Private Dick Chapter 31

More Oren Trough!

I'm ALL messed up, as I'm posting on multiple writing sites, so if I've already posted this, bummer!

The following may be grammatically incorrect, to highlight the

main character's lack of smarts!  Also, what do I look like, an editor?

      Pontooner had pulled the old 'disappearing client' trick on my a*s, and I was hurting.  Financially, I was in desperate straights.  Then my desperate straights straightener walked through the door with a 'jingle!"  Not literally, the door bell jingled, and a man wearing a three-piece suit (the pieces were rich, wealthy, and double rich!)

 

     "Welcome to Clarkson Investigations; may I help you!"

 

     "I've got a problem,"

 

     Hopefully a bad one; and a long one!   Wait, by long one I meant the case taking a long time; more money for me! 

 

     "and I hope you can help me."

 

     "Well, why don't you tell me about the problem, and I'll tell you if I can help you or not."  Look, I don't care if the problem is bullshit; I need the money, and if I have to investigate bullshit, I'm game, as long as you're willing to put out (the money!) I'm your dick!

 

     "Well, I need to hire someone for a delicate operation.  See, I don't exactly know how, or if, I should tell you.  If you don't want to get involved with a slightly-illegal operation, I'll stop now, and turn around and leave, and if you ever tell anyone, the authorities, I'll deny it, and you'll wind up looking like a fool."

 

     I hesitated; it wasn't the looking like a fool part, I'm very used to that, but the moral dilemma.  On one hand, I didn't want to break the law, on the other hand, I wanted to eat; the latter hand won the moral pissing contest.  "Well tell me what you have in mind, and I'll see."  In truth, I would have robbed a liquor store with a jagged table spoon, but I didn't want him to know that.

 

     "Oh no, either you're in or you're out; no middle ground."

 

     "Well, in that case, count me in; what do you need done?"

 

     He stared into my eyes, either to judge if I meant it, or he was attracted to me, and was about to invite me for dinner and a movie.  At this point, as long has he paid me well, I would do either.  He stared and stared, until I started to think the dinner and a movie option was the winner, and I was desperately racking my brain for a way to let the guy down easy (I know I said I would do that, but wrong! ) when he seemed to make up his mind,

 

     "Okay, here's what I'd like you to do; I took some cash, a lot of cash, from my place of employment in a moment of crazy thinking, and I'd like you to put it back.  Embezzlement is not me, and I feel terrible guilt over what I've done."

 

     "Whoa, whoa there Charlie, hold the phone.  This is the craziest, most hair brained idea I've ever heard.  Usually, the problem is getting the money out, but you've gotten that part, but to put the money back?  I'm sorry, but to be a party to embezzlement?  No, I don't think so; it's against everything I stand for!"

 

     "I'll pay you 500 dollars."

 

     "Okay."

 

 

******

 

     He wouldn't give his name, and I didn't ask.  Well, that's not really true; I asked, and he just looked at me like a man who had asked him the stupidest question in the history of question-asking, so I dropped it.  I agreed, for an all-upfront payment of $500 to smuggle the money back into Gimble's Saving and Loan.  So here I was, dressed as a carpet cleaner, walking into Gimble's with over 3,000 bucks stuffed down my pants.  I was walking with as normal a gait as I could manage with a fortune in my drawers, and I'd almost changed my mind before entering, as it was probably the stupidest idea ever, but I couldn't come up with anything better, and I'd told 'Mystery Name Guy' this when he'd suggested it, but I thought of what I could do with $500, and I forged ahead.  I limped up to the nearest teller, looking like I had a log strapped to my leg, and on the way I exchanged just a glance with my mystery benefactor, whose name plate said was 'Paul', and pulled out the piece of paper on which 'Paul' had written the number of a safe deposit box, and he had also supplied me with the key to, from which he had stolen the money.  He had copied the box holder's key when he had come up with the brilliant idea of swiping the contents.

 

 

     I was taken to the safe deposit box by "Glenda" and we both inserted our keys.  She had lifted out the box, handed it to me, and left me alone, shutting the vault door behind her.  Time to get to work.  I stuffed my hands down my pants, and grabbed the first bundle of stolen money.  As I sat at home afterwards, trying to figure a way out of this mess, it dawned on me that there was no way 3,000 stolen clams would fit into the safe deposit box, but at the time, all I could see was $500, and logical thinking was never my strong suit anyway.  Anyway, when I had my hands buried to the hilt in my trousers, the vault door suddenly opened and "Paul" came in with a camera.  He snapped a picture of me with one hand still down my pants, and the other holding a wrapped bundle of cash.  I asked what the hell he thought he was doing, and he replied,

 

     "What does it look like, dick?"

