I rushed to his side, and when I saw that he wasn’t hurt, the boxes of lemon chiffon and double chocolate covering him were just too much.
“You got something going on with Betty Crocker I don’t know about?” I quipped.
He gave me an “I’m gonna kick your butt” look, and then we both burst into laughter.
We had just finished putting Betty back in her place when “code fifty,” roared over the intercom.
Code fifty was used when a greeter had spotted a shoplifter and required assistance. We took off toward the front of the store.
The old gentleman who had spotted the thief was pointing down the fruit and vegetable aisle. “There! He’s getting away!”
We looked and saw the perp sprinting down the aisle toward the swinging door that ultimately led to the service entrance.
He was a good seventy-five feet from us when we spotted him. No way were we going to catch him before he made the swinging door. Vince grabbed a coconut from the fruit display and in one sweeping motion of that cannon arm, fired his fruit bomb at the perp. The coconut struck the fleeing felon squarely in the back of the head. He fell headlong into a display of picnic supplies and came down covered in plastic forks and paper plates.
“What an arm,” I droned. “A great slide, but the runner is out at the plate.”
Not bad for a day’s work.
So far we had exposed dirty tricks and petty thievery, but theft of this nature was to be expected and certainly didn’t account for the massive losses the store was experiencing.
We gave our report to Gil and called it a day.
The next morning I was back at greeter again. A woman approached me with a large box. “I bought this laptop computer, but when I opened the box there was nothing inside but this Styrofoam and some wood.”
Hmm, I thought. Now were getting somewhere. We’re not talking about a seventy-five cent Slim Jim. We’re talking eight hundred bucks!
I called someone to relieve me, took the lady for her refund, and called a conference with Gil and Vince. After examining the box, we concluded that someone was tampering with the merchandise before it hit the floor. It had to be an inside job.
But from where?
All merchandise came from the main distribution center in Unionville, Arkansas, so we concluded that would be the logical place to start. If we could track a shipment from warehouse to store, we might be able to discover the culprit.
Vince and I met with the captain, and we had a conference call with Dewey Coughlin. He approved our plan, and we made preparations for a field trip to Arkansas.
Coughlin told us to contact Larry Dugan when we arrived. Larry was in charge of the distribution center and another friend of Coughlin’s from the old days. He said he would call Dugan and give him the details of our plan and assured us of full cooperation.
After our conference, Shorty asked me to stay behind. “Walt, I’m afraid I have some bad news. We were all really excited about getting the C.R.A.P. program started, but we might have jumped the gun a bit. Captain Harrington, who, as you know, is not your biggest fan, went to the executive committee. He reminded them that each time a recruit is hired for your program that eliminates a new hire for the regular force. There is only so much money for salaries in the budget. I’m afraid they agreed with him. It looks like Vince may be it for quite a while. I’m really sorry.”
Yeah, I was too.
Naturally, I was discouraged. Why is it that so often new and innovative ideas are brought to a halt by mundane and practical realities?
Well, it is what it is, and Vince and I had a job to do.
It was a good six-hour drive from Kansas City to Unionville. We left early and arrived at the distribution center at three in the afternoon. We asked for Mr. Dugan and were sent to the loading dock.
We were met by three strapping men in overalls. The oldest approached with his hand extended. “Hi,” he said. “My name’s Larry, and this is my brother Darryl, and this here’s my other brother, Darryl.”
No! It can’t be, I thought. That stuff only happens on TV.
But this is Arkansas.
We introduced ourselves and discussed the details of our plan.
“That all sounds good,” he said. “But you boys barely caught us. We got us some big plans of our own for the evening. I’m going over to my brother-in-law’s place. He just bought hisself a new house.”
“Oh, kind of a housewarming,” I said.
“Yeah, that too.” Larry replied. “But mainly we got to help him take the wheels offn’ it.”
“Ah,” I said. “Then the Darryls will be going with you.”
“Nope, not tonight. They both got plans o’ their own. Darryl here’s got hisself a moon pie, a six-pack, and a new bug zapper. He’s looking forward to an evening of quality entertainment. And I saw Darryl over there with a new tub of lard.”
“Oh, his wife must be planning on frying some chicken,” I said.
“Nope,” Darryl chimed in. “It’s good for that too, but we use it mostly in bed.”
Wow! Too much information.
There was obviously a lot I didn’t know about Arkansas culture.
“Yeah, Darryl’s feelin’ a lot better since he came from the doc this afternoon.”
“Was Darryl ill?” I asked.
“Well, he thought he was. His wife told him he was gettin’ Grapenuts, and he thought he had one of them venereal diseases.”
We bid the Dugan brothers farewell and checked into a local hotel. When we got in our room, we knew we had chosen first-class accommodations. There was a stuffed possum on the dresser, a spit cup on the nightstand, three back issues of Outdoor Life on the coffee table and a velvet painting of Elvis on the wall.
Arkansas luxury.
