The Shrinking Nuts Case Read online

CHAPTER 16

  MICKS

  “Hey! This ain’t the way to Henry’s house,” I told Vinnie. I hadn’t been paying very close attention to where he was driving us. Actually, I was tired and trying to catch a few zees. When I woke up he was driving us through the warehouse district near the river, miles from Henry’s place.

  “I know it ain’t,” replied Vinnie. “Henry’s stuff ain’t at Henry’s no more.”

  “It ain’t?”

  “No. We moved it last night for safe-keeping.”

  He didn’t explain further. I like that in a guy. Guys that yap-yap-yap about everything and nothing, like women do, are a big pain. If I wanted to hear that kind of fake bullshit from a guy I'd be watching one of those daytime soaps on TV.

  A minute later we were pulling up to the backdoor of what looked like a deserted warehouse. As we approached it the big door slid up and we drove in. It slammed shut in back of us, cutting off the two cars that were following us. Pretty nifty.

  There were mountains of wooden crates and cardboard boxes of assorted sizes inside. I also noticed about a dozen toughs with automatic rifles pointed at us. We got out of the car. The smell hit me just as I noticed that the toughs were all wearing necklaces strung with garlic. Lots of garlic. Too much garlic. It stunk and it looked goofy and unnatural, to see mob tough guys wearing necklaces.

  “I told them about what Elaine said about garlic,” Vinnie explained.

  They must have taken it really seriously. While guns were kept pointed at us, a big bowl of crushed garlic was shoved in front of Vinnie, and then me, obviously as some sort of test. My face probably changed color, but the smell wasn’t quite unbearable. Good thing, because they might have shot me if it was. “Whew!” I exclaimed, my eyes watering, “couldn’t we all just eat an Italian meal?”

  “Hope to get to that later,” said Vinnie, as he led through a maze of crates. “With extra garlic.”

  “Isn’t this garlic business jumping the gun just a little? Maybe the elves love the stuff.”

  “Not so,” said Vinnie. “Some of the boys just tried it a few minutes ago on an elf and a spooked cop.”

  “And it worked?”

  “The elf totally lost its cool, turned green and puked.”

  “And then?”

  “Don’t know. One of the boys got excited and popped him with some silver bullets. Those worked real good too.” He gave me a big toothy smile.

  “And the cop?”

  “Garlic didn’t do much to the cop until we force-fed him a couple of cloves. Then he came around to his usual good natured cop-self. We gave him some garlic and some Italian recipes and sent the guy home.”

  “So the garlic works then?”

  “Seems to. Fresh garlic and garlic juice seem to work better than powdered. We’re hoping we’ll learn even more from all this stuff we got from the banker’s place.”

  We came to a clearing in the middle of the warehouse, where we walked into a big plastic tent. Inside it a couple dozen men and women in white lab coats were busily going through stacks of furniture, paper, clothes and assorted trash. I guess it was Henry’s stuff, but trash being trash it could have just as well come from my closet, for all I could tell, except for the blood and guts on some of it.

  They wore rubber gloves and were using magnifying glasses, microscopes, and other tools to go through Henry’s stuff. From time to time one of them got excited about something and yapped about it with a buddy and put it in a little plastic bag, but for the most part they were quietly working their way through everything. “Who are the geeks?” I asked.

  “This is our forensics team in action,” Vinnie explained. “Hey Doctor Mike, anything interesting yet?”

  An old man in a white lab coat stepped out from the mob of geeks. “Not yet, Mr. V. Physical retrieval, categorization, and preservation are the first steps. Is this young man with the nifty white fedora Jake Simon?"

  "It is," I said. I tried to shake his hand but he backed off, waving me away from his gloved hands.

  "So what have you got?" Vinnie asked the geek.

  "Nothing of obvious significance stands out so far. At least nothing is recognizable as a case-breaker. We’ll give you a daily report and rely on your feedback to help focus our efforts better.”

