Murder At The Folk Festival!!

Subject: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 23 Jul 01 - 06:21 PM

I don't play anything except maybe the horses, but I have been around here for some time. Name's Madison, Blake Madison. No ear for music either, except that I can tell from the whine what make of gun the bullet passing my ear came from; and I can also tell when someone is lying. Part of the trade.

It was a hot day in late July, one of those dry runs for what Christmas was going to be like if Congress continued to be in hock to the carbon cartel, but that wasn't my business at the moment. My business was sitting in front of me, an older extremely thin woman with long blonde hair who looked like Mary Travers xeroxed about twelve times too many. She was carrying a guitar, and I could spot a tambourine edging out of her macrame bag, and all in all I wouldn't have been surprised if she had broken out into song, which was a good thing, because she did.

"Anyway, Mr. Blake, I was on stage singing a song from my forthcoming comeback album, "Ms. Tambourine Person", which goes something like this:

"You were my first love,
But not the first person I ever loved,
Which was maybe my mother, but anyway,
The thought is there, as were our bodies,
I said that your body was like one of those Chianti bottles
with a dripping candle sticking out of it,
And we drank each other like empurpled wine,
In the days of splendorous grass,
In the days of our glorious flower!"

I interrupted at this point, partly based on my fear that the Aesthetic Police from the International Court of Justice at the Hague were about to break the door down, and partly to get a bit more meat on this story.

"So, Ms. Schwartz --"

"Condolezza, please!"

"Condolezza. So you were in the middle of singing this song, and very lovely it is too" -- (client, client) -- "and then what happened?"

She thrust the guitar forward. "AT that moment, a large knife came hurtling at me out of the audience, and embedded itself in the body of my guitar -- HERE!!" And she pointed at a broken section of her instrument.

"Hmm, " I said, which was about as snappy a riposte as I could muster at the moment.

"And, and --" she continued, "and there was this note wrapped around the handle!"

She handed me a wrinkled note. I read:

"NOBODY KNOWS, NOBODY SEES, NOBODY KNOWS BUT ME. YOU ARE ABOUT TO BE VERY DEAD. YOURS, A MUSIC LOVER."

"Which means?" I asked.

"I think it is a joke, or someone is threatening me."

"Or both."

"The truth is, Mr. Madison, I am booked to appear at the "Just Do It" Pepsi Winston AT&T "Fresh Folk Natural" Festival this weekend, as part of my comeback tour, and I am worried."

"Why?"

"Well, you see, Mr. Madison -- how can I put this? Do you know anything about folk music?"

"Only what I read in the funny papers."

She shrugged, and leant forward, her hair falling in her face, which she then swooped back, and gave me a big stare with her pale eyes. I think this was supposed to be the moment when the American flag dropped and the cheerleaders popped out of their tights, but it did nothing for me.

Mildly disappointed, she pressed on. "Anyway, Mr, Madison, the essence of the folk music community is that we are bound to each other by deep bonds of love and mutual understanding, sharing our dreams and our stories through our mystic ecological connection to traditional music and the heritage of compassion and healing that it embodies."

"Yes," I said, "go on."

"We are all together searching for honesty and mutual respect and nonviolence."

I said: "So what you are telling me is that everyone hates everyone else."

She looked at me plaintively.

I said, "What I mean, Ms. Schwartz, is that it would be hard to work out which one of the many beloved members of your community hates you enough to actually kill you."

"More or less, yes. You see, Mr. Madison, we have all known each other so long, that everyone has gone to bed with everyone else two or three times, and there are all kinds of unexplained children, and people were put lower on advertising than other people, and there are immense backlogs of grudges stretching back at least to Newport 64."

"Sounds complicated, Ms. Schwartz," I said. "What do you want me for?"

"I think it may be a prank, of some kind, But I was wondering if you would be my bodyguard for the evening, not of course in the Whitney Houston sort of way, I don't want to have to sing over your dead body, that isn't really what I meant to say, but well, you know, to calm me down. It is a very stressful time for me, as you can imagine. "

They all sounded to me like a bunch of fruitcakes, and I was reluctant, but she pulled a capo out of her guitar case that had some hundreds rolled up in it. We were on for Saturday. I arranged to come there early and check out the Morris dancing or whatever it was she said was racked up before her show.

She put her guitar away, got up and went to the door. She turned back.

"Just out of interest, Mr. Madison, what kind of music do you like?"

"Fusion jazz."

"Oh," she said, and went out.

