The Full Moon Caperby Lewayne L. White |
Table of Contents Part 1 appears in this issue. |
conclusion |
“So, you know anything about these women?” I asked, placing scene photos on the desk.
Wolf looked at the pictures. “Nope. Old ladies aren’t my thing. I like them young and pretty.”
He reached over and gave Gretel’s leg a pat.
“How about Casey?” Dagan asked. “He’s good with a bat.”
Wolf howled. “He’s retired.”
Casey reddened, but said nothing.
“Know anything about Full Moon Financing?” Dagan asked.
Wolf cocked his head. “What?”
“The victims each received calls from Full Moon Financing regarding accounts.”
“Never heard of it,” Wolf said. “What is it?”
“As near as we can tell, it doesn’t really exist.” “Then it has nothing to do with me,” Wolf replied. “I only deal with things I can see, hear, touch, smell and,” he paused to give Gretel a lascivious look. “taste.”
Gretel smiled back. I recognized the smile from high school, too. Buffy and her pals used it when they wanted their boyfriends’ blood to leave their brains.
“Well, I guess you wasted your time,” Wolf said. “And mine. Scat. I have other things to do.”
Gretel’s smile widened, and Wolf added, “Casey, show them out.”
Casey sighed and rose from the desk. He walked with us out of the office and down the stairs.
Dagan and I each fished out our badges and draped them around our necks.
“If it means anything,” I said to Casey when we reached the ground floor, “I thought you got a bad call on the first pitch.”
After a moment I added, “But, everything after that was your fault.”
He shrugged. “Win some, lose some.”
“Why are you working for Wolf?”
Casey shrugged again, then said, “After I struck out, I had an accident. Broke both my hands.”
He showed us his hands. His right had healed very badly.
“I can’t hold a bat anymore. No one would take me, so Wolf hired me to hang around. Said he figured I owed him, because he lost a bundle betting on Mudville.”
Dagan said, “That’s it? You just hang around?”
Casey shrugged. “Everyone knew he had money on that game. Now, he uses me to scare other people who don’t pay.”
“He did that to you?” I asked.
Casey shook his head. “Everyone just assumes he did. Keeps them in line. He doesn’t hurt anyone if he can help it.”
I raised my eyebrows at that. “He’s a wolf.”
“Sure,” Casey replied. “But, dead people can’t pay. Neither can a guy too crippled to work.”
“He really has no idea about Full Moon or the old ladies?”
Casey shrugged. “Look, I doubt you’ll believe me, but if he did them, he’d say so just to annoy you. He’s nearly untouchable.”
“Thanks for the help,” I said, extending my hand to shake his.
Casey glanced down, surprised. He shook, using his mangled right hand, then turned to Dagan, who also shook his hand.
We opened the front door, and sunlight streamed in.
The light reflected off our badges, and Casey said, “Why’d you take those off? He knew you were cops.”
Dagan looked at Casey. “Gretel told us Wolf wouldn’t let us up with them on.”
Casey scowled. “He wouldn’t care. He’d get a kick out of knowing you might be reading his mind. Teasing cops is his hobby.”
Dagan looked at me, then back to Casey. “So, he didn’t tell Gretel to have us ditch them?”
“I’ve been in the office with Wolf all day. If he told Gretel that, I’d know about it.”
“Thanks again, Casey,” I said. “We appreciate it.”
“Anything for a fan,” he said, and gave me a wink.
We walked past the coyotes and out to our unmarked.
As soon as we were on the road, I turned to Dagan, “We were wearing the badges when we talked to Casey. If he’s lying, I didn’t sense it.”
Dagan nodded. “Let’s look at Gretel.”
After calling Central, he said, “I didn’t know you were into baseball.”
I shrugged. “When I was a kid, by dad, brother, and I watched games on the weekends. Even years later, I’d turn on a game and know that they were probably watching it, too. It felt like we were all still together.”
I sighed. “When I first came to Fairy Tale Land, it seemed too weird. I didn’t think I was going to adjust.”
Dagan nodded.
“I found out they played baseball here, so I went to a game. Mudville vs. Thunderclap, I think. Anyway, Mudville came from way behind to win. Casey batted the homer that turned it around.”
“So, you became a fan.”
“Eventually,” I replied. “But, I was really ticked when he blew that last game. He was showing off.”
“But, you still kind of like him don’t you?”
