Chapter 2

The public relations counsel who had engineered publicity for the National Hardware Association was Jasper Diggs Calhoun. Everything about his offices was arranged to impress visitors with the idea that they were entering the presence of a DYNAMIC PERSONALITY.

The attractive secretary, with lots of curves showing through a tight-fitting dress, had an expression of demure innocence on her face which had been carefully cultivated. It made her look as though she had no idea the curves were showing.

“Can you tell me what you wished to discuss with Mr. Calhoun, Mr. Lam?” she asked, her wide blue eyes looking at me with naive innocence.

“An interesting problem in post-public relations,” I said.

Post-public relations?”

“That’s right.”

“Can you explain what you mean by that?”

“Certainly,” I said. “I can explain it in a very few words — to Mr. Calhoun.”

I gave her a smile.

She got up from behind the desk and walked around it so that I could see how her dress fitted in the back. It fitted. She vanished through a door marked J. D. CALHOUN — PRIVATE, and within a few minutes emerged to say, “You may go in, Mr. Lam. You have no appointment but Mr. Calhoun will endeavor to shuffle his other appointments so he can see you. He has just returned from luncheon and he has several appointments; however, he’ll see you.”

“Thank you,” I said, and walked in.

Calhoun sat behind his desk, leaning slightly forward, an attitude of dynamic energy about him. His lips were carefully held in a straight line. The small mustache had been trimmed so that it emphasized the look of determination which was as synthetic as the expression of innocence on the face of his secretary.

He was broad-shouldered, somewhere in the thirties, with dark hair, dark eyebrows and piercing gray eyes.

“Mr. Lam!” he exclaimed, getting up and extending his arm as though he was shooting his hand at a mark.

I put my hand in his and arched the knuckles so that his squeeze didn’t make me wince. I could tell he was a chronic hand squeezer. It showed his dynamic personality.

“How are you, Mr. Lam? Sit down. My secretary said you wanted to discuss a problem in post-public relations.”

“That’s right.”

“What is it?”

I said, “You public relations men do a lot of thinking. You dream up some terrific ideas. The ideas are used and then forgotten. That’s a waste of good material. In many instances there are opportunities to get good publicity out of things which might be termed the aftermath.”

“Such as what?” he asked.

“Oh, generally,” I said, waving my hand around the office and looking at the photographs on the wall, “any of your ideas. Now, here’s something interesting. This is quite a photograph.”

Calhoun yawned and said, “You may think so, but in this business, bathing beauties and models are a dime a dozen. We use cheesecake in our business.”

“Just why do you use cheesecake?” I asked.

He said, “Look, I’m too busy to give you lessons in the public relations business. Generally, if we’re selling something that has no eye appeal we try to attract the reader’s interest in terms of cheesecake.

“That’s why you see new models of automobiles photographed alongside girls in bathing suits or good-looking models with tight-fitting skirts and nylons. We have them by the dozen. That particular photograph you’re looking at shows the contestants who were vying to win the thousand-dollar cash prize and the title of Miss American Hardware. That was publicity for the hardware convention at New Orleans a few months ago. I handled all their publicity.”

“They’re good-looking babes,” I said.

“Yeah,” he repeated in a bored voice, “they’re good-looking babes — so what?”

“Who won?”

“Contestant Number Six,” he said.

“Now, there’s something that would be interesting,” I said. “That’s what I mean by post-public relations. I’ll bet Contestant Number Six would interest the American public. She was a girl working as a waitress someplace or—”

“She was a bookkeeper in an importing house,” he interrupted.

“All right,” I said, “she was a bookkeeper. She had great beauty but no one recognized it. She was doing humdrum daily tasks, and then she heard of a contest for the queen of the National Hardware Association. Timidly she typed out an application. She found out it would be necessary to appear in a bathing suit. She hesitated for a while, and then decided to go ahead with it. She—”

“You said she timidly typed out an application?” he interrupted.

“That’s right.”

“Not that babe,” he told me. “As I remember it, she was the one who suspected one of the other girls had padding in her bathing suit and suggested that the judging should be done in such a manner that the judges would be satisfied no artificial aids to beauty were being used... My secretary can tell you a lot more about her. I don’t remember too much of the details. It was just another contest, and, frankly, we get damn good and tired of them.”

“I know,” I said, “but think of the follow-up — that’s what I’m coming to. She won. The elation, the—”

“The cash,” he said dryly.

“All right, the cash. And all the notoriety, the publicity, the chance to go to Hollywood. I suppose you provided for some sort of a screen test?”

“Oh, sure,” he said, “that’s what makes the thing attractive to the public. There s a photograph over there on the other wall showing me handing her the thousand-dollar check, the contract for a screen test, the television appearance as Miss American Hardware on a national hookup... it’s all part of a routine build-up these days. The newspapers will give you space on it — if they’re hard up for news.”

I walked over to the other side of the room and looked at the photograph of Jasper Diggs Calhoun trying not to look bored and the winner looking up at him with soulful eyes. She’d taken a full breath and pushed her chest out and her stomach in. The bathing suit fitted her like the skin on a. sausage. Down underneath was a caption: “Evelyn Ellis acclaimed Queen of American Hardware Wholesalers’ Convention.”

“You’re not in hardware?” I asked Calhoun.

He shook his head. “I’m in public relations.”

“I should think that the presentation would have been made by one of the officials of the Hardware Association.”

“That shows all you know about it,” he said. “Those birds are married. Their wives don’t like to have them photographed in public with bathing cuties.”

“Aren’t you married?”

“Sure, but that’s my business. My wife understands. I can show you a thousand photographs taken of me and cheesecake.”

