Slay, Belle

Dampness from once-white snow seeped into her boots. Almost home. With one mittened hand, Belle dragged the fir sapling along the uneven path. She was only 10 miles southeast of the civilised town of Stowe but this vast, silent Vermont forest could’ve been in Lapland.

The timbered cabin stood at the edge of a clearing. Splodges from wet footprints marked the porch. The front door was ajar. Five-year-old Belle dropped the tree. Inside the cabin her father was stretched across a mat, partially blocking the doorway. In the bathroom her mother’s body was twisted sideways in the empty bath. Her dog, still on its chain, lay dead in the backyard.

Someone had killed her family and taken their car. Plus they’d ruined Christmas. Someone was going to pay.

Meanwhile, someone was tapping on the car window.

Belle snapped out of the dream. That dream. Always the same, always true.

Her neck was stiff, her shoulders contorted. Stakeouts were more fun in the movies and cops never had trouble finding parking in New York’s streets. But then she wasn’t a cop.

She squinted at the knocker’s face. Hard to tell his age. Either he was in his 40s and the years hadn’t been kind or he was mid-50s and needed a better moisturiser. On the bright side, his large, sad eyes had a touch of the bloodhound and she needed a good tracker.

With the window up, his mouth seemed to silently form the words “Back again?” or perhaps “Back pain?” Both would’ve been correct. She’d driven into the Lower East Side before breakfast, cased the block and his office building, returned later when a kerbside space opened up and now she’d been literally caught napping after sunset. Just how much she’d been hoping to learn about Kent and his clients by sitting in an easily identifiable, dusty out-of-town Jeep with a notepad on her knee was doubtful.

Those mournful, bloodshot eyes roamed over her uniform. Grey shirt, green pants, a cloth badge marking her as a National Park Service Ranger and, on the rear seat, a broad brimmed, flat hat that matched Smokey Bear’s. 

As the window slid down, he leant forward and guessed she was about 30. He was right.

“I’m Belle,” she said. “I’m told you find bad people.”

He gave a reasonable impersonation of a smile. “Sometimes … and you’ve found your way here from Hicksville.”

“Vermont.”

He shrugged. “As I said …”. Turning, he walked towards a tenement-style building. She knew that he knew she was traipsing silently behind him, up a narrow flight of stairs to his office. He held the door open, nodding towards two chairs which looked more tired than he did. “Take your pick.”

Kent manoeuvred around a leather topped partner’s desk and flopped into a battered, high-backed chair. He looked at his watch. Belle took the hint.

Wisely she started by explaining she’d saved enough money to pay him. She had his attention. Then came the backstory from 25 years earlier:  dead parents and dead dog followed by a restless childhood in foster homes. She’d eventually joined the Rangers because the State Police thought handing her handcuffs, a gold badge and a gun might not be a wise given her family history. And, she sighed, they call this “The Land of the Free”?

“Oh, and by the way, my folks were drug dealers,” she added. “Old school – cocaine. Not currently on trend dope such as fentanyl or ketamine. Gentler times. Except for the murders and the fact my parents’ stash was stolen.”

On that subject, she had a name.

Two weeks previously she’d been bouncing down a dirt track in her Jeep to see what damage recent lightning strikes had caused in Groton State Forest. One strike had felled a Northern Red Oak which, in turn, had knocked over an interwoven matting of cut branches camouflaging her parent’s abandoned car. Wedged under the front seat on the car floor was a dropped driver's license.

“That’s what we private investigators call a clue,” interrupted Kent. “Did you show it to the police?”

“No. But I’m showing it to you.” She slid the license across the leather top.

Kent tilted it towards the desk lamp. A quarter of a century of State Forest climate changes had faded the lettering. All that was left was a surname, Blasio, and a partial address – a NYC zip code ending in 02. Kent’s home territory. The washed-out photograph revealed little more than two cold piggy eyes set between two large ears.  

She tapped the desk. “I can pay cash.”

“My favourite form of pay. Come back tomorrow. Same time. Pro tip: don’t sleep in your car. It’s unbecoming for a Vermonter.”

A cheap local hotel had proved harder to find than parking. Eventually she’d found both in nearby Alphabet City. She’d slept, showered, sought out a clothing store with the largest SALE sign outside and, in civies, was now back in what she considered “her” chair, facing him.  

For an industry-standard bribe, Kent had his contact in NYPD’s 7th Precinct run a trace on Mr Blasio – purported drug and car thief and, yes, THAT little detail: killer.

 An hour later, he and Belle stood outside an Italian restaurant on Mulberry Street. “Appears Blasio has gone legit,” said Kent. “Unless there’s more money in Cacio e Pepe than I realised.”

“It could be a front,” said Belle.

“You’re wasted as a ranger. Let’s see if you’re right.”

The restaurant was hopping. As they entered, a rattled hostess stepped in front of them. “Reservation?”

“Plenty of them,” replied Kent. “But we still want to eat here. First, we’d like to see Mr Blasio.”

“Signore Blasio is busy.”

Belle took a pace forward. “Tell him I said Vermont is beautiful at Christmas.”

Blasio had, frankly, let himself go. With endless pasta and pinot nero within easy reach of his chubby hands, something had to give: in this case, his belt buckle.

He looked up from his office desk, kept picking under his fingernails with a silver letter opener and greeted the visitors: “Welcome to Little Italy.”

A tall, smirking man in a sharp leather jacket leant against the wall behind Blasio.

Belle and Kent refused an offer to sit.

"Let me tell you a Christmas story,” began Belle.

“Fanciful,” said Blasio when she’d finished.

Belle flipped a folded sheet of paper towards him. He spread open the paper, saw a photocopy of his driver’s license and sneered: “I knew I should’ve waited and killed you too, you little bitch.”

The tall man pushed himself off the wall and then bounced back when Kent kicked that nice jacket – hard.

Thirty years of watching bobcats leap in forests gave Belle an unfair advantage over a porky man wedged in a chair. From a standing start, she sprung across the desk and landed on him.

They both let out an “oomph”.

Kent spotted the glinting blade of the letter opener swing up. It came down. Up and down. Up and down.

Belle left it in Blasio’s neck.

“I saw that,” said the tall man. Two seconds later he witnessed the window pane coming at him or vice versa.

Kent leant through the large gap in the broken glass and watched the body bounce off a car roof two storeys below.

“What next?” Belle asked.

 “I hear the fettuccine Alfredo here is excellent.”

# # #

Copyright 2025 GREG FLYNN

 

 

Snatched

With the cool (as in groovy not, of course, cold) breeze of feminism blowing through 1975, it would be chauvinistic to refuse a lady’s offer to buy drinks. It’s Detective Susan Wanamaker, right? Thanks, I’ll have two fingers of Jameson and maybe some bar snacks. I notice you smoke Virginia Slims. You’ve come a long way, baby. Hey, it’s from their TV jingle. Really? You prefer reading to watching television. You’re my kinda gal. A thinker plus you’re strapped. I do like a dame who’s packing heat. The gun, I mean, holstered on your hip next to that shiny NYPD shield.

