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"Xtreme"
Chapter Seventeen of a novel
by Claude Hall
She was surprised and even more confused the next morning when she found
Bill Ferguson almost half asleep under the steering wheel of the dark
car in the parking lot. His collar was unbuttoned and his hair was
mussed as usual and he stared at her in surprise while trying to keep
his eyes from closing. No, not surprise. In disappointment at being
discovered. Had he been guarding her?
Before talking off on her daily morning run, she had approached the car
to say hello to the guy who claimed it was his job to follow her. The
windows of the car were a dark gray in color as were many cars
throughout the west because of the blazing sunshine. It was difficult
to see inside. The driver's window, however, was open and Bill
Ferguson, head leaning almost out the window, was startled when she
reached inside and honked the horn as long and as loud as she could.
"What are you doing here?" she demanded.
He took a deep breath, shook his head to clear some of the sleep from
his brain, sat up straight, sheepish little smile on his face.
"Evidently, sleeping," he said.
"That's definitely not a sufficient answer," she said. She reached
inside and honked the car horn again, accidentally hitting him in the
face.
He grabbed for his ears, covering them with his hands.
Just then his nose started to bleed.
"Enough!" he shouted. "I give up."
He grabbed a handkerchief out of his hip pocket, having to wriggle to
reach it, and placed it over his noise.
"Well?"
He might give up. Not her! She glared at him, waiting for an answer.
"The guy you beat up the other day is a friend of mine," he explained
quickly. "He said that it didn't matter if your life was in danger, he
wasn't going to perform guard duty anymore. Anyway, he thought that if
someone tried to attack you, they'd more than likely end up in the
hospital."
"He had that right!" said Susan. "How's your nose?"
He cautiously took the handkerchief away, breathing quickly through his
nose to coagulate the blood.
"That's one of the things I don't like about you," he said. "I'm
beginning to realize that you don't need an awful lot of help. A man
needs to think he's of some use. The traditional sort of thing. You
know, defending his woman."
"I'm nobody's woman, as you say. And being able to defend yourself is
not a horrendous character flaw," she said.
"No, of course not. It's just that, well, most women would have some
kind of problem."
"I'm not most women," she insisted.
"Okay. Okay. I'll accept the point," he said. He folded his
handkerchief and placed it back in his hip pocket, having to wriggle
again. "Anyway, I've been sort of, well, helping out even if you didn't
actually need anyone helping out. Doesn't make much sense, does it?"
"When do you sleep, other than on duty?"
"I only need about four hours. That's enough."
"That is definitely not enough," she said. "What do you mean about my
life being in danger?"
"Somebody shoots at you, somebody is found dead in your office. Doesn't
that indicate someone is out to get you? Seems that way to me."
"No. It's more like someone is trying to scare me off," she said. "The
shots missed. And the Mojo Man probably needed killing, so someone was
merely doing the world a favor."
"Now, that's another thing against you. I don't care if he was a
creep," Bill said, "a human being is a human being and deserves the
right to live as long as possible."
That grandiose statement gave her a chance to find out something more
about this man who insisted on being a mysterious stranger. Feelings,
emotions often gave away more about a person than the way they dressed
or combed their hair...or in his particular case, the way they didn't
comb their hair.
"Not trash," she said. "Trash deserves what they get."
She waited anxiously to see his reaction to such a brash and unruly
statement. His eyes widened slightly. He ran a hand through his hair,
which didn't help it one mite.
"I can see that you and I are not going to agree on a whole lot of
things," he said after a moment. "I wouldn't be a bit surprised if
you're also a democrat."
Again, she attempted to needle him. You can discover an awful lot about
a person needling them. They sometimes give themselves away. The real
person comes out.
"A liberal democrat," she said. "A very liberal democrat. In fact,
ultra liberal."
"Lord! My mother is going to have fits!"
"Good!" said Susan, which she realized was a rather dull answer. But
maybe she'd just learned too much, suddenly, about Bill Ferguson. First
and foremost, there was the strong possibility that his mother was
behind everything. The impromptu lunches, the sudden kiss, the trip to
Knottsberry Farm, even the proposal of marriage yesterday down on Santa
Monica Beach! That grayhaired lady must want grand children in the
worse way!
So, just like countless times before, she ran away. This time down a
long sidewalk amidst palms, gentle breezes thrown past her face,
somewhere in the distance the sound of Paul Anka singing his own version
of "My Way." She heard the song quite clearly because, suddenly, she
was overwhelmed with an idea and it froze her. She'd run maybe six
blocks just as hard as she could run. Now, she stood still, hearing all
of the noises of an early-morning city slowly coming to life, hearing
her own hard breathing. Now, she knew.
