Lucifer's Hammer - Larry Niven [14]
"Okay, I could live with them. But then there are a couple of dozen who couldn't stop a Time for Beany revival, but they want to show how important they are, too. So to show each other they could really stop the show if they wanted to, they raise as many objections as they can. Got the best interests of the sponsors in mind, right? Don't want to get Kalva Soap mad, right? Bullshit. But I've got to put up with it." Harvey was suddenly aware of what he sounded like, "Look, let's change the subject."
"Right. You've noticed the name of this place?"
"Security First Federal Bar. Cute. Stolen from George Carlin. About time, too."
"Right! Now maybe some others will pick up the idea. Can you see Crazy Eddie's Insurance?"
"Why not? They bought cars from Madman Muntz. How about Fat Jack's Cancer Clinic?"
"Fat Jack's Cancer Clinic and Mortuary," Czescu said.
The tightness in Harvey's neck and shoulders was going away. He drank more beer, then went to a booth where he could lean against something. Mark followed and took the opposite seat.
"Hey, Harv, when we making another run? Your bike still work?"
"Yeah." A year ago—no, dammit, two years and more—he'd said the hell with it and let Mark Czescu lead him on a ride up the coast, drinking in little bars, talking to other drifters, camping where they felt like it. Czescu took care of the bikes, and Harvey paid the bills, not that they amounted to much. It had been a time of no worries. "The bike works, but I won't get a chance to use it. When this series gets going it'll take full time."
"Anything I can get in on?" Mark asked.
Harvey shrugged. "Why not?" Mark often worked on Harvey's shows. He carried cameras or clipboards and did maintenance or just plain acted as gofer. "If you'll shut up once in awhile."
"I'm hip."
The bar was filling up. The jukebox ran out of sound, and Mark got up. "Something just for you," he said. He retrieved his twelve-string guitar from behind the bar and took a chair at the end of the room. This, too, was part of his routine: Czescu sang for drinks and meals in bars. On their run up the coast Mark had got them free steaks in half the places between L.A. and Carmel. He was good enough to be professional, but he wouldn't discipline himself; whenever he got a regular gig it didn't last a week. To Mark, those who made steady money were magicians with a secret that he couldn't quite learn.
Mark strummed an experimental chord, then began a prologue. The tune was the old cowboy number, "Cool Clear Water."
All day I face the TV waste, without a trace of culture,
Pure culture.
With soapbox operas all day long, and giveaway shows that run too long, And lead you on,
From culture.
Pure … sweet … culture.
Harvey laughed approval. A fat man at the bar sent over a pitcher of beer and Mark acknowledged with a toss of his head.
The sun goes down, and through the town you hear the cry for culture,
Sweet culture.
While lawyers grin, and cops will win, to stop the sin of culture.
Culture. Pure … culture.
There was a short break as Mark picked at the guitar. The chords jangled, obviously wrong, but obviously right too, as if Mark were searching for something he could never find.
Keep a tunin', friend, it'll set you in a trend, And your mind it's goin' to bend,
And hook you in the end, With culture. Culture. Pure culture.
Friend, can't you see, for you and me, and a mind that's free,
It's pay TV for you and me,
And culture. Culture. Pure … sweet … culture.
The guitar stopped and Mark said in a plonking voice, "Almost as much as you get from an old Bogart movie."
PURE, SWEET, CULTURE.
"Leonard Bernstein conducts the London Symphony Orchestra and the Rolling Stones in a dazzling display of
"CULTURE. Pure, sweet, culture.
"Folks, tonight we have a debate between the president