Murder Most Merry

CHRISTMAS PARTY – Martin Werner

People in the advertising business said the Christmas party at French & Saunders was the social event of the year. For it wasn’t your ordinary holiday office party. Not the kind where the staff gets together for a few mild drinks out of paper cups, some sandwiches sent in from the local deli, and a long boring speech by the company president. At F&S it was all very different: just what you’d expect from New York’s hottest advertising agency.

The salaries there were the highest in town, the accounts were strictly blue chip, and the awards the agency won over the years filled an entire boardroom. And the people, of course, were the best, brightest, and most creative that money could buy.

With that reputation to uphold, the French & Saunders Christmas party naturally had to be the biggest and splashiest in the entire industry.

Year after year, that’s the way it was. Back in the late Seventies, when discos were all the rage, the company took over Numero Uno. the club people actually fought over to get in. Another year, F&S hired half the New York Philharmonic to provide entertainment. And in 1989, the guest bartenders were Mel Gibson. Madonna, and the cast of LA. Law.

There was one serious side to the party. That’s when the president reviewed the year’s business, announced how much the annual bonus would be, and then named the Board’s choices for People of the Year, the five lucky employees who made the most significant contributions to the agency’s success during the past twelve months.

The unwritten part to this latter (although everyone knew it, anyway) was that each one of the five would receive a very special individual bonus— some said as high as $50, 000 apiece.

Then French & Saunders bought fifteen floors in the tallest, shiniest new office tower on Broadway, the one that had actually been praised by the N. Y. Times architecture critic.

The original plan was to hold the party in the brand-new offices that were to be ready just before Christmas. A foolish idea, as it turned out, because nothing in New York is ever finished when it’s promised. The delay meant the agency had to scramble and find a new party site—either that, or make do in the half finished building itself.

Amazingly—cleverly? —enough, that was the game plan the party committee decided to follow. Give the biggest, glitziest party in agency history amid half finished offices in which paneless windows looked out to the open skies, where debris and building supplies stood piled up in every corner, and where doors opened on nothing but a web of steel girders and the sidewalk seventy floors below.

Charlie Evanston, one of the company’s senior vice-presidents (he had just reached the ripe old of age of fifty), was chosen to be party chairman. He couldn’t have been happier. For Charlie had a deepdown feeling that this was finally going to be his year. After being passed over time and again for one of those five special Christmas bonuses, he just knew he was going to go home a winner.

Poor Charlie.

In mid-November—the plans for the party proceeding on schedule— the agency suddenly lost their multi-million-dollar Daisy Fresh Soap account, no reason given. Charlie had been the supervisor on the account for years, and although he couldn’t be held personally responsible for the loss a few people (enemies!) shook their heads and wondered if maybe someone else, someone a little stronger—and younger—couldn’t have held on to the business.

Two weeks later, another showpiece account—the prestigious Maximus Computer Systems—left the agency. Unheard of.

The trade papers gave away the reason in the one dreaded word “kickbacks.” Two French & Saunders television producers who had worked on the account had been skimming it for years.

Again, Charlie’s name came up. Not that he had anything remotely to do with the scandal. The trouble was that he personally had hired both offenders. And people remembered.

There’s a superstition that events like these happen in threes, so it was only a question of time before the next blow. And, sure enough, two weeks before Christmas, it happened. A murder, no less. A F&S writer shot his wife, her lover, and himself.

With that, French & Saunders moved from front-page sidelines in the trade papers straight to screaming headlines in every tabloid in town. In less than a month, it had been seriously downgraded from one of New York’s proudest enterprises to that most dreaded of advertising fates—an agency “in trouble.”

It was now a week before Christmas and every F&S employee was carrying around his or her own personal lump of cold, clammy fear. The telltale signs were everywhere. People making secret telephone calls to headhunters and getting their resumes in order. Bitter jokes about the cold winter and selling apples on street corners told in the elevators and washrooms. Rumors that a buyout was in the making and nobody was safe.

And yet, strange as it sounds, there were those who still thought there would be a happy ending. At the Christmas party, perhaps. A last-minute announcement that everything was as before—the agency was in good shape and, just like always, everyone would get that Christmas bonus.

Charlie was one of the most optimistic. He didn’t know why. Just a gut feeling that the world was still full of Christmas miracles and, bad times or not, he was going to be one of F&S’s five magical People of the Year.

Poor Charlie.

A few days before the party, his phone rang. It was the voice of J. Stewart French, president and chairman of the board.

