Sam Diamond, P.I.

Tales of a second-rate detective.

SAM DIAMOND, P.I.
AND THE CASE OF THE HALF-EATEN SANDWICH

The room was dark, and the fog was as thick as tapioca pudding. It was garbage day, and I was attempting to launch my garbage bags out of my 4th-story window. The bags exploded on impact with the street below, launching banana peels and cardboard boxes like so many shells out of a Gatling Gun.
"You're paying for that, Diamond!" a familiar voice roared.
Picture a gorilla. Now picture what a gorilla would say to be an equivalent term to "gorilla". Thus begat Lazy Marv, proprietor of Lazy Marv's Delicatessen, located on the first floor of my office building. Marv was not someone most people would describe as "ugly". Marv was someone most people would describe as "Gheeuhallgh!" the first time they saw him, as they run away clasping their mouths. His voice was soft and calm, like a bullhorn made of chalk being used to scrape barnacles off of a boat made of human nails. His hands were less like hands and more like those giant novelty hands they sell at ballgames. His smell was reminiscent of afternoon in the Sahara Desert, complete with rotting camel and stagnant canteen water. And, most importantly, he can whip up one fine peanut-butter-and-pickle sandwich. No, not peanut butter and pickles, don't be ridiculous. Peanuts, butter, and pickles were crudely stuffed into two slices of always-suspiciously-green bread to create food nirvana. Well, not quite nirvana, more like Purgatory. Still, Marv's was the only delicatessen left in the entire city. So, I made it a point of stopping there for lunch every day.
Of course, today's lunch might be a bit awkward, what with the garbage and the Gatling Gun and the gorilla references. Oh well.

...

I trudged down the steps of my apartment building, slyly avoiding the 30-day-old eggs and broken glass that had somehow not gone all the way to the sidewalk. Lazy Marv's was open, but the place was as empty as the premiere of "Chicken Fried Steak: The Musical". Of course, I helped produce that musical, and the box office failure is what got me into the Private Eye business in the first place. But that's beside the point. The point is, Lazy Marv was looking a bit more haggard than usual. Not much, mind you, as his laziness always made him look a bit haggard. However, there was something off in everything about him. His stank was more stanky, his stubble was more stubbly, and, most noticable, his face was sagging like a rubber band forced around a 50-square-foot fence for 20 years.
His sag perked up as soon as he saw another human entity walk across the threshold.
"DIIIIIAMOND!" he shrieked in a voice unbearably more grating than before. "What can I get you? The usual? A pie? The caviar?"
"Your caviar is 800 dollars an ounce! And it tastes like Miracle Whip!"
"Look, Diamond, I need some revenue. A new delicatessen opened up a block away, and now everyone's headed there instead of here. Just because they have 'low prices' and 'edible tomatoes'. Feh."
"A new delicatessen? I didn't hear about any construction projects around here."
"Oh, they didn't need to construct anything. They just renovated The Incredibly Ancient Historic Building, where they keep the original copies of the Magna Carta and the Shroud of Turin. They converted the art gallery into a bathroom!"
"At least they have a bathroom."
"HEY! Look, I'm hiring you. I need you to get to this place, and dig up some dirt on it. Shut it down, you know how to do it."
"Well, it's $50 and hour, plus expenses."
"Fifty bucks an hour? That's insane!"
"It's the cheapest P.I. rate in town!"
"Tell you what. I promise not to use your sandwiches as toilet paper no more."
I was on the case.

...

Unlike most cases I work on, I actually knew where to begin: The Incredibly Ancient Historical Building. Or, as it was known now, McSpunker's Deli and Milkhake Funtime Adventureland!. Yes, the exclamation point is legally required. I walked through the giant double doors. The place was cleaner than an alcohol swab on Monday. Why Monday, I don't know, but I had always assumed it was the cleanest day of the week. The whole place must have been ten stories high, coated in white tile, with an anthropomorphic elephant drawn on every flat surface in the place. It was louder than a plaid magenta tie worn with a puke green pantsuit, and I was trapped in the middle of the whole ordeal. I approached the one-quarter-awake teenage cashier, who was covered in more pocks and craters than the Moon with acne.
"Can I speak to the manager?"
"Would you like one of our hmmspecials?"
"No, I just want to speak to the manager!"
"It's a pastrami sandwich with Thousand Island Dressing and cherry hmmtomatoes. It's called the hmmMcPastramo. How many do you hmmwant?"
"I don't want any! Just get me the manager!"
"That'll be hmm$16.25. Drive around to the first hmmwindow. Have a McSpunker's hmmday."
"GET ME THE MANAGER!"
"Hmmnext."
I was dragged off by three burly men wearing anthropomorphic elephant suits, and vaguely remember hitting the pavement.

