Part 2

"A sentimentalist no doubt."

"No doubt," Bag Ears agreed.

I patted Joy's hand and said, "Don't be alarmed, darling. I will take care of everything."

The situation was definitely obnoxious to me. Tolerance of one's fellow men is one thing, but this was something entirely different. These people had come uninvited to our festive board and were of the criminal element, pure and unadulterated by any instincts of honesty or decency. And it made me angry to see them wading into Aunt Gretchen's liquor supply as though the stuff came out of a pump.

They were easy to count, these hoodlums, segregated as they were. The more respectable of the guests who had not already left, were clustered together in one corner of the living room, possibly as a gesture toward self-protection. None of these elite were making any effort to approach the buffet or the portable bar at the other side of the room. And in thus refraining, they showed a superior brand of intelligence. Under present circumstances any attempt to reach the refreshments would have been as dangerous as crossing the Hialeah race track on crutches.

In fact, as I surveyed the scene, one brave lady made a half-hearted attempt to cross over and spear a sandwich off the corner of the buffet. She was promptly shoved out of range by a lean, hungry-looking customer in a pink shirt, who snarled, "Scram, Three Chins! You're overfed now."

Unhooking Joy's dear fingers from my arm, I said, "You will pardon me, but it is time for action. Bag Ears will see that you are not harmed."

I started toward the buffet, or rather toward the crowd of male and female hoodlums who completely blocked it from my sight. But Bag Ears snatched me by the sleeve and whispered,

"For cri-yi, Homer! Don't be a fool! This mob is loaded wid hardware. They don't horse around none. Start slugging and they'll dress you in red polka dots. Better call in some law."

I shook my head firmly and pulled Bag Ears' hand from my sleeve. But, his attention now turned in another direction, he held on even harder and muttered,

"Jeeps! I'm seeing things!"

I glanced around and saw him staring wide-eyed at the entrance hall, his battered mouth ajar. I followed his eyes but could see nothing unusual. Only the hall itself, through an arched doorway, and the lower section of the staircase that gave access to the second floor of the house. It appeared to be the least-troubled spot in view. I frowned at Bag Ears.

"Maybe I've gone nuts," he said, "but I'll swear I just saw a face peeking down around them stairs."

"Whose face?"

"Hands McCaffery's face! That's whose!"

"And who is Hands McCaffery?"

Bag Ears looked at me with stark unbelief. "You mean you don't know? Maybe your mom didn't give you the facts of life! Chum, they's two really tough monkeys in this town. One of them is Cement Mixer Zinsky and the other is Hands McCaffery. At the moment they're slugging it out to see which one gets to levy a head tax on the juke boxes in this section. It's a sweet take and neither boy will be satisfied with less than all. Seeing them both in one place is like seeing Truman and that music critic sit down at the piano together. And I know damn well that Hands is up on them stairs!"

"You are obviously overwrought. If I have this type of person sized up correctly, none of them would be dallying on the stairs. If this Hands person were here, he'd be at the buffet fighting for a helping of pickled beets and a gin wash. Pardon me—I have work to do."

But there was another interruption. I froze in sudden alarm when I realized Joy was no longer at my side. Just as I made this discovery, there was an upsurge of commotion at the bar; a commotion that went head and shoulders over the minor ones going on constantly. A short angry scream came to my ears, then a bull-voiced roar of agony.

The crowd at the buffet surged back and I saw a bucktoothed hooligan bent double, both hands gripping his ankle. Thick moans came from his lips.

And standing close to him was my Joy. But a new Joy. A different Joy than I had ever seen. A glorious Joy, with her head thrown back, her teeth showing, and the light of battle in her eyes. She was holding a plate of jello in one hand and a bottle of beer in the other and was shouting in outraged dignity.

"Watch who you're shoving, you jug-headed gorilla! And keep your mitts out of the herring! Eat like a man or go back to the zoo!"

With that she placed an accurate kick against the offending character's other shine-bone and aimed the beer bottle at his skull.

Joy turned and smiled gayly. "He pushed me," she said. "It's the most wonderful wedding reception I ever attended. Have a pickle."

But surprise was piling upon surprise. Again I froze as a new phase of this horrible affair presented itself.

Uncle Peter.

Clad in apron and cap, he was behind the bar serving out drinks. This shook me to the core. It was a little like seeing Barney Baruch hit a three-bagger in Yankee Stadium and slide into third base.

