The Frumious Bandersnatch by Ed McBain

From Barnes & Noble

The Barnes & Noble Review
Even after more than 50 novels in the entertaining 87th Precinct series, Ed McBain proves he can still deliver the goods in this, vital, insightful, and timely tale that satirizes everything from fat-cat politicians to the glam music industry.

Rising young hip-hop star Tamar Valparaiso is reenacting her latest music video (in which she fends off a would-be abductor from a Lewis Carroll poem), when -- in an ironic "life imitates art" twist -- two kidnappers snatch her from the yacht where she's performing and escape via speedboat. Soon steadfast cop Steve Carella is on the case, aided by fellow 87th Precincters Ollie Weeks and Cotton Hawes. Although the FBI interferes at every turn, the true "villains" are the voracious media and a desensitized public willing to turn someone's anguish into a three-ring circus. McBain's breezy, entertaining style and storytelling skills -- which have, if possible, only strengthened over the years -- make this a consistently winning series with a likable cast of characters who seem like old friends. It's a testament to the author's craftsmanship that no single element or plotline outweighs any other; all contribute equally to the perfect blend and balance of the novel. With this amusing entry, McBain shows us just why he's the undisputed master of the field. Tom Piccirilli

From the Publisher

But no one attending the dazzling launch party for up-and-coming pop idol Tamar Valparaiso knew what they were seeing when, halfway through her performance, masked men whisked the sexy young singer off a luxury yacht and into a waiting speedboat. Now, the evening that was supposed to send Tamar's debut album, Bandersnatch, skyrocketing with a million-dollar promotional campaign has instead kicked off a terrifying countdown for Steve Carella and the detectives of the 87th Precinct. Time is their enemy in the race to find Tamar's abductors — before the rising star is extinguished forever.

USA Today

The Frumious Bandersnatch is Ed McBain's 53rd 87th Precinct novel. Yet the grand master of the police procedural certainly hasn't mellowed. In fact, this newest installment might be one of his most delectably cynical, out-and-out corrosive tales since he started writing the series in 1956 … This is McBain as savagely satisfying as a very rare filet mignon. — Diedre Donahue

The New York Times

O frabjous day! In his new 87th Precinct police procedural, The Frumious Bandersnatch, Ed McBain takes us through the looking glass and into the surreal world of the music business. Armed with lots of informative dope on the cutthroat marketing practices of this $12 billion industry, McBain spins a riotous, if ultimately sobering, tale about a record release that goes awry. — Marilyn Stasio

The Washington Post

This is not McBain at his grim, gritty best, but McBain in an antic mood, having fun with a crime caper that keeps us smiling until the very end, when he delivers a kick in the teeth that reminds us that at heart he is a writer with an extremely dark view of our species. — Patrick Anderson

Publishers Weekly

Amazingly, MWA Grand Master McBain remains as fresh and sharp-edged as ever in his 53rd 87th Precinct novel (after 2003's Fat Ollie's Book), which takes on the culture of celebrity. Bison Records' self-styled impresario Barney Loomis runs into a snag in his effort to catapult his newest performer, Tamar Valparaiso, to stardom. As Tamar is lip-synching the provocative video of her first album aboard a rented yacht, two men in Saddam Hussein and Yasir Arafat masks snatch her before a stunned audience. With his usual expert pacing, McBain alternates the action among a number of characters, including the kidnappers and Tamar; series stalwart Steve Carella, who must endure political maneuvering within a Joint Task Force of police bigwigs and FBI agents; and misogynist Ollie Weeks and his new amour, Det. Patricia Gomez. McBain injects enough humor to leaven the underlying tragedy-the fate of a vulnerable, talented young woman. Although it's soon obvious who's behind Tamar's kidnapping, we don't read McBain for surprising denouements but for his true-to-life dialogue, skill at defining characters and effortless transitions. The Lewis Carroll theme provides an extra level of enjoyment. (Jan. 2) FYI: McBain is only one of two Americans (the other being Sara Paretsky) to win a Diamond Dagger, the highest award from the British Crime Writers Association. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

McBain (winner of the Mystery Writers' Grand Master Award) is back with his 53rd 87th Precinct novel. Tamar Valparaiso, a hot young singer on the verge of superstardom, is set to launch her debut CD and video Bandersnatch when she is kidnapped in the middle of a performance for a record industry party and the press. The whole episode is caught on camera, but the masked abductors flee, leaving behind few clues. Steve Carella and Cotton Hawes of the 87th Precinct are called in and are soon joined by a Joint Task Force and FBI agents. Detective Ollie Weeks, resident racist, homophobe, and misogynist, is also back on the scene, this time romancing a fellow officer. McBain displays his usual mastery of the police procedural along with an astute grasp of the music industry, the news media, and publicity, as well as political ramifications within the force. Taut plotting, crisp and believable dialog, and memorable characters make this another McBain success. Narrated by actor Ron McLarty, it's recommended for fiction collections.-Phillip Oliver, Univ. of North Alabama Lib., Florence Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

The latest challenge for the boys of the 87th Precinct is the kidnapping of a rising rock star. Of course, Tamar Valparaiso, 20, doesn't think of herself as a rocker; what she does is more Contemporary Hit Radio-Pop. And what she's done in her debut single and video is to get assaulted by a masked Bandersnatch out of Lewis Carroll's "Jabberwocky." As she's reenacting the video, complete with luscious lip-synching, for an audience of 112 movers and shakers handpicked by Bison Records mogul Barney Loomis aboard the launch River Princess, three intruders wearing their own masks-Yasir Arafat, Saddam Hussein, and George W. Bush-burst onto the scene, make off with tomorrow's diva, and toss the mess onto the laps of Steve Carella and Cotton Hawes. Even after an FBI Joint Task Force headed by Carella's former friend, Lt. Corky Corcoran, muscles into the case, Loomis insists Carella stay on it, and he's on hand for the ransom drop, which goes off without a hitch, but without results either. Witless Det. Oliver Wendell Weeks of the 88th (Fat Ollie's Book, 2001) is on hand to contribute nothing but idiot-sage remarks about how "ze clock, she is ticking," helps make the adventure, for all its violence, so relaxed, even playful, that it's more carnival than mystery. Does anybody need a reason to start reading this venerable series now? If you do, try this: It's the freshest 48-year-old in town.

