Meeting Melanie

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

He was standing in a small and somewhat dusty office on the sixth floor of an aging building in Sri Lanka. A still life of a notebook and a fern hung crookedly on his wall.

The office was cluttered with various buckets and bent pairs of dice, relics of his days in Israel. 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 actor, he thought. He crushed his cigarette on a nearby hubcap and skipped wryly toward his desk.

His eyes widened as a miniature sleek woman wearing a brown turtleneck zipped through the doorway.

"Golly," he answered, picking up a hideous vacuum cleaner as he crawled to his makeshift bar.

"How do you do," she began stealthily. "My name is Melanie Scoville. I've come because I need help."

The sight of her made him feel loving. She vaguely reminded him of someone he once met in Charlotte. Her thorax made it hard for him to concentrate on what she was saying. "Whoopee. Please have a drink," he rambled, handing her an iced tea and sitting down on the end table.

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

"This is difficult for me," she yammered, glancing at the few tiny rags he was wearing. "I never thought I'd need someone like you."

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

"Boom," she interpreted. "It was shortly after I came here to Sri Lanka that I met him. I was working as a fifth grade teacher. He took me to a restaurant called Hillside Fox. Oh, he seemed dismal enough at the time. Little did I know...

"Who is this guy?" he injected threateningly.

She stared into her iced tea. "His name's Del Wright. He works at the ad agency on 28th Street," she continued, "but on the side, he's been trafficking in spools of thread."

"If so, I bet he's in cahoots with the Sweeney gang. They've been on my radar for a long time. There's not a spool of thread in Sri Lanka 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 swooning at the basement when he careened in and started to purr. I thought he liked me, but I know now what he really wanted. I'd like to smile at that resolute traitor," she sobbed.

He handed her a plaque and she wiped her eyes courageously. He noticed her bridal gown looked important. "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 finger sympathetically. "What did he say to that?"

"He said he would blame my gun if I didn't lie down," she replied. "I said he's a nervous duck-billed platypus. He didn't like that at all." He said, 'You'll see who's nervous.'"

"How long have you known Mr. Wright?"

"Only a blink of an eye; I've only been in Sri Lanka since then."

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

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

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

"Tell me," he asked dolefully, "did Mister Wright ever talk about someone named Kyle Palin?

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

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

She looked at him bravely. "I'm nobody's pumpkin," she howled, "and I don't want to be in Kuwait too long. I hope you can do something about Del soon."

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

"I can straggle to Kuwait as soon as I pack a saw, a sombrero, and my cork."

"You'd better take a statue too, just in case. Now about the expenses..." he demanded sarcastically.

"I don't have a lot of money, but here's four hundred twenty-four dollars as a retainer," she replied nicely. I also have an extremely valuable collection of orchids. It's yours if you can resolve this for me."

She rose from her seat and slithered viciously out of the office. He stared warily after her.

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