In this case, Harold Smith was merely keeping his president informed.
"Mr. President," he said, "the four major networks have received extortionary faxes demanding twenty million dollars from each, or all broadcast television will be blacked for a seven-hour interval."
"Is that so bad?" was the President's first question.
"It could be catastrophic. The public would be cut off from their most immediate source of news, not to mention passive entertainment. And the advertising revenue loss would exceed . . ." Smith consulted his computer ". . . 600 million dollars."
"But there's still KNNN. This only affects on-air broadcasting, right?"
"Mr. President, I have traced the faxes to their transmission source. They all come from the Kable Newsworthy News Network headquarters in Atlanta."
"What?"
"I have confirmed this to my satisfaction. KNNN appears to have launched a campaign to demoralize if not destroy network television."
"Smith, I find this very hard to believe. Here at the White House, we could hardly get by without KNNN."
"Mr. President, any hoaxer with access to a KNNN telephone could have sent those faxes. But to knock coast-to-coast television off the air requires enormous money and extremely sophisticated equipment."
"I know the competition out there is pretty fierce, but isn't this taking it too far?" the President said weakly.
"There is reason to believe that KNNN head Jed Burner is directly culpable," Smith added. "This is no prank."
"You have proof?"
"I admit it is circumstantial, but it appears telling. The fax was signed Captain Audion."
"Audion?"
"An old-style vacuum tube critical to early TV reception."
"So? KNNN is cable."
"You might recall that in his more flamboyant days, KNNN president Jed Burner was known by the sobriquet of Captain Audacious."
"Audacious. Audion. Hmmm. Isn't that kind of obvious?"
"Only if the fax source is known to the people Captain Audion is attempting to extort. It was a blind fax. He cannot know I have determined its origin."
"How do you know these things, Smith?"
"Sorry. Privileged."
"The last guy told me you were like that. All right," the President said tightly, "what do you suggest?"
"The national economy, never mind public peace of mind, cannot afford a seven-hour blackout. I am putting my people in the field."
The President's swallow was audible. His raspy voice became tinged with reluctance. "If you think this warrants it."
"I do."
"Well, I guess there's nothing more to say, is there?"
"No, Mr. President. I just wanted you to know."
Harold Smith returned the red receiver to its cradle and lifted the blue contact phone handset, reflecting that it was always difficult breaking in a new chief executive. Now more than ever it was fortunate that CURE stood prepared.
There were a great many questions that remained to be answered, but one thing was certain. After tonight, the threat of a television blackout would be nullified.
The Destroyer would see to that.
Chapter 9
The first problem Remo encountered was getting out of the Atlanta airport.
Remo had been in airports all over the world, ranging from tiny cubicles in distant deserts to urban mazes. But this place was Byzantine. There was more space in the complex than out on the runways. Most of it seemed designed to impress other airport architects.
Remo got lost twice before someone directed him to the automated buses.
He got on the first one that arrived, and it began talking to him in a silly-ass 1950s robot voice.
"Welcome to Atlanta. Welcome to Atlanta. This is Terminal A. The next stop is . . ."
"Shut up," Remo snapped.
". . . Terminal B. If you would like me to stop at Terminal B, press . . ."
"Shut up!"
"Welcome to Atlanta. The next stop . "
There was no one else on the bus, so Remo gave the wall a kick.
"iiiisssss . . . squawwk . . ."
Immediately, he felt better. But not by much.
Once outside, Remo hailed a cab. The dogwood-scented city air was sultry entering his lungs. It was still too full of hydrocarbons and metallic traces for his taste, but it least it was a change. Remo wasn't so sure he liked living in New England. The climate and foliage reminded him of North Korea.
"Where to, friend?" the cab driver asked in a mellow Southern drawl.
"Peachtree," said Remo.
"Which Peachtree?"
Remo frowned. The call from Harold Smith had told him to go to the KNNN headquarters on Peachtree. That was all. It seemed enough.
"There's more than one?" he asked.