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She came cruising downriver like the city personified, all bright lights and big bad music, banners and flags flying from bowsprits and railings, a hundred and sixty-three feet of sleek power and elegant design. It was costing Barney Loomis $6,000 to charter the yacht and its staff of twenty. The additional cost of catering food and drink for a hundred and twelve music industry movers and shakers was close to $12,000. Add the cost of the ten-piece orchestra, and a 15% service charge, and the 8.25% city tax, and Loomis figured the launch of Bandersnatch would cost Bison Records something like twenty-five grand overall. But it would be worth ten times that amount if the CD jumped to the top of the charts.

The boat, or the ship, or the vessel, or whatever the people at Celebrity Yacht Cruises had called it when Loomis was negotiating for the bash, had picked up the assorted glittery guests at Pier 27 West, just off the new marina complex in the renovated Overlook Zone of the city. The boat, or the ship --

Loomis liked to think of it as a launch.

"We'll charter a launch for the launch!" he'd told Tamar, and she'd clapped her hands in excitement -- well, hell, she was still only twenty, she reacted like a teenager more often than not.

The official launch, then, of the new album had started at six P.M. with cocktails on the bridge deck of the launch -- he loved that pun -- where bistro tables were festooned with roses that picked up the red of the mask the beast was wearing on the album cover, and where the mahogany-topped bar seemed haphazardly strewn with giveaway CDs and tapes. The covers on each version of the album showed Tamar as skimpily dressed as she was in the video that had aired simultaneously last night on MTV, VH1, BET, and WU2. Wearing a shredded white tunic that seemed to have been torn forcefully from her legs, she struggled in the clutches of a muscular black dancer wearing an oversized red mask that made him look like some sort of fire-breathing mythical beast -- the Bandersnatch of the title song -- who brought her close to his gaping jaws, while she tried to fend him off, creamy white breasts tumbling virtually free of her equally tattered top.

"Like in King Kong," Loomis had told her.

"Like in King who?" she'd asked, never having seen either of the movies -- well, she was only twenty.

A mahogany stairway swept the assembled guests down to the main deck salon where the passed hors d'oeuvres included raw oysters (even though this was already the fourth day of May, which was not an "R" month when oysters were supposed to be safe, according to the "Oysters 'R' in Season" legend), and chanterelle-and-lobster risotto cakes with white truffle creme fraiche and chives, and salmon tartare on scallion potato chips. For dinner, there was first a mesclun salad with walnuts, Stilton, and cranberries, and then a choice of either grilled tarragon chicken or seared mustard salmon, both served with steamed asparagus. For dessert, the chef had prepared chocolate pâté with vanilla bean sauce and raspberries. Merlot and Chardonnay were served with the meal. A champagne toast was planned for later this evening, after Tamar sang the title song of the new album.

Barney Loomis was a big man, and he didn't get that way by accident. His plate was heaping full, and he demolished his dinner with obvious gusto now, listening to the chatter all around him, alert to every signal beamed from this influential crowd. For a record company mogul -- he tended to think of himself as a mogul -- he was dressed somewhat conservatively, wearing a mocha colored cashmere sports coat over slacks a shade darker, a beige sports shirt open at the throat, a gold necklace showing. His hair was black and worn in a sort of shaggy-dog style, his eyes brown. He fancied a spade beard the same color as his hair but strewn with a few white whiskers that gave it a distinguished professorial look, he thought.

As the launch cruised up the River Dix, passing under the bridges that connected Isola with Calm's Point and Majesta, gliding past Cavanaugh Island and the exclusive Cavanaugh Club, and coming back inbound on the deep water range to head downtown again on the River Harb, a disc jockey began spinning songs from Tamar Valparaiso's debut album, and the talk was of nothing but Bandersnatch and the spectacular television video that would cause the single to leap onto the charts -- Loomis hoped, he hoped. The stars and the moon were bright overhead.

The music swelled.

Several brave souls ventured out onto the dance floor.

Tonight was Ollie's first date with Patricia Gomez.

Man, she looked like a million bucks.

He had first admired her feminine pulchritude in uniform, the blue tailor-mades showing off her perky figure to great advantage, ah yes. But in uniform, she wore highly polished flat black rubber-soled shoes. And in uniform, her long black hair was pulled up and tucked under her cap, and she wore no lipstick or eye shadow, and she carried a nine-millimeter Glock on her right hip.

But tonight...

On this balmy, breezy, first Saturday night in May...

Patricia Gomez was wearing a tight-fitting red dress cut high on the thigh and low on the neck. And tonight, Patricia Gomez was wearing her raven hair falling to the shoulders, punctuated by dime-sized circles of red earrings on either side of her beautiful face. And tonight, Patricia Gomez was wearing glossy red lipstick as bright as the dress, and midnight-blue eye shadow that made her look slinky and sexy and Spanish, like some señorita coming down a long wrought-iron staircase in a movie with banditos and good guys. And tonight, Patricia Gomez was barelegged in strappy red satin sandals that made her seem even taller than her five-feet-seven, which Ollie had already informed her was a perfect height for a woman.

Best of all, Patricia Gomez was in his arms, and they were dancing.

Detective/First Grade Oliver Wendell Weeks was a damn fine dancer, if he said so himself.

The place he had chosen for their inaugural outing was a spot called Billy Barnacles, which was perched on the edge of the River Harb, on the city's Upper North Side. The place served great sea food -- he had asked her two nights ago if she liked sea food -- and it had the advantage of a live band and a parquet dance floor under the stars and directly on the river's edge. The band called itself The River Rats...

Ollie wondered what their name was when they were playing someplace less proximate, ah yes, to the river, but they'd been playing here forever, and in fact Arnie Cooper, the leader, was Billy Cooper's brother, who owned Billy Barnacles, but that was another story.

The band played all kinds of music, all of it danceable. Dixieland from the twenties, swing from the thirties and forties, doo-wop from the fifties, rock from the sixties all the way to the present, even a rap song or two to satisfy the handful of Negro customers who wandered in from Diamondback further uptown. Ollie did not mind dancing on the same floor as "people of color," as they sometimes preferred calling themselves, so long as they behaved themselves. The trouble with most Negroes -- and Ollie preferred calling them this because he knew the outmoded label pissed them off -- was that they seldom knew how to behave themselves. He considered this a crying shame, which was why he tried to take as many of them off the street as he possibly could.

