There Goes the Neighbourhood

By Karen Keeley

“I know he’s been abducted by aliens. They whisked him away in the ship, left me standing there, watching the ship grow smaller and smaller. Len has to be somewhere, and you’re a tracker. Word on the street, you can track anything.”

Syd Malloy smiled. Yes, he was a tracker but he preferred private investigator which meant searching for people who had gone missing or rustling up clues with regard to stolen property, collecting his standard rate for his efforts.

Excerpt from ONE WOMAN TOO MANY, the first of nine short stories featuring Syd Malloy, Private Investigator and his long-time pal Detective Al Simms with the Vancouver Police Force. Join them as they battle crime in post-WWII Vancouver, British Columbia.

KAREN KEELEY has published short fiction in a number of anthologies, including Murder! Mystery! Mayhem! (Nordic Press). Karen is a former Communications Analyst with the Yukon government, now retired and living in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Her previous works include STICKS AND STONES, Three Murder Mysteries, and TELLING TALES, a collection of short stories.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Karen Keeley
• Release date: Jul 25, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005496487

Book preview

THERE GOES THE NEIGHBOURHOOD

Syd Malloy, Private Investigator

Short Stories

KAREN KEELEY

This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is coincidental. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

Copyright © 2022 Karen Keeley

The book author retains sole copyright to her contribution to this book.

All rights reserved.

ISBN 9798838262639

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1 One Woman Too Many

2 Date with Destiny

3 Fire Brigade

4 Year of the Pig

5 Cry Me a River

6 A Firm Grip

7 Lost Causes

8 Random Act of Madness

9 Sideways

Acknowledgments

About the Author

ONE WOMAN TOO MANY

Malloy tapped a Camel from a rumpled cigarette package kept in a desk drawer and told the woman, That’s quite the story, missus—

Watkins, said the woman. Diana Watkins, and she paused, having taken in a big breath and holding it to the count of three before exhaling. I know how it sounds, Mr. Malloy. I too, would be skeptical. But I’m telling you, I was there. I saw them with these two eyes—

Eyes as blue as the Mediterranean, identical to the summer frock she was wearing. If not for the length of her nails, and the colour of her lipstick, both magenta, he might have dismissed her as a fruitcake, the magenta adding a splash of colour to an otherwise everyday ensemble which included a white leather belt belted around her slim waist, matching shoes and purse, and the white cotton gloves.

When she first sat down, she’d removed the gloves, having placed them on Malloy’s desk, giving him his first glance at her long-lacquered nails. She now leaned back and crossed her legs. She gestured for Malloy to hand over the cigarette. He did so, and lit up another for himself.

I don’t usually do this, she said. Smoking I mean. It’s so unladylike. She studied the cigarette as though it were something Malloy had unearthed during an archeological dig in some far-off Amazonian jungle. They pointed some kind of ray-gun at us, and there we were, no better than frightened Jack rabbits caught in the crosshairs.

I gather you want me to find your husband, said Malloy.

She nodded, uncrossing her legs and leaning forward, pinning Malloy with those striking baby blues. Len is often gone for days at a time because of his work, his sales calls. They take him throughout the province. But this—this is different.

She blinked, the connection broken, stubbing out the cigarette, embers flying from the ashtray. I know he’s been abducted by aliens. They whisked him away in the ship, left me standing there, watching the ship grow smaller and smaller. Len has to be somewhere, and you’re a tracker. Word on the street, you can track anything.

Syd Malloy smiled. Yes, he was a tracker but he preferred private investigator which meant searching for people who had gone missing or rustling up clues with regard to stolen property, collecting his standard rate for his efforts. If the woman with the painted nails, shapely legs and trim ankles wanted to spend her money finding a deadbeat husband on the lam, who was he to argue?

I’ve got a few things to settle up, he said. Paperwork mostly. After that, I’ll find your husband.

Thank you, said the woman, retrieving her gloves and her purse. As she left the office, Malloy glanced at his notes: Diana Watkins, twenty-four years of age, her husband Len, three years older. Diana suited her, as did her honey-blonde hair, cupid-shaped lips, and striking blue eyes with the homegrown lashes. Realistically, she looked no more than eighteen.

The drive north of the city offered an impressive view of the ocean, sunlight winking off the coastal waters, a tugboat in the distance, the long V-shaped wake played out behind the working tug as it towed a massive log boom north, its final destination somewhere up the rugged BC coastline. But Malloy’s thoughts were not on the view; he was thinking about Diana Watkins referring to him as a tracker.

He'd decided to begin where the trail ended, Horseshoe Bay. According to Diana, she and her husband, Len, had gone there Saturday afternoon, taking in the sights. Later, they’d eaten at a seafood place on the waterfront. It was Len who suggested the drive into the mountains and that’s when the saucer and the little green men appeared. Reluctantly, Diana admitted, they’d also been drinking, Len less so than her, she’d thrown caution to the wind.