"More than one? There's dozens. Take your pick." The cabby began ticking off items on his thick fingers. "Peachtree Lane, Peachtree Road, Peachtree Street, Peachtree Circle and then you got your Peachtree Avenue-"
Remo brightened. "Avenue! That's it, Avenue."
"Good. Now is that Peachtree Avenue East, or Peachtree Avenue West?"
Remo's face fell. "Happen to know where the KNNN building is?"
"Which one?"
"The one on Peachtree," Remo said.
"There's two on Peachtree. They call them KNNN South and KNNN Not South."
"Not South?"
"You hang a North on a business down in these parts, you might as well torch it the next day."
"Take me to the nearest one," Remo sighed, settling back into the cushions. He was starting to feel glad the Master of Sinanju had decided to stay behind.
After receiving the word to move on KNNN from Harold Smith, Remo had reluctantly awakened Chiun. He would have preferred not to. But he knew that he would catch hell either way.
The first words out of the Master of Sinanju's excited mouth were, "It is happening? Is the baby coming! Tell me!"
"No, that's not it," Remo said hastily.
The Master of Sinanju had stopped in the middle of a frantic lunge for his traveling kimono, which lay neatly folded at the foot of his sleeping mat. "What? Then why do you awaken me?"
"Smitty wants us on this TV blackout thing," Remo had explained. "He thinks Jed Burner is behind it."
Chiun's haughty chin came up. "I do not know that name."
"You're one of the lucky ones. They used to call him the South's Loudmouth. He runs KNNN. That's where I'm headed. Now let's go."
To Remo's surprise, Chiun had tucked his hands into the sleeves of his sleeping kimono.
"I cannot go," he said stiffly. "If harm come to both of us, there will no one to take care of the boy."
"What's wrong with the freaking mother?" Remo had shouted.
"The boy needs a father," Chiun had said in a thin, remote voice.
"Sounds to me like the little bastard's going to have his pick," Remo shot back.
"I should be at Cheeta's side," said Chiun, averting his face.
"Then why aren't you?"
"Remo. It would be unseemly; Cheeta is a married woman. There are those who would gossip."
"Beginning with her husband. He'd have you both on his TV talk show so fast your head would spin."
"I have seen his program. It is filth."
Remo got control of his voice, "It's called The Gabby Gynecologist," he explained patiently, "and doctor talk shows are the latest thing."
"I will accept talk. But they show pictures. Gross pictures."
Remo folded his arms. "No argument there. But if anything breaks on Cheeta's condition, you might as well be with me as sleeping."
"How so?"
Remo repressed a smile. The hook was baited. Now to reel in the unwary fish...
"Where I'm going," he said, "I'll be on the ground zero of TV news for the entire world. If Cheeta's water breaks, KNNN will probably have it on the air before Cheeta even knows it's happening."
"In that case," Chiun said, "I will remain here, my ears gl
ued to KNNN."
"The expression is eyes. Eyes are glued to TVs, not ears."
"Glued eyes cannot see and I intend to resume my sleep. But I will leave the television device on, so that if the name of Cheeta Ching is spoken, I will snap awake and race to her side."
Remo frowned. "Last chance. The scuttlebutt is that Cheeta's been keeping her legs crossed until sweeps start, anyway."
Chiun's hazel eyes grew round with shock. The hair over each ear shook imperceptibly. "Is this possible-to hold the baby within the womb until the mother wishes to release it?"
"For normal woman, I don't know. For Cheeta Ching, I wouldn't put anything past her. She's so ratings crazed, she'll do anything for more face time-or whatever they'd televise."
"So speaks the green voice of jealousy," Chiun sniffed.
"So speaks a man who's had more than one run-in with that barracuda," Remo snapped.
"My mind is made up."
And it was. Hurt, Remo had left. It was hard to believe. Chiun actually cared more about some brat who hadn't even been born yet than he did about Remo.
All during the flight to Atlanta, Remo's eyes had felt hot and dry and there was a funny tightness in his throat. He couldn't figure it out ....
