“Hey, watch it!” the transmitter man yelled. “You want to get burned?” Murtaugh knocked the wire out of his hand.
“Right,” Maine said calmly, grabbing the wire again and picking his teeth with it.
Murtaugh shook his head and started outside with his flashlight. “Call me when it comes back on,” he said.
The first time I laughed, Maine thought. When I shrieked that time. That’s what jammed it. That’s when I tore it. And they hadn’t noticed. Not the engineer or the relief engineer, not the transmitter man or the relief transmitter man, not Shippleton, not the Indians—not even Credenza himself. Hell, not even me.
“Because we had all stopped listening.
“And that’s why I never heard. Because one by one we had all stopped listening weeks before when I came back from Lincoln with the new records. Because they never heard those other programs. Because without consulting anyone each of them had become bored, without even recognizing the moment when they no longer cared to listen to their own radio station, and without even deciding not to, without—my God, they must have been bored—its even being a conscious act on their part, and so there was just this piecemeal tuning me out, just this gradual lapse as one loses by degrees his interest in a particular magazine he subscribes to, just this sluggish wane, just this disaffection, not from my programs alone but from Shippleton’s too. They were all so bored that it was simply something personal, taking boredom for granted, almost as if it were something in the eye of the beholder with no outside cause at all, just a shift in taste, as one day one discovers that he can no longer eat scrambled eggs. So bored that it was just too trivial to mention to one’s brothers, because each made the unconscious assumption that the others still had their appetites intact.”
Well, thought Marshall Maine, I’ll be. I ran KROP right into the ground. All by myself. I did it. Not even my engineer listened to me. Not even my transmitter man with nothing to distract him except the sound of the relief man’s snoring. I’ll be. It doesn’t have a single listener. Not one.
“This is Marshall Maine,” he said aloud in the empty shack, “KROP’s Voice of the Voice of Wheat. Be still. We interrupt this radio station for a special announcement. Be still.”
2
It is not enough to say that he lost his job. Rather, it disappeared—his as well as the jobs of the transmitter men and engineers and the other announcer. Even the radio station disappeared—KROP plowed back under.
As it happened, Dick Gibson was able to take advantage of the Credenza boredom for a few more days. Though now that some of his colleagues had realized what had happened—or soon would—he knew he did not have much time. Once the requisitions were put in to replace the equipment he had damaged, the Credenzas would easily be able to fill in the rest of the story. Meanwhile he worked.
Perhaps it was the knowledge that no one heard him, or perhaps it was to make a sort of amends for his former fear, or simply the hope that if they should tune him in now, at the top of his form, they would forget who it was that had driven them away from their sets in the first place and would place a new and stronger confidence in him. At any rate, using the name Dick Gibson, he spoke during this respite with a silver tongue, lips that were sweeter than wine, a golden throat. He was in a state of grace, of classic second chances. The more it galled him that no one heard him, the better he was. The weather had turned bad and there was a thin film of unseasonable ice along Route 33; yet he hoped that someone passing through might be listening. It could make the difference between one concept of the place and another. Such a stranger might think, for as long as the signal lasted, that he had entered a Shangri-la, crossed a border more telling than the Iowa-Nebraska one, and come into—despite the flatness stretching behind and before him—a sort of valley, still unspoiled, unmarked perhaps on maps. To stay within range of the signal—never strong and now damaged further by the involuntary surges and slackenings of an inconstant electricity—the stranger might slow down (it would have nothing to do with the ice) and Dick would guide him, preserving him on the treacherous road as art preserves, as God does working in mysterious ways. The stranger might even pull over to the side. Dick pictured the fellow, his salesman’s wares piled high in the space from which he had removed the back seat, sitting there, his appointments forgotten, time itself forgotten, preoccupied, listening with a recovered wonder unfamiliar since childhood, in a state of grace himself.
