Read Online A Carnival of Killing by Glenn Ickler - Free Book Online Page B

his job, Sean,” I said. “According to the law that you helped push through, we have a right to ban guns in this building.”
    “But this is a fucking exception,” Fitzpatrick yelled. “I can’t explain what I want to explain if I don’t show those assholes the kind of gun I’m talking about.”
    “Hey, Tex, cool down,” said another voice. It was Al, who had just come in the door. He always tried to ruffle Fitzpatrick’s feathers by calling him Tex or Gunslinger.
    “Oh, great, now I’m triple-teamed by the leftwing, patriot-hating media,” Fitzpatrick said. “I might as well go home.”
    “Oh, bullshit! What’s your problem?” Al asked.
    “Your dumbass editorial writer wrote a piece attacking the concealed weapons bill and your equally dumbass cartoonist drew a picture of a woman pulling an AK-47 out from between her boobs,” Fitzpatrick said. “I want to show them the size of gun we’re really talking about in this bill.” He waved the pistol toward us and I saw it was only about five inches long.
    “Is that a gun or a cigarette lighter?” I asked.
    “That’s what I’m trying to get across to you dumbfucks in the media,” Fitzpatrick said. “People don’t conceal guns any bigger than this one. It’s a Derringer. A two-shot Cobra Derringer.”
    “You’re sure it’s not loaded?” Al asked.
    “Of course it’s not loaded,” Fitzpatrick said. “I know better than to bring a loaded gun in here.”
    “Show me,” Al said.
    Fitzpatrick pushed out the cylinder so we could see that it was empty.
    “How about if I take the gun and go with you to the editorial page editor?” Al asked. “I think Frank might allow that, being as how I work here and he sees me every day.” Frank, who was delighted to be taken off the hook, nodded in vigorous affirmative.
    The three of us rode up the elevator to the fourth floor. When we got there, I headed for my desk, and Al walked Sean Fitzpatrick through the newsroom to the editorial page office after getting everyone’s attention by yelling, “Armed and dangerous gunslinger on the floor.”
    On my desk was a note to call Ted Carlson and a scrap of paper informing me that the ME would release the autopsy report on Lee-Ann Nordquist at 9:00 a.m. On my voice mail was a message from Kitty Catalano saying she thought my Sunday story on our ride with the Vulcans was “really super.”
    Ted Carlson could jolly well wait in line. I’d phone Kitty later to hear first-hand, possibly at lunch, how really super she thought my story was, but my first call had to be to Detective Curtis Brown.
    He picked up after only three rings. “Homicidebrown.”
    “Dailydispatchmitchell. What’s new on the late Klondike Kate?”
    “The autopsy report,” Brownie said. “Didn’t you get the word?”
    “I did. But there must be more than that. Surely your detectives have not been sloughing off over the weekend.”
    “You can tell the taxpayers that we’ve been working very hard on this case. However, we haven’t turned up much beyond a shitload of Vulcans as possible persons of interest, which is still off the record by the way. I’m hoping you can help reduce the number from your contacts with the Vulcan menagerie. Good story and pix, by the way.”
    “Thanks from both me and Al,” I said. “I’m sure you already know the names of three members of this year’s Krewe who were in O’Halloran’s.”
    “I do,” Brownie said. “It’s the possible fourth one we haven’t come up with. Either the woman who thought she saw four Vulcans was seeing double from too many drinks or there was a ringer in the group.”
    “If there was a ringer, it could have been a guy named Ted Carlson.”
    “The Vulcans’ manager?”
    “That’s the one. Have you questioned him?”
    “No. What makes you think I should?”
    “He talked to us at Klondike Kate’s Friday night, dressed up in his Vulcan suit from three years ago. He let slip that he was at the Queen of the Snows dance