Advanced Mythology (11 page)

“Uh-huh,” Dorothy said, with a summing-up look, as she swept sample books off its surface and put them in a heap next to her desk. “We’ll see how you feel later on when we’re bumping elbows. We’ll see how
I
feel. I may want to throw you to the wolves or stick you in the fire-escape stairwell.” She sat down and waved him to the other chair. “So what’s your great idea?”

Keith held out the creative brief. “This is for the airline magazines, right?”

“And
Newsweek
, and fifty other glossies.”

“Yeah, but we can do something dynamic with the Origami for travelers. How about just a really simple headline: ‘Ready to take off when you are.’ We could make it look like it’s about to take flight.”

Dorothy’s eyebrows went up and she reached for her drawing pad. “I like it. Yeah. You know, I looked up a book on origami after the first meeting. It’s around here somewhere.” She and Keith bent down to sort through the books on the floor. “Yeah. Here it is. There’s one classic design that’s supposed to be lucky.” She paged through until she came to a pinched figure with bent points coming off it at several angles. “It’s the crane, the symbol of long life. The legend is that if you fold a thousand cranes your wish will come true.”

Keith’s eyes danced. “That’s great. It pulls in a feeling of magic. That would be good.”

“If we don’t say the word ‘magic,’” Dorothy said, shaking her head warningly. “You would not
believe
what things are taboo. You can have people with tattoos selling brokerage accounts, but the second you bring in the pixie dust, you’re toast.”

“Too bad,” Keith said, waggling his eyebrows. “Magic is my middle name. Well, one of them. I like the idea of the crane, though.” He scooted his chair closer as Dorothy started sketching. “Can you make the Origami look like the origami? The keyboard looks like a pair of wings, but the head and neck would be too wide.”

“I think I can do it,” Dorothy said slowly, concentrating as she worked. “Oh, yes, look at that. If we change the perspective, tilt it a little and give it a backlight, they’ll see the outline as much as the screen part. Yes, I like that. Here, what do you think?”

“That’s terrific. You really can draw! You said a thousand cranes,” he added speculatively after a moment. “What about having one in the middle, and 999 others fading off into the distance?”

“No, little boy. If you really want to draw the eye, you don’t want more than three main elements in your design. Any more than that, you lose focus.”

“Well, there’s only one product,” Keith reasoned. “They’d be all the same element.”

“Yes, but you want the name and the company as well. You don’t want those surrounded by clutter. But make it clear by emphasis and placement what you want them to look at first. That would be the unit itself.”

“Make sure the screen shows,” Keith said, scooting his chair over so he could see better.

“I know, I know. Don’t bother the lady while she’s working.”

“Wow, that’s great,” he exclaimed, as she changed the whole perspective with a few penciled lines. “Yeah, it just jumps out at you, doesn’t it? That’s just right.”

Dorothy glanced at him. “That’s what I think, too. No argument?”

“None at all,” Keith assured her. “It’s terrific. It works just like you said it would.”

“It all started from your headline,” Dorothy acknowledged. “This is screwy. We’re just too compatible.” She raised her chin defiantly. “This is just ’cause I knew you from before.”

“Maybe,” Keith said carefully, not wanting to read too much into the moment, “maybe we just think alike.”

“Wouldn’t that be weird,” Dorothy said, dropping back in her chair and looking Keith square in the eye, “if it turned out that we were thrown together over a year ago because we were meant to work together? I mean, we had some mojo going back then, when we were coming up with fake ads for Paul, but this is just falling together, bang-bang-bang.”

“Is that why you called me?”

“No,” Dorothy said, going back to the sketch. “I told you, Gadfly came across so weird at the first meeting with the top bananas that I wanted someone with a different perspective sitting in on the creative pitch. You always came up with the strangest things, at the drop of a hat. I thought they were going to ask for the usual dog-and-pony show, like a lot of the big accounts do. I had no idea that their idea of an audition was to name the product. I struck lucky there, too. They could just have easily taken a walk over to a different house. Every agency in Chicago was ready to pitch them. Tech companies are big, big money. I remembered that you had a creative mind, and you were easy to work with. Seems I was right.” She shot a quick glance at him. “It’s too much to hope that I was sensing the copywriter I’m going to be paired with for my whole creative life. You know, there’s some legendary teams out there. But that would be too scary.”

“I don’t know why,” Keith said. “I believe in magic, so seeing the future’s not that far out of range.”

“Now, don’t you go talking like that and scaring the customer,” Dorothy scolded him, rapping him on the wrist with the pencil.

“It’ll just be between you and me,” Keith assured her. He leaned closer to see what she was doing. “I think the image ought to be higher up on the page.”

