“Kitchen?” Nate says as they step out of the elevator into the stately foyer of his triplex.
“Yes, please,” Laurel says, relieved to forego the formalities of her first visit here and glad to notice that Nate’s jeans, split at both knees, are in worse shape than hers, and that his sweatshirt is as shapeless as her sweater is rumpled.
He takes her coat, leaves it on a bench in the foyer and leads the way to the kitchen, where she’s shown to a place at the breakfast table and asked if she’d like something to eat. Although no reference is made to the trencherman appetite she brought to their last meeting, she’s embarrassed to admit she’s hungry when asked. In truth, famished after having eaten nothing all day. But she doesn’t tell him that. Nor does she explain why mere thought of the drink he’s just offered is so repugnant.
“Tea is fine. Toast will be just fine. Please don’t go to any trouble. Enough that you’re letting me stay here until things . . . stabilize.”
“Stabilize . . . Interesting word for it.” Nate takes eggs, cheese, and butter from the refrigerator and lays out a selection of bagels next to the toaster. “I’m not placing any qualifiers on my hospitality, but. . . .”
He fills the electric kettle, assembles the tea things and turns to face her.
“Okay, let’s see what we have so far . . . Some kind of misunderstanding led to your leaving the party alone last night. And tonight, you slept through your commitment to attend Rayce’s concert, possibly incurring David’s displeasure and hardly enough reason to—”
“Yes, that’s it. I’ve let
David
down, and I’m not ready to face him yet,” she says in a rush.
“Bullshit, my dear. Whatever happened just before you left the party could have been cleared up last night and
certainly
could have been cleared up by now if you’d given the offending party a chance to explain himself. And if you’d given yourself a chance to reason things out before calling me, you would have realized it wasn’t at all too late to put in an appearance at the Garden . . . Unless, of course, you didn’t want to. That being the case, may I ask why?”
“Shit,
I’m
still working on why.”
“Then I am right.”
“Yes. I didn’t give the offending party—Colin—a chance last night and when I relented late this morning, matters went from bad to worse.”
“Again . . . May I ask why?”
“Because of you. Because he terminated you.”
Nate loses his grip on the copper omelet pan he’s removing from an overhead rack and gasps, “Jesus, I did not see
that
coming.” For a second it’s unclear if he means the pan that almost hit him on the head or the truth she just revealed. Either way, he appears stunned.
“At the party for Rayce, I started getting bad vibes when I heard David triumphantly declare that he could guarantee the so-called shelter Colin was looking for and Colin jumped through his hoop without a backward glance. And later, Amanda told me Colin had in effect banished you from our table, so I should have—”
“Banished is too strong a word, and if I hadn’t already considered moving to another table, believe me, I wouldn’t have cooperated.”
“Very well, that aside . . . When Amanda prevailed upon me to speak to Colin earlier today and he said that he’d broken with you, I spared nothing in stating my extremely low opinion of his idiotic decision. The conversation went downhill from there and ended with my hanging up on him. I remain appalled by his remarkably thankless behavior toward you and want
nothing
more to do with him until I’ve had time to—”
“Stop . . . right . . . there. Do
not
say another word.”
The implied threat in his delivery is enough to shut her up, and if it wasn’t, she’d have to shout to make herself heard over the extraordinary amount of noise he’s making with the cooking utensils.
In relative quiet, he serves her a perfect cheese omelet, a selection of lightly toasted bagels, and a pot of tea. She’s given no opportunity to say thank you, much less pick up where she left off, before he excuses himself to get something from another room.
With no good reason to wait for his return, she goes to work on the food and puts away most of the omelet and an entire pumpernickel bagel before he reappears with a collection of items that include a video cassette, several audio CDs, some loose papers, and what looks like a lengthy fax folded under his arm. He sets everything but the fax at the far end of the table and takes a chair opposite hers, where he encourages her to finish eating before listening to what he has to say.