I’m guessing the smoke you blew in my face just then is a subtle hint to back off. Fair enough. Right, you want me to start from the beginning about the New York Dolls case? Let’s see. It was this morning … about 10 …

When I arrived at my Mott Street office, the door was ajar. Nudging it with my toe cap, I pushed it wide and saw her in a visitor’s chair, facing my desk and ashing her cigarette into a wastepaper basket next to her nicely-turned ankle. It’s an observation, Detective, not a sexist remark.

Without looking around, the woman said: “Kent? You should lock the office. Someone stole your ashtray.”

“I’m going for a minimalist look.”

Then she turned towards me. Eyes like shaved ice, mouth slashed with scarlet lipstick and exuding all the warmth of a slammed door.  “Close it behind you. This is confidential.”

Her handbag lying on my desktop looked expensive. She had my full attention.

“Take a seat, Kent,” she said. There was a hint of the Madam Lash about the command. “I’m Miriam Sleet, two of my clients have been kidnapped. I want you to find them … and don’t say it’s a matter for the police.”

“It’s a matter for the police.”

“I’m told you’re a discreet PI with a liking for whiskey and a wad of cash.”

“Not necessarily in that order. And kidnapping is for the local cops, maybe even the Feds if they’ve crossed state lines. The answer’s ‘no’.”

“I’ll pay you $500 a day plus expenses.”

“Of course, it’d be premature to decline before hearing the details.”

By the time Miriam finished her tale she was onto her second cigarette and I’d poured her the first cup of coffee from a drip-brew coffeemaker I’d inherited from the previous tenant who’d skipped town. She managed rock bands and her missing clients were David Johansen, frontman for the New York Dolls, and his bandmate Johnny Thunders.

I shrugged a “who?”

She ignored it and continued. Johansen and Thunders had disappeared five days earlier while on a press tour trying to drum up ticket sales for their coming gig at Gramercy Theatre. The band’s fortunes had been falling while the musicians stayed almost permanently high. “Don’t mix drugs and alcohol with business,” she warned. “Heaven forbid,” I answered.

And I’d been wrong. I had actually heard of these guys. The TV news had run nightly pieces while paperboys on street corners had been hollering: “Extra! Extra! Read all about it! New York Dolls snatched!” From the news clips and front page pix, I saw Johansen had the coquettish pout and showgirl strut of a low rent Mick Jagger, if that’s not an oxymoron, while Thunders gave off a Keith Richards not-quite-with-us vibe. I still didn’t want their concert tickets.

They’d last been seen in Greenwich Village heading into a corner bar named The Black Duck. I knew the manager. More importantly, he knew me. Being gallant, I’d shown Miriam out of the office before holding the first day’s cash payment up to the sunlight falling through the window. I checked. The bills were kosher.

Putting $400 in the safe, I drew out the Smith & Wesson Model 13 which I stash alongside a let’s-celebrate bottle of Redbreast whiskey. I cabbed it to the Black Duck, pocketed the receipt to charge back to the fair Miriam and pushed open the batwing doors.

Molloy was behind the bar either polishing a glass or rubbing dirt into it. “It’s a little early even for you, Kent.”

I held out a $100 note. “I’ve only got a Benjamin. Can you make change?” I took the proffered 20s from him and pushed two across the bar top. “I need some advice.”

“Don’t wear brown shoes with a blue suit.”

The two 20s lay there for an instant longer before he slipped them into his pocket. A moment later, he poured me a slug from a label-less bottle.

I downed it, shuddered, told him who’d hired me and asked about the New York Dolls’ disappearance. He claimed he knew nothing more than he’d told the cops: Johansen and Thunders had come into the bar, sat in a corner booth looking downbeat, drinking and squabbling. Two hours later, as they left, a battered van had come up MacDougal Street, three men jumped out, slid open the side door and threw the two musicians into vehicle. Gone in 15 seconds. That’s all she wrote, added Molloy.

I peeled off another 20. Apparently, she wrote more. He’d noticed three men sitting quietly in the bar about 10 feet away from the band members. They kept glancing at the pair and they didn’t look like fans. Sharp suits rather than good quality ones. Maybe they were Made Men.

Which family? I asked.

He lifted my shot glass off the bar and began turning away. Yet another 20 made him pause. The Primfacto family was his guess. Try L'anatra Nera in the meatpacking district. Knock twice. Play nice.

I knocked twice. The doorman’s nose didn’t look like it’d been broken recently. Given it hadn’t been fixed I guessed the Mafia didn’t have an employee healthcare plan. It seemed unwise to ask. Instead, I asked for a Birra Moretti from the waitress who’d shown me to a far table with all the grace of someone steering a leper away from a children’s playground. She returned with the beer plus three men who didn’t seem happy.

“Non sembri felice,” I said.

“Skip the wop lingo,” said the slimmest of the trio. “We’re never left the Five Boroughs.”

He added he knew why I was there. A little bird had told him. I pictured a little bird about 5’10” with an Irish surname serving mediocre liquor out of label-less bottles. I could feel the dead weight of the Smith & Wesson in my jacket’s right-hand pocket. I sensed I had a one-in-a-three chance of reaching it in time.

The slim man leant back with a tight smile. My anal sphincter was tighter. “We need your help,” he began. What he needed was a white knight – with or without shining armour – to rescue two rock musicians. The bulky men either side of him nodded, thick necks pressing into collared business shirts.

If the word “insufferable” had been part of the three men’s vocabulary it would have been aired. Instead “sons o’ bitches”, “assholes”, “stuck-up jerks” and “motormouths” took its place. Accompanied by obscenities. Frequently accompanied. The trio admitted they’d made a – and the slim man had bitten hard on the next word – mistake. Snatching the men, demanding a large ransom and collecting the loot had seemed a straightforward idea. Within 24 hours, after the cops went to the press and spilled news of the kidnapping, the Cosa Nostra discovered it definitely was not “Our Thing”.

Instead of being terrified when they were told the TV had picked up the story and the papers had run their photos on Page One, Johansen and Thunders loved it. Finally, the New York Dolls were back in the news and not simply for lackluster concerts and drug busts. And, no, they did not want to be liberated too soon. Tickets sales to their concerts would boom. They were hot again. Sure, a basement prison under a disused slaughterhouse wasn’t the Waldorf Astoria but they’d stayed in worse motels when touring. And they loved to talk and talk and talk to their guards about “the Biz”. The music business.

The slim man reached for a word to describe the captives. He finally found it: “Insufferable.”

He slipped me a torn-off notepad page with a scribbled address. “You gotta help us,” he pleaded. “They won’t leave if we just let ’em go and we ain’t calling the law.”