But there he was, taking orders and dishing out drinks with an attitude as solemn and impersonal as an owl on a tree branch.

Also, he had an assistant—his blonde bombshell. She was fully dressed now and I was struck by the peculiar manner in which this peculiar team functioned.

Uncle Peter would mix a drink, glance at his wrist watch as he served it, then turn and whisper some sort of information to the girl. She noted it down in a small book and the routine was repeated.

At this exact moment, I felt a sharp dig in the ribs. This brought my attention back to Joy, who had done the digging.

"I'm still here, husband mine. Your bride—remember? Or are you waiting for that blonde hussy to start stripping?"

"Darling, I'm afraid you're not paying close attention to things of importance. Don't you see Uncle Peter there—serving drinks?"

"Of course I see him. What of it? If the old roue feels like dishing out a little alcohol to the boys, what—"

"It's absolutely beyond all conception. Uncle Peter never does anything without a good reason. And this—"

My reply was cut short by a cold, brutal voice that knifed through the room and put a chill on all present. "Hold it, everybody! Stand still and don't move a finger!"

Not a finger in the room moved. But all eyes turned toward the arched doorway leading to the entrance hall. In its exact center, there stood a man—a short man of slight stature. He stood spread-legged, wearing a colored kerchief over the lower part of his face. Only his eyes were visible—icy, black, narrowed. Those eyes seemed to be smiling a grim smile. Possibly his hidden teeth were bared in a snarl. But no one cared about that. Everyone was far more interested in the black Thompson sub-machine gun he held cradled over one arm.

He toyed with the trigger, knifing the room with quick side glances. He said, "Okay. Start sorting yourselves out. You, pretty boy, and the frail with the beer bottle—out of the line of fire." He motioned with the gun barrel and I drew Joy toward the wall.

"Now you, Cora—and old puddle-puss. Out of the way. And not a peep out of anybody."

No one was inclined to peep, and now the stage was set in a manner which seemed to satisfy the masked gunman. The Cement Mixer Zinsky crowd was clustered, cowering, around the buffet, staring at the machine gun as though it possessed the hypnotic eyes of a snake.

The situation was entirely plain. The masked man fully intended to break the law by committing murder in Aunt Gretchen's living room. The only moot point seemed to be whether he intended to slay the whole mob or be selective and cut down only important members. His trigger finger turned white at the knuckle.

Then Uncle Peter stepped forward to hold up a protesting hand. "You mustn't fire that weapon, my good fellow. Indeed you must not."

His matter-of-fact attitude, rather than his words, was what gave the gunman pause. He had hardly expected the display of completely impersonal bravery that Uncle Peter put on. The gunman asked, "Are you nuts, fiddlefoot?"

"Far from it. But you must not, under any circumstances, fire that gun. It will upset one of the most important experiments in the history of science. That experiment is now in progress."

"Look, brother. I came here to mow down Zinsky and his mob. And I'm mowing. The St. Valentine's deal in Chi'll look like a Sunday school binge after this one."

"Possibly it will not be necessary to use your weapon."

Uncle Peter's words, it seemed, were prophetic. At that exact moment, Cement Mixer Zinsky exploded. Not violently, or with any peril to those standing close by. Yet no other term can describe it. There was a soft pop—as though a large, poorly inflated balloon had been pricked with a pin. Zinsky seemed to go in all directions—fragments of him that is. Yet, as each fragment flew away from the main body, it shriveled up so that there was no blood, and no bystander suffered the inconvenience of messed-up clothing. Just the pop and Zinsky expanded like a human bomb and then turned into dust.

As this phenomenon occurred I saw Uncle Peter nod with great satisfaction and consult a passage in the book presided over by his blonde assistant. He made a check mark in the book.

Then a second member of the buffet group went pop. The masked man stared in slack-jawed wonder. In fact his jaw went so slack the kerchief dropped away revealing his entire visage. He lowered his head and looked down at the gun in his hands; the gun that had not been fired.

Two more members of Zinsky's party followed him into whatever oblivion was achieved by going pop and dissolving into dust. Uncle Peter evinced bright interest and made two more check marks in the book.

The balance of the mob moved as one, but in many directions. They paid no attention to their own weapons as they headed for cover. One of their number exploded as he was halfway through the French doors. Uncle Peter checked him off and Bag Ears said, "Jeeps! tomorrow every juke box in town can play 'Nearer my God to Thee.'" Then he added, "Leave us blow this joint. Goofy things is happening here. I don't like it."

