Services Rendered: The Cases of Dan Shamble, Zombie

by Kevin J. Anderson

  “Enough jokes, time to get down to business. I need your help, McGoo.”

  “You need a lot of help,” he wisecracked. “Official business? Or something we can talk about over beers tonight?”

  “Official police business. I need to file a missing turkey report.”

  McGoo took it in stride. As I said, unusual cases crop up in the Quarter every day. He led me back to his cubicle and rummaged in his desk drawer. “I think we have a form for that.”

  It turned out, to my surprise, that half a dozen missing turkeys had been reported in the last week, all across the Quarter. “Is that unusual?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “It’s the holiday season, and everyone wants a turkey dinner.”

  “But most grocery store chains have ridiculously cheap sales on holiday turkeys. Why risk jail time instead of just buying one of the five-dollar specials?”

  McGoo’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t try to talk logic when it comes to turkey thieves. They’re the worst—take it from me.”

  McGoo had a small cluttered desk in the main pool, but he rarely spent any time there because he’s the sort of cop who likes to be walking his beat, seeing problems with his own eyes—and picking up fodder for more bad jokes. He handed me the sheet. “You’re perfectly capable of filling out a missing-turkey form on your own.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence,” I said while he amused himself by playing a game of Cockroach Crush on his phone. Sadly, I couldn’t actually finish the form. I knew some of the answers: name of owner, date the bird went missing. Under distinguishing marks I wrote down “Aztec ceremonial tattoos marked on hide, charm bangles tied onto feet.” But as to the details of the night on which it had gone missing, or even what names the turkey responded to, I was at a loss. I would have to go back to the Aztec mummy to get the final details.

  “Get started with this, McGoo.” I slid the incomplete form over to him. “I’ll come back with more information later today. I’ve got to see a mummy about a turkey.”

  Even from halfway down the suburban street it was plain which house belonged to Kashewpetl. It was a modest rambler, but the garage was a ziggurat, a stair-stepped pyramid with a small sacrificial altar on top where the mummy intended to sacrifice his wish turkey on Christmas Eve. Right now the platform had a bird feeder and a wind vane. The mailbox was adorned with Aztec symbols.

  Kashewpetl’s neighbor, though, was obviously an Egyptian mummy, his house built in the shape of a pyramid, the sides sloped to a perfect triangular apex, only two stories high. Considering the slope of the angled ceilings, I doubted that the upstairs or attic would have much usable space.

  Not content with pink lawn flamingoes, the Egyptian mummy neighbor had a sphinx in the front yard (though only a small decorative model) and a statue of Anubis. I saw the Egyptian mummy out in the yard holding a garden hose, watering a hedge between his and the Aztec mummy’s property.

  Being neighborly as he saw me shamble along, he raised a bandaged hand, but when I turned toward the Aztec mummy’s door, he looked away in a huff. There seemed to be no love lost between the neighbors.

  I knocked on Kashewpetl’s door and entered. The Aztec mummy had been sitting in a recliner chair that perfectly accommodated his bent-over posture. “I need a few more details for the missing turkey report, and I’d also like to have a look at the cage, see if we can figure out how it got loose.”

  Kashewpetl used the remote to switch off the TV. He was obviously a single man who lived alone, someone who dwelled in the past—more than a thousand years of it. On the wall hung the large ornate disk of an Aztec calendar with the words “Today’s Date Is …” The calendar was one of the extended post-2012 holocaust editions with extra dates added. A sticky note marked with festive holly leaves and berries marked Christmas Day!!! only two days hence.

  Kashewpetl shuffled to the back room. “I gave the turkey his very own bedroom—the master bedroom in fact, nicer than mine.”

  In the hallway hung two framed pictures, one of an Egyptian pyramid and the other showing a bandaged mummy—both obscured by the circle/slash of the universal No symbol. I frowned at the anti-Egyptian sentiment. “I take it you’re not on the best of terms with the pyramid next door?”