So, Detective Wanamaker, there you have it. That’s why I phoned the 6th Precinct’s detectives. How’d you like to be on TV tonight, standing alongside two rescued rock stars? Oh, no, please. Surely you’re not paying for another drink? Ah, but first you want the address where they’re being held. Why didn’t you ask earlier? It’s not as if I’m the kinda guy who spins out a story merely to sit at a bar with a foxy lady who’s picking up the tab.

Cough. Now there you go again with that smoke-in-the-face thing.

# # #

Copyright 2025 GREG FLYNN

The Blag

 

London, 1910. The Ritz was four years old. Fruity Frynn was older.

The hotel suite, its curtains drawn, was gloomy. So was Fruity. He was the last to enter and he planned to be the first to leave. In the near darkness, he made out shapes drifting around a table lit by two bankers desk lamps and covered with architectural drawings. 

Sniffing the air, he greeted the man who’d opened the door. “Mornin’ Crafty, I didn’t know Johnnie Walker made cologne.” 

Crafty Blandings allowed his pince-nez glasses to slide to the tip of his nose: "Jou bliksem!”

A black-clad, shaven-headed man approached, moving with the grace of a panther, albeit a middle-aged panther with a touch of gout. Chris Dior tapped his fob watch: “Late as always, Fruity.” 

“You will insist on these dawn meetings.”

“It’s 11am.”

“My point precisely – oh, look.” Fruity headed towards a liquor-laden sideboard.

Squeezing between a woman dressed like a Pearly Queen and a man with a pomaded beard, Fruity poured a brandy. He eyed the pair while giving his tall glass a short blast from a soda siphon. “I’m surprised to see you both made bail.”

“Trumped up charges,” said Slick Rick. “I only asked that Covent Garden flower girl to come up and see my etchings. I may also have suggested she bring a chaperone so the three of us could …”

“Lacks judgment, he does,” snorted Cockney Sue. “In my case, I was a bit Scotch mist after I left a gay and hearty so when on the frog and toad I dips me mitt in some geezer’s bag of fruit …”

A sigh.  An elegant figure lounging in a high-backed brocaded chair stretched. “Spare us the local colour.” Jon van Hoit exhaled again, bit the tip off a cheroot, spat the end into an Aspidistra pot and snapped a match alight between thumbnail and forefinger, singeing his left eyebrow.

Standing behind van Hoit’s chair, a bit of rough flexed his tattooed forearm. The tattoo read: Rupertus fidem habemus. Tommy Two Fingers, a former Grub Street reporter so nicknamed because they were what he typed with, growled “Let’s start” through opium-stained teeth.

Dior plucked the still flaming match from van Hoit’s fingers and lit a Partagás cigar. The resulting smoke resembling a summer forest fire engulfed a nearby trio of chancers: Kerry Bushmills, Ghostie Gonzaga and Michelle Darlin. Five years earlier Bushmills claimed to have co-written with Sigmund Freud his book “Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious”. Freud was not amused: “Das ist ein Witz!”. Gonzaga, who earned her sobriquet by disappearing before it came to working on a caper, retreated deeper into the shadows. Darlin cracked her knuckles. The sound often heralded a left hook, a rabbit punch or a jab to the throat – someone else’s.

Two men stood with Crafty, guarding the door. Alec Chance and Greg Diorissimo had the dead eyes of stone cold killers and the nimbleness of ballerinas. To underscore their agility, they often wore matching satin pointe shoes. 

Waving his cigar like a baton, Dior said: “The Mauritian will now recap the game plan.”

She stepped up. A onetime professional escapologist who specialised in shedding her manacles and freeing herself from glass-fronted water tanks, the Mauritian had broken free from numerous watery coffins and four marriages. 

“Wonderful to see you again, Fruity,” she said.  “You’re carrying that extra weight well although your cat burglar days are obviously in the rearview mirror. 

“Tonight’s party at the South African High Commissioner’s London digs will be the major event on the diplomatic social calendar. You possibly know the Union of South Africa was created in May and Richard Solomon has been appointed as that country’s first High Commissioner here. To mark the occasion, Solomon is throwing a knees-up. Every toff is invited and they’ll be expecting expensive grog, fine nosh and great service. That’s where you lot come in. 

“Your name-tagged uniforms are hanging on racks over there. In most capers, Diorissimo, Chance, Slick Rick, Darlin and Cockney Sue would be the muscle. At this party they’ll be serving drinks – Lord help us. Ghostie, Bushmills and Tommy will be offering around canapes. Crafty, you’re the greeter, directing arrivals to the ballroom. 

“Van Hoit will act as usher, announcing each eminent guest as they enter.

“Don’t panic. None of you will need to do any tricky work. You can blag your way through. We’ve been told a hospitality firm is providing real staff for the event. ‘Thirteen of London’s finest’ was how Fruity’s pal at the High Commission put it.”

Fruity stared into the bottom of his empty glass. “And me?”

Dior stood up quickly, too quickly, stubbing a gouty toe on a chair leg. “Fok! Given you bribed the High Commissioner’s aide-de-camp to get us on the service team, I’ll need a throat to choke if anything goes wrong. So, you’ll be joining me and the Mauritian.”

“Doing what?”

“Stealing gold bullion.”

Fruity’s sphincter twitched. He walked to the curtains and inched them apart. Summer sunlight spilled in.

At Scotland Yard, a 15-minute walk away, Inspector Clarence Barclay dragged his office curtains shut. He had a headache and a sergeant, the latter being responsible for the former. Sergeant Alfie Gardner was twirling, the tails of his waiter’s frockcoat spinning out. A cluster of po-faced police officers kitted out as waitstaff stood off to one side. 

Gardner spread his arms. “I do like to frock up!” 

Barclay winched, sprinkled Beechams Powders into a glass of water, stirred the mixture with the barrel of his fountain pen and gulped down the swirling result. “You’re guarding the gentry, Sergeant, not entertaining them at the Palladium.”

For over an hour, Barclay had stepped his team of eight men and four women through that night’s mission. He explained the Union of South Africa’s celebratory event could be the target of dissidents from the former Boer republics, unhappy with their country being declared a Dominion of the British Empire. The undercover police would be on duty as a lowkey security detail at the High Commission building. Neither the British nor South African governments wanted anything overt.

“Discretion is the theme, lads,” said Barclay, either cleverly bringing the female officers into the boys’ club or ignoring the fact they were in the room. “And you won’t have to work hard. The aide-de-camp assures me he’s hired 13 professionals to do the main food and drinks service.”

In the High Commission’s basement, a hulking twin-doored Chubb & Sons safe held 26 Transvaal-produced, pyramid-shaped gold bars weight 27.4 lbs each. In the heaving ballroom, an edgy Fruity held a tray of eight crystal champagne coupes. The gold was in situ to assure the City of London of the strength of the new Union. Ditto the glasses fizzing with Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame. 

