hands grabbed at my throat.
While I was trying to get Gertrude's fingernails out
of my skin, the gremlin jabbed one of its tiny horns
at my face, aiming for my eyes.
She exhibited an amazing strength! I found it
difficult to breathe with her claws dug deep into my
throat. In desperation, I fell backwards and used my
right foot in the pit of her stomach to catapult her
flying through the air and against the wall. It
didn't stop her even for an instant, but it allowed me
a second or two to deal with the gremlin. I leaped to
my feet and swatted at it with my hand and got lucky.
It fell to the floor. I immediately kicked it as hard
as I could against the wall. It gave one more
piercing whistle before it died.
With an enormous cry of pain, as if the little gremlin
had been something she dearly cherished, Gertrude
leaped upon the desk and also flung herself again in
my direction.
I may have made a serious mistake charging into her
office and confronting her, but she also made a
mistake when she thought I wouldn't hit a lady.
My right fist landed solidly on her jaw. Almost.
Unfortunately, the thing that had been Gertrudge
quickly changed into a weird kind of dark bird about
the size of a cat. I felt my fist collide with
something that felt like feathers. The bird, for it
actually looked something like a huge black flying
creature, was knocked tumbling through the air. It
quickly straightened with a horrible flapping of
wings. Two eyes, each as red as bright coals, glared
at me.
With a sharp caw that sounded like some weird demon,
the bird flew wildly for the open doorway and
disappeared out of sight. By the time I got to the
door, the black demon was flapping ferociously down
the hallway in the direction of Braun's office. As it
ricocheted from one side of the wall to the other,
pushing off first one way and then another with its
wings, the bird continued to scream in that rasping,
bone-shuddering tone.
Instead of dodging into the open doorway of Braun's
office, however, the bird continued down the hall to a
stairway that led down into the depths of the
hospital. It whirled into this and disappeared from
sight.
By the time I got to the stairway, I found only
darkness. The steps disappeared down into a black
pit. I could see nothing. And the light switch at
the top of the stairs didn't work. Only J.D. could
have found his way in that black chasm.
With a shout of rage, I turned and ran back down the
hallway to Braun's office. But a quick glance
revealed that Braun's office was empty, so I ran to
the open stairs that led to the second floor.
I ignored the elevator next to the stairs. I was
afraid they would be watching for the elevator on
every floor.
It turned out that they were also watching the top of
the stairs. Three men with guns were standing in the
hallway. One of them pointed his gun at me and pulled
the trigger. The bullet screamed off over my head and
thudded into the wall.
Before he could fire a second shot, I'd reached the
top of the stairs, shoved him out of the way, and
threw one of the men at another. The third man,
however, simply turned into a dark bird and flapped
past my head and down the stairs.
My "weapon" fell to the floor of the hallway and lay
there unconscious, leaving me somewhat puzzled. Why
hadn't these two men turned into birds? Or, perhaps,
a better term would be dervishes. Because I would bet
almost anything that the Gertrude thing wasn't really
a bird. Not any bird I knew. Maybe they resembled a
black crow. That thought really upset me because I
remember the black crows whirling in the parking lot
the other evening and that shiny black crow in the
tree up at Lake Tahoe just a few hours ago!
I checked the guy I'd shoved out of the way. As far
as I could tell, he was about an normal as you can
get. For a moment, I was afraid I'd broken his neck.
But, no, he was still breathing heavily. And it
appeared he would be unconscious for some while.
I quickly decided, however, that it didn't pay to use
the stairs. There would be just more men on every
floor and maybe, by this time, even several waiting
for me on the steps of every level.
What I needed was a different modus operandi.
Something that would take them by surprise.
So, I decided to take the elevator and pushed the
button. When it arrived at the second floor, I
dragged the two unconscious men inside, propped them
against the far wall so they would be in clear view
when the elevator door opened, and pushed the button
for the fifth floor. I placed the gun in the center
of the elevator floor. Then stood to the side out of
view.
The elevator stopped on the third floor. I heard a
sharp gasp. But no one came into the elevator and,
after a moment, the door closed and the elevator
proceeded to the fourth floor. Again, the door
opened. I could sense that someone--maybe several
men--were poised in the hallway. Although I held my
breath, waiting for someone to charge into the
elevator, nothing happened. A few seconds later, the
door closed and the elevator moved almost without
noise to the top floor of the hospital.
This time, I was not disappointed. As soon as the
elevator door slid aside, I heard a shrill scream like
that of an angry demon. A man suddenly leaped
spread-legged into the elevator to examine the bodies
sprawled on the floor. But somehow he probably sensed
that I was behind him and almost before he was inside
the elevator, he'd hopped backward through the doorway
and out of view. Several caws--the same as if from
giant crows--immediately erupted in the room and these
grew in intensity.
Deciding that I wasn't going to surprise anyone, I
pressed the elevator button for the fourth, third,
second, and first floor...and, on second thought, also
pressed the button for the basement. That might cause
a little consternation down below. The doors closed
and the elevator moved downward.
On the fourth floor, I jumped out of the elevator when
the doors opened. I had expected a welcoming
committee. And I got one.
Three men--or maybe they weren't really men--stood
waiting. And they knew all about me. Because one of
them held a walking cane with a handle that appeared
to be made of silver.
Another carried a revolver. I suppose it may have
been loaded with bullets made from silver. I wasn't
about to find out. I hit him first. It was just a
glancing blow with my left fist because I also had to
worry about the man with the cane and the third man.
