ate.
“Now,” Fletch said to Moxie, after she had downed six quarter-sandwiches, four lobster tails and half her shrimp, “want to tell me why you asked me to come down here? Or have you had enough for today? Or maybe it isn’t relevent any more… ?”
“You’re hard enough to find,” grumbled Moxie. “It took me the better part of a week to trace you down.”
“I was in Washington,” Fletch said, “trying to find The Bureau of Indian Affairs.”
“Did you find it?” She was chewing a lobster tail.
“I narrowed it down to one of three telephone booths.”
She wiped her hands on a napkin. “I seem to be in real financial trouble.”
“How is that possible?”
“You tell me.”
“Some nights you’re on two television channels simultaneously. You’re on the cables so much I should think you’d twang. Your films play the theaters. Last Christmas you did the first one hundred days of
A Broadway Hit—”
“And I’m drowning in debt. Explain that to me.”
“I’d like to understand it myself. You’re smudging the American dream. The rich-and-famous dream.”
There were tears in her eyes. She ducked her head to her plate. “I work hard. I have to. So many people are counting on me. My work contributesto the income of literally thousands of people now. We’ve got my mother in this fabulously expensive sanatorium in Kansas. I’ve taken over some of the cost from Freddy.” She lowered her voice. “And I don’t have to be much of a fortune teller to say that pretty soon I’m going to have to take it all over. And everyone knows this is just a crazy business I’m in!” she said more loudly. “No security. Bankable today, a bum tomorrow. A person like me can’t get so much out of herself if she thinks that next week, next month, next year sometime she’s going to be on the sidewalk!”
“Have some shrimp.”
“I have some shrimp.”
“Have some more shrimp.”
“I don’t want any more shrimp,” she said with annoyance. Then she looked at him. “Was that your Sympathetic Routine Number 12?”
“Number 9, actually. I wish you wouldn’t see through me so quickly. It makes me blush.”
“You’ve never blushed in your life.”
“Why don’t you try to tell me in some sort of narrative form, some sequence—”
“Can’t.”
“I’m just a simple journalist, temporarily out of work—”
“The whole thing landed on me like a big bomb just a couple of weeks ago. Just before I was due on location for
Midsummer Night’s Madness.
Hell of a way to start a picture. Looking drawn and haggard.”
“You’ve never looked drawn and haggard in your life.” He looked at the lights in her tanned,blond skin, the lights in her blond hair. “Ashes and honey don’t mix.”
“Okay,” she said. “The story. A couple of weeks ago, I get a call from a man at the Internal Revenue Service who says he’s very sorry to bother me
but…”
“With them it’s the but that counts.”
“Right away I told him to call Steve Peterman, that Steve Peterman takes care of all my business affairs, taxes, etcetera, etcetera. And he said that was why he was calling me personally because maybe Mister Peterman hadn’t told me that if I didn’t do something within a matter of days, I was going to jail. Me going to jail—not Steve Peterman.”
“Oh, Moxie, the Internal Revenue Service always talks tough. I once had a very funny experience—”
“Right now, Fletch, I’m not interested in the comic side of the Internal Revenue Service. I asked the man what he was talking about. He said I had gone way beyond my last extension, and a lot of other things I didn’t understand. I asked him to slow down and speak in a language I could understand.”
“That’s asking a bit too much of any government.”
“Well, he did. He was really very kind. I sort of understood him, after a while. Instead of paying my taxes over the last years, Steve has been asking for extensions. So I’m years behind. I
“Now,” Fletch said to Moxie, after she had downed six quarter-sandwiches, four lobster tails and half her shrimp, “want to tell me why you asked me to come down here? Or have you had enough for today? Or maybe it isn’t relevent any more… ?”
“You’re hard enough to find,” grumbled Moxie. “It took me the better part of a week to trace you down.”
“I was in Washington,” Fletch said, “trying to find The Bureau of Indian Affairs.”
“Did you find it?” She was chewing a lobster tail.
“I narrowed it down to one of three telephone booths.”
She wiped her hands on a napkin. “I seem to be in real financial trouble.”
“How is that possible?”
“You tell me.”
“Some nights you’re on two television channels simultaneously. You’re on the cables so much I should think you’d twang. Your films play the theaters. Last Christmas you did the first one hundred days of
A Broadway Hit—”
“And I’m drowning in debt. Explain that to me.”
“I’d like to understand it myself. You’re smudging the American dream. The rich-and-famous dream.”
There were tears in her eyes. She ducked her head to her plate. “I work hard. I have to. So many people are counting on me. My work contributesto the income of literally thousands of people now. We’ve got my mother in this fabulously expensive sanatorium in Kansas. I’ve taken over some of the cost from Freddy.” She lowered her voice. “And I don’t have to be much of a fortune teller to say that pretty soon I’m going to have to take it all over. And everyone knows this is just a crazy business I’m in!” she said more loudly. “No security. Bankable today, a bum tomorrow. A person like me can’t get so much out of herself if she thinks that next week, next month, next year sometime she’s going to be on the sidewalk!”
“Have some shrimp.”
“I have some shrimp.”
“Have some more shrimp.”
“I don’t want any more shrimp,” she said with annoyance. Then she looked at him. “Was that your Sympathetic Routine Number 12?”
“Number 9, actually. I wish you wouldn’t see through me so quickly. It makes me blush.”
“You’ve never blushed in your life.”
“Why don’t you try to tell me in some sort of narrative form, some sequence—”
“Can’t.”
“I’m just a simple journalist, temporarily out of work—”
“The whole thing landed on me like a big bomb just a couple of weeks ago. Just before I was due on location for
Midsummer Night’s Madness.
Hell of a way to start a picture. Looking drawn and haggard.”
“You’ve never looked drawn and haggard in your life.” He looked at the lights in her tanned,blond skin, the lights in her blond hair. “Ashes and honey don’t mix.”
“Okay,” she said. “The story. A couple of weeks ago, I get a call from a man at the Internal Revenue Service who says he’s very sorry to bother me
but…”
“With them it’s the but that counts.”
“Right away I told him to call Steve Peterman, that Steve Peterman takes care of all my business affairs, taxes, etcetera, etcetera. And he said that was why he was calling me personally because maybe Mister Peterman hadn’t told me that if I didn’t do something within a matter of days, I was going to jail. Me going to jail—not Steve Peterman.”
“Oh, Moxie, the Internal Revenue Service always talks tough. I once had a very funny experience—”
“Right now, Fletch, I’m not interested in the comic side of the Internal Revenue Service. I asked the man what he was talking about. He said I had gone way beyond my last extension, and a lot of other things I didn’t understand. I asked him to slow down and speak in a language I could understand.”
“That’s asking a bit too much of any government.”
“Well, he did. He was really very kind. I sort of understood him, after a while. Instead of paying my taxes over the last years, Steve has been asking for extensions. So I’m years behind. I
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