100 Malicious Little Mysteries

Operative 375 by Gary Brandner

When the creature walked in the office door, Gus Blattner stopped cranking the printer and stared. The apparition wore a trench coat and a thrift-shop fedora pulled low over a pair of orange eyebrows. The eyes and mouth were concealed behind purple shades and an unlikely black moustache.

“Aren’t you supposed to say trick or treat?” said Gus.

With a flourish the trench-coated figure whipped off the hat, glasses, and moustache to reveal a grinning young man with orange hair to match the eyebrows. He stepped to the counter and announced, “I’m Dudley McBean.”

“So?”

“This is the Universal Academy of Investigation, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Gus admitted.

“Well, I’m Dudley McBean,” the young man repeated. “Operative 375.”

Gus wiped his hands across his ink-smudged sweat shirt. “I think you better talk to my partner,” he said and retreated to the rear of the office and into a plywood-partitioned cubicle. Inside, a round-faced man sat at a card table with a pile of envelopes in front of him. He was slitting these open with a nail file and removing cash and checks, which he stacked in tidy piles.

Gus said, “Secret Agent X-9 or somebody like that is out front. I’ve got a terrible feeling it’s one of our students.”

“What does he want here?” asked the man at the desk.

“How would I know? I’m just the muscle in this operation. All I do is crank the stupid machine.”

“Don’t sulk, partner,” the other man said. “You know how important it is that we keep turning out the lesson booklets. I would gladly spell you out at the machine, were it not for my old lacrosse injury. Shoulder stiffens right up.”

“I’d just like to get out of here once in a while, even if it’s only to go to the post office.”

“Now, Gus, the only reason I pick up the mail is because I have to be out anyway making the necessary personal contacts. That is, after all, my specialty. Besides, what difference does it make how we split up the work? The money goes fifty-fifty, and take a look at what came in just today. You never did this good sticking up gas stations.”

“Ah, don’t mind me,” Gus said. “I’m on edge from worrying about Natalie. I think she’s playing games with some other guy. If I could just catch her at it, then I could kill both of them and get it off my mind.”

The other man stood up and walked around the table to clap his partner on the shoulder. “That’s the curse of being married to a beautiful woman,” he sympathized. “While I go out and talk to our visitor, you sit down and count some money. Maybe that will help cheer you up.”

Adjusting his butterfly bow tie, the round-faced man left the cubicle and strode to the counter where Dudley McBean waited, smiling hopefully.

“Good afternoon, my friend. I’m Colonel Homer Fritch. What can I do for you?”

“Pleased to meet you, sir. I’m Dudley McBean.” The young man waited for a reaction, got none, and went on. “Operative 375. From Snohomish. I took your course in how to be a private detective.”

“Of course!” Colonel Fritch exclaimed. “From Snohomish. One of our very best students. What brings you to Los Angeles, Dudley? You do know that our classes are strictly home study?”

“Oh, yes, sir. But now that I’ve completed the course, I wanted to come down in person to pick up my solid bronze investigator badge and handsome embossed diploma. I brought the extra ten dollars for handling, like it said in your ad in Fearless Action magazine.”

The colonel searched the guileless blue eyes for a trace of mockery. Finding none, he said, “I think I can fix you up, young man.” He reached under the counter and brought up a badge in the shape of a shield with an eagle perched aggressively on top. It bore the words Official Private Investigator. Colonel Fritch laid it reverently in front of Dudley. “Wear it with pride,” he said. Reaching down again, he produced a printed sheet of stiff paper. “There wasn’t time to have your name embossed on it, but if I may borrow your pen I’ll take care of that. I have been told I write a very fine hand.”

Dudley passed over a ballpoint pen, and the colonel carefully stroked the young man’s name in the blank space on the diploma. He added a touch of rococo scrollwork and slid it across the counter.

“There you are, my boy, and godspeed back to Sno-qualamie.”

