Death of a Scriptwriter Read Online Free

Songs from the Gorbals . She had not seen or heard of any of them.
    ‘I do not see any detective stories here,’ said Patricia.
    Harry ignored that. ‘Because of this your books will be back in print,’ he said. ‘We suggest a publicity tie-up with Pheasant Books. We plan to start serializing The Case of
the Rising Tides .’
    Patricia stared at him unnervingly. Then she suddenly smiled. From being a rather tatty building inhabited with people who were definitely not ladies and gentlemen, Strathclyde Television and
all in it became suffused with a golden glow. She barely heard anything of the further discussion. She did, however, agree to signing an option contract for a thousand pounds and accepting an
agreement that if the series were sold to the BBC or ITV or anyone else, she would receive two thousand pounds per episode. Money was not important to Patricia, who was comfortably off, but the
thought of getting her precious books back into print made her pretty much deaf to other concerns.
    Business being done, Fiona and Harry said they would take Patricia out for lunch. As they ushered her towards the door, Harry glanced down the table to where Sheila Burford was making notes.
Sheila had cropped blonde hair, large blue eyes and a splendid figure which her outfit of bomber jacket and jeans could not quite hide. ‘You’d best come along as well, Sheila,’
said Harry.
    They took her to a restaurant across from the television centre. It was called Tatty Tommy’s Tartan Howf and was scented with the aroma of old cooking fat. They were served by Tatty Tommy
himself, a large bruiser with a shaved head, an earring and blue eye shadow.
    Patricia was disappointed. She had thought that a television company would have taken her to some Glaswegian equivalent of the Ritz. She bleakly ordered Tatty Tommy’s Tumshies, Tatties and
Haggis, thinking that an ethnic dish of haggis, turnips and potatoes might be safer than some of the more exotic offerings on the menu; but it transpired that the haggis was as dry as bone, the
turnips watery and the potatoes had that chemical flavour of the reconstituted packet kind.
    ‘In my book,’ said Patricia, ‘the setting is a fictitious village called Duncraggie.’
    ‘Oh, we’ll be setting it in the Highlands,’ said Fiona brightly. ‘Pretty setting and lots of good Scottish actors.’
    ‘But the characters are English !’ protested Patricia. ‘It is a house party in the Highlands. Lady Harriet is Scottish, yes, but educated in England.’
    Harry waved an expansive arm. ‘English, Scottish, we’re all British.’
    Sheila repressed a smile. Harry was a vehement campaigner for Scotland’s independence.
    ‘I suppose,’ began Patricia again, but Harry put a bearlike arm about her shoulders.
    ‘Now, don’t you be worrying your head about the television side. Just think how grand it will be to see your books on the shelves again.’
    He had shrewdly guessed that, at that moment in time, Patricia would agree to anything just so long as she got her books published.
    ‘Who will play the lead?’ asked Patricia. ‘I thought of Diana Rigg.’
    ‘Bit old now,’ said Fiona. ‘We thought of Penelope Gates.’
    ‘I have never heard of her,’ said Patricia, pushing her plate away with most of the food on it uneaten.
    ‘Oh, she’s up and coming,’ said Fiona.
    And cheap, reflected Sheila cynically.
    ‘Have I seen her in anything?’
    Fiona and Harry exchanged quick glances. ‘Do you watch television much?’ asked Fiona.
    ‘Hardly at all.’
    ‘Oh, if you had,’ said Fiona, ‘you would have seen a lot of her.’
    And most of it naked, thought Sheila. Scotland’s answer to Sharon Stone.
    Sheila did not like Patricia much but was beginning to feel sorry for this old lady. She had asked Harry why on earth choose some old bat’s out-of-print books when they meant to pay scant
attention to characters or plot, and Harry had replied that respectability spiced up with sex was