*
The sun beat down on Huey and the littered sidewalk he strolled along. The neighborhood was full of dime stores, seedy skee ball parlors, and pawnshops peddling second-hand unicycles. Huey remembered fondly the days he used to hustle bumper pool up the street at Bippy’s. But that billiard hall closed long ago.
Kermisberg had changed. Violence still reigned and if you weren’t careful, some fool would try to slip you a wet willie. But gone were the days of clown gangs and mime syndicates. Life was more civilized when jokers and mums ran things. Kids were safer knowing a clown on every corner would bust your lip if you cracked wise. Dusk sniffed the asphalt, felt the steam from the sewer grates, and continued his walk.
“Hey, clown!”
Huey turned and saw young Nicky Beat dressed in a little tan suede jacket and big collared, floral shirt. An oversized tweed driver’s cap rested smartly on his head. Flaming red hair peeked out from under it. His small but sturdy jaw chomped on a lollipop as his lips formed a half smirk. Brown leather kicks with steel toes covered his feet, ready at a moment’s notice to throw some saggy-eyed bully a boot party. His blue eyes stared fiercely at Dusk and filled the clown with a strange pride.
“You know those blow pops are bad for ya, kid?” Dusk asked as he smelled the cherry flavor coming off the boy.
“Yeah, life stinks then you die, and I aim to go out chompin’ on suckers and drinkin’ soda!”
“That’s no way for a nice kid like you to talk,” Huey scolded.
“Ha! Nice! You know why they call me Nicky Beat?”
Huey smiled, pretty sure at what the half-pint’s answer would be.
“‘Cause, I like to beat people up!”
“Didn’t you tell me once it was on account of your good rhythm?”
“Yeah, forget what I said then, what I say now goes.”
Dusk’s eyes lit up the more he interacted with the little sport. “Say, your mom wants you home. She sent Detective Blatz out looking for ya.”
“Oh yeah! That clown pig comes near me, he’ll get a fistful!” Nicky cracked his small knuckles.
Beat puffed up his chest to show off further for the clown. As the boy strutted around, Dusk noticed the sprout’s bulbish nose and realized he might be half clown.
“Well, anyway, your mom’s worried and wants you home right away.”
“I’ll get there, but first I’m gonna take ten dollars off a jerk at skee ball, and then I’m going to the mayor’s press conference…a little job for Feathers!” Nicky chuckled as he waved Huey off.
Dusk frowned. “You know how I feel about you hanging around that gooney bird.”
Sadness mixed with rage. “You’re not my dad! ‘Sides, Feather’s been good to me!”
The clown did his best to keep a cool composure and hide his extreme concern for the boy. He knew Nicky would only see worry as weakness and pull away from him.
“No, kid, you’ve been good for Feathers. But one day you won’t be so good and you’ll end up where all the other wisenheimers go.”
“Oh yeah, where’s that, your mom’s house?” Nicky replied, laughing and grabbing his sides.
No, kid, actually they go to your mom’s.
The kid had pluck, but if Dusk were his father, he’d teach him the fundamentals and some manners.
“Next time your mom goes to the store, tell her to pick up a bar of soap!” Huey shouted after the boy as Nicky ran down the street.
*
Buttons Larue, Kermisberg’s first mime mayor, got elected by overcoming fierce prejudice. In the end, the voters found him likeable, clean, and articulate. They also latched onto his simple and direct message.
The quiet politician, tall and virile, stood holding hands with fifty youngsters under The Great Loop De Loop roller coaster. Dangling off one of Larue’s white-gloved fingers was a golden pair of shears to cut the satin red ribbon for the thrill ride’s grand opening.
This project had been one of the finest accomplishments of his first term. Through his political acumen, he was successful in pushing a tax increase on the citizens to fund the attraction’s construction, despite their screeching protests. But to Larue, it was part of his legacy, to leave something lasting for the kids. He was all about the children.
An assemblage of supporters and well-wishers stood below the stage, eating every word the mime gesticulated about civic pride. At one point in his speech, he took time to pat the head of Nicky, who was standing next to him. The boy found himself ducking when the silent city official swung the shears in his direction for dramatic emphasis. When the mime finished his oration, he snapped the scissors and cut the ribbon.