“It’s Snohomish, Colonel Fritch, and I’m not going back.”

“You’re not?”

“No, sir. I figure there are probably more opportunities in the detective business here in Los Angeles than there would be back home.”

“I daresay. Now, if you’ll excuse me...”

“So I’d like to get the free job-placement assistance like it said in your ad.”

“Hmm, yes, right your are. Sharp-eyed lad. Very promising. I’ll take care of that right now.”

The colonel tore a sheet out of a spiral notebook and wrote rapidly:

“There you are, my boy,” he said. “Just take this note to any of the larger detective agencies in town and they’ll have you out on a case before you can say Continental Op.”

“I don’t know how to thank you, Colonel.”

“Tut-tut, lad. Good luck to you and good-bye.”

With the new badge pinned discreetly inside his lapel, Operative 375 cinched up the belt of his trench coat and replaced the hat, shades, and moustache. “Lesson Eight — The Art of Disguise,” he explained, and slipped furtively out of the office.

Colonel Fritch sighed heavily and headed back to the plywood cubicle. Gus Blattner came out to meet him.

“Didn’t you lay it on a little thick?” Gus said.

“It doesn’t do any harm,” the colonel said, “and it made the boy feel good.”

“How will he feel when he finds out that your name at the legitimate detective agencies carries about as much weight as Daffy Duck?”

The colonel shrugged. “I am afraid the young man will be disillusioned, but he will have learned one more valuable lesson — Be Wary of Strangers.”

“That won’t help much when the cops come for us.”

“There is nothing to fear from the police. We have made good, to the letter, on all offers put forth in our advertisement. Try to remember, Gus, that we are honest businessmen, so stop your worrying.”

“Sure, if you say so,” Gus muttered, and resumed cranking the machine.

The next afternoon the colonel and Gus were stuffing handsome embossed diplomas into mailing envelopes when Dudley McBean entered their office again — undisguised this time.

“Hello, there,” the colonel said coolly. “I didn’t expect to see you back here.”

“I think I need more assistance,” Dudley said. “I took my diploma and your personal note to every detective agency in the Yellow Pages. Some of them laughed at me, and the others weren’t that polite.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, my boy, but I’ve done all I can for you.”

“So I decided to go into the business on my own,” Dudley continued, as though there had been no interruption.

“I see. Well, best of luck.” The colonel returned to stuffing diplomas.

“I thought you might want to put up the money to get me started.”

The jaws of Gus Blattner and Colonel Fritch dropped in unison, and they stared at the orange-haired young man. When the colonel found his voice, he said, “What gave you that preposterous idea?”

“It would be a good investment for you,” Dudley said. “I’ve learned a lot about detective work. For instance, how do you think I found your office? All the ad gave was a post office box number.”

Colonel Fritch started to answer, then his eyes grew suddenly thoughtful and he turned to his partner. “Gus,” he said, “how about running down to the stationer’s for some more of these envelopes?”

“What for? We got two boxes in the back.”

“It wouldn’t hurt to have two more.”

“Oh, all right,” Gus grumbled, and walked around the end of the counter and out the door.

When he was alone with Dudley, the colonel asked, “Tell me, my boy, how did you find our office?”

“Lesson Three,” Dudley said proudly, “Shadowing and Surveillance. I waited at the post office until somebody — it turned out to be you — came to pick up the mail from the box. Then I trailed you, just for practice.”

“Very enterprising.”

“But you didn’t come straight here from the post office. You stopped at an apartment on Franklin Avenue where you visited a blonde lady for one hour and twenty-two minutes.”

The colonel dabbed at his forehead with a crisp white handkerchief. “Dudley,” he said, “I have reconsidered and decided to finance you after all. If you will step back into my private office, we will discuss the terms.”

“I sure appreciate that, Colonel Fritch,” the young man said. “Some coincidence, isn’t it, how that blonde lady has the same last name as your partner.”