Bite The Wax Tadpole Read online

  The cricketer’s wife had just surprised everyone by answering correctly that Einstein had won the Nobel Prize for physics for his work on the photo-electric effect when the 4WD erupted onto the set in a screech of brakes and shredded tyres. It hit the corner of the raised audience seating and ploughed towards the panel of astonished celebrities. The seating collapsed. The audience screamed. The celebs dived for cover. The Genial Host tried to think of an ad-lib. The glamorous Lara fell out of her low-cut dress.

  The 4WD spun several times before coming to a halt on the exact spot where it should have been parked several hours ago. How spooky was that?

  Nev beat the white balloon down from his face and orientated himself. Having realised where he was he grabbed the holdall, jumped out of the car and headed for the door marked “Fire Exit”.

  Karl yawned, shook his head. Shit, this was ridiculous. He should be on an actor’s high here, not feeling like he’d just run a marathon in diver’s boots and not slept for three days. What the hell was going on?

  Waiting outside the door to the Bowlo set, Rosanna wriggled and scratched at her back. Perhaps it was some sort of nervous rash. Whatever, it was beginning to really annoy her. The AD gave her her cue and she pushed open the set door. Rubbing a thumb over her lower shoulder blade, she looked round for Karl, stormed over to him and slapped a photograph on the table. She knew he was supposed to be cool in this scene but the yawn was surely going too far.

  “Oh, hello.”

  “Who is she?”, demanded Rosanna with a puzzled look on her face as she scratched at her ribs.

  Karl picked up the photo. “Her? She’s my... yawn... excuse me... secretary.”

  “Oh, yes, and do you... Christ...” Her back, bottom and boobs were all beginning to itch like buggery. “Do you normally kiss your secretary?”

  “It’s a... yawn... friendly kiss, that’s all. She’d just heard her auntie’d got terminal... yawn... look, I’m really sorry... terminal cancer and I was comforting her.”

  “You bastard!”, yelled Rosanna as she reached behind her, started to pull down the zip. “You put something in my dress, didn’t you, you creepy little sod?”

  The dress slid to the floor and she stepped out of it, kicked it to one side.

  “I... I don’t know what you’re...” He fell forward, his head smashing against the table as Rosanna stood in bra and knickers, hands running madly all over her body.

  The switchboard operators looked up at the monitors, took deep breaths and prepared themselves for more calls.

  In the Control Room, Scott stared catatonically at the screens in front of him as Leo, at last galvanised into action, burst through the door.

  “Pull the plug, switch it off. For God’s sake, do something!”

  I’ll become a missionary, thought Scott.

  Fred stepped uncertainly onto the stage. “Er, yes. Right, folks, any more entries for the karaoke before we decide on a winner?”

  Throwing back his hood, Bruce jumped to his feet. He’d been a bit puzzled by these changes in the story line but he was no longer a regular cast member so he’d obviously missed something somewhere. Anyway, this was his cue. He whipped the gun from under his jacket and pointed it at Phyllida.

  “Yeah”, he said. “You got “I Shot The Sheriff?” on that machine of yours?”

  In the boiler room, Terry was having his own little karaoke party. Alarms whooped, bells rang, red lights flashed and a restraining bolt flew off the side of the G-Tech 2000. Drunk and maudlin, Terry sung along with an invisible Frank Sinatra. Yes, they’d both done it their way.

  Zing! Another restraining bolt flew off.

  The moment cometh, thought Malcolm, as Bruce moved menacingly towards the intriguingly cross-eyed Phyllida. Of course, no-one else could see Norman tripping along behind Bruce, shadowing his every movement.

  “If only you’d kept your mouth shut”, said Bruce, “taken the money, none of this would have happened.”

  “Life is but a poor player”, said Norman.

  “Just put the gun down, Tony”, said Melissa. She was quite enjoying the acting life so far though she couldn’t quite figure out why, when she said her lines, everybody looked off to their left. Probably some acting technique they taught at NIDA or wherever. “Don’t make things worse for yourself.”

  “Who struts and frets his weary hour upon the stage...”