Booming applause burst from the crowd. After a few minutes of pandemonium, Larue calmed the throng with a sharp wave. He rejoined hands with the group of kids and led the gathering in a round of “We are Kermisberg.”
As the mime mayor acted out the song through various facial expressions, Nicky wound up like a pitcher on a pitcher’s mound and stamped down hard on Larue’s foot.
Buttons audibly howled and sobbed. “You snot-nosed little brat!”
A swell of shock rolled through the crowd. Larue continued to wail and hop up and down as he nursed his big toe. Slowly, the audience and the kids came out of their stupor.
“He’s an imposter!” yelled a man as he wagged his finger at the stage. A gaggle of fists and feet descended upon the whistleblower from a gang of die-hard Larue supporters. A puff of smoke masked a cane whisking Buttons offstage.
*
Dusk sat in his apartment guzzling a longneck bottle of milk. He watched the press conference about the scandal with the mayor’s spokesman Dill Knuckleford.
“Many people are saying that Mr. Larue has perjured himself and should be removed from office. Does he have any plans of stepping down?” asked a TV reporter.
“The mayor and I were discussing this matter before the press conference and we came up with an appropriate response.” Dill pressed his thumb to his nose and wiggled his fingers at the crowd while sticking out his tongue.
The clown took another gulp of moo juice and continued to watch the special report. As he stared at the television, a loud knock rattled his door. Dusk rolled his eyes as the racket continued.
“Whaddya want?”
“Open the door, lunch meat, or I’ll break it down!”
The clown raised his eyebrows in surprise. The voice on the other side was not what he expected. Curious, he undid the chain and opened to a bulky, stubble-jawed lug head in a drab suit and shortened tie. He was a head smaller than Dusk with dullness in his almond eyes. Everything about the thug screamed “out to lunch.”
“What can I do for you, putso?” Huey asked.
The gunsel stared at him like a gorilla salivating over a banana. But then he was all business. “Boss wants to see you.”
“And who might that be?” Huey asked.
“Feathers, dumbsky!”
The clown had known who he was referring to, but didn’t want to give this henchman any more than an inch. “What if I don’t want to see him?”
The gangster peeled back the flap of his jacket and revealed a chrome Desert Eagle tucked into the waistband on his right side. “I have a friend that says you do.”
*
The smell of birdseed, caused by a warehouse filled with pallets of the stuff, invaded the air. A forklift skittered like a cockroach moving beds of supplies from one end to another. A sliding corrugated door opened and the clown and the hood entered.
In the middle of the floor stood two giant bodyguards in cheap black suits. Both of their noses were crooked and their faces full of scars. No doubt these abrasions were due to something sharp, like maybe a bird’s beak.
Sandwiched between the two strongmen sat a short gent with a comb-over, wearing bifocals and a green visor. Draped in a seersucker suit, he clattered away at an adding machine in his lap. Behind the accountant stood a tall, rail-thin man in a bright yellow linen outfit. A straw hat with a f
eather protruding from the band hung low on his head but couldn’t hide a hook nose and black beady eyes. Tattooed on the side of his schnoz was a green shamrock. The ruthless Feathers O’Beakish. On his shoulder perched a yellow portly lovebird with a matching tattoo on his beak and clover designs on his wings. Feathers stroked the little fowl with a spindly finger.
For a while, the mob boss had been sitting in the catbird seat thinking he had the politicians and police in his talons. But times were changing and other crime bosses were muscling in on his crew.
Before the thug’s troubles, he turned a pretty penny hijacking pet store shipments and charging the owners double to buy them back. The proprietors, unable to pay the lump sum, had set up an installment plan with O’Beakish. Feathers ended up making a killing off the interest he charged on top of the principle.
Buttons Larue, as of lately, was a pain in his tail plumes. He hated that mime mayor. The damn mute just couldn’t be bought.
