in Uncategorized, Blog, Lit, Serial Fiction 3:32 pm Monday, December 3rd, 2007

“Death On The Breeze”
A Danny Stark Mystery
by James Walling

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18

Danny stoked the fire and brooded. It had been an unusually productive day—he’d retrieved the boy wonder from jail, alienated his main squeeze, and made a token appearance at an old pal’s funeral. It was one for the record books, however you wanted to slice it.

Back at the garage, his pal Fox had spent the better part of the day sucking down cheap bourbon and gritting his teeth while a stoic Charlene pulled a dozen or so fragments of buckshot from his thigh.

He might have gone to the hospital like any sane person would have in his place, but Bill Fox had never been one for red tape and explanations.

“How wassa funeral?” Fox inquired, slurring his words.

Danny didn’t answer at first. He registered the sound of Bean rustling through the cupboards—no doubt in pursuit of hooch—and he was tempted to issue a dire warning about the possible hazards of killing his last few ounces of scotch.

But Bean—poor, miserable, unlucky Bean—had earned a few ounces of whatever happened to be on hand. Seventy-two hours in the pokey preceded by a day and a half of special time with friendly Jimmy Elmer was all the pedigree anybody needed to earn Danny’s patience.

“Hey!” Fox bawled. “You deaf?”

“Sorry…” Danny answered, snapping out of his reverie. “The funeral was great, a barrel of laughs. Too bad you missed it.”

Charlene giggled.

“Very f-funny,” Fox mumbled. He was sprawled out on Danny’s bed dressed in a bathrobe, his bandaged thigh exposed, a pint of Rebel Yell in his hand.

A crash from the vicinity of the kitchen cut the conversation short.

“Sonofabitch!” Bean exclaimed amidst the remnants of a punchbowl he had been attempting to wrestle down from a shelf.

“Don’t move, dear,” Charlene chided as she rose from her chair to assist him. “You’ll cut yourself.”

Fox roared with laughter. Bean didn’t think it was funny. He wasn’t sure yet he’d emerged unscathed.

“Sorry, Dan,” he muttered miserably.

“Don’t let the glassware getcha!” Fox teased between guffaws. “it ain’t quite buckshot,” he went on, “but it’ll do…”

Danny slipped out the door and down the hall to escape the commotion. He took his sweet time and detoured into the shop. He padded amidst the machines and empty space. Apart from the stolen Hummer and the Jag he’d worked over the night Jimmy Elmer had paid him a visit, these rooms had lain barren since Herb’s death.

Danny wondered if he should give up the ghost. Should I drop it or what? Should I let it go and get on with business as usual?

He paced the floor and genuflected.

Whattaya say, Herb? Why’d they kill ya? What’d you do, boy? How ‘bout you tell ol’ Danny just what the fuck went down? Cut me loose and find some other fool to haunt…

He waited in the silence for a feeling of surrender or resolve to wash over him. None came.

The price tag… the cost in blood… it’s too much, too much to ask…

But those were Herb’s words, Danny thought. Herb, who could never bring himself to ask a favor, would not have asked for this. It made little difference.

Danny thought back to the last time he’d seen Herb alive. They had marked the first thaw of the season by hitting the catfish hole in the narrows beneath the old single-span bridge above the falls.

Herb had remembered to bring a steaming thermos of Irish coffee. Only trouble was he’d forgotten to pick up the bait. They sipped coffee with their legs dangling from the roadside and laughed until they cried.

“Somebody did it,” Danny said aloud to the empty room. “And somebody’s gotta pay.” His words echoed back to him unanswered.

He turned on his heel and trudged into the office. He pulled the chair free from his desk and sat in the dark, wondering what to do next.

Without being aware of having made a conscious decision, he found himself dialing information and asking for Tommy Thompson’s home number.

The phone rang four times before the machine picked up.

“You’ve reached the Thompson residence,” a stately feminine voice intoned. “We’re not here to take your call right now. Leave a message after the tone and we’ll get back to you just as soon as we can.”

Danny hung up. He jerked open the desk drawer and fished out his tape recorder to make note of Thompson’s number.

After replacing the recorder, he crossed to the front door and stepped into the night.

It was still and cold. He shivered a bit and wondered when the weather would begin to match the month of the year.

He was about to lock up and rejoin the circus in the back when a car pulled into the gravel lot. The engine died and a long moment passed before the driver opened the door and emerged from the car.

Danny resisted the urge to call out. Hesitant steps approached him and stopped halfway to the door.

“We need to talk,” she said.

Danny had heard the voice over the telephone once before, and he guessed right in presuming it belonged to Lorraine Elmer.

“Fellas are inside,” Danny said, nodding his head toward the back of the building, “still lickin’ their wounds, I guess. Might not be too friendly just now.”

“I spose not,” she agreed. “I came to see you.”

“Yeah,” Danny said, skeptically, “you and what army?”

Lorraine said nothing.

“Where’s Jimmy?” Danny asked.

“I ain’t seen hide nor hair of that boy, not since you all run him off.”

Danny laughed.

“We woulda called first, but we were anxious to meet him.”

The woman sighed and turned back to the car.

“Come on, Stark,” she said, climbing behind the wheel. “Let’s take a drive.”

Danny shrugged resignedly and followed her to the car.