The Fourth Estate (37 page)

“Haven’t you
heard?” Arno asked, waving Armstrong into his chair.

“Heard what?”

“We sold 350,000
copies of the paper last night, and they still want more.”

“Three hundred
and fifty thousand? And they want more? Why?”

“Der Berliner
hasn’t been on the streets for the last two days. Julius Hahn rang this morning
to tell me that for the past forty-eight hours his electricity has been cut
off.”

“What
extraordinary bad luck,” said Armstrong, trying to look sympathetic.

“And to make matters
worse,” added Arno, “he’s also lost his usual supply of paper from the Russian
sector. He wanted to know if we’d been having the same problems.”

“What did you
tell him?” asked Armstrong.

“That we haven’t
had any trouble since you took over,” Arno replied.

Armstrong smiled
and rose from his chair.

“If they’re off
the streets again tomorrow,” said Arno as Armstrong began walking toward the
door, “we’ll have to print at least 400,000 copies.”

Armstrong closed
the door behind him and repeated, “What extraordinary bad luck.”

SYDNEY MORNINg
HERALD

30 JANUARY 1957

D
ane’s Controversial Design Wins Opera
House Contest “BUT I’VE HARDLY seen you since we announced our engagement,”
Susan said.

“I’m trying to
bring out one newspaper in Adelaide and another in Sydney,” said Keith, turning
over to face her. “It’s just not possible to be in two places at once.”

“It’s never
possible for you to be in one place at once nowadays,” said Susan. “And if you
get your hands on that Sunday paper in Perth, as I keep reading you’re trying
to, I won’t even see you at the weekends.”

Keith realized
that this wasn’t the time to tell her that he had already closed the deal with
the owner of the Pertb Sunday Monitor. He slipped out of bed without making any
comment.

“And where are
you off to now?” she asked as he disappeared into the bathroom.

“I’ve got a
breakfast meeting in the city,” shouted Keith from behind a closed door.

“On a Sunday
morning?”

“it was the only
day he could see me. The man’s flown down from Brisbane specially.”

“But we’re meant
to be spending the day sailing. Or had you forgotten that as well?”

“Of course I
hadn’t forgotten,” said Keith as he came out of the bathroom. “That’s exactly
why I agreed to a breakfast meeting. I’ll be home long before you’re ready to
leave,”

“Like you were
last Sunday?”

‘That was
different,” said Keith. ‘The Pertb Monitor is a Sunday paper, and if I’m buying
it, how can I find out what it’s like except by being there on the one day it
comes out?”

“So you have
bought it?” said Susan.

Keith pulled on
his trousers, then turned to face her sheepishly. “Yes, subject to legal
agreement. But it’s got a first class management team, so there should be no
reason for me to have to go to Perth that often.”

“And the
editorial staff?” asked Susan as Keith slipped on a sports jacket. “if this one
follows the same pattern as every other paper you’ve taken over, you’ll be
living on top of them for the first six months.”

“No, it won’t be
that bad,” said Keith. “I promise you. Just be sure you’re ready to leave the
moment I get back.” He leaned down and kissed her on the cheek. “I shouldn’t be
more than an hour, two at the most.”

He closed the
bedroom door before she had a chance to comment.

As Townsend
climbed into the front of the car, his driver turned on the ignition.

“Tell me, Sam,
does your wife give you a hard time about the hours you have to work for me?”

“Hard to tell,
sir. Lately she’s stopped talking to me altogether.”

“How long have
you been married?”

“Eleven years.”

He decided
against asking Sam any further questions about matrimony. As the car sped
toward the city, he tried to dismiss Susan from his thoughts and to concentrate
on the meeting he was about to have with Alan Rutledge. He had never met the
man before, but everyone in the newspaper world knew of Rutledge’s reputation
as an awardwinning journalist and a man who could drink anyone under the table.
If Townsend’s latest idea was to have any chance of succeeding, he needed someone
of Rutledge’s ability to get it off the ground.