Now, racing through downtown Atlanta, he was angry. And he was going to take his anger out on whatever was behind this.
Up ahead, Remo could see the distinctive KNNN Tower emblazoned with its world-famous corporate symbol-a nautical anchor. The roof was a clump of satellite dishes, like crouching spiders searching the heavens for prey.
"I just hope that this is the right building," Remo growled.
The cab driver hoped so too. His passenger was wearing a really fierce expression. And the way he was gripping the upholstery and shredding the stuffing gave a man a queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach.
Chapter 10
Jed Burner was the last person on earth anybody would have thought capable of transforming the face of television news.
"TV? Ah don't watch it," he had boasted upon assuming control of a tiny Atlanta UHF station his suddenly deceased father had built from the ground up. "TV's for setters. Ah'm ah doer. Ah've probably watched all of ah hundred hours of TV in mah entire life. Tops."
"So what do you want us to do, Mr. Burner?" asked his nervous station manager on the occasion of new owner Jed Burner first setting foot in the station he had inherited.
"How much this station gross in a yeah?" Burner had asked looking around the master control room and pressing buttons that interested him. Videotape squealed as it went into reverse and a thirty minute episode of Adventures in Paradise went onto the air backward. No one noticed.
"Currently we're losing a half million per quarter."
The sandy-haired man with the crinkling sea-blue eyes paused, took his Havana cigar out of his mouth and said, "Find me a sucka."
"Mr. Burner?"
"Ah'm unloadin' this sinkhole. Now get hoppin'."
The staff of WETT-13, "Your Window to the Sunny South," hopped out of the new president's office, their eyes dispirited. They hadn't expected any better. Jediah Burner was a playboy, a sailor of fast boats, a winner of gaudy brass trophy cups and a relentless pursuer of busty blondes. No one expected him to take the helm of anything as stationary as a troubled TV station.
A week and hundreds of cold calls later, they hopped back into his office.
"Who made the best offer?" Burner demanded.
"The ones who hung up laughing," said one.
"The others told us to shove it," added another.
Jed Burner eased his lanky frame into his seat, put his deck-shoe clad feet up on his desk, and tilted his yachting cap back with a cocked thumb. His eyes crinkled humorlessly.
"What we gotta do," he said slowly, "is turn this scow into a sloop. Make it shipshape. Give it some value."
The staff looked to one another. No one quite knew what that meant. Exactly.
The station manager took a helpful stab at it, though.
"We could put a sail on the roof, I suppose."
Jed Burner fixed him with a nautical eye. "Main or jib?"
"Reef?"
Burner's feet came off the desk and a tanned-brown fist slammed the green felt blotter. "Now yoah talkin'! We need us a new motto, if we're gonna catch us a friendly wind."
"The Flagship of the South?"
"Damn fine thinkin', theah. Get on it. Ah got me some practice runs to make. Anybody wants me, tough. Ah'm gonna be writin' mah name all over the Chesapeake. The Americas Cup ain't that far off."
And with that, Jed Burner left. The staff didn't lay eyes on him again for two months. But they heard about him. Twice he was reported missing. Once, his sloop had been boarded by the Cuban Coast Guard, but he had ended up having lunch with Fidel Castro. Each time, he turned up alive, smiling, and posing for the cameras with a vacuous blonde-sometimes two-rubbing herself against him.
Every time he resurfaced in the station, he had ditched the blonde, but never his smile or his cigar.
"We're still in the toilet," he grumbled on one of those rare occasions, looking at the most recent Arbitron book.
The station manager wore a glum face. "We tried everything, sir."
Burner scratched his beard. "Maybe we need a bigger sail . . . ."
"The one we got keeps getting blown off the roof. We've gone through seven already. It's been costing us dear."
"Dammit. Do Ah gotta do everythin' around heah? If a sail won't do it, fetch me up an anchor."
And with those fateful words, Jed Burner stalked from the building in search of a headwind and headnot necessarily in that order.
The staff looked to one another helplessly.