O’Beakish knew the reason. Larue wanted the people to think he was a saint and crusader. Feathers knew otherwise. Just like every other political hack in this city, Larue was nothing more than a tongue-tied scumbag. It’s just that he was another crime boss’s scumbag. Now there was less gravy to be spread on the head honcho’s pastrami and sunflower seeds.
The lovebird angrily tweeted in Feather’s ear while the slight accountant sweated as he crunched the numbers. In a high-pitched voice, O’Beakish threatened his other goons that if they didn’t start earning, the cops would be busy pulling bodies from Chuckle’s Point. He chattered on about not caring whether he had to take the rap for the rub-outs. One of the guards produced a cuttlebone and held it close to the avian. The little winged guy buried his beak into the stone and emerged composed. Finally Feathers and his sidekick acknowledged Dusk and the other henchman.
Dusk stepped forward. The goon put his hand on the clown’s shoulder. Huey twisted his arm. The man fell to the concrete. When the bodyguards stepped forward, Dusk drew his pistol like a gunslinger and pointed it at one of the thugs.
“I can get both of your gorillas in a dead run, dirt bird, then I’m going after you!”
Feathers gave Huey the stink eye, then bobbed his head to signal his stooges to back off. The bird mimicked the move.
Dusk twirled his gun, then reholstered it. “Now that we’re on equal terms, why am I talking to you and not sitting at home curled up with a bottle?”
Feathers cocked his head. “Should we tell him?” The fowl whipped back and forth and madly chirped.
“Nicky’s missing?”
“Do we have to spell it out for you?” O’Beakish mocked. His avian tweeted some more.
“Kidnapped, how?” Dusk balled his fists making his knuckles turn yellow.
Feathers pointed at Dusk. Huey ducked when the lovebird circled his head, re-perched on his master’s shoulder, and purled again.
“Yeah, of course I’ll look for him!” Dusk replied. The clown perked up when the crime boss mentioned money. He would have gone after the youngster for free, but decided to clam up about that. With gall, he put his face close to O’Beakish and the bird. “If anything happens, that boy’s blood’ll be on both your beaks!”
One of the bodyguards stepped in and pulled Dusk back. “That’s enough, Grease Paint!”
The clown flung the dope’s hand off and headed toward the door. “Next time, get yourself better muscle, O’Beakish!”
*
Traffic clotted the intersection. The light flashed to green causing a jangle of horns. Tires screeched and mufflers belched. The town was slogging through another drudge-filled day. To some, it would bring happiness, but to others, more lonely moments ticking away until sunset.
Dusk stood across the street from city hall and stared at the government workers scurrying up and down the granite steps. As the working stiffs slapped the stones with their drab, sensible shoes, Huey checked off items on his list of good fortune. He was happy he didn’t have a straight job. What a lousy life it would be working for some blockhead you could run rings around. Nope. Not this clown!
He’d seen how others turned out, like that retread Blatz. What a burned out lump of licorice that joker was. Worked all his existence for the government and still looking for that lost marble to round out his collection.
“Now, what are you up to?”
Huey turned and saw Lou staring at him through his baggy eyes. Someday, he would find something in those slits. Today, they were as spiritless as the Dead Sea.
“There a law against standing and thinking?”
“I could find one if I wanted to,” Lou replied.
Dusk popped a stogie in his mouth and searched for a match. Lou reached into his raincoat, pulled out a lighter, and fired up the other clown’s cigar. Huey blew smoke in the direction of the administrative building.
“You’re thinking exactly what I’m thinking,” Blatz stated.
“The day we think alike is the day I get doped up on jelly beans and bite down on the barrel of a gun!”
“Keep smarting off like that and I’ll help you with the gun part,” Lou replied.
The punchinello private eye pulled some more on his cigar and smirked at Blatz.
Lou shook his head. “You’re not getting under my skin, not today, kid.”
The homicide funster pulled out a smoke of his own and clinched down hard. After lighting, he dragged on it and blew the fumes through his nose. Then he flicked the cigarette over to the sewer grate. “You know, if any harm comes to Nicky, I’m gonna cut Larue’s throat and watch him bleed out like a greasy hamster. I know you feel the same.”