I sat for awhile, trying to remember the words to "She'll Be Coming Round the Mountain" and got to the part about the garterbelt, and gave up.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 23 Jul 01 - 08:11 PM

The banjo player did it while re-tuning his/her 5th string.;-)

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: CarolC
Date: 23 Jul 01 - 08:32 PM

Outside the door of Madison's office, the small woman with the dark hair waited. She bit her lower lip as she thought. There were too many things that just didn't add up. Too many strange things had happened lately that, take separately, wouln't mean much, but together they added up to something very troubling.

She was relatively new to the folk festival, and was not privy to most of the behind the scenes gossip. She really had no interest in such things, or in the power struggles that seemed to turn the whole thing into a writhing mess of maggots fighting over a rank piece of meat. She just wanted to play music and laugh and have fun. But somehow, she felt she had unwittingly gotten herself caught up in the behind the scenes machinations.

She thought about it a little bit longer, and then took a small envelope out of her pocket and slid it under the door. She didn't know if any good would come of this, but she didn't know what else to do...

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 23 Jul 01 - 08:54 PM

I left the office carrying my recently delivered envelope, and walked down to the Keg'n'Cork for a little bottled clarity after the events of the morning, and smiled as I walked through the door. Just the usual atmosphere, the few scattered regulars, the Del Vikings playing on the Wurlitzer.... and her. She had her back to the door and was standing behind the bar, en pointe, putting away glasses.

"Well, it must be my lucky day..." I drawled as I pulled up a barstool. She turned slowly, fixing me at first with a glare that would make Medusa blink, and then gradually shifted it to a warm grin that made me want to do anything but.
"Blake Madison.." Lucky smiled, "To what do I owe the pleasure?" She slid a coaster and ashtray towards me, and glanced at the clock as she fixed my drink. "It's a bit early for you, isn't it?"

"Celebrating." I countered. "A new case deserves a new drink, don't you think?"
Lucky sighed and slid my drink across the bar, "Anything you want to share, or do I have to drag it out of you?"
I quickly pondered the mental list of things I'd gladly let her drag from me before I continued. "What do you know about this folk festival in town?"

"What? Other than the bear that has been overturning the dumpster in the alley and the obvious desperate grab at the commercialism of the fading flower that is folk music? We've had them all in here from that Fresh Folk Natural bullshit-o-rama....and Billy's bought into it hook, line and sinker. Fer crissakes, look at this shirt!"
To this point, I'd tried very hard to not make mention of the "Billy's 'hearts' the FFN" t- shirt she was poured into, hugging her form, and bending the letters in a way that would make Dali cry for shame. I took a long drink and drove on, "What? Didn't he have it in your size?"
She squinted and stuck her tongue out at me as she refilled my glass. "Billy seems to think it will improve business, but frankly the only increase in offers has been ones to take a fiver in the alley, and that is the one thing I don't need right now. I tell you what, if this weren't the only gig in this one horse shit-hole, I'd quit like that!" she snapped her fingers and handed me a book of matches.
"You could always come to work for me, Lucky..." I said.
She smiled that smile again, and said, "But Blake, darlin'...I can't type"

Work, man, work...I changed the topic fast.
"Well then, what about that woman they have headlining? Schwartz something-or- another?"
"Condolezza Schwartz?" Lucky spoke "You have to be kidding me..."
"You've heard of her?"
"Only from these" Lucky reached under the bar and produced a handful of cds that she spread before her on the bar. "Pure crap. And Billy wants this played over the speakers during 'peak hours'. I tell you what, she rhymes. And there is a song about goat cheese too...you might like that one.. but for the most part, it drives the customers fit to kill. I had to take away the swizzle sticks last night, one guy threatened to jab them in his ears..."

I tried to look concerned, but she saw right through me, so much for opacity. Lucky leaned low on the bar, "It's her, isn't it? What's the poop, oh, Mr. Madison'o'mine?"
I explained the case to her, as best I could recall while gazing into blue eyes, and asked her to tell me more about the customers from the night before. She squinted slightly, for how long, I don't know, I was lost in counting the faint freckles across the bridge of her nose. She finally took the cigarette from my hand and took a long draw off of it before handing it back to me. Dear lord, the little lipstick ring...
"What's it worth to you, Madison?" she asked, faintly blowing smoke-rings toward the ceiling.
"Oh, what do you say to a weekend trip to Tahiti?" I offered
Lucky laughed, "Nice try, Blake. You see, the way this bargaining thing works, you are supposed to offer me something that would be good for ME....and unless you can promise suntanned cabana boys that will bring me drinks for a change, then you are outta luck."
"I think that can be arranged..."
"It's a thought...." she muttered, then spoke again "I'll hold you to that then. There was one table full of characters that you just might be interested in..."