No matter. Within four days of discovering the truth he received word from Shippleton that none of their services were required any longer, that the Credenzas had decided to close down the station. That they fixed no blame and were willing to write letters of recommendation for all the staff was evidence that they had not yet figured out what had happened. But Dick knew, if the others didn’t, and felt a fondness for his crew, determinedly sentimental on the last morning they were together. (Actually it was the first morning: all six of them were in the shack for the first time, plus Lee Credenza, who had driven over to bring them their last paychecks.) As they packed and made hurried preparations for their exodus, he saw that in emergency each had auxiliary lives which they would now take up. They might have been men who had served with him in a war, or political prisoners given some eleventh-hour reprieve and told to leave the country. He saw that he had one of Murtaugh’s handkerchiefs and that Shippleton had a pair of his shoes. They re-exchanged combs, ties, books and magazines they had lent each other over the months. Why we’ve been friends, he thought, amazed, brothers (the six of them only two less than the sum of the Credenzas themselves, and actually equal if you didn’t count the Credenzas in Lincoln).
It was Dick, however, who went about taking down their addresses and carefully writing out his own for them. “Of course I won’t be there long, but a letter would always be forwarded. I’ve put down my real name, but here in parentheses is the name you’ve known me by. No, keep the scarf. I’ve got another.”
And when the valises were closed and placed beside the bunks while they waited for the taxi that would take them to town, he saw the makeshift essence of their belongings—bandboxes, cardboard grips tied with rope, duffel bags, paper parcels, only one leather suitcase— and was moved by this additional evidence of their gypsy, trouper lot.
And so, still a young man, he started out for home, where they would probably be happy to see him.
It took him months to get there. He found himself explaining this one night, a few years later, to strangers.
“How do you do, ladies and gentlemen, this is Dick ‘Pepsodent’ Gibson. I’m very happy to be here in Minneapolis tonight. Bob Hope will be with you in a few minutes, but first he’s asked me to come out here and talk to you all for a bit. I’m your warmup man. Are you cold, madam? Skinnay Ennis was supposed to do this but he’s working out, he’s getting in shape for a tug-of-war next week against the 142nd Airborne. I won’t say Skinnay’s team is the underdog, but Frank Sinatra’s the anchor man. Frank Sinatra—he was putting one of his songs on the phonograph last night and his hand slipped through the hole in the record. I won’t say he’s thin, but his mother used to use him to test cakes.
“Listen, Bob asked me to tell you he’s got a great show lined up for you tonight. Bob’s here, and Frances Langford and Vera Vague—and Frances Langford. Let’s see, then there’s Skinnay Ennis and his orchestra and Jerry Colonna—and Frances Langford. Frances Langford, I won’t say she’s pretty but the other day someone told me she looks just like the girl next door and I went out and bought a house. You know who lives next door to me? Vera Vague. Vera Vague—that’s Fibber Magee’s closet in a girdle. I won’t say she’s ugly but her beauty mark died of loneliness. I won’t say she’s unattractive but the St. Paul police saw her crossing Kellogg Boulevard yesterday and put out an all-points alert for a hit-and-run driver.
“Now the show’s going to begin in about thirty minutes, so if anybody has to cough let him do it now. I tell you what, when I count three everybody cough together. All at once now.
All right, are you ready? Let’s go. One. Two. Three. Cough, everybody. Let’s do it again. One. Two. Three. Fine, now just once more. One. Two. Three. Wonderful. Everybody passes the physical. You’ve all just been inducted into the United States Army!
“Well, come on now, you don’t think I tell jokes for a living, do you? This is Dick ‘Pepsodent’ Gibson. I just warm you up for the star, let you know you’re among friends. Bob’s show’s dependent upon audience reaction and the way we get that—this is inside stuff, folks—is to let you know we’re human too. Now that fellow sitting on the stage there is Joe Glober. Joe’s Bob’s card man. Been with him for years. During the show he’s going to hold up a sign that says ‘Laugh,’ and that cues you to laugh. Joe, hold that sign up for these folks. Not upside down, for God’s sake. Who hired you, Red Skelton? There, that’s better. All right, people, let’s hear your laugh. The engineer wants a sound level. Come on, when I say three. One. Two. Two and a half. Two and twenty-one thousand twenty-two thousandths. Three. Go. Look at Joe’s sign, Joe’s sign. Too soft. This is coast-to-coast. How are they supposed to hear you in Tucson? All right. There were these newlyweds. They go off on their honeymoon. The trains are crowded, so all they can get is an upper berth. It’s their first night together and they’re in this little upper berth, do you follow? Well, it’s pretty crowded up there and they don’t want to disturb the other passengers, so the little bride whispers in her husband’s ear, ‘Sweetheart, when you want to make love just say, “Pass the oranges.” That way the other passengers won’t know what we’re doing. “Pass the oranges.”’ So the husband agrees and in five minutes he gets pretty excited and he tells his wife to pass the oranges. Then a little later the wife says, ‘Pass the oranges.’ Then in twenty minutes the husband says, ‘Pass the oranges.’ And that’s the way it goes all night. Then, just before dawn, after the guy’s asked for the oranges about forty times, they hear this voice from the lower berth: ‘Lady, will you hand him the god-damned glass carefully this time? The juice keeps dripping in my face.’
