Radio Activity (The Rick Shannon series)

by Bill Fitzhugh

  As he stalked down the hallway to Clay’s office, Rick rehearsed a thundering sermon that opened with a litany of Stubblefield’s managerial shortcomings, moved on to threats of legal action, and ended with the promise to tear him a new asshole.

  When he got to Clay’s office and found it dark, a salesman in the next office said, “You just missed him. Probably headed for happy hour.” Rick made a beeline for the parking lot and caught Clay as he was getting into his car.

  “I just left the bookkeeper’s office,” Rick said, obviously agitated. “We have a problem.”

  Clay tossed his briefcase into the passenger seat then checked his watch and said. “Is it the kind that can wait?”

  “Not if you expect me to keep working here.”

  Clay propped an arm on the roof of his car and put his foot on the running board. “Hell, sounds pretty serious,” he said. “What’s up?”

  Rick was ready to let go with both barrels when he thought better of it. As he stood in the parking lot, it occurred to him that if he really wanted to stick it to Stubblefield, his best bet was to keep his job. He might be able to find out all he needed by following the leads on the tape, but you never knew when proximity, the ability to poke through files and computers, would come in handy. With that in mind he lightened up and said, “I, uh, hadn’t had time to read my employee manual, so I just found out I’m not gettin’ paid for two more weeks.”

  Clay’s head rocked back in a quick laugh and he slapped the top of the car. “Oh shit, that’s right. I hadn’t even thought of that. You need me to float you a loan, tide you over?” He stabbed a hand into his pocket and pulled out some folding money.

  “Well, you know, I was gonna squeeze by all right until somebody saw fit to bust the window out of my truck.”

  Clay reflexively thumbed the edge of his bills like it was a deck of cards and he was about to do a trick. “Oh yeah, heard about that,” he said with no evidence of real concern. “You think it’s somebody’s gonna come back?”

  “I doubt it, but it’s hard to say. That kinda shit just happens sometimes.”

  “‘Cause if it is, you might wanna park down the road somewhere and walk here since we ain’t exactly got secure parking.”

  “I might do that,” Rick said.

  “Hey, hey, hey.” Clay thumped his folded bills with a finger. “Just had a brainstorm that’ll put some cash in your pocket and help me out too, a regular win-win deal.” He peeled five twenties off his stack. “Got a little thing coming up next weekend and we need a DJ for the dance afterwards.” He held the hundred out toward Rick. “I can advance you this and pay you the rest, night of the show. A hundred tide you over?”

  “I’ll make it stretch.” Rick, playing bashful, reluctantly took the cash and said, “‘Preciate it.” He pushed the bills into his front pocket. “Been a while since I emceed a party. How long’s the gig?”

  “Just be a couple of hours,” Clay said. “And I already got the gear lined up, so you ain’t gotta worry about that.”

  “Who’s dancing? Kids? Adults?”

  “The Bob Seeger crowd,” Clay said. “Just get them old records off the shelf.” He rapped his knuckles on the roof of his car. “All right then, glad this worked out.”

  “Oh, by the way,” Rick said, gesturing at the building. “I forgot to ask while I was in there. You had a chance to talk to the bookkeeper yet, about adjusting my pay?”

  “You bet,” Clay said as he got into his car. “All taken care of. You can count on that. Tch.”

  24.

  Rick used a credit card to pay for the replacement windshield and gave J.C. fifty bucks to replenish his cigar box. He figured if he cooked his own meals instead of eating at Kitty’s every day he could hold out for two more weeks without a paycheck, maybe even lose a couple of pounds in the process.

  In lieu of being blind-sided by additional station policy, Rick took the time to read his employee handbook. Among other things, he found out that the company’s meager dental plan didn’t go into effect until he’d been employed at the station for six months, so it was a good thing his tooth had firmed up in his jaw on its own.

  Over the next few days Rick used his free time to look into various matters. It turned out that Mississippi had no state laws regulating private investigators, no license requirement or anything, though there was an association of PIs lobbying to change that. In the meanwhile he was free to hold himself out as a professional shamus.

