"Brian, you're wanted in the bunker, straight away."
Brian Palmer was surprised. As the youngest copywriter in the agency it was unusual for him to be summoned to the main conference room. He looked up at the man who had appeared in front of his desk. Eric Mansell was probably the best creative director in Perth. Anyone who could show up for work whenever he liked in an Hawaiian shirt and a company BMW had to be good.
"Hmm, OK, what's it about?"
"You remember that we gave you the Bailey's shoe account as your first big job? A rep from the client is here and wants some words about that print ad you and your partner put together."
Brian took a deep breath. "Well, if it's gone wrong I'm sorry but you know that I practically begged you and Georgina to do it my way. If they're looking to blame somebody I guess I'm the one who has to wear it."
"It's all experience. Get hold of Georgina and find out what the problem is."
Brian reluctantly put aside his work for City Motors and began wandering around looking for Ms Georgina Tench, a remarkably good looking young lady who could fairly be described as a high profile target. She was almost two metres tall, her blonde hair so long it reached her waist, last seen wearing faded blue jeans, a T-shirt promoting tours of Outer Mongolia and a small round straw hat with ribbons dangling from it. Even by advertising agency standards she cut quite a noticeable figure. And, like a lot of other people around the place, she made Brian feel very aware of his youth and inexperience. A bush high school had done little to prepare him for this place. Not that he cared about his rawness: it just added even more magic to a workplace he'd fallen in love with from the first day he'd entered it. Perhaps because it was so full of life and energy -- on this side, anyway.
Like Korea, the ad agency was divided into two conflicting parts, the reception desk marking the cold war zone between them. On one side was the 'suit' territory, where the account executives, accountants and others of that ilk lived. Very quiet and dignified, a lot of individual offices and several conference rooms, forums for the frequent discussions held with the many VIP visitors. Indeed, Brian had already decided that the only real difference between advertising management and prostitution was that the ad industry seemed to need a lot more meetings to make things happen. But the heart and soul of the agency was on his side, where the 'creatives' did their thing.
As he walked through it seeking Georgina, Brian felt the adrenalin tingling within him as it always did. Each of the open plan corridors bustled with activity, the ringing of telephones, the rise and fall of conversation as busy groups coalesced briefly to exchange sheets of paper, photographs, gossip and wails of anger because somebody somewhere had just totally stuffed things up. It was a place of experts. Creative artists, photographers, TV production specialists, printers, and the backbone of the creative side, the finishing art department. But all of this collective expertise was useless without the creative impetus supplied by the copywriters; and you couldn't make a copywriter, because that job was out on the edge where there were no rules. You had to be born a copywriter -- and maybe it was going to turn out that he hadn't been. The thought of being kicked out of the agency made Brian feel sick with apprehension.
As he had expected, he found Georgina in the finishing art section, talking to a couple of the girls over the drawing boards and probably exchanging dirty jokes to judge by the expressions on their faces. He was hesitant to interrupt the conversation. In the first place the finishing art workers were an insular crew, as touchy and awkward as a gang of longshoremen, best left to other artists to deal with. In the second place Georgina Tench made him feel about five years old whenever she talked to him. For each copywriter to be assigned a creative artist was perhaps a good idea, but Brian would have been happier with a team associate that he had something in common with.
Until he'd got the job at the agency his home had been in Dampier, two thousand kilometres away from the nearest city: Georgina bitched every lunchtime because the agency was ten minutes walk away from the centre of the metropolitan shopping area. Brian had once asked her if she'd ever been to the north west. For somebody who used to think a trip to Perth once a year was a big deal, her answer was unforgettable: "Oh, yes, I often fly up there at the weekends with my parents for the game fishing."
Which at least proved that having a rich family in the background certainly gave a different perspective on life.
"You want something, Brian?"
Georgina had at last decided to notice him. "I don't, but Eric wants both of us in the bunker, now. We've got a visitor from Bailey's shoes who wants to talk to us."
"Oh God," she answered, turning around to stare at him. "I warned you what was going to happen if you didn't change that ad but you wouldn't be told, would you?"
"I've already made it clear to Eric that I remember fighting both of you to send it out the way I wanted it. It was my ad and I'll take the blame if it's a cockup."
"You certainly will. Come on then, let's get it over with."