I never saw his weapon. And that was just as well, it
turned out.
The gun exploded and a bullet went somewhere past my
ear. But I delivered a vicious chop with the edge of
my right hand that sent the man crying in pain and
reeling backward with his good hand holding onto his
arm.
Then I faced the man with the cane. He had it raised
in both hands and was just bringing the cane down
toward my head. I reached up and blocked the wooden
part of the cane with my right arm. Then took the
cane away from him.
I tossed the cane into the corner. "You've been
watching too many horror movies," I said.
Then I was jabbed in the back with a needle and
everything quickly got hazy and then got nothing at
all.
When I came to, I was tied to a chair. Facing me,
also tied to chairs, were Amanda and J.D.
"You okay?" asked J.D.
It took me a moment before I could think straight. I
had to shake my head a couple of times and suck in a
lung full of air before things really cleared up.
I tried to bust the ropes that engulfed my hands
behind the rungs of the chair, but without success.
For the first time in my life, I wished for a full
moon! Anything to give me extra strength!
The room was full of darkness. Only a moon, far from
full, shining through an open window and the faint
glow of distant streetlights in the parking lot below
prevented the room from being completely black.
"I guess I'm okay," I finally said.
My hands had been tied behind the back of the chair
with more than the usual amount of rope and that rope
had been tied to the legs of the chair. I couldn't
move my hands. I could wriggle a couple of fingers
and that was about it. My feet had also been bound to
the chair.
"I had a silly thought that you were trying to rescue
us," J.D. said.
"Sorry about that," I told him. "Are you
okay?"
"We're okay. For the moment," said J.D.
"I'm sorry we got you into all of this," I told
Amanda.
"All of what?" she said.
In spite of everything, she still tried to smile. And
it appeared as if nothing could erase the perpetual
twinkle from her eyes.
"I wish I really knew," I said.
"We've seen a lot of birds coming through the window.
Some have gone down the stairs," said J.D.
"Crows?"
"Not crows, puppy. No. Good old Corvus corax, once
known throughout Asia and northern Europe as the
hraban, from whence, I've always thought, the word
ravenous came."
I thought about Braun and Gertrude.
"It does seem to fit," I said.
"A horrid creature only slightly less despicable than
the vulture," said J.D. "No wonder Edgar Allan Poe
despised them immensely."
"I've read that poem of his about the raven. He
didn't despised ravens. As I recall, he was always
quoting them."
My attempt at a pun fell into empty space.
"Yes, he did despise ravens," insisted J.D. "When
you
read a poem like that upside down, you get the full
meaning. In this particular case, of course, we're
not talking about mere ravens, but werehraban. Which
would be slightly mispronounced in this country and
also spelled a little differently."
It suddenly dawned on me what he was really saying.
"God! So that's what the dervish really are!" I said.
"Wereravens!"
"Seems like a better than average guess," said J.D.
"Of course, I never guess so it has to be the truth."
"No wonder they were hard to see," I said. "We were
looking for the wrong thing all of the time."
"Right. Fling a few rocks, fire an old pistol and fly
away literally invisible in the dark of night."
I told them both about Doris. About the raven in the
tree outside of the O'Connor home at Lake Tahoe that
I'd mistaken for a crow. About driving back to Las
Vegas with Doris. About the gathering back at my
apartment and the weird rites that must have taken
place in the living room.
I also mentioned that Senator Bangor O'Connor and his
wife were en route to Las Vegas.
"You talk too much, but I'm glad to hear it," said
J.D.
"Glad? What good could they do? They'll just get
trapped like us!"
"Little you know," J.D. said. "Extremely little, in
fact. Otherwise, you would have waited until the
senator arrived."
"In retrospect, it may not appear like I made a very
bright maneuver, but I had some silly idea about
storming up here and rescuing you and Amanda."
"You? Rescue me?"
"Well, at the moment it certainly looks as if someone
needs to rescue you," I said. "And I should point out
that just a minute ago you said something about me
coming to the rescue so you must need to be rescued."
"All I said was that it was a silly thought," said
J.D.
"Well, how come you haven't changed and flitted away?"
I asked. "You could do the rescuing a lot better than
me at the moment."
"My rope is a bit different from yours," J.D. said.
"They've driven toothpicks into the rope. If I move,
I get a splinter."
"Wood?"
"Naturally," he said.
"Are you a werewolf, too?" Amanda asked him.
J.D. sighed. I could tell he was reluctant to talk
about it to her.
Did this puppy tell you he was a werewolf?" he
demanded angrily. "Don't believe a word of it!"
"He told me no such thing," she said in sort of a
snappy tone. "But I've been a so-called bag lady in
this town for several years and you'd be surprised
what I've seen during that time."
"The puppy says you're the sister of Elvin Robinson."
"Yes. That is so," she said.
"Then it's very difficult for me to understand how you
became a bag lady," he said.
"It's very simple," she said. "Well, not all that
simple. Many years ago, I was kidnapped. My brother
refused to pay the ransom. I think it was something
like $30,000, a rather grandiose figure in those days,
but I had at least that much in my personal bank
account. Elvin, god bless his soul, quickly declared
me dead. You can imagine how amusing it was to read
about your own death in the newspapers and learn that
a body had been found."
"That would, indeed, be a laughing matter," J.D.
agreed.
