A Fistful of Collars

by Spencer Quinn

  “Truth is,” Rick said, “you’re pissing me off. Big-time.”

  Pissing. A huge subject. Where to begin? It was certainly something we’d done by the side of the road, me and Bernie, and more than once, but had there ever been any of that side by side stuff with me and Rick? Maybe something to look forward to.

  “I know you, Bernie,” Rick went on. “You want something from me, but you’re hesitating to ask. Why? Possibility one: you’re implicated in some shit and you’re looking for an out. Meaning I’d get implicated, too, and that’s just not you.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” Bernie said.

  “Fuck you,” said Rick.

  Then they both laughed, a surprise to me: I’d been pretty sure they were about to throw down. Quiet laughter, though, and it didn’t last long.

  “Possibility two,” Rick said. “You don’t trust me. And I can’t come up with a possibility three. If it exists, let’s hear it.”

  Bernie said nothing.

  “There you go,” Rick said.

  Where? This wasn’t easy to follow. In the not-as-far-as-downtown distance I could see the airport, the runways lit up, planes circling, landing, taking off, soaring away with blurred orange trails slowly dissolving behind them. The whole city hummed and muttered in the night like a living thing. A disturbing thought. I tried to forget it, couldn’t, then tried again, and succeeded with whatever it was.

  Bernie took a deep breath.

  “Stop with the deep breathing shit,” Rick said. “You saved my goddamn life—think I’d ever forget that?”

  “Happened to be there,” Bernie said.

  “It cost you your job, asshole,” said Rick.

  Bernie shrugged. “Things worked out all right.”

  Well, of course: just think of the Little Detective Agency, for starters. Who was better? The Mirabelli brothers? Georgie Malhouf? Ha! But whoa. Bernie got canned on account of Rick? News to me. This felt like the kind of puzzle to take on from different angles, a project for later.

  They sat in silence. Fine with me. I sat in silence, too. Rick gave me a little pat. Bernie smoked his cigarette down to practically nothing, then ground the practically nothing under his heel, ground it out extra-hard.

  “I need a cold case file from Central Records,” he said.

  “In an informal sort of way,” said Rick.

  Bernie nodded.

  TWENTY-THREE

  He’s wearing eye makeup?” Bernie said.

  “Bernie, please,” said Leda.

  We were back at the movie set, me, Bernie, Leda, and Charlie, all by ourselves in one of the trailers. Leda wore tight jeans, a tight little top, and lots of jewelry. Bernie was dressed like Bernie. I had on my brown leather collar—the black one’s for dress-up, in case that hasn’t come up yet. Charlie wore a sort of cowboy outfit—cowboy hat, cowboy boots, and one of those long duster coats. Bernie had one, hanging in the closet back home, a gift from Mr. Teitelbaum, who owned clothing stores, although not as many after the Teitelbaum divorce, a case I’ll never forget. Mrs. Teitelbaum driving that earthmover right through the garage where Mr. Teitelbaum kept his antique car collection? And then back the other way? That kind of thing stays in the mind. It was also on that case that I first discovered kosher chicken, proving there’s good in everything; one of my core beliefs.

  But back to Charlie. There was no doubt that he was wearing eye makeup, dark and kind of purple. Also his face had whitish stuff on it, making him look pale, like he wasn’t feeling well. Plus he seemed so small in that long duster.

  “My son,” Bernie said, “is wearing eye makeup.”

  “God almighty, it’s for the camera,” Leda said. “John Wayne wore eye makeup. Humphrey Bogart wore eye makeup.”

  “I don’t believe it,” Bernie said.

  Charlie glanced up from a sheet of paper he was staring at. “I’m trying to memorize this.”

  “Memorize what?” said Bernie.

  “His line,” said Leda. “Why are you not getting this?”

  All of a sudden it felt like old times. I preferred new times, especially if old times meant going back to the Leda days. In some ways—this occurring to me for the very first time, funny how the mind works—she was like Mrs. Teitelbaum. But unlike Mrs. Teitelbaum, Leda couldn’t drive a stick—would I ever forget the time Bernie tried to teach her?—so the earthmover episode would never have happened to us.

  “What’s the line, Charlie?” Bernie said.

