Ping explodes out of the car like a very small firecracker. Anzia starts trailing her, obviously unaware that she’s royally screwed the pooch, and Ping probably doesn’t care about what the history books say about anything, unless it details methods to savagely murder young anthropologists.
Ping’s car is empty, and a quick look around the area says Bloodtard is long gone. Anzia is about to start reciting from her tablet when Ping grabs it and throws it away.
“You fucking moron,” Ping says. “What the hell were you thinking?”
“I just—”
“No!” snaps Ping. “God dammit, no! You stop speaking! Now! Jesus Christ. Fuck. Fuck me. Fuck.”
Ping storms off, gets on the phone, and I hear her asking Jackson to track the Bloodtard with surveillance cameras. I bet he’ll do it right away, the turdmonkey.
Anzia picks up her tablet, knocks some of the grit off it, and turns it on. It has a big black spot in the top right of the screen, but it’s still just as annoying as ever. She’s crying, the poor kid. Maybe she needs a lollipop.
“Don’t feel bad,” I say. “She’s just jealous because you’re taller.” I eyeball it, shrug. “By a few centimetres, anyway.”
“I…” Anzia sniffles, “I thought I was helping.”
“Kid,” I say, leaning on a nearby car, “in this business, if you’re helping, you’re doing it wrong. We specialize in mediocrity.”
She stares at her tablet, sniffling some more. She doesn’t even look at me, but I can tell she wants me to ask. I refuse to ask, though, on account of it suggesting some sort of sympathy, which I obviously am incapable of feeling.
“Do you want to know what I found out?” she asks, looking up with those damn puppy dog eyes glistening.
“No,” I say.
“The Phoenix and the Scarlet Lemming were lost—”
“Sorry, I mean to say ‘fuck no, shut up.’”
“— in the English Channel in the late eighteenth century. A big storm, everyone onboard died. And it created this… this legend of the curse of Santa Domina. I mean, if you look at this, it’s really amazing. There are no books about Santa Domina. No books on the Scarlet Lemming. It’s a totally undiscovered part of history, and one that we’re on the verge of really exploring—”
“Can you see me falling asleep over here?”
“No!” she says urgently, taps a button on her tablet, and hands it over to me. “See? Read this!”
I look at the screen.
“‘This article is flagged for deletion’.”
“What? No. No, it’s here… this section here…”
I read the page. Wikipedia always comes across as being written by delusional twats who came across old boxes of notes from their high school history classes and felt the need to share… but this article actually seems coherent.
“The whole story about losing the treasure of Santa Domina at sea was a cover. It was a story made up to keep people from bothering to look anymore. Throw them off the trail!”
I frown.
“So what?” I ask. “How does this connect to—”
“Maybe the Scarlet Lemming isn’t really lost at all. Maybe all this has been done to keep people from looking for it anymore.”
“Wait, are you suggesting Wilkes was working with Ryoma to fake the hijacking?”
“Yes!” Anzia exclaims, bouncing up and down like she just heard the ice cream truck was coming round down her street and wants a double-scoop strawberry cone with sprinkles, mommy! Whee!
Still, it’s so stupid it might just be—
“Marx!” yells Ping, marching back towards us. “For you.”
I take the phone from her, uncertain.
“Hello?” I say.
“How could you?” weeps the Ewok, and pauses to sob a little. I cover the phone, frown at Ping.
“What’s going on?” I ask.
“Monitor City said no,” she says quietly.
“What the fuck?” I say into the phone. “Why?”
“They said I have no money,” he sobs. “They say I have to be able to prove I have enough to live there for a year, and I don’t have any money!”
Uh oh. I think I know where this is going.
“Where’s all my money, Gare?” he cries. “I’ve been saving and saving and you said you were taking care of me!”
“I am!” I say, not entirely honestly. “I’m taking care of you, me, and Ruth. All of us!”
“Then why do they say you transferred all my money to an offshore account in Switzerland?”
“Better interest rates?”
“I needed that cash, dude! What the hell! You’ve ruined my life! Ruined it!”
This is awkward. I mean, it’s true I sent the money to Switzerland, but that was months ago, and I’ve had rent to pay and dental work done, and—
“I need to talk to Jei,” he says softly.
I hand the phone over. She takes it, listens for a second, then covers the phone with her hand.
“He wants to know if you look sorry.”
I’m not sure how to do that one. I shrug.
“No,” she says into the phone. “I’m sorry, Jackson. If there’s anything… oh. Oh, yeah. Sure, I can do that. No, we’ll get you a corner office with win— oh, right, no in the basement is good too. Okay. See you Monday.”
She hangs up, puts the phone away.
“What the hell just happened?” I ask. “What was all that about? What are you doing to him in a basement? You do realize that hair can’t be shaved off, right?”
“He’s coming to work for me at Your Eye,” she says. “He told me to tell you he quits.”