But this was a Saturday night, and not a time to be ruminating about the difficulties of the job in a city as large and as diversified, ah yes, as this one. He considered it a comment upon his social aptitude that he had never once discussed police work all through dinner, and was not now discussing it as he and Patricia glided nimbly across the floor to a spirited version of "When the Saints Go Marching In," another of the tunes in The River Rats' repertoire.

To watch Ollie prance around the dance floor was tantamount to watching the hippos in Fantasia performing to "Dance of the Hours," except that Ollie wasn't wearing a tutu. He was wearing instead a dark blue tropical-weight suit he had purchased at L&G, which was short for Lewis and Gregory, two brothers -- literally and figuratively -- whose shop Ollie frequented on Chase Street in the Eight-Eight Precinct, where both he and Patricia worked. Ollie suspected that half the clothing at L&G had fallen off the back of a truck, which meant it had been stolen. But "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" was a very good policy to follow when you were looking for designer-label garments at discount prices. The suit made Ollie look a lot thinner than he actually was, which meant he looked like an armored weapons carrier instead of a tank, not to mix metaphors with hippos, oh no, m'little chickadees. Ollie was also wearing a white shirt and a red tie, which made him look patriotic in the blue suit, and which also picked up Patricia's dominant color scheme, the tie, that is.

For a fat man...

Ollie knew that there were some people in this city who called him "Fat Ollie," but never to his face, which he considered a mea-sure of respect. Besides, he would break their heads. He himself never thought of himself as being "fat," per se. Large, yes. Big, yes.

For a big large man, then, especially one who was gamboling about the dance floor the way he was, Ollie sweated very little. He figured this had something to do with glands. Everything in life had something to do with glands.

He twirled and whirled Patricia.

The number was reaching a climax.

Ollie pulled Patricia in as close as his belly would allow.

"A hit video is all about screwing," Todd Jefferson was telling Loomis. "The guys out there want to whack they castles on Britney's bellybutton, the teenybopper girls want to wrap they little boobs around Usher's dick. It's as simple as that."

Loomis tended to agree with him, but he wished he was talking about Tamar Valparaiso instead of Britney Spears. As for Usher, he didn't give a rat's ass about him or his dick.

"Hit videos are all about guys and girls in they underwears," Jefferson said. "White guys like to see leggy black girls in they sheer panties. Black dudes like to see titty white girls in they skimpy bras. All this black-white shit really grabs 'em."

Todd Jefferson was a black man himself, with a black wife, but he was purported to have a white mistress. Loomis figured he knew whereof he spoke.

"Take J. Lo," Jefferson said. "She worked both sides of the street. In the movies, she was screwing white guys, in real life she was screwing ole P. Diddy. Your little girl could take a few lessons from her."

Loomis knew he was talking about Tamar.

Little girl.

34-C cup.

Some little girl.

"Her being Hispanic and all."

Loomis knew this was only half-correct. Tamar's father was Mexican, hence the soulful brown eyes, but her mother was of Russian descent, hence the blond hair with a little help from Miss Clairol. Her South-of-the-Border heritage pretty much guaranteed the loyalty of the Hispanic market. It was the crossover crowd they were going for with Bandersnatch. Bring in all those little Anglos who belonged heart and soul to Britney. If they failed to do that...

"Not too many singers can do what J. Lo did, you know," Jefferson said. "Only other artists done it before her was Boyz II Men."

Loomis didn't know what the hell he was talking about. Did he mean screwing white men in movies? Screwing a black man in real life?

"Three number-one hits in the Billboard Hot 100 for five weeks or more," Jefferson said, nodding. "J. Lo did it with 'Ain't It Funny.' She's the lady your little girl has to beat, man."

"We're hoping for a number-one single with the title song on Snatch," Loomis said.

"By the way," Jefferson asked, "is that related to her pussy in some way? The title of the album?"

"No," Loomis said. "What makes you think...?"

"Cause it sounds somewhat pornographic, you know? Bandersnatch? Sounds like the girl has a whole rock group going down on her pussy. Band, you know? Snatch, you know? Bandersnatch. You know whut I'm saying?"

"No, it's not intended that way."

"That's not necessarily bad, mind you," Jefferson said. "That kind of association. It relates back to what I was saying before. About videos being all about screwing. Does your little girl screw somebody on this video?"

It dismayed Loomis to learn that Jefferson hadn't even looked at the fucking thing yet. CEO of WU2, the fourth-largest video TV station in the country, he hadn't even glanced at the new video.

"Yes," Loomis said, "she screws the frumious Bandersnatch."

"Uh-huh," Jefferson said.

"This big black dude wearing a monster mask," Loomis said.

"Is that what Bandersnatch means? Big black dude? Cause I'm a big black dude, man, and nobody ever called me no Bandersnatch before. Nor any other kind of snatch."

"No, it has nothing to do with being black."

"Then what does it have to do with?" Jefferson asked. "Cause I have to tell you, man, the word 'Bandersnatch' is bewildering to me."

"Actually, it's a word Lewis Carroll invented."

"Who's that? Bison's Artistic Director?"

Bison was the name of Loomis' label. His Artistic Director was a man named Carl Galloway, whom Loomis had hired away from Universal/Motown, where he'd been Manager of Artist-Development. Jefferson should have known that. CEO of WU2, Loomis thought again, doesn't know Lewis Carroll was an English writer and not Bison's fuckin Artistic Director. Shit, man!

"Lewis Carroll wrote Alice in Wonderland," Loomis said.

"Ah. Nice. I liked that movie," Jefferson said. "Disney, right?"

"Not the movie," Loomis said. "The book. The one that had 'The Jabberwock' in it."

Jefferson looked at him blankly.

Loomis began quoting.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

"The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

"Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

"The frumious Bandersnatch!"

"Frumious, huh?" Jefferson said. "Still sounds pornographic to me."

"There is something totally obscene about chocolate," Patricia was telling him.

