The Reggis Arms Caper

by Ross H. Spencer

  He said Brandy eventually outmaneuvered him.

  Betsy stared at me.

  She said now do you agree with me?

  She said all three of these characters climbed out of somebody’s cookie jar.

  She said you call the cops and I’ll open a window and scream.

  Ace said take it easy Mrs. Purdue everything’s okay now.

  He turned to me.

  He said Brandy baited a trap.

  He said for some insane reason the KGB was beginning to zero in on your wife as being the missing Princess Sonia.

  He said Brandy decided to capitalize on their mistake.

  He said she sent letters and packages to Kaleski and she made several trips with evidence that would firmly establish Betsy as the needle in the haystack.

  He said one of our old battalion crests set the hook and it was all downhill after that.

  He said Brandy sold Groganovitch on the idea of the KGB throwing an expenses-paid bash for our outfit.

  He said Brandy convinced Groganovitch to hire you to spot Sonia.

  He said ostensibly this was done to get you out of the way and render Betsy vulnerable to an uncomplicated kidnapping but the real purpose of the plan was to lure Groganovitch into the net.

  He said it worked to perfection and we have the big fish on several counts.

  He said espionage and attempted kidnapping and impersonating a government agent and breaking into a broom closet to name a few.

  Grogan groaned and touched his nose gingerly.

  Harry said Chance we’ve been a CIA team for years and we pulled this assignment because Langley knew we’d fit in well at the reunion.

  I said I got one question.

  I said whose side is that goddam panda on?

  Grogan snickered.

  I looked at him.

  I said you sonofabitch.

  Grogan sneered.

  He said capitalist swine.

  He said Barbara Frietchie was a whore.

  Betsy said call girl you ignorant baboon.

  She spun in my direction.

  She said Chance who the hell is Barbara Frietchie?

  Grogan said Barbara Frietchie is dead.

  He said she was waving that goofy flag and she fell out of a window and busted her rotten old ass.

  I pointed a stern finger at Grogan.

  I said look Grogan trying to kidnap my wife is one thing.

  I said sitting in my living room and bad-mouthing Barbara Frietchie is an entirely different goddam matter.

  Harry waved his hands and hollered shut up.

  He said everybody shut up.

  He said Groganovitch you missed the boat.

  He said you’ve been rubbing elbows with Sonia without knowing it.

  He said Brandy Alexander is Princess Sonia of Kaleski and she has hated Communists since the day you bastards gunned her father down.

  Grogan shook his head and smiled slyly.

  He said nyet.

  He said Sonia is blonde and blue-eyed.

  Ace Hacker threw back his head and laughed uproariously.

  He said why you blundering Bolshevik boob.

  He said haven’t you heard of hair-dye and tinted contact lenses?

  Grogan sat bolt upright in our blue chair.

  His eyes widened perceptibly.

  He snarled.

  He said so.

  He said more capitalist trickery.

  Harry said well Chance we have to run along.

  Ace said yeah we’ll take Groganovitch downtown and run him through the grinder.

  He said if he isn’t cooperative we’ll just have to drive him out to the Reggis Arms and lock him in 415 with Nellie Callahan.

  Grogan leaped from his chair and rumbled through our apartment.

  For a man with a limp he moved with surprising speed.

  Ace and Harry jumped up and collided with each other.

  I started after Grogan.

  Ace fell on top of me.

  Harry fell on top of Ace.

  I said get off goddammit.

  I said let me nail that big bastard.

  I said he insulted Barbara Frietchie.

  Betsy looked at the tangled pile of humanity.

  She said oh God the Three Stooges ride again.

  We headed for the back door.

  Grogan had left it ajar and rain was drifting in.

  We heard Grogan fall down the back stairs.

  We heard an engine start.

  Tires screamed.

  We burst onto the landing.

  Ace had unlimbered a Colt .45 and Harry was brandishing a wicked-looking Luger.

  They poured a fusillade into the night.

  I said what the hell are you guys shooting at?

  I pointed to Kimball Avenue.

  I said he went that way.

  Ace said Chance it’s too damn dark for accuracy.

  I said yeah but you could have come closer than that.

  I said you just blew the windshield out of my Olds.

  Harry said sorry old buddy.

  There was a thunderous crash on Kimball Avenue.

  Grogan had driven into the side of a southbound moving van.

  He piled out of his demolished Chevy and shook his fists at the van driver.

  He yelled capitalist road hog.

  He headed down Kimball Avenue at a gallop.

  Ace said the sonofabitch got away.

  Harry said yeah well what the hell Ace.

  He said you win a few you lose a few.

  Betsy was standing behind us.

  She was shaking her head.

  She said dear God in Heaven I just don’t believe this.

  Harry said where’s my panda?

  Betsy said I think he just walked out.

  She caught my eye.

  She said men make lousy operatives.

