Connie Returns from Lunch
Wellington Leg: When last we saw Arthur Murray he was crouching under his desk. A drop in with a Mexican Hairless and a revolver had blown a hole in Arthur’s window. He’d found the palm pilot missing these many weeks but faced almost certain death as the dog growled.
Her second shot ripped through my appointment calendar, punched a gap in the plaster as big as my fist. The neighboring office was an accounting firm where CPAs argued about GAAP and Pro-Forma and whether shoe leather is a deductible expense. I wondered what a nine millimeter might do for their morale. Hell, it was tax season.
I couldn’t hear much of anything by now but somehow the dog was communicating loud and clear. I know it’s wrong to resent a dog, or dislike a dog, or even entertain fantasies about silencing a dog. Dogs are people too. At Arthur Murray Inquiries we’re all about the little guy. I’ve had Big Gulps that weigh more than this mutt.
I figure it’s anxiety transference. It’s not about the dog. It’s about the dog’s owner, the woman with the gun. That’s who I’m mad at. If it were just the dog I could read the paper, drink some coffee, put my feet up on the desk and ignore him. Let him bark. Sooner or later dogs give up and go away. They bark at someone else. They see a bird or a shadow or Bentley Turbo and lose interest. Who knows. I’m no expert.
Guns I understand. The drop in ( why can’t they make appointments?) raised the barrel of her Glock to the level of my chin. Yeah, I was standing now, deaf, a little happy about the palm pilot, a joy tempered by the look of intense concentration on the lady’s face.
That’s when Connie returned from lunch. The office door banged open and the dog went nuts again. The woman got distracted, gesturing to the dog to settle down, but Connie was a new element, something fresh to bark at.
“What the hell is going on in there?” Connie shouted.
A Bird, a shadow, a Bentley Turbo. She sighted down the barrel her tongue extended through those pink lips. I’m color blind so pink is a generalization.
“They were out of pastrami,” Connie yelled.
Yeah, well, that figures. I thought about smiling at her. No, that’s gutless. I’m Arthur Murray. Take your best shot.