  Bruce swung the gun towards Malcolm. “And don’t think I’ve forgotten you, Doc.”

  “And then is heard no more.” Norman turned towards Malcolm. “Come along, old boy, you’re on.”

  Malcolm, like the trouper he was, came in on his cue, plucking the gun out of his pocket and standing up.

  “Now then, which camera are we on? Ah, yes.” He turned to face the one with the red light glowing on the top. “Good evening viewers, sorry to have kept you waiting but the show, the real show, starts now.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY NINE

  In the Control Room, Leo was spitting fire with a soupcon of brimstone down the phone to the Head of Studio. “I don’t know, put on a video of your granny’s funeral, anything. You just have to get this show off the air now!”

  Jan was still stoically switching between shots whereas Scott had decided that a return to the womb would be a good temporary solution to his current difficulty and had curled up on the floor in the foetal position. While the Head of the Studio was telling Leo he couldn’t see what all the fuss was about, Leo stared with increasing disbelief at the bank of screens. What in the name of Reg Grundy was Malcolm doing now? Bruce was gamely carrying on with his lines, although his delivery was beginning to waiver.

  “Er, yeah, yeah... if you hadn’t dobbed me in. I thought doctors was like priests, you know, patient confidentiality and all that.”

  “Thank you, Bruce”, said Malcolm levelly, “your work here is done. Tirez le rideau, la farce est jouee.”

  At which point he raised the gun and put it to his temple.

  “No, no, hold it!”, Leo screamed into the phone. “Keep us on air, keep us on air!” He wasn’t quite sure what was going on but his producer’s instinct told him that it should be shown live to the nation.

  Rob, along with the many students of French literature who watched the show, recognised immediately Malcolm’s quoting of the reputed last words of Rabelais. Surely Malcolm wasn’t going to... he wouldn’t... couldn’t... live on air?

  “Yes, the farce is over”, confirmed Malcolm. “But I’m going out with a bang, literally. I suppose the Network could pull the plug but I doubt it. If it’s a choice between good taste and good ratings, blood and brains on the studio floor win every time.”

  He was. He was going to do it. Live. On air. Rob dashed open the door to the Control Room. “Have you seen what’s happening?”

  Leo had taken Scott’s place in front of the monitors and was now calling the shots for Jan. “Yeah, fantastic, isn’t it? Eat your heart out, Davies Cup tennis.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve even got the big cheese to drop the ad breaks. We’re going to stay with this right till the end. Go to two.”

  Rob was struggling to believe this. Leo was one of the good guys. How could he be taking part in this madness? Because the whole thing was mad. Television was a madhouse run by mad people in order to entertain the insane while selling them dog food. Maybe he was the only sane person left in the industry. Which, in a totally logical sense, made him the mad one, the one out of kilter with everyone else. Whatever. He didn’t want to be a part of it any longer.

  In the same time frame, things were happening in several elsewheres.

  Nev had made it outside the studio and was sprinting, still clutching the holdall, unseen by the police, through the car park towards the helicopter.

  Niobe, a raincoat wrapped around her slashed nightdress, flashed her pass at Craig the security guard who was on the phone to Head Office about the wailing sirens and crashing cars and walked determinedly towards the studio entrance.


  A taxi drew up and out jumped Phyllida followed by Rupert, the poodle. This made Craig even more bewildered as he’d just seen her on live TV.

  “You see”, Malcolm continued, gun still pointed at his temple, “my days in this superannuated sudser were numbered anyway Thanks to the bunch of dull, cretinous, ratings obsessed philistines who run this empire of entertainment mediocrity.”

  “I think you can safely say your bridges are well and truly up in flames now, old boy,” said Norman.

  “Not that I’d have lasted much longer in or out of the show. I’ve got a brain tumour, you see. Oh, and in case anyone thinks this is a prop...”

  He extended his arm and, knowing he was no Deadeye Dick, took careful aim at the largest target he could find and squeezed the trigger. Having never fired a real gun before the kick took him by surprise and he staggered backwards. The mirror behind the bar shattered into an expanding galaxy of glass and silver.