  60

  …oncet I knowed a feller whose wife bought a sheer nightgown and got him throwed in the loony bin…he swore up and down there was a cloud-bank in his bedroom…said there was a dirigible in it…

  Monroe D. Underwood

  Betsy smiled sweetly over our late coffee.

  She said Chance do you think the KGB will ever catch up with Princess Sonia or Brandy Alexander or whoever she is?

  I said not if they’re lucky.

  I said she killed a KGB man a few years back.

  Betsy said really?

  I said damn right.

  Betsy said on purpose?

  I said no she shot him fifteen times by accident.

  Betsy said where?

  I said in the same place.

  I said this Sonia is no Little Red Riding Hood.

  I said she’s tougher than a carload of cactus.

  Betsy took my hand.

  She said big boy you just wait until I get you in bed.

  She said I’m going to wear my sheer blue nightgown and we’re going to have a party.

  She said I’ll just bet you’re hot to trot.

  I said oh yeah I may go up in smoke at any goddam moment.

  Betsy said I’ll take my shower first.

  She went into the bathroom.

  I stumbled wearily into the bedroom and stripped to my shorts.

  I sat on the edge of the bed and lit a twisted Camel.

  I was foggy.

  Over the sound of the shower I heard Betsy say Chance?

  I said yeah?

  Betsy said honey will you look in my dresser drawer and bring me my sheer blue nightgown?

  She said the one with the beige trim.

  I went to the dresser and opened a drawer.

  I said I don’t see any sheer blue nightgown.

  Betsy said the top drawer.

  I said oh.

  Betsy said I know it’s there.

  I closed the bottom drawer.

  I was fully awake now.

  I found the nightgown and delivered it.

  It weighed one-quarter of an ounce.

  In a few mi
nutes Betsy came in.

  She said ta-dahhhhhh.

  She said how’s this?

  I looked.

  I covered my eyes.

  Betsy said isn’t it beautiful?

  I said it looks like a cross between absolutely nothing and not much of anything.

  Betsy said seventy-five dollars at Field’s three years ago.

  She said it would cost over a hundred now.

  She popped onto the bed beside me.

  She kissed me on the shoulder.

  She drew back.

  She said oh Chance that must have been a very difficult case.

  I shrugged.

  I said well it was no bargain.

  I said I handled it the best way I knew how.

  Betsy said I’m sure you did.

  She said your shoulders are scratched.

  She said there’s Autumn Rose lipstick on your neck.

  She said there’s eyebrow pencil on your chest.

  She said you smell like a great big fat lilac.

  She said do you know what I’m thinking?

  I said yes.

  I said do you know what I’m thinking?

  Betsy said no.

  I said I’m thinking I should have taken my shower first.

  I started for the bathroom.

  Betsy said Chance what happened at the Reggis Arms?

  I shrugged.

  I said Betsy I just followed orders.

  61

  …perfume is something what gets you in bed with one woman and in big trouble with another…

  Monroe D. Underwood

  It was Monday evening.

  I watched winter’s first snow drift through the blue neon glow at the tavern entrance.

  I was behind the bar and Betsy was upstairs and the beer cooler was clanking and Old Dad Underwood and Shorty Connors were discussing the fall of the Roman Empire.

  Old Dad Underwood said it got so’s all them Romans ever done was get drunk and go to bed.

  Shorty Connors said that ain’t no big thing.

  He said hell I been doing that for forty years.

  Old Dad Underwood said I mean with women.

  Shorty Connors said women ain’t no fun to get drunk with.

  The phone rang.

  It was Wallace.

  Wallace said I’m coming back to Chicago.

  I said what happened in Tampa?

  Wallace said nothing happened.

  He said that’s why I’m coming back to Chicago.

  He said you want to sell that tavern and make a fast five grand?

  I said how soon can you get here?

  I said this goddam beer cooler is driving me insane.

  Wallace said have you tried kicking it?

  I said of course I’ve tried kicking it.

  Wallace said where?

  I said to the moon.

  Wallace said you got to kick it just above where it says Frosti-Frig.

  I said I see.

  I said I’ve been kicking it just below the bottle opener.

  I said you want to talk to Old Dad Underwood?

  Wallace hung up.

  I turned the Monday night football game on.

  Sundown Sanders was singing “I Had a Home Down in Texas.”

  I turned the Monday night football game off.

  Old Dad Underwood said you don’t look so good.

  I said I feel like I just crawled out of a jigsaw puzzle.

  Old Dad Underwood said oncet I knowed a feller what bought a jigsaw puzzle and lost his mind.

  He said he couldn’t get the box open.

  I played Alte Kameraden on the jukebox.

  I found an Eagles magazine.

  I was reading “Plague of the Black Fokkers” by Arch Blockhouse when a woman walked in.

  She was wearing a ranch mink coat.

  She moved like a tigress.

  She sat at my end of the bar.

  Snow gems sparkled in her dark wavy hair.

  She looked at me with smoldering liquid brown eyes.

  I said I thought you were going to Bolivia.

  She said we had to land in Tampa.

  She said that was where I threw in the towel.

