The Case of the Desiccated Dolphin
by Shanethewolf / Fearmoths



The moon was mistier than a piano with a lizard on it. I remember 
it like it was Tuesday. The broad walked into my office like she 
had two legs instead of a swivelling tortoise. She smoked a pipe 
and owned a TV station. "Detective Funload?" she said in that 
sultry, southern accent from the east of North Carolina. "Who 
wants to know?" I asked without losing my subscription to Tentacle 
Fuss magazine. She blew a smoke cube through her shiny red gob. 
"I'm Mrs Fumes. Mrs Wanda Fumes." I took my shoes off my desk and 
slipped my feet into them. I stubbed my cigarette out in a cinema 
and emptied the water out of my hat. "Yes, I'm Mephistopheles 
Funload," I said, pretending to be Japanese. "What can I do for 
you." She took a handkerchief out of her favourite cubicle and 
dabbed her eyes. "I want you to track down the beast that killed 
my husband." She smiled through her grief, just like Spider-Man. 
"I'm not sorry your husband's dead because I didn't know him," I 
said. She nodded in supplication. "When did he die, Mrs Fumes?" 
"In the summertime." It wasn't much to go on, but it was better 
than being forced to eat mustard from a rabbit's forehead again. 

"You got to help me, Detective Funload. Yhindis was a good man." 
I stopped humiliating my gerbil and stared in amazement at her. 
"Your husband was Yhindis Fumes? The guy who owns the cigar-cloning 
factory.?" She nodded, which is a non-verbal way of saying yes. 
This was gonna be tough. A guy so rich could easily make a lot of 
enemies. Hell, I only had four bucks, and an enemy for each of them. 
"How did your husband die, Mrs Fumes?" Wanda stopped playing the 
trumpet and answered me. "Someone sellotaped his morning bowl of 

cornflakes to his face and he drowned." Poor guy, I thought. That's 
just how my pop was taken out by One-eyed Tony Six-Eyes. "Don't worry 
Mrs Fumes," I said through a tea-strainer. "I'll get to the bottom of 
this faster than you can make up seventeen ancient Sanskrit haikus."
 She raised an eyebrow above her head. "I wouldn't be too sure, Doctor.
 Go have a cigar." She strode out of my office and went back to her 
basketball game. 

I leaned back in my chair and pondered where to begin. A mallard
 wandered into my office, removed its boxing gloves and said, "Why
 don't you go ask Harpoon Jake?" That seemed like a good idea. Ol'
 Jakey knew a lot of stuff. 

I hailed a passing pillow and told the driver to get me to Jake's
 place. It was snowing outside of Jake's when I got there, but 
luckily it was clement inside. Jake greeted me with a fanfare, 
and I put a sparkler in his windmill. A light hung above his head;
 a bright idea waiting to be seated. "You know why you invited me 
inside, so let's measure things," I prompted. He liked my style. 
I removed a can of oxtail soup from his bed and placed it next to 
the shandy. An ominous weasel peered back at me: a tinker in the 
candlelight. His face was a plum, round and shiny, its nose protruding
 from a hairy mask. I gave him a cuddle. 


I had been mimicking the gourmet when I overheard Jake's voice:
 "Mephistopheles Funload? It said. "Uh?" I replied, with an air 
of steely fortitude; a silent cannon cocked in the face of my
 friend. I had left my trousers unzipped all week and this was
 as much as I could take. I turned to leave and a hose whipped
 me in the groin. I curled up into a ball and sniggered, trying
 to conceal my shame and distress. Jake sobbed sympathetically. 

I figured I should ask him about Yhindis's killer. "I'm calling 
the shots dadio. What do you know about Yhindis's killer?" I asked.
 "Be cool, Jake," he said. "I do not know nothing about everything."
 I stooped over him and licked his collar. I had a facility for 
tasting evil. This was not my man. 

Just then, the mallard returned. He bore a swollen ear and his
 belly was black and midnight-ochre. The poor bastard had been
 squeezed. "Mest..Mistopolis..Miph." he spluttered in panic.
 The provincial cretin couldn't pronounce my name. I laid him
 down on a packet of sausages, wrote "Keith" on his forehead
 and blew the joint. 

I had a tale short of a conclusion and a crossword puzzle without
 clues. But more importantly, I was faced with a murder case 
without a suspect. I don't know who informed the dame I was a 
detective. I sensed a ruse, a sliver of candy luring me towards 
a spiteful dog in a robe. Like my pops before his passing, I was 
a cabbage-hoist by trade and I had strayed far from my headquarters 
at Yindis Khiller's Ltd. My boss, Yindis Khiller, would not be too 
happy. Wait a minute.pops always used to say the thing you're 
looking for is always in the last place you look. I decided to 
go look there. 

Room 26bee. I was one step ahead of myself when I arrived, and 
found two men complimenting a flannel. "Which one of you liked 
Yhindis the least?" I laid my trap and imagined how one of them 
might kick a policeman. "Who wants to know?" the strangers asked
 in perfect harmony. I was falling for Wanda in a big way and I 
had to confide in someone. "I think I'm in love. Her name is Wanda 
or something," I told them in an indistinct nasal voice; a superb 
impersonation of Kilroy Silk with his mouth closed. 

One of the men lurched at me. "I don't know Wanda, mister, but I'm 
still angry with you," he uttered, forcing a bowl of cornflakes over 
my face. I couldn't see, so I asked him what the other man was doing. 
"He has knelt down and has started making a list of his favourite 
crisps," my assailant informed me. In this game you couldn't take 
chances. 