“Hi, Charlie. Got a minute?”

“Sure.”

“I wonder if you’d mind coming up to my office. I’ve got a couple of things I’d like to talk to you about.”

Nothing menacing about that, thought Charlie. J probably wants to discuss the party. The food. The caterers. The security measures that would be needed so that no one would be in any danger in those half finished offices.

Very neatly, very efficiently, Charlie got out his files and headed upstairs. When he arrived in the president’s office—it was the only one that had been completely finished (vulgar but expensive, thought Charlie)—J was on the phone, his face pale and drawn, nothing like the way he usually looked, with that twelve-months-a-year suntan he was so proud of. He nodded over the phone. “Sit down, Charlie, sit down.”

Charlie sank into one of the comfortable $12,000 chairs beside the desk and waited. After a minute the conversation ended and J turned to give him his full attention. Charlie had known J for fifteen years and had never seen him so nervous and ill at ease.

Then he spoke.

“Charlie, they tell me you’ve really got the Christmas party all together. Looks like it’ll be a smash.”

“We’re hoping so, J.”

“Well, we can certainly use some good times around here. I don’t have to tell you that. It’s been a bad, bad year.”

“Things’ll be better. I know it.”

“Do you really think so, Charlie? Do you? I’d like to believe that, too. That’s why this party means so much to me. To all of us. Morale—”

“I know.”

“Well, you’ve certainly done your part. More than your part. That’s why I called you in.”

Here it comes, thought Charlie, here comes my special Christmas bonus! Ahead of time, before anyone else hears about it!

“I wanted you to be one of the first to know. The Board and I have agreed that, even with all our troubles, there’ll be something extra in everybody’s paycheck again this year. Nothing like before, of course, but it will be something.”

“That’s wonderful.”

“Yeah. Wonderful. We monkeyed around with the budget and found we could come up with a few bucks. The problem is, we’ll have to make some cuts here and there.”

“Cuts?”

“Well, for one thing, I’m afraid there won’t be any of those special bonuses this year, Charlie. And I’ll level with you—you were down for one. After all these years, you had really earned it. I can’t tell you how sorry—”

Sure, thought Charlie. “It’s not the end of the world, J,” he said. “Maybe next year.”

“No, Charlie, that’s not all. With our losses and the cost of moving—I don’t know how to tell you this, but we’re doing something else. We’re cutting back—some of our best people. I’ve never had to do anything like that in my life.”

You bastard, Charlie thought. “Go on, J,” he said. “I think I know what you’re going to say.”

J looked at him miserably. “You’re one of the people we’ll have to lose, Charlie. Wait a minute, please hear me out—it’s nothing personal. I wanted to save you. After all, we’ve been together fifteen years. I talked and talked. I even threatened to resign myself. But no one wanted to listen.”

Sure, Charlie thought.

“They said you hadn’t produced anything worthwhile in years. And there was the business of those two crazies you hired. And—”

“Is that it?” Charlie asked.

“Don’t get me wrong, Charlie. Please, let’s do the Christmas party as we planned, just as if nothing happened. As for leaving, take your time. I got you a year’s severance. And you can use your office to make calls, look around, and—”

“No problem, J.” Charlie was moving to the door. “I understand. And don’t worry about the party. Everything’s all taken care of.”

Not even a handshake.

Many people at some time or other have fantasized about killing the boss. In Charlie’s case, it was different. From the minute he heard the bad news from J, he became a changed man. Not outwardly, of course. He wasn’t about to become an overnight monster, buy a gun, make a bomb, sharpen an axe. No, he would be the same Charlie Evanston. Friendly. Smiling. Efficient. But now that he knew the worst, he began piling up all the long-suppressed injustices he had collected from J for fifteen years. The conversations that stopped abruptly when he entered an executive meeting. The intimate dinners at J’s that he and his wife were never invited to. The countless other little slights. And. finally, this.

December 20. Party time! Everyone agreed it was the best bash French & Saunders had ever thrown.

The day was fair and warm. The milling crowds that drifted from the well stocked bars and refreshment tables didn’t even notice there wasn’t a heating system. The lack of carpets, the wide-open window spaces, the empty offices—it all added to the fun.

Carefully groomed waiters in white gloves and hard hats pressed their way from room to room, carrying silver trays laden with drinks and hors d’oeuvres. A heavy metal band blared somewhere. A troupe of strolling violinists pressed in and out. From the happy faces, laughter, and noise, you’d never know the agency had a care in the world.