  The issues surrounding the tape were more complicated. Poking around the Internet Rick found what looked like legitimate citations of Mississippi law regarding the interception and acquisition of the contents of wire, oral, or other communications with a mechanical or electronic device. Rick’s best interpretation was that it was illegal to record a conversation if none of the parties involved knew it was being taped. However if a person is a party to a communication, or has obtained consent from any one of the parties, no civil liability can be imposed unless the interception was accompanied by a criminal or tortious intent.

  Not that it mattered particularly, but Rick wondered if the law protected conversations about illegal activities, and if it did, why? He was pretty sure contract law didn’t apply to contracts for something illegal. But maybe his problem was in applying logic to legislative matters. Regardless, in his reading of the law, Rick was unable to ascertain if being in possession of an illegally recorded tape was a crime in and of itself. But he suspected that absent criminal or tortious intent, it wasn’t.

  It was a felony, however, for anyone who was not a law enforcement officer to disclose the contents of intercepted communications for any reason other than testifying under oath in a governmental or court proceeding, and the penalty for such disclosure can be up to five years imprisonment and up to a $10,000 fine. Rick wondered what constituted ‘disclosure of the contents’? Had he violated this already by telling Lisa Ramey what he had? He made a mental note to keep this in mind as he moved forward. As much as he wanted to yank Clay’s chain, he sure as hell didn’t consider it worth five years or ten thousand dollars.

  All this got Rick thinking again. It seemed obvious that Clay didn’t know he was being recorded; even someone as possum-brained as he was had better sense than to say such things knowingly on tape. The banker, on the other hand, hadn’t said anything incriminating. This meant either that he had nothing incriminating to say or that he had been careful not to say it, while at the same time he had encouraged Clay to dig a deeper and deeper hole for himself and for others. If the latter was true, it seemed to suggest once again that the banker might have been involved. Since he was a party to the conversation, it wouldn’t have been illegal for him to record it, unless he had criminal or tortious intent, which would be the case if he were the blackmailer.

  Of course blackmailers, by definition, aren’t particularly concerned with the law. That and several other points seemed to mitigate against the banker’s involvement; the tape starting in the middle of the conversation instead of the beginning; the tape being in Captain Jack’s possession, not the banker’s; and the fact that the banker came across as too much of a weak sister to be involved in a crime.

  Everything came back to Rick’s original theory. The problem was, he was no closer to proving it now than he was the day he found the tape.

  25.

  Rick looked on line but couldn’t find anything about the furniture store fire. He had visited the website for the local newspaper, The McRae Monitor, but there was no search engine for archives. He called the paper and the local library and was told by both that there was no index to back issues. Hoping to narrow his search, Rick asked if anyone recalled the fire. No one did.

  Rick thought back to the tape, hoping for a clue as to time frame. After casually mentioning that he thought the woman had set the place on fire, Clay had said, “I don’t know what in the hell’s . . . it’s some kinda damn hardware store looking thing in there now.” That helped a little. It meant the fire must have occ
urred at least a few months ago, time enough to rebuild and open a new business in the same space. Based on that, Rick decided he’d start looking at issues of the Monitor from three months ago and work backward from there, one issue at a time.

  But first he had to get to a staff meeting.

  Autumn was standing in the doorway to Rick’s office, dressed like she was on her way to Woodstock, bell-bottom jeans, tie-die T-shirt, and blue-tinted granny glasses. J.C. was sitting on the floor with a cowboy hat tilted down over his face. Rick had his feet propped on his desk. He said, “You sure it wasn’t Lester Bangs?”

  “Yep.” J.C.’s hat bobbed up and down.

  “And it wasn’t Greil Marcus or Christgau or somebody like that?”

  J.C. pushed the hat out of his eyes and said, “Bow up and listen! It was Roy Plomley in 1942 at the BBC. They still do the show, but with a different host. And it’s eight, not ten. It was never ten.”