“Then the hardware executives keep themselves aloof from the queen?” I asked.

“Don’t be silly,” he said. “They’re not photographed with her in public, but they brush up against her, they let their hands slide along the curves of the bathing suit. Some of them are always patting her on the fanny and telling her to be a good girl. What the hell! That’s part of the game. That’s what she got the thousand bucks for; that, and the opportunity to show off.”

“Well,” I said, “she could be great material. Think of what happened afterward — I suppose she attracted a lot of attention on television?”

“My God, but you’re naive,” Calhoun said.

“Well, what did happen?” I asked.

Calhoun said, “You’re taking up a lot of my time. Do I get anything out of this, Lam?”

“Sure you do,” I said. “If I can make a story out of this I’ll write it from the angle of the public relations expert. All this cheesecake thrills the public, but with us it’s a dime a dozen and—”

“Now, wait a minute,” he interrupted hastily. “Don’t pull that line. That disillusions the public. In public relations we don’t want the public disillusioned. Now, you just back up and begin all over. You sketch me as the enthusiastic guy who likes to see these girls make good, who has an eye for beauty — professionally, of course. I can see a girl as a bookkeeper or as a waitress or an usherette or something of that sort and tell right away if she’s got what it takes. I am as thrilled as the public is with the romantic opportunities for discovery and advancement. They’re Cinderellas. I’m a fairy godmother. I wave the wand of publicity and, presto, they’re made. That’s the kind of publicity I want.”

“I see your point,” I said. “Where is this woman now? What’s her name?”

“It’s on the caption there,” he said. “Evelyn something. I remember I had to make the check over because she spelled it with a y.”

“Evelyn Ellis,” I said, reading from the photograph. “Where is she now?”

“How would I know? The last I saw of her personally was when I gave her this check.”

“May I ask your secretary? Would she have the address?”

“Oh, I’ll dig it out for you. I’ll find it.”

He opened his desk, rummaged around among some cards, then opened another drawer, looked in some books, finally went to still a third drawer and pulled out a notebook.

“Evelyn Ellis,” he said, “at the time of her last television appearance was living at the Breeze-Mount Hotel.”

“I take it that after the Hardware Convention you dropped this bit of cheesecake and started thinking up other publicity stunts.”

That got a sparkle of response. “You’ve said it, Lam. We have to keep coming up with new ideas like this and this and this...”

He raised his right hand and snapped his fingers every time he said “this.”

I nodded. “I might be able to make quite a story out of that.”

“Would it do me any good?”

“Would it do you any harm?” I asked.

“No, I don’t suppose so.”

“Publicity,” I said, “is always good.”

“Well, this sort of publicity might not be too good — particularly if she isn’t happy or prosperous or... you know how it is with a girl of that sort. She expects to crash Hollywood just because she has a good figure and has won a contest. The woods are full of those girls. Usually they can’t stand the disappointment. After they’ve had the glamour and the adulation it’s difficult for them to settle down to routine work.”

“How about looking her up and letting me know where she is now?”

He said, “I’ll have to think this one over. Give me a ring tomorrow.”

“I’ll do that,” I promised. “Perhaps we can help each other.”

We shook hands again.

I went out and the automatic door-closing device clicked the door shut behind me.

I turned to the secretary, looked her over and said, “How in the world does it happen they don’t use you?

“For what?” she asked.

“For Miss American Hardware at the convention of the National Hardware Association,” I said. “Good heavens, how did they pick Evelyn Ellis when you were around?”

She lowered her eyelids. “Mr. Calhoun never uses the personnel in the office.”

I looked her over again appraisingly. She registered becoming modesty under my glance.

“Where’s Evelyn Ellis now?” I asked casually.

She made a little gesture. “For a while she was on Cloud Seven, ringing up and wanting help getting bookings as a model, wanting us to help her crash the movies. She had a few television appearances and she thought she was the belle of the ball. She quit her job, couldn’t get up until one or two o’clock in the afternoon, spent a couple of hours a day in the beauty parlors.”

I nodded sympathetically. “I know the type.”

“Then she got a job as a car hop somewhere, and more recently she skipped out with a married man.”

“Where’s she living?” I asked.

“She was living at the Breeze-Mount Hotel,” she said.

“Look,” I said, taking out a ten-dollar bill. “You’ve got lots of pictures of her. I want some. I haven’t time to hunt her up and then hire a photographer. How about it?”

She eyed the ten, hesitated.

“Does Mr. Calhoun know you are asking me for these pictures?”

“Will Mr. Calhoun know I gave you ten bucks?”

She took the ten.

She went to a filing cabinet, looked at a card, went to another cabinet and took out some photos. She ran through the photos, found two that were duplicates and handed me the copies.

“Will these do?”

I looked at the photos and whistled.

“Evidently those will do,” she said acidly.

“I was just surprised,” I said. “Those other pictures Mr. Calhoun has in his office weren’t so revealing.”

“Those were for the newspapers,” she said. “These were for the nominating committee.”

I said, “If you ever try out for a contest I’d sure like to know how to get on the nominating committee. How would I go about it?”

She looked me over, smiled. “Why not start your own contest?”

Before I could answer a buzzer sounded.

The secretary flashed me a dazzling smile. “Excuse me, Mr. Lam,” she said. “Mr. Calhoun wants me.”

I didn’t go out until after she had walked around the desk, so that she could see I was standing there to watch her as she walked.

She looked back over her shoulder just before she opened the door and flashed me another dazzling smile.

I walked out, looking at the photographs. They bore the signature of some Japanese photographer and on the back was the stamp, HAPPY DAZE CAMERA CO.

The Happy Daze Camera Company had a San Francisco address.

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