Momma's boy. His mother had told him to get married and probably even
selected the victim that evening Susan first visited the Mind's Eye
bookstore!
The thought so amused her that she laughed out loud. Another jogger
broke stride, looked over his shoulder, continued on north.
With a wide grin, Susan started running again, this time not so fast nor
so furious. By the time she'd racked up her usual six miles, she had
returned to the apartment. The dark car was gone.
To tell the truth, she missed it.
The assailant tried to hit her on the head as she entered her apartment,
but years of HCX training caused her to react instinctively, even though
she never actually saw the person in the gloom. The blow hit her only
on the right shoulder, numbing that entire arm.
She grabbed at whatever she could find with her good hand. Her hand
fastened on a jacket of some kind and she immediately felt to the floor,
jerking the assailant off balance. She landed on her back, one foot
jamming into the assailant's midriff, and pulled down hard at the same
time, taking advantage of the person's own impetus. The assailant flew
over her head and hit the far wall with a distinct thud.
Still winded from her morning's run, she climbed to her feet and turned
on the lights. She didn't recognize the person. She did recognize the
sap, a leather thong with a little pouch full of sand. Handmade. Used
correctly, the assailant could have cracked her skull. Quietly.
Efficiently.
She went to the door of her apartment, then realized there was no dark
car out in the parking lot anymore. She went back inside her apartment
and discovered that the telephone was dead.
A moment later, she also discovered that the assailant had no
identification on him. No billfold. Nothing. Not even a ballpoint pen
in his pockets. No gun either, which sort of disappointed her because a
guy with a gun would have told her a lot about the man. He was still
out cold. No sense letting him run loose, not daddy's little girl, she
thought, so she found some duct tape and covered up his mouth and bound
his hands and feet. Just for good measure, she then bound his head to a
chair in the kitchen. By the neck. If he tried to move, he would be
awfully uncomfortable. He came to as she was finishing up binding his
ankles, one to each rung of the chair. He tried to say something, but
the tape over his mouth prevented any words from escaping. After he
tried to squirm out of the tape, he gave up on that, too, and just
stared curiously at her, very still, a lot of questions in his eyes.
"Be grateful," Susan told him. "I could have killed you, you know.
Real easy, by the way."
He only blinked his eyes in response to her statement. He didn't
believed her. So, she took out one of the K-Bar knives and carefully
cleaned her fingernails while singing an old song written by Stu Hamblen
that she thought was titled "Out on Those Texas Plains." She couldn't
sing the lyrics very well, but that was okay because she didn't know the
entire song and filled in missing words with humming.
The guy in the chair began to squirm. That was the problem with her
singing; they always squirmed. By the time she finished all of the song
that she was going to sing, he was quite furious with his squirming, but
not too much good. Duct tape sure comes in handy sometimes. She also
kept a roll in her MG.
She placed the knife back in its scabbard and went down to the manager's
office and phoned the police.
It turned out that the police didn't know anything about the dark car or
a Bill Ferguson. Nor the man who'd just tried to debrain her with an
old-fashion sap. The detective took notes, but he didn't bother to
write down much. It was difficult to explain why the man had attacked
her.
She also found it difficult to explain about "her dark car" and Bill
Ferguson.
"This Ferguson guy has been following you?"
"Yes. And taking me to lunch. Even Knottsberry Farm."
The detective pointed with a ballpoint pen at the man bound in the
kitchen chair.
"Who's this guy here? Another boyfriend?"
Susan turned and stared at him, her injured arm hanging at her side,
throbbing, her other hand on her hip.
The detective didn't really seem to be interested in this particular
case. Probably a pretty dull incident to everyone concerned except
herself and the guy taped to the chair. She wondered if a possible rape
would have perked up the detective's interest just a bit. Well, this
was one lady who wasn't willing to oblige!
"He's not very pleasant looking," she pointed out. "Should I take that
last remark of yours as an insult?"
"No, maam," he said quickly. He suddenly became a little more alert.
"I don't know him," she said. "And I couldn't find any identification
on him."
"You looked?" He was even more interested now.
"I'm rather curious for some reason about the people who attack me," she
said.
"A burglar?" he suggested.
"How absurd," she told the detective. "Because he was waiting for me
when I got here. Behind the door."
"What was he after then?"
The look in his eyes suggested the strong possibility that the guy
certainly would have had no interest in rape.
"Now that's a dumb question," she said. "I sort of perceived, however,
that he was trying to kill me, if that's of interest to you."
