by C. L. Bevill
David fingered the beads on the fake dreadlocks. “Blimey. Me hasn’t had time to grow them in properly,” he defended himself.
“Just so you know,” Kiki said.
“Grmpkaliph,” Dougie said.
“See,” Kiki added as she gestured at Dougie.
“He doesn’t have dreads,” David protested.
“About why I’m here,” Bubba interrupted because he was going to make a certain pirate get the plank out of there if he didn’t shut his yardarm swiftly.
Kiki threw herself down on one of the camp chairs. Bubba would have sat, too, but he wasn’t sure he would be able to get back up. “Okay, Bubba dude, what’s the 4-1-1?”
“This is the short version. I found a note. It says someone will be murdered. It’s an old note. The person is probably dead. It looks like it’s real. I want to figure out who wrote it and who killed them.”
Kiki studied Bubba frankly. “Homes, I am never bored when you come calling.”
“Rpptrnakh,” Dougie said.
“That’s right, Dougie,” she said. Then she looked at Bubba suspiciously. “This isn’t something to do with the festival. No offense, B, but your mother can do something wicked stuff in her mental hooha.”
Bubba had to think about that. “Yeah, Ma can be wicked-wild.”
David sat in the broken rocking chair, and extracted his dagger, and began to clean it.
Kiki was momentarily distracted. “Is he, like, a real pirate?”
“For the moment.”
Her attention came back to Bubba. “So I take it that’s a no on the festival relationship?”
“It don’t have nothing to do with the festival. I found it in an old car part.” Bubba took the battered baggie out of his pocket and handed it to Kiki. She took a few minutes to look at it.
“This isn’t a sammy,” she commented. “Hard to read the writing on the baggie.”
“That’s exactly what I said,” David declared and swung his dagger through the air with a great swipe. He nearly decapitated a macramé decoration on the wall.
“It was the only baggie I could find.”
“Well, this is creepy,” Kiki said. “I heard about the note. Everyone’s talking about it at the festival.” She hummed woo-woo music. “It’s like a surge for extra points for all the dicks to find. The crème de la crème, you know.” She looked at Bubba. “I’m asking again for complete clarity. This isn’t part of the festival?”
“No. Ma let the cat out of the bag in her own inimitable fashion,” Bubba said.
“What do you want from me?” Kiki said.
“You’re good with the computer. Good with other people. Good with research,” Bubba explained.
Kiki nodded regally. “The Kikster is a goddess with information technology. It is true.”
“Find M,” Bubba said simply.
Kiki looked at the note again. “This is a real murder mystery?”
“Yes.”
“This is from an old car part?” Bubba nodded. “Someone stuck it in there and there it sat for years?”
“Mebe decades.”
“You got the part from?”
“First Monday Trade Days.”
“You’re going to have to narrow it down,” Kiki said grimly.
“The note dates from 1954 to about eight months ago. The writer is prolly a woman.”
“Aye, a woman from all graphological indications,” David interjected.
“She was murdered. Her first name starts with an M. She or the person who murdered her has something to do with Chevys or their parts.” Bubba was as systematic as he could be. “I aim to talk to the man who sold me the part, once I catch up to him. I also aim to rattle his bones ifin he ain’t amicable.”
“Also someone tried to kill ye olde Bubba yesterday,” David inserted.
“I haven’t heard about that,” Kiki marveled. “That must be some kind of record, dude.”
“I’ve lost count.”
“There was the time Donna Hyatt tried to shoot you,” David said helpfully. “That was in-between trying to frame you and then killing someone else. Didn’t she try to burn your house down, too?”
“It wasn’t really burned down,” Bubba muttered. “But the inspector thought the load-bearing walls were too badly damaged.”
“Do we count Nancy Musgrave’s efforts as once or twice?” David asked cheerfully.
“No one’s tried for at least eight months before the bomb blew up the front gate,” Bubba snarled.
“Unless you count that thing at spring break,” David said. He laughed. Then Kiki laughed. Even Dougie laughed.
Finally, Kiki grinned as she stopped laughing. “And they told me that living in Pegramville would be boring.”
“Does Willodean braining you with a manacle count as one?” David went on.
