Previously in The Maltese Sparrow…
Lee’s troops had advanced once again into Northern Virginia and were knocking at the door of Washington. With the Union army in disarray, Lincoln looked at his options – there was a young General Grant, who had been having great success along the Mississippi, or General McClellan, who had screwed things up three times already. Lincoln put McClellan in charge again. It’s all a game to some people, isn’t it?
And now, The Maltese Sparrow: Part 6 – Shiloh…
When Patterson led me into my office, now surrounded by yellow police tape, I was greeted by the sight of my secretary, Eva, surrounded by a crowd of trench-coated men poking their noses into my things. Sarcastically, I said, “What is this, some sort’ve trench-coat convention?”
Patterson looked up and his face clouded in anger. “Hey, get outta here, this is a crime scene!” With that, the crowd of men shuffled noisily out the door. I looked out the window and read the sign on the Ramada Inn across the street: “Trench-coat Con 2003 – Check out the new Z9000 waterproof from Burlington Coat Factory. Also, meet the stars of Babylon 5.” Well, I’ll be damned.
I turned angrily towards Eva. “And you, what are you doing around here? I thought you were supposed to look after the office?!” I opened her desk drawer and pointed to the machine gun in it. “Did you even use this? Didn’t I say, ‘If the cops come, defend the office with the machine gun.’ Didn’t I say that? Huh? Didn’t the ad you answered for this job say, ‘Must be able to type 60 words per minute. Must be willing to die in bloody machine gun battle defending office from police.’ Do you think machine guns are cheap? Huh? Why do I even have this thing if no one’s going to use it? Maybe I should just throw it away, would you like that?” With that I tossed the machine gun in the waste basket. Eva looked at me guiltily.
Patterson nudged me towards the inner office. “Come on, Sam, the bird’s in here.”
With a last disgusted look at Eva, I walked into my office. A uniformed cop was dusting for prints around the file cabinet. A uniformed maid was dusting for dust bunnies under the book shelves. A crop duster was dusting for boll weevils around my potted fern. “You look busy in here, Lester. What’s the occasion?”
Patterson looked at me from under his hat and said, “We got a tip, Sam. Supposed to be some stolen property down here so we came down to check it out.”
I looked around. “You got a warrant for this little shindig?” He handed me the latest Warrant album. I glanced at it for a moment and then tossed it aside. “I see. And what, precisely, is it you’ve found?”
Patterson led me over to the desk and pulled on a rubber glove. He then opened my desk drawer and stepped back. I peered into the drawer. There it was, a small, stone sparrow. I reached down and touched a wing and felt a sticky residue. I tasted it. Chocolate malt.
I turned to Patterson. “Who am I supposed to have stolen this from?”
Patterson flipped open a notebook and looked over some scribblings. “We got a call this afternoon shortly after one o’clock from a young lady. She said a statue of a small bird had been stolen from her family. She said that she suspected it was being kept at this address. Dame’s name was Ms. Penny Bouvier. Know her?”
I tried not to betray any emotion as I flung an ashtray through the window. “Yeah, I know her. She came down to the office this morning to hire me for a case.”
Patterson looked up. “Oh yeah, what case?”
“Someone was trying to kill her… because they thought she had stolen a small, stone bird statue….”
Patterson took off his hat and produced a handkerchief that he used to wipe the sweat from his forehead. “Funny coincidence, you happening to have a stone bird statue in your desk.”
“Hilarious,” I said drily.
“Listen, Sam. I dunno what you got yourself mixed up in, but this dame’s the daughter of a Senator. I hafta bring you in on this.”
“Patterson, you know I’m not gonna get myself mixed up in petty theft. Counterfeiting, sure. Elaborate bank robberies, fine. Serial killing, child pornography rings, tearing the tags off mattresses – that’s more my game. You know that.”
Patterson replaced his hat on his head. “Sure, Sam. I don’t like this any more than you do.”
I took a step toward him and grabbed his lapel pleadingly. “Then give me a chance. You’ve got the bird but you couldn’t find me. Gimme a day to find out what’s going on here.”
“Alright, Sam. Twenty-four hours, but after that I’m gonna put out an APB and bring you in. Got it?”
I thanked him and showed him out of the office past the distraught Eva. When the door closed behind him I turned to her and told her to pull herself together. With the clock ticking, we set to work.
Eva called the Cleveland stone bird stores listed on Yahoo! and within an hour we had a hit. The man at the store remembered having sold the bird to a young woman fitting Penny’s description about a month ago. He said he had sold it to her for $20 – a pretty good deal for what Penny called the most valuable statue in the world. I quizzed him on the merchandise and he said that in the stone bird market it was a pretty average statue that had lost value because it was covered in a chocolate malt.
I sat back in my chair as the summer sun began to fade. My mind raced. Penny said the statue was worth five million bucks. The Senator had sent an armed thug to make sure she didn’t stir up any trouble. She had clearly planted it on me in my office and then called the police at some point while we were waiting to go in to see the Senator. Why? Why go through all that for a $20 statue? It made no sense. Was someone trying to kill her or was that just a ruse – make herself the damsel in distress to appeal to my chivalry? But if she was legit, who would be trying to kill her? Her father? That thug Tommy? A homicidal clown?
Realizing I was out of bubble soap, I grabbed my hat and told Eva I was stepping out for a moment and that she should go home for the day. I strode down the street, hands shoved in my pocket and lost in thought. I didn’t hear the screeching tires of the Wonder Bread truck until they were almost upon me. I turned to see the truck barreling down on me – a white-faced, red-nosed, homicidal clown at the wheel, laughing maniacally.
To Be Continued…