“She’s alert and feeling no pain. In fact, she’s pretty sharp.”

“Good.”

“What’s the plan?” asked the chief nurse.

“It’s a relatively easy plan. We’ll drill around the nail, pull out the piece of skull, pound the nail out of the piece, and put the hunk of skull back in her head. What else?”

“It’s bad,” said the chief nurse.

“How bad?”

“She was struck by an out-of-control cab that jumped a curb near Saks at Fiftieth and Fifth Avenue, Doctor. The accident caused an epidural hematoma. The hematoma is located between the left outer covering of the brain and the skull. She’s suffered several seizures already. On the plus side, the patient is young and strong. She appears to be in basically good health with good pressure and a good pulse. I have all the X-rays and scans up on the reflector in the OR.”

“Do you know the patient’s name and what she does for a living?” asked Dr. Mendavey.

“I don’t know her occupation,” answered the chief nurse, “but her name is Billie Berry.”

Father DP Brady telephoned the offices of The Big Question to request information about being a prospective contestant.

The jolly person on the other end, a girl with a very young, very high, very loud voice, asked the priest if he lived in New York City. When Father Brady told her he did not, that he lived in Philadelphia, she explained to the priest that if he could come to New York and visit The Big Question’s offices, it would make his becoming a contestant that much easier. “I’m lettin’ you in on a little secret, okay?” yelled the girl into the phone.

“What’s that?”

“Like it’ll help you a lot more to come yourself, okay?” she said.

“Okay. Do I have to bring anything?”

“Golly no! Just yourself, okay? Oh, and one other thing. What do you do?”

“I’m a priest.”

“No shit! You are? We’ve never had a priest try out for the show before, okay? We’ve had a black cat…sorry…a nun, sir, okay? But she screwed up and we’re not using her. You’re the first priest, okay?”

“Okay.”

The priest made an appointment for early Friday afternoon, September 14.

When the date arrived, the priest took an Amtrak train to New York City and a cab to the address he was given. The Big Question’s offices were on the third floor of a building on Forty-fifth Street between Eighth and Ninth avenues. It was just starting to rain as DP entered the building. He took an elevator to the top floor. The door of the elevator opened onto a large loft that had been partitioned into various cubicles, some large, some small. But first was an immense reception area. There were posters of past game and reality shows tacked onto the walls. At least two dozen old public school chairs with the large right arm for writing were lined up in rows. A dowdy woman in her late seventies was seated in one of them. She gave Father Brady a pallid smile when he walked in.