Simms, the security type with the tinted glasses, got to his feet.
I looked at him. “Simms,” I said, “this horse’s ass that you work for has made me very edgy. If you do anything more than stand up, I will put you in two weeks of traction.”
Simms said, “Hey.”
“I mean it,” I said. “Sit down.”
Candy’s face was flushed. She moved in front of me. “Come on,” she said. “You’re making it worse. Come on. I want to go home.”
Brewster pushed his desk intercom. “Miss Blaisdell,” he said, “send some security people in here at once.”
Candy said, “See what you’ve done. Come on, let’s get out of here.”
I said, “It is not dignified to run off like this.”
“Come on,” she said and headed for the door. There was nothing left there for me to do. Telling Brewster he’d be hearing from me seemed graceless. I thought about kicking him, but by the time I got around the desk, the entire security force would be setting up gun emplacements in the reception room. I lingered another few seconds, hoping that Simms would lay hold of me. No luck. Nobody moved. Everyone looked at me. I felt like I’d stumbled into an Italian Western.
Candy was out the office door. She wasn’t waiting. I was supposed to guard her. I went after her. On the way out I picked the globe off the table in the booklined room and dropped it on the floor. That oughta fix ‘em.
Chapter 12
IN THE ELEVATOR there were tears in Candy’s eyes. In the parking garage her lower lip was shaky. In her car, pulling out onto Santa Monica Boulevard; she cried.
As we passed Bedford Drive I said, “If you’ll tell me why you’re crying I’ll buy you a large frappeed margarita at the Red Onion, and maybe a nacho supreme.” She sobbed. We crossed Camden.
I said, “It’s down here, on Dayton at Beverly. You keep sobbing and driving and you’ll miss an outstanding margarita.”
She kept crying, but she turned right on Rodeo, drove down past stores that sold eight-hundred-dollar farmer’s overalls, and parked near the corner of Dayton. Then she put her head down on the steering wheel and wept full out. I cranked the seat back as far as it would go on my side of the MG and leaned back and stretched my legs out and folded my arms on my chest and rested my head and closed my eyes and waited.
It took about five more minutes before she stopped. She straightened back in the seat, turned the rearview mirror toward her, and began to look at her face. Her breathing was still irregular, and a half sob caught her breath. She took makeup from her purse and began to readjust her face. I was still. When she got through she said, “Let’s go.”
We walked down to the Red Onion. Pink stucco, Mexicanesque tile, a bar on one side of the foyer and the dining room on the other. The bar was full of young women with very narrow backsides wearing very tight jeans with designer labels on the back pockets. They were talking with very young men with very narrow backsides wearing very tight jeans with designer labels on the back pockets.
We went to the dining room and each drank a margarita. Then we ordered two nacho supremes and another margarita. The waitress went away.
I said, “What happened at Oceania to make you cry?”
“They were so”-she shook her head-“they were so… mean.”
“Nice guys work in the mailroom,” I said.
She nodded. The waitress brought more margaritas. “I know,” Candy said. “I know that. I mean, it’s the same in broadcasting. I know. But they were so-” She raised both hands slightly from the table, made a small open gesture, and let them drop.
“First of all why do you say `they‘? The three clucks on the couch barely spoke. Simms just made a few security-chief noises. How else would we know he was tough?”
“Well, it was really”-she twirled the stem of her glass-“it was really just him, I guess, and the rest of them looked threatening.”
“ ‘Him’ being Brewster?”
“Yes.”
“He scared you by his talk of going to the station management?”
“No, not scared me. But…” She drank some of the margarita. It was a pale green. “A station manager is quite often friends with big shots in town. I mean, they really can make waves when the license comes up for renewal, or when they talk with other big shots about where they advertise.”
“You could get fired?”
“Well, it’s possible. Or not get more money or not get good assignments. Get a troublemaker reputation-first Hammond, and now Brewster complaining to the station.”
“That made you cry?”
“Not just that.”
“What else?”
“Well, I was alone and they were all there.”
“Well, you weren’t absolutely, completely, one hundred percent alone,” I said.