  “I always heard ten,” Autumn said. “That’s how we always played it.”

  Rick glanced at the clock on the wall and wondered where Rob was.

  “Obviously, you can do it with any number,” J.C. said. “But the original was eight, so that’s what we’re doing. And no greatest hits or career retrospective box sets. That’s cheating.”

  “What about, like, Woodstock,” Autumn asked. “Is that one or three records?”

  “One,” J.C. said. “And not a very good one at that, except in terms of quantity of crowd noise.” He sat back and pointed at Rick. “So what’re your eight?”

  “I can’t do it with eight or ten,” Rick said. “There’s just no way.” He thought for a moment before he said, “What about doing it with artist catalogs instead of albums?”

  J. C. shook his head. “Why do it at all if you’re not going to do it right?” He threw up his hands. “All right, fine. Desert island catalogs. But only five, not eight.”

  “Here’s what I always wanted to know,” Autumn said. “If you’re on a deserted island, how are you supposed to play these?”

  J.C. ignored her and pointed at Rick. “Go.”

  “Okay. Five artists. Everything they recorded? Is this limited to--”

  “Not limited to anything.”

  “We gotta limit it to something,” Rick said with a mock whine. “How about pop-rock? ‘Cause if I can take jazz I’m not going to be able to do this. That’s just too much to choose from.”

  “Christ, it’s not supposed to be easy.” J.C. stood up, waving his hands. “Oh, just forget it. Where the hell’s Rob? Let’s get this show on the road.”

  “No,” Rick said. “Don’t be like that. How about this? What if we get a different island for different types of music? You got rock island, jazz island, reggae island, like that.”

  J.C. lifted his hat with one hand and rubbed his head with the other while saying, “How ‘bout we just forget I brought it up and you just call this dang staff meetin’ to order?” He put his hat back on and said, “I swear. You’re more irritating than those damn U.F.S. spots.”

  “No, hang on. I’m gonna do this,” Rick said. “If I was stuck on a desert island and I could have the catalogs of five pop-rock artists, I’d take Bob Dylan, Van Morrison, Paul Simon, Bruce Springsteen, and Steve--”

  “Oh, hey, Rob,” Autumn said. “We’re doing desert island discs.”

  “--Earle.”

  Rob stepped into the room like he was sorry he took up space. “Sorry, I’m late,” he said. He had the expression of a boy whose dog had just died. “Mr. Stubblefield stopped me on the way in. Said he had to let me go.”

  Simultaneously the others said, “Whhhhaat?”

  “I just wanted to say good bye.”

  “What’re you talking about?” Rick sat there, shaking his head. “That’s crazy.”

  Autumn knew how much Rob loved his job. The poor kid looked like he might start crying. She went over and put an arm around his shoulder. “What’d he say?”

  Rob twisted an angry look onto his face, trying to overcome his dejection, trying not to cry. “He said he couldn’t afford to pay me. I told him I’d go back to working for free but he said it was probably better if he let me go, so I could concentrate on school.” He shrugged like it was the sort of reasoning only adults could understand.

  “That rat bastard!” Rick was furious. He slammed a fist on his desk as he stood. “This is the same guy who told you to drop out of school so you could work for free. That’s how concerned he is about your education. This is bullshit, Rob, don’t worry about it. Stubblefield did this to get back at me for putting you on the payroll without consulting him.” He slammed his fist on the desk again. “Goddammit! Not only are you not fired. I’m giving you a raise.”

  26.

  Rick took his time with the meeting. He figured if he charged down to Stubblefield’s office before he cooled off he’d find himself directly behind Rob in the unemployment line. If this had happened on his first or second day on the job, he wouldn’t have hesitated but, as things were, he was too invested in his format. He had the feeling it was starting to work and he had to get at least one good ratings book before he could leave the station on an upward career trajectory. Plus he wanted to stay and be a thorn in Stubblefield’s side.