Sam turned off
Elizabeth Street and swept up to the entrance of the Town House Hotel. Townsend
smiled when he saw the Sunday Chronicle on top of the news stand, and
remembered its leader that morning. Once again the paper had told its readers
that the time had come for Mr. Menzies to step down and make way for a younger
man more in tune with the aspirations of modern Australians.

As the car drew
in to the curb Townsend said, “I should be about an hour, two at the most.” Sam
smiled to himself as his boss jumped out of the car, pushed his way through the
swing doors and disappeared.

Townsend walked
quickly through the foyer and on into the breakfast room.

He glanced
around and spotted Alan Rutledge sitting on his own in a window seat, smoking a
cigarette and reading the Sunday Cbronicle.

He row as
Townsend headed toward the table, and they shook hands rather formally.
Rutledge tossed the paper to one side and said, smiling, I see you’ve taken the
Cbronicle even further downinarket.” Townsend glanced at the headline:
“Shrunken Head Found on Top of Sydney Bus.” “Hardly a headline in the tradition
of Sir Somerset Kenwright, I would have thought.”

“No,” said
Townsend, “but then neither is the bottom line. We’re selling 100,000 more
copies a day than they did when he was the proprietor, and the profits are up
by 17 per cent.” He glanced Lip at the hovering waitress.

“Just a black
coffee for me, and perhaps some toast.”

I hope you
weren’t thinking of asking me to be the next editor of the Cbronicle,” said
Rutledge, lighting another Turf. Townsend glanced at the ashtray on the table,
and saw that this was Rutledge’s fourth since he had arrived at the breakfast
table.

“No,” said
Townsend. “Bruce Kelly’s the right man for the Cbronicle. What I have in mind
for you is far more appropriate.”

“And what might
that be?” asked Rutledge.

“A paper that
doesn’t even exist yet,” said Townsend, “other than in my imagination. But one
I need you to help me create.”

“And which city
have you got in your sights?” asked Rutledge. “Most of them already have too
many papers, and those that don’t have created a virtual monopoly for
themselves. No better example than Adelaide.”

I can’t disagree
with that,” said Townsend, as the waitress poured him a cup of steaming black
coffee. “But what this country doesn’t have at the moment is a national paper
for all Australians. I want to create a paper called the (‘ontinctit, which
will sell from Sydney to Perth, and everywhere in between. I want it to be the
Times of Australia, and regarded by everyone as the nation’s numberone quality
newspaper. More importantly, I want You to be its first editor.”

Alan inhaled
deeply, and didn’t speak for some time. “Where would it be based?”

“Canberra. It
has to corne Out of the political capital, where the nation’s decisions are
made. Ourbiggest taskwill be to sign up the best journalists available. That’s
where YOU come in, because they’re more likely to come on board if they know
you’re going to be the editor.”

“How long do you
imagine the run-in time will bc” asked Rutledge, stubbing out his fifth
cigarette.

“I hope to have
it on the streets in six months,” Townsend replied.

“And what
circulation are you hoping for?” Rutledge asked, as he lit another cigarette.

“Two hundred to
250,000 in the first year, building up to 400,000.”

“How long will
you stay with it if you don’t manage those numbers?”

“Two years,
perhaps three- But as long as it breaks even, I’ll stay with it forever.”

“And what sort
of package do you have in mind for me?” asked Alan.

“Ten thousand a
year, with all the usual extras.” A smile appeared on Rutledge’s face, but
then, Townsend knew it was almost double what he was getting in his present
job.

By the time
Townsend had answered all his questions and Rutledge had opened another packet
of cigarettes, they could have ordered an early lunch. When Townsend finally
rose to shake hands again, Rutledge said he would consider his proposition and
get back to him by the end ofthe week.

As Sam drove him
back to Darling Point, Townsend wondered how he could make the idea of
traveling between Sydney, Canberra, Adelaide and Perth every seven days sound
exciting to Susan. He wasn’t in much doubt what her reaction would be.

