by Nic Saint
“Don’t answer that, babe,” Chase grunted, then turned to take in the reformed crook. “What are you playing at, Vale? Why the sudden interest in the Pink Lady?”
“Cool your jets, detective,” said Jerry. “Like I said, I’m just expressing a natural interest in the goings-on in my own town.”
“Yeah, right,” Chase said.
Jerry directed himself at Marge again. “So where is the stone now?”
“That’s none of your business,” said Uncle Alec.
Jerry’s eyes narrowed into slits. “I sense a lot of hostility, Chief, and I can tell you right off the bat that this is both uncalled for and frankly a little disappointing.” He spread his arms. “We’re all friends here—and is this the way to treat a friend? Eh?”
“Friends don’t break into banks and steal stuff,” Uncle Alec pointed out.
“Cross my heart, those days are behind me, Chief,” said Jerry, now exuding earnestness, which didn’t really become him. “So where is the stone now, Marge? Safe and sound at Gems World?”
“I’m sorry, Jerry,” said Marge. “But I have no idea where the Pink Lady is right now.”
“And even if she knew, she wouldn’t tell you,” said Marge’s husband. Tex’s face was flushed, and Dooley’s words about the man’s drinking habits now returned to me.
“He’s drunk, Max,” Dooley whispered in my ear. “He’s hiding it well, just like a true alcoholic, but he’s completely wasted.”
“I’m afraid you’re right, Dooley,” I said with a frown.
I mean, I’m not my humans’ keeper, but the Pooles are all very near and dear to me, and it frankly pained me to see Tex in his current state of obvious inebriation.
“I’m telling you, he’s going to take out someone’s kidneys one of these days,” said Brutus, “and that person won’t be happy.”
“If he took out a person’s kidneys that person would be dead, Brutus,” I said. “So they wouldn’t be able to complain.”
“Well, let’s hope so, cause if they do complain, Tex will lose his license, and then what? He’ll have to get a job selling typewriters door to door.”
“Do people still use typewriters?” asked Dooley.
“I doubt it,” I said.
“So let’s just make sure Tex doesn’t lose his license, then,” said Brutus, with a sense of logic I found hard to dispute.
“Here we go,” said Harriet when suddenly Fido Siniawski walked onto the stage and a hush descended upon the room.
Everyone turned to face the front. The show had begun.
14
“He looks nervous,” Dooley remarked, in reference to everyone’s formerly favorite hairstylist.
And indeed Fido did look nervous—in fact he looked terrified.
“Someone once said that the number one fear for humans, even more than the fear of death, is the fear of speaking in public,” Harriet said.
“Is that so?” I said.
“Yeah, apparently the thought of having to talk to an audience is terrifying for most people.” She shrugged. “Don’t ask me why. Just another one of those human foibles, I guess.”
Harriet didn’t have any fear of speaking in front of an audience. In fact the opposite was true: it was impossible to drag her off a stage whenever she had the opportunity to mount it.
“So where is Buster?” asked Brutus, glancing around.
And as if summoned by the mention of his name, suddenly Buster made a beeline for us, and took up position next to Brutus. He was panting slightly. “Sorry I’m late, you guys,” he said. “What did I miss?”
“Nothing,” I said. “Fido hasn’t started yet.”
And judging from the fact that the hairdresser still stood there, looking like a deer in the headlights, and not a single word had rolled from his lips yet, I had the impression he’d never get going.
“Tell us about your flat earth!” suddenly a voice called out from the crowd.
“Yes, yes,” said Fido, his voice sounding awkward and squeaky. “Thank you, Jack. As we all know, people have been told that the earth is round.”
“That’s because it is, you muppet!” another voice called out.
“Ha ha, thank you, Fred!” said Fido. “But now the latest scientific research has proved that this common theory is all wrong. All wrong!” he said, shifting into higher gear as he drew strength from his own convictions. “And tonight I’m going to prove this to you.”
“Oh, don’t bother,” another heckler called out, but immediately was shushed by several of the people sitting in his vicinity.
