Typo Squad, page 10
part #1 of Typo Squad Series
“Oh, hi Dick,” she said brightly. She eyed Thea up and down. “Bringing in some new talent for the boss to check out?”
“Hey!” Thea said indignantly.
“No, nothing like that,” Dick cut across them. “This is my new partner. I just need to ask the boss a few questions. Is she available?”
The girl looked at Dick and batted her fake eyelashes. “Oh, Dick,” she said. “She always has time for you. She makes time for you. Come on in.”
They passed through the expansive hallway and into a waiting area appointed in fine polished oak, brass, and antique furniture. Scattered around the place, sitting and standing, were girls of every shape and size, in various stages of undress, eyeing them both hungrily. Thea edged closer to Dick, who paid the women no mind at all.
They passed a set of open double doors on the right that gave way to a bar. Dick looked in and saw even more women entertaining a host of gentlemen callers. At a glance, Dick recognized the Semicolons’ third baseman, Justin from the firing range, and the mayor, all drinking and having a ball.
They reached a wide, circular room at the end of the hallway. A door opened with a theatrical flourish, and out stepped Miss Information. She was a big, buxom blonde with a knowing twinkle in her eye and a practiced smile on her bright red lips. She wore a long black silk gown that hugged her body in a way that was just short of obscene. She kept her expression neutral, but when she saw Dick her face brightened all the same.
“Hello, Richard,” she said in a deep, throaty husk.
“I prefer Dick.”
“Then you might be in the wrong place,” Miss Information said quickly, and the girls around the room tittered.
“You look good,” Dick said. “It’s been a while since I saw you in person.”
“Well whose fault is that?” She sidled up as close to him as she could, tapping the tip of his nose with her finger. “I’m here every night; you know that. But you always pick one of my girls instead. Why is that?”
“Because I can’t afford you,” he said.
The girls all laughed again, and this time Miss Information joined them.
“Listen, I need your help with something. Can we talk in private?” He gestured toward the door to her chambers.
“Dick,” she said, “we can do anything you like in private.” She hooked his arm and began guiding him away.
“Wait here,” Dick told Thea. She shrugged and sat down carefully between two women lounging on a Queen Anne sofa with effortless grace. Thea blinked at the woman to her left, then turned to the woman on her right. “My goodness. That’s certainly a lot of cleavage.”
Dick smiled, then let Miss Information lead him away.
Miss Information led Dick into a room dominated by the single biggest bed he’d ever seen. The candles on every free surface gave the room a soft, flickering glow, and the assorted cuffs and clips hanging on the walls gleamed weakly.
“You’ve redecorated,” Dick said.
“Well, I needed to replace the bed.” She patted the duvet gently. “The old one just wasn’t . . . durable enough. So I reappointed the whole room while I was at it. What do you think?”
“It’s nice,” Dick said. “Cozy.”
“Glad you like it.”
“Has Anton Nym seen it?”
He expected her to be shocked, or angry, or thrown off in some manner, but instead she smiled and swatted at him playfully. “Dick!” she said. “Just like that? No foreplay even?”
“Sorry.” He grinned in spite of himself. “I’m a bit pressed for time.”
“Well, if you’re planning to get anything out of me, you’re going to have to play first,” she said.
“Really?”
“Oh, come on, Dick,” she said. “It’s been ages. You’re the best I ever had. Don’t make me beg.”
Dick took a deep breath and sighed. “All right. But as soon as we’re done, you’ll tell me what you know. Deal?”
“Deal!” she squealed. “Take off your jacket and get on the bed. I’ll be right back.”
She slipped off through a small doorway and disappeared. Dick slipped off his jacket and crawled onto the bed, sinking deep into the marshmallow mattress.
“Are you ready?” she called from the other room.
“Yes.”
“Then let’s do it.” She walked back into the room, and in her hands was a Scrabble board.
The board was set between them, and Miss Information was as giddy as a schoolgirl. Anytime Dick tried to bring up anything about Nym, she shushed him and insisted he continue playing.
“Listen, my partner’s been waiting a long time,” Dick said at last, when the board was nearly full.
“Oh, I’m sure she’s fine. My girls will keep her well entertained.”
Dick smiled at the thought of Thea being entertained by Miss Information’s girls, and played the word QUAY off the Y in ESSAY.
“Very nice,” Miss Information said. She looked at her tray of letters, and then looked up at Dick. They locked eyes, and she placed the tiles on the board without looking at them.
Dick looked down. She had placed tiles around the Q in QUAY to spell AQUATIC. But she spelled it AQATIC. The euphoric disorientation hit him almost immediately.
“What . . . ?” was all he could manage before the room began to spin. He got awkwardly to his feet, shaking his head in an effort to sluff the effects, but if anything, it only made them worse.
He looked over at Miss Information. She was wavy, off kilter, but he could see that she was watching him impassively, neither inclined to help him nor particularly concerned about his plight.
The room kept shifting like a funhouse ride. He held on as long as he could, but darkness filled his vision and he pitched forward on the bed, knocking the Scrabble board sideways and sending the pieces flying.
