"It isn"t right, you know. I don"t throw rocks at padiddles. I just make them."
Clem was leaning over the back of the seat. Oddly, he did not smell nearly as unwashed as he looked.
"What is a padiddle?"
"A car with one headlight out," said Rocky. "When you see one, you"re supposed to kiss the driver. At least, that"s what my father used to say."
Mickey shook his head. "And which one of you starts barking now?"
"Oh, no," said Clem. "I"m dead serious. Take the next right. Halfway down the block."
Mickey was holding the door for Clem when a police officer appeared in the entrance to the precinct station. Her expression was one of exasperated patience. "Not again," she said with a sigh. "You want to press charges?"
Rocky touched the dent in the fender and shook her head. The car was not new, and it wore worse mementos of parking lots and traffic.
"Just as well," said the cop. "It wouldn"t make much difference." Then she looked at the b.u.m. "You"re in luck, Clem. We"ve got an empty cell."
He crooked his arm and offered her his elbow as if he were a gentleman escorting his lady to a ball. She sighed again and looked at Mickey. "Thanks for saving us the pick-up trip."
10. I Love Lucy and Ronnie and Bonzo and Quayle
Something slammed against the apartment door three times in quick succession.
Mickey set down the slice of toast he was b.u.t.tering and stood up.
The sound repeated--Wham! Wham! Wham!--louder than before.
Kilroy barked.
"Someone"s knocking, dear," said Rocky. She was at the kitchen sink, washing her plate. A mug of coffee sat within reach on the counter.
"I had that impression." As his shadow fell across the spyhole in the door, a rough voice said, "Open up. Police."
That didn"t sound right. He unfastened only the deadbolt, but as soon as the door began to gape, a boltcutter lunged through the crack and severed the chain. He tried to push the door shut, but the effort was futile.
"Back up." The speaker was a burly cop whose arms reached to his knees.
Mickey obeyed, retracing his path to the kitchen.
"Who"s the ape?" asked Rocky, her back to the sink. "Bonzo?"
"Shaddap," said the ape.
Kilroy wagged his tail.
"Siddown," said a woman cop with curly red hair and too much makeup.
"Is that coffee?" asked a slender man with a long, wrinkled face and wavy hair. He pushed Rocky toward the table and appropriated her mug.
The fourth cop was the youngest. He had sandy hair and a square face with an innocuous expression. "I know them," said Rocky. "But who the h.e.l.l are you?
Quayleedum? And what the h.e.l.l are you doing in here? Do you have a warrant?"
"Siddown," said the redhead, and she put a hand on Rocky"s shoulder.
"Where"s that rope, Ronnie?"
"You too," said Bonzo as he pressed Mickey into his seat.
Ronnie put down Rocky"s coffee mug and produced a hank of clothesline.
Together he and Quayleedum tied Mickey and Rocky to their seats, their hands behind the chair backs.
When they were done, Ronnie opened cupboards until he found the dog biscuits and gave Kilroy two. "Good dog."
The redhead made a fresh pot of coffee and found mugs for everyone except her hosts.
Quayleedum asked, "Why?"
"Why what?" asked Mickey.
"Don"t get cute. You know what we want to know."
Mickey was afraid he did. Why was he so interested in barking businessmen and backwards singers? Why didn"t he ignore them the way everyone else did? Why did he have to go looking for business to stick his nose into? And how much had that nose sniffed out already?
He tried to explain: He was a writer. He wrote about UFOs and aliens and other strange things, and the barking man had made him wonder where he was from and why he was here, and then things had rapidly gotten weirder.
"You thought he was a s.p.a.ce alien," said Rocky.
He still did, but he thought--he hoped--that if he kept his mouth shut, their interrogators would go away.
When the cops had stopped laughing, the redhead said, "You were warned once already. Stay out of it."
"Yeah," said the ape. "Or..." He set down his coffee mug and made a twisting motion with both hands.
"I still..."
"Shut up," said Rocky. "Please!"
Quayleedum grinned. "You"re ruining her peace of mind."
"I still want to know what"s going on."
"Forget it," said the redhead. "They"re not s.p.a.ce aliens."
"Just flakes," said Ronnie. "The city"s full of flakes."
"So cool it, guys." Quayleedum tipped up his mug and then stared into its bottom as if surprised it should already be empty. "And don"t rush off anywhere."