“Yep, but he won’t be the only one,” Huey replied.
Blatz raised his eyebrows. The other clown looked back. Something silent was communicated; a message that neither jester could voice. For years hatred caused them to go at each other like two scorpions in a bottle. But now, this quiet understanding bonded them like brothers. What was it? Neither of them knew for sure. But it took root deep in their dark and cackling souls.
“So here’s the breakdown…as much as I’d like to, I can’t work over the mayor for info. I do that, I’d lose my shield, again—that damn nun bus. But you can!”
Dusk scoffed. “Good one, I do that and my PI ticket gets pulled. Boy, you really thought of all angles, didn’t you?”
Lou ground his teeth like a car with a bad timing belt. To calm himself, he breathed in a draft of dirty air and exhaled loudly. “The chief is just as twisted about little Nicky’s disappearance as we are. I didn’t realize he and Mrs. Bartholomew were also friends. So, both he and I are going to look the other way while you sweat down Larue for information.”
“I’ll never get through the front door,” Dusk replied. “Security has barred me from the building.”
Lou snorted, “Don’t worry about that!”
Huey chewed on his tobacco. Although he didn’t put much stock in Lou’s plan, the thought of beating on Buttons lightened up his somber mood.
*
The leather heels of Dusk’s snakeskin clown shoes clacked against the polished floor all the way to the mayor’s office. A yellow star with “Buttons Larue” stenciled in the middle was planted in the office door’s murky glass. This jerk thinks he’s really something nifty.
The sign sneered at the clown and he finally grabbed the knob and rattled the plank. The door wobbled open and Huey bounded into the office.
Buttons stood behind a mammoth desk pouring a carafe of booze. He looked up, startled, and slammed the glass container on the oak.
“Go ahead and have your drink Larue, you deserve it. Anyone who can pull off the scam you did could use a spot of sauce!”
Buttons waved his hands frantically. Dusk chuckled. “Aw, come on now, the jig is up Buttons, so start talkin’!”
Larue pointed out the window and puffed up his chest.
“Yeah, I heard your speech two years ago at the children’s theater. You mimed to the kids that if they looked up
at the sun and saw it as a big orange lollipop, everything would be just ducky. Well, in one day, you turned their world into a bowl of boiled Brussels sprouts!” Huey stepped ever so slightly toward the mayor.
Watery beads slid down Buttons’ forehead onto his collar. He dug his nails into his skin scratching hard at a phantom itch.
“You were going to be the most transparent mayor Kermisberg ever had.”
Larue quaked in his rubber-soled slippers and shuffled toward the window.
Huey grabbed the side of the desk and glowered at the fake mime. “Transparent, all right! Nicky saw right through you and with one little stomp, exposed your venal business, and that’s why you had him snatched, didn’t ya!”
Buttons hopped like a frog and went for the drawer. Huey scrambled around the side of the desk and slammed the compartment on the politician’s hand. Larue howled and tears welled up in his eyes causing his makeup to run. Huey grabbed Button’s other hand. “Where’s the kid…what’d you do with him?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know!” Buttons yelled.
Dusk opened the drawer again and jammed the mime’s other mitt in. As he was about to smash it, Larue screamed. “Okay, okay, all I know is that, when you showed up, I was to tell you to meet Melvin Caprice at Seashore Park for ransom instructions!”
The clown looked bug-eyed at the mime, grabbed a hunk of shirt, and breathed heavily into his face. “What’s that, you knew I was coming?”
Fear overtook Huey. The room felt a little smaller and he needed a glass of water. When he tried to speak, he choked out gibberish. But somewhere from a fathomless reservoir he found the strength to give Larue a slug to the stomach. “What’s the setup? How many are coming for me?”
Buttons held his gut and gasped for oxygen. “No one’s coming. I told you what I’m supposed to tell you.”
Dusk threw the impersonator to the floor. “Then why did you hold out on me?”
“Because I hate the little rat bastard and wasn’t going to tell you squat. I figured the beating would be worth it, but I couldn’t take it. I am weak, weak, weak!” Buttons blubbered.
The Untreed Detectives Page 11