Swimming to Catalina Read Online Free PDF

coffee table, and a fire glowing cheerfully in the fireplace. “Notice that the doors are all a bit wider than usual,” Betty said. “That’s so a camera can follow the actors around the house.”
    “It’s amazing,” Stone said, looking around. “It feels as though you could move right in.”
    “You could. The bathroom works, and your toothbrush is probably in the medicine cabinet.” She led the way into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. It was full of food, some of it half-eaten. They walked to the back door and looked out into the yard. Three small children were sitting on the “snow” next to a large snowman. Vance Calder sat a few yards away in a folding chair, reading his script. Somebody yelled out an order, and Calder got up and came into the house.
    “Hello, Stone,” he said, offering his hand. “I’m glad you could come. You and Betty had better go into he living room, or you’ll be in the shot.”
    Stone followed Betty out of the kitchen, and they sat on the living room sofa. He pointed to a butler’s tray with an array of liquor bottles. “If it weren’t so early, I’d expect you to offer me a drink,” he said.
    “You wouldn’t like it,” she replied. “It’s all tea or water.” She looked at him frankly. “So, what brings you out here? You’ve missed Arrington. I suppose you know she’s back East, visiting her family.”
    “I didn’t have anything else to do,” Stone replied. “I’d just wrapped up a case, and I was at loose ends.”

    “A case? You’re still a police officer, then?”
    “No, I’m a lawyer these days.”
    “What kind of a lawyer?”
    “A very good one.”
    “I mean, do you have a specialty?”
    “My specialty is whatever my clients need.”
    “I didn’t know law was practiced that way anymore.”
    “It isn’t, very often.”
    “Are you with a firm, or on your own?”
    “Both. I’m of counsel to a large firm, Woodman and Weld, but I mostly work out of an office in my house.”
    She cocked her head and frowned a little. “I’ve heard of Woodman and Weld, of course, but what does ‘of counsel’ mean?”
    “It’s a catchall phrase, usually applied to an elderly lawyer who doesn’t practice full-time anymore, but who the firm calls on from time to time for advice.”
    “You’re not exactly elderly.”
    “Not yet.”
    “What does ‘of counsel’ mean in your case, exactly? ” she persisted.
    “It means that I’m not quite respectable enough to be a partner at Woodman and Weld. I’m at arm’s length, but they can reel me in whenever the need arises.”
    “What sort of need?”
    “Let’s say a valued client is arrested for drunk driving, in a car with a woman who is not his wife; let’s say the daughter of a client is beaten up by her boyfriend, but the family doesn’t want to prosecute; let’s say the son of a client rapes a nun. That sort of thing.”

    “Sounds pretty sordid.”
    “Sometimes it is. All sorts of people need all sorts of legal representation, and not everything a client needs can be directly provided by a prestigious firm. The firm, in fact, is as concerned about its own good name as the client’s. They want these cases to go away in the quietest and most expeditious manner possible.”
    “I suppose it must be interesting at times.”
    “It’s interesting all the time,” Stone said. “And it beats estate planning any day.”
    She laughed again, and he enjoyed it.
    “Vance is tied up for lunch,” she said, “so you’ll have to make do with me at the studio commissary.”
    “Making do with you sounds good; you’re a lot more interesting than Vance and nearly as beautiful.”
    She threw back her head and laughed until someone in the distance screamed, “QUIET!”

Chapter 6
    B ack in the golf cart, they drove down the street past more soundstages and made a couple of turns, finishing up in front of a low building with a well-kept front lawn. A patio was filled with tables, and people in all sorts