  The Aztec mummy’s face was too desiccated to feature a genuine frown. “We don’t see eye socket to eye socket—mainly because he’s full of himself and still living in another age. He’s uppity, gets his bandages cleaned at a high-priced rewrapping and styling salon, then makes insulting comments that Aztec mummies aren’t real mummies, that we’re just pretenders, naturally desiccated, with no embalming process.” He looked at me. “That’s enough reason to hate your neighbor, isn’t it?”

  “I suppose so,” I said. I take a lot of pride in that, keeping my body in shape—which includes regular touch-ups at the embalming parlor—so I don’t rot and fall apart like too many of my less-conscientious zombie comrades.

  “And his girlfriend is even worse, a total dingbat,” Kashewpetl continued. “His name is Eff-Tup. I did some digging in the city records, found out that he wasn’t even nobility back in Egypt! That he went through the whole expensive mummification process due to a paperwork error. Eff-Tup was just a traveling papyrus salesman, and now he thinks he owns the Nile.” He snorted, making a hollow whistle through his empty nasal cavities. “Once I get my wish turkey back and I have my favorite sled, I’m not going to let him use it. Ever.”

  I didn’t think there were many toboggan hills in the Quarter, but I let the mummy have his dreams.

  Inside the turkey’s master bedroom, the walls had been strung with Christmas decorations, tinsel, glittering ornaments, a small set of speakers with an MP3 player and Christmas carols playing on a constant loop.

  “What are all the festive decorations for?” I asked.

  “To celebrate the season, let him feel the holiday cheer. I figured if the turkey was marked for death, I should at least keep him happy. After all, he’s granting me my wish to get my favorite present back.”

  “Do you think the wish turkey felt that he was fulfilling a destiny? That he had a well accomplished life?”

  The Aztec mummy’s stiff neck tilted forward at an odd angle. “Mr. Chambeaux, no matter what the circumstances, there’s really not much more that a standard turkey can hope for.”

  The cage had a simple hook-and-eye latch that had been popped open to leave the door wide. Inside was a water dish, a food dish, and an expansive bed stuffed with goose down (Would that bother a turkey? I wondered.); a postage-stamp-sized picture of Kashewpetl hung on the cage wall. Gold chains and colorful ribbons dangled from the bars for decoration, and a plum-sized, mirrored disco ball hung from the roof. Decadent and hedonistic indeed, if you were a turkey.

  I looked at the simple hook and eye, flipping it back and forth with my clumsy fingers. A turkey could easily have knocked it loose. “Are you certain he didn’t get out by himself?”

  Kashewpetl rolled his tiny shriveled eyes. “Turkeys can drown in a rainstorm because they aren’t smart enough to close their beaks when they look up into the pouring rain.”

  “Just checking all the bases.” I raised the other obvious possibility. “Do you think someone stole it?”

  “Kidnapped my turkey? Why would anyone do that?”

  Sometimes the client doesn’t see what’s right in front of him. “You said it’s a wish turkey. Maybe somebody else wanted the wishbone.”

  He looked horrified. “Oh no! Mr. Chambeaux, we’ve got to find my turkey before Christmas! If we don’t, everyone’s holiday will be ruined.”

  Not the turkey’s, I thought.

  Back at the Chambeaux & Deyer offices, late at night before midnight on Christmas Eve, Robin worked through dinner on the convoluted new legal case of the Medusa with a conscience. I needed to call McGoo (for the fifth time) to find out if he had any leads on my lost turkey—or on any of the lost turkeys, because what happened to one gobbler might have happened to another.

&nb
sp; We gathered in the conference room to discuss the day’s work, partly to exchange information and leads, partly as a support group. “My new client is an Aztec mummy,” I said. “He’s lost some kind of magical turkey that he thinks will be able to restore a long-lost sled he had as a child. He wants to give it to himself as a Christmas present.”

  “A sled?” Sheyenne asked. “Can’t he just buy a new one? For a lot less than what he’d be paying in our fees.”

  “Nostalgia,” I said, as if that explained everything. “That’s reason enough for Kashewpetl.”

  Robin said, “Bless you.”

  “So, did you resolve the moral dilemma with the hippie gorgon?” I asked.

  Robin sighed. “Saffron has a deep abiding sense of right and wrong, but she has no clue about the law. She thinks that if she steals something for altruistic reasons, then it’s not stealing. I tried to explain, but she keeps wanting me to find a loophole.”

