STRANGE  BEDFELLOWS

 

            I could hear the phone ringing when I pulled into my driveway. That would have been unusual except for the fact my front door was standing wide open. I ran up the steps to the porch, pulled the .38 Smith & Wesson that rested comfortably under my left armpit and cautiously peered inside.

            He was sitting in my favorite chair watching my TV and talking on my phone. All I could see was the back of his head. I stepped into the room, but before I could speak I felt a cold piece of steel in my back.

            "Drop the gun, pal," said a deep voice.

            I scooted the gun across the floor, and then twisted clockwise, my right elbow moving his weapon away from my vitals. I grabbed the guy's forearm with my left hand. The look on his face said he wasn't used to being on the receiving end of grief. As I prepared to break his arm over my knee, I heard somebody say my name.

            "Johnny!"

            I hesitated, but not before backhanding the bum with the gun across the face. I wrenched the pistol from his hand and then turned to get a better look at the guy getting out of my chair.

            I recognized the face. Everybody in the country had seen it recently. The headlines read: The Politician and The Playmate. Only thing, this politician is married and the playmate is missing. Come to think of it, it wasn't such an odd story. A middle-aged politician fooling around with one of his interns. Sounded more like the six o'clock news. Half the locals up here in Logjam knew about the affair and they voted for him anyway. Then one day the girl disappeared. Now everybody in the country was talking.

            "Congressman. Did I forget about giving you a key to my place or are they going to add breaking and entering to your rap sheet?"

            "I have to talk to you, Johnny." He put down the receiver.

            "So you break into my house?"

            "This is important."

            "And the law isn't?"

            "Okay, I'm sorry. But I need to talk to you."

            "Lose the goomba and I'll give you five minutes."

            I wouldn't hand back the bodyguard's gun. He made himself scarce on the redwood deck overlooking the lake while I retrieved my gun and then heated some day-old coffee in the microwave for my guest.

            "Have you seen the TV coverage?" asked the congressman.

            Some people miss the Super Bowl, some skip the Oscars, but nobody misses a juicy murder, especially if it involves somebody famous. Anyway, that's what everybody presumed, and here was the prime suspect in my living room.

            "Everybody loves a circus, Jerry."

            "That's what it is, Johnny. A bloody circus." He plopped down on my sofa and drank his coffee. "You know I don't have anything to do with Sheila's disappearance."

            "No, I don't know that. But you do have a reputation."

            "You can't believe those rumors," said the politician.

            "Most people I know saw you with her."

            "That was a long time ago."

            "It was last month," I clarified.

            "Well, we broke it off."

            "You didn't happen to break her neck at the same time, did you?"

            He slammed down his half empty coffee cup, stood up and said, "No! I didn't kill her. I don't know where the hell she is."

            "Jerry, you were the last one to see her."

            "The killer was the last one to see her," he said.

            "The police know she's dead?"

            "How should I know? Nobody will tell me anything."

            Small wonder, I thought. National television indicted, tried, and convicted the guy twenty-four hours after the news broke that he had an affair with the missing woman. Even if he had been Joe Six-Pack, he was the primary candidate. And being a politician, even a mediocre congressman from Nowhere, California, he was news. Nothing else was going on nationally or internationally, so Congressman Jerry Shoemaker was the main topic of discussion from the water cooler to Washington.

 ....Continued.