on the biggest TV audience of the year tonight," Oswald
had told him gleefully at noon. "The buildup's been a natural, and
those 'Salem with a new twist and a singing commercial' plugs have
been continued on this network--the cost of that was comparatively
small--and I've even gotten them onto a few of the really big shows to
boot."

Bill Howard came on the screen, his big homely face leaning across the
desk toward the TV audience.

"The biggest news in the country right now," Bill said in a solemn
tone, "is the biggest single cleanup job in the country today.

"There's a slum," Bill said, "right here in New York that the Witches
of the world will unite to cleanup--tonight."

Then he put on the full power of the personality that made him the
most listened-to newscaster on the air, TV and radio. The manner that
made the news sound human, like it really happened to real people. He
put it on full power, and went to work.

First he showed a big map of New York, and talked about how people
thought of it as a big, impersonal place, but it wasn't. He made it
everybody's home town.

Then he traced the map right down to the exact spot where the
buildings were. Then he turned on a movie, and he showed the
back-door, garbage strewn, and a room where a family slept, seven of
them, and the privy they shared with five other families.

* * * * *

Then Bill turned off the movie, and he brought that family to the
mike, each of them dirty and in clothes that never had amounted to
much, and had seen a long life since--even the baby. One kid's shoes
had a sole flapping off, another had the toes cut out so he could wear
them, though he'd long outgrown them.

"We haven't added to what we found," Bill said. "This is the way the ...
I've introduced them as the Jones family, let's leave it at that. This
is how the Joneses have had to dress. This is how they've had to live.
This is a very real part of America," he said, and his voice was choking
a little, and Randolph thought, if he's putting that on, he's the best
actor I've seen yet.

Randolph found himself glad he was alone, and didn't have to speak
himself. His own throat felt choked.

"And now," said Bill to his audience, "It's time for the witches...."

The camera shifted, and there was a papier-mache model of the
buildings, built so you could look in the curtainless windows and see
the squalor, lighted with a single bulb on a string. There was