“High risk, high reward” was how Fruity had originally pitched the idea to Dior who, disconcertingly, had been picking his teeth with the tip of a stiletto blade. The plan: at the height of the High Commissioner’s party, when the by-then boozy guests were dancing the cakewalk to loud ragtime music, a crack team – preferably not including himself – would blow open the safe then gang members, in two and threes, would sneak downstairs, each would stash two of the heavy bars in a bag or holdall, scarper and later rendezvous. 

The biggest risks? Dior had asked. Fruity named one he knew Dior could solve: the potential threat that politically obstinate Boers might target the party. 

“I’ll get van Hoit and Blandings to have a sharp word with that bunch,” Dior had replied. “The Afrikaners can misbehave on another night.”

After offloading the champagne to eager guests, Fruity placed the tray near the bar and made for the stairwell just as two waiters in ill-fitting frockcoats brushed past, bearing crowded drinks trays. 

Inspector Barclay’s head twitched. “I could’ve sworn that was Fruity Frynn,” he whispered to Sergeant Gardner who, because he was humming the music hall ditty "The Boy I Love Is Up in the Gallery" while balancing a tray, only heard the word “Fruity”.

“So judgmental!” thought Gardner.

The basement smelt of fresh paint, cold steel and Dior’s cigar. “A stick of dynamite should do it,” said Fruity, standing well back. 

“Forget that milksop,” snapped The Mauritian, “make it three sticks, Mr Dior.”

Dior held his white-hot cigar tip against a dynamite fuse before the trio backed into a corridor. Forty seconds later the entire building shuddered. Dancers were flung off their feet. Band members toppled from a stage. Bottles and glassware tumbled, shattering on the floor. Flying waiters and waitresses, friend and foe alike, landed atop one another.

Dior, The Mauritian and Fruity stood shakily – faces blackened, clothes smoking and shredded – staring at the mangled remains of the safe.  

Leaning against a broken door jamb, Fruity lit a cigarette and hissed: "You were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!"

It was, he decided, going to be a long night.

# # #

Copyright 2025 GREG FLYNN

Come Nightfall

 The tramp, tramp, tramp of jackboots lured Rene Brindeau to his bookshop doorway. Over the past four years that rhythmic beat had often prompted him to wonder: had the Germans cornered the market in noisy footwear? 

Now the squad was thumping towards his Librairie du Rive Gauche in a narrow back street where echoes of leather on cobblestones bounced from shuttered shopfronts. His business was the only one offering an open door to the few passersby. 

In August 1944, Paris – sullen, stifling and occupied – had all the charm of an open prison. Buying books wasn’t a priority for locals or invaders.

Backing into his shop, the stooped, grey-haired Brindeau considered flicking his sign to Fermé. Too late. The hulking man blocking the door with his boot wore lightning flash insignia on his jacket collar and, on his pale, hard face, the practiced sneer of a Gestapo officer. Perhaps it was a smirk. Brindeau decided not to ask.

The officer’s questions were shouted. Brindeau’s replies soft. Why was this dreary, unessential little store still open? Because there was always demand for the escapism of literature. Did he sell books by masterful German thinkers such as Nietzsche? A niche market so, in a word, non. Do you understand why we are shutting you down? Given Allied forces are sweeping towards Paris, I would have thought you had other priorities.

A hand shot out, grasped Brindeau by the throat and lifted the elderly man off the floorboards. More shouting was followed by strangled responses. Was he homosexual? I’d be better dressed if I was. Was he Jewish? I’d be a better writer if I was. 

The Frenchman was flung into the street. The officer lit a cigarette, studied the little man for a minute then gave an order. Brindeau’s arms were pinioned behind him before he was marched away. 

The sign on the shop door read: Fermé.

Come nightfall, light from a streetlamp shafted through the front window silhouetting three shapes standing between floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. As the shapes drifted towards the wide window, the cold light revealed a tall, gaunt man in a loose-fitting, dark tweed suit alongside two smaller figures – one female, the other male. The petite woman wore a modest, almost Quaker-style long dress with a nipped waist; the portly man had waxed, twirled moustaches and carefully tailored clothing. 

“Very puzzling,” murmured Jane Eyre. “This is most unlike our dear friend.”

The short man at her side tilted his egg-shaped head to see out into the street. “I agree, mademoiselle,” said Hercule Poirot. “Il est parti.”

“Have you two finished stating the obvious?” sighed Sherlock Holmes. “Of course Brindeau has gone.” 

Holmes dropped to one knee, pinched some fallen cigarette ash between his fingertips and sniffed the crumbled remains. “If you had read the excellent monograph I wrote on utilising tobacco clues to help solve crimes, you would …”

“Oui, oui, mon ami,” interrupted Poirot, trying to avoid a lengthy Holmesian discourse. “And your findings tonight are …?

“A quality German brand. I would estimate a Hun stood here not less than three hours ago. I fear the old man is in danger.”

Poirot nodded. “Monsieur Brindeau often speaks of the brutality of the all-conquering Boche.”

“Then,” said Jane, “it is our duty to ensure he is safe.”

“But first,” said Poirot, “our nightly ritual.” He moved silently to a side cupboard and lifted out a half full bottle of absinthe, elegant glasses, sugar cubes, a spoon and a crystal water cask. 

For decades, when night fell and with the shop shut, the three characters would materialise from their books and join Brindeau for a glass of the aniseed-flavoured spirit and a game of cards. 

Each evening, looking up from the cards he’d been dealt, Brindeau would pause and ask the same question: “Am I dreaming?”. On cue Holmes would pinch the man’s arm lightly and say: “That is a clue. You are not.”

It was Jane’s turn. In his best governess’ voice, she would explain, yet again, that not only were readers drawn into books, losing themselves in plots, so too did characters flow out of novels to influence the physical world. 

Glasses emptied, paraphernalia tidied away, the trio stood in the humid night air, peering up and down the darkened street. 

Jane gave a start. “We are being watched.”

“Nonsense, my dear,” Holmes said. “We are alone. Quite possibly you have absorbed Poirot’s and my sixth sense for unidentified threats.”

“Actually, I can see someone in the shadows.”

“Oh,” said Holmes, squinting.

A moment later, a horse gave a soft whinny. The three stepped closer. Sitting on a rickety cart, a cloaked figure held a pair of reins high as if ready to snap them down on the horse’s flanks. Sacks of potatoes were propped in the rear of the cart.

Raising a gloved hand, Jane explained in English-accented schoolgirl French how she and her companions were searching for a friend, Rene Brindeau. 

The figure threw back its cloak revealing a young woman with her hair tucked under a dusty beret and kitted out in the faded blue overalls of a farmer. She stared at the exotically dressed group who, in turn, watched her slide a pistol back into a deep pocket. 

Yes, she had heard the bookshop owner had been arrested and taken to the Hôtel Le Meurice where the German Command had their headquarters. And, no, he could not be rescued. The firing squad awaited.