"Did he mean an anchor anchor or a news anchor?" asked the program director.
"It don't matter none," the station manager returned glumly. "We can't afford either."
"Let's price both and go with the cheaper option."
If the Savannah Nautical Supply House had been having their annual November sale a week later, WETT-13 might have gone the way of the Confederacy. They could have had a nice stainless steel twofluker for $367.99. A bargain. But they missed the sale by thirty-six hours and couldn't afford full price.
On the other hand, Floyd Cumpsty was willing to anchor the WETT-13 News for free.
"I'll even brown-bag my lunch so as not to put any strain on the station cafeteria," Floyd said with the youthful sincerity of a man who knew where he wanted to go in life.
"The station cafeteria," the personnel manager said, "is that broken down candy vending machine you passed in the hall. And why do you wanna go and work for nothing, boy?"
"I hear they make big money reading the news up North. I figure I can learn, get experienced, and seek my fortune up there."
"Sounds reasonable. Except for the living up north part. But first I gotta see if you have the qualifications."
"Yes?"
"Can you read, son?"
"Yes, sir. I'm a high school graduate."
"That hair sitting on your noggin, it the real McCoy?"
"Yes, sir."
The personnel manager stood up and offered a firm hand, "Then let me be the first to welcome you aboard the Flagship of the South. You're our first official anchor."
In those days, there was no news department. In fact, there were no scripts. The WETT anchor assembled his own scripts by cutting up newspaper headlines and changing enough words that no one sued. Then he read them into the camera, frequently mispronouncing words.
No one sued. But a lot of people watched. At first, with their jaws hanging slack in disbelief. Then, with their bellies shaking in laughter. WETT News became a favorite in dorm rooms and seedy bars. People caught on to the headline trick and big money was won and lost on which words the anchor would mangle.
Ratings rose. They did not soar. But a quarter point here and an eighth there meant that in six months they had crept up one whole point. Enough to become a blip on the local TV screen a
nd lure in a few thrifty advertisers.
Eight months of steadily rising ratings later, Jed Burner called.
"Hey! How's the boy?"
"Fine, Mr. Burner. And my name is David. David Sinnott. "
"Now don't get all fussy with me, boy. Ah'm here off the coast, just cruisin' along, with Bubbles and Brenda. Ah heah we got us some upward movement in them poll things."
"They're called ratings. And we've jumped a point. It's not a lot, but-"
"It ain't beans and you know it. Don't you kid a kidder, heah? Now Ah got mah friends in town callin' me about this thing we got on the air."
"WETT News?"
"Yeah. That. Whose damnfool idea was that?"
David Sinnott winced. "It's bringing in some advertising now," he said hopefully. "Elmer's Linoleum Emporium, a couple independent filling stations, and we think the A r people are interested-"
"It bringin' in enough that Ah can sell this talky white elephant?"
"No, sir."
"My friends are also tellin' me they don't see hide nor hair of no anchor on mah roof."
"Oh," Dave Sinnott said, only then understanding that his boss had meant an anchor anchor. "Well, we priced anchors and they were a little out of our range."
"Listen to me, boy: You take that new advertisin' money and you sink some of it-Ah don't care how much-into a shiny new anchor so mah friends won't think Ah'm some kinda windy blowhard."
"Yes, sir."
"Only you don't put it on the roof. Since we got all these nice folks watchin' that fool news show, Ah want it up on the wall behind that idiot what's doin' the readin'."
"Yes, sir."
The nautical anchor was in place in time for the five o'clock news that very day. And it hadn't cost a thin dime. Dave Sinnott had bartered advertising time for the thing, which required four strong backs to carry it into the building.
The news anchor took one look at it and refused to go on the air.
"Are you kidding?" Floyd said tearfully. "This will ruin my career."
"Boy, your career's done. You just don't know it yet. Now you get your raggedy ass planted in that chair and you read."
Floyd Cumptsy cut his copy of the Atlanta Constitution more slowly that day, like a man who had come to the end of his string.
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