But Charlie Evanston knew. He pushed his way over to a small crowd pressing around J. All of them were drunk, or on the way, and J. drink in hand, was swaying slightly. His laugh was louder than anybody’s whenever one of the clients told a funny story. He spotted Charlie and shouted to him. “Charlie, c’mere a minute! Folks, you all know my old pal Charlie Evanston. We’ve been together since this place opened its doors. He’s the guy who put this whole great party together.”

There were murmurs of approval as J drew Charlie into his embrace.

“J.” Charlie said, “I just came to ask you to come over here and let me show you something.”

“Oh, Charlie, always business. Can’t it wait till next week? After the holidays?”

“No, I think it’s important. Please come over here. Let me show you.”

“Oh, for Chrissakes, Charlie. What is it?”

“Just follow me. Won’t take long.”

J pulled away from the group with a back-in-a-minute wave of his hand and followed Charlie down a narrow hall to a room that would one day become the heart of the agency’s computer operation.

It was empty. Even the floors hadn’t been finished. Just some wooden planks, a few steel beams—and the sidewalk below. J glanced around the room and turned to Charlie. “So? What’s the problem?”

“Don’t you get it, J? There isn’t a single Keep Out sign on that outside door. The workmen even forgot to lock it. Someone could walk in here and fall straight down to Broadway!”

“Oh, come on, Charlie, this place is off the beaten path—no one’s going to be coming this way. Stop worrying.”

“Yes, but—”

“No buts, Charlie. Just tell one of the security guards. My God, you drag me all the way out here just to see this. Jesus Christ, I’ll bet I could even walk across one of these steel beams. The workmen do it every day.”

It was uncanny. Charlie knew that was exactly what J would say. It was part of the macho, daredevil reputation he had cultivated so carefully. “Hey, wait a minute, J,” he said.

“No. Serious. Watch me walk across this beam right here. It can’t be more than twenty feet long. And I’ll do it with a drink in each hand.”

“Come on, J, don’t be crazy.”

But J had already taken his first tentative step on the beam—with Charlie directly behind him.

It was all so simple. Now all Charlie had to do was give J the tiniest of shoves in the back, watch him stagger and plunge over the side, and it would be all over.

As J continued to move along the beam, he seemed to grow more confident. Charlie continued to follow a few steps behind, his right arm outstretched. It was now or never. Suddenly he made his move. But J moved a couple of quick steps faster and Charlie missed J’s back by an inch. Instead, he felt himself slipping over the side. He gasped. Then all he remembered was falling.

The hospital room was so quiet you could barely hear a murmur from the corridor outside.

On the single bed there lay what looked like a dead body. Every inch was covered in a rubbery casing and yards and yards of white gauze. All you could see of what was underneath was a little round hole where the mouth was supposed to be and another opening where a blood-shot blue eye stared up at the ceiling. Charlie Evanston.

The door opened slightly, admitting J, followed by one of Charlie’s doctors.

J shuddered. He always did, every time he’d visited over the past six months. He turned to the doctor. “How’s he doing today?”

“About the same. He tries to talk a little now and then.”

“Can he hear me yet? Can he understand?”

“We think so. But don’t try and get anything out of him.”

“Yes. I know.” He bent over the bed. “Charlie. Charlie. It’s me, J. I just wanted you to know I’m here. And I want to thank you again—I guess I’ll be thanking you for the rest of my life—for reaching out and trying to save me at that damn Christmas party.”

The blue eye blinked. A tear began to tremble on the edge.

“I was a fool. Only a fool would have tried to do what I did. And you tried to stop me. I felt you grab my jacket and try to hold me back. Then you took the fall for me.”

The blue eye stared.

“So what I came to say—what I hope you can understand—is that no matter how long it takes you’re going to get the best care we can find. Just get well. Everything’s going to be okay.”

The blue eye continued to look at J without blinking.

“And, Charlie, here’s the best news of all. The agency’s just picked up three big accounts. Over a hundred million.”

A light breeze blew the curtains from the window.

“So today the Board asked me to come up here and give you a special bonus. Not a Christmas bonus—more like Purple Heart. You deserve it, Charlie. You saved the old man’s life, you bastard!”

Charlie tried to nod, but it was impossible.

“And just wait till you come back,” J said enthusiastically. “You’re a hero, Charlie! We’ve got all kinds of great things waiting for you. All kinds of plans. It’s going to be a whole new ballgame, Charlie! Imagine!”

Yeah, thought Charlie. Imagine.