“Take your time,” he says. “We have all night if necessary, and I’m guessing it may take that long to convince you how badly mistaken you are—how horribly mistaken you are about a number of things.”
If he had said wrong instead of mistaken, she would be sputtering her way out of this temporary refuge. As it is, she’s hard put not to argue—blindly—without even hearing his contentions. What’s more, the remainder of the omelet doesn’t taste nearly as good when consumed under protest.
“Very well,” she says, pushing the plate aside. “Let the convincing begin. Let’s hear how
horribly
flawed I am in my interpretations.”
Oblivious to her disdainful undertone, Nate gnaws on a bagel before handing over the accordion-folded fax. “Colin happened on this by accident when he was here yesterday to use the gym. It’s the results of a background check I ordered when my overriding ambition was unmasking you as David Sebastian’s chief recruiter.”
As she scans through the long document, he keeps up a running commentary, alternating between explaining and confessing. By this means, she learns that Mrs. Floss was not hallucinating when shooing away a rooftop intruder and that Amanda was not exaggerating when reporting a damaging rumor afloat.
From the fax alone, she discovers that the worrisome presence on her street was only the overambitious agent of a private investigator—an agent since reprimanded and relieved of duty—and feels a measure of relief to know she’ll have just Mrs. Floss to deal with when she returns home tomorrow.
From Nate’s sustained outpouring, she determines that he influenced the opinions of the publicists overheard in the ladies’ room and supplied slanted innuendo to certain tabloids. It’s not a stretch to picture him advising some vacuous reporter to deliberately misspell mouthpiece—a laughable affront now—if he thought it would help discourage her, and by association, David.
“Aside from protecting my own concerns, I still would have gone against Colin’s wishes and had you investigated when I picked up on his interest in you. Anyone knowing what Colin was put through by Aurora would have done the same, so I offer no apology there. And I can’t really apologize for this, either . . . something else carelessly left in plain sight.”
He hands her a page bearing the letterhead of the American Institute of Creative and Performing Arts and text describing the Institute’s keen disappointment that Colin Elliot is unable to accept their invitation to perform his nominated song at the awards ceremony scheduled for Monday, March 30, 1987.
“At the time the invitation was issued, no one could say for sure if Colin would be equal to the task, and I was goddammed if I’d let him falter on a global stage,” Nate says. “I’m not sorry I turned down the invitation without his knowledge, and I’m prepared to pay for misleading him. All things considered, I can’t imagine he won’t press charges.”
“I’ll see to it that he doesn’t.”
“Jesus! You’re
still
on my side? What’s it gonna take to make you see I really am the bad guy?”
“More than you’ve shown me so far.”
“Okay . . . try this. My motives were less than straightforward when I set out to court your assistant.”
“Now
there’s
a real piece of news.” Laurel laughs and pours them each another cup of tea. “As if she wasn’t on to you from the start.”
“Was she ever. I had egg on my face for days after that first attempt with her.”
“Then no harm done there unless you continue to view her as an empty-headed pushover.”
“Trust me, that error will not be repeated. But even so, aren’t you pissed that I did try to use her?”
“Have you forgotten I’m a lawyer? I’m no stranger to chicanery. I employ it myself when nothing else works. Nothing you’ve done is counter to Colin’s best interest, so I’m still in your corner.”
“Okay, then consider
this.
Yesterday—within hours of Colin’s accidental discovery of the fax and the letter—I also had a rude awakening. I can’t call it an epiphany because I think down deep I’ve always known that my relationship with Colin was headed for big trouble and sooner or later, something or someone would have to give. However, until yesterday I didn’t want to see that it had to be me—me and the string of theories I’ve let shape my behavior ever since his accident. This line of thinking might once have had practical application, but given time and strength of imagination, it devolved into a form of paranoia that sapped everything it touched. Once I was able to see that, I was also able to see that the best and surest way out of this—this miasma of self-doubt and second guessing—was to relinquish my professional hold on Colin.”
“Isn’t that throwing the baby out with the bathwater?”