“So someone tried to kill you,” Kiki mused. “Obviously, you think it has something to do with the note.”
“I do.”
“Which means that the note probably came from here originally,” Kiki surmised. “Or from around here. Or even that it was pure happenstance that the person who murdered M happened to be in the audience at the time that Miz Demetrice blabbed. If the murderer was from around here, that would help narrow it down. I can start searching for an unsolved murder of a woman whose name started with an M from the 1950s to the last year.”
“Me has a friend checking the paper the note was written on,” David said. “That’ll narrow it down some more. Should be getting back to me in a few days. Me said to rush it.”
Bubba nodded again.
“Willy didn’t think they could do anything with it?” Kiki asked.
“They think it’s a dead-end or a joke,” Bubba said tightly, “although I ain’t exactly sure what they think of it now.”
“Because of the bomb?”
“Yep.”
“Wrumpturgl?”
“Yes, Dougie. What about missing women, too?” Kiki said.
“What about ‘em?”
“Try thinking like a murderer for a minute,” Kiki said. She twirled her dreads with one hand. David’s hand self-consciously went to his head. He brushed his fake dreadlocks back.
“Okay.”
“Murderers usually get caught because of evidence. If there isn’t a body, there isn’t evidence, you know. This is the main reason that murderers hide the bodies of their victims, you see?”
“So this M might be listed as a missing person,” Bubba said.
“I’ll include those in the search.” Kiki looked at the note once more. “I’ll just scan a copy of this and get to work. I have a few hours before I get to commit a fake felony.” She stood up and made shooing motions at Bubba and David. “Do you still have your cell phone, Bubba?”
The last cell phone he had owned had been a throwaway, but Bubba had ruined the phone before he could throw it away. He shook his head.
“Get another one and call me, so we can keep up to date.” Kiki went into the next room, and Bubba could hear various beeps and computer equipment being utilized. She came back out and handed Bubba the note in the baggie. “Don’t expect a lot. It could be a list of a hundred people. It could be a list of a thousand.”
“A thousand is better than a million,” Bubba said.
“It could be no list at all,” Kiki warned.
“I got nothing now,” Bubba growled, “so it wouldn’t be going downhill.”
Kiki walked them to the door and Dougie said, “Kjrpplpped.”
“Yeah, Dougie said you should watch your back,” Kiki said cheerfully.
“I shall dance a jig upon yon rum monkey’s blunderbuss,” David proclaimed.
“That, too,” Kiki said, and the door shut behind them.
Chapter Thirteen
Bubba and the Enduring Enigma
Monday, August 20th
“How will we find ye rascals who be mutinizing the pirate ship?” David enquired politely.
Bubba stared fiercely at the Smart car
with its spiffy Jolly Roger wrap. Roger was definitely laughing at Bubba. He could tell. Walk, or ride in a vehicle that looked like it would carry Barbie and her BFF, Midge. Ken would have to cut off his feet to fit inside, so he probably took the Barbie Corvette or the Barbie Jeep instead.
“What?” Bubba realized Ding Dong David the Doodlehead was speaking to him.
“Follow the trail!” David announced. “They be swashbuckling like a slimy sea snake with a surfeit of Snoop Dogg.”
“I’m not following ye, er, you, David.”
“Let us be off after the man who sold ye the part, Bubba,” David said slowly because he clearly thought that Bubba was slow.
“He’s a Traveller,” Bubba said. “He’s a little hard to get ahold of.” Although Bubba had it in his head to return to the trading compound, park himself in front of Rory Donal’s place of business, and sing sea chanteys with David the Piratous until the kid caved in and upchucked Paddy’s phone number. It could work. I kin sing yo ho ho and a bottle of rum a whole lotta times.
“A Traveller,” David said. “Why didn’t ye say so? I know a group of Travellers in White Settlement in Tarrant County. They be drinkin’ fools, says me. They did the roof on me ex-wife’s house. Some say the Travellers are all thieves, but that roof will outlast Dorothy and Toto.”
“There’s a lot of Travellers, David,” Bubba said, “and I reckon the odds are against you knowing the same man.”
“What be the salty sea dog’s name?”
“Paddy Sheedy,” Bubba said.