“Shut up,” I said, punching his shoulder.
By the time we hit Central, the dwarves had a Gretel file waiting on our desk. It wasn’t very thick, but it was spicy.
Dagan whistled, then read from her rap sheet. “Counts for soliciting, dealing, assault.”
He sat up, grabbed his notebook from the desk.
“What?”
He raised a finger for quiet as he scanned his notes.
“We have a link.”
“How?”
Dagan turned the arrest sheet toward me. “See this assault with intent? Victim’s name is Pumpkineater.”
I nodded. “And?”
“Hubbard. Before she married Old Father Hubbard, she was married to Peter Pumpkineater’s brother, Paul. Several years ago, Gretel attacked her with a bat.”
I scanned the arrest reports. “No reason given?”
“Nothing on here,” Dagan said. “I’m going to give the responding officers a call. See what they say.”
I nodded and took the Gretel file from him.
He started calling around, and I kept reading.
Soon, I was on the phone, too.
We both hung up and looked at each other.
“Rock, Paper, Scissors,” I said.
We threw.
Dagan got Rock. I got Scissors.
“Hah,” he said. “I go first. But to prevent confusion I’m going to call her Hubbard instead of Pumpkineater. Responding officer named Sunday caught the Hubbard call. Sunday said Gretel was a raving nutter. Smashed up the house while screaming ‘I owe you. I owe you’.”
“She owed her?”
Dagan nodded. “As the cops dragged her away Gretel kept yelling that Hubbard killed her brother, Hansel. Once Gretel got to lock-up, she lawyered up, got a public defender, and went down for assault with intent.”
“What about the brother?”
“Sunday said that he was beaten to death with a baseball bat. No clues. No arrests. Hubbard denied even knowing the girl.”
I smiled.
“What?” Dagan asked.
“She lied,” I said, waving notes I’d taken during my own call. “She probably knew the kids because she knew lots of kids.”
I continued. “According to this court reporter I know, Paul Pumpkineater ran a film company for a specialized clientele. The company’s cover was as producers of travel and vacation movies. They called it Full Moon Fantasy Films.”
Dagan’s eyes widened.
I nodded. “Yep. Paul went down for it, but the wife walked. Claimed she had no idea he was doing that sort of thing. She divorced him while he was in jail, married Hubbard, and moved away.”
“You think Gretel was one of their actors?”
“The more I read in her file, the more I suspect it,” I said.
“I also found a missing persons report on Hansel and Gretel. Their father filed it after the kids went for a walk in the woods, and didn’t come back. He died before they re-surfaced.”
“The interesting thing is, before he was even in the ground his widow immediately moved to have Hansel and Gretel declared dead. Seems she expected to inherit some money as a result.”
Dagan shook his head. “How do you do that to your kids?”
“Must have been easier because they weren’t hers. She was Hansel and Gretel’s stepmother and has a record of marrying guys with money and children. First Gretel’s dad, who dies penniless searching for his kids. Then some guy from Hamelin whose children also went for walk and didn’t come back. Then...”
I paused for effect.
“Mr. Shoe,” Dagan said.
“You cheater. You read my mind.”
He smiled. “Nope. Pure police work.”
“Whatever,” I said. “So now we have a dead woman who used to make movies with little children.”
“And another dead woman who keeps losing her husband’s children,” Dagan added.
“And finally we have yet another woman who knows the other two, and tried to kill one,” I said. “Who probably called each of them and left messages about settling accounts,” Dagan finished.
“Let’s snatch up her up for a chat,” I said, and we headed for the Predator Social Club.
The coyotes didn’t bother to speak as we walked through the door a few minutes later. We went up the stairs to Wolf’s office and knocked.
“Wolf, open up!” Dagan yelled. “We need to talk to Gretel.”
The doors flew open and Wolf stormed out with Casey close behind.
“Well, you can’t. She’s not here. She’s out shopping.”
“For what?” I snapped. “A new bat?”
“Now you think she did your old ladies?”
“We just want to ask her some questions,” Dagan replied.
“Right,” snorted Wolf. “Cop talk for ‘we’re going to railroad you’.”
I grabbed a handful of fur. “Look, Wolf. She’s killed at least two people...”
Of the three people involved in the movie business.
Dagan said, “Pumpkineater.”
I released Wolf’s fur and headed for the stairs. “Where the hell is he?”