  “Don’t disturb him,” Leda said. “He’s internalizing it.”

  “Huh?” said Bernie.

  “The artistic process is a complete blank to you, isn’t it, Bernie?” Leda said. That tone: hard to describe, sort of like Bernie was one of those butterflies our pal Professor Bokov from the college gazes at through his magnifying lens. Once we worked a case that came down to a certain kind of butterfly; that’s all I remember of it, except for Bernie losing the check on the way home.

  “Artistic process?” Bernie said. “He’s six years old.”

  Charlie, who’d gone back to gazing at the sheet of paper—his lips moving silently, an interesting thing you saw sometimes in humans, no time to go into it now—looked up again, paused for a moment, and said, “How can I concentrate in this atmosphere?”

  Bernie’s mouth fell open. When was the last time that had happened? For a moment, he seemed about to speak, but nothing came out. He turned and stalked out of the trailer, slamming the door after him, so hard the door opened again, good thing since now I could get out, too. We walked down the movie Western street and into the movie Western bar. No one around. Bernie grabbed a bottle from behind the bar, twisted off the cap and drank, then banged the bottle down on the bar.

  “Tea, for Christ sake. Cold goddamn tea.”

  Tea? And some had splashed down onto the floor? Water’s my drink, but I didn’t mind tea. I licked it up.

  “Atmosphere?” Bernie said. “He said atmosphere? What the hell is going on?”

  No clue, on my part. I wouldn’t have minded if more tea got spilled. Bang the bottle again, Bernie! Keep spilling! And maybe he would have—there’s no end to what Bernie can do—but at that moment the light, all of which was flowing in from the street, dimmed. I turned and saw Jiggs at the saloon doors. The doors swung open and Jiggs walked in, bringing the light with him.

  “Trying to sneak in a quick snort?” he said, coming over to the bar.

  Bernie slid the bottle toward him. “Help yourself.”

  Jiggs shook his head. “Not a tea drinker, myself.” He sat on the stool beside Bernie’s, pointed his chin at the bottle. “That’s so the studio can tell the Wall Street boys how careful they’re being with their money. Meanwhile, Lars gets his meals flown in every day from some restaurant he likes in Barcelona.”

  “And how about Thad?” Bernie said.

  “How about him?” said Jiggs.

  “What are his special requirements?”

  Jiggs looked down at Bernie. “Not sure where you’re going with that.”

  “Don’t be so cautious—I’ve got no connections on Wall Street.”

  “You’re just curious about his meals?” Jiggs said.

  “Sure,” said Bernie.

  “He’s a normal guy, eats normal food, like you and me.”

  “I’m partial to caviar, myself,” Bernie said.

  Caviar? A new one on me. Oh, wait, not quite. I came very close to remembering a party at the Ritz, possibly the Romanoffs’ anniversary. What a nice old couple, and we’d brought their runaway daughter back from Reno for them safe and sound, and at that party had there been an icy bowl—on a sideboard but well within my reach—full of tiny round black glistening things, that didn’t look like food but turned out to be . . . ? No. I couldn’t quite remember.

  “You’re a funny dude,” Jiggs said, although he didn’t laugh. “A funny dude who’s good with his fists. Don’t see that every day.”

  “So?”

  “So it’s a kind of surprise,�
�� Jiggs said, “and I’m wondering what other surprises you’ve got in store for us.”

  “Who’s us?” said Bernie.

  “Me and Thad, who else?”

  “You’re very loyal to him.”

  “We’re cousins—I told you.”

  “How does that work?” Bernie said. “Where’s the family connection?”

  “My mother and Thad’s father were brother and sister.”

  What was that? Something absolutely impossible to follow, that was all I knew.

  “Where was this?” Bernie said, meaning maybe he was somehow staying in the picture. That Bernie! I just loved him.

  “Back in Kansas City,” Jiggs said. “The whole family’s from there originally.”

  “Where are they now?”

  “Pretty much dead and gone.”

  “Any family connections here in the Valley?” Bernie said.

  Jiggs gave Bernie a long look. “Nope,” he said.

  “How about old friends?”

  “Nope.”

  “Mere acquaintances, ships passing in the night?”