“Curses of the splintering peg leg!” David said. “Me knows some Sheedys!” He reached inside his leather coat and retrieved a cell phone from an inner pocket. The phone had a matching Jolly Roger flying across the back. “Let me make a few calls. Blimey bilge rats.”
Bubba opened the door of the Smart car and looked inside bleakly. It didn’t look any bigger than the last time he’d looked at it. Maybe if he backed into it, he would fit better.
David pressed buttons on his phone and put it up to his ear. After a moment, he said, “Arr. Pip! It be David Beathard.” There was a pause as he listened. “It’s a pirate thing, lovey. Me is sure you understand.” Another pause. “Yes, it’s like the superhero thing.” Pause. “No, there be nothing wrong with Terry’s roof. At least me don’t think so. She’s taken up with a scurvy Hell’s Angels biker, so let him fix her roof with his Harley. Arr.”
Bubba tentatively stuck a foot inside the car. Eight air bags? Where did they put eight air bags in the little itty-bitty thing? He had a sudden mental image of the Mars Pathfinder rover bouncing safely onto the red planet cocooned in its array of airbags.
“No, no, no, Pip. No need to break his kneecaps or even keelhaul him. Me has moved past Terry. There are better wenches in the sea. Pillowy wenches with lots of chutzpah.”
Two in the front? Two in the doors? Where were the other four? Does it have a butt air-bag?
“Be ye knowing a flea-bitten gob named Paddy Sheedy?”
Would eight air bags have prevented any harm from an IED? Bubba was rapidly reconsidering his all-original stance on his truck. Ifin they can stick eight air bags in a micro-car, how many can I stick in the truck?
“Me has a matey,” David said and paused to listen again. “Not that kind of matey. Listen, this pirate is purely hetero. Only buxom-busted wenches for me. Well, this here matey needs to talk to this fella, Sheedy.”
A Kevlar hood on the truck, Bubba thought. That way, I’m prepared for the next time. Mebe that thick plexiglass in the windows, too. A fella would have to have a tank to take me out. He frowned to himself. Someone could get a tank. Mebe I could get a tank. I can put longhorns on the front. Sleep in it, too.
“It’s about a part this fella, Sheedy, got from somewhere, aye.” David glanced at Bubba and winked. “This fella, Sheedy, he don’t want to mess with my matey. Me matey’s the biggest, baddest freebooter to ever loot a galley.” Pause. “Ain’t a threat, Pip. Me just be tellin’ ye the God’s honest truth. Me matey’s got connections. He can do things. Some people wouldn’t want to wake up with a Bassett hound in their beds, me be telling ye.”
Bubba frowned harder. This time it was directed at David. David waved nonchalantly at Bubba.
“Sure and you could, Pip,” David said. “Ye knows me number, so let your brethren know. It’s an urgent matter so best not be resting on your laurels.” Pause. “And a blessing on your family, ye bonny wench. Say hello to Rick and the boys.”
“Did you just threaten a complete stranger on my behalf?” Bubba asked.
David pursed his lips. “Aye. Them hornswagglers don’t take a polite enquiry to heart. Best to err on the side of menacing to be sure. Pip wouldn’t take me seriously if I just asked if she knows Paddy Sheedy.”
“Connections. The biggest, baddest freebooter to ever loot a galley? Them folks are going to change their number and never talk to you again,” Bubba said. “And I wouldn’t ever put Precious in some stranger’s bed.”
“They don’t have to know that.”
Bubba rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I got to talk to Ma. Can you take me to the festival?”
“Sure, I mean, aye, Bubba,” David agreed happily. “Me gots to be there in a few hours anyway. I be cutting off a man’s beard and feedin’ it to the cap’n.”
“I thought you were being slaughtered.”
“Aye, but me gets to have some fun first.”
Bubba managed to get into the passenger seat again. Somehow. It wasn’t fun.
•
The front lawn of city hall was awash with would-be detectives doing their various things. They chattered. They played Frisbee. They sang a song about being zombies and not wanting to eat the brains of their true loves. “Don’t these people have to work?” Bubba wondered.
“Arr. Role playing vacations are the way to go,” David said.
“How’s that work for you?”
“Me pretends to be normal.” David laughed mightily and one of the gold teeth flew out of his mouth and hit someone in the head.
