Don't Explain: An Artie Deemer Mystery Read Online Free Page A

and walked out.
    “Artie, I’m afraid the fact is we’re going to have to get a new R-r-ruff Dog.”
    “What?”
    “Well, Artie, first I want you to know this is not my idea. I was against it from the gitgo, and I made my opinion known. Very loudly. But the corporate boardroom is not a level playing field. Frankly, Artie, there is a faction on the board that, well, to put it charitably, is concerned with values.”
    “Values?”
    “Appearances, ah, in the family-values arena.”
    “What are you talking about? Jellyroll’s neutered.”
    “Ha-ha, good one, Artie. No, Artie, actually, from their point of view, it’s not Jellyroll that’s the concern, it’s you.”
    “Me?”
    “You see, Artie, they learned that you live with a professional pool player. And, well, this faction on the board, the one concerned with family values, can’t in good faith be seen to support the homosexual household. Now, I have no problem with gay people. Some of my best friends are gay.”
    I sputtered inarticulately at first, but then I said nothing.
    “I know how you feel, Artie. I tried to tell them, but they were adamant—”
    “She’s a woman.”
    “What? Who is?”
    “The pool player.”
    “A woman pool player? I didn’t know there was such a—”
    And at that moment I felt suddenly sorry for Barry, just a minion who probably made three hundred thousand bucks ayear, but still a minion without a wealthy dog to rescue him from the workaday humiliations.
    “You’re not ga-ga—?”
    “Barry, I want to talk to you about this coffee. This coffee is cesspool overflow.” I handed him the cup. “This coffee doesn’t even deserve the name coffee. I’m going to sue you and the board for attempted murder by antifreeze poisoning.”
    The poor guy was trembling in fear and confusion. Coffee was sloshing over his index finger.
    “Artie, we can discuss this.”
    I headed for the door.
    Barry pursued me out into the reception area. “Artie, who knew she was a woman? I mean, Chris Spivey. Who knew it was Christine, not Christopher?”
    I kept going.
    And suddenly Barry stopped pursuing me. “Yeah,” he sneered, “go ahead, be righteous. You can
afford
it.”
    He knew he had a point. This R-r-ruff gig paid big bucks, but the fact was Jellyroll and I didn’t need it. We used to, but his career has taken off since then. I
could
afford it, and freedom to walk is one of the sweets of wealth. I hustled through the heavy glass door toward the elevator. I free-fell thirty-four floors back to the studio. A hush descended as I stepped from the elevator. Heads turned. A dozen people on the floor, five more up in the booth, they all stopped work to watch us. They all loved Jellyroll, and now he was going from their lives. Jellyroll sensed the difference. His head pivoted.
    I strode straight to him, took his leash from one of Fleckton’s assistants, who flinched as if I were going to belt him. Long faces prevailed. Marsha was sobbing in the corner, while her associate Brad, also in tears, patted her shoulder blade. I felt this impulse to go over and try to make
them
feel better, but I ignored it. I walked out wordlessly.
    New Yorkers develop keen alertness to anomalous movement in the street. Anything jerky or sharp, anything faster or slowerthan the daily pace leaps right out of the background. Heads turn, shoulders hunch, and like prey animals, no one relaxes until the anomaly can be identified, evasive action taken. Jellyroll and I hadn’t even made it the half block from the side exit of the studio to the corner of Sixty-eighth Street and Broadway before I spotted the stalker sprinting at us with a baseball bat in his hands.
    From somewhere a woman screamed.
    He was about fifty, bald on top, wearing an undershirt, snapping sandals, one of those misfit types at whom, from the time he was a tiny child, bullies threw lighted matches. I didn’t think it would happen like this.
    But the stalker skidded to a stop ten feet away and began to