Malloy made the rounds looking for Len Watkins’ baby-blue Chevy Deluxe. He finally spotted it—or one just like it—at the Destiny Motel, a seemingly forgotten establishment hidden behind a row of towering old-growth cedars, the motel virtually invisible from the harbour.

He parked his own Chevy LaSalle in the gravel lot after maneuvering the vehicle past a chain link fence and a couple of the giant cedars. He then entered the lobby. At the front counter he stated, Len Watkins, pharmaceutical salesman. Any details you have, I’m trying to find him.

The high school kid with sandy blond hair and a protruding Adam’s apple indicative of his age stood behind the counter, a Hank Williams tune coming from a Philco radio near the kid’s elbow, the same model Malloy owned. Suspicion clouded the kid’s hazel flecked eyes. Maybe he doesn’t want to be found.

That may be, but the wife is worried, said Malloy. He disappeared Saturday night. It’s now Monday. And before you ask, yes, she tried putting in a missing person’s report but you know the police—they only look for politicians and bureaucrats.

Ain’t that the truth. The kid flipped shut the comic book he’d been reading, pushed it off to the side. I’m just filler around here. I’ll get my granddad. He normally works the counter.

The kid disappeared behind a beaded curtain. A moment later he returned with his grandfather. Malloy found himself repeating his question three times, thinking the old fellow was hard of hearing, a consequence of his age. The old man finally cottoned onto what Malloy was asking, screwed up his face, and told Malloy, Come with me.

Malloy followed, pushing through the beaded curtain which took him into a kitchen overrun with Formica countertops and Naugahyde chairs, eggs boiling in a saucepan, bacon sizzling in a frypan. Granddad then pushed open a flyspecked screen door at the back of the kitchen and pointed. There’s your man.

Malloy scrutinized the fellow whacking away at a fallen tree, the hatchet doing little to clear the branches from the main trunk of an old-growth cedar. He walked toward the man, saying, You’re Len Watkins.

What if I am? The man chopping wood, roughly eight years Malloy’s junior if Malloy took Diana’s word as truth, chopped into another branch. What’s it to you?

I’ve been asked by your wife to find you, to bring you home.

The man grunted. Haven’t got a wife. He twisted the hatchet, freeing it from a gnarly branch with teeth of its own.

According to the woman with the lacquered nails and the magenta lipstick, she says she’s your wife.

She’s lying. Watkins held the hatchet, flexing the fingers on his right hand, reasserting his grip. She lies about everything.

Look, buddy, how about setting aside the hatchet for a few minutes. Give me your undivided attention.

Len Watkins set the hatchet on the woodpile and sat down on a stump near a firepit ringed with jagged rocks. He told Malloy, he’d been chopping wood all morning, earning his keep, the old granddad kind enough to let him stay on while he figured out his next move. As for the little lady, she’d been stalking him ever since he’d met her in a bar on Granville a couple of months back, him thinking she was just a nice-lookin’ kid out for a good time, never knowing once she got her claws into him, there was no letting go.

Malloy told Watkins she’d come to see him just that morning. She seemed competent, but she did spin a yarn about a spaceship and little green men.

Yup—that’d be her. Watkins tapped two cigarettes from his pack of smokes, offered one to Malloy. We took in that movie Invaders from Mars at the drive-in out in Ladner on Friday night. That’s probably what gave her the storyline. She’s nuts, a real humdinger. I was hoping to get lost out here in Horseshoe Bay, keep my head down, chop a few trees and inhale some fresh air. I figured in time, she’d forget about me, get her claws into someone else.

Malloy struck a match, lighting his and Watkins’ cigarettes. A cheeky squirrel ran up a tree, chittering in its sassy way, announcing it was annoyed at the two men intruding in its space.

What I’m thinking, she was so goddamned certain about the spaceship, said Malloy. That, and the little green men. I know—a ridiculous story, but she had a way of making it sound plausible.

Watkins flicked an ash off his smoke, reiterating once again, she was a liar. She’s a pro at making things up.

And here you are in the pharmaceutical business.

Watkins grunted. What’s that supposed to mean?

I’m thinking Saturday, after the movie, you slip her a mickey, take a drive into the mountains and while she’s under the influence, you hightail it out of there, leaving her high and dry. Only a lowlife would do that.

You can think whatever you want, said Watkins. It’s a free country, no law against that. We were up there. He pointed east toward the rock-walled cliffs skirting the highway. At the lookout. She was a half mile back to the road. But I tell you—she’s a liar from the tip of her nose to the tips of those long fingernails. Once her claws are dug in, you’re a goner.

Malloy studied the length of the ash growing on the end of his cigarette. If I’m to take her money, I owe her an explanation.

Watkins rolled the end of his cigarette between his fingers and thumb, tobacco falling on the fabric of his khaki trousers. Look mister, you may be who you say you are. I saw your credentials, thanks for that. But you could also be her husband, her brother, her uncle, someone who cares for her, and for that I’m sorry. But I’m telling you, I never slipped her a mickey. I’m just trying to slip out of her grasp—she’s nuts, and I’ve nothing more to say.