  Rick started the meeting with some cheerleading, complimenting everybody about something he’d heard them do, a good segue, a good set, a good improv on the station promos, whatever. He talked up the positive feedback he’d heard about from the sales staff, then he touched briefly on format issues. “New rule,” he said. “Let’s avoid anything over ten minutes between seven A and seven P,” he said. “There’s very little at that length that’s worth playing.”

  J.C. raised a hand and said, “Funeral for a friend / Love lies bleeding is eleven oh five.”

  “Thank heaven for small favors,” Rick said.

  “But I love playing that,” J.C. said.

  “Play it at home. It’s a cliché and it’s too long for the daypart.”

  “Oh, that’s right, and you want me playing Judy Collins and Buffy Sainte-Marie.”

  Rick shot him a glance. “That’s right, and I’m considering a Joan Baez hour so don’t push me. Now, between seven to ten at night, try to keep tracks under fifteen. After ten you can play Mountain Jam, Foreigner Suite, Thick As A Brick, or whatever you want. If there’s something you can edit for day play, fine, but let me hear it first.” He finished the meeting by selling the importance of the cash giveaway promotion that was ten days away. “Remember try to get people out to meet us. We want to connect to the community face-to-face, okay?” Everyone nodded. “All right. We’re sounding good,” Rick said in closing. “Keep it up.”

  As the jocks went their different ways, Rick stopped Rob and pointed toward the control room. “You’re going to be in that seat tomorrow morning, right?”

  Rob smiled and tried to act cool and grateful at the same time. He said, “Oh yeah, no problem, Mr. Shannon. If you say so.” He looked at the carpet, then at Rick and said, “Thanks.”

  27.

  Clay was going over some sales contracts when Rick walked in to his office and asked why he had fired Rob. For the first time since Rick had been at WAOR Clay dropped his aw-shucks-how-can-I-help-you routine and said, “Hell, you shouldn’ta gone behind my back and hired him in the first place. Bet you thought you were bein’ pretty cute with that little move, huh? Gettin’ outta doin’ mornin’s and givin’ me a jab at the same time.” Clay tossed the contracts into a file. “We gotta control costs, here. These’re budget considerations.” He made an angry gesture toward the studios. “That shift was pure profit, and then you go give the kid a damn salary.”

  “I’d hardly call minimum wage a salary. Besides, Rob does a good job, he never misses a shift, and he knows the music inside and out.”

  “That’s right, Professor. And he was doin’ all that without costing us a dime until you started givin’ away my money.”

  “You’re the one who made me the program d
irector,” Rick said. “And traditionally that’s who hires and fires air staff.”

  “Yeah, well, we got different traditions,” Clay said, jabbing himself in the chest with his thumb. “I’m the big swinging dick around here. It all comes through me, you got it?” He gave Rick his best intimidating stare.

  Rick stood his ground despite the obvious dismissal. “I hired him back.”

  Clay blinked. “Bullshit.”

  “Gave him a raise, too.”

  Clay’s expression turned into the sort of thing that tended to foreshadow unemployment but after a moment, he smirked. “What kinda damn raise’d you give him?”

  “It was unspecified,” Rick said. “How much do you think it should be?”

  “Shiddif I know.” Clay leaned back in his executive chair, hands behind his head. He almost chuckled. “Tell you what,” he said. “You give him whatever raise you want. I’ll just take it out of that adjustment I was gonna make in your pay. How’s ‘at? That’s pretty clever, don’t you think?” He sat forward and snatched the phone off its cradle. “Hope that’s gonna work for you.” He punched a number then wagged the handset toward the door and said, “Excuse me. This is a private call.”

  28.

  Rick walked into the reception area and sat in one of the chairs. He looked at Traci, who was reading a Billboard magazine, and said, “I believe I’ve been Stubbled again.”

  A hint of amusement crossed her face. Traci kept reading but nodded her lack of surprise. “What’d he do this time?”

  “Well, first he fired Rob.”