Poirot touched the brim of his grey homburg and gave a small bow. “I am Hercule Poirot, you will have heard of me?”

The woman shook her head.

In disbelief he paused before pressing on. As he, a Belgian, and his two English friends were newcomers in Paris, could she take them to the hotel? 

“You have a plan?” she asked. 

“A plan?” they echoed.

En route through the empty streets, Holmes drew a curved pipe from inside his jacket, lit it and nodded towards the woman’s bulging pocket. “A service issue Lebel revolver. A clue whose side you are on.”

“We are the Maquis,” she said. There were three blank faces. She added: “La Résistance.”

“Ahh,” they said in unison. 

“Ahh,” they repeated as they stood near the goods and servants’ entrance of the Hôtel Le Meurice. “So, we are all agreed,” said Holmes. “Indeed,” was the answer.

They had discovered another thing in common aside from their shared mission to rescue Brindeau. They all spoke passable German. Plus they were aware their clothes, to modern eyes, looked theatrical. Hence, the plan. Maybe not a plan, more a concept: they were a group of travelling actors commissioned by Berlin to entertain the troops. That evening they’d been despatched to the hotel to perform Heinrich von Kleist’s masterpiece Die Familie Schroffenstein for the High Command.

The two Wehrmacht soldiers guarding the rear entrance were skeptical … skeptical until Poirot asked in meticulous German if they really were refusing Berlin’s order. 

Five minutes later the trio descended three sets of stairs to the basement. Candles flickered; stacked wine bottles lined the corridor. 

Outside a bolted door, a trooper lifted his Maschinenpistole and pointed it at Holmes, ignoring the other two. It was what Holmes would refer to later as “an elementary error.” A shadow moved and the soldier landed with a thump, his bleeding head leaving a large puddle on the stone floor. Still holding the bloodied bottle of 1938 Chateau Lafite Rothschild she’d swung, Jane looked pleased.   

Within a few minutes, with Brindeau being part-carried, part-dragged by Holmes and Poirot, the group stood warily near the exit door. Brindeau, his mouth bruised, asked: “You have an escape plan?”

The answer came from the street. With American armed forces closing in from the north and south of Paris, La Résistance had begun noisy, running battles with the Germans desperately trying to defend their captured prize – the City of Light.

Outside the hotel there were two shots. The tradesmen’s door swung open. Holmes, his fists in a Marquess of Queensberry rules boxing pose, stepped up, then relaxed. 

The cart-driving woman beckoned through the doorway. “A ride back to the shop, mes vieux? Le jour de gloire est arrivé!”

As Brindeau was lifted onto the potato sacks in the cart, he looked up at Jane. “Do you think the invaders have learnt a lesson?’

She smiled at her fellow characters. “Hopefully that the pen is mightier than the sword.”

# # #

Copyright 2025 GREG FLYNN

Dr Yes

Funnelling down the jet bridge to the aircraft, passengers in ill-fitting leisurewear and, shudder, loungewear lugged neck pillows, scuffed cabin bags and mewling children onto the plane. After stumbling to their narrow seats, they battled greedily for precious space in the overhead compartments.

 At the Airbus’ pointy end, the aquiline nose of the tall passenger in Seat 1A twitched. James Bond, who unlike the rabble squabbling in steerage had turned left at the cabin door, sniffed the air. The stewed aroma of body odour mingled with duty free cologne samples drifted into First, clashing with his elegant Floris Limes eau de toilette.

Lifting a glass of Glen Goldstein whisky, he drew in the sweet scent of babka with top notes of challah and matzo from the 15-year-old single malt distilled behind a shul on the Isle of Mull.

Through the window he caught a flash of red on Heathrow’s Terminal 5 observation deck. A squint confirmed it was the frisky flight attendant who’d blocked his path earlier as he’d strode towards BA’s Executive Club for a pre-flight vodka-based stiffener.

“Привет красавчик,” she’d murmured before running her fingertips inside his jacket lapels and pausing just above his belt buckle. The winged badge on her scarlet uniform read: Aeroflot. Priding himself on being a global traveller, Bond guessed it was an airline based east of Dover where the local language sounded like someone spitting into a bucket.

“Hello, handsome,” she repeated, her throaty voice sultry and brazen. “I crave your body.” Her hand reached behind him, turned the handle of a door marked Cleaning Supplies and with a shoulder thrust she propelled him into the darkness beyond. The door clicked shut and Bond felt himself being stripped from the waist down.

Just as he was about to ask “What’s in it for me?”, the doorknob rattled, followed by a muffled shout from the terminal’s corridor.

“Быстрый,” hissed the flight attendant, thrusting his clothes into his hands. “Quick!”

He dressed hurriedly in the pitch-black closet. Whispering “another time, another place, сладкий,” the woman opened the door, placed a hand between Bond’s shoulder blades and shoved him past an irate cleaner wielding a threatening mop.

And now there she was again, waving two-handed from the observation deck. Bond twisted in his seat and felt his underwear pinching. Puzzled, he undid his trousers and stared down at a pair of gold silk ladies’ knickers. I must’ve pulled on the wrong panties in the dark, he decided, but at least they aren’t G String style.

Taking a sip of whisky, his mind drifted back 24 hours to M’s office in MI6’s HQ, Thames-side. The briefing had begun with M torching a pipe bowl of Mac Baren’s Scottish Blend tobacco and sending up smoke signals worthy of an Apache. Miss Moneypenny sat on M’s side of the desk, batting away the smoke while taking shorthand.

“… and get her back,” M concluded.

Bond lent forward. “I say, M, could you recap? I lost focus after you said: ‘Good morning.’”

Flipping through her notebook pages, Moneypenny read out: “The Berlin-based Black Spot gang has kidnapped Melania … ahh … ahh …” Allergic to tobacco smoke, she gave a sharp sneeze.

All Bond heard was a surname sounding like “Thump.”

Moneypenny continued: “Britain and America want Melania freed before the Black Spot sell her to the Russians. Her husband has asked the US Government to pick up the ransom tab. The gang works out of the Kitty Kat Klub in Berlin. You’ve been chosen, James, because of your extensive experience in Germany.”

Germany? mused Bond. Really? He vaguely recalled somewhere with over-spiced sausages, boiled pig trotters and fermented cabbage but few locals had bothered to learn English, so he hadn’t asked where he was. As the thought “bone idle foreigners” crossed his mind, the toe of a shoe began to creep up the inside of his leg. He sighed. Moneypenny would have to wait. That afternoon he planned to visit his Savile Row tailors to learn what was sartorially de rigueur in Germany.

Moneypenny stood suddenly, snapped her notebook shut and said: “I’ll book your flight, James.”

The shoe toe continued to sidle up his thigh. Bond glanced across at M who, with a coquettish smile, was running the tip of his tongue around the end of his pipe stem.

Bugger, thought Bond, my upcoming annual performance review is going to be trickier than usual.