Finally, she told him about the murder at Songdust News and the name of
the detective who'd investigated, Raul Cardenas, Los Angeles Police
Department.
At that point, the detective was very alert and very interested. He
made an attempt to use her apartment phone, gave up, left quickly to use
his car radio.
"How are we going to get him loose from the chair?" a policeman in
uniform asked. "That stuff is very sticky and hard to pull loose."
"Just a minute," she said. She got the K-Bar knife out of the drawer in
her bedside stand and came back into the living room and neatly sliced
the duct tape from around the man's head and his ankles, freeing him
from the kitchen chair.
"Good lord!" said the policemen very softly. He stared at the knife.
"Can you imagine," Susan said brightly, "our friend here thought I might
use this on him for a moment. Of course, my hand might have accidentally
slipped. Could happen, you know."
"I'm beginning to believe that this burglar or whatever he is may be
very lucky that he's still alive."
"True," said Susan. "Very true."
She patted the "burglar" on the cheek as they took him away, now also
draped in handcuffs. The policeman also mentioned something about the
man's rights as if he had all of the rights and she had none.
The detective returned.
"Nothing on this Bill Ferguson," he said. "But Detective Raul Cardenas
says he'd like to talk with you and will phone you at your office
later. I would like to also apologize. Didn't know who you were."
When they left, Susan took a long hot bath, overdoing the
lavender-scented bubble bath because she needed it and she thought she
deserved it. Her arm was a little better now. Still sore. She dressed
slowly in a pair of slacks, a white blouse, a wine-colored jacket with
sleeves that she'd purchased years ago on a trip to Mexico, and a funny
little hat and boots. When she glanced into the mirror, she thought the
person framed there was about to step out into the center of a bullring
in Nogales. Well, bring on the bulls because she had her special-make
pistol tucked into an inside pocket in the jacket. And a rather handy
K-Bar knife in her purse. She took her time driving over the mountain.
Her arm hurt, but she could still handle the driving okay.
So, she was quite late reaching her office. Detective Raul Cardenas was
waiting. He sat in one of the two extra chairs in the office. Both
were uncomfortable. She could tell that he'd been sitting there long
enough to know about the chairs.
"Hit man," he said, rising to his feet. "From Detroit. A guy named
James Jones."
"Not likely," Susan said. "Hitmen use .22 caliber pistols. Target
pistols, in fact, with beautiful engraving along the barrel and the
barrels are longer."
Cardenas shook his head.
"Real hit men use high-powered rifles with scopes. Girls use .22
caliber pistols," Cardenas said. "This hit man probably wanted to make
it look like an accident, I suspect. You slipped and fell in your
apartment. Happens all of the time."
"Just for the record," Susan said. "I never slip and fall."
Cardenas just sighed, refusing to look her in the eyes. He didn't know
whether to believe her or not, even on such a simple claim as this.
Some people are not always what they seem to be. He'd known this for
many years, but still old prejudices crept into his thinking now and
then. To him, she was just a girl. A tiny thing that needed someone
around to open the door and step aside gracious with a tip of his hat
and a smile when she said thank you.
"We never found his car, so he evidently parked it a good distance off
or had an accomplice who drove him to your apartment and intended to
pick him up. In any case, he's a pretty vicious guy, to my way of
thinking. But clean. He said he was at your apartment because someone
called for a handy man. Said he was going to put in a new faucet as
soon as he found out what kind was needed. Then he was startled by an
intruder and had to protect himself."
"Almost sounds believable," Susan said.
"But all that doesn't matter," the detective said, "because he had bail
inside of an hour. Cash. Which means he's probably leaving for an
all-expenses-paid vacation in Brazil. And there's nothing I can do
legally about it."
"What! Well, I hope you put a tail on him."
"Naturally," said Cardenas. "He stopped at a pay phone and made one
phone call. No way to tell just who he phoned. He's now at a motel on
Wilshire Boulevard. Packing, I presume."
Leaving? Before she'd talked with him seriously? Obviously, she'd made
a mistake by telephoning the police too quickly. She should have had
some conversation with this James Jones first.
"You need to talk with me?" she asked the detective politely, trying to
smile as cutely as possible.
"Yes."
"Could it wait until this afternoon?"
"I suppose so," Cardenas said. "If necessary."
"I have an important appointment," she said.
She felt that he was suspicious about her "important appointment," but
realized that he couldn't prove otherwise.
He nodded.
"Okay," he finally said after thinking the matter over. "Maybe I'll
still be here when you get back. I'm going to talk to your editor and
your managing editor. There's something funny going on here."