...

I awoke in my office. Surprising, considering I blacked out when I was thrown out of McSpunky's. I ran through a list of people who might do such a thing. Lazy Marv was too lazy. My secretary, LuAnn, couldn't have done it; I wasn't stuffed upside down in a trash can like she usually puts me after my blackouts. Then I detected it; the smell of rotten meat, cleaning solution, and acne cream. It was the kid at the McSpunky's.
It was at that point that I realized said kid was standing directly across from me, peeling the darts off the wall and throwing them at the dartboard. The whippersnapper.
"What's your name, kid?"
"My name's R. H. hmmMacGuffin."
"What's the R. H. stand for?"
"Red hmmHerring."
"Well, you can't be behind this conspiracy."
"What hmmconspiracy?"
"There has to be some sort of conspiracy! Lazy Marv's being put out of business, and I got kicked out of your restaurant!"
"You were hassling the manager, and Lazy Marv's food tastes like gym hmmsocks."
"So you were the manager this whole time?"
"Hmmyup."
"Well, that makes - wait a minute. How do you know Marv?"
"I hmmdon't -"
I slammed him against the wall, mostly for dramatic effect.
"What aren't you telling me, MacGuffin?"
"You're a hmmmadman!"
"And you're coming with me!"
MacGuffin knew more than he was telling, and I knew how to get that knowledge out of him. Unfortunately, I didn't know that he was currently hurling a lead pipe into the back of my head.

...

I awoke with a strong sense that I black out a lot more often that should be humanly possible. Fortunately, I've had a thick layer of gelatin surrounding my skull after an incident three years ago, the details of which I don't currently plan to reveal. I saw MacGuffin standing in front of me, brandishing his lead pipe. But standing next to him were some fast food mascots, whose names I am contractually obligated not to mention. Copyright infringement, et cetera. But these weren't just guys in costume. They were the real deal, and, just as I was scared out of my pants,and immediately before I realized I wasn't wearing any pants, and hadn't been all day (I knew I forgot something!), I saw it. A giant, anthropomorphic elephant.
"So you're McSpunky!"
"Reggie McSpunky, the one and only!" the elephant wailed.
"Why are you trying to put Marv out of business?"
"This town was the only place in the world without a McSpunky's! Do you know how maddening that is, to have an empire all but complete, and the only thing standing in your way is some fat guy named Lazy Marv?"
"I can honestly say I don't. Hey, have I been wearing pants at all today?"
"So we needed to get him out of business. We said he used his sandwiches as toilet paper, and people stopped coming!"
"But he always does that."
"What?"
"And you forgot something else, McSpunky."
"Well, what's that?"
"For one thing, you forgot to tie me up."
I leapt from the slab I was laying upon, grabbed the lead pipe from MacGuffin, and struck a threatening pose.
"And for the second, you forgot you were dealing with Sam Diamond, P.I.!"
I beat them up, saved the world, yadda yadda. Let's just move on to the conclusion.

...

The room was still dark, and the fog was still as thick as tapioca pudding. My unseasoned sandwich actually tasted relatively bland, and for that I was less than rejoicing. However, I did get the vile people at McSpunky's out of the neighborhood. So, I guess things are back to normal. But then, things are never normal for ...