“Oh, you liked that one. Did you get a level on that, Mel? Mel Bell, ladies and gentlemen—the engineer. Mel’s been with Bob for years.
“So that’s the kind of material you people like, is it? Well, you won’t hear any stories like that once the show starts. We don’t talk dirty mouth around here. Not on your tintype we don’t. Not on the Pepsodent Show. Anybody here ever been to Boulder Darn? No, seriously folks, we can make all the jokes we want to about lust. Well, we can. What do you think those Frances Langford jokes are all about? And the Vera Vague routines? Why, to hear Bob tell it you’d think Miss Vague was a nymphomaniac or something. You want the inside story? Frances Langford isn’t even my type. (Herbie Lauscher, ladies and gentlemen, one of Bob’s writers. Been with him for years, years.) And Vera Vague is actually a very lovely person. A real lady. Sinatra weighs as much as I do and last year Jack Benny raised a quarter of a million dollars for United War Relief. Skinnay Ennis spells his name S-k-i-n-n-a-y. He’s from down south. They name folks like that down there. Wait till you see him. That’s just a joke about his being thin.
“All right?
“And only the band goes by bus. That’s a practical arrangement, a matter of logistics. Mr. Ennis arrives by plane a day before the show. Mr. Hope travels first class but alone. The private life. And it would break your heart to see him come down the ramp from the plane with his coat over his arm and his briefcase in his hand. He brings the script, you see, he carries it with him. And even if some flunky fetches his baggage, why at least Hope has to hand him the claim checks. And most of the time he picks it up himself, if you want to know.
“All right, granted Bob Hope’s got a face people recognize. That makes a difference. But what about the others? The poet who carries his bags aboard the train and takes off his coat but doesn’t know where to hang it and rolls it up with the manuscript inside, then remembers and removes it, and folds up the coat all over again and puts it down beside him this time because he doesn’t want people to see him jump up and down and think he’s a hick? What of people in air terminals waiting for connecting flights, passing the time at coffee counters, the sleeve of their trench coats in the puddle of Coca-Cola? What of men on vacation or business in countries where they don’t speak the language or know the customs? What of the arrangements men have to make? I’m talking about obtaining rooms and getting your supper sent up. There’s no way of greasing all of life, I say.
“Are you warming up? Jacomo Miller, folks, Bob’s microphone man for many years. Been with him since he was a kid in fact. This summer the final adoption comes through.
“There’s always the tire gone flat in the desert and no air in the spare. This is small time, peanuts, granted, agreed. All I mean to get across is—
“Listen, maybe this will explain what I mean. The guest lecturer for the Men’s Auxiliary or the Temple Sisterhood. He’s been around the world. He has slides from the upper reaches of the Amazon. Beautiful stuff, no white man’s ever gotten this close. The slides are in a black leather case. He’s afraid to check them so he takes them aboard the plane with him. But the case is too big. They won’t let him put it in the overhead rack, and it doesn’t fit comfortably under the seat. Besides, he’s uneasy; suppose they hit an air pocket and the case slides forward under someone else’s seat? It would be all right in the rack, but the stewardess won’t let him put it there. What does she know? Where’s she been? To Cleveland five hundred times? This guy’s been everywhere—the top of the Amazon, the bottom. Still, he has to hold the case on his lap like any salesman with an order pad on his knee. It’s different, but who’s to know this? Nobody knows. There’s this appearance of ordinariness. That’s what breaks your heart. You follow? You see? Mel, quick, get a level. No?