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 23 Jul 01 - 11:45 PM

Just as she leaned across the bar again, giving me a spectacular view of the 'Billy's' on her t-shirt, when the swinging doors to the kitchen parted and Tracy came into view. Twin slices of cheescake on the piecart of life. It's a wonder anyone ever left this place.
"Freedom girl, the shift is up, you better run while you still can.." Tracy called to Lucky, and then caught the apron that Lucky tossed to her.
"'Nuff said," Lucky called back, she came out from behind the bar and looked at me. "You still wanna hear about those guys, Madison?" I nodded "Grab a table and give me a few minutes, okay?"

I sat down at a corner booth, facing the door, and waited for Lucky. She came out in a clean shirt that was nary a thread larger than the one she'd had on earlier, but who was I to complain? Just enjoy the view.
She fixed herself a cherry coke and came to the table, "Your drink okay? Need a refill?" she asked, but I waved the suggestion off. She sat down and told me the story of the previous evening.
"Okay, you know that Chaz Chesterton guy that Billy has in on Tuesdays now? He was wailing away, as usual. Gawd, that guy can murder a song...sorry.." she looked at me apologetically then continued. "Anyway, he was just about done for the night, you know the spot where he always sings 'Love Potion #9' as a pre-encore, but then leaves out all the words in his vain attempt to be cute?"
I smiled and nodded, I'd seen the joker before and he was the reason I didn't come here on Tuesdays. There isn't enough alcohol in the world to combat Chaz Chesterton. Lucky must have seen that look on my face, because she smiled and did the waitresses patented Chaz impersonation dance that included a 'swim' that could give a guy a coronary, and the pouted lyrics "She bent down and turned around and gave me a _____".

"Enough, I get the idea." I grimaced. "What next?"
Lucky smiled her smile, and continued. "Well, I was trying not to vomit, as is usual on Tuesday nights, when I got this table of new guys in. Never been in here before, of that I am sure. We don't get many of the refugees from PearlJam summercamp in here. They all had crummy LedZeppelin shirts on, and were complaining about having to be roadies for a 'freakin' folkie gig, man'. And of course, all they are drinking is lite beer, there is NO tip coming from that table, but something struck me as funny, so I hung around a bit."

"What was so funny?" I asked, what I thought was innocently enough..
"You are so cute when you act ignorant Blakey-boy. You know exactly what. A group like that, in here, and talking about an attempt on the life of Condolezza Schwartz, that's what. Now if you want to play games, I can go home right now. My feet are killing me and I'm not up for your theatrics."
I reached down and pulled her feet into my lap, apologizing a bit too profusely, but she continued anyway.

"They said they had seen the little knife throwing gag at her gig that night. No one had seen where it came from, but no one was suprised either. That was a bit odd. There was one guy, quite a bit older than the others, that seemed to be this kind of roadie guru, kind of leading the inquisition. And with that brain-trust at the table, well, you know it took long enough to get around to what they thought had happened.....Damn, Madison, easy on the arches....anyway, the general consensus was that they could pretty much reject the idea of the jilted/jealous lover. Condolezza has the rep. The only thing they could come up with is that she was getting her just deserts for stealing all of those songs."

I stopped abruptly somewhere inbetween the piggie with roast beef and the piggie with none and stared at Lucky. "Stolen songs?"
"Yeah, I heard the cds too, and I still can't believe it. But the story they had...lemme see if I can do this right," she sat up and adopted the vacuous gaze of the roadie before continuing "You see, man, it was like, you know, just like when Robert Plant was accused of stealing songs from Robert Johnson, man..." They think she was being threatened out of retribution...but after hearing that stuff, I have a tough time thinking that there was anyone out there willing to claim authorship."

I gently set her feet to the floor, looked into her baby-blues, and asked her, "What are you doing on Saturday?"

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 09:51 AM

A purple battered pickup with a SMith and Wesson On Board bumper sticker slewed to a halt outside the bar, and a fellow from another walk of life came through the door blinking in the dim light. He wore suspenders that must have run with Polk, about four inches wide each, a baseball cap promoting the 1939 Cincinatti Reds, and a faded yellow button down shirt with sweatstains left over from the war on it and "Phillips Academy -- Exeter" in once-neat letters over the pocket. There was a large hunting knife strapped to his belt. And he carried a black hardshell banjo case.

