The Search for Yaser Abdel Said (part 5)

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By Denis Schultz

If Bernard Piffy had been Mike Hammer he would have known what to do. He would have pulled out the old trusty Army Colt.45 and blasted Umyar back into the Pleistocene Age, filled him so full of holes he would have been mistaken for a Swiss cheese in a Tom and Jerry cartoon. But Piffy had left his peashooter back in his flat over the Red Dragon.

He could have taken to his heels. That would have been another option. If he had been Jim Thorpe he would have been halfway to Heathrow the moment he had caught sight of Umyar but he was not Jim Thorpe, he was Bernard Piffy. There wasn’t much traction left in his Buster Browns. He would never make it out of the mosque alive!

He heard something scream! It could have been a dinosaur. It could have been Fay Wray. It could have been Bernard Piffy. It could have been Umyar who was lurching across the mosque toward him like King Kong searching for a toothpick! He swallowed, glanced at bint Marwan. Good grief! She was taking a powder, evaporating, pulling herself up into her halo! In a moment she would be gone and he would be left to face the music! Hot damn! The mosque was shaking as if a hundred Heinkels had just flown in from Der Vaterland with gifts for a broken-down old private eye name of Bernard Piffy! He could feel Umyar’s breath singing his collar! Was this the way it was to end?

Then a hand reached out from what was left of the halo—a tiny hand, a child’s hand, bint Marwan’s hand! “Hurry! Hurry!” she urged. Piffy grabbed the hand and bint Marwan pulled him into the disappearing halo! God, she was strong for someone so little. But something had him by the foot—something was tearing at his shoe, at his pants leg! The scream came again! It was Umyar, a cry of rage. The struggle over Piffy’s pants leg was brief and he was suddenly free and the halo, now no more than a thin slice of light in what had become an inebriating darkness shot away from the Prophet’s premier assassin. It made a circle of the mosque—maybe two—and then vanished through a hole in the wall. No, that would have been too easy. It must have been a time warp—yeah, a time warp!

The darkness in the aura was all encompassing. It was a roller coaster ride at sonic speeds. He was upside down, then right side up. He was standing on his head, rolling over and over. His nose was running.

“Will you stop groping me!” squealed bint Marwan.

“I’m not groping you!” said Piffy. The very idea! Piffys didn’t grope children! Piffys didn’t…

“Maybe I had better stop this thing,” said bint Marwan.

And stop it she did—suddenly and completely. Piffy tumbled out of the halo into a puddle that stank worse than the Devil’s armpit! He sat there for a minute or two trying to figure out where he was. Then he got to his feet. He was covered with coffee grounds and grapefruit rinds. “You ought to put some seat belts in that damn thing!” he said.

Bint Marwan was massaging her derriere. “I’ve never had a passenger in this thing before,” she said.

A bobby with a flashlight was coming down the alley. “I say, what’s the racket here, old chap,” he asked.

It was at this point that bint Marwan, having little taste for the affairs of mere mortals, took leave of Piffy. A mist had come up and quicker than Piffy could say ‘Count Dracula’ bint Marwan had become part of it and had drifted back into the aura and in another moment she was whisking down the alley like a dead afterthought.

The bobby never noticed her. He looked Piffy up and down. “You again!” he said. “Didn’t I tell you yesterday to move on and the day before that and the day before that? And just look at you! What a mess! Do you always wallow about in the garbage like this?”

No, Piffy didn’t always wallow about in the garbage like this but there was no mistaking he was a mess. He stank; he was covered with filth, his left shoe was missing its heel and his left pants leg was shredded from the knee down. It could have been worse, but he didn’t’ see how.

“Run along now,” said the bobby. “I don’t want to see you here again. Understand?

Piffy understood.

He made his way back to the Red Dragon. As he walked up the steps to his flat he caught a whiff of cordite and phosgene! On, no! Mohammed Atta and Hani Hanjour! Of all the rotten luck! This was all he needed! He paused for a moment, took a deep breath. This was where Jessica Fletcher would call in the real cops and they would make the arrests. All nice and easy, sure, but there was not much chance of that happening here. He needed Mike Hammer, not—not… He sniffled. “I wish Andy were here!’ he said.

It took Piffy a moment to regain his composure. He took a deep breath, trudged down the corridor to his flat. Odd—the odor of cordite and phosgene wasn’t as strong as it had been coming up the stairs. Were they behind him? Maybe he could make a stand in his reum. He leapt toward his flat, threw open the door.

There was a man lying on his bed—a man in a trench coat and a crown hat with a long thin nose and a trim mustache. It was Inspector Clouseau!

“Ah, you are still alive!” said Clouseau.

“What are you doing here, Clouseau?” demanded Piffy.

“What does it look like?” said the Inspector. ‘I am looking for a reum.”