I was perspiring. I mopped my forehead. "A most amazing occurrence," I observed.

Joy was digging the fingers on one hand into my arm. I had been watching Hands McCaffery back crestfallen out of the living room and toward the front door, terrific slaughter having been accomplished without the firing of a shot. I turned my eyes now to follow the direction in which Joy pointed with her other hand and saw the blonde assistant hauling Uncle Peter through one of the French windows. He did not seem to be enthusiastic about leaving. In fact he appeared to argue quite strenuously against it, but her will prevailed and they disappeared out onto the lawn.

Now, with all the danger past, people began fainting in wholesale lots. Aunt Gretchen was resting comfortably with her head braced against the brass rail of the portable bar. Those who didn't faint contributed variously intonated screams to the general unrest. And over all this brooded the dank clouds of acrid dust that had so lately been Cement Mixer Zinsky and certain members of his mob. Indeed, the scene took on a startling semblance to one of Dore's etchings in an old edition of Dante's Inferno.

"I repeat," Bag Ears bleated plaintively. "Leave us blow this joint. It ain't healthy here."

"He's right," Joy said. "A lot of explanation is wanting. There are some people we've got to catch up with. Let's go."

With that, she drew Bag Ears and me toward the French doors through which had recently passed some of the fastest moving objects in this or any other world. We made the flag-stone terrace above the drive where Bag Ears cordially grasped my hand and said,

"Well, it was a nice party, folks, and if I ever get spliced I'll sure give you a invite and I sure had a swell time and remember me to your aunt when she wakes up and—"

He was backing down the steps when Joy cut in with, "Bag Ears. Don't be so rude. You're in no hurry."

Bag Ears slowed down and allowed us to catch up with him. He gave us a sickly smile. "That's where you're wrong, babe."

"Bag Ears," Joy went on. "I heard you whisper to Homer that you know who that blonde is."

"What blonde? Me? I don't know nothing about no blonde no-how."

"Don't hedge. I mean the girl who was assisting Uncle Peter behind the bar. Who is she, really?"

"Oh—her. Everybody knows her. She's Hands McCaffery's moll. He likes 'em blonde and—"

Bag Ears was on the move again, striding in the direction of the gate. We hurried to catch up. "That babe's poison," he told us. "Any skirt that'd flock with Hands McCaffery is poison. I'll tell you kids what I'd do. If she drives south—I'd drive north. Goodbye now."

Just at that moment a big blue sports roadster pushed a bright chromium nose around the corner of the house. I took a firm grip on Bag Ears' collar, grabbed Joy by the arm, and the three of us leaped behind a bush. The car rolled past us. We saw the blonde behind the wheel and Uncle Peter seated beside her, evidently still protesting the hasty exodus.

But the girl looked very sharp and businesslike; the way a girl would look who knew where she was going and why. The car picked up speed and swung north.

"I wonder," Joy murmured, "how Uncle Peter happened to select Hands McCaffery's girl friend as his assistant."

"She was a burlycue queen last time I heard of her," Bag Ears said. "Still is, I guess."

"That could explain it," I told Joy. "You see, Uncle Peter has—ah, facets to his personality. A tendency to admire women. Ah—"

"Women—period; isn't that what you mean?"

"Well, it would be perfectly logical for Uncle Peter to select an assistant from the stage of a burlesque theater."

"Enough of this," Joy snapped. "We're wasting time. Go get—oh, never mind! Wait here."

Joy was off in the direction of the garage and in no time at all she was back in my Cadillac convertible. As she sailed by I managed to hook a finger around the door handle and get a foot inside.

This was no mean feat, as I was also occupied in hauling Bag Ears along by the collar. I managed to deposit him in the seat beside Joy and squeeze in beside him.

"A burlycue queen, eh?" Joy was muttering. "Well, she's not so much! If she couldn't get her clothes off she'd starve to death."

"Darling," I said, "I don't think this is the sort of thing you should be doing. It's far too dangerous for a girl."

"Or anybody else," Bag Ears moaned. There was a bleak look on his face. "I don't like playing around with a guy like Hands McCaffery or friends of a guy like him. It's a good way to collect your insurance."

"She's heading for Higgins Drive," Joy observed.