"The two kidnappers--after they read the
newspapers--shook their heads sadly and let me go.
When I showed up in person, Elvin seemed to think I
was a fake. Stared me right in the eyes and pretended
he didn't know me. Pretended I wasn't even there!
He'd taken over my bank account and destroyed
everything I owned. I had nothing. No bank account.
No name. Not even a brother."
"How is it that you didn't contact a lawyer?"
"A lady just didn't do those things in those days...I
probably never thought about it," said said. "Anyway,
my brother was a lawyer, you see. I did ask several
people that I knew for help, but Elvin had been there
first. By now, I probably didn't even resemble Amanda
Robinson anymore. No one paid me much attention. I
now believe I was suffering from a slight concussion.
And you know how it is, when you scream out people are
more apt to consider you merely crazy than someone who
has suffered an injustice. Ignored me completely.
Over the days and the weeks, I somehow survived."
"When I mentioned your brother Elvin to J.D. the other
day," I said, "he said that we'd probably have to
make a call on your brother one of these days."
"Oh, I hope not, Chuck," said Amanda. "I forgave
him
a long time ago for all those things. One of these
days, he'll have to answer to a higher power than us
all, don't you think, Mr. Candor?"
"In all probability," J.D. said.
That was the first time I'd heard J.D. even come close
to admitting that there was a god.
"Then you agree that there is a heaven?" she asked
J.D. She appeared to be rather curious, as if seeking
confirmation.
"I don't know about heaven, but there is definitely a
hell," J.D. said. "I've often thought it was here and
now."
"No. Indeed not," said Amanda. "I don't
believe that
at all."
"Well, there is, indeed, a dark side to us all," he
continued. "Normies, too. We are one thing in a
suit, but put us in a uniform--rather, a different
shape, if you will--and we are changed to the persona
of the uniform, even if it is just a black armband on
a brown shirt. I've long felt there are two forces at
work in the world, literally the salt and pepper of
life. The ying and the yang. Or, as someone more
mundane might put it, the forces of good against the
forces of evil. There are those, of course, who
blunder merrily along, smiling in the sunshine, never
realizing what really goes on in the dark."
"Nothing, of course," I quickly told Amanda just so
that she wouldn't grow more alarmed than she was
already.
"See what I mean?" J.D. said to her. "I've not yet
figured out whether they--people like this puppy
here--are the blessed ones or merely dolts who should
be horrendously terrified because the world is falling
apart around them and they don't know it."
"Then you are a werewolf," she said. It was a
statement, not a question.
"No, ma'am," said J.D. "I'm a vampyre.
Do you know
a lot about vampyres?"
When he said that, I sat there totally astonished.
Because time and time again he'd advised me to keep my
mouth shut about not being a normie.
"Just from movies," she said. "And, to be quite
honest, bag ladies don't get to see an awful lot of
movies."
"Trash," he said. "They write only trash about us.
The real Prince Vlad Dracula was a noble 15th century
warrior who trained for knighthood. Later, when he
sought retribution for all of the injustices heaped
against him, he became known as Vlad Tepes, the
impaler. He was merely seeking justice."
"It's okay anyway," Amanda said.
"I had already figured that out," J.D. told her. "And
I want you to know that I'm very grateful."
I glared at him. "How can you tell her something like
that when you've never let me admit to anyone that I'm
different?"
"Hush," Amanda said to me.
As for J.D., he just grinned. It was the first time
I'd ever seen him do something like that. I was
almost in a state of shock. It wasn't really a very
pleasant grin, but it made him seem more, well, human.
"This room smells," I said.
J.D. took a while before replying and when he did
finally reply, his words were clipped and some of them
carried a greater emphasis than others.
"That's just your imagination," he said.
"Don't you smell it?"
"I have a keen sense of sight. But I haven't smelled
anything in almost 200 years. Maybe longer. I can't
even imagine an odor."
"What happens with the light of day?" I finally asked
just as soon as I could breathe again.
"By then, of course, I will have figured out some
method of escape."
"Of course," I said. "Well, I wish you'd hurry
about
it."
I think the tone of my voice probably indicated doubt
that he would be able to pull this one off. And both
of us knew what would happen to him once the sun began
to shine in that window.
"Why don't you rescue us, son?" Amanda asked. "I'm
positive that I heard the howl of a wolf a few minutes
ago."
"Wasn't me," I insisted.
"I heard a wolf, too," said J.D. "From somewhere on
one of the floors below."
"I didn't hear anything," I said.
"You wouldn't," said Amanda.
"There wasn't enough moon," I pointed out as firmly as
I could.
"Did you ever wonder, you puppy, how much moon is
enough moon?" J.D. asked.
"A full moon, of course!"
"Bah!" shouted J.D. "All of that's strictly in your
imagination. Look at what you did in that bar the
other night...threw a man across the room!"
"That was just a matter of muscle," I explained.
"I've always been fairly strong."
"It's a matter of imagination!" J.D. insisted.
"Look, who's the werewolf here and who's the vampyre?"
"You're no more a real werewolf than I am," J.D.
insisted.
"Well, Jesus H. Christ!" I shouted back in
exasperation.
"Just a puppy," J.D. told Amanda in a calm, confiding
tone of voice. "A werepuppy, you might say. He only
imagines he's a werewolf now and then."
And that last observation caused him to laugh. And
that caused him to grimace because of the wood
splinters surrounding him.
