“Is that a fact?”
“It seems as if Mr. Tibbits was planning on making a snuff film, but someone came and rescued the snuffee.”
I wiped some blood off my nose. “Sounds like she got lucky.”
“She said it was a bald man.”
“Poor guy. It's tough being bald. Society discriminates.”
“It would help the case if this mysterious bald man came forward and testified.”
“If I see him, I'll let him know. But you probably don't need him. If you check out Lyle's apartment, you might find plenty of reasons to lock him up for good.”
“We did that already. Mr. Tibbits will be eligible for parole when he's four hundred years old.”
“So why the call?”
“The woman who was saved wants to thank her hero. In person.”
An image flashed through my head of Linda, my fiancée. I'd left her because I didn't want her to see me suffer and die.
No one should be subjected to that. To me.
“That's not possible,” I told Jack.
“I'll let her know. Pool Monday?”
“I'll try to make it. Jack?”
“Yeah?”
“They holding Tibbits over at Cook County?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“General population?”
“I think so. He's in for kidnapping and attempted murder. The State's Attorney is putting together the illegal porn case.”
“Thanks, Jack.”
I staggered to the bathroom and rinsed the blood and powder off my face. Then I threw on some clothes, left my apartment, and staggered to the corner news vendor. The daily paper set me back a buck. I sat on the curb and read the police blotter until I found what I needed. Then I picked up three cartons of Marlboros and took a cab to Cook County Jail on 26th and California.
I spent two hours waiting before I was able to see Jerome Johnston. He was black, twenty-two years old, a member of the Gangsta Disciples. Jerome was being held for first degree murder.
“Who the hell are you, cracker?” he said upon meeting me in the visitation room.
“I've got a deal for you, Jerome. A good deal.” I handed him the three cartons of smokes that the guards had already searched. “This is for your valuable time.”
“What do you want?”
“There's a white boy in your division. Name of Lyle Tibbits. He's a baby raper. Likes to have sex with five-year-old boys and girls.” I stared hard into Jerome's lifeless eyes. “I want you to spread the word. Anyone who takes care of him will get twenty cartons of cigarettes. He'll be an easy mark—he's got a broken arm. Here's a picture.”
I handed him the photo I'd taken from Lyle's apartment.
“How do you know me?” Jerome asked.
“I don't. Just read about your drive-by in the paper. Thought you'd be the right man for the job. Are you, Jerome?”
Jerome looked at the picture, then back at me. “Hell yeah, dog.”
“One more thing. It can't happen until tomorrow. Okay?”
“I'm straight.”
I left the jail and cabbed it back home. In my room I did more coke, ate some codeine, and stared at the eighty-thousand dollar life insurance policy I'd taken out on Lyle Tibbits, which I'd bought posing as his brother, using fake identification. It would become effective tonight at midnight.
Eighty grand would buy a lot of pain relief. It might even be enough to help me forget.
I drank until I couldn't feel Earl anymore, and then I drank some more.
When Monday rolled around I cashed my policy and met Jack at Joe's Pool Hall and whipped her butt with my new thousand dollar Balabushka custom-made pool cue.
School Daze
Jack Daniels fans are usually polarized when it comes to Harry McGlade. Some love him. Some hate him. Personally, I love the guy. Harry let's me be goofy, which is something I really enjoy writing, but normally have to tone it down because it takes away from the storyline. But in a Harry McGlade short story, the storyline takes a back seat to the goofiness, and I try to see how many jokes I can cram into the least amount of space. This one sold to the anthology Uncage Me edited by Jennifer Jordan.
“Cute kid,” I said.
The kid looked like a large pink watermelon with buck teeth and bug eyes. If I hadn't already known it was a girl, I couldn't have guessed from the picture. What was that medical name for children with a overdeveloped heads? Balloonheadism? Bigheaditis? Melonoma? Freak?
“She takes after her mother.”
Yeeech. My fertile mind produced an image of a naked Mrs. Potatohead, unhooking her bra. I shook away the thought and handed the picture back to the proud Papa.
“Where is Mom, by the way?”
Mr. Morribund leaned close enough for me to smell his lunch—tunafish on rye with a side order of whiskey. He was a thin guy with big eyes who wore an off-the-rack suit with a gold Save The Dolphins tie tack.
“Emily doesn't know I'm here, Mr. McGlade. She's at home with little Rosemary. Since we received the news she's been... upset.”
“I sympathize. Getting into the right pre-school can mean the difference between summa cum laude at Harvard and offering mouth sex in back alley Dumspters for crack money. I should know. I've seen it.”
“You've seen mouth sex in back alley Dumpsters?”
I nodded my head in what I hoped what looked like a sad way. “It isn't pretty, Mr. Morribund. Not to look at, or to smell. But I don't understand how you expect me to get little Rotisserie—”
“It's Rosemary.”
“—little Rosemary into this school if they already turned down your application. Are you looking for strong-arm work?”
“No, nothing like that.”
I frowned. I liked strong-arm work. It was one of the perks of being a private eye. That and breaking and entering.
“What then? Breaking and entering? Some stealing, maybe?”
I liked stealing.
Morribund swallowed, his Adam's apple wiggling in his thin neck. If he were any skinnier he wouldn't have a profile.
“The Salieri Academy is the premier pre-school in the nation, Mr. McGlade. They have a waiting list of thousands, and to even have a chance at attending you have to fill out the application five years before your child is conceived.”
“That's a long time to wait for nookie.” But then, if I were married to Mrs. Potatohead, I wouldn't mind the wait.
“It's the reason we took so long to have Rosemary. We paid the application fee, and were all but assured entrance. But three days after Rosemary was born, our application was denied.”
“Did they give a reason?” Other than the fact that your kid looks like an albino warthog who has been snacking on an air compressor?
“No. The application says they reserve the right to deny admittance at their discretion, and still keep the fee.”
“How much was the fee?”
“Ten thousand dollars.”
Ouch. You could rent a lot of naughty videos for that kind of money. And you'd need to, because those things get boring after the third or fourth viewing.
“So what's the deal? You want me to shake the guy down for the money.”
He shook his head. “Nothing of the sort. I'm not a violent man.”
“Spell it out, Mr. Morribund. What exactly do you want me to do? Burn down the school?”
I liked arson.
“Goodness, no. The Salieri School is run by a man named Michael Sousse.”
“And you want me to kidnap his pet dog and take pictures of me throwing it off a tall building, using my zoom lens to capture its final barks of terror as it takes the express lane to Pancakeville? Because that's where I draw the line, Mr. Morribund. I may be a thug, a thief, and an arsonist, but I won't harm any innocent animals unless there's a bonus involved.”
Morribund raised an eyebrow. “You'd do that to a dog? The Internet said you love animals.”