Page 140 - Labelle Gramercy, On the Case

Soaked to the Bone

“Then the level of intensity ratchets up: Ellie bangs on his door in
the middle of the night. She is frightened. He calms her down
enough to learn that she is afraid to go home. Why? Earlier in the day
she again saw the man who had removed Orson’s kidney: he was
coming out of Benton Profitt’s office. But he was dressed in a
business suit and was carrying an attaché case rather than a
stethoscope. They confronted each other briefly and the man saw the
questioning look on her face. When she was on her way home that
evening she stopped outside her apartment building and happened to
look up at her window: a figure was briefly silhouetted against the
window. Frightened, she walked into the lobby, then out the back
door and kept going, taking refuge in a rear booth of a dimly-lit
restaurant she knew stayed open late, waiting until it closed. She
sensed great danger, both for him and herself. Something was badly
wrong, and they had to face it together.”
I suppressed a yawn. Tim’s story and his manner of delivery
reminded me of too many overpriced lunches with agents and would-
be screenwriters where I had to listen even more politely to a rehash
of tried-and-true elements as garish and boring as the nouvelle
cuisine on the table. But he believed in his hackneyed conflation, and
so had his father, and it had seemed to me as if a successful joint
venture might lead them to reconciliation and better times. G. Felton
Fish, however, could not change his thieving ways, and their
relationship was heading for the rocks again. I wondered if Tim had
gotten wind of the audit of G.F.’s charges for the story rights. Nick
might have thought he could use Tim as a weapon against Fish, and
gotten him riled up. If so, then why did—but the scenario droned on,
sopping up my attention like a mildewed old sponge.
“…so Orson and Ellie make a run for it. They try to sneak out of
his flat just before dawn. A shadowy figure who had been keeping
the place under surveillance follows, but they sprint down some back
streets, steal a car and get away after some harrowing moments. Ellie
wants to flee to a friend’s house in the suburbs of San José, but
Orson decides that they would be caught in the stolen car, and that
the address of her friend might be known to their enemies. Instead
he drives to the business district and parks the car on a side street.
Then they walk to his office. Ellie asks him why, and he tells her that
the answer to their dilemma might be discovered by a bit of research

139