Our plan for the next day was fairly simple. An eighteen-wheeler was being loaded for the trip to the Kansas City BuyMart Mega-Store. I, being the smaller of the two of us, was to be packed inside a large box that supposedly held a fifteen-cubic-foot refrigerator. Larry would see to it that I was loaded in the trailer at a location where I could see what was happening through little holes we had cut in the side of the box. Larry had inspected all of the shipment, and so far all the merchandise was intact. Vince would follow along at a safe distance in our car so as not to arouse suspicion.
BuyMart owns the trailers, and they contract out for the drivers who own their rigs. The trailer was completely loaded, and I was wheeled up the ramp in the big box. It was at least a six-hour trip to Kansas City, so I had equipped myself with a couple of candy bars, a bottle of water, and an empty bottle in case I had a call from Mother Nature.
We were all set. I heard the door slam shut and felt a jerk as the tractor hooked up to the trailer.
Off we went!
I had gone to the bathroom just before being sealed into the box, but with all the jiggling and bouncing, I soon was getting warning signals from my bladder. So there I was, sealed in a refrigerator box in the back of a truck, going seventy miles an hour down Highway 65, trying to piss in a Coke bottle. They just don’t cover this stuff at the academy.
After about an hour, I felt the big rig pull off the highway and onto a gravel road. It came to a stop and I heard voices. Then the door opened, and as I peeped through my little holes, I saw the driver and another man take a box that contained a DVD player, open it, remove the DVD player, and replace it with a block of wood the same size and weight as the player. They sealed the box and put it back with the other players.
Clever!
The number of boxes would match the invoice sheet. The DVD player might sit in the warehouse for a month before it was put on the shelf and might sit there several more weeks before someone bought it and returned it like the lady with the laptop.
Then they went to another box that contained maybe fifty watches. They carefully removed just one watch and sealed the carton. They only count cartons at check-in, not individual pieces. It would never be missed. These guys were good.
There were no further incidents until we pulled into the loading dock at BuyMart.
When a trailer is unloaded, sturdy metal ramps with ball-bearing wheels are placed on the back of the trailer and extend down into the warehouse. Boxes and crates are placed on the ramp, gravity takes over, and the carton rolls into the waiting arms of the dockhand.
When I was in high school, I worked at the small town supermarket. It was the job of my buddy and I to unload the weekly grocery shipment. It became a contest. The driver would load the cartons on the ramp and shoot them into the store as fast as he could. If we weren’t there to catch them, they would go sailing off the end and crash onto the floor.
Great fun.
The driver opened the trailer door and with the help of the dock man hoisted the ramps into place. Then he turned to the dock man and said he’d be back in a minute. I figured he was going to the bathroom and I would have plenty of time to cut myself out of the box.
I had just cut the top and was standing up when he returned. He must have just been getting a drink. When he saw me in the box, he knew he had been made. He pulled a gun from his pants. The startled dock man took off in the other direction. I scrambled out of the box just as he fired. A carton of mayonnaise exploded next to me. I ducked, and his next shot took out Orville Redenbacher.
I felt like one of those ducks in a firing range at the carnival. I was trapped in the trailer, and it was only a matter of time until one of his shots hit pay dirt.
Then I saw it. A large carton was on the edge of the ramp ready to be whizzed into the waiting arms of the loader. The driver was at the end of the ramp ready to fire again. I thought about how as a kid I would place my American Flyer sled at the top of a hill and with a running start, belly flop on the sled and speed down the hill.
What the hell! Either that or stay there and get shot.
I launched myself at the carton, hit it with a whuff, and sped down the ramp with blazing speed. It all happened so quickly the driver didn’t have time to react. He fired, and I heard the bullet whiz over my head just as the carton and I struck him in the chest.
He collapsed in a heap, and I cuffed him. I glanced at the box I had ridden in on and saw a mule on his front feet with his hind feet extended. The box label read, “Louisana Ass-Kickin’ Hot Sauce.”
Right on!
Lady Justice! How does she do it?
I found Gil, and he told me he had just gotten the report. Vince had seen the exchange between the two men and had followed the guy to the garage where they were hiding the contraband. He called it in, and the State Highway Patrol came to assist in the collar.
Not a bad day’s work for a couple of old farts.
After the thieves were taken into custody and booked, Vince and I met with the captain and through another conference call shared with Dewey Coughlin how the perps were ripping off the company. He expressed his gratitude for our service and for the C.R.A.P. program and said he was in our debt. If there was anything he could ever do to square it up, we were to just let him know.
The captain thought for a minute and said, “Mr. Coughlin, by any chance are you looking for another worthy cause for an endowment?”
“We’re always looking for a good tax write-off that will benefit the community,” he replied. “What did you have in mind?”
The captain explained our situation involving the suspension of the C.R.A.P. program, and before the morning was over, Dewey Coughlin had agreed to underwrite the expenses of the City Retiree Action Patrol.
How great is that?
Apparently Lady Justice does give a C.R.A.P.!
CHAPTER 23
I drove home happy but exhausted. I guess riding six hours in a box and getting shot at will take the starch out of a person.
As I walked up to my apartment building, Willie was sitting on the front porch reading my newspaper.