"Not just funny," she said. "Hilarious."
She took her purse and saluted the detective rather smartly with her
good hand and left the office, leaving him sitting complacently in a
chair near the desk.
She had never seen a real hit man before. Not until now. She'd heard a
story about someone in New York City sending a hit man down to
Philadelphia to tap Carl Manson who operated a tipsheet and had printed
something someone didn't like. The record promotion person who'd told
her the story said he'd "pulled" the hit man off the train before he got
there. She couldn't remember why the hit man had been pulled off.
Personally, she didn't think Manson would have been much of a loss to
the music and radio industries.
Unfortunately, she had another problem when she got to her car. Bill
Ferguson was there, in slacks and a teeshirt and sneakers, once again
leaning against the fender of the low-slung British sports car.
She needed to get rid of him as quickly as possible, but she didn't
quite know how to do it. A lie, a simple fib, perhaps. In truth, it
was an appointment of sorts. That's what she would use.
"Slept yet?" she asked brightly, then thought what a dumb way that was
to open a conversation.
"Just a quick catnap," he said. "I'll sleep later. This morning, I
made a mistake in leaving you unprotected. Are you okay?"
"Banged up arm," she said. "It's okay. But how did you hear about it?"
"Rumor," he said.
"While this may be the most rumor-monger business in the world, I don't
believe that for an instant," she said.
"I hear lots of things," he insisted. "In fact, I heard something else
about the term trash and you."
"Bull!"
"True," he said. "No lie this time."
"Well, lie or not, like it or not, I've got some work to do. Please let
me into my car."
"Sure," he said. He opened the car door and then ran around and got
into the passenger seat before she could even start the engine.
"I thought we'd established the fact that I could defend myself. That I
certainly don't need any help from a momma's boy. Out!"
If she'd thought that the term "momma's boy" would offend him, she was
wrong. At least, he showed no emotion. Most men would have thrown a
hissy at a statement like that. Most men in Texas.
"No way," he said. "I'm glue. I'm your alternate ego. Your shadow.
Until we--I mean, you, of course--find out what's going on, where you
go, I go."
"Look, I don't care what you do, I'm not going to marry you. You're not
my type."
"I'm precisely your type," he insisted.
"I don't care what your mother says," she said.
"Neither do I," he said.
She was exasperated. And in a hurry. How could she get rid of him!
"I don't need you around just now," she said quietly and quite firmly,
"and I'm in a hurry. Please get out."
He fastened his seatbelt and crossed his arms and squared his chin and
stared directly ahead as if he hadn't heard her.
"Oh, hell!" she said and started the engine of he MG. The car roared
down the indoor ramp to the street and she didn't stop as much as
hesitate briefly before whirling out onto Sunset Boulevard heading
west. She had to stop for the traffic light at Doheny.
"Where are we going, may I ask?" Bill said.
"Doesn't matter. You aren't going to like it," she shouted, already
blasting out as soon as the traffic light turned green. "And if you
have any smarts at all, you'll get out right now!"
But he merely shook his head no.
This hour of the day in this part of Los Angeles, the streets were not
crowded although neither were they empty. But the MG is an astonishing
car when it comes to diving in and out amidst cars and taking sharp
turns. It goes where you steer it and with twin-barrel carbs it goes
there very fast. She dodged one Rolls and left the guy white-faced and
shouting obscenities.
"I wasn't all that close," she yelled at Bill.
"Yes, you were!"
The motel that Detective Cardenas had mentioned wasn't more than two
miles away. It stood, remnant and almost a castoff from a different
year, on the edge of Gucci paradise where you could buy a dress for a
few thousand dollars up and the store clerk might still think you were a
cheapskate. Beverly Hills rubbed elbows with Westwood, known far and
wide as the home of the UCLA basketball team and not much else and
sometimes not even that.
She arrived at the motel fairly quickly and pulled up in front of a row
of rooms that opened onto a narrow parking area. Her hit man was just
closing the door to his room behind him and he saw her and, without
question, recognized her. In one hand, he carried a small suitcase.
The kind of suitcase you pack for a quick overnight trip. His other
hand was reaching under his jacket when Bill hit him with a right cross
on the chin.
"How did you get out of the car so fast?" Susan said.
"Track star," he said.
"I thought it was football."
"Track," he insisted. "Your basic momma's boy doesn't like getting hurt
and that, without question, includes me. I also boxed a little. Not
much, though. You can get hurt boxing, too."
"You boxed enough, evidently," she said.
"Then, I take it you're impressed."
