The Strange Case of Blondie Katie Moore

The Strange Case of Blondie, Katie Moore

By Paul Doherty

A man sat slouched at his office desk, alone, while indistinctly, through the outside window were the sounds of couples returning to their homes from their evening’s entertainment. He had been motionless for hours and even he was becoming aware of his own unwashed state. Pike was deep in thought. Near midnight, the room was dark and still, apart from the sliver of moonlight streaming down from the waning moon. The power had been turned off and he had no money to have it switched back on. If he could just solve this new case, there would be a bank roll of cash, enough to solve his problems. Some of them, anyway. All his remaining money had been spent on the items sitting on the desk in front of him. A half-empty bottle of Kentucky’s finest bourbon, a packet of Lucky Strike’s smokes and a red Zippo.

He hadn’t eaten since the evening before, and that had been pretty lousy, causing his thin hand to shake as he poured bourbon into a dusty tumbler, but he managed not to spill a drop. He lit up a Lucky Strike, the flame from the Zippo briefly shining on the window behind him. Engraved letters on the dusty window read ‘Kanen Pike - Private Detective’. Only the rare few called him Kanen. To everyone else he was only plain Pike. Not that long ago Pike had been the number one P.I. in the Big Apple. He had charged one hundred dollars a day, plus expenses, and his expenses were always too high. He loved the dames, and the dames loved him, especially the high society ladies from up-town. Needless to say, their husbands hated him. There were even rumors going around town that he was having an affair with Gorgeous Felicity, the wife of Elijah Burnstyne, or as most New Yorkers called him, Mayor of New York.

“If I catch you with her, I will kill the both of you,” Mayor Burnstyne had told him point blank. The mayor, had been naked, at the time, with a large towel wrapped around his flabby loins, secured under his drooping, hairy belly. He had been coming out of a steam room at the Eastside Sauna at the time. His lack of clothing not inhibiting his right to give orders. Pike had been about to enter the room for his weekly steam but had thought the better of it and left. Pike had backed off though, as he did not want to chance anything happening to Felicity. Dames and booze are guaranteed to always bring a man down. ‘But it’s a hell of a way to go’, Pike mused.

It was not long after this that Pike had met this pretty, little Latino spitfire from Philly. She had a spicy Spanish bloodline and an expansive sexual appetite that even exceeded his. She did not just break his heart. She smashed it and took his soul straight to Hell. Women and booze had turned this one-time Adonis into a pathetic creature, drowning in booze and self-pity.

The once strong hand slowly lifted the tumbler, and he took another sip of Wild Turkey. Amazingly, despite the booze, Pike’s mind was still sharp, as he recapped the ins and outs of this new case. He was curious about why this particular client had come to him, for this was his first case in a long time. Sure, he was still well known in this City, although now his peers were all laughing behind his back. Saying he was through, a has-been. Pike had hoped that this new case could bring him out of the cesspool of failure.

He also had much deeper problems. He was falling in love with a woman he had never even met. Her photo was safely stored in his inside coat pocket, close to his heart. The woman was his Blondie, Katie Moore. Was she hiding or, he choked down bourbon at the thought, was she already dead? Pike could not rest until he found her.

Pike pulled out a manilla folder from the top drawer of his desk, shining the narrow beam from his pocket torch on the file while he again went over this strange case. When solving his cases, he always treated them like a jigsaw puzzle. Working from the outside edges he would find all the pieces, putting them together to get the full picture. The only problem with this method was that it took time. Time that he did not have. However, it only needed one more piece, and the puzzle would be solved. Pike relentlessly searched for that one piece as he went over Katie’s case, again.

She had a body straight out of a Hollywood script, artists would fight to sketch her face. Her mane, the colour of liquid honey, had a silken sheen that you wanted to slide slowly, sensually over your face. All her lovers were left heartbroken and in despair and that is where this mystery lay. Without even a momentary thought she dropped them all, leaving the men with bleak, uncrying eyes.

It was on the eighth of June, a wet sultry night, the waning moon was occasionally glimpsed, though dark angry clouds hampered its view. That night Blondie had driven her black Studebaker down Woodville Lane to Old Pit Bridge. This is where her car was discovered. Blondie was nowhere to be found. Pike had been over the car with a magnifying glass looking for any clue. A hair, a nail, something that might point him to her whereabouts. There was blood covering the top of the trunk and numerous different sized footprints on the muddy ground. On the driver’s side window was Blondie’s handprint, covered with fingerprint dust. On opening the car door, the smell of her perfume destroyed him. Pike placed his hand where her hand had been on the window, he was sure he could hear her voice calling in the wind, “Please, please find me.”

Pike took another sip of bourbon, for he knew there was a lot more to this case. What was the missing piece that would solve it?

He was startled by a faint whispering noise, loud in the silence of the empty building. Shining the narrow torch light over to the door, he watched as an envelope slid into the room from under the door. Slowly walking over, he bent down and picked it up. This minor exertion took just about all the remaining strength he had. Sitting back down at his desk he opened the envelope and pulled out the single sheet of folded paper. Unfolding the page, he read the letter. A big smile came over Pike’s face. Bingo, he now had the final piece of this puzzle. The note read, ‘Meet me at Brooklyn Pier at midnight. Don’t be late. Blondie.’ Pike rushed to the door, wrenching it open and peered left and right down the corridor. Who had it been? Was it her? But there was no one there to answer.

Taking Blondie’s photo from his coat pocket, he looked at her beautiful face, saying, “I know who you are now. You are the red herring of this whole plot. Some evil tyrant is behind it all.”

Pike knew he had a tail on him for the last few weeks, and that someone had been watching every move he made. The guy that hired Pike, the supposedly jilted lover, he was also in on it. And thinking back, the pretty little bimbo from Philly, she was the start of it all.

“What a job she did on me!” His mind could now see it all. Pike also knew this trail would lead him to the Dishonorable Mayor of New York. Mayor Burnstyne wanted him dead, not quick, and merciful, but nice and slow. With pain, lots of nasty pain, just like the old Chinese water treatment. You would not think that the single slow drip of a water droplet falling onto your forehead could be excruciating, but multiply it millions of times, repeatedly, every few seconds and it would drive you out of your mind. Burnstyne had taken everything away from him and tonight he is going to have him finished off.

Pike knew Burnstyne had a hand in every crooked racket in the city for years, even before he had been first elected. He had most of New York’s finest in his top pocket, and he had the city in his other ones. Burnstyne thought he had every base covered, except one.

Pike now knew it all. He maybe even had a little ace up his sleeve. He knew that Burnstyne would be at the Pier tonight to watch his henchmen finish him off. The mayor liked being in on the painful end, to gloat in his dark power. The sad thing was that these henchmen would be police officers. Pike hated crooked cops. He put his hand inside his coat pocket and felt the cold steel of the snub nose 38, his ‘Equalizer’. A wry smile came over Pike’s face. He whispered to himself, “Just maybe, with the Equalizer and a major miracle, I might just get through this. I might even have a future.” He mused, fancifully perhaps, “If I get through this with my skin intact, I might even move to Miami. Hot weather, under-dressed broads, and me, tanned and fit again.” His thoughts ended with a dry chortle.

Looking at Blondie’s photo, he said “Burnstyne sure did know my weakness. I hope Felicity is okay. If he went to these lengths for me, I can just imagine what he would do to her.”

Pike stood up out of his chair. He looked much taller and stronger now, as if his backbone had been stiffened by a new purpose and direction. Following the torch beam over to the door, he opened it and went out into the corridor. Pike looked at his name engraved across the door and in a loud voice said, “Pike is back, business as usual!” as he strode off to meet his fate.