“All right, try this … Your father. Your father goes to Indianapolis to call on a store. He forgets to take his shaving cream, or maybe he’s all out of it. Well, he has to make a good appearance. You don’t walk up to L. S. Ayers’s head buyer with five o’clock shadow. If you’ve got bad breath you can put something sweet in your mouth, you can hide it, but how do you hide your whiskers? What do you do, throw your hands up over your face? Well, it’s Sunday night, and he’s got an appointment first thing in the morning. The drugstores don’t open till nine or nine-thirty. In a town the size of Indianapolis there could be some place open all night, even on a Sunday, but it’s late. What’s he going to do, start looking now? The man’s tired, he’s had a hard day, it’s been a long trip. He goes to bed. The last thing on his mind before he falls asleep is the lousy shaving cream.
“In the morning he unwraps the little soap, the souvenir Ivory with the hotel on the wrapper, and he lathers with that. He rubs his palms furiously to work up the lather. He goes through the whole bar until it’s only a tiny sliver. He pats it on his face. He shaves. He cuts himself. That cut, that blood! That’s what I’m talking about—your daddy bleeding in a stuffy little room in Indianapolis. Where’s the dignity? Where’s the authority? Do you see? Do you see what I mean? Do you follow? Turn on the applause sign, somebody. Where’s Bob’s applause sign man? Joe Glober, hold up the ‘Laugh’ card. Pretend it’s applause. No?
“The private life. That everybody has. Being loose in the world. On your own. On mine, Dick Gibson’s. ‘Pepsodent’ is not actually my middle name. This is inside stuff. How much time do we have? Seventeen minutes? Twenty? … Marty Milton, ladies and gentlemen, Bob’s pre-show time man. How long have you been with Bob, Marty?
“I’ll tell you what happened to me after I lost my job. I meant to return the twelve or thirteen hundred miles to my home by bus. You’ll just have to accept this. It was exciting for me, the most exciting thing that had ever happened. I was in disgrace, you see. In a way. I’d blown it, fucked up, torn it. The shit had hit the fan. I’d lost this job in Nebraska. There’s a certain kind of disgrace in declining fortunes. And a certain kind of excitement in disgrace. This was a sort of ill health—an illne
ss of recuperation. Oh, how weak I was, how vulnerable to everything. Dizzy as a lover. My pores were open, goners to drafts. I mean my spirit was such that I could have caught cold or picked up bad germs. Just to stand up straight made me giddy. And young as I was, I had this power of the has-been like a secret weapon. How sweet is weakness! How grand it makes us feel when we really feel it, how happy and how solemn! You’ve seen those men, five months past their heart attacks, making their leaden progress up the stairs, one foot on the next step and the other brought up to join it, a hand on the banister perhaps, and the deep, stately breathing.
“That’s how I was. And not the least of it was the bus itself. This was a few years ago, before the war. It was still the depression; only the rich traveled by plane and even at that only between coasts. Buses were respectable then. You remember Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert in that movie. But this was my first time on a bus. Before when I had moved about—I was turning myself into a professional and I traveled considerably—I took trains. Well, I was always going to better jobs; people were to meet me. And even if that hadn’t been the case I would still have traveled by trains because I associated them with show business … The movies did that, the montages. Remember those triumphant tours, hands clapping over the big wheels and the successive signs saying Cleveland and Chicago and Detroit and the last one always New York.
“So there I was on this bus with this incredible ticket they give you like folded scrip—I hope you folks like small talk—and my unfamiliarity with the nooks and crannies of the thing, as if a bus were some queer sort of contraption they didn’t have in America. That’s it! I could have been a foreigner, but a foreigner come from a really major power to some hole-and-corner country where they drink wine with their meals and have no facilities for dry cleaning. My demeanor must have invited hospitality, reminded others I would be taking back my impressions of them. Or maybe it was the weakness I was telling you about. Whatever, several people smiled at me. And one older man actually got up and prepared this empty double seat for me. He raised the window shade and adjusted the footrest. Then he helped me with some of my things, kneeling on the arm of the seat to put them neatly on the rack.
The Dick Gibson Show Page 6