Lucky coked an eyebrow at me and changed gears. She swirled up to the stranger, all eyes and superstructure and big white purdy teeth and gave him her Number One Disarm and Control routine.

"Well, howdy, Mister! Welcome to the Keg'n'Cork!! C'mon in and set!" She led him to a booth where she knew I'd be ablke to hear them. One of the things I like about Lucky. She has a brain. And she's not afraid to use it.

Lucky came back with the stranger's Heinekin and curled around the ned of his table batting her eyes. The guy smiled politely -- he was thinking of other things, though. He looked like cast iron, I thought -- steely gray eyes, a neatly cut full beard in silver and white, bushy eyebrows, and broad shoulders with a hardened look to them.

"What brings ya to our little town, stranger?" Lucky said with her eyes wide and her voice pitched just so.

"{}I'm a folksinger. Name's Logos, Theet Logos. 'Least, that's what folks call me. 'S a nickname."

"Glad to meet ya, Theet! New one to me!"

"Wal, my ma named me Aesthete, but I couldn't stand the jokes, so I settled on Theet."

"Can't blame you for that!" she smiled. "You gonna be in town long?"

"Dunno. I'm looking for an old friend of mine, a gal I used to know back in North Beaqch a long time back. Name of Rice -- Condolezza Rice. Know her?"

Lucky threw me a quick glance with more meaning than a bale of old Websters. I hunched my stool a little closer and listened harder.

"Isn't she famopus or something? Oh... a singer???" Lucky prompted him. "Where'd you get to meet someone like that??

The tough-eyed old timer relaxed a little. He cracked a deck of Camels, unfiltered, a lit one up. Lucky didn't even flinch. The gal was good.

"Long story," he said, looking into the middle distance at a velvet Elvis painting someone had given Billy as a joke one year, never thinking he would fall in love with it. "A very long story....."

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Les from Hull
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 10:32 AM

Roaming Ned Loonbucket stumbled into the Keg 'n' Cork and rested the battered guitar case against the bar. He looked like the definitive travellin' folksingin' guy, but anyone unfortunate enough to hear him grunt his way into a song wouldn't stay around long enough to hear him forget the rest of the words and collapse into a coughing fit. He wandered around the room looking for half-finished and abandoned drinks.

He came upon a book of matches and thought 'Yer, could be useful'. He was ready to slip them into the pocket of the smelly old tweed jacket he wore when he noticed a single word scrawled inside in a child-like hand in pencil.

In the dimness of the bar he couldn't make out what the word was. He could hardly read the instructions on the matches 'tear off a single match and strike against bottom'. Well here goes, he thought, tearing off a match and striking it against his bottom.

By the light of his burning trousers he could just make out the word 'Cosmo'.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 10:44 AM

~mystery themes twanging violin music crescendos from behind the Elvis painting~~~

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 11:08 AM

You could tell in one look that this man used to have "hero" written all over him. But tattoos fade like old memories and all he had left of his dreams was a battered flight jacket with an Apollo 18 mission patch.

"If only she'd stayed in Huntsville." He moaned like a steel bar reluctantly accepting the weight of a concrete command module."She is the only one who knows the whole truth."

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: LR Mole
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 11:35 AM

Meanwhile, parked in an elderly Buick, an editor in a well-cut suit handed a sheaf of manuscript to his passenger, an emaciated literary type in an old military overcoat and a greasy cloth cap pulled low.
"But Mr. Veblen,"stammered the poet(for the passenger was a member of that underpaid ilk,), "what's wrong with my stuff?"
"It reads like half-baked Bukowski, sauteed Brautigan, and parboiled Edna St. Vincent Millay," the smaller man snarled. "The kids won't touch it.You need music!Tunes! Acoustic-electric ersatz-authenticity, with sensitivity and singers with piercings!Amps!"
"Like fuzz-tones? Wah-wahs?" hazarded the bard, trying to get with things. "Ya thirty years behind the times, there, Woodstock," snarled the money man, "Get out of the car."

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: GUEST,Egads! Another Twist???? (thanks Moose)
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 11:36 AM

The long black limosine outside the Keg'n'Cork held none other than the nefarious Afteh Whoom, a Persian refugee with a PhD in particle physics from the University of Tehran, a small fortune in mis-channeled oil money from the Pahlavi era, a collection of original John Hammond master disks, and a mysterious connection to a gun-running cartel headquartered in Hilton Head, North Carolina. He had been out of circulation for a while after he first came Stateside. Seems he blew a chunk of dough on a glamourous customized van with velour hangings, full-size TV in the back, all mod cons... and he took a gang of his buddies out on the Interstate to show it off, put that baby on cruise control at 75 mph on I5 North, and went into the back to have a drink with his friends. Well, it SAID cruise control!!