She was dipping into the double chocolate soufflé she had ordered. Ollie was on his second wedge of strawberry short cake. The band was playing a tune Patricia recognized from Christina Aguilera's first album. It was called "When You Put Your Hands On Me," and it was all about this girl who gets all oozy when this guy touches her. It was a very hot song that sounded as if Christina had written it herself from her own personal experience, but she probably hadn't. There was a time -- before Patricia joined the force -- when she wished she could be a rock singer like Christina Aguilera. Every young Hispanic girl in the city wished she could be a rock singer like either Jennifer Lopez or Christina Aguilera. There was only one trouble; Patricia had a lousy voice. Even her mother said she had a lousy voice.

"My sister went to Australia last year on one of these tours," Patricia said. "And...I forget which town it was..."

"You have a sister?" Ollie said.

"I have two sisters, actually. And a brother, too. My older sister went to Australia with her husband, and I think it was Adelaide where..."

"Is that your sister's name?"

"No, that's the name of the town. At least, I think that was the name of the town. Where she had this great chocolate dessert. They have this shop sells chocolate desserts there, you know? And it's called 'The Chocolate Slut.' Isn't that a terrific name?"

"Great," Ollie said. "The Chocolate Slut. Perfect. What is your sister's name?"

"The one who went to Australia?"

"Well, yes. Well, both of them, actually."

"She's called Isabella. The other one, my younger..."

"Come on," Ollie said, and almost dropped a piece of cake off his fork.

"What?" Patricia asked, puzzled.

"That's my sister's name!"

"Get out of here!"

"I mean it. Well, not Isabell-a, but it's Isabelle. Yes."

"How about that?" Patricia said, grinning.

"What's the other one's name?"

"Why? Do you have two sisters, too?"

"No, just the one. But I'm curious."

"Enriqueta. It means 'Henrietta.'"

"Do you know what Patricia means?"

"Well...Patricia, I guess. I think it's the same in Spanish as in English."

"I know what it means," Ollie said, and grinned knowingly.

"How do you know what...?"

"I looked it up."

"Get out!"

"It means 'one of noble descent.' It's from the Latin."

"No kidding?"

"That's what the book said."

"Gee," Patricia said.

"I think it suits you," Ollie said. "Would you care for another soufflé?"

If the three people on the boat had been hired by Central Casting, they'd have been labeled The Hunk, The Pretty One, and The Nerd.

The Hunk was driving the boat.

His name was Avery Hanes.

Tall and somber looking, with curly black hair and dark brown eyes, he was muscularly built -- not because he'd ever done time but simply because he worked out regularly. Like the other two, Avery was wearing black jeans, a black sweatshirt, and black running shoes. Later tonight, he would put on one of the masks. But for now he was enjoying the mild May breezes that blew in off the stern of the boat, riffling his hair, touching his face like a kiss. Avery had once worked for the telephone company and then had sold electronics at The Wiz. Then he'd got the job at Lorelei Records on St. John's Av. The gig tonight was sort of related.

The Pretty One was Avery's girlfriend.

Some five-feet-six-inches tall, twenty-four years old, redheaded and green-eyed and freckled and lithe and lean and wearing for the job tonight the same black jeans and Reeboks and black sweatshirt without a bra. Her name was Kellie Morgan, and she was here because this had to look like a nice little boating party cruising up the river and not some people intent on mischief. She was here because a pretty face in the crowd had a way of stilling the most dire fears. She was here because her boyfriend Avery had told her this would be a piece of cake that would be over and done with by Tuesday night at this time, and there was nothing to worry about because it was all planned to the minute and no one would get hurt and there'd be a quarter of a million bucks for the three of them to split when all was said and done.

The Nerd had straggly blond hair and intense blue eyes and contact lenses over those eyes. He looked like a man who might be an accountant for a small private firm, while actually he was an ex-con who'd been paroled only five and a bit more months ago after having done time for 1st Degree Robbery, a Class-B felony punishable by a prison term not to exceed twenty-five years. That didn't mean Calvin Robert Wilkins wasn't smart; it merely meant he'd been caught. He wasn't as smart as Avery, but then again he didn't have to be. He'd got along just fine until the bad break that night of the bank heist when he got a flat tire during the getaway. He'd tried to ride out the flat, but the tire fell all to pieces and shreds, and suddenly he was riding on the rim with sparks flying and the fuzz gaining, and before you knew it his luck ran out completely and there he was upstate, wearing a number. He'd been paroled from Miramar shortly before Thanksgiving. Until just before Christmas, he'd been working as a dishwasher in a deli on Carpenter Avenue. Then he'd found the job at Lorelei Records, which was where he'd met Avery.

The boat they were on was a Rinker 27-footer powered with a 320-hp Bravo Two that could juice up to almost forty-three miles per at top speed. There was an aft cabin with an oversized mattress, and the dinette seating in the lounge could convert to a double berth, but they didn't expect to be sleeping on the boat.

If everything went as planned tonight, by this time Tuesday, they'd all be sleeping in their own little beddie-byes.

If everything went as planned.

Tom Whittaker was program director for radio station WHAM. He was telling Harry Di Fidelio -- Bison's Vice President of Radio Marketing -- that the question his station recently had to ask themselves was whether they should skew their targets younger or still go for the mother/daughter double play.

"It wasn't an easy decision to make," Whittaker said. "With all these new uptempo releases, we all at once had a responsive audience for teen-based pop and hip-hop acts."

"So which way are you going?" Di Fidelio asked.

"Well, we'll continue to beam primarily to our twenty-five to thirty-four base. But what we've done over the past few months is expand our focus to the eighteen to twenty-four demographic. We're trying to get away from that image of a thirty-something station. We want our listeners to think of us as dynamic and youthful instead."

"That makes sense," Di Fidelio said, and then got down to what Bison was paying him for. "We think Tamar will have a broad base among the thirty-somethings as well as the younger group. Her appeal is what you might call universal."

"Oh, hey, she's terrific," Whittaker said, gobbling down his second helping of chocolate pâté with vanilla bean sauce and raspberries. "What I'm trying to say, though, Barry...may I call you Barry?"

"Harry. Actually, it's Harry."