"Not in the slightest," she said. "That creep there probably never
worked out a day in his life other than at the craps table in Las
Vegas. And he was probably a sucker for a right cross anyway."
Her hit man was out cold. He had been reaching for a gun. It was
tucked in a shoulder holster under his jacket.
She was reaching for the man's billfold when Bill stepped in front of
her and relieved the man of his weapon, taking it out gently with his
handkerchief.
"Just in case. I wonder if he has a permit for this?" He looked at the
gun closely.
"Who cares?" demanded Susan.
Bill stared at her for a moment, but his eyes revealed nothing. "Good
point," he said. "But perhaps we should phone the police."
"The police just let him go on bail," Susan said. "This sucker is
fixing to blow town."
"Ah, and you don't want that to happen." It was a statement, not a
question.
"He's my bait," she said.
"Bait for what?"
She stepped around him and reached down and took out the hit man's
billfold. It was stuffed with bills. A considerable number were $100
bills. She took out all of the money except for $10 and put it in her
own purse. Then she took all of his identification, looked at it, and
put it also in her purse.
"He's a James Jones, all right," she said. "You probably meet a lot of
them in his line of work."
"And now almost penniless because of a certain thief who stole his
money."
"He won't need it. He's probably going to be very dead very soon."
"I won't let you kill him," Bill said very sternly.
"Not me," she said. "Them."
"Them who?"
"The them," she replied.
She looked in the small suitcase and found tickets for a flight to San
Diego. As Detective Cardenas had theorized, James Jones had a vacation
in mind. Pity that he wasn't going to get there. Maybe not ever, but
certainly not soon in any case. She placed the suitcase behind the seat
in her MG, dug out the duct tape and began wrapping the man's hands and
feet. She also placed a strip over his mouth.
Bill watched while all of this was taking place.
He seemed quite astonished, she noticed. But that was daddy's little
girl, quite astonishing. Of course, daddy might not have been too
pleased with what she was doing at the moment. Uncle Charles, though,
would have laughed his head off.
"Grab his shoulders and help me place him in the car," she said.
"What for?" Bill said.
He still wasn't quite sure that she didn't intend to kill this
particular James Jones.
"Move!" she said loudly.
Well, she thought, at least he follows orders pretty good. Because he
helped lift James Jones.
The hit man was unceremoniously dumped into the space behind the seats.
There wasn't a whole lot of room. His head showed. But she theorized
that this was, after all, Los Angeles and a lot of crazy things were
going on all of the time and more than likely few people would notice
and those that did would merely shake their heads and say "tsk, tsk."
When you got right down to it, Los Angeles was just another tsk, tsk
town.
"What did you do with the gun?" she asked.
"I'm keeping it," Bill said, climbing into the passenger seat again.
"Silly. I have my own gun if I wanted to shoot him."
"I'm keeping the gun anyway."
"Well, our friend here certainly won't need it where he's going," she
said.
"You're not going to dump him in the river, either," Bill said.
"None around. Not unless it rains. And you know the song, it never
rains in Southern California. Anyway, the so-called rivers around here
are all made of concrete and they're absolute no fun when it comes to
dumping refuse. I know a better place."
She drove leisurely over to UCLA and through the campus and came out on
Sunset not far from the pillared entrance to Bel Air.
This was all spur-of-the-moment stuff. She'd just thought of it.
However, the impromptu methodology is sometimes the best because the
brain's subconscious often knows what you're doing when you don't know
yourself.
Bel Air is actually two different areas. You have the lower part around
Bellagio filled to the brim with a country club and very expensive
estates flocking around it like birds feeding. You meander through all
of this, mouth gaping, eyes bulging, very impressed until you come out
on Roscomare Boulevard and the homes here are still extremely impressive
although by now you've closed your mouth. Bob Belser had a home in the
lower section and the home had a gate. She parked by the gate and,
again under orders, Bill helped her fetch James Jones from behind the
seat. He draped him over his shoulder and carried him to the gate.
Here, Susan proceeded to tape the sitting form to the gate. No one
would go in or out without noticing the body, now awake and squirming,
of one James Jones.
"You're very lucky, Mr. Jones, that I'm having a good hair day. Because
you're still alive. Say hello to Bob for me, will you?"
"Bob who lives here?" Bill wanted to know.
"You don't know him and you don't want to know him," Susan assured
Bill. "Come along. Back in the car. Where would you like to have
lunch? I know a great deli with great matzo ball soup and I'm sort of
hungry."
"You should be, because I've had a rather hectic morning and I would
surmise that your morning has been even more so."
"More so the merrier," she said, which, of course, didn't mean anything
specifically and was rather silly to say, but now that she'd given Mr.