“I was just moving it!” Dorothy exclaimed. “Hmm … I think … just slightly above center line. Yes.”

“That’s it!” Keith said excitedly. “Sorry, I know the art’s your department, but where it is right now, your eye has to go to it.” He piled junk on the layout page around her drawing. “See? It’s still the first thing you see.”

“I know, little boy, I know. Let Mama work, okay?”

Dorothy lettered out Keith’s headline on a 4x6 card and held it at different angles to the image of the “crane.” “I like this spot best,” she said, setting it on the page at a 45-degree angle above and to the right of the picture of the Origami. “This way, the dynamic line of the image draws your eye diagonally up to the headline. Since people read from left to right, they’ll look at the picture first, the headline second. And … we’ll put the rest of the copy into a block in the lower right section of the ad. If we leave the left side of the ad clear except for the picture, it’ll be stronger than having copy run straight across. It says we think it can speak for itself.”

“It can talk,” Keith said, grinning. “It can do anything. I can’t wait until it’s for sale. I hope I can afford it.”

“And the elements form a triangle. Hmm, company name and logo at the bottom in bolder print, maybe two or three points larger. That’s visually interesting. I like it.”

“Me, too,” Keith agreed. “I’d better work out some copy, then.”

“We can slot in dummy copy for now,” Dorothy said. “Let me get the keyliner to run up a rough for the others to look at. Hot stuff, Keith.”

“The same to you,” he said, sketching a bow to her. “You know, we really do work together pretty well.”

Dorothy eyed him up and down with a half-smile as she picked up the ad sketch. “We do, at that.”

* * *

When she returned from the production department, Keith was sitting at the table staring out the window and tapping his pencil against his teeth.

“It’ll be done soon,” Dorothy said. “I caught Cary with a free moment. What’re you thinking?”

Keith swung around, the pencil still at his lips. “That poster is still up for grabs,” he said thoughtfully.

“What poster?”

“The one that’s going to be used for billboards and bus wraps. I want to do that one, too.”

Dorothy shook her head. “I think Doug’s going to give it to Rollin and Janine.”

Keith sat up eagerly. “No, I think we can do it better. I want to do it. Badly. How do I get Doug to let us have it instead of the others? … It is
us,
isn’t it?”

Dorothy gave a big, mock sigh. “It’s us. For better or worse. You get an ad that’ll have prominent exposure by doing a good job on this one.”

“Do you think he’ll go for it based on ‘Ready to take off …’?”

“The way things are done these days, you have to have a rough of the billboard for them to look at.” She saw that his eyes were dancing. “You have an idea already.”

“Yes,” Keith said, barely able to stay in his chair.

“What is it?”

Keith leaned in close. “Doug all but designed it himself. Remember what he said? A photo of hands operating the Origami, with an overlay of words, all the functions the Origami has. It’d be so simple, and I think, totally effective.”

“You’d have to have a killer headline.”

“I do,” Keith said, jumping up and spreading his hands across the sky. “‘One of everything.’”

Dorothy stared at him, a slow grin starting on her face. “It’s got a bundle of meanings besides the obvious, and it’ll make people read the overlay. Yes, that’s so simple they’d jump for it. And Doug will like it because he’s already thought of it.”

Keith smiled wide enough to swallow his ears. “That would
never
have occurred to me.”

“See? You belong in advertising,” Dorothy said, picking up her sketch pad. “You lie like a master.”

* * *

But Janine and Rollin had decided to make a pitch for the high-profile poster, too. The keyliners were kept busy that afternoon, as both teams hurried to have a rough layout ready to present. At four o’clock, both teams appeared in Doug’s office, clamoring for the assignment. As Dorothy predicted, Doug was already inclined toward the design he had suggested so offhandedly.

“I like yours, too,” Doug assured Janine and Rollin. “It’s kicky. I like the headline, ‘Fold it your way.’ Don’t get me wrong. I’m sure we’ll be able to use it later. But this one is good. I’m surprised.” He nodded to Keith, who acknowledged it without speaking. He had wanted to show Doug that the idea had come from his own suggestion, but Dorothy told him not to bring that up unless asked. The others would already know it. “And,” Dorothy had said privately to Keith, with a grin, “they’ll be kicking themselves they didn’t pick up on it first.”

“It’ll be expensive to do,” Rollin argued. “It’ll need a fresh overlay for every language. We’d have to get translations of the features for each country the ad goes to.”

“We’ll have to have that anyhow for the box layout,” Doug said. “We’ll already have all the descriptive copy in hand. The owner’s manual is in eight languages including Russian, Mandarin Chinese, and Japanese.”