“A reum?” Piffy glanced around the flat—what was left of it. It had been demolished! It must have been a Kansas twister. Everything had been turned upside down; papers were strewn across the floor; anything that had resembled a drawer had been yanked open and the contents deposited in a discordant pile. Some of the stuffing was out of the easy chair, a spring was sticking out of the mattress right where Clouseau was making himself at home; the lining was gone from Piffy’s suitcase and someone had went to the trouble of pouring his aftershave into the kitchen sink—but the place smelled nice. Piffy turned on the Inspector. He was mad. He would have to pay for this. He felt like taking it out of Clouseau’s hide. “What the hell were you looking for?” he said tightly.

Clouseau swung his feet over the edge of the bed. ‘Toenail clippings,” he said.

“Toenail clippings?” said Piffy. That was ridiculous!

“They know you are looking for Yaser Abdel Said,” said Clouseau.

“Did they expect to find him here?” said an incredulous Piffy.

“No,” said the Inspector. “ They were looking for the toenail clippings. They do not appreciate your interfering in their affairs.”

“Out!” said Piffy. “Out!”

“They know about your contract with the boys at Joe’s Bar and Grille and Gun Club. They know about bint Marwan.”

“Out!” said Piffy.

Clouseau stood up. “Have you met James Bond?” he said. “I can get you in to see him.”

“Out!” said Piffy. He grabbed a bookend form the floor.

“Well, I can see you’re in no mood to talk,” said the Inspector. He backed toward the door. “Remember, for two quid I can arrange a meeting with 007” Then he bowed—he had reached the exit. “Viva la France,” he said and then he was gone.

Piffy lay down on the bed. It was too late to do anything but cry and he was too tired for that. Maybe things would look brighter in the morning.

Piffy had overslept. He splashed some water on his face, put on his spare pants, dabbed some aftershave on his face from the sink. He didn’t have the foggiest idea of how to contact bint Marwan but he was sure she would take care of that. They had some unfinished business to attend to—the soul of Yaser Abdel Said. But first he would have to find a new pair of shoes. He couldn’t go clumping around like Walter Brennan in The Real McCoys—yeah, and their was that stain on his pants. That bobby would be sure to spy him. Didn’t that rascal ever sleep?

He left the Red Dragon. Something seemed to be pulling him toward the Birmingham Central Mosque. Is must have been Kismet. A peddler was selling shoes from a cart directly across the street from the mosque. Was it more Kismet, fate or just plain dumb luck?

Piffey took a look at the shoes on the cart. They were good sturdy brogues, the kind that would have appealed to Jed Clampett. They had been imported from Turkey—the George W. Bush U-2 model said the peddler; they were noted for their sturdiness and ability to maintain a true course when launched in a proper trajectory.

A blind man with a seeing-eye dog came up and began an argument with the peddler. The dog took an instant liking to Piffy. It was a nice pooch with large liquid eyes. It sniffed Piffy here and there and nuzzled Piffy’s hand. Piffy scratched the dog’s head. “How you doing, Kujo?” he said.

A large group of Muslims were across the street escorting an Imam to a waiting vehicle.

“Could I try one of these shoes?” Piffy asked the peddler.

“Allahu akber!” said the peddler. “You are my tenth customer this morning. Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim!”

Piffy took off the shoe with the missing heel. He set it atop the cart; then rummaged amongst the footgear till he found one to his liking—the good sturdy reliable George W. Bush U-2 model. His back was to the street, to the Muslims clustered about the Imam. He had better look inside the shoe to check its size. Yeah, a good idea—he didn’t want something so small it would pinch his tootsies. He was bringing the Bush U-2 model up to his face when the seeing-eye dog must have mistaken his left leg for another dog. Maybe the mutt was just horny and wanted to cop a quick feel. It was the suddenness of the mutt’s assault that startled Piffy. He yelped as Kujo’s nose ventured into his derriere and the hand holding the Bush U-2 shot into the air. The shoe slipped from his fingers and went sailing across the street and into the believers gathered about the Imam. Something went ‘thunk’ and there was a stunned silence!

Someone screamed. It was shock and awe! “He threw his shoe at ul-Haq!’ a voice thundered.

A bearded man—what the heck they were all bearded—pointed at Piffy. An ugly murmur rose from a dozen throats

“It was the Kafir!” bleated an overweight replica of Omar Bakri.

“Blasphemy! Blasphemy!” they were all yelling at once. “He has insulted Islam!”

Piffy realized at once what had happened. If it wasn’t the faux pas of the Century it was close! He grabbed the shoe with the missing heel from the cart and took off down the street with the mob after him. He might not have been Jim Thorpe at the ’36 Olympics but even with one shoe on and one shoe off he was a damn site faster than Walter Brennan and he would need every last MPH he could get out of his tired aching limbs! He would be lucky to get out of this one alive! “Holy Mother of God, save me!” he cried. Maybe he should have yelled “Allahu akbar.”

(To be continued)