Get Shorty: A Novel

That’s why Chili was looking right at Catlett as Catlett looking back took two quick barefoot steps to the railing, got his left hand on it, the gun pointing out of his other hand, and kept going, screaming as the railing fell away behind him and Catlett, it seemed for a moment, hung there grabbing at space.

The guy who had sung the national anthem was doing “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough.” Which wasn’t exactly true, Chili thought, standing at the edge of the deck looking down. He could see Catlett, the white silk robe, lying in weeds and scraggly bushes, more than a hundred feet from here, not moving. The Bear came up to stand next to him and Chili said, “Jesus, how’d that happen?”

The Bear started taking bolts and nuts, old used ones, out of his pants pockets. Wiping each one on his shirt before dropping it over the side, he said, “Beats the shit out of me.”

Looking at sky, Catlett knew everything he should have known while he was still up there looking at Chili Palmer instead of the Bear, the Bear too dumb to have the idea himself, shit, he had given the Bear the idea and the Bear had come in his house last night, even told him he did, but he kept seeing Chili Palmer instead of the Bear. Even knowing he was going to do them both he had listened to the Bear

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’cause it sounded like movies and he said yeah, not taking even half a minute to look at it good . . . But, shit, even if he had taken the half a minute and said forget it and then did them both, he wouldn’t know what the Bear had done to his deck, no, he’d walk out there some night hearing bossa nova or the nice sound of that girl laughing, look over the rail at the lit-up swimming pool down there in the dark, movie people having some fun, knowing how to live. He believed he was almost in their yard, but couldn’t turn his head to look, couldn’t move, couldn’t feel nothing . . .

28

The way Chili told it when he got back to Karen’s and they were in the kitchen: “He fell off his sun deck and was killed.”

She said, “He fell off his sun deck.”

“The railing gave way on him for some reason. When he leaned on it.”

She said, “The railing gave way . . .”

“Yeah, and he fell. I’d say about a hunnerd feet.”

“You went down, looked at him?”

“The Bear did. I never would’ve made it, it’s steep.”

“It was an accident?” Karen said. “I mean you didn’t hit him or push him and he happened to fall?”

“I’ll take a polygraph neither one of us touched him.”

“But you didn’t call the police.”

“Not with a suitcase full of cocaine in the house. Also he had that gun in his hand. He still wanted to shoot me.”

Karen poured their coffee. She sat across from him at the kitchen table and watched him put two spoons of sugar in his and stir it slowly, carefully,

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smoking a cigarette. He looked up at her. She thought he was going to ask if she was still watching him, but he didn’t. He smiled, stirring his coffee. He said after a moment, not smiling now, “You think I might’ve done it. I say I didn’t, but you still think I might’ve. What can I tell you?”

Karen didn’t say anything. He was a cool guy. Or seemed cool because she didn’t know him and maybe never would. She thought, All right, the guy fell off his sun deck. She said to Chili, “Were you scared?”

“You bet I was scared.”

“You don’t act like it.”

“I was scared then, not now. How long you want me to be scared?”

There was a silence. She heard him blow on his coffee and take a sip.

“The meeting’s at two-thirty,” Karen said. “Harry wants to pick us up.”

They sat around the coffee table in the living room part of Elaine’s office at Tower waiting for Michael to get off the phone. Chili listened to Harry saying that as soon as this guy told him the story he knew they had a picture. Elaine saying that from what she’d heard so far it did sound off-trail, a shylock not your usual good guy. Harry saying that was the beauty of it, a hard-on type metamorphosized by his love of a woman. Elaine saying she hoped he didn’t soften up too much, become limp. Chili thinking, Jesus Christ. Michael came over from Elaine’s desk and took a seat next to Karen on the hard sofa. Chili, in his dark-blue suit, looked at Michael in his beat-up flight jacket thinking, What if it’s that same fuckin jacket was at Vesuvio’s?

They waited while Michael put his hand on Karen’s leg, told her she looked great, then started explaining to everybody why he was leaving his agent who—they wouldn’t believe this—could not acquire a property Michael wanted, could not make a deal with the writer, and if an agent couldn’t make a deal with a writer, for Christ sake . . . Until Chili said, “You want to talk about that one or this one?” It got a surprised look from Michael and Harry, deadpan reactions from Karen and Elaine, and the meeting started.

* * *

Elaine: “Mr. Palmer?”

Chili: “Okay. Open at the drycleaning shop. You see the shylock talking to Fay, the wife.”

Michael: “I thought the guy was an agent.”

Chili: “I changed him back to a drycleaner.”

Michael: “You still don’t have a script?”

Karen: “They’re working on the moral dilemma.”

Michael: “That writes itself. I want to know what happens.”

Chili: “Yeah, that’s what I’m telling you.”

Michael: “Let’s go to the third act and then come back if we want. You build to a climactic scene. What is it?”

Chili: “You’re referring to the action, with Ray Carlo.”

Michael: “Who’s Ray Carlo?”

Chili: “He was Bones, I changed his name. Okay, Randy finally catches up with Leo . . .”

Michael: “Wait. Who the fuck is Randy?”

Chili: “Randy’s the shylock. You need a nice-guy name. You don’t want to call him Lefty, Cockeye, Joe Loop, one of those.”

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Elaine: “Sonny’s nice.”

Chili: “It’s not bad. I know a Lucky, a Jojo, Momo, Jimmy Cap, Cowboy, Sucky, Chooch . . .”

Elaine: “Sucky?”

Michael: “Okay, I’m Randy, for the moment anyway. What happens?”

Chili: “They catch up with Leo the drycleaner, Randy leans on him a little, not much, and Leo tells them, okay, the dough’s out at the airport in a locker. So Randy and Fay have the key and are at the moral dilemma part when Ray Carlo shows up. Actually he’s already there, searching the place when they get home from Leo’s. Carlo, he’s got a gun, takes the key offa Randy and Randy says okay, you win, the dough’s out at the airport. Ray Carlo leaves to go get it and Randy calls the FBI.”

Michael: “All he’s doing is picking up money. What would they arrest him for?”

Chili: “They’d at least give him a hard time. Randy knows this and wants to see it, so he and Fay go out to the airport. They see the bust and look at each other with surprise, ’cause what’s in that locker is not money but cocaine. You understand? Leo was setting them up, or anybody that got on to him.”

Michael, frowning: “That’s how it ends?”

Chili: “No, you still have Leo.”

Michael: “I thought Carlo was the heavy.”

Chili, noticing the way Karen was staring at him: “That’s what you’re suppose to think. No, that’s the