Bob Belser a notice, if you will, that he wasn't messing with just
another floozy, whatever a floozy was, she did, indeed, feel a little
giddy.
She drove without haste back to the gate to Bel Air which, of course,
isn't really a gate, but a fancy entrance to a very fancy place to
live. The deli was in Westwood just on the outskirts of the UCLA
campus. And the matzo ball soup was superb.
"Just what did we do?" asked Bill. "If I've committed a crime, I would
like to know about it."
"Nothing to get concerned about because James Jones back there doesn't
know you. He only knows me. And I sincerely doubt that he'll file
kidnapping charges, if he survives."
"He won't die. Someone will come along and notice him," Bill said.
"Sure. Especially the people who live there," Susan said.
"I noticed the address. It's a simple matter to find how who lives
there. Bob who and why who?"
"I've been trying to get an appointment with the record guy who lives in
that rich boy's dump. I believe he knows the topic of discussion and is
avoiding me strictly because of that. Once he discovers my calling
card, one James Jones from Detroit, I'm sure he'll call and say, hey,
fellow, good to hear from you...why don't you come over for afternoon
tea. And, viola, I will get to see that sucker and give him a piece of
my mine."
"In other words, you think he hired the hit man?"
"Hey, you're somewhat smarter than the average Harvard grad."
"You've met a lot of Harvard grads?"
"Enough," she said.
"One, I suspect. That's all. And that's me."
"One may have been from Yale," she said.
"I would still like to know what's going on," Bill said. "While I will
confess to being a momma's boy in many ways, not all momma's boys are,
well, sissies as I think you'd say."
"Back off. Let the police handle it," she suggested.
"Definitely," he said. "Good advice. Good soup."
"Told you."
He laughed.
"So, you knew about the football," he said.
"Track, you said."
"That, too. It seems to me that this does indicate some interest on
your part."
"Not even slightly," she said.
"Ah, you do lie after all. I can tell by your eyes." He laughed again,
but this time was a little more subdued about it.
"Not even slightly, I said," she said with as much sternness as she
could muster.
"Well, well," he said and burst out laughing again.
(continued next week)
e-mail claude@claudehallonline.com
|
June 28, 2004
Commentary
by
Claude Hall
John Quincy, aka Ted Tatman,
jq@johnquincy.net, wrote:
"I work for WTMA in Charleston, SC. Tomorrow I'm hosting a WTMA
reunion show of 1960s WTMA DJs and I'm trying to track down
George Wilson, former WTMA DJ and PD. Rollye Cornell suggested
that you might know. Like many great AM Top 40 stations of the
past, WTMA is a now a News-Talk operation. However, I've put
together a website that commemorates WTMA's rich history. (This
month we're celebrating its 65th anniversary.) Feel free to
check it out at
www.wtmamemories.com. Thanks so much."
I sent John's email on to George. Sorry I
received this message so late, John. My computer is growing a
bit long in the tooth, as the old cliche goes. Yahoo Mail just
upgraded and now I can't tap into my Yahoo mail at all. Lou
Dorren, an old friend, suggested I download a Mozilla program,
but it appears that you need Mac Operating System X for it, too,
and this unit won't take OSX. I have become (and I'm not sure I
appreciate the fact) a victim of technology. This Power Mac
6500 was presented to me by Harry O'Connor in exchange for some
work. But that was about a dozen years ago.
Re: Charleston. Don't know if it still exists
or not, but in the 60s I rented a travel trailer in Charleston
and had them pull it out to a campsite on the Isle of Palms.
Then Barbara and I with the two kids (John and Darryl were quite
small) drove down from New York City and spent a few days
walking on the beach, picking up sand dollars, resting. It was
a beautiful place then. Probably condos now. Come to think of
it, the whole world is condos now.
Heard from Lou Dorren,
xytar@yahoo.com, this past
week. He has made a deal with actor Ronnie Cox ("Stargate-1"
plus movies, etc.) to serve as spokesperson for the Xytar
recording system. Ronnie, a country music artist, is going to
record his next CD on a Xytar. I think Lou is also getting
close to moving his unique audio system, something different,
into movie theaters.
Also heard from Joey Reynolds, WOR, New York,
G1boney@aol.com. Guess
Joey and I are getting old. We talked mostly about our
children. Come to think of it, last time Bobby Vee called, we
also talked about our children.
Jim Rose,
rosekkkj@earthlink.net:
"Your mention of cattle running through the streets of San
Antonio, sure reminds me of Ole San Antone! I moved from Dallas
in 1968, where all streets are simple to navigate. One time in
particular in San Antonio, I absolutely could not drive straight
to this exact place I wanted to go. Nearly drove me up the wall!