  “Did she tell you what she stole?” Sheyenne asked.

  “Some kind of magical talisman that makes wishes come true,” Robin was obviously skeptical. “Chalk it up to fairy dust and the like. I believe Saffron is the type to plan her grocery shopping trips according to her horoscope.”

  “Hmm, a talisman that makes wishes come true? Sounds like my client’s missing wish turkey.”

  “A wish turkey, did you say?” Robin looked at me. “She did mention something about a wishbone. She and her boyfriend acquired it, but I think he’s just doing it to keep her happy. He’s an Egyptian mummy named Eff-Tup.”

  I sat up straight. I couldn’t believe the solution was right there. “They took that wish turkey out of the cage in Kashewpetl’s house, right next door. We should make a pyramid call to Eff-Tup and Saffron, so I can retrieve my client’s stolen property!”

  Robin looked horrified. “But you can’t use the information from my client against them! It’s a conflict of interest for me. Not ethical.”

  “But we’re doing it for the right reasons,” I said. “Saffron would certainly understand that.” Suddenly it all became clear to me: The Medusa wanted world peace, an end to war, the cures for all sickness, an end to poverty. That was how she intended to use the wish turkey. Kashewpetl just wanted an old sled back, a trivial and selfish wish. There shouldn’t be any contest as to which one had the better reason for sacrificing the magical turkey.

  But from our experience in dealing with Satanic contracts and practical jokester genies, wishes had a way of coming true—but in unexpected and often disastrous ways. I realized to my horror that one way to end all poverty, sickness, and war, and to bring about world peace, would be to simply wipe out all life on Earth.

  Not exactly a solution I would like to have. I wondered how powerful that wish turkey really was, and I decided that wasn’t a risk I wanted to take.

  “It’s not a conflict of interest,” I said to Robin. “Stealing is stealing, whether or not Saffron’s wish sounds better than my client’s.

  Robin hung her head. “You’re right, Dan. And the law is the law. We’d better bring in the police, though. We’ll get the turkey back, hold it in custodial care, then let the courts decide.”

  “That’ll take until well past Christmas,” Sheyenne said.

  “There’s always next Christmas,” I suggested. I called McGoo, so we could plan our late-night raid. Just how he wanted to spend Christmas Eve.

  Because McGoo had the uniform and the badge, he was the one who stepped up to the door of the Egyptian pyramid house. He pounded hard, knocking the festive wreath askew. It was long after midnight, but even the traffic on the main residential street was high, apparently for pre-Christmas Eve parties.

  McGoo pounded again. “Mr. Eff-Tup, Saffron the Medusa—open up, this is the police. We have a warrant to search for stolen magical poultry.”

  Robin accompanied us, in case she needed to provide legal protection for her gorgon client. Sheyenne’s spectral form drifted by my side, snuggling up even though we couldn’t feel each other. Sometimes solving cases was the only kind of date we got to have.

  The door opened, to reveal the white-wrapped Egyptian mummy. “We don’t want any, it’s late. You should be—” He looked at Officer McGoohan with his badge and Robin with the search warrant. The Medusa came to the door smiling airily; now she had mistletoe entwined among the rosebud-stuffed serpents on her head. They seemed drugged; maybe too much eggnog.

  “Good to see you again, Miss Deyer! Honey, invite them in for some cookies.” She seemed oblivious to why the guests might be there.

  The mummy tried to slam the door on us, but McGoo stuck his shoe in the way, then forced his way in. He propped the door wide open.

  I said, “We have reason to believe that you might be harboring a kidnapped wish turkey.”

  “No wish turkeys here,” said Eff-Tup.

  “What about other turkeys?” McGoo asked. “Several have gone missing.”

  The mummy shrugged. “It’s that time of the season.”

  From the back of the pyramid we heard the sounds of rattling cages, squawking noises. Ducking under the extremely angled walls, we barged through the kitchen door to see a pyramid-shaped utility shed. Through mesh windows we heard more noises from inside, birds and other creatures.

  “I need my lawyer,” the mummy cried.

  “Go ahead and call him. I have a warrant.”