As he drifted somewhere between unconsciousness and consciousness, Dick became aware of a muted voice speaking in the background.
“Okay,” the voice was saying. It sounded like a record that had been slowed down to the wrong speed. “I’ll take care of it.”
Then Dick felt a soft hand on his forehead, and everything slowly came back. Miss Information had typoed him.
He opened his eyes and saw his reflection in the mirror over the bed. Miss Information was curled up next to him, and as he watched, she moved her hand gently from his forehead to his cheeks.
“Dick?” she asked, and to his ears, her voice had returned to normal. “Are you all right?”
He sat up too quickly and paid for it. A painful stab split his brain, followed by a deep, rhythmic pounding. He fell back onto the duvet and put his hand over his eyes.
“Urgh,” he managed.
“Sorry, my sweet, wonderful man,” Miss Information said. “I hated to have to do that.”
“Then why did you?” Dick muttered. His voice sounded much too deep to his ears.
“It’s just business, Dick,” she replied. “Strictly business.”
He slowly opened his eyes again and looked at her. She batted her eyelashes and smiled, her dazzlingly white teeth contrasting with her bright red lipstick.
“Business?” Dick croaked.
“That’s all,” Miss Information said. “I had to knock you out for a short while so I could call him.”
“Call who?” Dick asked.
She rolled her eyes. “Who do you think?”
Dick suddenly felt much more awake and alert, though he could feel his temples still pulsing with his hangover. He sat up again, more slowly this time, and regarded her.
“Nym?” he asked. “You called Nym? Why?”
“He said if you showed up, to let him know,” she said simply, shrugging. “Like I said, business.”
“Okay, we’re gonna need to go back to the beginning, here. How do you know Anton Nym?”
“Oh, now,” Miss Information said, sitting up and scooting over to the edge of the bed. “If there’s one thing you should know about me by now, Dick, is that I don’t give it away for free.”
Dick sighed deeply. He reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet, and removed a $100 bill. He handed it to Miss Information, who made it vanish into her ample cleavage.
She hesitated, as if unsure what to say or how much. “Mot Grange is experiencing . . . financial difficulties. I don’t have nearly as many clients as I had even six months ago. I blame happy families.”
“Go on,” said Dick.
“Well, I put out a few feelers and found a financial backer who was willing to help me out.”
“Anton Nym.”
“Yes,” Miss Information said plainly. “Anton Nym.”
“And in exchange for the loan, he asked you to rat me out?”
“Let’s choose our words carefully, Dick,” she replied. “The money wasn’t a loan. It was a gift. And I didn’t rat you out. It’s not like he’s coming here to kill you or anything.”
“Oh, well, that’s reassuring.” Dick got unsteadily to his feet. He stepped on several Scrabble tiles, but didn’t seem to notice. Then a thought occurred to him.
“Did you meet him in person?” Dick asked.
Miss Information smiled and batted her eyelashes again.
“Oh for Christ’s sake,” Dick said, digging another $100 bill from his wallet. He threw it on the bed, and she made it disappear as well.
“Of course I met him,” she said. “A man offers you that much money, the least you can do is shake his hand. Or any other body part he prefers.”
“I’m guessing you didn’t see his face,” Dick said. “He was wearing a mask? Silver asterisk in the middle of the forehead?”
“Yes.”
“Did the fact that you were making a financial deal with a man in a mask strike you as . . . I don’t know, unusual?” Dick asked.
“Honey, in my line of work, ‘unusual’ is a very loose term.”
“Fair enough,” Dick said. “Let’s get to the phone call. What did he say when you told him I was here?”
“That, my dear, you can have for free,” she said. “He gave me two messages to give you. One now, and one later.”
“Messages?”
“Messages,” she repeated.
There was silence between them for a moment. “Well?” he demanded.
“See what your brother knows,” she said.
“What?” Dick asked, completely thrown by the change in direction. “What does my brother have to do with any of this? Come on, what’s the message?”
“I just gave it to you,” Miss Information said. “The message is: See what your brother knows.”
Dick stared at her blankly. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“I’m just the messenger,” Miss Information said. “But if you’d like to hear my opinion . . .”
Dick hesitated, but decided he needed all the help he could get. He pulled another $100 bill out of his wallet, handing it over.
“In my opinion,” she said, “he wants you to go and see what your brother knows.”
Dick rolled his eyes. “You’re a big help. What’s the other message?”
“Ah-ah-ah,” she said, holding up her finger and wagging it playfully at him. “One now, one later, remember?”
“But when is later?”
“I have a feeling you’ll know when later is.” She sat down primly on the edge of the bed. “And I’ll be right here waiting when you do.”
“Always a pleasure,” Dick said. He made his way through the door leading to Miss Information’s chambers and back out into the circular room at the end of the hallway.
“Thea?” he called, but she was nowhere to be seen. A blonde woman in a red satin robe sat on a nearby lounge, making bedroom eyes at Dick.
“Have you seen my partner?” he asked her.
“No,” she said seductively. “But I’ll be your partner if you like.”
Dick crossed through an archway into another lounge area, where he heard music and raucous laughter coming from behind a closed door. He opened it.
