Alone Along Writers’ Roads by Wood Tom

Author:Wood, Tom
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: fiction, novel, writing, writer
ISBN: 9798989439713
Publisher: Willow Days Press
Published: 2024-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

25

* * *

Perhaps a plot

It took only one day after her call to Arthur Pradle for Charlotte to find the opportunity to use the cabinet key. It was Amy’s birthday, and Charlotte earlier gave Randy permission to take ninety minutes for lunch. He explained that he wanted to take Amy to Zax’s in Brentwood. Charlotte was happy to oblige since she knew that the restaurant was all the way over on San Vicente Boulevard. Sandra had already left the office for the remainder of the day. Charlotte would have more than ample time to accomplish her task.

She waited almost fifteen minutes after Randy and Amy left just to be sure there were no sudden changes in plans. While she waited, she wondered what she would find. She also wondered if she would find anything at all since it was possible that Amy had already completed the assignment Sandra had given her. There might be nothing out of the ordinary inside that drawer.

Finally, her curiosity reaching the boiling point, Charlotte took the key and walked over to Amy’s desk. When she looked down, the drawer that she was certain to have contained all of those secrets was open.

“Open?” Charlotte almost shouted for all the world to hear. How can that drawer be open unless Amy was onto my little plan and managed to take the secret stash with her when she left for lunch?

Charlotte thought about how disappointed Arthur would be when she told him that Amy had left the drawer open while away celebrating her birthday with Randy. Arthur’s disappointment would involve more than just the news about the drawer being open. His faith in Charlotte would probably be shaken. That gnawed inside her as she bent down to shut the drawer. Then she glimpsed inside the partially open drawer and saw something under the box of Kleenex. Charlotte pulled the drawer wide open and removed the box of tissues. Underneath was a binder with a label that read Contracts.

Charlotte removed the three-inch-thick binder, took it to her desk, and sat down. Inside the binder was a letter addressed to Arthur Pradle at the New York office. Her eyes dropped to the space at the bottom of the letter. The space provided room for a signature but wasn’t yet signed. Under the space was typed “Davis Quigley.”

Charlotte read the body of the letter, and saw that it was a thirty-day notice, beginning on a date left blank, to terminate the contract between Davis Quigley and the Pradle Literary Agency. Underneath was an identical letter for Franz Graber and another for Simon DuValle.

All the remaining letters were identical to Quigley’s, Graber’s, and DuValle’s and each was the name of an author that Sandra had brought aboard to Pradle. Charlotte was flabbergasted. There had been no indications that any of the authors were displeased with anything or anyone at Pradle Literary Agency, at least none that she was aware of. And why did Sandra assign the preparation of the termination letters to Charlotte’s subordinate, Amy?

Charlotte decided it was urgent that she get Arthur on the phone.

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