Part 7
The
cow flashes her teats
IT WASN'T
Norman J. Hit's idea to investigate the wind. It was a mission from
the editor, Mr D.O.B. Leggs.
Mr Leggs
frequently came up with what seemed to be batty ideas. Sometimes they
worked; mostly they didn't.
His latest
offering was The Pick Of The Crop's win-a-cow competition which
sprang from a staff meeting he called to explore new ways of boosting circulation.
veryone
from executives to the copyboy attended but Mr Leggs belittled and
dismissed every idea they dared to suggest.
"I
know!'' he finally said, to his own delight and everyone else's
horror. "We'll give away a cow at the grand final.''
Norman,
like the others, couldn't believe his ears.
Nobody in
Windy Mountain raised cows. Apples, yes. Pears, yes. Sheep, only for
the mountain oysters. But cows? Nobody kept cows!
Mr Leggs'
plan was simple. For a reader to be in the running for a fine
Friesian milking cow, all he or she had to do was correctly guess the
name of the cow and say in 50 words or less why The Pick Of The Crop
was their favourite family newspaper.
In the
lead-up to the grand final, the newspaper tried to get as much
mileage as it could out the project, with the cow flashing her teats
on Page Three most days.
At first,
many people in Windy Mountain entered the competition but most of
them wrote much fewer than 50 words.
Mr Leggs
hoped to draw the winner on the half-forward flank of the football
ground during the half-time break of the grand final.
He
envisaged parading the cow on to the oval to the approving roar of
the crowd and then announcing the winner after a fanfare of trumpets
from the Windy Mountain Brass Band.
He told
his chief-of-staff, Bob Maurice, to make the arrangements.
Norman
buried himself in his reporting work, seriously tackling anything and
everything that he was told to pursue.
He was
regarded by his colleagues as a bit of an oddball.
He didn't
seem have any girlfriends or hobbies away from work.
He had
moonlighted as a chess columnist for a Hobart newspaper, the Mercury,
but this only served to puzzle people more because no one had ever
seen Norman actually playing chess.
Norman
lived in a little shack about 30 minutes walk from The Pick Of The
Crop's offices and he strolled to work, much to the bewilderment of
his work-mates who were lost without a car by which to judge Norman.
Mr Leggs,
for instance, drove a big white eight-cylinder car which told the
skilled observer that the editor considered himself to be righteous
and powerful.
At the
other end of the scale, The Pick Of The Crop's copyboy, Matthew
Mitchell, drove a rust-encrusted old jalopy with an old pair of
pyjamas stuffed down the hole where the petrol cap used to be.
This told
his work-mates two important things about Mitch: he couldn't afford a
decent car and he didn't wear pyjamas bottoms to bed.
Norman J.
Hit, however, was a mystery.
He had a
driver's licence so why didn't he have a car? He was earning a good
wage, wasn't he?
Nobody knew.
Because he
didn't have a car, they couldn't tell much about him at all.
One day Mr
Leggs summoned Norman and his notebook to his office, asked him to
sit down in a chair that was considerably lower than his, and looked
sternly down over the top of his half-moon gold-rimmed glasses.
This
wasn't an unusual occurrence at The Pick Of The Crop.
Mr Leggs
never worried about treading on the toes of his right-hand man,
chief-of-staff Bob Maurice who, technically at least, was supposed to
assign all stories to reporters and photographers.
Whenever
Mr Leggs had an idea, he simply summoned a chosen reporter to his
office and set him loose on the job - invariably without any
consultation with the chief-of-staff.
Consequently,
overworked reporters often only half-finished stories and it wasn't
unusual for two reporters from The Pick Of The Crop to arrive at the
same meeting - one on orders from the editor, the other on orders
from the chief-of-staff.
This
bothered Bob Maurice a lot but Mr Leggs was unperturbed.
He
justified his actions with the simple conclusion that Bob Maurice was
an incompetent fool.
He thought
the same about most of his staff.
"Norman,
my boy,'' said the editor. "I've got a special assignment for
you . . . I want you to find out where the wind comes from.''
"Eh?"
said Norman, puzzled.
"The
wind, my boy, the wind. I want you to find out where it comes from.''
Norman
gulped. "You're joking, aren't you, sir?''
"Certainly
not. Don't be impertinent,'' snapped Mr Leggs "The wind, my
boy, is one of the great discussion points of our society. It's
something that's common to all our readers. They talk about the wind
in the pub, at the football, in the hair salons. They want to know
more about the wind; they deserve to know more. I think you're the
young man right for this job.''
"But-but-but
. . .'' stuttered Norman.
"No
buts, my boy,'' said the editor. "Consider this a long-term
assignment. I want you to make a note of this.''
"Yes,
sir,'' said Norman, taking his notebook out of his left-side jacket
pocket and his pen from the chest pocket of his shirt.
As Norman
waited, pen poised, the editor peered thoughtfully at a blank spot
high on the wall and ran his fingers over his smoothly-shaven chin.
After a
moment or two, he began with his instructions.
"I
want to know where the wind comes from,'' he said, as Norman
dutifully started to scribble. "Is there only a certain amount
of wind in the world? If it's windy in Windy Mountain does that mean
it's calm at Slutz Plains? If there's no wind in Windy Mountain where
the heck does it all go? Get the idea?''
"Yes,
sir, I think I do,'' Norman lied.
"Good
boy. This should make a fine article. It's a chance to make a name
for yourself, young Norman.''
Norman
left the editor's office not knowing whether to laugh or cry. Had Mr
Leggs really flipped this time? Was this all a surrealistic dream?
Investigate the wind? Was this what journalism was all about?
Norman
slumped into his chair and looked blankly at the wall. He clearly was
in shock. After five minutes, he finally mustered the strength to
rise and stumble to the office urn where he made himself a cup of
coffee. He took it back to his desk and drank it slowly while he
considered his options.
He
realised through deduction, however, that there was no option.
To defy
the editor, no matter what the reason, was a fate worse than death
for a young reporter. Mr Leggs might not have had a firm grip on
reality but he had an iron grip on demotions and promotions.
Journalists
who fell foul of Mr Leggs usually wound up on the sub-editor's desk,
which Norman regarded as the last stop before reviewing books and dying.
As far as
he, and most of his young colleagues, were concerned sub-editors were
has-beens or never-wills: mostly overweight, hairy fellows who were
committed to changing reporters' beautiful words with little regard
for the thought, time and effort that had gone into them.
Sub-editors
worked strange hours, rarely venturing out into the daylight without
dark sun-glasses. They arrived for work after the sun went down and
left for home a few hours before it rose again.
They had
strange culinary habits, often eating their breakfast before they
went to bed because they rarely woke up until at least lunchtime.
In their
leisure time, they tended to smoke a lot, get drunk a lot and get
divorced a lot.
Norman
wanted more out of life than that. He thought it would be a good
career move to at least try to find the wind. He felt certain that,
this time, he at least would have the story on its own.
Bob
Maurice was very unlikely to assign a reporter to investigate the wind.