 

     "It looks like nothing too good," I replied.

 

     "Good guess; imagine what it will look like to the police, when I tell them we caught you red handed, emptying the safe deposit box and stuffing the 3,000 bucks down your pants!"

 

     "Ha, nice plan, except I'm removing  the money, moron!"

 

     "You know that, and I know that, but, and I know this will be hard for you, stop and think!  It'll be impossible from this picture to tell if you're removing the money, or in the process of putting the money into  your britches."

 

     I hated to admit it, but he might be right.  S**t!  "So, there never was any stolen money?"

 

     "Very good, dick, you figured it out all by yourself!  Glenda and myself thought up this plan; then we had to find an idiot private eye, and we heard from several of our customers that you fit the bill perfectly; and now we come to the best part; unless you give us $5,000, we'll go to the police."

 

     I felt the cold reality of my situation wash over me like a tray of disaster ice cubes were dumped down my pants.  I was caught in a reality-vice, and it was closing fast to squeeze me until all my guts and innards blew off the top of my head.  "Okay, I'll pay, but I think what you've done is reprehensible."  His only answer was a cackling laugh.

 

 

     I sat wearily down, opened a beer, and stared at the test pattern showing on my T.V. screen.  What was I going to do?  I had to think of a way out of this mess, but my mind was a complete blank!

 

 

******

 

 

     About a week later I was sitting in my office when a guy with meat hooks for arms, I mean these babies were big, and I doubted he had the I.Q. to match, burst into my office fist-first.  Startled by the water buffalo stampeding into my office looking like a side of beef with a neck, I tried to grab my gun from the drawer it was napping in, only Water Buffalo Neck aimed at gun the size of huge in my face and suggested politely that I cease and desist.  So I calmly (yeah!) laid my hands on the desk and quietly screamed,

 

     "Look, I don't know what this is all about, but I don't know anything!"

 

     He smirked and replied, "Of that, I have no doubt; but where is it?  My boss can get a little upset, and believe me, you do not want that!"

 

     I stood and said I had no idea as to what he was referring.  "It might help if I had any fricking idea what you're talking about."

 

     He quickly answered using sign language.  He spelled out, "ouch!" on my face.  I grabbed my face and said, "Man, take it easy, would ya?"

 

     He signaled his answer was 'no!' by driving his fist into my gullet, hard!  "Ooff!" I exclaimed, and staggered backward until I was seated in my desk chair.  The chair decided to tip over, so I of course went over tea-over-asskettle. 

 

     Water Buffalo loomed over my prone form and spit venom into my face, "Look, smart-a*s, where is it?"

 

     "What?" I answered truthfully, because I had no clue.

 

     "You know damn well what, the Burmese Flying Fish!"

 

      "What's that?" I asked.

 

     "Oh, you mean to tell me you don't know it's a priceless statue?  Pa--leeze!"

 

     That told me all I needed to know; I still had no clue!  "Sorry, I wish I could help you, but..."

 

     Giant Neck interrupted by making me eat a fist sandwich.  I plummeted from my chair to terra firma, where I sat there with a dazed, stupid look on my face; that's because I was feeling rather dazed and stupid.  Between fist-lunch and hitting the floor and it stopping my descent, I really wasn't feeling too well.   Then, I went from not feeling well to out.

 

 

******

 

 

     When I came to, my head was lolling back and forth like a merry-go-round, and a giant head was leering at me from the shadows.  I was struggling to process this information when the Big Head cleared everything up by speaking,

 

     "I'll ask you one more time, where  is The Burmese Flying Fish?"

 

      Then it all came back to me; I had no fricking idea, but I figured it would behoove me to pretend I did know.  "All right, all right, I'll take you to it!"

 

     With those words, he visibly relaxed.  "Well okay then, let's go."

 

     My mind was racing, trying to figure out how to make this guy stop pounding me like a hot nail through butter.  We started walking, me veering towards nowhere, and him watching my back like he thought at any moment, I'd take to the sky, which didn't sound like a half-bad plan, since I was completely clueless as to where I was going.  What I needed was to go somewhere that had a statue that looked a lot like a Burmese flying fish, except other that chucking my fish sticks at a family picnic, because I hated them, I had no clue what the hell a flying fish looked like, let alone a Burmese one.  The longer we walked, the more convinced I became that I was that I was f****d.   As I neared a park bench, I started limping furiously and sank down on it. 