"I suspected as much," Amanda said.
"You ever hear about leprechauns?" J.D. asked, but
this time he was speaking to me. And staring at me
hard.
"Sure. Television. There's this movie that has
Tyrone Power and, I think, Maureen O'Hara. He doesn't
believe in leprechauns, but meets one in Ireland in a
glen and...."
"That's enough," J.D. interrupted. "More movie
hogwash. Well, let me tell you: There are
leprechauns. Maybe not as many as there used to be.
There aren't many vampyres left, strangely enough and
even fewer now...in fact, I may be the last so far as
I know...but leprechauns have survived rather well
through the ages."
"You sure?" I asked, but I shouldn't have asked
because J.D. just glared at me for a moment without
really telling me what I wanted to know.
Finally, he said, "And if there are male leprechauns,
it follows that there might be female leprechauns."
"Amanda?"
"No, not Amanda! Your girlfriend. Maybe. Just
maybe."
"She is not."
"Yeah?"
"She doesn't even look like a leprechaun."
Just a short glare this time.
"You've got the movie leprechauns and you've got the
real thing," he said. "And as for the senator's wife,
a witch. No brooms and, anyway, it's a different kind
of magic. But a witch. So, your girlfriend is either
a leprechaun of some kind or a witch of some kind.
Or, and this is just a maybe, she could be something
else entirely. Something new and out of this world.
It would be in her genes."
"She's never said anything about it."
"You tell her you were a moonie loonie?"
"I tried once. Didn't make it."
"Got to tell her sooner or later."
"I know. But she talks a lot. Doesn't let me say
much."
"You two are a perfect couple. The truth is that
you've never said much. I've worked with you for more
than a year now and I don't know anything about you.
Not even your real name. Nothing except that moon
nonsense."
"I don't see any nonsense about it."
"Yeah? Why wait until the moon comes out? Explain
that."
"I can't explain any of it," I said. "I would
surmise
that if they handed out such things, I could easily
earn a Ph.D. in loup garou, but in all of my
research--and I seriously wanted to find out more
about myself--I never came across any real explanation
for that."
"Did you ever pause to think that perhaps the legend
about werewolves has more to do with the virus of
rabies than the moon?"
"The moon does things," I insisted.
"Hogwash! It's your imagination, that's all! There's
the varga mor, or wolf witch, of Norway and the moon
is always covered by clouds in Norway. According to
Gervaise of Tilbury, in his quite charming little book
'Otia Imperalia', werewolf means man-wolf which has
nothing to do with you because you're still wet behind
the ears. But the werewolf has been around a long,
long time and the legend is everywhere I've ever been.
There was the quite savage vairwolf in gothic times,
virawolf in sanskrit, and later the virwolf in the
days when the world spoke mostly latin. And you want
to tell me about werewolves! Hogwash!"
Since I couldn't argue with him...couldn't, in fact,
even understand him...I was silent for a while.
Several huge black birds, ravens...rather
wereravens...came through the open window and, without
pausing, immediately flew across the room and into a
pit of blackness where there was probably an open
doorway.
"What happens now?" I asked J.D. as softly as I could.
"Dinner, I believe. And if I'm correct, they're
planning on us being the main course."
(to be continued)
e-mail claude@claudehallonline.com
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Commentary
by
Claude Hall
February 8, 2004
You and I, businesses (yes, including most radio
stations), and products usually experience a cyclic
pattern of life. We come, we do, and we go.
Regarding public relations--and this includes a
promotional campaign--the theory is that there are
five stages in the lifecycle of most entities,
although these may overlap and, perhaps, one or more
stages may extend throughout the entire life of the
campaign. Reinvention of entity image can generate a
new lifecycle. But all lifecycles as a rule follow
certain stages.
These stages are:
1. Attention: In this stage, the public
relations
professional attempts to get the person, place, thing,
or service (i.e., the "product"
before the target
audience.
2. Indulgence: The product is now known
to some
extent, but the target audience has little real
knowledge about the topic and probably doesn't care.
3. Belief: The target audience
believes that the
product is valid.
4. Participation: the target
audience participates in
the product in some fashion (i.e., it reads the
magazine, buys and uses the soap, tunes into the radio
station or the television program).
5. Bible: At this point, the
product is so firmly
established, it is the Cadillac, the Randal knife, the
Pendleton shirt, etc. This, of course, doesn't happen
with very many entities.
Furthermore, a structural consistency can be found
among many of the promotions conducted by public
relations professionals today and many of those
executed by such legendary figures as P.T. Barnum and
Sir Thomas Lipton.
P.T. Barnum
It's well accepted that P.T. Barnum was a genius; his
management and promotion of General Tom Thumb
establishes that beyond doubt. However, his "brick
promotion" clearly indicates that he understood human
nature. This stunt was to promote attention and
attendance at a museum Barnum owned and operated in
Manhattan. Though the promotion was not designed, per
se, it does have structure and provides a thread of a
model. Barnum described it in his autobiography,
although, of course, public relations was virtually
unknown during those days and he described what he did
as advertising.