 

The thud of the Airbus’ tyres smacking on the tarmac at Berlin’s Brandenburg Airport jolted him out of his reverie.

Outside the terminal, he lit a Morland of Grosvenor Street cigarette. An overweight man waddled over. Past his prime – if he’d ever had one – the stranger was dressed in a once-white linen suit with a sauerkraut-flecked club tie holding together a grimy shirt collar.

“Welcome to Berlin, Mr Bond. I am Gregor von Frynn, the British Embassy’s driver.” He gestured at a burgundy Rolls-Royce Phantom II parked at an angle near the kerb.

Nestling into the rear seat, Bond helped himself to a schnapps from a dainty walnut drinks cabinet and addressed the back of von Frynn’s thick neck: “You don’t sound British, old boy.”

von Frynn squirmed. A German national, he’d been Hitler’s PR agent until April ’45 when he took his client aside in the Führerbunker and said: “Adolf, Mein Süßer, what you need here are fresh cut flowers in reception and embroidered throw cushions in the main meeting room. At the moment the ambience doesn’t scream: Winner!” von Frynn had been proved correct.

Gripping the steering wheel, he answered: “I am Northern Irish.”

Bond nodded. He’d guessed as much.

 

The Kitty Kat Klub squatted in Schöneberg, an inner urban area still hyper trendy decades after Christopher Isherwood and Marlene Dietrich went to their rewards. In daylight, the club gave off the cosmopolitan air of a shuttered laundromat. Beneath an unlit neon sign, two bouncers exchanged fist bumps. Bond recognised them: Alex Prance, a ballroom dance instructor who also taught the Kama Sutra to excitable widows on cruise ships, and Tim McGinty, on the run from debt collectors for his penchant for checking into luxury hotels under the name Chris Hemsworth. Both ignored the visitor when he brushed past.

In the barroom’s gloom, Bond spotted a small stage. At the mic, a torch singer with the mononym Shahlinee tortured a jazz standard, aided and abetted by backing singers Siouxsie Sioux and a woman whose name, Bond recalled, sounded like one of the more approachable Irish whiskies.

In a side booth, a clutch of gang members played Snap, betting with poker chips fashioned from dead men’s teeth: Johan Detroit, who with the scoundrel sitting beside him, Craig Cravings, ran guns and Prosecco over the Angola-Zambia border; Rick Durry, banned from Las Vegas’ Hotel Bellagio for texting what he called “Rick Pix” to colleagues at a company offsite; and Michelle Carling, heiress to a brewing fortune but whose catchphrase was: “Lips that touch liquor will never touch mine.”

Behind the bar stood Martine L’Évitâtę, polishing a beer stein with a grey rag. As Bond approached, she lifted the vessel, spat on the rim and wiped it.

“In a different glass,” began Bond, fighting a gag reflex, “I’ll have two parts bathtub gin, one part apricot brandy, a smoked oyster, stir it with your finger and pour it over ice.”   

Martine poured him a beer.

Lifting the stein to his lips, he sensed two shadowy figures slide alongside him: gang leader Kris Sauvage and his brother, Glenn. Before bolting to Berlin, they’d performed as a drag act – The Swinging Sausage Sisters – at Club Med Timbuktu. Kris still sported a black beauty spot on his right cheek (botty not face). Now they ran the Dark Web mail order service Dr Yes selling adulterated generic medications to anyone with a credit card (legit or stolen).

Before Kris could speak, the club’s front door swung inwards and the Aeroflot flight attendant from Heathrow strutted into the bar pointing a .380 9×18mm Makarov with an integrated silencer. Or, as Bond thought of it, a gun.

 “Ты тщеславный дурак,” she snapped. “I am Olga Kuznetsov, senior investigator in glorious Russia’s FSB security agency. Господин Bond, I traced you via a tracking device sown into the golden underwear’s waistband. Where is Melania?”

A backroom door edged open. Melania stood framed in the doorway, her face frozen by either fear or Botox. In a guttural Slovenian accent, she said: “Put that weapon away. The Black Spotters have been protecting me since I fled my vile husband. I am not defecting to Mother Russia nor staying here in the Fatherland. I have chosen Aunty Albion and, to celebrate, Mr Bond can give me the Full English welcome.”

Jerking her head towards the rear room, she added: “Come, darr-ll-hink. I am in a hurry. I can only spare you a minute.”

“More than enough time,” responded Bond, trailing after her with just one thought: for King and country.

# # #

Copyright 2024 GREG FLYNN

 

The Night The Cats Swung By

The bullet-pocked wooden door gave half-hearted resistance, reminding Fox he wasn’t a paying guest. He pushed again with his shoulder. The door surrendered. Staggering under the weight of an equipment-packed satchel and a cardboard suitcase, he found himself standing Goldilocks-like in a spacious, eerily pristine room sizing up five beds lining the far wall.

All singles. Immaculate bedding. Individual side tables. Numbered signs looped over the foot of each bed. He chose the closest to the door.

The November cold embraced the building. A knifing wind was picking up, thrusting a deeper chill through Geilenkirchen, a battle-battered town in North Rhine-Westphalia.

Gear stashed under the bed, shoes off and grey-blue cigarette smoke spiraling towards the vaulted ceiling, he stretched out on the all-white bedding and wondered who was the last health spa guest to part with Reichsmarks for the privilege of being birched after the sauna and plunge pool. Certainly not the Waffen-SS commanders who’d retreated with their men and artillery deeper into the Fatherland as the British XXX Corps – pronounced 30 Cor, Fox reminded himself – came a-hunting.

The moment he flicked ash onto the scrubbed floor, the door creaked. Four men stood in the doorway, silhouetted against the pale, dying light. They took a beat. Synchronised smiles appeared. “Howdy,” said the first man into the room. Tall, straight backed, he advanced on Fox, one hand swinging a saxophone case. “I figure you’re our bunkhouse buddy.”

Fox tilted his head to one side. To him, most Americans sounded the same but this one had a touch of the Hopalong Cassidys.

The four formed a semi-circle at the end of the Englishman’s bed, their USO-issue uniforms seemingly ironed just minutes before. The perks of showbusiness, Fox decided. Once on his feet, his thin civvy-street socks offered little protection from the mortuary-cold floor. The BBC didn’t run to funding a winter wardrobe for its war correspondents.

The newcomers looked like they could handle themselves on either a stage or a battlefield. Although no longer up for the latter, Fox was quietly confident he could switch on a microphone on the former.

“I’m Harry Fox, BBC,” he said, shaking their hands and feeling pressure a little too painful for someone who’d taken three bullets in the Western Desert in ‘42.

No reaction. Fox added: “It’s like CBS and NBC but without deodorant commercials.”

The Americans stared at him as if he’d broken wind. Then, seconds later, came introductions to The Swinging Cats quartet. The tall, assertive man was Samson. To his left Beamer then McMahon and Jackson. Instruments? Respectively saxophone, double bass, drums and – when an undamaged one could be found in war-whipped Europe – piano. Vocals too, added Jackson, removing his garrison side cap and patting his neat, fair hair.