I’m nobody’s husband, brother, or uncle, said Malloy. I’m just hired help looking to make some dough.

If it’s dough you want, I’ll pay you double whatever she’s giving you, countered Watkins. You forget you ever saw me. Tell her I disappeared into that UFO with the little green men. Tell her you tracked me to their landing pad and the saucer is gone. She’ll believe that if you give it to her straight.

Malloy had been in the business long enough to know when someone was lying. In this case, it was the tick in Watkins’ left eye, a tell similar to what some of Malloy’s poker buddies did during a friendly game of cards—but what was Watkins lying about? Did he have a wife or not? Was the little lady a chronic liar or not? Had Watkins slipped her a mickey or not?

He finished his smoke and tossed the butt into the blackened remains of the fire pit.

On the return trip to the city, Malloy pondered what he would tell his client: the truth about finding Len Watkins or would he share what Watkins wanted him to say—he was now living off-planet, having been taken there by a UFO. It struck Malloy that he’d found Watkins with very little effort on his part, simply canvassing the area looking for the man’s vehicle.

And why the Destiny Motel in Horseshoe Bay, a quiet little backwater town just now beginning to see some growth with the opening of the Black Ball Line ferries. Anyone living in Vancouver knew there were ferries travelling to Departure Bay in Nanaimo while others headed up the Sunshine Coast or took the route along the Jervis Inlet south of Powell River. With ferry travel literally just down the road, why hadn’t Watkins bought a ticket and heaved ho?

Back in the city, Malloy stopped for a bite to eat at the Bavarian Schnitzel House on Main, which filled his belly with schnitzel and sauerkraut. He then parked his LaSalle at his local garage and walked Broadway, headed home.

Neon lights advertised the Odeon, Capital and Plaza theatres, bars and restaurants, and a number of hotels. The din of the city gave him trolley cars and automobiles kicking out exhaust fumes. The day’s headlines sold by those hawking newspapers shouted in bold font that Grace Kelly had married Prince Rainier of Monaco. Malloy bought a paper and jaywalked across Broadway toward Alma, eventually climbing the four flights to his one-bedroom apartment. Once there, he caught the tail end of the six o’clock news on his own Philco radio—a suspicious death at the Destiny Motel in Horseshoe Bay. Police and medical personnel were at the scene. His gut told him Len Watkins had met an untimely demise which had nothing to do with the old granddad boiling eggs in a stainless-steel saucepan.

Malloy made the call.

It was close to midnight when his old-time pal and former partner, Detective Al Simms arrived on Malloy’s doorstep. The detective was out of breath, grousing about the climb that damn near killed him, looking as he always did—wrinkled gabardine suit, beat up fedora, red-veined nose indicative of high blood pressure. He’d been sucking on a toothpick, never without one when working a case. He snapped the toothpick in half and tossed the broken bits into an ashtray on Malloy’s coffee table. Malloy told his old-time pal he liked the view facing north, the reason for the apartment, a panoramic view of Jericho Beach. Simms wasn’t interested in the view. He now dropped his hat on the coffee table, confirming Malloy’s suspicion—Len Watkins had indeed been killed at the Destiny Motel.

Someone walloped him with the backend of a hatchet, said the detective. Used it like a hammer, one blow on the right side of his skull, just above the ear, a second blow to the back of the head. Then, for reasons unknown, they shoved a hypodermic needle up his nose, the needle long enough to lodge in the frontal cortex.

Christ, said Malloy. You’d think the hatchet would’ve done the job.

We’re waiting on the ME to ascertain exact cause of death, said Simms. And what about you? You know anything about hypodermic needles?

No, why would I? said Malloy. Show me a needle, and I’m out cold. You’d need smelling salts to bring me around. Not something most folks carry in their pocket.

Malloy was smiling, Simms having no part of it.

Don’t be a smartass, he snapped. You admit you spoke with the victim. What more do you have to say?

Just what I’ve been saying. A wife looking for her husband. I found the husband. I was gonna tell her tomorrow, drive her to the motel or she could retrieve him herself. Jesus—what a way to die.

You’re telling me, Simms agreed. Only we didn’t find any record of a wife. If there was one, she’d collect ten thousand simply for marrying the guy.

Malloy blew out a slow whistle.

Simms added, I’ll see to the little lady, ascertain her story myself. If you think of anything further, give me a call. He picked up his well-worn fedora, jammed it on his head and departed.

At noon the following day, Diana arrived at Malloy’s office after having been with the police most of the night, identifying Len’s body and explaining her side of things.

You look all in, said Malloy. I mean that in the nicest way.

His client’s attempt at a smile failed miserably. You notice a lot, don’t you?

It’s my job to notice things. Such as you being the beneficiary on a big life insurance policy.

You know about that?

Malloy nodded. I spoke with the lead detective last night. He’s the one I gave your name to. He told me Len’s covered by Empire, part of his onboarding with the job, and you the beneficiary. Ten thousand is quite the hefty sum in this day and age. Something worth killing for.

Oh—for heaven’s sake! I did not kill Len. His client snorted, not