  “What are you driving at?”

  “You tell me,” Bernie said. You tell me: one of my favorites! We’ve closed a case or two with Bernie’s you-tell-me move; not actually closed, because that happens when I grab the perp by the pant leg, but just about.

  “Got nothing to tell, my friend,” Jiggs said. “You’re barking up the wrong tree.”

  Whoa. Had I heard that one from the mouths of humans before? You bet, and it used to floor me every time, but finally I realized they just don’t know much about chasing little critters, because what would be the point of barking up the tree where the critter isn’t? No member of the nation within would ever do that. Plus after the critter’s in the tree, it’s too late for barking. And why bark when you’re in chasing mode in the first place? Here I come, critter? What sort of technique is that? One more thing: humans don’t bark. Except for Mad Dog Dutwiller, of course, a perp I never want to think of again, so I won’t.

  “Whatever you say,” Bernie said. “As long as you’re aware of your legal position.”

  Jiggs went still, but not the relaxed kind of still. One of the legs of his stool creaked, sort of on its own, if that makes any sense. “Legal position?” he said.

  “Specifically relating to the statute of limitations,” Bernie said.

  “Lost me there,” said Jiggs. “Kind of weird—you losing me and threatening me at the same time.”

  They stared at each other. I got ready for just about anything. Jiggs placed his hand on Bernie’s shoulder. Up until then, I’d always thought Bernie had real big shoulders.

  “Now’s a good time for asking you what you asked me,” Jiggs said. “Whose side you’re on?”

  Bernie shrugged his shoulder free. “I’m working for the mayor’s office. You know that already.”

  “Doesn’t the mayor want this movie to be a success?” Jiggs said.

  Bernie nodded.

  “Then just do your job,” Jiggs said. “No more, no less. And it’ll all turn out peachy.” He rose. “Oh, almost forgot. Your son.”

  “What about him?” Bernie said; his hands, which had been pretty relaxed, started curling into fists.

  “They’re getting ready to shoot that scene,” Jiggs said. “Which is what I came to tell you, before we got off-topic.” He tapped his hand on the bar, then turned and walked out.

  What side were we on? That was an easy one: we were on each other’s side, me and Bernie. We also had each other’s backs, which made it a little more complicated. As for peaches, Bernie’s mom had surprised him on her last visit by baking a peach pie. “What the hell do you mean I never baked when you were a kid?” she’d said, and then downed the rest of her G and T and gotten right to work, but there’d been an oven glitch leading to the end result being tossed in the trash—although with the lid left off, meaning I knew the taste of peaches, at least in the blackened state.

  * * *

  We—meaning me, Bernie, and Leda, plus a bunch of movie people—stood outside a kind of log cabin, except the roof and one wall were missing. Inside, the cameraman was mounted on a seat behind his camera, and Lars Karlsbaad was talking to Thad, who sat on a chair facing a bed. On the bed, wearing his Western outfit, lay Charlie, his cowboy hat on the pillow beside him. He looked dark-eyed and ashen, like he was real sick. I sniffed the air, smelled no sickness coming from Charlie’s direction. But sickness was in the room, no question, a thin, sour sort of invisible trickle that led straight to Lars. Hey! He had the same sickness as Mrs. Parsons. That surprised me, not sure why.

  Lars stuck a cigar in his mouth. The clipboard woman hurried up with a lighter. “I don’t like the hat,” he said.

  “Should I get props in here?” the clipboard woman said.

  “The hat itself is fine,” said Lars. The clipboard woman looked confused. “It is the placement of the hat.”

  “So . . . ?” said the clipboard woman.

  “So? So get props, of course.”

  Props turned out to be a little dude with a dangling earring in one ear and a stud in the other, one of those human looks that bothered me a bit.

  “Lars?” he said, running in.

  “The hat,” said Lars. “Place it on his chest.”

  “Right side up?” said Props.

  “Unless we want to throw money in it,” said Lars.

  Silence. Lars frowned. Then, a little nervously, the clipboard woman began to laugh. The corners of Lars’s lips turned up slightly. The laughter spread. Soon all the movie people were laughing their heads off.

