Chapter 1: Private Lives Part II

2.

Tracy strolled about the crowded hallways and in and out of the jam-packed conference rooms, happy in her anonymity. 

She was no judge of crowds but it would not have surprised her to learn that there well over a thousand people here. And quite a few of them wearing The Coldest Equations T-shirts, featuring her, in an action pose, emblazoned across the front of each one.

Meeting rooms, some large, some small, lined each side of this wing of the Wavelry Hotel. Tracy paused at each one to read the posters taped beside each door, giving the day’s schedule for that particular room.

There were panels on how special effects had been created, how the scriptwriters went about their jobs, what radio acting entailed, and so on. Tracy paused before a room that promised to offer an insight into the techniques of radio acting. That would be an interesting discussion to attend, if she were to fulfill her promise to Nick and appear in “Sorry, Wrong Number” at the next year’s convention.

Two things mitigated against it. One, if the second season of The Coldest Equations proved to be a disaster and the series was canceled, they probably wouldn’t want her to show up to sign autographs, let alone appear in some radio re-enactment.

And secondly, it was at the same time as Nick’s scheduled performances in “Three Skeleton Key” and “The Thing on the Fourble Board.”

What a careless piece of scheduling, Tracy thought. With a TV star like Nick Belfour appearing in the re-enactments, it was surely a safe bet that everyone would be in the large ballroom to watch that event. It was not fair on the people trying to give the panel to have to compete with that.

               

 As a matter of fact…Tracy glanced at her watch. There was still three hours to go. Perhaps she’d better go into the ballroom now, so that she could get a good seat. 

Then she thought better of it. No matter how many fans of The Coldest Equations might be present – with no interest in radio drama per se but just to see Nick Belfour up close and personal – there surely would be plenty of good seats left if she waited another couple of hours.

Tracy went into the Dealers’ Room, which was huge – two large conference rooms with their separating partition removed to make one gigantic room.  Although it was huge, it looked small because every space was taken up by tables stacked high with merchandise.

So much to buy, thought Tracy. I’m in heaven.  She began to browse. She saw plenty of memorabilia over 50 years old…decoder rings, comic books, cereal boxes, Little Big Books featuring radio characters as well as early TV shows, and CDs and tapes of the shows themselves.

And there were also reference books, episode guides for everything from I Love a Mystery to the Voyage of the Scarlet Queen – a seafaring series, she noted, picking up the case to take a look at the summary. The episode titles were amusing, things like “The Fang, Rubies and the Black Siamese” and “The Green Tourist and the Temple Bell.”

But she wasn’t quite interested enough to buy it. Tracy returned it to its stack.

She’d have to find out what Nick’s favorite radio programs were. He probably had a CD collection of every episode, but perhaps she could find him a decoder ring or something of that nature to give him as a present for the three month anniversary of their more personal relationship which had developed during the run of Private Lives.

The cover of a CD caught her eye, and Tracy turned. Now, that was interesting. On the cover was a photo of a very young, very suave looking Vincent Price, smoking a cigarette and looking out at her. He had a halo tipped over his head.

The Saint had been a radio program? Tracy picked up the CD. Yes, Price had appeared as the Saint from 1950 to 1951, and the CD contained 62 episodes. Tracy grinned. 28 hours and 29 minutes, listening to the “golden syrup” voice of Vincent Price. 

She had to have this. 

Although she was not a fan of horror, Price hadn’t been typecast in that genre until very late in his career. Before then he’d made a ton of great movies, from Laura to His Kind of Woman to Jules Verne’s Master of the World, and guest-starred on dozens of TV series, and she’d watched them all avidly.

She hadn’t realized he’d done radio as well. What a treat!

At another table she found novelizations of the adventures of several radio characters. Her eye fell on one called The Green Hornet Strikes.  She’d seen the TV series from the 1960s on DVD, and she’d seen the movie made a few years ago that had updated the Green Hornet to the present day, and  had enjoyed it for the most part – although the gory death of the villain at the end had made her wince - so unnecessary.  

She had found the concept of a hero pretending to be a villain intriguing. 

Tracy picked up the book, wrapped in plastic, with a year of publication on it of 1940 and a price sticker of $150.  She put it down again. She wasn’t that enamored of the character. 

Next to it was a Whitman book from 1966, entitled The Case of the Disappearing Doctor and that one was only $7. 

You’ll do, she informed the book mentally, and went to pay for her purchases. 

Although there was a bit over an hour to go before the re-enactments started, the ballroom already about a third full.  The eager audience had settled into the front rows, and Tracy smiled at the view of dozens of The Coldest Equations t-shirts. They’d all come to see Nick. That would make him happy.

Tracy took an end seat in the fifteenth row – the closest she could get. The chairs weren’t all that comfortable, but if the book was good it would take her mind off that.

The Case of the Disappearing Doctor was aimed at teens, but was well-written for all that, and Tracy felt her attention caught for several minutes. Then the increased noise in the room roused her and she looked up to find that every seat was now full.

Nick was a hit!

Well, of course he would be. And hopefully when the first episode of the new season aired that night, it would be hit too....

Tracy tucked the book into her purse and continued to look around, paying more attention to the stage area than she had up until that point.

Four chairs were placed on the stage, facing the audience. Before three of those chairs were clustered four microphones –one of them set about a foot lower than the others. A roll of scrim ran from one side of the stage to the other so that nothing behind it could be seen. To one side of the chairs was a long table on which were a variety of trays and pieces of equipment – old fashioned sound effects equipment, Tracy deduced.

She sighed and glanced at her watch, as several people around her were doing. Surely it was time to get this show on the road.