  I doubted it. These geeks would study this stuff for years probably, and then write a fancy report that didn’t help anything. That, in a nutshell, is what geeks do. It’s a living, I suppose, but that sort of job would drive most regular folks crazy. “What's over here?” I asked. Something made me want to look at a little pile of cards and papers laid out on a card table.

  "That's the contents of the victim's wallet and pockets, Mr. Simon," Mike the geek explained.

  Right, I could see that. It was Henry's driver's license, credit cards, ATM receipts, and other odds and ends. All of this should have been at the police station, of course, but I wasn’t going to ask any questions about that. Before I could reach for them Mike had me put on rubber gloves like his, then I was allowed to look through them. I didn't pay much attention to most of it, until I found a little folded up sheet of pink paper. I don’t know how, but I knew at once it was the thing I was looking for. "This is it," I announced, even before I unfolded it.

  "What is it?” asked Vinnie.

  "A note from Margie Wainwright to Henry," I said, after glancing at it. I held it out for Vinnie to read. "I hope you have a good vacation, Henry," is all that it said, and then Margie had signed it.

  "What's the big deal about that?" asked Vinnie.

  "I don't know, but I knew this was here, before I even looked. I somehow knew it was here and important!"

  "Your troll curse?"

  "I guess so." That was crazy, but what else could explain it?

  "Do you feel drawn to anything else here?" Mike gestured with his hands at the piles of stuff that surrounded us.

  I looked around, but sensed nothing. "I suppose not."

  "The fact that you were drawn to that little note, and not to anything else, may be significant," he suggested, as he took the note from me. “I’ll run some tests on it.”

  "Do that," said Vinnie, "but I don't think you'll find nothing. It came from that Wainwright broad; that might be the point. It ain't her words or finger prints or DNA that are important. She's cursed or something too, according to the elves, and this about cinches it. Jake here could find the paper because of his curse, because her curse cursed it."

  Margie Wainwright? She was a client, so I should have kept in touch with her better. Fifty bucks a day is fifty bucks a day. But mostly I had Elaine keeping in touch with her instead of me. Why, as usually I liked keeping in closer touch with good looking clients, I didn’t know. The truth is I always had a funny feeling about Margie. I felt drawn to her in a weird sort of way, besides the usual I mean. There was something strange about her, and that bothered me. I wasn’t too anxious to see her now, but what the hell. "I suppose we should go talk with her," I said, without much enthusiasm.

  Vinnie noticed. "What's the matter Jake, I hear she has really nice legs and cleavage."

  Any discussion we might have had about her legs and other nifty attributes was cut short by one of the mob toughs running up to Vinnie. "There's a visitor with a weird black cat that just came to the front door, and he wants to see Mr. Simon. A big ugly guy by the name of Grogorath.”

  “What’s weird about the cat?” asked Vinnie.

  The tough looked uneasy. “The creepy little son-of-a-bitch can talk. The damn cat says it wants to see Jake too."

  "Son-of-a-bitch!" exclaimed Vinnie. "It's your old friend the giant, Jake, and Prince. Bring the big fella up to the office, but keep a close eye on him, boys. And let the cat come too, if he tells you his name is Prince. Prince is the Falconie Family cat, so treat him real, REAL special."

  We walked to the front of the warehouse, up some metal stairs, and into a small office. A minute later, two toughs escorted the big guy in. They had his hands tied together
in front of him with stout rope. Prince followed them in, prancing with tail pointed high in the air, looking as cocky as ever.

  "Hello, Mr. Jake, nice hat," Grog said, smiling and showing off his rotten teeth. He stunk to high heaven. I hadn’t seen him since the cops carted him off from Grisim’s place last week, and I can’t say that I was too happy to see him again now. For one thing he was wearing his white fedora, and maybe that sort of made my white fedora seem nasty by association. He also wore a tee-shirt and blue-jean overalls, matching what the troll wore the last time I saw him. They must have shopped together at the same big and tall dude clothing store.