I was admiring Death's urbane moustache, but when I promised him a 
free go on my tom bola he let me off. When he flushed the toilet it 
was with the anticipation of some horizontally challenged and 
motivationally deficient kid I knew from school. Hell, Murphy 
"Fat Layabout" Chimperoony was about the best darn friend I ever 
had. If only he.I was delirious. It was foolish to let such ideas 
into my mind. He was long dead and I didn't believe in angels. 

I was one number short of a full goblet when the bowl fell from my 
face. I gasped and gargled like a pelican puking over a blow torch. 
My attacker lay beside me, face down in a pool of crimson oil that 
resembled pig's blood. 


I looked around the hall; panicky penguin pulling post. I didn't see 
nothing or nobody that could've made this guy red on the outside. 
Somebody up there liked me. I rented a spatula and flipped the guy 
over. I had a hunch straight away this guy had killed Yhindis, but 
I doubted he was behind it. Who would try to pull the old cornflakes 
routine on me? It was obviously someone who knew One-Eyed Tony Six-Eyes. 
Did they want me dead because I tracked him down and electrocuted him? 
Maybe, it was time see what the word on the street was. 

Eddie "The Phallus" Minkowitz was a small-time crook, a hustler. There 
were three things he loved: Ladies, money and Rentaghost. Still, 
as much as I hated him, I knew he'd be able to tell me something. 


I found him just where I expected to, in the place where his location 
was at. As usual he was hustlin' people. He had his old 'Hats n' Corn' 
stall set up. "Hey, Detective Funload," he said with subtitles. "Could 
I interest you in a hat, or maybe some corn? Hey, I do you a deal, eh? 
How 'bout a hat wit' some corn in it?" I shook a passing lady's head to 
indicate I wasn't interested. "How 'bout a rabbit?" he said more quietly.
 "Shut your sound-cave, Eddie," I rasped. "I don't got no time for your 
turds today." He stopped smiling and told his orchestra to take five. "I 
need some info, Eddie." "Sure thing, Detective. You know I always got 
that." "What do you know about the death of Yhindis Fumes?" Eddie's eyes
 widened like the aperture on a camera when you change the shutter-speed.
 He looked around him like a baseball player checking the road to make 
sure it was safe to cross. He beckoned me into the alleyway between Al's 
Diner (in which only Al was allowed to dine) and Salvatore's Cigar Shop 
of Doubtful Legality. Eddie looked kinda scared. "If anyone knew I was 
talkin' to you, they'd beat me to death with a radio or somethin'!" "Then 
you better talk fast," I said sounding really cool. Too bad Big Bird from 
Sesame Street wasn't around to hear it. "One-Eyed Tony Six-Eyes put a hit
 out on that fumes guy," Eddie said sounding like the coward that he was,
 which is why he sounded like him (a coward). "I knew it!" I replied. 
Eddie shook his head. "Yeah, but it wasn't his idea. He didn't have 
nothin' against the guy. Watercress sandwich?" "No thanks. So who did?" 
Eddie was just about to answer when something hit him in the neck. At 
first I thought it might be a wasp, but then I thought it was more 
likely to be a poisoned dart. It turned out to be an airbus. It 
destroyed Salvatore's place and turned Eddie into mush. I guess 
from now on he'd be known as Eddie 'The Liquid' Minkowitz. What 
the hell was I gonna do now? Nobody else would be able to tell me 
who did it. As I walked out of what was left of the alley I saw 
something that answered all my questions, except the one about why 
nobody swears in Grange Hill. The company logo on the plane! It said 
'Yindis Khiller's Airbuses'. That dirty dog! That clean cat! That 
overpriced tomato! All the pieces were falling into place. I'd worked 
for that guy for twenty years! That's almost thirty years! 



I hailed a cab and told the driver to take me to Yindis's office. 
He was there waiting for me. I walked in and two of his goons 
grabbed me. "Mephistopheles, my old friend. I was wondering when 
you'd show up," he grinned. I decided to get straight to the point. 
"Why'd you do it, Yindis? What's in it for you?" He shrugged and 
laid some carpet. "I might as well tell you since you're about to 
stop living. You see, Yhindis Fumes left nothing to anyone in his 
will, not even his wife." "The lovely Wanda," I said. "Yes. The 
lovely Wanda," he replied. "So no one would stand to inherit his 
factory. I could buy the property cheap and use it to bicycles 
and wigs! I'll be a millionaire before I know it." "I don't think 
so," came a sultry woman's voice. Yindis turned around and there 
stood Wanda. She was pointing a broadsword right at him. Yindis 
dropped his Monopoly board in surprise. "Call off your goons or 
I fire," she commanded. Yindis showed his goons a picture of a 
nice lamb and they immediately ran away. Yindis turned on the 
charm. "Wanda, baby. I can make you rich. I swear I was gonna 
vut you in on the deal." Wanda shook her face. "I don't want 
to be rich, I just want to be with him." She nodded in my direction. 
I felt warm inside. Yindis pulled a gun from his flapjack and pointed 
it straight at me. Wanda was too fast for him. She somersaulted over 
him and sliced him clean in two. She's the fasted broad I ever saw. 
She turned to me and smiled. "You were my guardian angel, weren't you?" 
I said in a golden voice. "You plugged that guy who tried to cornflake
 me." She held her hands up like paws, stuck her tongue out and nodded
 her head, panting like a puppy. I smiled at her. "You're under arrest." 

[The End]