Afteh Whoom was one of the unadvertized sponsors of the FFN, and had been doing a tidy money-laundering business with the buskers in the area, but the heat was getting to be too much. Condolezza Schwartz seemed to be at the center of this, dragging Madison and the cheeky waitress along in her wake. The infidels must be stopped.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 11:49 AM

The Infidels finished their set. And not a minute too soon. "Tune that bloody banjo!" Came a cry from the crowd. "And you HUM into a kazoo! don't blow into it!"

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 11:52 AM

Efteh WHoom reclined in the back of the stretch limo, gazing sullenly through coal-black eyes that some said held the fires of Satan. He was content -- it was going, going, just as he had foreseen. He stroked his small but perfect goatee, and took another small sip of the Chivas on ice as he watched the buxom barmaid of the Keg 'n' Cork escort some patron to the door. She had her arm over the stranger's shoulder and her head held down to hear what he was saying; Whoom could not make out the stranger's face in the shadowed doorway, but something about the Cincinatti Reds baseball cap seemed vaguely familiar. Suddenly, the stranger reached into a back pocket and took out a small envelope and gently slipped it down the front of Lucky's shirt, with a little effort.

As the stranger turned away and stepped into the sunlight, WHoom suddenly sat up, spilling world-class whisky on his hand-painted silk tie, and pulled the wraparound shades from his face, staring. That beard! Those steely eyes! That portly waistline --- he knew this man!! Flashes of images rose unsummoned from his distant past --- the American gunboat looming out of the night, blinding him with its spotlights, the terror of losing his first really big deal as the sailors ransacked his little caique and threw all his carefully wrapped bundles into the sea... and the steely eyes of the deck officer watching from the gunboat rail...the cold wind of the night and the brutal beating that followed when he returned to Tehran empty handed with his story... this was a face Whoom would never forget...

A guttural whisper escaped through Efteh's clenched teeth, as he raised a vow to Allah, swearing revenge.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Les from Hull
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 12:12 PM

Roaming Ned opened up the battered guitar case and selected his other pair of trousers from the tangled heap of clothes the case contained. 'I wonder what happened to that guitar I used to have?' he thought.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 12:24 PM

I could care less about what it says on the bathroom wall, that Lucky Day is one hell of a dame.
I watched Lucky maneuver the suspendered picker to a table and heard their conversation. Condolezza Rice? Mental note to ask 'MadameVoila' about that small fact that she happened to forget to mention, but I outwardly concentrated on my drink until Lucky returned. She raised one eyebrow and gave me a 'howja like them apples' look, and then pulled the cherry from her coke. Absentmindedly she chewed as she watched the picker. When she glanced at me, it was only to reveal the stem of the cherry tied in a neat knot on the tip of her tongue and to laugh her low laugh. God help the little man.

When Theet stood to leave, after a few Heinies too many, Lucky reverted to barmaid extrordinaire and put her arm around him to help him out the door. The pair stumbled along but the mission was accomplished, and when she returned, her face was pale.
"We should leave." she said woodenly.
"Where?" I asked
"Anyplace but here....ya want to get some dinner?"
I stood and helped Lucky on with her coat, and inadvertantly noticed the small piece of paper sticking from the front of her blouse. Yes, it was inadvertant, give me some credit here. As we reached the sidewalk, I slid my arm around her waist and she looked at me reproachfully, but I could tell something was up. She was worried.

We walked the few blocks to Chu Phat's oriental deli in a silence that was only broken once. Lucky turned back to glance at the limosine that was making a show of following us and asked me "Friend of yours?"
"I was about to ask you the same thing." was my reply.

Chu Phat's was as dingy a dive as you could find in these parts, but the food was excellent. We ordered, the waiter left, and then we looked at each other for a moment before speaking.
"You first." she said.
"Nope," said I, "Together."
I reached into my shirt pocket and retrieved the letter that had been slid under my door at the office, and Lucky reached into 'No Man's Land' for her letter from the picker. We read in silence, then passed each other our letters like in the time honoured ritual of sharing the little bits of paper from the fortune cookies. Only this wasn't "You will live a long and happy life".....this was more like "Shaping Up to Be One Hell of a Case"....