 

     "Hey, what are you trying to pull?" Giant Neck asked suspiciously.  I pointed to my foot in the air and said,

 

     "I must have a railroad spike in my shoe, because with every step I take, that's what it feels like."

 

     "Come on, cut the crap, and get up!"

 

     "No, really; maybe you could take a look?"

 

     "Oh, bullshit!  I'm not going to fall for that; how stupid do you think I am?  Now get your a*s up!"

 

     Damn, how had he figured out my plan of getting him to look, and kicking him in the head?  Now what?  I slowly stood back up and resumed trudging.  I really exaggerated a limp, shouting in pain with every step.  I really must have looked like a puss, because Big Head warned me in a whispered voice,

 

     "Stop that s**t!"

 

     I was saved from having to think of a good comeback for that remark by the sight of a police car driving up from behind us.  The cop rolled down his window and said,

 

     "Is everything alright here?"

 

     Giant Neck jabbed his gun in my ribs and turned on the charm, "Why yes, officer, everything is fine."

 

     I started to reply when he painfully jabbed the gun further into my ribs.  "Ah-yeah officer, no problems here."  As I was saying this, I was furiously trying to signal him with my eyes, blinking them in an SOS pattern, only he must have thought I had a stick in my eye, because he said,

 

     "Okay, well, you two have a great evening."

 

     My spirits fell about two feet; he was just going to walk away; I was once again at the mercy of Giant Neck and his wind blowing me in the direction of Disaster!  The Bailing Dick turned to walk away, then turned back and said,

 

     "Oh, by the way, I suppose I should take a look at your I.D's."

 

     That's when Giant Neck lashed out with the gun, striking the officer on the temple, and took off running, yelling.

 

     "I'll be back, dick, and you damn..."

 

     I couldn't hear the last part, because of the shriek of a car horn.  I looked quickly to my right, and saw the police officer who'd been de-brained staggering out in the roadway.  I knew if I was going to prevent him becoming a law enforcement hood ornament, I had to act fast.  I looked up the road and saw an 18-wheeler barreling towards him; he was dancing an uncaring jig, and I knew there was no chance of either him giving a s**t, or the semi stopping in time, so I leaped out into the roadway and grabbed him by the collar.  As I did, I glanced towards the big-a*s truck coming towards us, looking like a steel avalanche with bugs smashed on the grill.  Just then, the driver must have seen us, because he laid on the horn (not literally!) and slammed on the brakes.  I loaded my pants (not really!) and threw us both back towards the curb.  We both hit the pavement, and the truck somehow barely missed us, and went up on the curb, plowing over paper boxes and road signs, and slammed into the outside wall of a business.  Unfortunately, that business was a chicken slaughter house, and the out-of-control truck set both chickens and a foul odor loose, and there were chickens making a mad dash for freedom, and feathers filled the air.    

 

    

     Back home that evening, I tried to relax, but the barbiturates mixed with beer proved a none-too-good idea.  I had a bizarre dream in which I had a trial for 'excessive stupidity" (that tells you how weird the dream was; I'm pretty sure there's no such law!) and the jury was made up of old clients who felt I had failed them somehow.  The jury spokesman was a red-glowing-eyed Greg Paddock, for whom I had failed to locate his missing wife.  What he didn't know was that I had located his wife, underneath a muscle-bound dude.  I had chosen not to tell him that little bit of information, but he thought I was totally incompetent, and was sitting in judgment.  Of course he was going to vote guilty. I had gotten to the part where the judge, who suddenly morphed into my father, was saying I'd been found guilty, and he had long thought I was dense, when I was startled awake from the dream by the ringing of either the phone, or the fire alarm.  Since I didn't have a fire alarm, I took a chance and answered the phone. 

 

     "Mmm...hello?"

 

     "Yes, Oren, this is Gary Faustino calling, and..."

 

     "Wait, did you say Gary Faustino?"

 

     "Yes."

 

     "Oh, that's what I thought you said; sorry, I don't know any Gary Faustino."

 

     "Oh, maybe you'd know me better if I asked mentioned The Burmese Flying Fish?"

 

     S**t!  "I'm sorry, but that name doesn't ring a bell."

 

     "That's unfortunate for you, because you know where it is and my boss what's it back."

 

     I slammed the receiver down and immediately started making plans to leave town, possible disguised as a bus seat.

 

 

 

 

Reviews

[Marie]

Private Dick evidently doesn't know that there really is a law against excessive stupidity. He keeps violating it, and that's why he keeps getting dumped on...

[Michael Stevens]

Yep, he's the poster-dick for stupidity!