  Behind the first storage unit was a tiny, stuffy corral that held a hobbled unicorn, filthy and skeletal, its mane and tail drooping and tangled. The creature’s eyes were forlorn and sad, with less than ten feet of space to plod back and forth. The corral was filled with bright purple lumps of unicorn manure, each one sprouting pink flowers. When the unicorn snorted miserably, small rainbows came out of its nose.

  “This is disgusting!” McGoo said.

  “We kept it for its own good,” said Saffron. “We were going to make the world full of magic and light.”

  Hearing the commotion from next door, Kashewpetl stormed over in his lurching stiff-jointed gait and shouted through the wide-open front door. “What’s going on here?”

  “In the back, Mr. Kashewpetl,” I called. “I think we found your wish turkey.”

  Sheyenne went to comfort the poor unicorn and untie it.

  Eff-Tup stood in front of the pyramidal storage unit, barring our way. “You’ll never break the lock!” he insisted. It was secured with a simple hook-and-eye clasp. Did no one understand security these days?

  McGoo easily flipped the hook.

  Behind us, the Aztec mummy barged and took one look at the pyramid utility shed, furious. “Right here? My own neighbors? After I wish for my special sled, I’ll never let you use it!”

  “We’re going to wish for world peace instead,” said Saffron, “as soon as we get around to sacrificing the turkey.”

  McGoo swung open the flimsy door to reveal a shed of horrors—and not nice ones. We saw cages and cages of rescued, and then imprisoned, magical creatures. A trio of magic flower fairies huddled in gloom, looking brown and neglected, as if they hadn’t been watered or fertilized in days. A multicolored feathered serpent was all scales and bones. Even a sullen, small lawn gnome hunched down in a cage much too small for it, so that its perky pointed cap was crumpled under the wire-mesh enclosure. “Help us,” he moaned.

  “Ugh,” McGoo said, glowering at the Egyptian mummy and the Medusa. “There’s nothing worse than incompetent do-gooders.”

  “We meant well!” Saffron said.

  Then I spotted the turkey sporting Aztec ceremonial tattoos and golden bangles around its feet. “Here, Mr. Kashewpetl!”

  The Aztec mummy stormed forward as best he could with his petrified joints. “That’s my turkey! It’s my wish! I get to sacrifice it! I want my sled!”

  “That turkey’s just a pawn,” Robin said to me.

  Even in this less-than-ostentatious cage, the turkey seemed fat and happy, without a care in the world. Kashewpetl flung the wire door wide, kicked the cage,
rattled it. “Get out of there! Let’s go home—up to the altar. It’s Christmas Eve!”

  The turkey squawked and fluttered out of the cage, its body so huge it could barely step forward, but it waddled out as if it were some sort of feathered Aztec god.

  “You will not take our wonderful creatures!” And suddenly the peacenik Medusa seemed as fierce as one might expect a gorgon to be. Her eyes blazed bright, and her serpent hair writhed and flashed. But the snakes were all blindfolded and they couldn’t get their fangs free of the rosebuds.

  Eff-Tup threw himself on Kashewpetl, and the two mummies wrestled, in a rather stiff and slow-motion fashion. They fell against the cages, knocking the groaning lawn gnome off to the side.

  “Careful! You’ll break something!” shouted Kashewpetl.

  “I intend to!” Eff-Tup said.

  I found an empty plastic grocery bag hanging on a hook next to an unused unicorn pooper-scooper. I dumped the bag and yanked it over the Medusa’s head, just in case those snakes figured a way out. McGoo easily pulled the mummies apart without tearing too many bandages.

  During the tussle, though, the wish turkey flapped its wings, gobbled—and then bolted. It was too fat to run quickly, but we were preoccupied and didn’t notice until it had already waddled through the pyramid house and sprinted out the open front door.

  “Get the turkey!” I said, and suddenly we were all running.

  All the pell-mell pursuers only made the turkey bolt faster. Gobbling, it ran into the busy street.

  “Catch it!” Kashewpetl wailed so loudly that four moths came out of his lungs. “My sled!”

  Saffron finally tore the plastic bag from her head. “World peace!” she cried.