“I don’t
understand,” said Jimmy. “You mean, we’re back on the case?”
“Yes we
are,” I answered.
“But, I
thought they got him. We saw it on TV,
the moose is dead.”
“That’s
not the real spy moose,” I replied.
We were
sitting around my kitchen table, plates from our just finished dinner pushed to
the side, discussing our next moves. Simon
leaned forward (which was obviously his next move, though we didn’t discuss it
ahead of time).
“Dick,” he said, “fill us in. You apparently know some things you haven’t
been telling us.”
“Indeed
I do. But first, I need to know if
you’re still with me. I need to know if
you’re going to see this thing through to the end.”
“You
know we are, Dick,” Simon answered, “but
how can we? We got fired, remember?”
I did
remember. I also remembered that it had
been a long, long time since I had lit a cigarette without even thinking about
it.
“Did we?” I asked.
“Well,
yeah dude,” Jimmy said. “You were right there with us.”
“Oh, I
remember alright,” I said, suddenly
noticing the lit cigarette in my hand and not having the faintest idea of when
I had lit it. “But think about it for a
moment. Who fired us?”
“Well,
Sandy did,” Simon replied.
“That’s
right. But what is Sandy after all?”
This
question seemed to stump them for a moment.
Jimmy’s guess was “a man”, which technically was true, but not the
answer I was looking for. Simon
eventually got it.
“He’s a
consultant?”
“Right
again,” I said. “And what did I tell you about consultants?”
This was
a much harder question and took a few minutes.
I was surprised when it was Jimmy who came forth with the answer.
“Oooo! Oooo! I
know! I know!” he said, wide eyed and jumping up and down. “They’re sneaky bastards and you can’t trust
a thing they say!”
“Good
man,” I said smiling. “You’re right. You’re absolutely right. And if you can’t believe anything they say,
then . .
.”
The
lightbulb went off in Simon’s head first this time.
“Then we
can’t believe them when they say that we’re fired!”
“Correct-a-mundo,” I said, enjoying their moment of discovery.
It was a
good time to have a beer, so we all opened another one and toasted our good
fortune of being employed again. The
celebration was short lived, however, as we soon returned to the business at
hand.
“Okay,” Simon said, “we’re back on the case. But are we any further ahead than we were
before?”
“Absolutely. A lot has happened since we got fired,” I said.
“And pieces of the puzzle are finally starting to fall into place.”
“Like
what?” Jimmy asked.
“Like
moose hats and cod stands and trips to Amsterdam. Like a mechanical moose that destroys crops
and walks on the ceilings of airplanes and leaves antler fuzz on my car. Like commercials that don’t make any sense
and a bar that disappears and a chapter of this book that is missing.”
“We know
all that,” Simon said, obviously frustrated, “but what
does it all mean?”
“I’m not
completely sure yet,” I said, “but I
think we’re actually dealing with two mysteries, not one.”
“Holy
shit, dude,” Jimmy said, “you’re gonna
fry my brain! This is getting hard.”
“It is
complicated,” I offered, “and there are
a few pieces of the puzzle – or should I say
puzzles – that are missing. But
here’s what I think is going on . . . ”
After
explaining for the next half hour, I sat back and watched Simon stroke his chin
in what I can only assume was a thoughtful, introspective manner. Jimmy looked totally confused, so I was
pretty sure I had covered everything in full detail.
“Interesting,” Simon said.
“Outlandish, unbelievable, and totally ridiculous, but interesting.”
“Can you
go over the second part again dude?” Jimmy
asked.
“Sorry
Jimmy, we don’t have time for that. Things
are starting to come to a head and we need to get moving if we’re going to get
to the bottom of all this in time.”
“Yeah, I
hear ya dude. A big 10-4 roger wilco on
that,” he said.
“So what
now?” Simon asked.
“Now, I
have to make a few phone calls. One to
the local public library, and one to the great city of Montgomery, Alabama.”
“And
then?”
“Then,
we’re going out to get a drink.”
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