“Hey, Mr. Walt,” he said. “Mary tells me you workin’ down at de BuyMart. I been meaning to get me some stuff, you know, stuff to take care of the ladies. You suppose you could get me one o’ dem employee discounts?”
“Sorry, Willie. My BuyMart days are over. I turned in my cap and vest.”
“Damn. Emma’s been wanting to see me, but even at my age, I can’t go ridin’ into de sunset witout my hat on.”
Good to know that Willie practices safe sex.
The Professor once told us, “You should wear a condom on every conceivable occasion.”
I glanced over Willie’s shoulder at the front-page headline. It read, “Importer Myron Blanchard Found Hanged. Suicide Suspected.” The article went on to say that Blanchard was found by an employee at one of Blanchard’s import warehouses in the West Bottoms. He was found hanging by a rope from a ceiling rafter. The room was empty except for an overturned chair.
I had read about Blanchard and his partner, Clark Grissom. They were up and comers in Kansas City commercial circles. Their imports from East Asian and European markets were filling the shelves in Midwest retail stores. Makes you wonder why such a successful guy would pull the plug.
Willie said, “Mr. Walt, Mary called and wanted me to come over and replace some lightbulbs in de hall what she couldn’t reach. You got time to take me ova der?”
I looked at my watch. “Still early. Why not?” We headed to the Three Trails.
Mary was just coming out the door when we arrived. “Hey, Mr. Walt,” she said. “I was just going to the downtown bus stop. Gotta go see about a cataract.”
“Whoa,” Willie chimed in. “Wot’s an old lady like you need wit a big ole car like dat?”
“Not a Cadillac, you dipshit,” she replied. “A cataract. You know, in my eye.”
“Oh yeah,” Willie said. “I knew dat.”
Sure.
“Tell you what,” I said. “Let’s get those lightbulbs changed and I’ll drive you downtown. You won’t have to wait for the bus.”
So Willie finished his chores, and as we headed downtown, Mary remarked, “Mr. Walt, since I don’t have to wait for the bus, I’ve got some extra time. My tummy’s been growling at me. You think we might stop at a drive-thru and pick up a sandwich?”
I hadn’t eaten much myself, and Willie’s always hungry, so we pulled into the first drive-thru we found.
I pulled into the drive-thru lane and inched my way closer to the order speakerphone. As I rolled my window down, a muffled voice came from the speaker, “Mlunth drsjp?”
Having been through drive-thrus before, I figured that was speaker-ese for “May I take your order?”
“Yes,” I yelled into the speaker. “We’d like three Mega Burgers, no onions, fries, two cokes, and a coffee, black.”
“Tufhsk leabn,” came the reply.
“Oh yeah,” Mary said. “Give me one of those little apple pies too.”
“Beavun yusfh,” was all I heard.
I saw the amount of the bill that registered on the digital readout by the speaker and it looked about right, so I pulled through to the pickup window.
The window flew open. I looked up and yikes! The girl at the window looked like she had lost a fight with a nail gun. Each ear was pierced three times, and each hole was adorned with large hoop earrings. There was a stud bar through her eyebrow, a diamond stud on her left nostril, and two studs protruding from her lower lip. When she opened her mouth to speak, her tongue flopped out, sporting a stud the size of a pea.
“No wonder the girl can’t talk,” Mary said. “Her mouth’s stapled shut.”
I handed her a twenty and tried not to think about the fact that the food I was about to eat had been prepared by a practitioner of self-mutilation.
I pulled out of the line and into traffic. Mary was opening the sack of goodies and distributing the food when I heard her exclaim, “Oh crap! That little bitch put onions on my burger. I didn’t want to go to no doctor breathing onions up his nose.”
I turned to calm her down, and when I looked up again, the car in front of me had stopped to make a left turn. I jammed on my brakes just as Willie was peeling the lid off his coffee.
The coffee sloshed out, and Willie screamed, “Yeow! I done scalded my pecker!” He began frantically undoing his pants. “Ice, ice,” he shouted. “Gimme some ice!”
Mary poured what was left of her coke out the window and turned to hand Willie the ice and saw, I presume for the first time, Willie’s manhood as he frantically wiped it with a napkin.
“Don’t need no new glasses to see that big thing,” she exclaimed.
“Oh,” moaned Willie, “now I can’t go see Emma fo’ at least a week!”
My life is nothing if not exciting.
I delivered Mary to her eye doctor and drove Willie home. He was still complaining about his affliction when we met the Professor.
After hearing Willie’s tale of woe, he helped put everything in perspective: “It’s better to have a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without.”
Willie went away, hurting but happy.
The next morning after squad meeting, the captain asked me to stay behind. He handed me an envelope that was addressed, “Walter Williams, c/o C.R.A.P. Program.”
“Looks like you’ve got a fan,” the captain said.
I opened the envelope that contained a computer-generated message. It read, “A dead man is found in a locked room, hanging from the ceiling four feet above the floor. The room is completely empty, except for a puddle of water below him. How did he die?”
We stared at the note. “What the hell is this, Walt?”
“Don’t have a clue.” The note was not signed, and the envelope had no return address.
[Lady Justice 01] - Lady Justice Takes a C.R.A.P. Page 15