  "He gobbled down a couple pounds of raw garlic when we showed it to him," said one of the toughs, grinning. “He’s crazy about the stuff. Maybe he’s an Italian giant.”

  Grog's smile deepened. "Good food. Make Grog big and strong." Over the next few seconds everyone watched in astonishment as Grog, already immense, grew several inches taller, to nearly eight feet tall and maybe six to eight hundred pounds. Conveniently his clothes including the hat grew with him. The ropes around his growing wrists snapped off, and the mob toughs watching nervously leveled their guns at the big guy.

  Vinnie waved them off. "Take it easy boys; Grog here is a troll friend like us."

  “Yes, me be troll friend.” The smile got even bigger, and then faded. “Big Mick unhappy when troll friend Jake go far away.” His smile got bigger. “Happy when he come back. Happy that Jake wear troll hat.” The smile disappeared. “Unhappy when Jake not find Mick. Grog look for Jake, find cat.” The smile returned. “Nice cat want to find Jake too, so cat come with Grog.”

  Peachy keen. The giant and the cat, a couple of my very favorite folks, come to see me.

  “Grog happy he help troll friend Jake now.” He grinned widely, showing off his big rotten, stinking teeth.

  “How did you get past the cops and the elves?” I asked.

  “Elves not like daytime sun so much. Mick give Grog nice gift so Grog fool others.” Grog reached under his vest. In an instant the bastard simply disappeared! He was there, and then he wasn’t, I kid you not!

  “What the fuck!” exclaimed Vinnie.

  The mob toughs were soon going nuts looking high and low, behind chairs and such, pointing their guns here and there.

  A couple seconds later Grog re-appeared exactly where he had disappeared from. He hadn’t gone anyplace at all, he just made himself invisible! “Shi-i-t,” I remarked. “I could use a trick like that!” I could have used it on my trip to Arizona. Hell, I’d be on a beach in Hawaii by now, watching the bikini clad babes, or invisible in their dressing rooms, watching them become bikini unclad. What a deal!

  “Jake job be to find Mick,” the giant stated. “Jake find Mick now?”

  “Yes,” said Prince. The cat jumped up onto Grog’s wide shoulders. “Jake find Mick and then find Elaine.”

  “Is good,” said Grog, as he pet the cat with a huge hand that was as big as the cat. “Cats be troll friends. Elves not like cats, not like black cats most. Black cats confuse evil magic.”

  “Grog, I don’t understand,” I said, ignoring the silly cat business. “You just came from Mick.”

  “Yes.”

  “So you already know where he is?”

  “Yes.”

  “So why do you need me to find him?”

  “Jake job be to find lost Mick.”

  “Jake dumb,” interjected Prince.

  I wished the damn moron cat would shut up; trying to talk with just a moron giant was tough enough. I looked at Vinnie, who shrugged, then asked the obvious question himself. “Why does Jake need to find Mick?”

  “Mick need Mick.”

  “What the fuck does that mean?” demanded Vinnie. "Some kind of psychology crap?"

  “Need one Mick.”

  “One is plenty, that’s for sure,” I agreed.

  “Yes,” agreed Grog, nodding and grinning, as though I finally understood. I didn’t.

  “This troll talk ain’t getting us no place,” said Vinnie. “Did you guys take down Henry the banker?”

  Blank grinning stare from the giant.

  “You know, did you rub him out?”

  Slack-jawed confusion from Grog.

  “Grog dumb,” noted Prince.

  Even Vinnie was losing his famous patience. “Did - you - or - Mick – whack - Henry - the – banker?” he asked slowly.

  The big guy shook his head no. “We see his home, see him dead. Mick say elves kill little old bank man so he not help Mick. Henry be the bank man we look for, man who bring Mick to Source that give him note. Note wake up Mick. Mick think Henry help Mick find Source and Mick. But then Henry be dead. Dead be full dead in this world, true end of being alive. Henry not help Mick again, ever.”

  “What’s a source?” I asked. Mick had used the term earlier. “The source of what?”