"Harry, right, what I'm trying to say, Harry, is that it was merely a matter of re-examining our goals. A lot of Top 40 stations try too hard to pitch their product to both the kiddies and their parents, and the result is mass confusion. At Radio 180, we augmented our focus rather than radically change it, and we actually improved our ratings with demos who wanted to feel younger or who just wanted to listen with their kids."

"'Bandersnatch' should appeal to both," Di Fidelio said.

"Oh, hey, she's terrific. I feel sure she'll get hundreds of plays on our station."

If much of what Whittaker was saying sounded like total horseshit, that's because much of it was total horseshit. Whittaker knew, and Di Fidelio knew, and -- with the exception of the crew and the caterers and the black dancer who'd be playing the role of the Bandersnatch when Tamar performed the song later tonight -- everyone on this showboat vessel knew that most Top 40 and rock radio stations today got paid by the record manufacturers, and in some instances by the performing artists themselves, to play their songs on the air.

Moreover, this practice of Pay-for-Play, as it was called, was entirely legal provided the station mentioned on air that payment had been made. Usually, the deejay merely said, "This record was brought to you by Bison Records." Whittaker knew, and Di Fidelio knew that the music industry was a twelve-billion-dollar-a-year business. They further knew that only three broadcasters controlled more than half of the top hundred radio markets in the U.S. There were 10,000 -- count 'em, Maude -- 10,000 commercial radio stations in the land, and record companies depended on about 1,000 of the largest ones to create hits and sell records. Each of those thousand stations added approximately three new songs to its playlist every week.

Enter the independent record promoter.

Hired by the record company, the indie got paid each time there was an "add" to the playlist of a Top 40 or rock station. Average price for an add was a thousand bucks, but the fee could go as high as five or ten thousand depending on the number of listeners a station had. All in all, the indies earned about three million bucks a week for their services.

That was a lot of fried corn husks, honey.

Whittaker knew, and Di Fidelio knew, and everyone connected with either Bison Records or WHAM -- "Radio 180 on your dial!" -- that a record promoter named Arturo Garcia, who worked for the indie firm of Instant Prompt, Inc., had made a deal with WHAM that guaranteed the station $300,000 in annual promotional payments provided its list of clients regularly made the station's playlist. Morever, in certain special circumstances...

Consider, for example, the case of Tamar Valparaiso's debut album, Bandersnatch. What with Carroll's original rhyming (which would certainly sound like hip-hop doggerel to many teenagers), and what with Tamar's poundingly simple five-note melody (that would most certainly sound sexually-driven to many teenagers), the title-song single seemed poised, please dear God, to do what Alicia Keys' Songs in A Minor had done in its first week, more than 235,000 copies for a debut album, #1 on both the Billboard Top 200 Album Chart and the R&B Album Chart, please dear God, let it happen!

But just in case God wasn't listening, and just in case all that legal payola didn't do the trick, IPI (ever mindful of its guiding slogan, "The Tin Is in the Spin") was paying WHAM -- and each of forty other top stations around the country -- a $5,000 bonus for fifty plays in the first week of "Bandersnatch's" release. That came to a hundred bucks a spin, and that was a whole lot of tin, man.

To put it mildly, much was riding on the success of that album.

Meanwhile, in the main stateroom of the River Princess, Tamar Valparaiso was getting into her scanty costume.

Ever since 9/11, and especially since the FBI began issuing vague warnings of terrorist attacks hither and yon but nowhere in particular, the Police Department had been on high alert for any possible threats to the city's bridges. There were 143 men and 4 women in the Harbor Patrol Unit, which operated a municipal navy of twenty vessels, ranging in size from twenty to fifty-two feet. The workhorse of the HPU was the new 36-foot launch, which could travel up to thirty-eight miles an hour -- more than twice the speed of the older vessels in the fleet. The Police Department had recently purchased four of these boats at a cost of $370,000 per. To the relief of taxpayers everywhere in the city, the boats were expected to last twenty years.

Not too long ago, Sergeant Andrew McIntosh would have been wearing the same orange life vest over his blue uniform, but there wouldn't have been a Ruger Mini-14 semiautomatic rifle lying across the dash. You broke those out only when you were going on a drug raid. Those and the twelve-gauge shotguns. Nowadays, with lunatics running loose all over the world, the heavy weapons were de rigueur for the course, as they said in old Glasgow, Scotland, from which fine city McIntosh's grandmother had migrated.

McIntosh was fifty-two years old, and he'd been driving boats for the HPU for twenty-two years now, before which he'd operated a charter fishing boat in Calm's Point. Back then, watching the police boats pulling into the marina, he'd wondered what the hell he was doing ferrying drunken fishermen all over the Sound. He finally asked himself Why not give it a shot? Took the Police Department exam the very next week, asked for assignment to the Harbor Patrol the minute he got out of the Academy.

Back then, the Police Department was still calling itself the Isola PD, even though precincts were located in all five sections of the city. Eventually, Calm's Point, Majesta, Riverhead, and Bethtown rose up in protest, demanding equal rights or some such. The department, figuring it would cover all the bases and not cause any more riots than were absolutely necessary, began calling itself "Municipal PD," and then "Metro PD," and then "MPD" for short. Some of the older hands, however -- McIntosh included -- felt they had changed the name only because the acronym "IPD" for Isola Police Department was being translated by the ordinary citizenry to mean "I Peed," a not entirely flattering descriptive image for stalwarts of the law rushing to the rescue.

There was nothing suspicious about the twenty-seven footer moving slowly toward the Hamilton Bridge, except that she was cruising along with just her running lights on. No lights in the cabin or anywhere else on the boat. Well, that wasn't too unusual, McIntosh supposed, but even so, in these difficult times he didn't want to be blamed later on if some crazy bastard ran a boat full of explosives into one of the bridge's pylons. So he hit a switch on the dash, and a red light began blinking and rotating on the prow of the launch, and he signaled to Officer Betty Knowles to throw a light onto the smaller boat ahead.

Aboard the Rinker, Avery Hanes whispered, "Let me handle this."

Well, hell, he was the smart one.

"Why do I have to be black?" Jonah was asking her.

Tamar didn't know what to answer the poor man.

Because the good Lord intended you to be that way?

She hated deep philosophical questions.