He turned to Keith and Dorothy. “So, what’s going in here?” he asked, pointing to the image of the Origami screen, still blank.

“We’re still working on that,” Dorothy said. Keith had pleaded with her not to put anything in that Doug would demand in the final. He had an idea, and wanted nothing to interfere with it. “We have to figure out what won’t detract from the overlay.”

“Yeah,” Doug said, stroking his chin. “All right, kids. Put some thought to that. Show me on Monday or Tuesday. In the meantime, good work.”

“Slick,” Rollin muttered to Keith as they left the room. “You trying to do us out of a job?”

“There’s enough assignments for everyone,” Keith said sincerely. He didn’t want to create ill-will among the full-time employees.

“Back to work, Doyle,” Dorothy said, pointing toward her office. “I’ve got to e-mail the rough to the client. They might kill the whole thing anyhow,” she added, with a meaningful look toward Rollin and Janine. “You never know.”

Grudgingly, the other team withdrew. Keith didn’t wait. He strode back to Dorothy’s office and closed the door. He needed privacy for a telephone call he wanted to make.

***

Chapter 10

“It’s perfect,” Keith said, spreading the sheet out on the kitchen table for all the Little Folk to look at. He’d made the drive from his apartment to the farm in record time that Friday evening, the old Mustang practically flying down the long Illinois highway on pure excitement. It had been a glorious summer evening, full of birds calling as they soared over the lush, green cornfields, but all Keith could see in his mind was the layout for the advertisement. “The empty screen is just sitting there. It has to have something on it. Why not put the invitation to the party out all around the world for free, courtesy of Gadfly and the Origami? ‘Come one, come all, to the Mythical Beings Grand Reunion!’ This will be on billboards, walls, posters, even on the sides of buses, in every country that buys electronics. Everyone will see it.”

“Everyone who lives in a city, you mean,” Maura corrected him, joggling Asrai on her hip as she helped put away the dinner dishes. “Why would you think that most beings like ourselves will be within range of seeing this advertisement?”

“There’d be at least one poster near places like Midwestern. That’s where I found you folks, isn’t it? And the folks who see it can pass along the news to others.”

“That is, assuming they know any others,” Holl said. “We don’t.”

“What if there are no others?” Maura asked.

“Sure there are,” Keith exclaimed. “You know the air sprites. They’ve told me they have seen lots of beings not strictly human or animal. And there’s that grouchy guy I ran into in Scotland. Who knows? There could be
hundreds
of races and thousands of beings out there who are just dying to come to a great party. The trouble is getting the word out is very tricky. I didn’t want it so obvious that we’d get fairy-hunters or UFOlogists showing up. It’s just supposed to be a nice party like a family reunion. A big family, with maybe a few more, uh, unusual talents than most.”

“Many of the creatures of legend are no more family to us than you are,” Catra said. As Archivist she stayed as neutral in village disputes as she could, but on this issue Keith knew she was more of a Conservative.

“I dinna like it,” Curran said, his white eyebrows low over his bright blue eyes. “And so we’ll be invaded next spring by a crowd o’ strange beings, comin’ and goin’ as they please, who’ll know where we are forever after? I still dinna care much for the trampings in and out of Big Folk … er, present company is excepted, o’course.”

“Thanks, Curran. But it’ll be fun. You’ll see,” Keith promised. He observed the elders exchange sour glances. Evidently their faction was still not completely on board about the party. He hoped they would still let it go forward. The Master had given his approval, but he could still withdraw it if there was enough of a popular outcry. He’d have to sound Holl out on the subject later. It’d be impossible to pull the invitation back once it had gone out around the world. He didn’t have to hammer that home; they knew it. He would know by the time he went home if he was going to be able to do it or not. Mentally, he crossed his fingers and looked hopeful.

Catra looked over the advertisement. “The text would have to be brief. There’s little room there.”

“It’s going to be a poster,” Keith replied. “The available area will be at least a foot across, and much bigger on billboards. Naturally we want to avoid any recognizable words. Is that a problem?”

Holl tilted his head, reading the text that Keith had written out. “Like any other migratory people, we’ve picked up words from the lands we’ve traveled through. A few of German, many English, and Irish, a scattering of other tongues.”

“Well, could it be done without using any adopted words?” Keith asked. “Go back to the base language without confusing anybody?”

Holl shrugged. “I don’t know if anybody but our folk would be able read it, new words or no.”

“Yeah, but it’s my best shot,” Keith pleaded. “If I use sign language or symbols somebody might figure it out. I thought that if you used your own alphabet, we’d minimize the possibility of unwanted guests. And, if no one at PDQ can read it, they won’t be tempted to cut any of it out. Besides, it’ll look pretty.”