The person looked at Bubba first. “Hey, Bubba,” Judge Stenson Posey said. “What was that? A rock or were you just happy to see me?”
“Sorry, your honor,” Bubba said. He glanced at David who had dropped to his knees and was busily searching for the missing tooth. “It was a little dental mishap.”
The judge reached up to stroke his beard, but he’d forgotten that he’d shaved it.
“Thought you’d be off campaigning and such,” Bubba said as David felt around the grass.
“Met up with several groups last night,” the judge said. “Kissed twenty-six babies. Twenty-six, I kid you not. That is a cotton-picking lot of babies. But their parents are all registered voters so it’s all gravy.”
“That is a lot of babies.”
“Dear,” Miz Posey said from beside her husband. Bubba nearly started because he hadn’t noticed the mousy woman before she’d spoken. She was in a nondescript brown suit and wore one of those aprons again. It said “Too many cooks in the kitchen?” on top. On bottom was “Vote Posey for governor!” “You have a news conference at 11 a.m.,” she said.
“You bet, sweetie pie,” the judge said. He glanced at Bubba. “Might want to be around later in the week. I get to be a murderer, and it’s going to be great fun catching me. It’s a humdinger, ifin I ain’t giving something away.”
“Say, Bubba,” said someone else from beside him. It was Mary Lou Treadwell, who was one of the operators/receptionists at the sheriff’s department. Her hair was the color of a fire truck and twice as high. Her eyes were a brilliant sky blue and the color about as real as the color of her hair. Finally, her husband was still extremely happy about the falsity of the cup size of her brassiere, thanks to the boob job she’d had in the last year. “What’s all this about a note?”
“Ain’t nothing,” Bubba said flatly. He looked around. Everyone’s head abruptly swiveled toward Bubba. It reminded him of Linda Blair, and not in a g
ood way. It was as quiet as a cemetery in the wintertime, and all eyes rested upon him. Even David had looked up from digging in the grass. “Nothing ‘tall.”
Mary Lou looked at him with pure suspicion. “I beg to differ, boy. I heard all about the mysterious note. Folks say it’s the biggest murder mystery of the festival and all we have to do is find it and solve it. So fork it over, Bubba. You ain’t interested in the festival.”
“I dint even know about the festival until I found Lloyd Goshorn with a fake machete in his chest.”
“A likely excuse,” Mary Lou said. “I remember your part in locking me up in the hoosegow. You and Sheriff John up to your little conspiracies. Here I am. I got a wet butt, a hungry gut, but nary a scale to show for it. I need me a big win in this here festival.”
“Ain’t nothing,” Bubba reiterated. The tone had changed incrementally, but Mary Lou Treadwell was too determined, or too dense, to pay attention.
The judge laughed, “Methinks the man doth protest too much.”
Bubba looked at the judge and stopped. His Honor might have been laughing out loud, but there wasn’t a lot of humor in his eyes. The very first days of a campaign, and he clearly already disliked it. Bubba couldn’t help but wonder if the judge’s heart was really in it. After all, he could have run for years and years before but he hadn’t. Even the Mrs. Hizzonor was looking at him askance.
“Bubba’s a real card,” the judge said. “Finding bodies that done vanish and now a note that speaks of a murder long steeped in the tea of time. Miz Demetrice has outdone herself. I hope it don’t put my murder into the shade. I’d hate to one-upped by that gal.”
David made a noise indicating success. He held up the tooth. “Me thinks dental adhesive is not a worthy sort!” That pretty much broke the spell, and everyone went back to doing whatever it was they had been doing before that. However, a significant proportion of them kept an ear peeled in case Bubba said something important and clue worthy.
“Time to put the chairs in the wagon,” Miz Posey said to her husband.
Bubba didn’t know what to say. There was a crowd of people who were listening avidly, to include Miz Mary Lou Treadwell, who had the biggest mouth south of the Mason-Dixon Line. If he said even one more word about the note, it could mean his doom. He needed to get away before his mouth opened involuntarily, and words spewed out like pea soup. “I got to speak to Ma about something,” he mumbled and left them all with open mouths. David trailed along while he looked at the tooth in his hand.