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 06:51 PM

I've eaten at Chu's for five years and for some reason I can't even begin to explain he likes me. When he came out from the kitchen with his sushi cleaver in his hand, I wasn't worried, at first. What I had seen in the two notes already had my brain in overdrive, and what's a Buddhist razor or two between friends? He came over and shook hands with his left -- the cleaver was occupying the other hand -- and bowed to Lucky, who gave him the best Day Glo smile I'd seen from her all day.

"Meestuh Mattzin, you nee' know somfin!" Chu told me sotto voce. "Dey some guy parke behinna kitchen, big stletch rimo, de chauffeur look like Attira or sombuddy... 'bout three hunnert poun!!!! Not too firenly, you know??"

"Thanks, Chu. You're top Dlawer!" I said, and slipped him a fin I found in my shirt pocket.

"Follow me, darlin'" I told Lucky, and led her into the men's room along the side of the building. I didn't care what was written on those walls, or what it smelled like. We had to blow that nightclub, and we had to do it fdast, and this was the only way I knew how.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 07:42 PM

Tall and blond, as she sauntered down the street, the butt cheeks in her tight dressed looked like puppies wrestling under a blanket. Her boobs, the product of Canada's finests medical science. Even with Lucky on my arm, I was paying attention. "Look at this. I think it may be a clue."

"That stud in your ear is a ruby."

"You mean"...

"Yes exactly"......

"A red earing"....

We walked on.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 08:01 PM

[Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssss....!! :>)

A]

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 08:27 PM

SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

We cut the valves on the Limo's tires and slink out of the alley.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 08:45 PM

Lucky's teeshirt almost didn't make it through the vent window, but I gave her a boost --at which she grimaced appreciatively-- and made it down the alley to the front end of the building and back around the block and up the street. Whoever the dude in the stretch limo was, he obviously wasn't working the pro line in his recce, so I put him out of mind. We needed a quiet place to work out what we were going to do next; if the information in the two notes was right, we were short on time and long on necessity.

"Ya wanna come up to my place?"

Lucky just turned up her sweet upper lip, and looked over her shoulder.

"Thanks, sweetie, but I'd just as soon go back and thumb a ride with Mister Rentalimo back there!!"

"Thanks. We have life and death nipping our buns and you still have time for wisecracks, huh?"

"You got a better suggestion?"

"Your place?"

"You haven't met my roommate, have you?"

"Should I?"

"Not if your jolly-bag has any particular meaning to you...."

"Oh."

We took a few carefully chosen ramdom corners and ducked into a small cafe, where a forty-year-old waitress gave us a couple of stained plastic menusleeves with mimeoed lists inside them, the price column stained with several decades of white-out, and warned against the Spanish omelette. We slipped into a booth in the shadowed back end of the greasy dive and settled down on the warm red naugahyde banquette seats. We were sweating. But it was airconditioned.

"OK, bright-eyes, what's your read on it?"

I waited while she took a deep breath, several times. I was oping she would do it again, but she leaned over and started speaking in a low whisper that captured all my attention...

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 09:34 PM

"Wait a sec, here comes our waitress..."

"Hey kid, how ya doin'?" the waitress asked Lucky
"Fine, and yourself?" she countered
"Oh, I can't complain..." said the waitress
"Yeah, who'd listen?" The two women laughed, and amazingly, the waitress went and put on a fresh pot of coffee....new water, new grounds, clean pot.
I gave Lucky an incredulous look, to which she laughingly responded, "Secret handshake of the Gum Chewing Waitresses of North America...Flo there is the president of the city chapter...of course, if you tell anyone, I'm required by chapter rules to skin you alive..."

"I'll take it with me to the grave." I replied. I thought it was funny, but Lucky gave me a dark look that told me otherwise. "Oh, come on? No smile? Fine then, down to business. I showed you mine and you showed me yours....Man....Still no smile?...I must be losing my touch...The question now facing us is what to do with what we've got. I'll go with you to meet Logos..."
"The note said no baggage, Madison. I think you qualify as baggage."
"You aren't going by yourself."
"Well, thanks for the vote of confidence, oh mighty keeper of 'me', but I recall doing just fine without you this far..."
I wanted to argue the point further, but I knew a brick wall when I hit one. I'd picked her cinders out of my teeth a time or two before, she was no joke.

