Crampton (7 page)

HELEN

Listen to the case, not the suspect. The case led us here.

Fred retrieves something from a shelf, a package of some sort wrapped in oilstained brown paper and held together with twine. Fred and the kid speak in WHISPERS so they cannot be overheard. Fred seems to be giving the kid some kind of instructions.

BRADY

But the case doesn't make any sense!

HELEN

We're government agents--we're not supposed to care about what makes sense. (Beat) You know what I mean.

The kid nods. He takes the package and exits the shop.

HELEN

(to FRED)

We'd like to ask you a couple more questions.

FRED

No. I'm closing up for the night. I'm going to have to ask you to leave.

BRADY

I'm sure it will just take a few minutes.

FRED

I'll tell you what. It's my dinner time. If you really want to talk that bad, we can talk over at the diner.

He takes a ratty coat off a hook and walks Brady and Helen to the front door.

FRED

I got to go out the back to turn the lights off. I'll meet you out front and we can walk there together.

EXT. OUTSIDE FIX-IT SHOP - EVENING

Brady and Helen exit the shop. Fred looks the door behind them and turns the sign to "CLOSED." Brady and Helen watch him carefully as he walks to the back of the shop. ALL THE LIGHTS GO OUT.

They wait a few moments. No sign of Fred.

HELEN

Oh, no.

BRADY

(walking toward the back of the shop)

Come on--how far can the old geezer have gotten?

They hustle around the corner.

EXT. BACK OF FIX-IT SHOP - EVENING

The rear of the fix-it shop is a blank brick wall, bearing a few stains and patches of crumbling mortar. There is no back door.

HELEN

That's just wonderful.

BRADY

(in disbelief)

Shit.

(then shouting in frustration)

SHIT!

E

INT. "EAT HERE" DINER

Treacly MUZAK plays to empty tables. An advertisement for the "spectacular" magic show tomorrow at three is taped inside the front window.

Brady and Helen enter and wearily take seats at the counter.

BRADY

Okay, Sweeten, what do we have so far?

HELEN

So far? Nothing I'd care to bring back to Headquarters. Unless you want to haul Ricky Smith to Washington to do card tricks. (Beat) You know what's really strange?

BRADY

You mean apart from this whole fucking day?

HELEN

It's like none of this has anything to do with Larry Johnson's murder anymore. It's all changed.

BRADY

That's what I was talking about in the Fix-It shop. This investigation isn't following the regular pattern. Usually a case gets more focused with every lead you track down. But this one just keeps going and going.

HELEN

Agreed. It's like, Larry Johnson ... then the magic shop ... then Ricky ... I feel like we're on some kind of weird scavenger hunt.

Helen seems on the brink of something, but can't quite articulate it.

HELEN

It all seems so random ... but somehow
deliberately
random ... like this is all some kind of excuse to ... to--

COUNTERGIRL (O.S.)

Good evening, folks!

Brady and Helen look up sharply. A young COUNTERGIRL Is standing there. She is tall and very attractive, hut wearing too much makeup, giving her face a waxy appearance.

COUNTERGIRL

Would you like to try the meatloaf tonight?

BRADY

Uh ... yeah, sure.

COUNTERGIRL

And for you, ma'am?

Helen is a little out of it, still trying to hold onto her last thought ... to no avail.

HELEN

Just some coffee for me, thanks.

The countergirl walks away.

BRADY

What were you saying, Sweeten?

HELEN

I can't remember now. Probably wasn't important.

BRADY

Well, I'm going to visit the Men's. Don't eat my meatloaf.

He stands up and walks toward the back of the diner.

INT. DINER - BATHROOM

Two stalls, both with closed doors. One urinal. Lots of white tile.

Brady enters. He steps up to the urinal, starts to unzip his fly, and looks down. The urinal is cracked and broken--unusable.

BRADY

Whoops.

He turns toward the stalls. He pushes on the first door, but it's latched--someone's using it.

BRADY

Sorry, buddy.

He pushes the other door, which swings open.

INT. DINER

Helen sitting at the counter, all alone in the diner. Her CELL PHONE RINGS. She answers it.

HELEN

Helen Sweeten ... What's that? ... I'm sorry, I can barely hear you ...