“Let the man speak!” Charlene Butterwick said, raising her voice. “I might not agree with what he has to say,” she explained in a softer tone of voice, “but that doesn’t mean I don’t respect his right to say it.”
“Of course, sweetheart,” said her boyfriend, the police chief, who was apparently still ruminating on Jerry Vale’s words, judging from the annoyed glances he kept darting over his shoulder in the latter’s direction. Jerry, of course, pointedly ignored the Chief’s glances. If you’ve been operating on the wrong side of the law all your life, cops are like flies: annoying but essentially harmless.
“Look, I know what you’re all thinking,” Fido continued. “And I have to tell you that when I first learned of this theory, I was a little skeptical myself. But my own research on the internet has proven that we’ve all been lied to! The earth isn’t round. The earth is in fact a flat disk, just like all the other disks that surround us. Like the sun, which is also a flat disk, and the moon, and in fact all the planets. So we need to ask ourselves: why the lies? And the simple answer is: because most people aren’t ready for the truth. But the fact that you’re all here tells me that you are—and that makes me very happy!”
“So what’s the truth, Fido!” someone yelled.
“Well, the truth is…” Fido had walked over to a flip chart which he’d set up, and now flipped over the first page to reveal a large disk crudely drawn with a magic marker, dangling from a string. It looked like one of those UFOs from a sci-fi movie from the sixties, where the UFOs were plastic disks dangling from clearly visible iron wires. “This is the planet we’re living on,” Fido explained as he pointed to the disk. “And this…” He drew a square around the disk. “Is our corner of the universe.” He proceeded to draw other squares next to the first one, and in each square he drew another disk. “That’s right. We’re not alone in the universe, folks. In fact we’re all part of a gigantic network of connected disks…” He flipped over the page, and now a maze of cubicles became visible, and in each cubicle a disk was hanging, suspended from a wire. “This is the matrix,” said Fido, “and we’re all part of it.” He flipped over another page, and the maze had grown and now looked like a beehive, with hundreds of tiny cubicles with hundreds of disks inside them. “This is the universe,” he said. “This is what we are. Bees!”
Murmurs of mirth rose up from the audience.
“We’re all part of a big, very big beehive, and we’re the busy bees working and slaving away every day, producing…”
“Honey,” a voice suggested from the crowd, to much laughter.
“Something a lot more valuable than honey. Anyone? Entertainment!” said Fido, really getting going now, as he jotted down the word entertainment on the flip chart. “The beekeepers who are masters of the universe have created this gigantic beehive for their entertainment. And they like to watch us—in fact they’re watching us right now! And they’re laughing, and crying, and generally looking at us the way we watch television. And that’s it, folks. That’s the big secret nobody’s telling you. We’re all actors in a big reality show—only for us it’s real!”
“Oh, dear,” I said quietly.
“It’s worse than I thought, Max,” said Dooley.
“Yeah, the guy is clearly delusional.”
“Poor Fido,” Buster breathed.
“Poor you,” said Harriet.
“Yeah,” Brutus chimed in. “Once Fido has been admitted to a me
ntal institution, who’s going to take care of you, Buster?”
“We can always ask Odelia to adopt you,” Dooley suggested. “I’m sure she would do it in a heartbeat.”
“Hold your horses, you guys,” I said. “The patient might be sick, but there’s still hope.”
“And if you want to know what the beekeeper looks like—the master of our universe?” Fido was saying. “The monster that’s created us and is watching us?” On the next page a crudely drawn hairy monster was featured. Oddly enough it looked a lot like… the Cookie Monster. “This is the ruler of our universe! The monster who rules us all! And his name is Roger! That’s right. Roger!”
“On second thought,” I said. “Maybe we should ask Odelia if she’ll consider adopting you, Buster.”
“That might be a good idea,” Buster whispered, looking dejected as the room erupted into loud and confused chatter.
