I turned to page two, found a story about the previous night’s art auction, in which the Ricketts zombie puppies painting sold to a private collector for two hundred thousand dollars. Sheyenne had received the call that morning while I was at the Hope & Salvation mission; she calculated that Chambeaux & Deyer’s one-third commission would be enough to pay off my outstanding funeral expenses and also provide ample operating cash for the business.
Below the story, a quarter-page ad gushed about the imminent release of JLPN’s new Fresh Loam product line, posting a toll-free number for a full range of free samples.
Seeing me at the counter, Albert shuffled around the kitchen wall and stepped up to me, swaying on his feet. I could smell the aroma around him, but I wasn’t one to complain.
“What’s the lunch special today, Albert?” I asked.
“Lunch special,” was all he slurred.
“Different from yesterday’s?”
“Lunch special.”
“Sounds good. I’ll have that—the zombie special. And a cup of black coffee.”
Next to me, without a word, the hunchback turned the page of his newspaper and studied the classified ads.
Albert shuffled off without acknowledging me, but I knew my order had lodged somewhere in what was left of his brain. He returned a few minutes later with a mug of coffee that sloshed on the counter when he set it down. Ghouls weren’t known for their social graces or their dexterity. Neither were zombies, but I was glad to be on the high-functioning end of the spectrum. I lifted the cup and took a sip of coffee. It tasted flat and bitter at the same time; maybe it was me, maybe it was the coffee.
Now that Sheyenne had compiled my old cases, I took the time to ponder them while I waited for the food, mulling over what person, event, or bit of data might be connected to my own murder.
Back at the corner booth with the necromancers, Esther the waitress let out a howl of laughter loud enough that two werewolves at another table perked up before returning to their conversation. I glanced over, and one of the bald, sallow wizards looked at me. He could move one eye independently of the other, but when I met his gaze and didn’t flinch, the eyeball drifted back to the harpy waitress.
The necromancers’ guild didn’t like me either. About five years ago, an ambitious rabbi had brought a clay golem to life by placing an Amulet of Animation (where do they get these names?) on the golem’s chest. When a necromancer stole the amulet—thereby rendering the golem lifeless—the rabbi hired me to get it back. Pure detective work.
Robin, meanwhile, got on her legal high horse over the crime and as soon as I identified the perpetrator, she demanded that the DA file murder charges against the necromancer, because by stealing the Amulet of Animation, he had robbed the golem of life. The rabbi added his two cents to the case, insisting that the Amulet itself was an extremely valuable object, and he wanted grand theft added to the charges against the necromancer.
It seemed an open-and-shut case. Everything was going fine until I succeeded in stealing back the Amulet. (Definitely not an evening I would like to repeat; necromancers are abysmal housekeepers.) I retrieved the Amulet, and Robin presented the evidence to Judge Gemma Hawkins, who took one look at the mystical artifact and determined that it was mere cheap costume jewelry made of plastic and tin with gold paint. Worth about ten bucks. Grand theft charges dismissed.
Also, once the Amulet of Animation was restored to the golem’s chest, he came back to life again, good as new. So the judge dropped the murder charge as well: no victim.
But Robin refused to let the case go—Justice had to be served. She submitted a succession of post-trial motions. She filed a suit on behalf of the golem for personal injury and negligent infliction of emotional distress, which the judge dismissed because she could not rule that the golem was a “person.” Next, Robin demanded monetary damages to reimburse the rabbi for the lost value of the golem’s services during the days when he was no longer animated. In exasperation, Judge Hawkins relented; she reprimanded the necromancer and made him pay a small fine, which Robin then appealed for a higher amount.
I had the easy part. All I did was break into a necromancer’s lair in the middle of the night and steal a sacred object....
My blue plate special arrived. Sliced grayish meat swimming in an unappetizing sauce that had already congealed enough to form scabs. When Albert set down the plate, one of the maggots dropped out of his nose and into the gravy.
Not what I had ordered. “I think you gave me the ghoul special, Albert.”
He looked down, focused on the food. “Sorry.” He took it away.
Next to me, the hunchback was reading the sports scores.
“How did Notre Dame do?” I asked.
He slowly turned and looked at me through his round spectacles. “Do you have any idea how many times I’ve heard that joke?”
“Sorry, I’m a detective, not a comedian.”
When Albert brought back the correct plate, I concentrated on my lunch, cutting a chunk of meat and popping it into my mouth, chewing as I considered the cases again. Somehow I couldn’t believe that the rabbi or even the necromancer had any motive to shoot me. One down. Only about ninety-nine more cases to go through.
I finished my lunch in a hurry, paid the tab at the cash register, and returned to the counter to leave a two-dollar tip for Esther, even though she hadn’t spoken a word to me. Maybe that was why I did leave her a tip.
I left the diner and headed out into the streets. I had work to do that afternoon.
Chapter 16
That afternoon I turned my attention to investigating Miranda Jekyll’s case, revisiting my previous surveillance of her husband back when I was a living, breathing private eye. I had no doubt the man was scum, but so were a lot of people. It isn’t always illegal. I had to catch him at something else.
The corporate president and CEO hadn’t left his offices in two days, except to be transported in his black limo back and forth from the factory and the Jekyll mansion in a high-rent, guarded area outside the Unnatural Quarter. Earlier in the case, I had shadowed Jekyll for weeks to catch him going out on his extracurricular expeditions. (He was a singularly uninteresting man.)
This time, I wanted to get my ducks in a row before I started shooting.
Robin was preoccupied in her office writing a brief, so I told Sheyenne where I was going, then borrowed the keys to Robin’s car.
Since I live and work in the Quarter, where most of my clients are, I rarely need to drive. However, the municipal dump is on the outskirts of the city, so I drove.