Page 138 - Labelle Gramercy, On the Case

Soaked to the Bone

Labelle had stopped giving him the stony stare. She was making
notes.
“What is that story about?”
“Oh, it’s a typical conflation of successful plot lines and
characters; agents and producers see them by the dozen, written with
an eye toward cinematic production. Truly original works are either
ignored or have to stand the test of time in some other medium
before studios will take the gamble. My story is a romantic science-
fiction exotic-locale thriller. It opens with the hero, Orson Brother,
awakening from surgery. He had been in perfect health, but suddenly
was struck down with severe abdominal pains after dining at a very
expensive restaurant in his city of residence, San José, Costa Rica.
The first person to come into focus is a nurse, Ellie D. De Splay. She
is young, so is he, and the romance begins. She tells him he has had
an acute kidney stone attack, and nothing could be done to save his
life but remove the kidney. His concern temporarily turns to relief
upon learning how close he came to dying. But he can see something
is troubling her. She won’t say what it is, and he leaves the hospital
after a few days determined to stay in contact with her.”
I was already familiar with the plot, having helped Fish pitch it
several times at meetings small and large, near and far, but I had
never heard the author’s version. Labelle Gramercy somehow found
this potboiler worthy of her time and notation; must be a habit with
her. It could save her the price of a ticket to a disappointing movie—
if it ever became one.
Tim went on, warming to his subject. He became animated, all
tension released as he slipped into the guise of that ancient human
type, the storyteller. “Ellie, like him, is an American living abroad, so
they are already moving in circles bound to intersect. Although she
won’t return his calls and he cannot discover her address, they have a
chance encounter one Sunday in a park. He is well now, and she is
off duty. The attraction overcomes her reticence. We learn that he is
an orphan, raised in San José by an older couple who had retired
comfortably in the tropics and were happy to take in the child of
parents who had died in a boating accident. He has led a secure and
sheltered life among expatriates who guided him into an obviously
boring but safe job in an insurance office. All that history can be
shown in flashbacks. She was a former army nurse who developed a

137