  “A hit”, Norman cried excitedly amidst the general cringing, screaming and ducking . “A very palpable hit.”

  Rob started towards the set door. He knew that the script no longer belonged to him but at the end of the day and the coming up of the sun it was still his work that was going to be forever associated with Malcolm’s suicide. Which might frighten off the AWGIE judge’s a little. Besides, he quite liked old Malcolm. Maybe he could use the same skills that he brought to script meetings, the bullshitting, to talk him out of pulling the trigger. It was a long shot, poor choice of phrase, but worth a try.

  Recovering quickly, Malcolm put the hot and smoky barrel back to his temple. A million shards of glass sparkled under the studio lights. If that’s what a bullet can do, he reflected, there was little danger of ending up with a flesh wound.

  “Yes, where was I? Right, yes, so it came down to a choice between spending my last remaining days on this earth turning into a dribbling idiot with only a superannuated extra from the “Canterville Ghost” for company.”

  “I was actually in that film, you know.”

  “Why doesn’t that surprise me? Or go out with all guns blazing. Well, one gun anyway. I certainly don’t want to end up like him...”

  He nodded at the empty space between himself and the bar.

  “... dripping through the floorboards into someone’s cockaleekie soup.”

  Indeed he didn’t. It was time. One last ironic grin for the camera and it would be all over. His finger tensed on the trigger...

  “Wait!” The set door was thrust open. “ Let me through, I’m a psychiatrist”

  Malcolm had anticipated some sort of rush from security guards or the police. The appearance of the Welsh chap from the Script Department was unsettling.

  Attempting to escape by helicopter was close to, but not total, insanity on Nev’s part. He’d hit on the plan to smuggle drugs into the country when staring out of his office window one day. A bad day as it happened. The phone call from his accountant had confirmed that his assets now amounted to considerably less than a hill of beans while his debts were fast approaching the size of a 14th dynasty Egyptian pyramid. The accountant had advised bankruptcy. “Start again, mate. Wipe the slate clean. Oh, and give up the booze and the drugs, yeah?” Drugs... how there’s a thought, Nev had thought as the ‘copter came in over the neighbourhood rooftops sending the trees swaying and the grass dancing. In an instant he’d seen that it was the perfect vehicle for smuggling drugs into the country from boats lying offshore. Who was going to suspect the Channel Twelve chopper as it flitted hither and yon? It was an Archimedes –like epiphany, one which had caused him to yell out, rather less succinctly than the soaking Greek, “Well, fuck me sideways with a bargepole!” He knew enough people on the periphery of the illicit substances business and had no doubt he could find an introduction to someone who knew someone who could put him touch with one of the head honchos. First, however, he had to make sure he could get use of the helicopter. He’d casually made the acquaintance of Vince the pilot and, lo and behold, it was as if his plan was made in heaven. Or possibly hell, depending on your point of view vis-a-vis the drugs trade. Vince was a chap who liked the finer things in life and more of them if possible. It had taken almost no effort at all to persuade him that picking up a few packages from boats was easy money. During some of their airborne discussions, Vince had showed Nev the rudiments of piloting. Of course, had his brain not been full of adrenaline and metamphetamines, the thought of actually taking control of a helicopter was one that would have been laughingly dismissed. As it was...

  Nev threw the holdall into the back of the chopper and himself into the pilot’s seat. Now then, what was the drill?

  Cynosure was one of those words that Rob knew the meaning of but had never had occasion to use in his writing or, indeed, in general conversation. But as the eyes of the cast and crew and the vast, unseen viewing audience turned towards him the word flashed into his head neon bright. The silence was as heavy as a wet horse blanket. His throat felt paralysed. His chest heaved.

  “Dr Morris, Thank god I’ve found you in time!”, he said, hoping that he was channelling Anthony Hopkins.

  “What?” Malcolm’s eyebrows furrowed as the gun wavered.

  “Yes... you have to come back to the hospital. You... you shouldn’t have been discharged...”

  “What on earth are you babbling about?”

  “The accident you had this morning. Your car ran into a power pole in Randwick. Don’t you remember? Well, you had concussion so possibly you don’t but...”