Beamer rested a man-height double bass case against his hip. An oversize case shaped to fit a portable drum kit lay at McMahon’s feet. Piano-less, Jackson’s long fingers twitched, waiting for ivory keys to tinkle or, judging by his ice blue eyes, a throat to choke.

Fox’s still smoking cigarette held a teetering column of ash. Turning, he opened his bedside table drawer and found a Bible in German, a packet of condoms and an ashtray. “God, sex and tobacco. Hard to fault the Krauts’ priorities.”

The four musicians stood, blank-faced. A moment later, Beamer spoke: “Ah, the famous English sense of humour we’ve heard so much about.”

Samson moved first, choosing the bed next to Fox. The others stepped forward to claim the remaining beds.

Heaving his feet back onto the covers, Fox rested against the pillows: “Planning to rehearse before tomorrow’s concert? Perhaps I could record …”

The Americans froze. Another beat passed. Samson bent to tighten a boot lace. “Sure thing. But first we’re gonna get some chow.”

Fox tried another icebreaker. “I’ve been invited to MC your event. I’m imagining a touch of Benny Goodman, a sprinkling of Louis Armstrong?”

The room got colder. McMahon pointed a drum stick at him. “A Jew and a jungle boy? We play untainted music – Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby.”

“You’re not spooked by their Italian and Irish backgrounds?”

“Races you can trust.”

Samson cut the conversation off by offering Fox a cigarette. Chesterfields. The Englishman’s hand shot out, plucked one from its soft packet and nodded a thanks. The Americans lit up using Zippos. Fox scratched a Vesta match.

Blowing smoke at Fox, Samson looked wary. “Why’s a reporter getting into showbiz?”

“I’m here to interview the general in command. But I’ve been given time off to recover from bouncing around in trucks all the way from the Channel to the Rhine. Jerry really buggered those Froggy roads.”

Jackson cleared his throat. “’Buggered’ as in ‘sodomised’?”

“Wrecked.”

“The English language. It’s what separates us.”

“And,” said Fox, having taken the long route round to answering Samson’s question, “your concert for British troops will be a jolly sidebar to the general’s piece: American jazz quartet takes time out from entertaining its own troops to play for our men near the frontline. I’ll also interview you and …”

“Grub time,” snapped Samson, slapping his palm against his thigh.

In tight formation the four strode for the door. Fox gave them 10 minutes before tramping through dirty slush to a large mess tent close to where XXX Corps were bivouacked. He wasn’t planning to complain about the walk. He and the other outsiders had been assigned digs in the impeccable health spa while Lieutenant General Brian Horrocks and his men made do with an abandoned church and rows of pup tents.

Sitting at a makeshift mess table, Fox tried to identify chunks of meat submerged in thin gravy. Lamb, he decided charitably. A few feet away, the Americans sat with their tin plates wiped clean. They glanced at Fox, offering uniform smiles.

The buzz of conversation in the tent died as General Horrocks followed by an aide-de-camp pushed through the canvas flaps. They crossed to a small table close to the Americans. Four Jack-in-the-Boxes shot up, shoulders back, salutes crisp.

Horrocks returned the salutes and was about to drop into a folding chair when Samson moved swiftly towards him. Fox caught snatches of the conversation. The Americans had bought gifts from Major General Bolling of the US 84th Division. Samson tapped the side of his nose, presumably indicating the presents were potable, then offered to deliver the presents to Horrocks and put on a preview show for the commander and his aides.

Eyes twinkling, Horrocks invited the Americans to stay after their performance and share the gifts. Shaking his head, Samson explained the men had to rehearse later that evening: “Sorry … we’ll have to skedaddle.” A private joke, judging by the feu de joie of smirks from his countrymen.

Horrocks complimented their diligence. Dining resumed across the tent. Fox’s plate lay untouched. He’d skedaddled.

 

Standing in the shadows, Fox angled his wristwatch towards the soft light coming from Horrocks’ headquarters in the church. Eight pip emma. Carrying their instrument cases and two whiskey bottles, the musicians halted at the foot of the church steps.

Samson hissed at his fellow players. As one, the men swooped down to their cases, snapped open locks and snatched out weapons. Barrels gleamed in the church light. Fox, unarmed, pressed against a wall. In his stomach, he felt the familiar clench of pre-battle fear. This time it wouldn’t be his battle. There were metallic clacks as the men racked cocking handles then, side-by-side, charged up the steps.

Through the open doors Fox heard frantic click, clicking as firing mechanisms struck only frigid air. Couldn’t fight anymore, indeed, but he knew how to empty submachine gun magazines. Shouts. Although he didn’t speak German, he imagined the quartet’s outbursts were likely to be coarse, perhaps even blasphemous, and certainly unacceptable in polite society.

In the church vestibule, the four attackers crouched on their knees, hands behind their heads, fingers laced. Heavily-armed, red-capped military police, their blancoed Sam Brown belts reflecting the candlelight, encircled the men.

Horrocks appeared as Fox entered. “Splendid job,” said the general. “If you hadn’t gone over to the other side, I’d …”

“Actually, sir, I’m with the BBC.”

“Just teasing. I was about to say I’d award you a medal. Now …” the tip of his boot nudged Samson’s leg “… we have to find out what happened to the real Yank musicians.” The German ignored the prodding. Horrocks turned back to Fox. “And what tipped you off these treacherous blighters were German assassins?”

“Aside from the bigotry, it was hard to imagine jazz musicians turning down a free drink.”

--------------------------------------------

Historical footnote: December 1944. A month after The Cats had swung by – fictionally. In the Battle of the Bulge, elements of which took place in the Geilenkirchen sector, the Waffen-SS launched Adolf Hitler’s brainchild, Operation Greif. The plan: German soldiers disguised in captured US and British army uniforms and using Allied vehicles would infiltrate behind enemy lines to create confusion and wreak havoc. The operation failed.

# # #

Copyright 2024 GREG FLYNN

 

The Ketamine Konnection

Crossing Il Capri’s threshold from Las Vegas’ Gates of Hell heat into the cryogenic aircon of the casino hotel was one small step for Raymond Halliday, one giant stagger for the South of the Border-born bellhop toting three leather suitcases bound with buckled straps.

Cap askew, forehead damp, the porter wheezed: “Señor, the bags … now they come with wheels.”

Turning slowly, Halliday seemed surprised not at this insight into modern luggage but that a minion could or, indeed, should speak. Satisfied the staffer had nothing further to add, Halliday swung back towards reception, checked in and was waiting at the elevator before the bellboy had made it halfway across Il Capri’s expansive foyer.

Tuesday the 9^th. A quarter of 11. Seventy-five minutes until the production conference. Time to shower, punish the mini bar and rinse out with Listerine Cool Mint breath freshener, roughly in that order.