INT. DINER - BATHROOM

The sound of BRADY URINATING echoes against the tiled walls.

CU ON BRADY - his face goes from slack contentment to a scowl. His nose twitches as he sniffs the air.

BRADY

(to himself)

Aw, Christ!

(calling out)

Hey, you all right in there, buddy?

His face screws up as another wave of the stench hits him.

BRADY

Oh, mother of god!

INT. DINER

Helen on the phone.

HELEN

... I'm losing you, could you ... ah, shit!

She snaps the phone closed.

INT. DINER - BATHROOM - ON BRADY

Brady is holding his breath now. He shakes off and leaves the stall without flushing. He quickly runs his hands under some hot water.

BRADY

Mister, I think you need to see a doctor about that.

He grabs a few sheets of paper towel and leaves.

The CAMERA PANS DOWN to peer under the stall door. In the still occupied stall we see a pair of shiny black shoes, like the kind that come with a rented tuxedo. They FLOAT STRAIGHT UP AND OUT OF SIGHT.

INT. DINER

Brady comes back, drying his hands with the paper towel. Helen is obviously upset--somewhere between worried and pissed off.

BRADY

What's the matter with you?

HELEN

I got a call from the section chief, but the connection was pretty bad and he got cut off.

BRADY

Did he have any news?

HELEN

He sounded pretty shaken up, something about the Syrian situation. And I'm pretty sure I heard the word "nuclear."

BRADY

Nuclear ... as in nuclear
bomb
nuclear?

HELEN

I don't know.

Helen crinkles her nose and then looks at Brady.

HELEN

I guess that bran muffin finally kicked in, eh?

BRADY

What?

(he sniffs his jacket)

Aw, man! It's in my goddamn clothes!

HELEN

I think I might have to move down one seat. No offense.

BRADY

It's not me. Some guy in the bathroom. You know how they say red meat stays in your colon for seven years? I think this guy was letting all his go at once.

He removes his jacket and places it several seats down from them.

The countergirl arrives with a cup of coffee and a plate of mashed potatoes and gravy. It looks pretty good for diner food.

COUNTERGIRL

You folks enjoy your dinner.

HELEN

Excuse me, do you have a public phone I could use?

COUNTERGIRL

I'm sorry--we do, but it's broken.

BRADY

Can I ask you something? How do you--the town, I mean--stay in business? It doesn't seem like there's enough people around here to support it.

COUNTERGIRL

Oh, tourists, mostly.

HELEN

Tourists?

COUNTERGIRL

Oh, sure. We get lots of people Just like you passing through here.

The countergirl nods in the direction of a table toward the back where a OLD COUPLE Is seated. Judging by their colorfully patterned clothes, sunglasses, and cameras, they are tourists. They are scooping chunks of meatloaf and lumps of mashed potatoes into their mouths, seemingly not pausing between bites to swallow. They turn to Brady and Helen and smile, their chins dripping gravy.

Brady looks at his plate.

BRADY

You know, on second thought--

Helen's CELL PHONE RINGS.

HELEN

That's probably the section chief calling back--maybe he got a better connection.

(she answers the phone)

Helen Sweeten.

RICKY (ON PHONE)

Are you two still in town?

HELEN

Yes.

RICKY

Get out. Get out while you still can.

HELEN

What do you--

Ricky hangs up. Helen closes the phone.

HELEN

Wells, that was Ricky Smith. I think something's wrong.

BRADY

Let's go.

EXT. MAIN STREET - EVENING

The agents' car pulls out, then drives past the diner and out of town. A few seconds later, out of the agents' view, ALL THE LIGHTS GO OUT, as if someone pulled the plug on the whole town.

CUT TO:

INT. YELLOW HOUSE - KITCHEN

Brady, Helen, and Ricky talking again in the kitchen. Ricky is agitated.

RICKY

You shouldn't have come here. You should have driven right past and not looked back.

BRADY

No more of this crap, Ricky. If you've got something to tell us, then Just fucking tell us.

RICKY

This came through my mail slot about an hour ago.

He unfolds a sheet of paper and holds it up for them to see: "Spectacular Display of Illusion and Ventriloquism."