  She said I can’t make it without you.

  She said I was back in Chicago by dawn.

  I shrugged.

  Brandy said I’ve just bought the Ammson Detective Agency and I’m going to call it Confidential Investigations.

  I said what happened to Ammson?

  Brandy said I’m not sure.

  She said his attorney said something about him moving to Suva Fiji.

  She said I’ll need a right-hand man and I’m going to run an ad in the Sunday Tribune.

  She said watch for it.

  I shrugged.

  I took Brandy’s hand and squeezed it until she winced.

  I said Brandy thanks for what you did for her.

  Brandy said I was well paid for it.

  She said did Ace and Harry blow it properly?

  I said they were nothing short of magnificent.

  Brandy said for male operatives they’re okay.

  She said Ace’s religious act and Harry’s panda provide excellent cover.

  I said but Harry had a teddy bear in the Army.

  Brandy said Harry was a government plant even then.

  She said checking morale and whatever.

  She said Grogan was the ideal dupe.

  She said he thought I was working with him.

  She said by now he has contacted Moscow and the heat’s on me instead of Betsy.

  I said I came across her Krakenzekrust in her bottom dresser drawer last night.

  Brandy said well she certainly knows how to use it.

  I said yeah Grogan told me.

  I said by the way I still have your Beretta.

  Brandy said keep it for your new job at Confidential Investigations.

  I said I can’t spot the tattoo on her heel.

  Brandy said it’s been gone for years.

  I said I should have gotten the drift when I saw that beige and blue flag in the picture of the castle.

  I said was Betsy in on this show?

  Brandy said of course.

  She said Ace and Harry went over it with her last week.

  She said if she hadn’t been in on it Grogan would have had fifteen 9 mm slugs in him.

  She said does Betsy know that you know?

  I shook my head.

  Brandy said don’t tell her.

  She said that poor kid has been through pure hell.

  I said how did she become what she was?

  Brandy said call girl?

  I nodded.

  Brandy said when she came to this country her governess was only thirty-five and quite pretty.

  She said Kaleski went communist and there was no income.

  She said the governess had been charged with the responsibility of taking proper care of a princess.

  She said she was in a strange land with little command of the language and she knew the Reds were on the prowl.

  She said she did the only thing she could have done under the circumstances.

  She said she went to the night streets and provided the princess with the best.

  I said okay but how did Betsy get into the racket?

  I said my God don’t tell me the governess was responsible for that.

  Brandy said yes but not intentionally.

  She said a few years ago the governess was stricken with cancer and her medical bills were awesome.

  She said no normal income could have handled them.

  She said Betsy could have walked away from it but she stuck it out and paid the freight.

  I said by becoming a call girl.

  Brandy said yes God bless her.

  I said amen.

  Brandy said does that make you feel better?

  I said much.

  Brandy said it should.

  I said if the Communists wanted her out of the way so
badly why didn’t they plant a bomb or use a sniper or just walk in here and shoot her?

  Brandy said because they don’t know where the ibiothane is and they thought Betsy could tell them.

  She said they intended to kidnap her and torture the information out of her.

  She said then they’d have killed her.

  I said does she know where it is?

  Brandy said only Betsy has the answer to that.

  The door to the apartment stairs opened and Betsy stepped into the tavern.

  She stopped for a moment.

  She said Chance the beer cooler isn’t clanking.

  I said that’s because I kicked it just above where it says Frosti-Frig.

  Betsy said well that explains it.

  She said I’ve been kicking it right where it says Made in Japan.

  She glanced at Brandy.

  She smiled and said first snow of the winter.

  Brandy nodded.

  She said better than all that rain.

  Betsy said I just love your perfume.

  She said lilac?

  Brandy said that’s right.

  Her brown eyes were suddenly very alert.

  Betsy said that’s a gorgeous shade of lipstick.

  She said Autumn Rose?

  Brandy said right again.

  Betsy came from behind the bar.

  Brandy stood up.

  Betsy said you’re Brandy Alexander.

  Brandy said yes Betsy.

  The two most beautiful women on the face of Planet Earth were eyeball-to-eyeball.

  Neither blinked.

  Suddenly both pulled weapons.

  Handkerchiefs.

  Then they were in each other’s arms and weeping.

  Betsy said how can I ever thank you?

  Brandy said you shouldn’t.

  They slipped out of the clinch.

  Betsy said Brandy you’re a helluva woman.

  Brandy said Betsy it takes one to know one.

  Betsy went out and closed the door gently.

  Brandy kissed me on the cheek.

  She said Purdue you have a princess there.

  She said treat her as such.

  She said that’s an order.

  She left without another word.

  She stopped at the tavern window.

  She blew me a kiss and waved her handkerchief.

  Her face was sober.

  Old Dad Underwood said throw another beer on my tab.

  He said what was that all about?

  I shrugged.

  I went to the jukebox and played Alte Kameraden.

  62

  …’tis better to have loved and won…but find a man what got it done…