"I thoroughly understood the art of advertising, not
merely by means of printer's ink, which I have always
used freely, and to which I confess myself so much
indebted for my success, but by turning every possible
circumstance to my account. It was my monomania to
make the Museum the town wonder and town talk. I
often seized upon an opportunity by instinct, even
before I had a very definite conception as to how it
should be used, and it seemed, somehow, to mature
itself and serve my purpose. As an illustration, one
morning a stout, hearty-looking man came into my
ticket-office and begged some money. I asked him why
he did not work and earn his living? He replied that
he could get nothing to do and that he would be glad
of any job at a dollar a day. I handed him a quarter
of a dollar, told him to go and get his breakfast and
return, and I would employ him at light labor at a
dollar and a half a day. When he returned I gave him
five common bricks.
"'Now', said I, 'go and lay a brick on the sidewalk at
the corner of Broadway and Ann Street; another close
by the Museum; a third diagonally across the way at
the corner of Broadway and Vesey Street by the Astor
House; put down the fourth on the sidewalk in front of
St. Paul's Church, opposite; then, with the fifth
brick in hand, take up a rapid march from one point to
the other, making the circuit, exchanging your brick
at every point and say nothing to any one'.
"'What is the object of this ?' inquired the man.
"'No matter', I replied; 'all you need to know is that
it brings you fifteen cents wages per hour. It is a
bit of my fun, and to assist me properly you must seem
to be as deaf as a post, wear a serious countenance;
answer no questions; pay no attention to any one; but
attend faithfully to the work and at the end of every
hour by St. Paul's clock show this ticket at the
museum door, enter, walking solemnly though every
hall in the building; pass out, and resume your work'.
"With the remark that it was 'all one to him, so long
as he could earn his living', the man placed his
bricks and began his round. Half an hour afterwards,
at least five hundred people were watching his
mysterious movements. He had assumed a military step
and bearing, and looking as sober as a judge, he made
no response whatever to the constant inquiries as to
the object of his singular conduct. At the end of the
first hour, the sidewalks in the vicinity were packed
with people all anxious to solve the mystery. The man,
as directed, then went into the museum, devoting
fifteen minutes to a solemn survey of the halls, and
afterwards returning to his round. This was repeated
every hour till sundown, and whenever the man went
into the museum a dozen or more persons would buy
tickets and follow him, hoping to gratify their
curiosity in regard to the purpose of his movements.
This was continued for several days the curious
people who followed the man into the museum
considerably more than paying his wages till finally
the policeman to whom I had imparted my object,
complained that the obstruction to the sidewalk by
crowds had become so serious that I must call in my
'brick man'. This trivial incident excited
considerable talk and amusement; it advertised me; and
it materially advanced my purpose of making a lively
corner near the museum." (Barnum, 102-103)
Barnum didn't start his legendary circus until the
1870s. At the time, many small circuses were
traveling by horse and wagon across America. But
Barnum's circus soon outstripped all others in
attraction and scale. He was the first to move a
circus by rail, according to Candice Jacobson Fuhrman,
and "his spectacular advertising and publicity
techniques preceded him wherever he went.
"Early circus press agents would travel ahead of their
shows and tack up handbills in taverns and stores.
Sometimes they would stand in the town square, ring a
bell until a crowd had gathered, and then regale their
listeners with exaggerated descriptions of the coming
attraction. Barnum's circus had a separate publicity
and advertising department with its own railroad car.
The advertising team would arrive in a town in three
stages, in the first stage plastering posters on
everything in sight. About a week later, the second
contingent would arrive to poster anything left and
meet with reporters to plant advance stories.
Finally, the 24-hour men would show up to make sure
the newspapers had enough information, talk with top
officials in the town, and check the parade route.
The circus parade, which could be a lavish spectacle
involving a cast of thousands, was the final ballyhoo
that lured the crowd to the big top." (Fuhrman, 20-21)
Sir Thomas Lipton
Even all these years later, Lipton's promotions seem
original. His first move after tidying up his first
shop in Scotland was to hire an Irishman in knee
breeches, cutaway coat and cocked hat to drive two
scrubbed and polished pigs named "Lipton's
Orphans"
through the streets to his shop, always by a different
route. Within a few weeks, Lipton had to engage an
assistant to handle the business, and before six
months were up he had opened a second shop in a better
district. (Smallwood, 11-12)
His "Jumbo Cheese" promotion, however, was a
classic.
The cheese was made in Whitehead, NY, according to
Irving Wallace in "The Book of Lists."
"For the Christmas of 1881," Smallwood said, "Lipton
went all out to import, display, and sell the largest
cheese that had ever been made. He ordered it from
America and saw to it that no detail of its
preparation and arrival was kept secret from his
customers. Glasgow was informed that for six days 800
cows, attended by 200 dairymaids, gave their all for
this gargantuan cheese. The world's greatest experts
were called into consultation so that this cheese
would not only be the world's largest, but its best
and best known!
Watching them, Lipton got a fresh idea. Why not copy
one of the chief excitements of a Scotsman's Christmas
dinner: the six-pences in the pudding? He would
insert golden sovereigns and half sovereigns in the
outsized cheese. It was one of his happier
inspirations. A long metal butter taster was driven
into the cheese, revolved and withdrawn. Into the
extracted circular strip the gold coins were inserted;
the strip was replaced. Hundreds watched the
operation. When the cheese was finally cut up on
Christmas Eve, so many were on hand to secure a slice
that police had to be summoned to control the crowds.