Inside the bunker Brian had no thought of looking out of the windows at the thirty storey panoramic view across the Swan river. His attention was first focused on Mr Du Cann, the head of the agency. Impeccably dressed as always, down to the red carnation in his buttonhole, Du Cann was in a class of his own for smoothness and slicing people into fine slices with their own silly mistakes. It was strange for a man in his position to be bothering personally about a print ad, which was pretty small potatoes. The big money and the big decisions usually revolved around the TV commercials. But Du Cann would know what he was doing. He'd reached his mid fifties with most of his own hair, all of his teeth and a lot of other people's money. At this precise moment he was standing in front of an easel with a large blow up board of the Bailey's ad displayed on it.
"Ah, Georgina and Brian. Let me introduce you. Mr Highfield, Sales manager for Bailey's Fashion Shoes."
Mr Highfield was short and chubby, perhaps a few years younger than Du Cann, though looking a lot more harassed. He seemed to have put his clothes on in a hurry whilst trying to drink a cup of coffee at the same time and without having had a chance since to look in a mirror. Probably due to drop dead from a coronary any month, Brian thought. Unlike Du Cann, who was unlikely to be killed by anything except overindulging himself with some spectacular female like Georgina.
Highfield clearly had his dreams though, because Georgina seemed to be getting all of his attention. "This is a very remarkable ad you've done for us, young lady. Congratulations."
Georgina beamed, Brian rocked on his heels in astonishment and everybody's eyes rested for a moment on the blow up projected on the white board. The dominating feature of the photograph was a green baise table top littered with multi coloured poker chips and ashtrays with crushed cigar butts in them. Three pairs of heavily muscled forearms and hands were resting on top of the table with five cards lying face down on the table just in front of each pair of hands. Standing on the centre of the table was a woman in a blue ball gown, visible only from the waist down. Her hands were holding up the hem of the dress well above her knees, showing off her shapely calves and ankles. One foot was still wearing a Bailey's high heeled shoe, the other foot bare and gracefully arched on tip toe as she maintained her balance. A huge hand which looked as if it belonged to Arnold Schwartzeneger was holding up the discarded shoe and turning it over, letting cards spill out from inside it into the smoke filled air. Three of a kind: the ace, the king and the queen of hearts.
Underneath the photograph was the caption: "BAILEY'S FASHION SHOES -- THE BEST BET IN THE HOUSE WHEN THE CHIPS ARE DOWN".
"Interesting," Du Cann observed. "Clearly there's a story involved but it's up to the individual to decide what kind of a story. Was she caught cheating? Or attempting to help somebody else to cheat? Was it an attempt to stop the game by hiding some cards? Or a very grandiose way of playing the winning hand? Are more cards hidden inside the other shoe. Or something else, perhaps? Certainly there's something salacious about it -- tastefully so, though. Apparently it's generated quite a lot of interest amongst the ladies."
"But even more interest amongst the men," Highfield cut in. "We've been getting a lot of reaction to the ad from men who want to know what the girl on the table looks like. We regard this as very important because we also sell mens' shoes as well as womens', and it's been a slow moving business of late. We want to take advantage of the male interest to increase the sales of our mens' lines. So the company been wondering whether we might be able to use the shoe that's been taken off as a kind of Cinderella gimmick in a follow up campaign."
Brian was fascinated by the idea. "You mean -- have some kind of a ball?"
Highfield nodded: "Perhaps. We could put an entry form in the box with every pair of mens' shoes we sell. Every form that's returned goes into a barrel and the first fifty pulled out are invited to the ball to try on a shoe and find Cinderella."
Brian shook his head. "We could have a problem there -- we might find the shoe fitting the wrong girl. Maybe we could use the card angle as well and make it a sort of a gamble?"
"Would you like to suggest something, Brian?" the agency chief asked.
"I'm just thinking aloud. Mr Highfield talked about inviting fifty men to this ball. I suppose the idea would be to have one of them find the Cinderella at the ball and win some kind of a prize?"
Highfield nodded. "Yes, a world cruise perhaps, for the Prince and his Princess. It may sound a bit corny but the prospect of a few weeks on an ocean liner with a pair of legs like that . . . Of course we don't guarantee any romance, we just supply the tickets to the happy couple and let them sail off together in the sunset. How do we tie it all in though?"