“I suppose it might have seemed so if I’d beaten him to the punch.”
“Am I to understand that you were ready to resign
before
Colin initiated the action?”
“That’s correct. The letter of resignation had been drawn up and was awaiting only my signature and the opportunity to present it when Colin came to my office this morning with similar on his mind. My assistant can corroborate the timing if you have any doubt—”
“That won’t be necessary. The only doubt I have is about the accidental nature of Colin’s discovery. I doubt the fax and the letter were left in plain sight wholly by accident. This is not some untidy bachelor pad you live in. I can’t imagine anything is ever out of place for very long—with or without the efforts of a housekeeping staff.”
“Okay, you may have me there. But if leaving incriminating evidence lying around wasn’t a complete accident, it wasn’t a hundred percent deliberate, either. On the day I got careless, I was too preoccupied with how I was going to show you up as the transparently striving instrument of my then rival to give much conscious thought to the setting of another stage.”
“I see.”
“Does that mean you did or did not see through me at the time?”
“I initially saw you as a gracious host and discriminating connoisseur of the fine arts. As the evening progressed, I saw you as a devoted and unswervingly loyal friend and agent to Colin Elliot. At no time during the evening was I aware that you were trying to trip me up, so either you’re very practiced in your technique or you weren’t trying very hard.”
“I stopped trying soon after you walked in the door because you didn’t pretend not to be impressed with the surroundings or attempt to be blasé about my particular brand of hospitality.”
“So I’m at my disarming best when I’m either agog at some amazing sight or stuffing my face with choice gourmet treats.”
“You could say.”
“Very well. If that’s the way you see me, I’m emboldened to ask if you have any more of that fabulous ice cream dessert you served the other night.”
The request injects much-needed levity into the atmosphere. Nate is still chuckling when he brings her a cereal bowl containing a baseball-sized mold of gelato enrobed with chocolate and biscotti crumbs, so she feels at ease about asking what caused his rude awakening and subsequent throwing in of the towel.
“Colin said you recently clashed with him over something or other that he misplaced in L.A. Was that the catalyst?”
“No. That kind of clash had become commonplace. It took something more significant than a nasty exchange to make me see how far afield I was. What happened was . . . I encountered something—a symbol, I want to say—that produced an effect like seeing a troubled face in the mirror and not recognizing it as your own. Does that make any sense?”
She can’t answer right away, not while recalling Colin’s assertion that, for being true to everyone but herself, she couldn’t identify her own reflection. “I’m afraid it does,” she says when she finds her voice. “
Perfect
sense.” She extends a high five that initiates another burst of laughter.
“I’m not exactly making headway, am I?” he says.
“Toward convincing me you didn’t deserve to be terminated? No, you’ve made none. But you have convinced me I was mistaken to see your termination as unjust. That could hardly be the case if you yourself wanted out.”
“Okay. I should be grateful for that much, and I should feel fortunate to have a champion in you, but there’s still the matter of Colin’s alleged ingratitude. I cannot allow you to characterize him as thankless. He’s anything but. I’m guessing no one’s thought to tell you that the clinics he established—the one in Michigan and the one we just dedicated in Colorado—both bear my name, not his. He called them monuments to my tendency to overdo when I objected to the tribute. And look what he’s doing for Rayce, even as we speak.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean.”
“Didn’t he tell you he took on the last-minute job of coproducing the live album of Rayce’s concert tonight, and he’s contributing one of the songs?”
“No.”
“He must have mentioned they were making a video of the new tune today. I think it’s called ‘Angle of Repose.’”
“No, he didn’t, and now I’m wondering how he happened to tell you. I thought you two were barely speaking even before what happened this morning.”
“I got it from my regular contact.”
“That would be Bemus.”
“Yeah. Like you, he refuses to see me in a bad light, so he tries to keep me in the loop whenever Colin’s on one of his independent streaks. But that’s at an end. I’ve received his last clandestine report, I’m glad to say.”
“You don’t care what happens to Colin from now on?”