I could see where it was, but to get there, had to almost go in
the opposite direction, circle around and come back from the
other side. Returning in 1972, was hit with assignments all over
Bexar County by KITE's News Director! That's when I first began
never leaving home without my map! All this to say that an old
timer and I were discussing my dismay with San Antonio's
streets. He began to tell me the story of how the streets of San
Antonio were first laid out. 'Originally, there was only the
Alamo. Usually, it was full of cattle. When the decision was
made to put down streets, the cattle were turned loose from the
Alamo!
Some day, Jim, meander through downtown
Brownwood. I was once told how those streets were laid out, but
I'm not going to repeat it here.
Just FYI, I sent Jim's note to Harry O'Connor,
hairo@webtv.net, who now
lives in Austin, TX, and got back this response: "Jim's version
of how San Antonio streets were laid out is a bunch of hogwash!
The truth is, they were laid out by a drunken Mexican on a blind
mule. Which explains why north and south St. Marys streets run
east and west for the most part. Still loving Austin. Best to
Barbara."
Ah, Harry! You stole my story! Only in
Brownwood, it was a drunken Indian. And you know what's funny?
I've never seen a drunken Indian or a drunken Mexican that I can
recall. Seen an awful lot of drunken gringos, though.
Hal Smith,
hal-smith@sbcglobal.net:
"Just wanted to let you know how much I enjoy reading your
column. I especially enjoyed 'They Went Thataway'."
Hal, I sent your note on to Jonathan Fricke,
studio2812@msn.com.
He'll get a kick out of it. The article was first printed in
his magazine Tune In back in the early 80s.
Thinking about Jonathan reminded me. When the movie "Gone in
Sixty Seconds" was remade, Jonathan remarked that he appeared in
the first version. Got paid a bicycle. He wasn't in the
remake. But that started me to thinking about Ron Fraiser, who
appeared with wife and child in "Encounters of the Third Kind"
which was being filmed down in Alabama or somewhere in that
southern area where Ron was then programming a radio station.
Just wonder how Ron is doing these days. Anyone know? Anyway,
a lot of disc jockies used to get into movies. M.G. Kelly.
Charlie Tuna. Kelly wasn't bad in that Dirty Harry movie. Not
as good as Clint Eastwood, of course. Some deejays even became
actors. Guess that whole syndrome is now a thing of the past.
The reach of the website continues to astonish
me. Scott Gortikov,
Scott@Gortikov.com: "I just read your reference to Stan
Gortikov in your on-line novel and was interested how you came
to know my father's name in connection with the record
industry?"
There were several record men virtually everyone
liked. Mike Maitland, Stan Gortikov, Joe Smith, Bill Gallagher,
Steve Sholes and quite a few others had a definite charisma.
Juggy Gales. Don Graham. Ernie Farrell, though Ernie sometimes
rubbed people the wrong way. Still, Ernie was a phenomenal
character and extremely a major player in the music business at
one point. It's a pity that a definitive book will more than
likely never be written about the real music industry. Mostly
because all of the people who could write it are dying off.
There are people writing stuff, of course, but most of it is ego
prone, including what I write. This is not a negative
necessarily because, as Burt Sherwood recently commented in this
column, "We were there." Maybe some day far flung down the
years someone will put it all together. Just hope it makes
sense.
DuckiBuni@aol.com wrote: "Stumbled across your web site --
VERY INTERESTING!!! Look forward to reading all your
installments, bit by bit, in the future. Since you seem to be a
great admirer of William M. Randle Jr., thought you might want
to know that, as of last week at least, he's in the hospital.
Know no details, other than he was also having health problems
around mid-2003. Get well cards, etc., can be sent to him in
care of the Cleveland station for which he was last working.
The address is: WRMR, 26501 Renaissance Parkway, Cleveland,
Ohio, 44128-5761. Thanks."
I immediately wrote Bill Randle a personal
letter. If you know Bill--or know of him--it would be great for
you to do the same. My wife Barbara and I wrote about Bill in
"This Business of Radio Programming," a book currently in
reprint by Dan O'Day,
danoday@danoday.com. Ah, but you should hear the stories we
didn't tell! Once, in casual conversation, Bill mentioned to me
that he had intended to become the world's most deadly weapon.
I don't know if he ever did or not, but it wouldn't surprise
me. I saw a videotape once of him playing with rattlesnakes
during the Okeene annual derby. Anyway, three or four years ago
I wrote a novel called "Snake and the Spider Lady" which I'm
thinking about running on this website as soon as "Xtreme" is
done.