SAM DIAMOND, P.I.!

posted by Will Stabile @ 14:14

SAM DIAMOND, P.I.
AND THE CASE OF THE SOAP OPERA STAR

The room was dark, and the fog was as thick as tapioca pudding. I was throwing darts at the wall (the east wall, not the one with the dartboard) when a buzz came from my intercom.
"Mr. Diamond, Mrs. Seville is here to see you," my secretary's garbled voice announced.
The door swung open, and she walked in. She had the face of a hawk and the body of a barrel, plus one of those fake-feather boas slung haphazardly around her pencil-neck, and a dress disabling any sort of movement above her knees except for a sort of timid scurrying accompanied by a little scritchy-scratchy noise.
A brunette, I thought. Brunettes always meant trouble tied up in one of those gift boxes you get after leaving the airplane. Any thoughts of jet travel were snapped out of my head by an icy hand with red claws.
"So, you're Sam Diamond," the woman whispered. "I'm Barbara Seville, but you can call me Barbie."
"I've no doubt I can, Mrs. Seville," I replied.
The woman's face color changed from a sedated red to a pus-like purple, then to a Big-Bird-esque yellow. "I've got trouble. Soap opera trouble."
"Oh. No goldfish trouble, then?"
"Quiet, you incompetent beluga whale!"
"Why is it never goldfish trouble? I took four years of -"
"SILENCE!" She grabbed the ceramic dragon on my desk and smashed it to pieces.
"Alright then, Mrs. Seville. You have my attention."
"I'm looking for someone named Peter N. DeWolffe. He's on that awful program, As My Children Turn Bold and Restless."
"Was he the guy that went into the coma?"
"All the characters went into comas at some point in the show. But, that's beside the point. The point is, I want you to find DeWolffe, and I want you to kill DeWolffe."
I was flabbergasted. "Mrs. Seville, I'm a Private Eye, not a bounty hunter."
She slapped down 25 grand on the table. I was on the case.

...