  Malcolm unfurrowed his eyebrows and firmed his grip on the gun. “Now, where was I? Ah, yes, camera two.”

  “You’re hallucinating again. You’re in the bowling club. There aren’t any cameras.”

  “Saints preserve us! This is a TV show. Those are the cameras.” He pointed the gun towards the audience at home then swung it around the set causing much ducking and cringing. “These poor benighted wretches are all actors. And he...” Here he aimed the gun at an empty space intermediate between himself and Rob. “He is a dead actor.”

  “Alas”, agreed Norman.

  Rob felt confident enough to take a step closer to Malcolm.

  “When you were at the hospital you thought you were a brain surgeon, tried to perform a lobotomy on one of the porters with a ball point pen.”

  Norman adopted his thoughtful pose. “I think he’s trying some sort of psychology. They can be quite clever some of these writer johhnies.”

  Nev’s escape plan would not have got off the ground, literally, had not Vince left the keys in the ignition. Which he had thoughtfully, or unthinkingly, done. Getting the engine turning over was, therefore, not a problem and the blades were soon spinning. What next? Ah, yes, the stick thing by his left hand. This controlled going up and down... and the bent stick thing in front controlled your direction. And the pedals? What the hell did they do? They must do something, he reasoned, so while his hands jostled the sticks, he moved the pedals up and down. The engine roared and the body of the chopper started to vibrate violently. And then it started to rise.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  In homes around Australia, heads were being shaken and scratched. The voice-over bloke with the raspy larynx had told them this was the one episode they shouldn’t miss and although they heartily agreed with him they were confused. Phone calls, texts and tweets were sent. “ U watching R St?” Channels were changed and the viewing figures soared.

  In the Control Booth, Leo thumped the table. What the hell was Rob doing in there? The bloke was just about to shoot himself and he steps in and ruins it all! It would later occur to him that he was, at that moment, advocating that a man take his own life for the sake of the television ratings. It would be a very sobering thought. But he was able to console himself with the figures that showed that 68.2% of viewers shared his lack of concern for Malcolm’s continued existence.

  Rob was warming to the role. A doctor from the Psych Department at St Somebody or Other.

  “You’ve got
what we doctors call Traumatic Delusional Amnesia. You’re actually a doctor yourself but you think you’re an actor playing a version of yourself in a TV show. Surprisingly common delusion, actually.”

  He took another step closer. He knew what his next line should be: “Give me the gun.” He held out his hand. “Give me the...”

  “There you are, you bitch!”

  Phyllida strode through the fourth wall like the avenging angel she felt she was. Rupert, teeth bared like a canine Count Dracula, growled beside her. There were gasps and double-takes as she flew at Melissa who instantly grabbed a chair and threw it into her sister’s path. It hit Phylidda mid-thigh. She avoided the worst of the blow by sidestepping into the bemused Malcolm , sending him spinning. Melissa seized the chance to grab the gun from his weakened grip. She stepped back, aiming at, or at least waving the gun in the general direction of, Phyllida.

  “Oh, dear”, said Norman, “the plot unravels.”

  “Okay, bit of a change of plan, no problem”, snarled Melissa. “I was going to do for you anyway so why not do it on prime time TV, eh? Say your prayers, kiddo. Aagh!”

  She screamed as Rupert the pissed-off poodle sank his teeth into her leg. “Get off me, you fucking little cotton bud!” She swung around like a one-legged dervish, trying desperately to fling the suddenly savage dog aside. Instantly, Kevin and Malcolm both made a grab for the gun. Their hands locked round Melissa’s wrist and all three of them spun round in a lunatic version of a Highland fling. A sword dance sans sword avec gun. Round and round they whirled.

  “Let go of me!”

  “Give it here!”

  “It’s mine, I paid for the bloody thing.”

  Phyllida joined in, jumping on her sister’s back and pulling her hair. Melissa fell backwards and the scrum collapsed. Three hands hit the floor at the same time. And the gun went off. Instinctively, Roy the Wrangler hit the remote control button.