HELEN

They're all over town.

RICKY

This is bad. This is very bad. You don't want to be around tomorrow when this thing happens.

HELEN

We checked out the Masonic Hall. I don't see any spectacular displays happening in that place. Not tomorrow, not next week, probably not ever.

RICKY

I thought the same thing the first time I went in there.

BRADY

(figuring it out)

You were still investigating the Mystery Line case. Even after you quit the Bureau.

Ricky nods.

BRADY

But, I would have thought that, after ... what happened--

RICKY

After my crack-up? That I would have let it go?

BRADY

Something like that, yeah.

RICKY

Just the opposite. Cases like that were the whole reason I joined the FBI in the first place. The ability to point my finger and say, with all the authority of the Justice Department behind me, "None of this is real. It's all a con." That was what I lived for. When we looked into the Mystery Line, Larry and I, we could tell it was a front for something, but none of the pieces seemed to fit together. After Detroit, Larry had had it--too many dead ends. But I was in too deep.

BRADY

What happened that night?

RICKY

I got a glimpse of something. Something big. Maybe it was a warning, telling me to back off. Or maybe it was a dare, to see if I'd keep going. Doesn't matter--I've never responded with much wisdom to either warnings or dares. I quit the Bureau and made the Mystery Line my purpose in life. Eventually I ended up in here. Just as you did. I snooped around for while, and like you I went into that old ruin of a hall. And there it was.

HELEN

What?

RICKY

The curtain. The same fucking curtain from the warehouse. And that same
sound
.

(he bows his head and holds his hands over his ears)

Except this time it almost sounded like a voice ... or maybe more than one voice. Telling me things that didn't make any sense. Telling me to look behind the curtain. (Beat) So I did.

BRADY

Ricky, there was no curtain in the Masonic Hall. Just an empty stage and an old office, kind of like the one...

Brady trails off, but Ricky knows where he's going.

RICKY

Like the one in the Mystery Line commercial?

HELEN

I'm sure it's just a coincidence.

She sounds like she's trying to convince herself of this, and Ricky's not buying it.

RICKY

There is no such thing as coincidence.

No fate, no happenstance, no such thing as good luck or bad luck. Do you think you came to this town by virtue of your own investigative skills? Fuck that. You were brought here.

BRADY

That's a lot of horse shit.

RICKY

Oh, you don't realize it at the time. One thing just sort of leads to another. A map, a murder, a phone call, a message in a fortune cookie. They've got all the gimmicks. You think you're heading in one direction, and the next thing you know you're here--about as far as you can get from where you thought you were going.

HELEN

Let me get this straight--you think there is some kind of conspiracy or something that lured you ... us ... to Crampton?

BRADY

What the hell for?

Ricky sighs.

RICKY

These things I've told you so far, these are true things. You may not believe them, but I know they're true, because they happened to me. But the how's and the why's ... I can only speculate. I could say it's the Illuminati, or the Trilateral Commission, or the Freemasons, but really it's all of that. Every conspiracy theory you've ever heard is Just one little piece of what they can do. Nothing's too small, nothing's too big. You lose your car keys, your wife gets run over by a semi, some nut blows up the capital of Pakistan. Einstein said he didn't believe that God played dice with the universe. Do you understand what he meant by that?

HELEN

He meant that there was order in the universe--there was a comprehensible reason for everything that existed and that everything obeyed certain laws, even if we didn't understand all of those laws yet.

BRADY

Why are we talking about Einstein?

RICKY

Einstein's god may not play dice with the universe ... but
They
do. They play all kinds of games, maybe just with the world that we know, maybe with the whole fucking universe. Prom our point of view Their power is unthinkable--literally. Our brains just aren't wired to handle it. Maybe there is some kind of purpose and order, some kind of sense to the game They play. But that's not how it seems to me. To me it just seems like this insane power at work at the heart of things ... no, not at work--at
play
. Putting on a flimsy, pointless stageshow. And the only thing that keeps the show going is this crazy, relentless urge for more play. Just to play and play and play. Pure play for the hell of it. All for Their private amusement. That's what killed those people who called the Mystery Line. They wanted the truth, and they got it.