“Eddie, please be quiet.”
Eddie made growling sounds.
Dorothy rose to flee.
“No,” said Jack. “Please don’t go.”
“Let her go, Jack.”
“No. Please stay.” Jack rose, took Dorothy gently by the shoulders and sat her back down. “I’ll tell you,” he said. “I’ll tell you everything. But before I do, you must promise me that you will tell no one what I tell you. And I’m saying this for your own good. Murders have occurred –”
“Then you –”
“Not me. I’m not a murderer. Eddie and I are detectives. We are in pursuit of murderers.”
“That thing is looking at me in a funny way.”
“It’s the only way he knows.”
“Thanks very much,” said Eddie, and he shifted in his chair, which had Dorothy cowering.
“Please promise me,” said Jack, “and I’ll tell you everything.”
And Dorothy promised in a shaky voice and Jack then told her everything.
And when Jack was done there was silence.
Except for the background restaurant noise of large Californians chowing down on family chicken-burger meals.
“My head is spinning,” said Dorothy. “But somehow I always knew it. I used to say to my little dog Toto, before he was sadly run over by a truck, somewhere over the rainbow …”
And Dorothy burst into song.
Which rather surprised the diners. And rather surprised Jack, too.
“Oh, sorry,” said Dorothy, bursting out of song. “I’m rather prone to that.”
“It was very nice,” said Jack. “I liked the bit about the bluebirds.”
“I didn’t,” said Eddie. “Ne’er a hint of a bear.”
“A land of toys,” said Dorothy.
“Well, a city,” said Jack. “That was once Toy Town.”
“And the toys on the posters –”
“As I said,” said Jack, “some of them are already dead and if we don’t stop these doppelgangers of us, as you can see on the posters, many more folk in Toy City will die. Including Eddie here.”
“At least I seem to get star billing,” said the bear. “I’m the last on the list.”
Dorothy smiled upon Eddie. “He really is quite cute,” she said. “Can I give him a cuddle?”
“You cannot,” said Eddie Bear. “Most undignified.”
Dorothy smiled once more and shook her head. Her flame-red hair glittered in reflected sunlight. “Let me help you,” Dorothy said. “I’m sure I could do something to help.”
“I wouldn’t hear of it,” said Jack, finishing his coffee. “It’s far too dangerous.”
“Because you’re a girl,” said Eddie. “No offence meant.”
“I think you did mean some,” said Dorothy.
“I think he probably meant plenty,” said Jack. “But in a way he’s right. Eddie and I are used to getting into danger. It’s just about all we ever do. In fact, I can’t imagine how we’ve managed to sit for so long in this restaurant without someone trying to shoot us, stab us, or blow us up.”
“It can’t be danger all the time,” said Dorothy.
“Not all,” said Eddie. “The danger is relieved periodically by bouts of extreme drunkenness and bad behaviour. So as you can see, it’s no job for a girl. And Jack has a girlfriend anyway.”
Jack clipped Eddie lightly on the ear.
And then withdrew his fingers hastily to avoid having them bitten off.
“I could help you,” Dorothy said. “You are strangers here and I know my way around LA. I could be very useful to you.”
“It’s too dangerous,” said Jack. “You could get hurt, badly.”
“I know how to handle myself.”
“Yes,” said Jack, “of course you do.”
“Stand up,” said Dorothy. “Try to attack me, see what happens.”
“Don’t be silly,” said Jack.
“I’m serious. Try.”
“Some other time,” said Jack. “Sit down.”
“Chicken,” said Dorothy.
“Hardly a well-chosen word, considering the circumstances.”
“You’re still a chicken. Cluck! Cluck! Cluck!” And Dorothy made chicken sounds and did that elbow thing that people do when they impersonate chickens. As they so often do in passionate bedroom situations.[25]
“You’re making an exhibition of yourself,” said Jack. “You’ll get us thrown out.”
“She’s a stone bonker, this one,” said Eddie. “Give her a little smack, Jack, and make her sit down again.”
“I can’t smack a woman.”
“Let me bite her, then.”
Dorothy began what is called in theatrical terms a “dance improvisation”. Diners looked on briefly, then continued with their chowing down of chicken burgers. Because, after all, this was California.
“Just one little smack then,” said Jack, “and we’ll stop all this nonsense.”
Jack rose from his chair.
Dorothy ceased her dance improvisation, extended an arm and with her fingers beckoned Jack nearer.
Jack sighed, took a step forward and swung a gentle slap in Dorothy’s direction.
And what happened next seemed to Eddie to happen in slow motion. Dorothy leapt into the air and somersaulted over Jack’s head, turning as she did so to boot him right in the side of the gob.
It may have seemed like slow motion to Eddie.
It seemed very fast to Jack.
And as Jack hit the floor with a thunderous blow …
Dorothy landed several yards away, right on her feet, light as thistledown.
Eddie buried his face in his paws. “That’s going to hurt in the morning,” he said. “And as this is morning, it will probably be hurting now.”
“Ow, my face.” And Jack did flounderings about. “That wasn’t fair … my face.”
“I’ll get some ice,” said Dorothy.
“Eddie,” groaned Jack from his floor-bound repose, “Eddie, bite her, please.”
“Not my battle,” said Eddie.
“But Eddie.”
“Sorry,” said Eddie. “Count Otto kicked me over the big top. That really hurt. This woman could kick me all the way to England, wherever that is.”
Dorothy went and fetched some ice and then she helped Jack up.
“I can get up by myself.” Jack patted her away.
“I told you I could handle myself.”
“I wasn’t ready,” said Jack.
“Well, if you’re ready now you can take another shot. I’ll close my eyes if you want.”
“Go on,” said Eddie. “You might strike lucky.”
Jack sat down in a right old huff. Dorothy offered him ice in a serviette. Jack took this and held it to his jaw.
“It’s call Dimac,” Dorothy explained. “The deadliest martial art on Earth. My hands and feet are registered with the police as lethal weapons – I have to have a special licence for them.”
“Dimac?” said Jack.
“I sent away for a course. A dollar ninety-eight a lesson, from Count Dante – he’s the Deadliest Man on Earth, obviously.”
“Obviously,” said Jack. And he clicked his jaw.
“So do I get the job?”
Jack sighed and almost shook his head.
“I know my way around,” said Dorothy. “And I could come in very useful if anyone menaces you or Eddie.”
“Well,” said Jack. And then he said, “Why? Why would you want to help us?”
“Why?” said Dorothy. “Why? You have to be joking.”
“Jack’s not very good on jokes,” said Eddie. “Actually, as a comedy sidekick he’s pretty useless. But it is a valid question. You want to be an actress, don’t you? Why would you want to get involved with us?”
“How can you ask me that? You are a talking toy bear. Jack says that you and he came here from somewhere over the rainbow. I believe in fate. Our paths haven’t crossed by accident – destiny led you to me.”
“Oh dear,” said Eddie, and if he had been able to roll his eyes he would have done so.
“And there’s definitely a movie in this,” said Dorothy. “I might eschew acting in favour of a role as producer.”
“Hm,” went Jack.
“Hm?” went Dorothy.
“Ignore him,” said Eddie. “He’s had woman trouble. The love of his life left him. I suspect that his ‘hm’ represented something along the lines that your unexpected evolution from the wide-eyed innocent on Hollywood Boulevard to lean, mean killing machine with pretensions to movie moguldom within the space of a short half-hour is somewhat disconcerting for him.”