We finished our coffee in stilted silence, paid the check, and walked out into the falling night. It was starting to rain, so I went to the curb to flag a cab, but Lucky kept walking. Fair enough, I guess we were walking home. I walked up beside her and tapped her shoulder, "Hey, back in there...."
"It's all right, Madison" she said. "Forget it."
I stood for a moment more before she actually met my gaze and the smile crept across her face again. She reached down, grabbed my hand, and pulled me along behind her, dodging raindrops as we went. There's a lot to be said for a woman who will lace fingers with you. We walked for close to an hour before she stopped.
"Well, here's home. This is where I get off."
"Are you sure you don't want company?" I asked. She shook her head 'no'. "All right, just be careful, don't open the door to anyone, and I'll catch up with you tomorrow, okay?" She nodded, gave me a peck on the cheek, and darted up the stairs to her building.

I went to a convenient spot across the street, out of the rain, and waited. The lights in her apartment went on, and through the thin shades I could see her talking with her roommate and making a cup of tea. I waited. Eventually, the lights went out. I waited. A few minutes after lights-out, the door to her building opened, and Lucky came out in a baggy sweatshirt, jeans, and running shoes. I looked at my watch as I fell in step a short distance behind her, 12:01. Time for catching up.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 10:43 PM

The hiss of the occasional taxi made the cool dark sound punctuated with ellipses. This was the city of broken thoughts, where you never knew if you'd end up finishing a sentence. The quiet slap of Lucky's shoes faded into the damp, blotted by the gentle simmer of a light warm rain; I followed a block behind, and it wasn't easy. She was in better shape from shoveling out drinks than I was from shoveling them down.

I lowered my hat down over my purdy eyes and bent down against the rain, and stretched my legs a little further. She was leading me down to the waterfront.

I pulled my shabby trenchcoat closer, comforted a little by the hard lump in the left breat pocket -- a small but accurate Belgian piece I had picked up years before from Toolose La Truc, a refugee castrato from Iran by way of Venice, Berlin, Rotterdam, and Halifax. He'd made his way to the city by singing tenor arias in falsetto on street corners until he came to the States. After that, he couldn't make ends meet, and he'd sold me the piece for a coupla sawbucks one night out behind the Loy Avenue Dairy Queen. Ya mever know when you're gonna need some unmarked hardware. Toolose had told me, and I guess he was right.

Suddenly the wet slapping sound of Lucky's footsteps stopped. I rounded a dark corner, and stared through the rain. She was nowhere in sight. I smelled trouble.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 10:46 PM

Apart from broad daylight and mutual signals, I don't much like following women. They are rightly suspicious of the night, and they have those astral eyes that pick up vibrations, unless they are stupid enough to have Walkmans on, which is one of the main causes of women on slabs in the county morgue. Lucky was not going to end up on anyone's slab, if she had anything to say about it. It was incredibly tiring work: ordinarily you could only do it in relays, planned and set. The only easy thing was that I knew where she was going, so I could double back occasionally: but I wanted to make sure that she wasn't being followed herself. Also I had no idea what she was getting into, or for that matter what I was getting into, and I hate that.

The truth is, though I talk a good game, I worry about Lucky. I worry about them all. I worried about Samantha in grade 4, we would sit together on the school bus, and when her stop came, she would get off, and I would lean out of the window as long as I could see her pigtailed head, the bus would turn the corner, and I would worry about whether she would get home alright, 30 yards away from the end of the driveway. I worry about them all, and when I get involved with them I can't stand it: I want to put them into a warm soft room and make sure they are never hurt by anything ever again, which is crazy. It is one good reason why they leave. On the other hand, when she was 30 years old, Samantha took an overdose of pills one bright May morning in her fine house in Phoenix because she couldn't stand being the wife of the 2nd best realtor in the city any more; so maybe I wasn't that crazy after all.

We came down into the part of town I hate the most, the part the City Fathers have buffed up and cobbled and pipe music into during the day, and electrocute any stray homeless people who find their way by mistake into it. There was a flatiron building adjacent to a pocket park, and, taking a last look around, which forced me to duck quickly back into the alley alongside the "Oh Honey Isn't That What We Were Looking For Shop", Lucky slipped through the entrance. There was a row of lights on up on the third floor. I was just about to follow, when the stretch limo I had seen earlier pulled up at the entrance. And out of it stepped Lawrence of Arabia with his legs sawed in half, until I realised that the guy in the Bedouin costume was just very short. I wondered if he got half price at the Flowing Robes Emporium in Cairo. He stepped forward into the streetlight, and immediately after him, carrying a guitar case, and dressed from head to foot in black, came Condolezza Schwartz. She looked like a tassel of corn going to a funeral for the Kelloggs' Rooster. What the hell was going on?