Within two hours every ounce was sold." (Smallwood,
13)
Henceforth, monster cheeses were a fixture of the
Lipton Christmas. Occasionally, local authorities
objected. The Sunderland constabulary, for example,
once argued that the presence of sovereigns in a
cheese constituted a lottery. Lipton's attorneys
advised that he would be within the law if he warned
the public that any money found in the cheese must be
returned to the store. He warned them in a merry
little advertisement, something like a New Yorker
editorial. Naturally, no gold coins came back to him.
(Smallwood, 13)
The police of Newcastle, on the other hand, were
afraid that the public might choke themselves by
innocently swallowing the coins. Lipton countered
with a newspaper ad, headed "Police Warning," to
the
effect that anybody buying a portion of Lipton's Giant
Cheese was in danger of being choked by one of the
many sovereigns concealed in it. Again, there was a
record sale. (Smallwood, 13-14)
Today, Lipton is remembered for his tea. Actually, he
was 40 years old and a millionaire before he handled
an ounce of tea.
(Bibliography, plus Gordon McLendon, L. David
Moorhead, Jack McCoy, Chuck Blore, Bill Stewart,
Edward L. Bernays, Todd Storz, Jim Moran, Ivy
Ledbetter Lee, and Harry Reichenbach next week.)
OTHERS
George Wilson, KeokiWC@aol.com
"The Indian you were
writing about was named Billy. I forgot his last
name, he was from Oklahoma, he was booked by a man
named Jack Noone from someplace in Texas. We used him
at WTMA in Charleston, SC, in either '63 or '64, and
then again in Greenville, SC. You had to buy the
snakes from a snake farm in Texas, Noone got a
cut...he was buried 6 feet underground in a hole just
big enough to hold a single mattress, a thunder pot
and a phone...people paid a quarter to look down on
him for 2 minutes. We had to buy 32 poisonous snakes
plus an anaconda and a boa. People could put
poisonous snakes in with him if they handled them
with their own hands. He wore a tight swim suit and
sunglasses so the snakes wouldn't bite him in the eye.
Billy was a great showman, as was Noone, they would
bring the snakes up and milk them each evening and let
people hold the boa for a picture. Lord knows how
many quarters we took in...people would pay their
money, stay there 2 minutes and then go to the back of
the line, sometimes all day...it was truly a happening
for the shopping centers...thanks for the memory,
Claude. Best to Barbara. Your friends, Jackie and
George."
Jay Lawrence sent something in, too, about the
rattlesnake promotion because he was involved, in
Tucson as I recall, but this computer is fastly
growing ancient, as is the guy who handles the
keyboard, and I lost it; sorry, Jay. The Hadacol
trains? Nothing! Except that Bert Sherwood thinks
Mickey Rooney also did one of those trains. I
misplaced Bert's thing, too. Sorry, men! But isn't
it a pity that, to the best of my knowledge, this
promotion wasn't written about? Pat O'Day dropped me
a note recommending that I do a book about radio
promotions; he was willing to write about some of the
promotions he did. Heck, I'd be afraid to attempt a
book like that.
Jay Blackburn, radiojdb@satx.rr.com
suggested that I
contact Bruce Miller Earle about a "Free Lids"
promotion.
Bruce Miller Earle, ingbme@hotmail.com
"The LIDS
promotion dates back to the early seventies when Jay
and I were at the helm in Corpus Christi at KEYS. We
had just recently returned from an evening watching
Cheech and Chong live with with Dan Hicks and the
Hotlicks as an opening act. Jay came up with the idea
for the "Free Lids" promotion. We
basically promoted
that KEYS would be giving away free lids. The prize
was a white plastic styrofoam cup lid with a bright
orange KEYS sticker in the middle. To offset the
surprise we also had some regular station stuff to
give away. As I remember, things were running fairly
smooth until some heavy-duty motorcycle types showed
up demanding real free lids suitable for smoking.
Mild pandemonium ensued and at one point it looked
like we might be explaining why the station van had
been turned over and set on fire. Nonetheless in the
end all of the several hundred stickered logo lids
were given away and we got back to the station alive.
I am just returning after two weeks of being off the
scope in Oaxaca. My major reading material on the
trip was 'Inside Boss Radio' by Ron Jacobs. For those
of us who actually remember the real-time audio
portion of KHJ, it adds in-depth substance as to how
it all went together. You are left without any doubt
the Jacobs is a firm believer of team work as long as
he is leading the team. I would recommend anyone who
has or still participates in radio programming read
this book. You can feel the intensity in every memo
Jacobs typed. I can imagine he wore out an Underwood
or two during his boss radio tenure. One of my
favorite memos dealt with his explaining how the area
stations had faired during a 1967 ratings period. His
comment on the rating surge of all-news XETRA 690 made
me laugh out loud. His take was that Gordon McLendon
had paid the Israelis to stage the 6-day war with
Egypt for the XETRA book promotion. I also enjoyed
the excellent collection of promotional photos and
KHJ/RKO promotion material. Two photos in the book
really caught my attention. One of the Boss Phone
Girls waiting for your request at HO 2-2133. This one
to the point if anyone knows the name of the young
lady third from the right (page 134) please let me
know. My other favorite is the photo of Bill Drake
and Ron Jacobs (page 409) during interviews for the
book taken in 1999. My offering for a caption over
Drake would be BEEN THERE and the caption over Jacobs
has to be DONE THAT. Saludos."
Just FYI, if you're interested in the KHJ book by Ron
Jacobs, you can obtain information on how to purchase
one at whodaguy@lava.net.