15
That night, after they’d returned from Fido’s presentation, Marge had just washed her face and brushed her teeth when she came upon her husband, seated on the bed bench and staring at his favorite painting of a gnome. Gnome #16, the artist had christened it, and even though Marge wasn’t exactly a big fan of the painting, she’d allowed her husband to hang it in the bedroom, but only on the condition that it be used to hide the wall safe they’d had installed. Her reasoning was that thieves would see the gnome and be so unnerved they’d immediately totter back out the window and run off screaming. Though of course she hadn’t mentioned her thought process to Tex, since he’d have been devastated to know that his wife didn’t share his passion for gnome art.
“Everything all right, honey?” she asked as she took a seat next to her husband and rubbed his back. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but she had a feeling not all was well with the man she married twenty-five years ago.
“What? Oh, sure,” said Tex, as if emerging from a dream. “Absolutely. Say, do you think that diamond is safe in there?”
“Nobody knows that we have it, honey,” she said. “So it’s absolutely safe.”
“Uh-huh,” he said and continued to stare at his precious gnome. It was a fat gnome, as gnomes go, and as far as Marge could tell it was also a jolly gnome, or at least his cherubic red cheeks gave the impression that he was jolly, as did the smile on his bearded little face. Still there was something sinister about him. Somehow Gnome #16 reminded her of an evil clown, only in the form of a gnome. An evil gnome, if you will. If Stephen King hadn’t yet written a book about the species, she felt that he should, and would probably pack a great punch when he did.
“Let’s go to bed, honey,” she said as she slipped under the duvet. “I’m beat, and tomorrow is another day.”
“Sure,” said Tex, still continuing to not be fully present.
“So what did you think about Fido’s presentation?”
“Mh?”
“Fido’s presentation? If he’s to be believed we’re all living in the matrix, and ruled by a Cookie Monster named Roger.” She laughed. “Poor guy. He’s really lost it, hasn’t he?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I guess you’re right,” said Tex, then he finally got up and joined her under the covers. “But I’ll say this for him, though,” he continued as he put his ice-cold feet against hers—a habit she hadn’t been able to cure him from even after all those years.
“What’s that?” she asked, checking if her alarm clock was set at seven.
“Well, there are things in this world that we don’t know about, aren’t there? I mean, the government doesn’t always tell us everything, and that makes people suspicious, and wonder what else they might be keeping from us.”
“Like what?”
“Like… I don’t know. UFOs for instance, or aliens. Stuff like that.”
She glanced over to her husband with a frown. “Aliens, Tex? Really?”
“Well, it’s certainly possible that they’re out there. Theoretically speaking, at least.”
A tinge of worry niggled at her. “What’s gotten into you all of a sudden? You never used to believe in aliens. You always said that was just a bunch of nonsense.”
“I never believed in that kind of stuff before, but now I’m thinking… maybe I should.” And with these words, he switched off the light on his nightstand, turned over and muttered, “Night, hon.”
She blinked and her frown deepened. Usually Tex liked to cuddle before going to sleep. But then she shrugged. At least it gave her the opportunity to read some more of The Sheikh’s Passion. She picked up the book, flicked off the light in the room, turned on the small reading light attached to the headboard, and was soon engrossed once again in the story of Sheikh Bab El Ehr and the love of his life: Laura.
Laura wasn’t like the other women the Sheikh had met and married. For one thing, Laura wasn’t a woman from his own country but hailed from the West. Her parents had moved to Khemed when she was a little girl, and had settled there, her dad an expat for a big oil company, and Laura had grown up surrounded by a culture that wasn’t her own, but which she’d adopted with a passion. By the time she met the Sheikh, at a palace party her parents had been invited to, she was a beautiful young woman of nineteen, with the face of an angel and the body of a goddess, or at least that’s the way the Sheikh had described her to his right-hand man Sharif the next day. Sharif had seen that the Sheikh’s eyes were shining, and that the lovelight was strong in this one, and had immediately raised the alarm: the Sheikh of Khemed couldn’t possibly take a western woman as his wife. That kind of break with tradition was simply out of the question.