“That it would,” Maura smiled. Keith’s eyes grew dreamy.

“Just think,” he said. “By next month, it’ll be on buses in France, on billboards across the US, on hoardings in Germany and the UK, in magazines in Japan … maybe even on the Internet!”

Eyebrows went up all over the room.

“You may get more than you can handle, Keith Doyle,” Maura warned him.

“Better too many people at the party than too few,” he said cheerfully.

“Perhaps seven lines of print, then?” Catra asked, already interested.

“You’ll do it?” Keith asked, delighted.

“I see no reason not to, unless the Master objects.”

“Not at this time,” the red-haired schoolmaster said, his blue eyes glinting with amusement behind his glasses. “A most creatif solution to a difficult problem. I congratulate you, Meester Doyle.”

“Thanks, sir,” Keith said, reddening with pleasure. “It was just such an opportunity I couldn’t let it pass. I had to grab for the assignment.”

The teacher nodded. “Uf course. And how goes the progress on your other assignment?”

Keith blanched. “I, well, uh …”

Catra cleared her throat and shook the paper at the two men. “I can have this for you before you go Sunday night.”

“That would be terrific,” Keith said, grateful for the rescue. “I told them I wanted to play with it a little. Dorothy will let me get away with this. So long as I’m discreet, that is.”

“Too late,” Catra said, chuckling. “You’re a living billboard yourself, but a benevolent one.”

“Thanks, I think.”

She departed, already muttering phrases to herself under her breath. The Elf Master turned to Keith.

“And now, Meester Doyle, about your essay?”

Keith smiled winningly. “Could I turn it in at class on Sunday?”

The Master peered at him over his gold glasses. Was that a twinkle Keith could see in his eyes? “Very vell. I hope you are as confincing in your paper as you haf been this efening.”

“Would you like some coffee or tea?” Maura asked, setting Asrai in Keith’s lap.

“Coffee would be great,” he said gratefully. “I’m half asleep after the drive. By the way, dinner was terrific. I didn’t know how hungry I was. Hiya, pumpkin,” he added, tickling Asrai under the ear.

The toddler giggled. “I’m not pumpkin.”

“You’re not? Then why do you have a green stem?” He touched her on the top of the head. Asrai wriggled off his lap and ran to look in a mirror.

“You will make a fine father one day,” Maura said, watching her daughter with great fondness.

“Yeah,” Keith replied, a trifle wistfully. “I hope so.”

“How goes the progress on making your dream come true?” Holl asked, carrying a tray of mugs to the table. He set down Keith’s personal mug before him. Maura filled it with coffee.

“Well, you know, the salary sounded like a huge amount of money when I started, but I’ve got so many expenses. To give Dunn a break I’m picking up half the rent on the Crash Site right now.”

“Such an unfortunate name,” the Elf Master said, stirring milk into his tea. Asrai discovered she did not have a pumpkin stalk growing out of her head, and ran back to jump into her grandfather’s lap. Keith grinned at the resemblance between them, especially the owlish gaze. Asrai’s hair was a softer auburn, not the Master’s carroty red, but her eyes were the same color and shape, and she had that firm family chin. A good thing Holl was a diplomat at heart. “But I do understand the reference.”

“It’s only appropriate half the time. It
looks
like three guys live there, but Dunn’s programming hardly ever crashes. He is the most cautious guy in the world.”

“He has always maintained good scholarly habits, vit the exception of timeliness. His latest assignment is qvite late.”

“You wouldn’t believe how much he’s got going,” Keith explained, quick to defend his friend and roommate. “His brother is trying to raise venture capital for Uhuru Enterprises. It’s an excruciating process that takes months, if not years. I’ve offered to help him set up his presentations, but they’re not ready to show off yet. There’s a lot involved. And I thought advertising was complicated.” Maura poured more coffee for Keith, and tapped the side of his cup with her finger. He smiled at her and took a hearty sip. “Thanks. This is really good.”

“How is this vocal-recognition program different from what’s for sale already?” Holl asked.

“Well, you can organize different parts of your dictation by using voice commands,” Keith said. “It works really well. I’ve been using it to divide my notes into personal, business, school and your class,” he addressed the Master, then decided he’d better not dwell on that subject for long.