Jay Blackburn: "What BME failed to mention was that
at KEYS we had no money. KEYS was located in a former
grocery store and Bruce found the lids stored away in
some nook or cranny. I remember the lids were those
plastic lids that fit over Crisco cans after you open
them up. I should have mentioned that we desperately
needed sampling. Bruce had supercharged the
engineering. The quarterhour maintenance was 24/7. The
new programming was in place, all we needed was cume.
We got it. The three rules are for ARB book
promotions. There are other promotions for specific
problems. Lets do those first: If the station has a
name like THE LOOP,THE PASS, THE KATT or THE ZOO,you
need to sell that name early on. At THE LOOP we asked
for a picture of yourself and our name. The response
overwhelmed the P.O. The prize was a tradeout trip to
Jamiaca during harvest time. It was the 70s. Another
example of a one-use promo is the teen scam. If your
target is 18 to 34 and you want to boost your 12+ and
do not want to change you on-air presentation, you buy
a small ad in every high school paper offering an
endowment to the paper for the best story on rock
radio and BTW our station is offering tours for your
research. We also called each school and talked to the
teacher that is in charge of the school paper. 12+
jumped 30%. Of course you run your quarterhour
maintenance promotion 24/7. Now the rules for ARB:
1. Raise visibility in the market = more sampling,
higher cume; 2. Quarterhour maintenance = holding
those new people that sample you and holding your
regular cume over longer periods; 3. Sales = more
money from existing clients, money from sometime
clients and most important...found money...those
businesses that have never advertised on radio. I
hope my last few emails have not sounded snotty. After
reading your emails I was suddenly thinking like a
programmer again. Truth is the game has changed
considerably. Now that a few multi-nationals control
both electronic and print media, the strategy is very
different. If you own 6, 8 or 10 stations in a
market, it doesn't matter any more if your engineering
sucks or if you are programmed worth a damn. What the
hell, you own the competition. I recieved an email
about a year ago from a kid I had never heard of, but
he grew up with my LOOP. It started him in radio.
He's now a regional v.p. programming for Clear Channel
and it is driving him crazy. He saw my name in one of
your commentaries and tracked down my email address.
He can't get his engineering right. He saw BME's name
and was blowm away. Here was one of the 5 guys that
invented competitive engineering and me, one of his
P.D. heros of his teens. He took the tour. The point
is there are still real ones out there. BME is right,
we barely escaped the Lids promotion with our lives.
As long as I'm in the mood I might as well tell you
stories that Bruce never would. Notice I'm not copying
him. He refuses to brag on himself. It was during
the KEYS period that BME invented the timing clock. He
was facinanted by a new product called a nixie tube.
They showed numbers. They were used in automation
gear, but Bruce saw another use. He built a little box
with these nixie tubes so that every time you punched
off an element, the clock automatically reset and
began counting down again. Imagine what this piece of
gear allowed you to do. It was also that summer Bruce
rebuilt tw old spotmasters and raised the bar for
everyone in the business. He shared all of this info
with Jimmy whatshisname, the chief at WCFL. Jim got
the credit, but that's BMEs way. I've told you before
that Bruce was not just an engineer. Truth is he
really did the music at all of our stations. It's
not that I don't like music, but what I like is not
commercial. I always saw the tunes as little tools
used to garner a large
demographically/psycographically correct audience, and
I did the rotations and so forth. BME always had the
last say. Never in front of anyone, just when we were
back at our place throwing ideas around."
Jonathan Fricke, studio2812@msn.com,
fowarded info
about the death of Gene Hughes, 67, a well-known
Nashville record promoter and once lead singer of the
Casinos, a Cincinnati group that hit big in 1967 with
the million-selling single "Then You Can Tell Me
Goodbye." In record promotion, Hughes helped make
hits for Toby Keith, Vince Gill, Randy Travis, Conway
Twitty, Alabama, The Judds, George Strait and others.
More information is at www.musicnashville.com.
Larry Shannon, larryshannon@radiodailynews.com,
has graciously provided Sonny Melendrez,
SonnyRadio@aol.com, with his own website. Check
out
www.radiodailynews.com to locate the address of Sonny's
website. Sonny had written me: "Good stuff.
My
favorite promotion happened while I was in high
school: KTSA and KONO (two stations that each enjoyed
a 30+ share in the market) began their broadcast day
on April 1st by switching staffs, time slot by time
slot. Each personality acted as if they had always
worked there and new jingles were produce for that day
alone. Radio like that took guts, creativity, and
program directors who were allowed to run the show.
What a treat for listeners who enjoyed all the fun of
stations and radio people who didn't take themselves
too seriously!"
Carson Schreiber, carsonschreiber@socal.rr.com,
wrote
regarding the Janet Jackson promotion and Don
Whittemore forwarded the item to me. I wrote Carson
that he was right. The promotion had to be planned.
Because Bob Pond pulled the thing off Tivo or
something and she was wearing a pastie, a star just
slightly larger than a silver dollar. Only the curve
of her breast was shown and you can see that sort of
thing, if interested, when you see a mother nursing a
baby! But it's a cruddy way to get a hit, in my
opinion. However, I would have banned Janet Jackson
and most the commercials. Gross. Worse than Howard
Stern. The game was good. Everything else sucked!
At fault, of course, is the FCC. They should have
stopped this sort of crap years ago. But it permeates
TV.
