It began like any other dark, dreary night in downtown Boston. It began with a knock at the door, a story filled with lust, joy, greed, despair, and love. A dame walked in. A pushy type. I smelled trouble on her like sludge on a sewer rat. She stood before me in my office, the office of Smithy Ray Lewis, Private Eye.
Her tale started out like so many others, with a night gone terribly wrong, ending with her waking up in a stranger's apartment, with a dull headache and her clothes strewn all over the floor. That was last night. She'd dressed and ran herself straight here, or so she'd said, with her detestable nasally voice and Boston accent. I wasn't having any of it. She stood there expectantly, awaiting an answer. She waited awhile while I poured myself some scotch and took a drink. I poured myself some more, and drank it again. Twice more I did this. Hardly phased, I strode out of my apartment, grabbing my leather jacket as I ducked into the rain-swept street, with the dame trailing behind.
I walked down the street to a pay phone, and told my partner, Schroder, to meet me at Mel's cafe in half an hour. Schroder is a 6"6 German black man, and damn proud of it. I hailed a cab, and me and the dame rode to Mel's. I got out and walked into Mel's, while the dame paid and caught up to me. There in a corner booth is Schroder, looking for all the world like Morpheus out of The Matrix, with his bald head and black trench coat. We sat down, and the dame tells her story. As she wraps it up, Schroder stands, and beckons us out into the street. He led us to a dark, secluded street, where a girl was kidnapped not two nights previously. Suddenly, he shoved the dame against the graffitied, concrete wall, and pulled out his handgun. I had no time to react as he shoves it under her chin and-
"Freeze!"
Schroder and I froze and turned. A drenched cop stood there, his car parked in a dark part of the street, unseen. A camera went off as we turned back around.
"Put the gun down, and put your hands above your head!"
I glanced over at Schroder, who paused, clearly torn. Pain and indecision wrought across his face like ugly scars, disfiguring his features. What could have made his decision so hard? What had she done to him, or him to her? Was it his apartment she'd woken up in? A single gun-shot pierced the night, sending 6 and a half feet of guilt, despair, and pain crashing into the street.