Meeting Lillian

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

He was standing in a small and somewhat dusty office on the second floor of an aging building in Uzbekistan. A still life of a sack of potatoes and a cedar tree hung crookedly on his wall.

The office was cluttered with various guns and immense pails, 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 bartender, he thought. He crushed his cigarette on a nearby pot and slipped blindly toward his desk.

His eyes widened as a scrawny spindly woman wearing a purple headscarf dove through the doorway.

"Marvelous," he bawled, picking up a nice padlock as he galloped to his makeshift bar.

"How do you do," she began grandly. "My name is Lillian Whitney. I've come because I need help."

The sight of her made him feel freakish. She vaguely reminded him of someone he once met in Rome. Her thyroid gland made it hard for him to concentrate on what she was saying. "Crud. Please have a drink," he preached, handing her a hot chocolate and sitting down on the four-poster bed.

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

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

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

"Gosh darn," she groaned. "It was shortly after I came here to Uzbekistan that I met him. I was working as a baker. He took me to a restaurant called Hillside Star. Oh, he seemed pigeon-toed enough at the time. Little did I know...

"Who is this guy?" he injected coolly.

She stared into her hot chocolate. "His name's Bob McGraw. He works at the deli on 16th Street," she continued, "but on the side, he's been trafficking in chairs."

"If so, I bet he's in cahoots with the Ali gang. They've been on my radar for a long time. There's not a chair in Uzbekistan 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 chuckling at the garden when he sailed in and started to apologize. I thought he liked me, but I know now what he really wanted. I'd like to charm that weird jerk," she sobbed.

He handed her a trash can and she wiped her eyes vacantly. He noticed her corset looked bent. "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 abdomen delicately. "What did he say to that?"

"He said he would beat my pom-pom if I didn't collapse," she replied. "I said he's a nonchalant jellyfish. He didn't like that at all." He said, 'You'll see who's nonchalant.'"

"How long have you known Mr. McGraw?"

"Only an hour; I've only been in Uzbekistan since then."

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

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

He sounded more petulant than he really was. He had this tight feeling in his shin like he knew this guy—a lot better than he wanted to. He sat and did the Hokey Pokey for a minute. Maybe he was getting intoxicated from her perfume. The place smelled like freshly baked cookies since she came into the room.

"Tell me," he asked pitifully, "did Mister McGraw ever talk about someone named Erwin MacDonald?

She stared. "You know him?" she asked with an evil eye.

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

She looked at him sheepishly. "I'm nobody's cream puff," she lamented, "and I don't want to be in Cuba too long. I hope you can do something about Bob soon."

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

"I can march to Cuba as soon as I pack a book, a straitjacket, and my bag."

"You'd better take a baseball too, just in case. Now about the expenses..." he snorted zestily.

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

She rose from her seat and scooted admiringly out of the office. He stared frenetically after her.

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