Well this is a big pile of shit-kebab. The only part of my detectiving empire that earns any money is Jackson, and now even he’s defecting to the midget leagues? Over something as minor as ruining his life? Jesus, man, suck it up and learn to suffer with the rest of us!
Anzia is sensing the hostility in the air and is obviously too stupid to care. She holds out her tablet again, a big smile on her face.
“Ms Chow,” she says, “Mr Marx and I have a theory about the Scarlet Lemming. We think Mr Wilkes may actually be behind the whole thing.”
Ping stares at Anzia like she’s some kind of half-bred adolescent fruitcake with the mental acuity of a cabbage.
“Who the hell is Wilkes?” she says, and looks at me as if I’m the one making her stupid. “What is she talking about?”
“Wilkes,” I say. “The client.”
“The client is Leona Cavendish,” she says, then her face goes white with shock. “Oh my god. You’re not working for the same person!”
“How many people have lost this thing?” I shout. “When did yours lose it?”
“Two months ago!”
“Mine was two weeks ago!” I yell. “So… mine is more important!”
This is actually really bad. We’re pretty well screwed here. If Ping hands the Lemming in to her client, I get outed by Wilkes. If I hand the Lemming in to Wilkes, Ping gets no money and has me killed in a dark alley and makes sure nobody bothers to mourn me. Which is probably not that big a deal, but whatever.
“Anzia,” Ping says, snapping her fingers. “In the car. We’re out of here.”
“But Mr Marx—”
“Mr Marx is the competition, Anzia. Now come on. Let’s go.”
Anzia gives me the saddest little pouty face I’ve ever seen, and then gets into the car. Ping roars the engine to life, and then tears off, out of the Docks, leaving me all alone. I prefer it this way, but it’s still kinda sad.
My phone rings. I fumble it out, turn it on, and almost immediately, get blasted with fury.
“What the hell have you done?” shouts Wilkes.
“You need to be more specific,” I say.
“I just got off the phone with Bandyloo. He said you knocked him unconscious and threatened to expose me!”
Ah, Bandyloo. Those Interpol guys know how to play dirty.
“I didn’t—”
“No!” shouts Wilkes. “This is done! I was wrong to involve someone like you. I’d been warned, but I thought you might not be as bad as they said.”
“Thanks,” I mutter.
“You’re fired,” he says. “Fired, and I will be reporting you to the city this evening. Your days as a private investigator — however pitiful they have been — are over! Over!”
He hangs up. I stare at the phone for a second, trying to remember how to take a photo of my ass to email to him.
“Fuck-a-doodle-doo,” I sigh.
So here’s my situation: I am totally and utterly fucked. There is very little about my life that is worth living right now. I’m about to be outed by the fucktard who probably stole the stupid Lemming in the first place, and I’ll be framed for killing Ryoma, who was probably his accomplice, and if none of that goes wrong for me, Jimmy Scaz will find me and kill me. Or at least try to. I have my doubts about his abilities.
There are two ways out of this mess. I can try and clear my name and do the right thing, exposing Wilkes, and hopefully buying enough goodwill from the city to get to stay in business.
Or, I can figure out where the fuck the Lemming is, hide it from the world, and run like a coward to Bermuda.
I’ve had the Bermuda plan in my head longer, so it seems a natural fit. Sold!
Since I’m on the Bad Path, I hop into Ryoma’s sweet, sweet Lexus and take off in a loud, roaring joyride through the city. I never did this when I had a Lexus, because I was afraid of ruining it. But this ain’t my ride, so who the fuck cares what happens to it.
There are lots of ways for me to approach this problem, but I think the best way to do it is to be vindictive. Wilkes is trying to ruin my life? Let’s see how he likes me screwing with his. I have to get access to Ryoma’s files anyway, so why not have some fun along the way.
I pull up onto the curb in front of City Hall and stroll in the front doors with as much swagger as I can manage with a swollen nose and scarred forehead. The receptionist across the room looks up at me with shock, dismay, and a little bit of intrigue, I can tell.
“Greetings, hellhound!” I call. “Put Satan on hold, cause you’re my bitch now!”
She puts down a forkful soggy asparagus and stares at me with the kind of dead eyes only a government employee can muster. She’s chewing her food so oddly, it really reinforces the notion that receptionists aren’t really human.
“Can I help you?” she asks dryly.
“Yes,” I say, leaning over the counter. “I have to report a crime. To do with jewels stolen by the Nazis, being traded between rich fucktards in this city.”
She looks down at her directory, then back up at me.
“Which department, please?”
I sigh, roll my eyes. People can be so stupid sometimes.
“I guess if I have to choose… how do I find your Department of Antiquities?”
She snorts green good all over her desk, laughing.
“The what?” she gasps.
“The Department of Antiquities,” I say, suddenly not so sure.
She almost falls out of her chair, she’s laughing so hard.
“I don’t know who you’ve been talking to,” she says between gasps, “but there’s no such department in this city!”
I am not amused.
