Fiction Thursdays!

Hi, gang! Going forward on this blog I was thinking about running stories and such every Thursday. Found an old book of mine, a very early effort that never went anywhere, but I thought I could spiff it up and serialize it.

Haven't started that yet, but I also found this old chestnut I thought I'd share with you today.

CLOAK AND ÉCLAIR

by Frederick Key

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The sweat was hot on my brow as I turned the corner and stopped. Hands shaking, I let a cig. Don't show it, I told myself. If you show your nerves, you're a dead man. 

My opponent was smooth, though. I didn't know if he was still following. I didn't dare turn to look. That would reveal my face. Be cool, I told myself. It's just too important.

The big boys play for keeps in this business. Not a racket for the weak-kneed. Or the fainthearted. The lily-livered do better than you might think. But the pigeon-toed, forget it.

I had to keep moving. I had taken enough chances, and it was getting so every nerve in my body was doing the mambo. Had to give this guy the slip but good.

I darted into the next door along the Strasseheidelbergen. Took the rattling elevator to the second floor and broke into the fourth apartment along the hall. "Hi, honey," I said, kissing the Teutonic woman inside. Before she could scream I jumped out the window onto the roof of a passing bus. Leaping from bus to moving van to box truck to cement mixer (that kept me on my toes!), I managed to get across town. Then I shinnied down a lamppost, flagged a cab, handed the driver a fistful of counterfeit Euros, and said, "Airport! Schnell!" Then I rolled out the passenger side as he took off. I did that with other cabs, sending them to museums, theaters, massage parlors, and the zoo. That last one looked like he could use an outing. Soon I was all alone on the Himmelstrasse except for a potted fern, which I kicked over, sharply. Then I started for the shop. 

It was two blocks away, so to be safe, I walked 67. When I finished the hike the sweat on my brow was still hot. I should see a specialist about that. But I had made it, and I hadn't given away its location. It stood before me like a pub before a thirsty footballer. 

Ye Olde Spye Shoppe said the sign, cleverly covered in cloaks and daggers. Strips of microfilm dangled around the window, and track lighting illuminated racks of guns and knives. 

The boys had done a swell job. 

I entered quickly, jingling a little bell on the door. A customer at the counter was talking to the clerk, a man in a slouch hat and trench coat, his face hidden in shadows. "Let me have half a dozen more Uzis," said the customer, "I like the action on those."

"Yeah," whispered the spy.

"Oh, and if you have any more of the poison-needle umbrellas? No? Too bad. The kids loved them. You know how they are." The customer sighed. "You hate to spoil them, but the look on their faces when you hand them a Sig Sauer P238, or an AK-47 with the pin filed down? Priceless. For Christmas they got a DIY kit with cyanide capsules and stuff. Well, that's what being a dad is all about."

"Yeah."

"Bless their little hearts. Okay, just give me the Uzis, with a couple of those silencers, and how about a dozen garrotes? We're expecting company tonight."

"Yeah."

The man behind the counter made up the bundle and said, "'The ringworms are active in the fall.'"

"'But the wombat always crawls to its nest,'" said the customer with a chuckle, holding out some unmarked bills. 

Transaction completed, the customer left. We were alone. 

"'I came in like a wrecking ball,'" said the man. 

"'When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie,'" I said, agitated. I hate small talk when I'm in a hurry. "Come on, it's me."

"I thought so, Simple," said the spy, the one they call the Pieman. "Haven't seen you since..."

"Ludlow, yeah," I said. "Haven't got all day and I've wasted enough time. Walking 67 blocks takes a while. You know what I'm here for."

"Yeah, got the word from the Doughboy," he said, lowering his voice and looking around. "But he didn't talk price. You want to play, you got to pay."

"You know me, Pieman! I'm good for it!"

"Shh!" he shushed. "Call me Cobra! You want to blow my cover?"

"Sorry. I got all upset."

"I know. Low blood sugar. Just remember that I got this." He opened his trench coat a tad and I saw a flash of Boston cream -- his trademark. "Don't forget how I got my name, Simple. I'd hate to use it on an old friend."

"Sure, I got it. But since when do you talk money with me?"

"Got to be cash up front, Simple. Getting too hot around here. Last week they raided a Jack-in-the-Box on Schnitzicugelfurstrasse. Shot the clown in the throat. I might have go deep cover on short notice. That takes cash."

"I got cash."

"No coupons, either."

"Groupons?"

"Come on."

"All right." I reached in my inside pocket and pulled out a wad of American dollars. 

Pieman nodded. "Ten big ones," he said.

I grimaced, but I dropped the cash on the counter. "You want to count it?"

"I trust you," he said, whipping the money away. "I'll get the merch. You want it tied up with the red and white string?"

"You think I'm crazy?"

"Just joking. I'll put 'em in an ammo box."

He froze. Behind me the bell on the door tinkled again. 

I casually flung an eye over my shoulder. 

It was him! The one-kidneyed man! 

How could he have known? No one could have followed me. He must have had every spy in the city looking for me. Unless -- the potted fern! Should have kicked it harder. Damn!

"Meester Cobra?" said the stringy voice of my adversary. "You are the owner of thees estableeeeeshment?" He was covering his Canadian accent with -- actually, I don't know what that was supposed to be. Something European, I guess. 

"'The mules are in the garden,'" said the Pieman.

"Oh, excuse me. 'The lip balm is singing pianissimo.' Better, ja? Nice place here, MEEESTER Cobra. Not a typical spy store, though." He wandered past racks of fake passports and false noses while I turned my face away and the hot sweat started its thing again. I hate these cat-and-mouse games.

"You buyin' or tryin'?" asked the Pieman, cool as the breeze off Lake Schusluchshuchluchee. 

"Funny," said the one-kidneyed man, "it smells less like a spy shoppe and more like..."

I shifted my weight so I could leap for the exit.

"...like a...flower shop? Nein..."

He's playing with us, using flower for flour! Canadians are mean!

"No, it smells like... like..." 

I leaned forward. 

"A BAKERY!" he shouted, and pulled a communicator from his pocket. 

He never made it. The Pieman's Boston cream nailed him between the I's. Literally, into the communicator he was saying, "I," and after he got hit he said "I" again and fell down like his strings were cut. 

"Now you've done it," I spat. "The Health Police will be here in seconds!"

"And find no one!" said the Pieman. "Here, take these." He handed me my éclairs, packed as promised in an ammo box marked DANGER: LIVE AMMUNITION. "Fresh from the oven," he said. 

"Where will you go next?" I said. 

"Doughboy will hear from me," he said. "One thing you can count on with bakers. No matter how often we're beaten, how many times we get burned, we always rise again. We're kneaded."

He got out through the back door before I could punch him. 

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