Tom Bigby, WIP, Philadelphia, PA, TomBigby@aol.com,
"OK, now I wonder if you remember me...just wanted to
drop you a short note to tell you how much I enjoy
your postings. Hard to believe I am still at the
grind, and have been in one station for 15 years, but
I didn't blossom until I was old. I have not jocked
in a loooooong time, I have programmed several
stations here in Philly, but always at WIP, it has
been a wonderful 15-year run. Retirement is near, but
Mel has been good to me so I get to leave on my terms
for once in my life. Your writings are more the
history of the business as I remember it, you and John
Rook will never let us forget those wonderful days of
great radio. Some of us like to think our stations
are still great and in some ways they are. Thanks for
being there."
ChuckBuell, ChuckBuellRadio@cs.com,
reports that he
was asked to do his radio show live in Chicago for a
week. Ah, yes. Many of the good ones are still here!
Including, Jack Gale, jackgale@adelphia.net,
"I guess
us dinosaurs never really know when to quit. I just
filed an application with the FCC for a new AM here.
I'll know in a few months. I've always said, 'Do
whatcha gotta do, while you're here'. This area is
bursting at the seams. Lots of folks 55 and over
No
one ever plays Ricky Nelson, Leslie Gore, Bobby Vee,
Fats Domino, Gary Lewis, or Neil Sedaka. Maybe it
will live again. Your 'crazy' friend."
Two guys who are immensely entertaining and who have
graciously included me on their email list are Ken
Levine and Bill Mouzis. You have not actually
witnessed a Grammy Awards show or anything dealing
with TV and movies awards until you've also received
Ken's viewpoint. If those people had any sense, they
would reprint Ken's commentaries and distribute the
book at the ceremonies. Of course, he'd more than
likely garner a few lawsuits. But people might then
actually watch the show rather than talking. Here's
something from the wit of Bill Mouzis, known to one
and all as a sterling radio engineer of KHJ in Los
Angeles; Bill Mouzis, BMouzis@aol.com,
"My first
exposure to radio in these pre-TV and computer times
came in the late 1920's when I was 8 years old. Today
I vaguely recall listening to one of the very first
crystal type cat whiskers radios in existance. Because
of the bad reception and static the signal would fade
in and out mercilessly while I was attempting to
listen to the Max Schmeling-Young Stribling boxing
match from Madison Square Garden in New York.
Schmeling knocked out Stribling and earned the right
to fight Jack Sharkey for the heavyweight boxing
championship in 1930, which he won. Stribling died
shortly thereafter from a motorcycle accident. To me
it was incredible that with this strange looking
gadget I was able to hear something in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, that was happening in New York. I was
awe-stricken and wonderfully confused. A few years
later radios became the center piece of the living
room as I recall listening to the Joe Louis-Max
Schmeling, Henry Armstrong-Barney Ross fights on a
beautiful console radio in the mid-30's."
I should add that I think Ken also worked at KHJ for a
while. Under the name of Beaver Cleaver. Under his
real name, you'll find him writing and directing TV
shows. Whups! Guess I shouldn't have mentioned that
thing about lawsuits, huh.
POLITICS
One of the greatest tragedies of radio in the past two
decades is not a so-called disc jockey who makes a
living from verbal trash, although I personally
consider him rather abominable and unfit for the
medium. His only argument for existence on radio, in
my opinion, is that he appeals to sick minds. The
Federal Communications Commission, currently a fallow
sham, has now, suddenly, decided to clean up the
morals of radio stations when, in reality, they
promoted everything foul on the air these days by
letting the trash not only exist, but prosper for
years.
The worse tragedy, however, was when several radio
stations, especially in the country music genre,
decided to dump the records of the Dixie Chicks and
then defiled them personally with record burnings. I
recall one radio station even tried to hurt their
attendance at a local concert. This act was
despicable!
The whole action against the Dixie Chicks spoke to me
of the worse of the Nazis. It was, frankly, unworthy
of radio. I am ashamed of those radio stations who
put down the Dixie Chicks.
I also lament the fact that the Federal Communications
Commission did nothing to support the Constitution of
the United States during this period. I also lament
the fact that few other radio stations stood up to
defend the right of freedom of speech for the Dixie
Chicks. But more than the radio stations, I blame the
FCC.
Frankly, I sometimes believe that the commissioners of
the FCC ought to refund their salaries and retreat to
the boondocks. Janet Jackson? Foo. A gross
stunt.
But did you see those commercials during the Super
Bowl? Despicable! Most of them. Someone on
Madison
Avenue ought to be ashamed. And, as I said: to the
pigsty with the commissioners of the FCC and
especially Powell.
About "Xtreme"
The novel "Xtreme," a music-industry novel that
begins
on my website in about three or four weeks, is
fictional. The major characters of the novel are not
intended to resemble anyone currently alive or dead in
the music business with the exception of, perhaps, the
leading character and, as Gustave Flaubert stated
about Madame Bovery, "C'est moi."
If you read the novel, I hope you read the weekly
chapters with a sense of fun and that very few people
exclaim "Good lord almighty!" for the incident
probably in question probably didn't happen and if it
happened, probably happened just a dab differently.
If I chickenout, you can scratch the above two
paragraphs and I'll probably start a western or
something a bit more tame. I have a science fiction
novel you might like. However, at the moment, I'm
thinking fairly seriously about the music novel.
Probably.
Claude Hall
e-mail claude@claudehallonline.com
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