Like when a reporter from Billboard magazine asked her what she thought of Mick Jagger, and she'd had to admit she didn't know who Mick Jagger was. When the reporter explained that he was a seminal rock singer, she didn't mention that she didn't know what "seminal" meant. Instead, she told them she didn't consider herself a rock singer, and besides she was very young. So, of course they asked what kind of singer she considered herself to be, and she'd had to admit she thought of her kind of music as mainstream pop. But a question like Jonah's absolutely floored her. She'd never suspected till this very moment that he was so deep.

What she was hoping was that nobody would be disappointed because she and Jonah wouldn't be duplicating all the bells and whistles on the video, but of course how could they do that on a little boat in the middle of the river? Tonight, she'd be lip-synching, which was okay because everyone in the crowd was very hip, she guessed, and surely nobody expected her to really perform the entire video, did they? Shit, it had cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to shoot the thing with all the special effects and everything, so how could anyone expect a duplication of all that on this dinky little boat here, even though Barney kept calling it a "launch." She certainly hoped nobody had such wild expectations in mind, which was a good title for a song and maybe for her next album, "Wild Expectations." She certainly hoped they would appreciate her just lip-synching while she dry-humped Jonah.

Jonah was as gay as a bowl of daisies.

This was okay because he only came across that way when you were talking to him. Lisping and all, and sort of limp-wristed, a total caricature of a fag.

"Why do I have to be black?"

And a little limp flick of the wrist.

Cause you unfortunate, amigo, Tamar should have said.

Jonah hadn't done any talking on the video, and he certainly wouldn't be doing any talking tonight, either. Even Tamar herself wouldn't be talking until after the record played and they danced to it. Then she'd do the interview with Channel Four, and whatever other interviews she had to do with all the press people out there, and then they'd call it a night and hope for the best.

The video had premiered last night on all four music channels during their prime-time debut spots --

"I meant why does the beast have to be black?" Jonah asked.

Another philosophical question.

He was sharing the main stateroom as a dressing room with her, but that was okay because he was gay, and she didn't mind if he saw her naked boobs. She was half-naked in the costume, anyway, which she guessed was the whole point of the video, to expose herself as much as possible without getting arrested. She had to admit that she somewhat enjoyed all that screaming and yelling whenever she made a personal appearance, part of which she knew was for her voice -- she really felt she did have a very good mainstream pop style and a very good vibrato besides -- but part of which was for the way she shook her considerable booty, muchachos.

"So?" Jonah asked.

One hand on his hip.

Pouting little look on his face.

He was perhaps six-feet-two-inches tall, with a dancer's firm abs, and strong biceps and forearms from lifting girls considerably heftier than Tamar, thighs like oaks, an altogether wonderful specimen of a man, but oh what a waste! He had good fine facial features, too, a pity they'd been covered by all those masks he had to wear on the video, and would be covered by masks tonight as well -- not the same masks, of course. They'd used maybe ten or twelve different masks during the shoot, so that it looked like the Bandersnatch was changing form each time he -- or it, more precisely -- violated her or tried to violate her, rape or attempted rape as the case may have been, who knew? All these videos were supposed to be somewhat mysterious and murky, like adolescence itself, thank God that was behind her.

She was glad her video wasn't about a black guy going to jail while his chick moped around looking mournful and forlorn. She was glad it wasn't about a drive-by shooting, either, which a lot of the rap groups thought was entertainment. One of the Bison veeps had wanted the title song on the debut album to be something called "Raw Girls," and he'd suggested that they shoot the accompanying video in a high school locker room, with all these young chicks, white, black, Latino, coming in and stripping down to their underwear as they got ready for a soccer game. Tamar had gone directly to Barney Loomis to tell him she wouldn't do any video that looked like a G-rated version of Debbie Does Dallas, and she wouldn't sing any song called "Raw Girls," either.

Tamar knew exactly what she wanted to be.

Tamar knew exactly where she was going.

"Sorry to bother you, sir," McIntosh said. "Everything okay here?"

Standing on the bow of the police launch, Officer Knowles was playing the boat's spotlight around the chest of the man at the wheel of the Rinker. Something they taught you when you began training for the HPU. Unless the suspect was a known perp, you kept the light out of his eyes. Courtesy, Service, Dedication. That's what the decal on the side doors of all the police cars in the city said. That's what it said on the side of Harbor Charlie's cabin, too. Courtesy. Meant you kept the light out of a person's eyes, unless he was a perp.

Avery Hanes was about to become a perp in an hour or so, but Officer Knowles didn't know that yet, and neither did Sergeant McIntosh, at the wheel of the policdeo that looked like a G-rated version of Debbie Does Dallas, and she wouldn't sing any song called "Raw Girls," either.

Tamar knew exactly what she wanted to be.

Tamar knew exactly where she was going.

"Sorry to bother you, sir," McIntosh said. "Everything okay here?"

Standing on the bow of the police launch, Officer Knowles was playing the boat's spotlight around the chest of the man at the wheel of the Rinker. Something they taught you when you began training for the HPU. Unless the suspect was a known perp, you kept the light out of his eyes. Courtesy, Service, Dedication. That's what the decal on the side doors of all the police cars in the city said. That's what it said on the side of Harbor Charlie's cabin, too. Courtesy. Meant you kept the light out of a person's eyes, unless he was a perp.

Avery Hanes was about to become a perp in an hour or so, but Officer Knowles didn't know that yet, and neither did Sergeant McIntosh, at the wheel of the police launch, or Officer Brady, standing in the stern with his hand resting casually on the butt of the Glock holstered on his hip, just in case this guy driving the Rinker turned out to be some Al Qaeda nut determined to blow up either himself or something else, or else some drug runner or something. These days, you never could tell.

"Everything's fine, Sergeant," Avery said, because he was the smart one, and he'd seen the stripes on McIntosh's uniform sleeve.

"Saw you runnin with all your lights off," McIntosh said.

The launch was idling alongside the Rinker, which had come to a dead stop on the water.

"Ooops. Thought I had them on," Avery said, and flicked the dashboard switch that turned the running lights on and off, clicking it several times to make sure, and then turning to look at McIntosh with a slightly puzzled shrug.

"I meant in the cabin," McIntosh said.