Which was entirely true. The roadster had made a turn on two wheels and was going west.

"But our honeymoon," I said, plaintively.

"Yeah," Bag Ears repeated, "what about our—your honeymoon?"

Joy's eyes were sparkling. She turned them on me. The car lurched. She returned her eyes to the road. "Yes, darling. Our honeymoon! Isn't it wonderful?"

"But this isn't it! This isn't what people do on their honeymoons."

"Oh, you mean—but don't worry about that, darling. We'll have plenty of time for—"

"Lemme out o' here," Bag Ears moaned. "I got a date to take Red Nose Tessie to the movies."

Joy apparently did not hear him. "I wish we had all the parts to this puzzle. It looks as though somebody put somebody on the spot for a rubout. But it would seem that somebody else got the same idea but didn't know that somebody else was going to achieve the same result in a more spectacular way and—"

"I think you've figured it out most accurately."

"Some of it fits together. Uncle Peter was no doubt responsible for the Zinsky boys coming to our reception. We'll get the dope on that when we catch up with him. But the blonde must not have known what was going to happen, so she tipped Hands off that he could find the whole Zinsky mob at the reception. He decided it would be a good place to settle certain matters of his own."

"But why did Uncle Peter want them there?"

Joy glanced at me with love in her eyes. "Darling, we're going to be wonderful companions through life, but most of the fun will be strictly physical. Mental exercises aren't your forte."

"When Red Nose Tessie makes a date with a guy," Bag Ears said, "she expects the guy to keep it."

"The blonde Cora is no doubt heading for a rendezvous with Hands McCaffery," Joy went on. "And she's taking our dear uncle with her."

"Okay," Bag Ears replied. "So we mind our business and keep our noses clean and live a long time."

Joy was weaving through traffic, trying to keep the roadster in sight. "Turn on the radio," she told me. "There might be some news."

I snapped the switch and we discovered there was news indeed; an evening commentator regaling the public with the latest:

"—an amazing mass phenomena which leading scientific minds have pronounced to be basically similar to the flying-saucer craze. Relative to that—you will remember—otherwise reliable citizens swore they saw space ships from other planets hovering over our cities spying on us.

"This phase of the hysteria takes an entirely different turn. It seems now that these otherwise entirely reliable citizens are seeing other citizens explode and vanish into thin air. The police and the newspapers have been deluged with frantic telephone calls. In the public interest, we have several persons here in the studio who claim to have seen this phenomena. Your commentator will now interview them over the air. You—you, sir—what is your name?"

"Sam—Sam Glutz."

"Thank you, Mr. Glutz. And will you tell the radio audience what you saw?"

"It wasn't nothing—nothing at all. That is—this guy was running down the street like maybe the cops was after him—I don't know. Then—there wasn't nothing."

"You mean the man disappeared?"

"He went pop, kind of—like a firecracker only not so loud—and then pieces of him flew all over and they disappeared and there wasn't nothing—nothing at all."

"Thank you, Mr. Glutz. And now this lady—"

"Turn it off," Joy snapped. "The blonde's pulling up."

This was evident to all three of us. "And by a cop yet," Bag Ears marveled. "Looks like they're going to give theirselves up."

It was Uncle Peter who got out of the car and approached the traffic officer standing at the intersection.

"What'll we do?" Joy asked. "Do you want to try and keep the old goat out of jail or shall we let him go to the chair as he deserves?"

The possibility stunned me to a point where it was hard to think clearly. "Good Lord, Joy! Think of the scandal! I don't care about myself, but Aunt Gretchen would never live it down! She'd be black-balled at all her clubs and—"

"Then," Joy replied sweetly, "I'd suggest you get out and slug that cop quick and grab Uncle Peter before he makes a confession."

I had come to the cross-roads, so to speak. The necessity of a weighty decision lay upon my shoulders. Was blood thicker than water? Was I justified in breaking the law—assaulting an officer in order to keep my uncle from becoming a blot on the family name?

I decided, grimly, that one owed all to one's relatives and I was halfway out of the car. Then I paused. Uncle Peter did not seem to be making a confession at all. He chatted easily with the officer and indicated my Cadillac with a movement of his thumb. Something passed from his hand to the hand of the policeman and the latter looked toward us and scowled.

"Uncle Peter is pulling a fast one," Joy said. "The cop's coming after us!"