When Sam pulled
in to the drive a few minutes before one, the first thing Keith saw was Susan
coming down the path, carrying a large hamper in one hand and a bag full of
beachwear in the other.

“Close the front
door,” was all she said as she passed Keith and continued walking toward the
car. Keith’s fingers had just touched the door handle when the phone began to
ring. He hesitated for a moment, and decided to tell whoever it was that they
would have to call back that evening.

“Afternoon,
Keith. It’s Dan Hadley.”

“Good afternoon,
Senator,” Keith replied. “I’m in a bit of a rush. Would it be possible for you
to call me back this evening?”

“You won’t be in
a rush when you’ve heard what I’ve got to tell you,” said the senator.

“I’m listening,
Dan, but it will still have to be quick.”

“I’ve just put
the phone down on the postmaster general.

He tells me that
Bob Menzies is willing to support the state , s request for a new commercial
radio network. He’s also let slip that Hacker and Kenwright wouldn’t be in the
running, as they already control their own networks. So this time you must be
in with a fighting chance of picking it up.”

Keith sat down
on the chair by the phone and listened to the senator’s proposed plan of
campaign. Hadley was aware of the fact that Townsend had already made
unsuccessful takeover bids for his rivals’ networks. Both approaches had been
rebuffed, because Hacker was still angry not to have got his hands on the
Cbronicle, and as for Kenwright, he and Townsend were no longer on speaking terms.

Forty minutes
later Townsend put the phone down and ran out, slamming the door behind him.
The car was no longer there. He cursed as he walked back up the path and let
himself into the house. But now that Susan had left without him, he decided he
might as well carry out the senator’s first suggestion. He picked up the phone
and dialed a number that would put him straight through to the editor’s desk.

“Yes,” said a
voice that Townsend recognized from the single word.

“Bruce, what’s
the subject of your leader for tomorrow’s paper?” he asked, without bothering
to announce who it was.

“Why Sydney
doesn’t need an opera house, but does need another bridge,” said Bruce.

“Scrap it,” said
Townsend. “I’ll have two hundred words ready for you in an houes time.”

“What’s the
theme, Keith?”

“I shall be
telling our readers what a first class job Bob Menzies is doing as prime
minister, and how foolish it would be to replace a statesman with some
inexperienced, wet-behind-the-ears apparatchik.”

Townsend spent most
of the next six months locked up in Canberra with Alan Rutledge as they
prepared to launch the new paper. Everything ran late, from locating the
offices to employing the best administrative staff and poaching the most
experienced journalists. But Townsend’s biggest problem was making enough time
to see Susan, because when he wasn’t in Canberra he was inevitably in Perth.

The Continent
had been on the streets for just over a month, and his bank manager was
beginning to remind him that its cash flow was only going one way – out. Susan
told him that even at weekends, he was always going one way-back.

Townsend was in
the newsroom talking to Alan Rutledge when the phone rang. The editor put his
hand over the speaker and warned him that Susan was on the.line.

“Oh, Christ, I’d
forgotten. It’s her birthday, and we’re meant to be having lunch at her sistees
place in Sydney. Tell her I’m at the airport, Whatever you do, don’t let her
know I’m still here.”

“Hi, Susan,”
said Alan. “I’ve just been told that Keith left for the airport some time ago,
so I guess he’s already on his way to Sydney.” He listened carefully to her
reply. “Yes... Fine... OK... I will.” He put the phone down. “She says if you
leave right away, you might just get to the airport in time to catch the 8.25.”

Townsend left
Alan’s office without even saying goodbye, jumped into a delivery van and drove
himself to the airport, where he had already spent most of the previous
 
night. One of the problems he hadn’t
considered when choosing Canberra as the paper’s base was how many days a week
planes would be unable to take off because of fog. During the past four weeks
he felt he had spent half his life checking the advance weather forecasts, and
the other half standing on the runway, liberally dishing out cash to reluctant
pilots, who were fast becoming the most expensive newspaper delivery boys in
the world.