The mini bar was better stocked than he’d anticipated. If he’d bothered to check his Longines DolceVita watch when he finally reached the hotel’s conference room, he’d have noticed he was late. No matter. Most of the seats encircling a large lozenge-shaped table were empty. In the movie industry, timeliness was for apparatchiks. Real players operated by their own internal “screw you” clocks. 

Eventually there was enough above and below the line film crew present to tackle the most important agenda item: lunch. By 1, the executive producers and principal cast members still hadn’t arrived. “At least the workers are here,” began the production manager.

Only Halliday didn’t laugh. With his back to the room, he was working the buffet again, forking remnants of Maine lobster onto his plate. The manager cantered through the production schedule. The producer, one eye on Halliday who had graduated to spearing shrimp and scooping oysters, touched on budgets.

Director James Snide held up a hand. “When Raymond has finished prepping for the End Times, perhaps we can get to the script changes.”

Halliday heard only the final words. As a scriptwriter, they were two he loathed, along with “early deadline” and “budget restraints”. Plus there were elements within the script he couldn’t alter. Not unless he fancied sharing his Coco-Mat king-size bed in his fountain-view room on Level 20 with a horse’s head. If there was a single word which encapsulated any gangster’s approach to business failure it would be “unsentimental”.

Snide’s assistant stabbed at a MacBook Air’s keyboard and the movie’s title popped onto a wide screen on the far wall: The Ketamine Konnection.

 “I’m thinking of changing ‘ketamine’ to something more marketing friendly,” said Snide. He paused for effect. Halliday, with a gobbet of shellfish part way to his mouth, also paused when his anal sphincter suddenly clenched. Was dope being cut from the movie? He pictured that horse’s head with a risus sardonicus grin resting on his bedroom pillow.

Snide continued: “How’s this sound – The Special K Konnection? After all, Special K is a street name for ketamine.”

Halliday’s sphincter relaxed. But not too much. As a screenplay hack he could live with that minor change. As a man with debts to pay to Sláinte, L'Chaim and Gānbēi (sadly, as he’d discovered, not a reputable, broad-church New York loan firm) he was just happy to live. “Love it,” he said a little too loudly.

Dudley Duncan the Prop Master, a louche young man in white linen, hurriedly seconded Halliday’s support and gave Snide a kiss-ass smile: “So clever of you to have the plot revolve something other than stolen old school drugs such as coke, ice or horse.”

Again with the horse? Halliday suppressed a shudder. “It was my idea.” He swiveled to address the room. “Ketamine is the dope du jour. It was Matthew Perry from Friends’ mellow hallucinogen of choice when he hopped into his hot tub for the last time. It might also make the user feel disconnected and not in control. Or as I like to think of it: Tuesday.”

He gestured at the assistant who flicked onto the screen photos showing a bulky khaki kitbag packed with small plastic sachets containing white powder. The little bags had been consolidated into larger glassine ones. “I calculate that at $100 per gram, the prop K will appear to be worth around $12 mill. Street value, that is.”

“Nothing to sniff at,” said Duncan.

To match the movie’s new title, the script needed to be tinkered with. Halliday dutifully made notes then stared out the floor-to-ceiling window at the forced gaiety of the Las Vegas skyline. The plot remained unchanged: two divorcees on a cross-America road trip in a pink Corvette convertible pick up a handsome hitchhiker lugging a kitbag. He’s stolen ketamine from the Mob. The women, in turn, steal it from him. Neither the hitchhiker nor his former colleagues in crime are happy. The women flee.

Up next on the agenda: the DP blocked out the following day’s shoot capturing the divorcees exchanging a drug parcel after they’ve slo-moed towards the camera, seemingly floating on the quivering heat of the desert sand. No shortage of the latter around Las Vegas. It was a one hour 50 drive to the planned Death Valley location. A 2^nd unit director was already setting up just off the CA-190. “Look ethereal,” had been Snide’s directive during rehearsals.

 

Wednesday the 10^th. To Halliday it felt like pre-dawn. The bedside clock insisted it was 0805. He finished dressing and wondered for the second time in 15 minutes if lighting a cigarette would set off an alarm. Perhaps he could wrap the room’s smoke sniffer thingee in a hand towel. A soft knock on the door. Through the spy hole, Halliday saw enough fresh linen to flag who the visitor was. Duncan was shouldering a canvas kitbag.

“Heavy?” asked Halliday.

Duncan ignored the question. “It went well, thanks to me.” He heaved the bag onto Halliday’s rumpled bed. “What better way to disguise real dope than transport it in plain sight as a movie prop? A few busybodies questioned the two identical bags. I said we needed a backup if the first got damaged.”

“And where’s the dummy dope in the second bag?”

“In the trunk of the Corvette. Our leading ladies are taking it for a spin to the location site this morning. As you insisted, the real thing has a green tag sown on the bottom, the prop has a brown tag.”

There was that sudden clenching feeling – again. “No,” cut in Halliday. “The actual K is stashed in the bag with the brown tag, the dummy is green.”

On cue, the room phone chirped beside the clock. Snatching up the receiver, Halliday heard the Concierge announce that Messrs Sláinte, L'Chaim and Gānbēi were waiting for him in a limousine outside the hotel’s entrance. He looked at Duncan. The two men chorused an obscenity. Approximately 78 seconds later, they tumbled out of the lift into the hotel’s car park, scrambled into Duncan’s rented Jeep and, after torching the rubber on its tyres, were catapulted onto The Strip.

After a moment, a black stretch limo squealed out of Il Capri’s semi-circular driveway, sliced into the boulevard’s traffic, took a hard right, then a left, then another right; all the time keeping the Jeep in sight.

That quiet, sunlit morning, the corner of West Bonneville Ave and South Grand Central Parkway was blessed with the presence of a black and white patrol SUV. With their vehicle parked far enough onto the kerb to allow traffic to flow, deputy sheriffs Kellaway and Branston tried to, firstly, avoid spilling just-bought coffee on their crisp beige uniforms and, secondly, avoid any work.

Kellaway spotted the Corvette a moment before his second sip. Two scarf-wearing woman in the front seat squealed with laughter as their hot pink car fishtailed through the intersection. Within a heartbeat, it was rear-ended by a Jeep which, while still hovering several inches off the ground, was T-boned by a stretch limo. Melded together by momentum and twisted metal, the three vehicles spun in a choreographed swirl before slamming into the black and white’s hood. Scalding coffee seeped into the deputies’ crotches.

A kit bag, hurled into the middle of the intersection by the impact, lay ripped open. Hundreds of plastic sachets spilled white powder onto the asphalt.

Branston was first out of the patrol car, one hand on his holstered weapon, the other covering his sodden fly. He reached the passenger side of the Jeep as Halliday slowly lowered the cracked window.

The scriptwriter smiled: “Officer, I can explain everything.”

# # #

Copyright 2024 GREG FLYNN