  “Magic Source of power for Mick, so Mick can open door big, let Mick out.”

  “Door?” I asked.

  “Door to this nice world from bad place. Mick and Grog use door to come to this world. But door opens again and again now, using Source power and Mick, twisted by Elves' spell. Closes again and again, but opens again and again. Many elves and dwarves come through door again and again. That be bad. Big bad.”

  “Why are the elves after you and Mick?” Vinnie asked.

  “Elves be bad. Elves want to take Mick and Grog back to bad place.”

  Vinnie’s eyes lit up. “You guys are escaped cons! It’s like the newspapers say! The elves had you in their jail and you escaped!”

  “Yes,” said Grog, grinning.

  “What did you guys do? You know, to be in jail?” I asked.

  “Mick be troll, Grog be giant, and elves be elves."

  “And boys will be boys,” I concluded. “But I still need to know what Mick wants me to do.”

  “Jake job be to find Mick. Then Mick find Jake and Mick be Mick.”

  I shook my head. “OK, so how do I find Mick?”

  “Jake close eyes. Use power Mick give you. Feel where is Mick. Know where Mick is.”

  “Why don’t you just tell me where he is? You just left him!”

  “Yes. No.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Mick give you his gift to find Mick. Now Mick cannot find Mick. Grog cannot find Mick. Only Jake can find Mick. Jake must find Mick.”

  “Why find Mick?” asked Vinnie, again.

  “So Mick be one Mick.”

  “Wait!” I said. I just had a crazy idea. “Is there more than one Mick?”

  “Less than one Mick,” Grog said.

  It wasn’t exactly the answer I expected, but then again maybe it helped explain things even more.

  “Mick is small, you mean,” said Vinnie. “If he eats garlic will he get big and strong again like you?”

  “No, Mick need Mick. Garlic help only little bit.”

  The crazy idea was still jelling in my head. “Is the Mick I should look for a little Mick?”

  “Yes. Little Mick.”

  “How big?”

  Grog held up his little finger. “Big as mouse.”

  He couldn’t have meant that, Vinnie must have figured. “Big as a house?” he asked.

  “Mouse,” said Prince. “M-O-U-S-E.” The damn cat could spell, or at least he could spell mouse! But then being a cat he would know about mice, right?

  “Big like this,” said Grog, as he wiggled his little finger and looked at it.

  “Big as your little finger?” I asked.

  “Yes.”

  “What the hell?” asked Vinnie, dumbfounded.

  Me, I was smiling. Lights lit, bells rang. It all fit. “The figurine,” I explained. “The thing Henry got from the Indians in Arizona. The thing that big Mick needs so he will be whole again. The thing the elves want. It’s a little part of Mick that broke out of that elf prison and came to this world a long time ago. Hundreds of years ago maybe. There was only enough power for a tin
y bit of the troll to escape. Little Mick looked for more power in this world and finally found a source of magic power strong enough to help him get big Mick and his buddy Grog out of the elf jail too. Am I right, Grog?”

  The big guy nodded and grinned yet wider, apparently as happy as we were to at last have gotten somewhere.

  “Jake slow,” remarked Prince.

  “You find now?” Grog asked. “Find Mick?”

  “How?”

  “Close eyes and make brain empty.”

  No problem, I figured; I do that all the time, even with eyes open. I closed my eyes. My brain was about as empty as I could make it, and still nothing happened. “Shit,” I remarked. “Nothing at all.”

  Grog’s smile disappeared. “Jake no see where is Mick?”

  “No. Sorry.”

  The big guy's legs seemed to give in, and he sat down on the floor, hard. "Jake not see Mick!" he lamented. He sounded like he might start crying.

  "What does it mean?" I asked him. "Why can't I see him?"

  He looked up at me with big sad eyes. "Grog not know.” The cat lay down on the giant’s shoulders and took a cat nap, the lazy little bastard.

  They were both going to be a big help, I could tell.

  ****