It was a wide, mirrored room. Multicolored lights flashed off the walls, and a disco ball twirled on the ceiling. In the center of the room was a stripper pole, and all of Miss Information’s ladies were gathered around it, yelling and applauding.
Glued to the pole was Thea, doing her best to look seductive and sexual in her black Typo Squad uniform. As Dick watched, she hooked a leg around the top part of the pole and swung herself in a wide arc, arms spread wide and fingertips extended. The women watching exploded with cheers and applause. Dick approached the pole.
Thea was in the middle of a long, complicated one-legged twirl when Dick joined the audience, his arms folded, his head cocked slightly to the side. As Thea finished her maneuver and threw up her arms in victory, to renewed excitement from the women watching, she spotted Dick. She jumped awkwardly off the pole as though it had suddenly become electrified and stood there, looking abashed.
The women watching burst into a chorus of boos as the routine ended, and Dick took several steps forward. “What exactly are you doing?” he shouted over the still-throbbing music.
Thea looked over at the pole and then back at him. “Blending in,” she shouted back.
Dick grinned, offering his hand to help her down from the small stage surrounding the pole. The other women hugged her and high-fived her as they moved through the crowd.
“We have some work to do,” he told her as they headed to the lobby. “Unless you have a midnight show you need to be here for.”
She punched him playfully on the shoulder. “So what did that fat old whore have to say?” she asked, nodding her head toward Miss Information’s chambers.
“Hey now,” Dick said reproachfully, and then paused to process what Thea had just said. “She’s not . . . old. She’s my age.”
Thea opened her mouth gleefully to reply, but Dick held up a finger of warning. “Don’t!”
“You ruin all my fun, Dick,” Thea said as they passed through the front doors and out into the darkness beyond. “So really, what did she say?”
Dick filled her in on everything that had happened. Thea listened intently, then shook her head.
“Did it occur to you that you could’ve used her phone to call Nym?” she said, exasperated. “Maybe had a trace put on it? Find out where he’s hiding?”
“Hey, that fat old whore isn’t stupid,” Dick replied. “She’d have thought of that.”
“So we’re going to Fula Ord?” Thea asked as they climbed into the SUV.
“Unless you have a better idea,” Dick said.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Dick was uncharacteristically quiet as they drove north, passing through stately neighborhoods and frowning brownstones. Thea left him alone.
“It’s been a while since I’ve seen him,” he said suddenly, breaking the steady hum of the engine. “Chicago, I mean.”
“Oh?” Thea asked.
“Yeah,” Dick said. “I used to visit him a lot early on. I was kind of hoping he might come back, but whenever I tried to talk to him, he only spoke in riddles and weird, disconnected phrases. A few doctors thought they could help him and they tried a lot of therapy and put him on a bunch of different drug trials. But none of it ever did any good.”
They turned off the main street and joined a wide, sweeping driveway that led to Fula Ord. The grounds were immaculate, the grass so brightly green it hurt Thea’s eyes to look at it, but the building itself was nothing remarkable. Just a brick facade with tinted windows. It could just as easily have been a dentist’s office or a middle school.
They pulled up to the front door and Dick got out. “Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked.
“I’m sure,” Thea said. “And I’ll stay with you this time. I doubt there are any stripper poles here.”
“You might be surprised,” Dick said.
They ascended the stairs to the entryway.
After they both signed in and presented their IDs, the nurse at the reception desk told them to have a seat. The small, dingy waiting room overflowed with out-of-date magazines and crushed paper cups. In the corner, a balding man in a thin blue robe and paper slippers sat on the edge of his chair, grabbing wildly at the air above him, as if bedeviled by invisible butterflies.
Twenty minutes went by, and then a steel door across the room buzzed loudly and an extremely attractive woman in a white coat with a clipboard stepped out and looked around.
“Mister Shonnary?” she called. “Miss Saurus?”
Dick and Thea stood and crossed the room to meet her.
“Good morning,” the woman said, a little stiffly. “I’m Doctor Paye. Mister Manuel is a patient of mine. Follow me, please.”
She stepped aside so Dick and Thea could pass, then closed the door tightly behind her. The three of them fell in step together, making their way down a long, tiled, brightly lit corridor. They passed multiple rooms along the way. In one, a woman who looked even younger than Thea bumped her head softly against the wall, naming off state capitals with every hit. In another, an older man sat in a wheelchair, furiously shaking his head, as if strongly disagreeing with unheard voices. Still another held a woman who looked to be in her eighties, who was singing show tunes at the top of her lungs while whipping off her hospital gown with a stripper’s flourish. A weary-looking orderly gathered up the gown, perhaps to try and get it back on her.
At the end of the corridor, they turned into a small office, where Dick and Thea took seats on the opposite side of Doctor Paye’s desk.
“So,” Doctor Paye began, “I understand you’re here to visit your brother.”
“That’s right,” Dick said.
The doctor thumbed through some paperwork on her desk. “According to this, it’s been more than three years since your last visit.” It was less of a statement and more of an accusation.
“If that’s what it says,” Dick replied. “That sounds about right.”
“So why now, if I may ask?”