The questions were pouring down on me like the rain outside. At least, they would be, if there was any rain outside. But, besides that, my head was full of questions, nagging me like mosquitos at a blood convention, and the "ideas" part of my brain was emptier than the plot of a Stallone flick. If I only had some sort of lead, I might be able to find this "Peter N. DeWolffe" guy, and, since he was a soap opera star, maybe get an autographed photo of him and hang it in the Mexican restaurant across the street. At this point, my phone rang, thus thankfully stopping my incredibly boring train of thought.
"This is the office of Sam Diamond, Private Investigator," I said, trying to get my voice to reach the nasally octave of my secretary, LuAnn, who was out to lunch. "How may I be of service to you today?"
There was some heavy breathing on the other line. Finally, a raspy voice came through. "I have information about DeWolffe."
Not wanting to bust my cover, I sustained my LuAnn voice. "Just a moment please, let me put you through -"
"I KNOW IT'S YOU, DIAMOND!"
Oh, well, I thought. There goes my career as a voiceover artist. "Look, who is this?"
Some more heavy breathing.
"Hello?"
"Look under the tomatoes." I heard the click of a phone returning to its cradle. Then, I heard another click. It was the click of a Colt .62 hammer behind my head.
I swiveled around, knocking the Colt .62 out of my opponent's hands, then slammed them to the ground. It was a woman, nobody I recognized.
"WHO ARE YOU?" I shouted. "And why do you have such a huge gun?"
"I'm a reporter for the Villeton Times," the woman replied. "My name is Mary J. Offigaro. And I have a gun ... um ... because I'm on one of those 'Special Assignment' deals."
"Oh, yeah, those are crazy. Hey, do you know anything about 'looking in the tomatoes' or some-"
"DON'T YOU DARE LOOK UNDER THOSE TOMATOES!!!"
She sprung at me from across the room and dug her high heels into my back like she was trying to squeeze out my bodily fluids and set up a lemonade stand. It was like one of those Kiss of the Crouching Monkey martial arts movies, except, where there were snazzy camera tricks in one, there was excrutiating pain in my shoulderblades in the other.
Offigaro flipped me over so that my nose was pointing towards the ceiling instead of the floor, of which I got a long and thorough view while being smushed into it by the Flying Platform-Wearing Terror. The woman proceeded to pound me in the face like I was a slab of corned beef and she was a tenderizing hammer on St. Patrick's Day. My daylights had long since escaped me, but, for some reason, Offigaro stopped hitting me, picked up her Colt .62, and proceeded to click the hammer back, and point the barrel right between my eyes. That was when I made my move.
With a type of high-flying kick seen only on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I knocked the gun out of her hands. Unfortunately, I was unable to catch it in its descent, and it blasted a few clean shots at the mini-fridge I kept in the corner. Fortunately for the eggnog and various types of pickles-in-bags inside, my fridge was made of bulletproof plastic. Some sort of Energy Star standard thing.
I opened the mini-fridge and took out my "Foxy Grandpa" novelty mug filled with month-old eggnog. After a quick sip of the thick green stuff to get me going, I flung Offigaro to the floor.
"WHO SENT YOU?" I yelled.
"The Villeton Times."
"Wrong answer!" I slapped her.
"ABS News at 3."
SLAP!
She broke down into a sobbing lump. "Telemundo!"
SLAP!
"Alright, alright, I'll tell you, but then, I'll have to shoot you."
SLAP!
"Maim you."
SLAP!
"Tickle you?"
SLAP!
"Fi-i-ine, no repercussions. The person who put me up to this is..."
"Yes?"
"Is..."
"WHAT?!?"
"Dead. He was shot in a revolutionary riot last week."
"Dead? Where was he when it happened?"
"San Francisco. There's a big secessionist movement up there."
"I see ... Wait-a-minute, if he's dead, why did you still try to shoot me?"
"I just got the message on my cell phone."
"But it happened last week!"
"It's slow going up in SanFran."
"Your story has more holes in it than a brick with ... a lot of holes in it. But you might be able to accompany me on my quest to find Peter N. DeWolffe. You could be the sexy double-agent sidekick!"
"Sidekick? I would at least deserve the position of co-investigator-in-chief."
"In CHIEF?"
"Yes." She whipped out a 45-page contract and pointed to various places throughout the stack. "Sign here, here, here, here, initial here, phone number here, thumbprint here, address here, tongueprint here, social security number here, and do the bunny hop on one leg."
I knocked over her stack and pulled out my Luger .97. "Sidekick or corpse. Your choice."
She made a noise that sounded like a cross between a dying grouper and a squawking llama. "Fine."
"So, let's look under those tomatoes, shall we?"
Her face scrunched up like that little guy on the sour candy packages, and her eyes bulged out. Unfortunately, I was focusing on those oddities instead of the fact that her foot was flying towards me at about 90 miles per hour.
I hit the floor hard. So hard, in fact, that the floor crumbled beneath me like so much year-old Play-Doh.
Flailing my arms and yelling at the top of my lungs (it's a federal mandate that, when falling without a restraint of some kind, you must flail your arms and yell at the top of your lungs), I fell face-first into the Lazy Marv's Deli under my office.
Lazy Marv was aghast. "What happened, Diamond?" he asked in his gravelly voice. "You lose a bet or somethin'?"
I brushed myself off and prepared to speak. "I-"
Lazy Marv cut me off. "Shh, my soap just started."
The TV announcer's voice proudly proclaimed, "Catch a new episode of Canadian Idol in 30! But first ... Will Roderick's marriage last? Find out on As My Children Turn Bold and Restless! Only on Channel 17, KWOW!"
The screen flashed to a picture of a TV studio as a new announcer's voice said, "As My Children Turn Bold and Restless is filmed in front of a live studio audience!"
I started deducing something in my head: 237 divided by 3 is 79! Then I realized something about the case ... if the show was filmed in front of a live studio audience, I knew exactly where DeWolffe was! The K-WOW studios were less than a block away, and the soap was an hour long ... I could almost certainly get there in time! So, just to make it interesting, I ordered a large peanut-butter-and-pickle sandwich at Lazy Marv's. There I sat, munching on my sandwich and watching the soap opera with Lazy Marv. Suddenly, a bunch of men in trenchcoats and fedoras rushed up onto the stage and started shooting wildly at DeWolffe, who kept yelling, "This wasn't gonna happen until NEXT week!"
A collective gasp rose from the audience. The director screamed, "Tell 'em the entire SEASON, why dontcha? GYAAAH!" The last part was said as a stray bullet exploded the camera in front of him.
As I watched all this on TV, I started looking at some of the people in trenchcoats. There was Smash Jackson, Private Investigator! Inspector Edmunde Barron! Police Sergeant James Tuesday! Agent Smith (No, not that Agent Smith)! I finally figured out what was going on!
"Marv!" I yelled. "Go warn the police!"
Lazy Marv grunted. "Why should I? I mean, my name is even LAZY Marv!"
"Good point. I'll go warn the police."
And so I did.

