“And he drank most evenings?”
“He drank every evening, Mr. Perkins.”
“I see,” Perkins said, pouring her more coffee. “Now, when you came into the room...”
“When I came into the room, I looked left and saw the bed was made, then looked right and saw the desk. I crossed right and stopped by the near corner of the desk left of the chair. I looked for revisions on the desk, but the desk was very neat and tidy—script on the right, legal yellow pad and pencils on the left, bottle of Scotch upper left-hand corner. Then I saw the light was on in the bathroom and there was a faucet dripping, so I crossed over to there and found him in the tub.”
“What did you do then?”
“I went and got Mr. Mann. It was all I could think to do.”
“And what did he do?”
“He was lifting weights at the time. He put on his bathrobe, and he came and looked at the room, and then he told me to call the police.”
“Where did you call from?”
“My room. It’s down the hall.”
“And what did Mr. Mann do?”
“He stayed there, I guess. He was there when I got back.”
“I see. Were there any script revisions, by the way?”
“No,” she said. “I looked at the desk where he worked when I first came into the room. The script was set out there, and I guess he started to work, but he must have had too much to drink and didn’t finish. The bottle of Scotch was half empty.”
“Do you remember what kind of Scotch it was?”
“Sure, J&B, the only brand he drank.”
“I see,” Perkins said. “One other thing. Do you recall if Mr. McDougall was right- or left-handed?”
Millie sighed. “I should know,” she said. “I’m very observant; it’s part of my job.” She thought for a moment. “Right-handed, I think. But don’t hold me to that.”
“Fine,” Perkins said. “Now I wanted to ask you?—”
“Is that important?”
“What?”
“Whether he was right- or left-handed.”
“It may be,” Perkins said. “Now, I also wanted to ask you about this,” he said, and handed her the camera report form.
She looked at it with a puzzled expression for a moment and then nodded. “Sure,” she said. “I remember. This was from Tuesday, the day before yesterday.”
“That’s right,” Perkins said. “Now, I’m interested in the seventh setup.”
Millie ran her finger down the page. “Seventh... seventh... Oh yeah, I remember. It was a two-shot with Clete and Brenda. Brenda has that dialogue about taking care of himself. Camera was left of action with a three-inch lens, and Clete crossed left to right, kissed, then exited camera left; Brenda watches him go, looking camera left, then turns away and walks off camera right.”
“I was wondering,” Perkins said, “why it was scrubbed.”
“Oh, that was Tom,” Millie said, sipping her coffee and wincing. “I hate it black, but I can’t put sugar in. I’m on a diet.”
“So you said, but the scene was scrubbed by Tom because...”
“Let’s see... We broke for lunch, and after lunch he felt that the setup was wrong, so we moved the camera in and went to a fifty lens and did it again.”