Andrew Davis,
uamdtel@yahoo.com: "I enjoyed the anicdote about Corky
Mayberry. Corky is a friend of mine and is living in Amarillo,
TX. I will pass along the memory you shared on your website, I'm
sure he will appreciate it."
WAR
There are those for war. Most of these were never in war. War
is blood dripping, leg missing, flies. A smell so foul you find
it difficult to keep from vomiting. A heat so hard you can't
breath or a bone cold when everything hurts, including your
teeth. Dust. Rain that never stops. You sleep wet. If you
can sleep at all. What really bothers you most, however, is the
crying. Babies crying, old women weeping, your buddy crying
because of the dead or because he, too, is dying. Death comes
young. Before the wonders of life, even the miseries of life.
You die and your last thought is why?
There are those who think we can win this war when we cannot.
The reasons are clear. No war in the history of human kind has
ever been really and completely won, just as no war has ever
been really and completely justified. There are only two valid
human relationships--compromise and genocide. The woe of
genocide is that it depletes the gene pool and leaves a black
stink in the universe. We have yet to formulate a concept of
the purpose of this gene pool. It is the work of nature or a
supreme being. Or both. But if man exists, the logical
assumption is that there is more than likely a reason. The
complete eradication of a population depletes the gene pool just
as any single death depletes this wonderous machine that guides
what we are and, more importantly, what we may become. Thus,
the death of a single human being alters generations. The more
deaths, the greater the potential alterations. I have come to
believe that these potential laterations are more harmful than
good. Regardless.
There are those who claim Bush (I refuse him the title of
president because he was not elected and he certainly hasn't
earned any title) attacked Iraq for oil. He actually had no
reason for the war in Iraq, imagined or otherwise; he attacked
blindly. His ultimate purpose, perhaps, was to enslave a
nation. Perhaps the entire middle east. Even if this was not
his reason, the effect was essentially the same. We have faced
the consequences of slavery here in the United States and the
act of slavery was not only despicable, but we, as a nation, are
still paying the wages for this tragic mistake. Mankind does
not and never has taken gently to being enslaved. I would not.
They will not. And, quite frankly, I doubt that anyone ever
will. It is contrary to human nature.
If you tried to make a slave of me, I would fight in any way,
shape, or form to keep my freedom. My ideals and my ideas are
precious to me. I have to assume that various citizens of
Iraq--in fact, various citizens of the entire middle east--will
do the same. Thus, I can also assume they will not quit; The
Saxons did not quit, the Gauls did not quit, the people of
Stalingrad did not quit. At this time in the middle east--and
increasingly elsewhere--Americans and those who even talk to
Americans cannot afford to turn their backs. Death lurks in the
shadows of the alleys and in the dark of night. The
passion--and it appears to be spreading around the world--to
kill Americans and all associated with Americans has to be
blamed on Bush. Instead of seeking the perpetrators of 9/11, he
attacked a nation without cause. This--rightly so--created a
worldwide nervous tension that will be extremely difficult to
abate or rectify. Killing is not the answer.
Is there a solution? Well, you can always leave like we did in
Korean and Vietnam and say that we won when we did not. But if
you do this, then you must close up shop completely and build a
wall around America that keeps "us" in and "them" out. Forever
and ever. Which, of course, violates the concept of proper gene
pool stewardship. Anyway, Barbara and I have a cruise scheduled
and so this idea does not particularly appeal to me. And I love
Mexico and would go back down there for another visit if I
could. Canada. Alaska. We have at least Canada on our agenda.
Or you can live with the current situation just as depicted in
the movie "Brasil." I don't necessarily appreciate this
solution either. People who hate you do not, as a rule, grow
tired of hating you. Nor bored with killing you.
Or you can desperately seek the peace. Not with guns and tanks
and helicopter gunships, but with an open hand and the
question: "What do you want?" And then, "Let's make a deal."
In my opinion, unless we compromise, we all end up dead.
Eventually. Regardless.
On June 21, 2004, the same Supreme Court that inflicted us with
Bush ruled that you and I must give police, when asked, our
names. To refuse to do so warrants a jail sentence. Thus,
another individual right has been stolen away. That same day at
Mojave, CA, a private space craft rocketed into outer space.
The indication of extreme promise. Thus, on one hand I see the
potential glories of mankind. On the other, sadly, I find us
lacking with the essential ingredients that tend to make being
human worthwhile. What a great pity.
e-mail claude@claudehallonline.com
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