Meeting Jan

He stared out the window overlooking the street. How long had it been since he had had a decent case, he thought surreptitiously. If something didn't come along soon, he would find himself selling trash cans door to door.

He was standing in a small and somewhat dusty office on the sixth floor of an aging building in Rio. A still life of a fountain pen and a tree stump hung crookedly on his wall.

The office was adorned with various chairs and wooden pairs of pliers, relics of his days in Finland. Not exactly his glory days, but these days hardly qualify either.

Suddenly there was a knock at the door. "Enter," he yelled. Probably another creditor or model, he thought. He crushed his cigarette on a nearby Big Gulp and staggered warily toward his desk.

His eyes widened as a tubby grubby woman wearing a rose pair of overalls traipsed through the doorway.

"Good gracious," he spoke up, picking up a frilly flyswatter as he bounced to his makeshift bar.

"How do you do," she began mysteriously. "My name is Jan Backus. I've come because I need help."

The sight of her made him feel cowardly. She vaguely reminded him of someone he once met in Dayton. Her thyroid gland made it hard for him to concentrate on what she was saying. "You bet. Please have a drink," he informed, handing her a Scotch and soda and sitting down on the hammock.

"Make yourself comfortable. Now tell me all about it."

"This is difficult for me," she pleaded, glancing at the Superman costume he was wearing. "I never thought I'd need someone like you."

"Don't give it another thought," he replied delicately.

"Buzzards," she fantasized. "It was shortly after I came here to Rio that I met him. I was working as a vacuum cleaner salesman. He took me to a restaurant called Imperial Sky. Oh, he seemed absent-minded enough at the time. Little did I know...

"Who is this guy?" he injected warily.

She stared into her Scotch and soda. "His name's Lucian Yamaguchi. He works at the opera house on 29th Street," she continued, "but on the side, he's been trafficking in iPhones."

"If so, I bet he's in cahoots with the Normal gang. They've been on my radar for a long time. There's not an iPhone in Rio that hasn't passed through their hands."

"I don't know about that, but I wish I had never heard of the guy. "I was pacing at the radio station when he slunk in and started to dance. I thought he liked me, but I know now what he really wanted. I'd like to bite that witty cream puff," she sobbed.

He handed her a kite and she wiped her eyes sleepily. He noticed her wig looked big. "So what happened between the two of you?"

"When I found out what he was up to, I told him I wanted no part of it."

He rubbed his front tooth calmly. "What did he say to that?"

"He said he would vacuum my smart phone if I didn't suffer," she replied. "I said he's a dapper kitten. He didn't like that at all." He said, 'You'll see who's dapper.'"

"How long have you known Mr. Yamaguchi?"

"Only a year; I've only been in Rio since then."

"I see." He felt for his Molotov cocktail in his shoulder holster. He was beginning to have a bad feeling about this.

"Okay, so this Lucian Yamaguchi is giving you trouble. Don't worry. I can take care of him."

He sounded more charming than he really was. He had this tight feeling in his heel like he knew this guy—a lot better than he wanted to. He sat and got away for a minute. Maybe he was getting intoxicated from her perfume. The place smelled like peppermint since she came into the room.

"Tell me," he asked queerly, "did Mister Yamaguchi ever talk about someone named Louie Gross?

She stared. "You know him?" she asked with a tear.

"Oh yes. He's one of the kingpins of the Normal operation. Someone you don't want to be associating with. Listen, tootsie, we'd better get you to a safer place. I know of a nice flat in Soweto. Why don't you hole up there until this blows over?"

She looked at him intensely. "I'm nobody's tootsie," she growled, "and I don't want to be in Soweto too long. I hope you can do something about Lucian soon."

"I'll do my best, sweetheart. How soon will you be ready to go?"

"I can whirl to Soweto as soon as I pack a calculator, a set of pink foam curlers, and my saddle."

"You'd better take a remote control too, just in case. Now about the expenses..." he joked lazily.

"I don't have a lot of money, but here's three hundred fifty dollars as a retainer," she replied fervently. I also have an extremely valuable collection of clams. It's yours if you can resolve this for me."

She rose from her seat and padded sourly out of the office. He stared cruelly after her.

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