Dread Brass Shadows

8

Dean didn't want any suggestions He never does, but he doesn't mind having me offer. Then he can turn me down.

I settled at the table. Dean asked, "What was that all about?"

"I'm not sure. Somebody called Lubbock sent her to shake me down for a book."

He frowned. He's mastered the art. His face turns into a badland of shadowed canyons "That fellow who stabbed Miss Tinnie . .

"Yeah."

"There's something going on. Another genius. My place is lousy with them.

"Yeah."

"You going to find out what?"

"Maybe " I didn't have much inclination. The world is full of mysteries Do I have to solve them all? Without even anybody paying me? But I did wonder why Winger had come to me.

Somebody pounded on the front door. I grumbled something about maybe it was time to move. Too many people knew where I lived. Dean said, "That's Mr. Tharpe."

"You can tell from here?"

"I know his knock."

Right. Sure he did. But why argue? Let him have his little fantasies. I headed up the hall..." Whoa!" There was Saucerhead. Inside. "What the hell?"

He looked a little croggled himself. "It just opened up when I knocked." He stared at the door like it would maybe sprout fangs.

Couldn't be. I'd locked it myself. That's a prime rule. There are people on those mean streets dumb enough to drop in. Dumb enough not to worry about the Dead Man. I just sent one packing.

I puzzled it for half a minute before I caught a glimmer of a possibility. "Three geniuses!" Saucerhead scowled, baffled I popped my head into the small front room.

My guest had vanished "Dean!" I'd forgotten her in the excitement of my run and those cozy moments with Winger

"Mr. Garrett?"

"Something's missing." I indicated the small front room. "And Saucerhead found the door open."

Dean looked properly amazed. He went into the room and sniffed around, making sure everything was there. Like it was his own stuff. "The blanket is gone."

She would've taken something. You have to work to attract attention on a TunFaire street, but naked will do it every time

Saucerhead asked, "What's going on?"

"You know as much as I do. Dean, get Mr. Tharpe a beer. I'm going to talk to the Dead Man."

Dean herded Saucerhead toward the kitchen. I dropped in on my permanent guest, who—I sensed before I said a word—had fallen into a surly mood. His natural state. "What's eating you all of a sudden?"

You failed to mention this visitor who has vanished.

"Why should I?" He knew all the comings and goings. He was so disturbed he didn't prance around it. I was unaware of her presence. This is unprecedented. I had not thought it possible. He went off somewhere inside himself, looking for explanations for the impossible.

He was disturbed? I was beside myself. On both sides. All three of me were one breath short of a panic. Somebody could come and go around here without us having any warning?

"This doesn't sound good, Mr. Garrett," Dean said from behind me.

"Not only a genius but a master of understatement." I considered. "She can't have much of a head start. She'll stand out in the crowd. I better catch her."

"Catch who?" Saucerhead asked. So I explained. "Naked women just falling through your door." He sneered. "How do you do it? That don't never happen to me."

"You don't live right. We don't have time to hang around yakking."

"We? You got a pixie in your pocket?"

"You'd be impressed. That is, if you ever saw her. Imagine Tinnie but with a little more in the lung department."

"I wasn't up to much else anyway. Let's go."

But that little weasel of a god who watches out for Garrett's affairs didn't figure I ought to go chasing redheads. No sense of proportion at all.