But love listened to no reason, and the Sheikh had invited Laura to the palace under the pretext of wanting to ask her opinion about a pagoda he’d received as a present from the Chinese, and soon the two of them had been wandering around the gardens, without a chaperone, and their love had blossomed—a very unorthodox but powerful love, that had taken them both by surprise.
And by the time Marge closed the book, since the next day was a working day and she needed to get up early, she was already dreaming of a love so deep and so passionate that it consumed all.
Five minutes later she was fast asleep, spooning with her husband and dreaming of her own Sheikh, who may or may not have had a shock of white hair and the face of a certain small-town doctor with a weird penchant for garden gnomes.
So when in the middle of the night she was awakened by a strange sound, it took her a few moments to realize that the man standing in her bedroom, backlit by the full moon, wasn’t the Sheikh of her dreams, but a burglar! And then she was screaming bloody murder.
16
We’d just returned from cat choir when we heard a scream so loud it cut through us like a knife.
“That’s Marge!” said Harriet, alarmed. We were in the front yard when the scream rang out, which meant it must have been pretty loud, since Marge and Tex’s bedroom is at the back.
So we immediately ran like the wind through the narrow patch of green that runs along the house and soon found ourselves at the back, and made our way inside through the pet flap, then up the stairs. And as we did, we came upon a fascinating scene: Tex and Marge were both sitting bolt upright in bed, and a large man was standing in front of the window, while a second, smaller man was urging him to descend a ladder which had been placed under the window. The large man was, of course, Johnny Carew, and the smaller man was his partner Jerry.
“I told you this was a bad idea, Jer,” Johnny lamented.
“You idiot!” Jerry was saying. “You made way too much noise. Now look what you’ve done!”
“I didn’t make no noise, Jer!”
“You were like an elephant in there—stomping around!”
“It’s dark! I was trying to get my bearings—and then I saw that hideous monster and I got scared!”
We all glanced over to the portrait of a gnome, and I had to confess that Johnny had a point. It really was scary.
“What the hell are you doing in my bedroom?” asked Tex. A good
question, I thought, and I was curious to find out the answer.
“Do you want me to scratch him, Marge?” asked Harriet obligingly. “Cause I will, you know. In fact I don’t mind scratching both of them. Two for the price of one.”
“No, that’s fine, Harriet,” said Marge. She still looked shocked but was already recovering. “Johnny and Jerry!” she said, adopting her librarian’s voice—the one she uses when people return a book past its due date and have to pay a fine. “What are you doing in my bedroom?”
“That’s what I just said,” Tex pointed out.
“We’re really sorry, Marge,” said Jerry from the window. Only his head was visible, but that was bad enough. “We didn’t know this was your house, did we, Johnny?”
“Jer, we can’t lie to Marge. Marge is a friend, and you never lie to a friend. That’s what my mama used to say,” he explained to this captive audience.
Suddenly there was a loud noise on the stairs, and footsteps hurrying in our direction, and moments later Odelia and Chase came bursting into the room.
“What’s going on—are you all right?” asked Odelia, panting. She was dressed in Hello Kitty PJs and looked cute as a button.
“We heard screaming,” Chase explained. He was only dressed in his boxers, and looked very buff indeed.
“I’m very sorry,” said Johnny, adopting a rueful tone, even wringing his big hands. He was dressed in black from head to toe, like any sensible midnight marauder would. “Better come in, Jer,” he said. “We’ve got some ‘splainin to do.”
Jerry seemed reluctant to follow his friend’s advice, but finally did as he was told, and I saw that he, too, was wearing fashionable black, which, as we all know, never goes out of style, and can be worn on any occasion, even when breaking and entering someone else’s home in the middle of the night.
“Look, this isn’t what it looks like,” Jerry began.
“It looks like burglary,” said Marge.
Jerry took this in, then amended his earlier statement. “Okay, so maybe it is what it looks like. But we had good reason to pay you a visit, didn’t we, Johnny?”