...

I kicked down the door to the police station. Well, maybe not so much "kicked down" as "opened". But, semantics aside, the end result was still the same: I walked into a police station that was emptier than the gas tank in my car, which was why I walked there in the first place. The only thing missing from that station was a stray tumbleweed. This just proved my fears, so I bolted off to the studio as fast as I could.

...

I realized about three-fourths of the way through my bolt that my car was not, in fact, out of gas. I felt stupider than the inventor of New Coke. However, the car was of no use to me at that point, since I had almost reached the studio. I flashed my badge to the security guard, jumped over a barrel labeled, "Barrel- Scene 12B", trampled a guy in a penguin costume, slammed into a Marilyn Monroe lookalike, ran through a crowd of people wearing leotards and hamburger suits, and thrust open the door to the As My Children Turn Young and Restless just in time to get my hat shot off. Great.
I started yelling to the police. "Get over to the next soundstage! I can handle this!"
One of the policemen approached me. "Are you sure you can take care of these guys?"
"I'll do it the only way I know how."
The police got out of there faster than a cheetah on steroids. I, on the other hand, grabbed a bullhorn, some earplugs, and a radio. I stuffed the plugs into my ears and held the bullhorn up to the radio, which I turned on full blast. And just what was I blasting?
"You're listening to Radio Disney!"
Heads exploded. The foundation crumbled. I grabbed DeWolffe and thrust myself out of the building just in time to escape being crushed by a flaming beam.
I'd tell you more tales of extreme action, but I'm sure it'd all be pretty boring. I'll just skip to the scene in the police station.

...

DeWolffe, Seville, and Offigaro sat together on the bench behind the one-way mirror at the police station.
"That was some stuff you set up, DeWolffe. How'd you do it?"
DeWolffe scoffed. "Why should I tell you?"
"Benefit of the audience."
"Seville here was gonna hire all the detectives in the city to kill me. Most of them would probably respond, so I'd just happen to be wearing a bulletproof vest for the scene we were shooting in As My Children Turn Bold and Restless. Law enforcement all over the city starts shooting at me, I survive to press charges. The negative press for the State would be so overwhelming, citizens would revolt, and I'd land smack-dab in the seat of power."
"And Offigaro? How was she involved?"
Offigaro butted in. "Well, if you've ever watched Days When My General Passion Guides Life, you'd know that I play Charlandra, Baroness of Scotslavia. If everyone at AMCTBAR got all the positive publicity, DWMGPGL would be destroyed. I just couldn't let that happen, so I had to stop you from getting to him, Diamond."
"One last question: What was the deal with those tomatoes?"
Seville grinned. "Underneath those tomatoes was a well-thought-out and professional-looking pamphlet describing why exactly you should kill DeWolffe."
DeWolffe mumbled, "I was the voice on the phone."
I leaned against the wall. "Well, it looks like all 3 of you are gonna be in the pokey for a loooooooong time. Take 'em away, boys."
Offigaro screamed, "But I was trying to help!"
"Yes, but you'll have to pay $400,000,000 in damages to Lazy Marv for destroying his deli."
"Why so much?"
"Because he knew you couldn't pay it."
The police dragged the actors away from the scene, and I headed back to my office.

...

The room was still dark, and the fog was still as thick as tapioca pudding. I helped put some criminals away, got a soap opera cancelled, and had 25 grand to show for it. So, I guess things are back to normal. But then, things are never normal for ...

SAM DIAMOND, P.I.!

posted by Will Stabile @ 15:36