  Lars held up his hand in the stop sign. The laughter died at once.

  “Back to the salt mines,” Lars said.

  Props took the cowboy hat off the pillow, placed it right-side up on Charlie’s chest, and went away. Lars gazed down at Charlie. Charlie gazed back at him.

  “Give me more,” Lars called out to a guy up on a ladder. The guy did something with a light. Charlie looked sicker.

  “Still more,” Lars said. “Stops are for pulling out.”

  What was that? There and gone, way too quick, and besides, I was still somewhat stuck on salt mines. We’d been in abandoned mines more than once, me and Bernie—gold, silver, even emeralds once, although there was just the one emerald, planted by a perp, the details murky, but not the point. The point was why bother digging for salt? Salt shakers were on every restaurant table I’d ever seen. I mean, help yourself.

  The guy on the ladder did more fiddling with the lights. Charlie looked sicker and sicker.

  “What the hell’s going on?” Bernie said in a low voice to Leda.

  “Shh,” said Leda. “They’re creating.”

  “Voilà,” Lars said, a total puzzler. He rubbed his hands together, chubby, small hands. “We all understand the situation? Croomer has at last persuaded the sheriff to free the shaman and allow her to treat the boy with the special desert herbs.”

  “Got it,” said Thad.

  “She is now on her way,” Lars continued, “although we know she will never arrive due to . . .” He pressed a button on his belt. “Arn? Arn? Where the—”

  “Lars?” Arn’s voice came over a speaker, also the sound of a toilet flushing.

  “What was that plot point?” Lars said.

  “Where the saddlebag falls off and—”

  “No, no, for Christ sake. With the shaman’s ride.”

  “The renegades, you mean? The renegades suddenly—”

  “Yes, yes, the renegades,” Lars said. “So we know the outcome, but you, Croomer, and you, boy, do not. And yet. And yet.” There was a silence. “We are ready?” Lars said.

  “Yup,” said Thad.

  And Charlie, head on the pillow, nodded a tiny nod.

  After that came the quiet on the set part, the cameraman rolling in, Lars stepping back, and—action!

  Thad pulled the chair a bit closer to the bed. He looked down at Charlie and smiled a small smile. A
moment passed and Charlie smiled an even smaller one back at him.

  “Help’s on the way, boy,” he said. “You hangin’ in there for me?”

  Charlie nodded the tiny nod.

  “When you’re back to feelin’ good,” Thad said, “we’ll track down that herd, cut you out the finest l’il pinto pony on God’s green earth.”

  Very slowly, Charlie closed his eyes.

  Thad leaned closer toward him, his own eyes changing in a powerful way, hard to describe. “Still hangin’ in?” he said, his voice now kind of thick and throaty.

  Charlie’s lips moved, but no sound came out. They moved again, and so softly, Charlie said, “Pinto pony.”

  “Good boy,” Thad said.

  The camera moved in closer on Charlie, lying still, and Lars started to raise his hand, like he was about to make that chopping motion and say cut, when all of a sudden Charlie’s hands moved, wrapping themselves around the cowboy hat and holding it to his chest. Thad’s eyes misted over. And then Charlie opened his own eyes. For an instant they seemed to see Thad, and then they didn’t. Charlie’s eyes went totally blank and lifeless—I knew that look from my job, had seen it too often—and . . . and stayed that way!

  “Charlie!” Bernie shouted, and ran onto the set. Me right with him, of course. We’re a lot alike, as I may have mentioned before.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  I have never in my whole life been so utterly humiliated,” Leda said.

  We were in the parking area at the movie set, out behind the trailers and close to the two-lane blacktop leading back to the city, the Porsche and Leda’s minivan parked nose to nose. Good thing they weren’t moving, since there’d be a crack-up right away. Hey! What a strange thought! I gave myself a good scratching under the ear and returned to feeling normal.

  Bernie glanced at the minivan. Charlie sat in the front passenger seat, eating trail mix from a little plastic container and gazing out at nothing in particular. I have things I could mention on the subject of trail mix, but this isn’t the time or the place, as humans say. Maybe just the time part—actually not sure how place fits in.

  “For Christ sake,” Bernie said. “Who cares what those pretentious morons think?”