Dagan called dispatch on the run.
We hit the unmarked, I fired up the engine, and Central came back with a location on Paul Pumpkineater.
“He’s at Termite Terrace,” Dagan said, buckling his belt. “No phone, but it’s just a couple minutes away from here.”
We roared away from the Predator, and with handful of turns screeched up to a flop house. Flying from the car, we burst into the lobby.
“Blonde woman,” I gasped. “Paul Pumpkineater.” The twitchy guy at the counter pointed upstairs, “2B.”
We hit the stairs, sidearms drawn. An eternity later, we went through the door onto the second floor.
Howls echoed down the hall, and we rushed for 2B screaming “FTPD!”
I kicked in the door, yelling, “Drop the weapon!”
But, she didn’t.
Spinning from the crumpled form of Paul Pumpkineater, Gretel swung a bloody Louisville Slugger at my head.
I blocked with an arm and felt a bone break. Then I ricocheted off the wall and went down.
Dagan crashed into Gretel and they dropped in a tangle atop Pumpkineater. Gretel thrashed and screamed, Dagan wrestled to get a cuff on her, and Pumpkineater wailed beneath them.
Gretel broke free and started for the door.
I grabbed the discarded bat and chopped it across her knees. She dropped, and Dagan pinned her.
He cuffed her, recited her rights, then turned to me.
I cradled my arm and glared at Gretel.
“If her kneecaps were baseballs,” Dagan said. “You’d have nailed a pair of homers.”
I made an indecent gesture with my good hand, then called for assistance.
Emergency Medical Witches arrived almost immediately, followed by uniform and plain-clothes cops. When we’d called Central en route, they’d all been dispatched in anticipation. Gretel, Pumpkineater, and I all got rides to Witches of Mercy.
A little bit of griping on my part, some blue glowing fingertips from a warlock, and my arm started mending. Unfortunately, healing spells don’t work instantly like they do in the movies. My arm was set, but it would still take a few days to fully heal. As a bonus, it would ache the whole time.
I sat grumbling in an exam room when Dagan arrived.
“Everyone decent?”
“No,” I growled. “What happened?”
“How’s your arm?”
“Hurts. What happened?”
Dagan grinned. “Gretel did the old ladies. Pumpkineater told her where to find them.” “He sent Gretel after them because he went down on the kiddie charges alone,” I said.
Dagan nodded. “One of the dwarves got the dirt on Full Moon Financing. Pumpkineater set up the agency to clean the money he expected to get by blackmailing the women. Apparently he chose Gretel to help because he figured her connection to Wolf would intimidate them.”
“Instead of scaring them into paying, Gretel just whacked them,” I finished.
Dagan nodded again. “She’s confessed everything because she feels justified.”
“It’s hard to mourn the loss of people who abuse children,” I said.
He shrugged. “Our job’s finding the bad guys. After that...”
I sighed. “Speaking of kids, what’s going to happen to the Shoe children?” “Child Services Sprites have them. CSS is trying to find someone to take them all, but they’ll probably get split up.”
I banged my splint against the bedrail, and immediately regretted it.
“Careful,” said another voice. “You’ll end up with a gimpy hand like mine.”
Dagan and I turned toward the doorway.
Casey stood holding a colorful bouquet. “Wolf heard you were in the hospital.”
And he sent you to deliver flowers?”
“He told me to send some,” Casey replied. “I decided to bring them myself.”
Dagan coughed, then said, “Well, I better get back to Central and do the paperwork. See you, Ace.”
Dagan and Casey exchanged nods, then Casey walked toward the gurney, extending the flowers. “Is it considered a bribe if you receive a bouquet from an suspected underworld figure?”
“If he spent more than $2.99.”
“He spent more than $2.99.”
“So I’ll share them with everyone in the squad.”
Casey withdrew a couple tickets from his pocket. “You going to share these, too?”
“What are they?”
“Tickets to Saturday’s Mudville game. Technically they’re free, since they comp former players. But, their value exceeds $2.99.”
“I’ll risk it. I haven’t seen a Mudville game since...”
“Since Flynn and Blake kept us in the running and my ego sunk us,” Casey finished.
“I wasn’t going to say that, but, yeah.”
Casey smiled. “Win some, lose some.”
Story of my life.
Copyright © 2005 by Lewayne L. White