Holl, watching his expression, laughed. The Master wasn’t going to tease him any longer. Keith had apologized, and that was all the teacher ever asked, that and getting the assignments in as soon as possible. Keith was allowed a great deal of leeway for his generosity and willingness to let them make a fool of him. He never cared if he was the butt of their jokes, so long as he was allowed to be there among them. He would always be bigger and slower than they were, and he accepted the differences without rancor or resentment. He had remarkable grace of character. The Folk could have done far worse, Holl reflected, than trusting this one Big Person, out of the millions and billions. He could have revealed them to the world, but he kept their secret almost dearer than his own life.

“And do you still enjoy the job, now that you must answer to PDQ as an employer, rather than as an educational experience?” Holl asked.

“More than ever,” Keith said happily. “I’d like to keep going on the creative side, but sometimes I think I would like to get out there and find them clients. PDQ is a good firm. They treat their customers with respect, and they have a lot of fun making up the accounts. I mean, it’s a bloodthirsty business, but I like a challenge. Say, when are you going to let me do a campaign for you?”

Curran and the other elders looked alarmed. “A campaign?”

“To vhat end?” the Master inquired.

“Well, to advertise Hollow Tree’s products,” Keith explained. “We could really increase orders with the right kind of ad. If I pay for studio time, I can use the agency’s equipment and get a really professional look. Christmas is coming. How about a flyer mailed out to retail stores with new offerings for this year? The right look could even get you into the department store chains.”

“No, thank you,” Holl said firmly. “We are doing well enough with the accounts we have. Too much expansion would stretch us past our capacity. If our needs exceed our income, we will work out a different way to earn money.”

“Like the high-class art,” Keith said, nodding. “Well, how about a website? I know you bought Hollow Tree Industries dot-com. I checked. It’s in the registry with my name on it.”

Holl cleared his throat. “Our action was mostly to secure it to prevent another from taking it and ruining our reputation. We are proud of the quality of our work. We wouldn’t want anyone wandering about on the Internet pretending to be us.”

“So why not use it?” Keith asked reasonably. “You’ve already got an account with the shipping companies. You could set up a mail-order fulfillment service pretty easily.”

The Folk looked at one another.

“Now, that may be of interest,” said Holl. “We could sell our wares at a further remove from the customer. We will one day saturate this market. In fact, the day is not long in coming. Very well, we will talk about it.”

“Not now, if it’s okay with you,” Keith said, fighting back a yawn. “Wow. I didn’t realize how keyed up I was. Where can I sleep?”

“We’ve set up a bed for you in the workshop,” Maura said. “I’ll show you. If you wouldn’t mind watching Asrai, father?”

The Elf Master, arm around his granddaughter, waved them out of the room. “Go. Sleep veIl, Meester Doyle.”

* * *

Maura returned in a few moments, shutting the kitchen door quietly behind her.

“Abed already,” she said. “He took a moment to telephone to Diane, but he couldn’t do much more before he dropped off. I hated to do that to him.”

“He needed rest,” the Master said. “A simple charm of restfulness does him no harm. And ve haf not yet handled the situvation at hand so as to escape explanation. There are things he has no need to face. They are our business.”

“Keva in a pet is one of them,” Holl agreed. A disaster had struck at the heart of his formidable sister’s pride. Keva’s bread had fallen. Every loaf of the day’s baking had come out of the oven flat. Candlepat, with commendable tact for one who was usually focused upon herself, had tried to make things better by bringing in recipes for serving focaccia. Others gave their best efforts, too, but nothing had salved the old female’s feelings. She had never,
never
had a batch of bread fail in all her long life. The shame of it had driven her to their clan’s room, where she had spent the rest of the day, refusing dinner and any attempt to lure her out. Anyone who had approached her had returned looking half-chewed from the scolding. Keith was a favorite of hers, but even he’d be unlikely to escape a tongue-lashing.

“Surely she’ll be herself in a day or two,” Curran said, lowering his wiry white eyebrows. “The lass’s had her dignity wrung out. All have been under a strain that’d strangle a dragon, so it would. Whate’er wee beastie is muckin’ about around here bids fair to tear us apart.”

“We don’t know there’s anything here, Curran,” Holl said wearily. He’d hoped the old one wouldn’t bring up the subject again. “It could just be a run of bad luck. A trend can feed on itself when all are under a strain, as you say.”

The eyebrows climbed high on Curran’s forehead. “Bad luck, you say? And wasn’t it just you who told me yersel’ that the bad luck comes in bursts? Nor have these auld eyes missed that they come coincidently alongside breaks in our barrier charm. That smacks of intelligence, do you not say so?”

“I would,” Holl said, “but I can’t prove it. It only seems intelligent because of the coincidences. It is possible that there’s a mindless force underneath this place, or that we’ve brought something into the house that’s causing the problem. I hardly know where to start.”