"I'll turn them on if you like," Avery said. "Such a nice night and all, so many stars, thought we'd take advantage. They shine so much brighter without any lights."

"Where you bound?" McIntosh asked.

"Back to the marina."

"Where's that?"

"Capshaw Boats. Fairfield and the water."

"Off Pier Seven, would that be?"

"Yes, sir."

"Who've you got aboard, Captain?"

"My girlfriend and my best man. We're getting married in June, wanted to check out the River Club."

"Nice venue," McIntosh said.

"Yes, sir, it sure is. Might be too expensive for us, though."

"Well, sorry to've bothered you," McIntosh said. "Enjoy the rest of the evening."

"Thank you, sir. Did you want me to put on those cabin lights?"

"No need."

Knowles turned off the spot. The waters went instantly black. McIntosh eased the throttle forward, and the police launch pulled away from the Rinker. On the stern, Officer Brady took his hand off the Glock's butt.

J. P. Higgins was holding forth on the various types of videos on the air these days. He was Bison's Executive VP in charge of Video Production, and he was obviously impressing the foreign affiliates who'd been invited to tonight's launch party. The man from Prague didn't understand English as well as Bison's people from London (well, of course not) and Milan, or Paris and Frankfurt, but he was nonetheless hanging on every word because he hoped to learn how to promote the "Bandersnatch" video in his own country, now that the flood waters had subsided, and once the video and the album were released there. One drawback was that Tamar Valparaiso was virtually unknown in the Czech Republic. Well, she was virtually unknown here as well. But that was why Bison had spent a pot full of money on the video, not to mention all the publicity and promotion preceding tonight's launch party when -- in exactly one hour by the Czech's imitation Rolex watch -- Tamar Valparaiso herself would be performing with the very same dancer who'd accompanied her on the video.

There was a palpable air of expectation.

Something big was going to happen tonight.

Just how big, none of the assembled guests could ever possibly imagine.

Higgins was a man in his early forties, and he liked to think he'd learned all there was to know about video production by the time he was thirty. Convincing the foreigners gathered around him was a simple task. He concentrated instead on trying to sell his savvy to a young black girl wearing what appeared to be nothing but three chain links and a diamond earring, sitting on a hassock alongside their man from London.

"Your cheapest video to shoot is what I call your 'Pool Party' video," Higgins said, trying to catch the black girl's eye, but she seemed absorbed in her chocolate pâté, which was the exact color of her barely covered breasts, topped with a pair of red raspberries, the dessert, not her breasts. "One of the execs at any label is sure to have a house with a swimming pool. You go to that house, you set up your cameras around the pool, you decorate the premises with girls in bikinis and guys in thongs, and then shoot your artist against a backdrop of all these half-naked young people writhing in time to the music. You don't have to worry too much about lighting because you're shooting in broad daylight. Only thing you have to worry about is airplanes flying overhead. But that's the same as on any daytime shoot."

Higgins didn't know what it was he'd said that suddenly captured the black girl's attention. Maybe she was interested in auditioning for the role of one of those half-naked young people writhing. She was half-naked herself right now, albeit not writhing. Higgins plunged on regardless.

"Your second cheapest video is what I call the 'Disco Party' video, which is a variation on the poolside theme. You rent a disco for the night, you pack it with those same young people from the swimming pool, except the guys are in tight jeans and tank tops and the girls are in halter tops and hip huggers that show their bellybuttons. You use the club's own strobe lighting except for your star, who's performing in their midst and needs special lighting to show her own bellybutton or however much else of herself you'd like her to show," he said, and turned his steely blue-eyed gaze full force on the black girl, who licked chocolate pâté from her fork, and smiled at him. "You've got to remember," he said directly to her, "that there's absolutely nowhere your artist can go after she's stark naked."

Everyone laughed. The man from London had a sort of horsy laugh. The man from Paris sounded like he was choking on a Gauloise. Higgins figured he was both amusing and instructing these two stereotypes. Encouraged, he continued with his thesis, which he would try to get published in The New Yorker magazine one day.

"A little more expensive is what I call your 'Back to the Hood' video. This only works with black or Latino artists," he said, and winked at the black girl, "since your white performers don't come fum no hood, sistuh," and winked again. The black girl winked back. Higgins figured he was home free. "This is a video you shoot outdoors, with your male or female artist roaming the old neighborhood and feeling sentimental about it. You see shots of old black guys playing cards on an upturned garbage can, you see shots of little girls jumping rope and teenage dudes shooting baskets in the school yard, you see shots of what look like dope buys going down, this is like a documentary that says, 'Look where I came from, boys and girls, and now I'm a big rock star, ain't that something?' And your artist is roaming through all this like a hidden camera, with a soulful look on her face, singing her little heart out while she remembers what it was like to be a kid in this hood."

The black girl was nodding dreamily now, remembering what it was like to be a kid in the shitty hood where she herself was born, but look at her tonight, man, here on a million-dollar yacht, wearing chains and a diamond and flirting with a veep from a big-time label, oh lordy!

"The song doesn't have to have anything at all to do with the hood or memories of the hood. The song can have a lyric any twelve-year-old can remember in six seconds flat, 'I'll love you till the day I die,' something like that, 'I'll love you till the day I die, I'll love you till the day I die, I'll love you till the day I die-ai-ai,' like that. Nothing at all to do with growing up poor, the growing-up-poor is only the sub-plot. What the video does is tell all those kids out there who bought the album that here in this America -- or for that matter any of your countries, too, my friends -- anywhere in the entire free world, for that matter, you can grow up to be a diva who will love someone till the day she die-ai-ai-s."

Higgins smiled. They all smiled with him.

The black girl wasn't too sure Higgins wasn't dissing the sort of hood she grew up in, but she smiled, too, what the hell, and grabbed a glass of white wine from a waiter passing a tray.

