“Body Chemistry 4?” says Fangio. “Surely that’s a 1994 movie starring former Playboy playmate Shannon Tweed. The one where she has it away with a character called Simon on top of a pool table.”
“Well, you can play cards on top of a pool table, can’t you?”
“Not if someone’s having it away.”
“No, you’re right. Forget about Body Chemistry 4. There’s Round my hat with a pigeon on a string, Beat the bad boy Berty, Jump around Shorty and Set ’em up Joe …”
“You sure know your card games, buddy.”
“Listen, Fange,” says I, “in my business, knowing your card games can mean the difference between getting it up on a cold winter’s night, or getting them down in a Dormobile. If you know what I mean, and I’m sure that you do.”
“I know where you’re coming from there,” says Fange, and who was I to doubt him?
We paused for a moment and chewed some more fat.
“That was good,” said Fange.
“What, the fat?”
“No, the toot. That was a good bit of toot we just talked there. A first class piece of toot.”
“Glad that you enjoyed it. Do you want me to make up a few more card games?”
“No,” said Fangio, shaking his jowls. “The secret lies in knowing when to stop. But, by the by, Laz. There was a guy in here earlier asking after you.”
“How could he be asking after me, if he was in here earlier than me?”
“Search me,” said Fangio. “We live in troubled times.”
“So what did this guy look like?”
“Well.” The fat boy pecked upon a peanut. “Looked a lot like Mike Mazurki to me.”
I nodded thoughtfully.
“A hint of Brian Donleavy over the eyes.”
I scratched at my gonads with equal thought.
“Spoke a little like the now legendary Charles Laughton.”
I whistled through my teeth with less thought than it takes to pluck a turkey. “The now legendary Charles?” whistled I.
“Yeah, and he had a Rondo hat on.”[3]
Oh how we laughed once more.
“But seriously,” said Fangio. “He left his card for you.”
“Is it a one-eyed Jack?” I asked. “Because they’re worth double if you lay them on a black ten or nine.”
“No, it was his business card. We’ve done with the card game toot.”
“I’ve a few foolish names left in me.”
“I’m all too sure you have.” Fangio produced the card from a place where the sun never shines and pushed it over the counter to the place where I sat bathed all in glory.
I read aloud, to myself, from the card. “Mr Cormerant,” I read. “The Ministry of Serendipity.”
“Speak up a bit,” said Fangio.
“Cormerant,” said I.
“Cormerant?” said Fangio. “Isn’t that an aquatic bird of the family Phalacrocoracidae that inhabits coastal and inland waters, having dark plumage and a slender hooked beak?”
“No, I think you’ll find that’s a cormorant.”
“Ah, thanks for putting me straight.”
“So did this guy say what he wanted with me?”
“No,” says Fangio. “But if you want my opinion, I’d say that he was looking to engage your services as a private investigator in order that you might track down a briefcase of his that has gone missing and contains certain items which if they fell into the wrong hands, or even the right ones, might spell doom to this world of ours in any one of a dozen different languages, including Esperanto.”
“Well, if I want your opinion, I’ll ask for it,” says I. “Did he say that he might call back?”
“He might have,” said Fange. “But I wasn’t listening. Care for a bit more chewing fat?”
I shook my head in a negative way that mirrored my negative thoughts. There was something about this card that didn’t smell right to me. Something foully depraved and loathsome to the extreme. Something …
“Turn it in, Laz,” said Fangio. “You always do that when I give you a card and it frankly gets right up my jumper.”
“There’s something about this business card that I don’t like one bit.”
“Probably the shape,” said Fangio. “You can tell a great deal about a man’s character by the shape of his business card.”
“But surely they’re all the same basic shape.”
“Mine aren’t,” said Fangio. “Some of mine are such horrible shapes that it makes me feel sick to my stomach just to look at them. I figure that any man who owns business cards the shape of mine must be some kind of psycho.”
“And did you choose the shapes yourself?”
“Certainly not. How dare you!”
“I’ll sleep easy in my bed tonight then, Fange.”
“Gobbo the gnome who lives in my nose told me the shapes to cut them.”
“I’ll lock my bedroom door before I go to sleep.”
A guy along the bar was making waves and rattling his empty glass upon the counter. “Is there any chance of getting served here?” he was heard to ask. “Or are you two going to talk toot all night, while the rest of us die of thirst?”
“I’d better go and serve him,” said Fangio. “He’s been standing there with an empty glass in his hand since before we started chewing the fat, let alone talking the toot.”
“You go and serve him then,” says I, “while I ponder over this card and try to get a handle on the guy who left it here. By using certain psychic powers that I don’t like to talk about, I can conjure up a mental visualization of the card’s owner, by tuning myself to the cosmic vibrations emanating from the card. I’m already getting an image of Mike Mazurki, with a hint of Brian Donleavy over the eyes and a voice like the legendary Charles L—”
“I’ll leave you to it then,” says Fangio. “I’ll go serve the customer. Sorry to keep you waiting there, Mr Cormerant.”
“What?”
I bid the guy the big hello and made my presence felt. The hand that held his liquor was shaking more than a go-go-dancing vibrator demonstrator with a bad case of St Vitus. Or possibly just a little less. Who am I to say?
I looked the fella up and down and then from side to side. He had a definite hint of Brian Donleavy over the eyes. And there was more than a trace of the legendary Charles in the voice he used to speak with. But the thing that struck me most about him had to be his hat.
“Is that a Rondo?” says I, admiring the cut of his jib.
“No,” says he. “It’s a bowler.”
We established ourselves at the table near the rear. The one to the left of the gents. It’s a bit of a favourite with me. Secluded. Out of the way. That hint of exclusivity that offers the client confidence. Muted lighting that catches my noble profile just so in the tinted wall mirror and a lot of firm support in the seat, which can be handy if your piles are playing up.
“So,” says I, when we’ve comfied ourselves, “what’s the deal here, fella?”
“My name is—”
“Cormerant,” says I.
“Cormerant,” says he. “And I work for—”
“The Ministry of Serendipity,” says I.
“The Ministry of Serendipity,” says he. “And I …”
I paused.
“What?”
“What?”
“What are you pausing for?” says he.
“I wasn’t pausing,” says I. “I was waiting for you to continue. You paused first.”
“Well, you kept interrupting.”
“I wasn’t interrupting. I was anticipating.”
“That’s the same as interrupting, if you butt in. That’s interrupting.”
I leaned across the table and beckoned the guy towards me. As he leaned forward, I butted him right in the face.
He fell back gasping and clawing at his bloodied nose.
“What did you do that for?” he mumbled, pulling out an oversized red gingham handkerchief to dab at all the gore.
“I just wanted to clear up a matter of semantics,” says I. “That was butting. I was anticipating.”
Naturally he thanked me.
3
Rondo Hatton, legendary Hollywood star of