The Broom Of The System Part 15

"Oh, an extra-special look back at the Olympics!" Judith Prietht said into her People. People.

"Well, yes," said Peter Abbott. He fingered a wire-stripper uncomfortably.

"The tunnel guy hasn't found anything?"

"Well, Tunnels is just having some problems of its own, really, that aren't helping Interactive Cable's ability to deal effectively with this service problem at all," said Peter Abbott.

"Problems."

"Tunnel men are flakey. Tunnel men tend to be drips. It looks like the tunnel guys have decided to just take off for a while, go fis.h.i.+ng or wh.o.r.e-chasing or something. They even like haven't told their wives where they're going, and Mr. Sludgeman, who's the Tunnel Supervisor, is understandably really p.i.s.sed off, also."

"So wait. We have a hideous tunnel problem that totally impedes our ability to conduct business...."

Judith Prietht snorted.

"... and Interactive Cable all of a sudden, whom we pay for service, doesn't have the staff needed to restore our service? Is that it?"

"P.R. isn't really my specialty, you know," said Peter Abbott.

"That really sucks," Lenore said.

"Could I just say in pa.s.sing that you have incredibly beautiful legs?" said Peter Abbott.

"Fresh," said Judith Prietht.

"Fresh?"

"Go into our tunnel," Lenore said to Peter Abbott. The console was beeping insanely. Lenore had only recently gotten the hang of ignoring the console when she really had to. "Go and restore our service this instant. I'm sure everyone would be grateful, especially the apparently very busy girls over at Bambi's, if you get my drift." Or get Mr. Sledgeman to go fix them."

Sludgeman."

"Sludgeman."

"Mr. Sludgeman can't go, he's in a wheelchair. He broke his spine in the ice-storm crisis of '81. And I can't go down. You can't mess with the tunnels, they're real delicate. Think of them like nerves, and the city's a body, with a nervous system. I go in and clunk around, and mess things up even more, and then where are we? Nerves cannot be messed with by the untrained. A tunnel man needs incredible finesse."

"Even though they're drips."

"Right."

"Holy cow," Judith Prietht said into her magazine. "Holy cow. Kid, listen to this."

"I'm sure Mr. Vigorous went on record as saying that Frequent and Vigorous is collectively really ticked off about this," said Lenore.

"Kid, listen. Kopek Spasova. Kopek Spasova," Spasova," Judith said. "The superstar. " Judith said. "The superstar. "

"Who?" said Peter Abbott.

"Kopek Spasova, the little kid from Russia that wins all the gold medals all over the place in gymnastics. She's coming to Cleveland next Friday, it says. She's going to exhibit."

"May I please see that?" Lenore said. The console was hushed for a moment. "Holy mackerel," said Lenore. In People People there was a picture of Kopek Spasova, at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, spinning around the uneven parallel bars, holding on only by her toes. "She was really great," Lenore said. "I watched that on television." there was a picture of Kopek Spasova, at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, spinning around the uneven parallel bars, holding on only by her toes. "She was really great," Lenore said. "I watched that on television."

"It said she's coming to an exhibition sponsored by Gerber's Baby Food in the lobby of Erieview Tower," Judith said.

" 'Kicking off a promotional campaign for the infant-food giant will be hot gymnastic commodity Kopek Spasova,' " Lenore read out loud, " 'whose father and coach, Ruble Spasov, just signed a purportedly mammoth promotional and endors.e.m.e.nt contract with the firm.' That's just in few days."

"Endorsing baby food?" said Peter Abbott.

"Well, she's only something like eight, and really small," said Lenore. She looked back down at the magazine. " Dad's not going to be pleased at all. Gerber's done it again. And right here in Cleveland."

"How can a communist do endors.e.m.e.nts in the U.S. of A., anyway?" asked Judith Prietht. "There are death-penalty rules against that, in Russia, I thought."

"She's not Russian anymore," said Lenore.

"Oh, right, she's the one whose father just defecated."

"Defected."

"That's the one!"

"Right."

"I gotta go. I gotta go do P.R. at Fuss 'n' Feathers Pets," Peter Abbott said. "The minute we get competent access to the tunnels, you're going to get satisfaction, I'm telling you straight out right now. "

"How comforting."

"Take care."

"Kopek Spasova ... goodbye!" called Judith Prietht.

"Adios."

"I'd like to see that," said Lenore. "Frequent and Vigorous."

Every year in August Monroe Fieldbinder took a vacation and took his family deep into the woods to a lake in the Adirondacks. On this particular day Monroe Fieldbinder stood alone at the edge of the clear clean cold Adirondack lake, his fis.h.i.+ng line limp in the clear water, and stared across the lake at a vacation house burning in the woods above the opposite sh.o.r.e. Fieldbinder listened to the distant crackle and watched the black plume of smoke spiral up into the crisp blue sky. He saw shrouds of twirling sparks and the tiny figures of the house's occupants running around yelling and throwing buckets of water onto the edge of the inferno. Fieldbinder pulled his white fis.h.i.+ng hat over his eyes and grinned wryly at the chaotic scene. and grinned ryly at the scene.

"Get him down! Get him down!"

"Got him."

"Get him down, Shorlit!"

"I gotcha."

"G.o.d, what a racket."

"G.o.d."

"We need Wetzel. Ring Wetzel."

"He's out of his mind."

"Just hold him, Wetzel'll be here."

"We're gonna have to wrap him."

"He's right, go get a wrap. Wetzel, go get a wrap, run!"

"jesus."

"It's OK, it's OK."

"Is he gonna be OK?"

"Can you just stand back, please?"

"Got in the cab, wanted to go to the Loop, I says OK, I'm doin' like he asks me, I get to Wacker and LaSalle and he starts screaming like that. I didn't know what the h.e.l.l to do."

"You did the right thing. Please go stand over there. Shorlit, how you doing? You got him?"

"Barely. s.h.i.+t."

"Strong little guy."

"Out of his mind."

"He flipped. He just totally f.u.c.king flipped out. Thought I was gonna have an accident getting him here."

"It's OK, it's OK."

"He's gonna tear his throat out."

"Let's just get the wrap on him."

"Roll him over."

"Ow! Little b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

"Sshh, it's OK."

"Get the arm."

"Ow!"

"Roll him back. Wetzel, roll him back."

"I got him."

"Tighten it. Careful, his ribs. One more."

"Gotcha."

"Jesus G.o.d will you listen to that."

"Get him in. Wetzel, carry him. Shorlit, get a gumey with leg straps. "

"I gotcha."

"Christ, he weighs about ninety pounds. He's a skeleton."

"Can't you make him stop?"

"You're going to have to get back out of the way."

"Thorazine?"

"I want Thorazine, 250 c.c.'s. Get a rubber, he may swallow his tongue. Shorlit, get the door."

"It's OK, sshh, listen we're here to help."

"How can he keep it up? He's gonna stroke."

"Get a rubber."

"Put him down."

"Jesus."

"Straps."

"Thorazine."

"Give me access to an arm, Shorlit."

"Come on."

"Forget the rubber till we get him out. He'll bite your finger."

"People are gonna think we're killing somebody down here."

"Been drivin' a cab seventeen years."

"Please wait outside."

"Never seen any s.h.i.+t like that."