"Your next cheapest video is what I call 'Smoke and Mirrors,' it's all bullshit flashing lights and blinking neon. Looks like a million bucks, but doesn't cost a nickel. Well, it costs a lot more than the other three, but that's only in the construction. The shooting is cheap. Just your set and your artists on the set. This is the kind of set you use when your song is about absolutely nothing. In fact, not anybody out there can understand the words to the song. Nobody. Not a single living soul. I'm not talking rap. You can usually understand the words in a rap song. I'm talking about a song that has lyrics nobody on earth can understand, no matter how often you listen to the song. This is a song that kids keep listening to over and over again, trying to dope out what the hell the lyrics mean. This is a song that's usually a big hit overseas, because you don't have to understand it in Germany or Italy, it's the same as if you're hearing it in America, where nobody can understand it, either, because it's designed to be unintelligible. Are you beginning to get my drift?"

The guy from London was beginning to get Higgins's drift. Higgins was leading up to talking about "Bandersnatch." The man from London nodded sagely, like a member of Parliament who'd just been advised that his Prime Minister had the goods on Osama bin Laden.

"Your next to the most expensive video is your 'Story' video. This can be a video that actually follows the story of the lyrics in any given song, illustrating the song, so to speak, putting it into pictures for the twelve-year-olds out there, or it can be a video that tells a story entirely different from the one the lyrics are telling. Usually, the Story video is directed by some guy who has dreams of doing a feature film for Miramax. He is more interested in the video itself than he is in the song the video is supposed to be selling. In many respects, it's like your 'Back to the Hood' video. Your artist can be singing, 'I'll love you till the day I die-ai-ai,' and the picture on the screen will be showing a car crashing through the guard rail on the Calm's Point Bridge and hurtling to the dark swirling mysterious waters below. The 'Story' video is full of artsy-fartsy shots and dissolves and fades you learn in Directing 101 in film school. There are women with horns and pointy red breasts..."

Higgins glanced at the black girl again.

"...or guys who suddenly sprout huge wings and fly off into a sky torn apart by thunder clouds. You're sometimes watching two or three stories at the same time, either having to do with the song, or having nothing at all to do with it. The idea is to make the video look like a hi-tech movie so that the kids will run out to buy the album, thinking maybe it, too, gee whiz, is like a high-tech movie. Razzle-dazzle. It's all razzle-dazzle, thank you, Kander and Ebb. Which brings me to the most expensive video of all, and that is the 'Production Number' video, and that is what the 'Bandersnatch' video is."

Finalmente, the guy from Milan thought.

"Leave me dispense with generalities," Higgins said, "and invite you directly into my boudoir," and here his gaze brushed the black girl's long and shiny legs, and her pert and perky tits, and then her overblown lips and her loam-colored eyes, asking his question to those eyes, asking it with a small inquisitive lifting of his brows, and getting his answer with a slight imperceptible nod, Yes, the girl in the chains was saying, oh yes, yes, yes.

"'Bandersnatch,'" Higgins said, "although I feel certain Lewis Carroll didn't intend it this way, is the story of an attempted rape, the story of a thwarted rape, the story of a victim triumphant. Most importantly, it is in fact a story -- a genuine story and not one of those invented film-school stories that have nothing to do with the song they're selling. 'Bandersnatch' is the story of a girl who is warned of the beast out there on those mean streets, but who goes out to find that beast, anyway, and to slay it, my friends, to kill it dead, to emerge victorious, 'O Frabjous day! Calloo! Callay!' Yes, you're right if you're thinking this is the story of 'Beauty and the Beast,' told in nonsense syllables that captivate and mystify, part hard driving rock, part rap, so that we go after and deliver both audiences. You may well ask -- especially our friend from Britain here, who may be more familiar with the poem than some of you others..."

"I'm familiar with the poem," the black girl said.

Higgins looked at her.

"In fact, I know it by heart," she said.

"Then you may be wondering how..."

"I am indeed wondering," she said.

"...how the boy in the poem..."

"'Beware the Jabberwock, my son,'" she said, stressing the word.

"Exactly," Higgins said.

"'Come to my arms, my beamish boy,'" the man from London said.

"Exactly right," Higgins said. "How does this boy become a girl, become a rape victim, become in fact Tamar Valparaiso?"

"My magazine is wondering the same thing," the black girl said.

"Which magazine is that?" Higgins asked.

"Rolling Stone."

Ooops, Higgins thought.

She had cut her hair short for the video.

It was growing back now, but if the album was a hit and Tamar had to go on tour with it, she'd have it trimmed back to the length it was two months ago, when they shot the video at what used to be a bakery but what was now the Sands Spit Studios across the River Dix, which in fact they'd passed not half an hour ago. The River Princess had already come around the tip of the island and was now heading downtown, cruising the waters between the two states, moving at a leisurely pace toward the bridge.

On the video, the short hair made her look like a blond Prince Valiant. Or more like a Peter Pan, she guessed. No question there was a girl in that tattered tunic at the end of the song, though, the beast clawing and biting at the garment till it came away in shreds under his talons and teeth, no question about that at all. They'd even had to edit out a thirty-second shot where her left nipple distinctly showed, and another longer sequence where too much cheek and almost some pussy were revealed when Jonah lifted her; you couldn't risk offending all those soccer Moms out there, as if they didn't have pussies and nipples of their own.

Started her quest in what looked like a sturdy-enough white thigh-length tunic, sandals strapped to the calf, subtly heeled to give the leg its essential curve...

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood...

That was when Jonah burst upon the scene wearing the first of his masks. That was when the innocent boy in the song began morphing into a female rape victim as more and more of Tamar's body was revealed in the shredding garment. There was a lot of meaning to this song. This song spoke to gender problems and crises of identification. This song spoke to adolescent boys and girls in turmoil. This was a very deep song.

She was worried that some of its depth and meaning might be lost in the live performance tonight. It had taken hours and hours of shooting time to capture the dual morphing effect. Tamar's transformation from adolescent boy to vulnerable maiden to ferocious defender of her virginity had required repeated costume changes to achieve the effect of a gradually more girl-revealing garment, the rape becoming in effect a subtle strip tease. Nor had it been simple to morph Jonah from a merely somewhat threatening creature (albeit with eyes of flame) that came whiffling through the tulgey wood in a blue mask, burbling as it came, into the raging monster in a red mask, slain and bleeding at the end of the battle. How on earth would they convey all that tonight? Eyes of flame? Wouldn't it have been simpler and better merely to show the video? But it had previewed last night on all four music channels and tonight Barney wanted something to top that. Something like Tamar Valparaiso, live and in person!

And scared to death.