I had to get closer, and was just stepping sideways to make a move for the fire escape ladder alongside the flatiron building, when something heavy hit me on the back of my head, and I went spinning down into total darkness just like the no fail high tech stocks my brother-in-law recommended to me last year.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 11:40 PM

I came to with the mother of all skull-pounders doing a two-step in my head. Wherever I was, for the first sensation. it was dark and incredibly close. The second sensation was that the darkness came from a veil of hair across my eyes that smelled like dime-store shampoo, and the closeness came from the writhing form of Lucky Day, who was peering intently down at me.
"Oh thank god...you're alive!" she gasped, and kissed my temple, which I soon came to realize was the closest thing she could reach, given our awkward position.

Lucky squirmed around to face me, lying on her side, and whispered, "Can you manage to flip over? I can't get my hands untied, but I might be able to get yours free..."
I groaned and turned over, the sparkles threatened to take over my field of vision, but I took a deep breath and held on to consciousness while Lucky chewed like a sewer rat on the ropes that bound my hands behind my back. I groaned again as the ropes went slack. I wriggled feeling back into my fingers, and then used them to rub the stardust out of my eyes before I sat up and untied my feet.

Back in the land of the living, I turned to look at Lucky, who was expectantly awaiting her release. This was too good a chance to pass up.
"Do you mind telling me just what they hell you think you were doing?" I asked
"Blake, please, c'mon...." she pleaded
"No, just wait a minute. Didn't I tell you, in plain English, to stay home and mind your own business? English is your first language, am I correct in assuming that?" I was correct in that respect, but in my weakened state, I had expected her to be tied up similar to yours truly, and was shocked when her foot shot out and kicked me square in the shin.
"Gawdammit, Madison, turn me loose..." she hissed
"No way, sister...not until you tell me how the hell we got in here..."

Lucky scowled at me, "You were in here when they threw me in. I don't know how you got here, but it couldn't have been from following me, could it?"
"Wow, you plan on staying here all night? That's fine. I think I'll let myself out..." I stood up, hoping she'd take the bait, because I had no idea how to get out of here. She bit.

"Wait! Okay! Jesus, you're a hard-ass. Let me loose."
"Not just yet." I squatted down in front of her, "How did YOU get in here?"
She glared at me a minute, then caved, "I followed the directions on the note, and found the room where the workmen were fixing the ventilation ducts, just like it said. I climbed in and started crawling. The office was just like Theet had written down. I went through, and across the ceiling and saw them. That Schwartz chick, the head roadie, and some half-pint arab with a runny tie...."

"That's all well and good, but it doesn't explain our current predicament very well..." I drawled. Lucky glared at me with a look that she usually reserved for frat boys and people that kick dogs, before she continued.
"I couldn't hear, okay? So I crawled out along the ceiling and leaned over a grate..."
"And?"
"And I fell through the gawdamn ceiling, all right? Fell right on the middle of the table, landed like a ton of bricks..."
She knew it was coming, and she was prepared. Her foot hit the other shin roughly the same time the laugh escaped my lips. In the midst of wiping my eyes, I made a mental note to check and see just when Chuck Taylor started making steel-toed sneakers.

"All right, Dick Tracy, scoot over...lemme at those ropes." Lucky, hotter than a two dollar pistol, turned her back to me and gave me her wrists. The instant the ropes were free, she stood up and started pulling a shelf unit to the middle of the floor. "What are you doing?" I asked
"I'm going out the same way I came in. If you want to stand around and wait for the arab firing squad, that's your business, but I'm outta here." She climbed the shelf and pried off a vent grating. In a few short moments, I was following the soles of her Chucks and the view of her backside in jeans, through the vents to the outside world.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 12:23 AM

I took two aspirin and sat down to ponder the facts. What was the motive? The moon landing coverup? The stolen songs? Her secret formula for cold fusion? or perhaps I was overthinking this. So I took me a little shave with occam's razor. But who would be cold an caloused enough to take the life of a fellow human being? Perhaps it is a music lover who believes the following...

"Some creatures forfeit any and all rights, and make ignoring the faint possibility that someone somewhere sees good in them, or will miss them REAL easy. "

She was a pretty bad singer. That left me with about 10,000 suspects. I look at the schedule and a cold northwestern chill went up and down my spine. 11:00 AM to 12:30 Willie MacGates master of the Windows Named Pipes.......

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 01:56 AM

Dawn was breaking over the skyline as Lucky and I climbed from the vent to the fire escape, then dropped from the fire escape into the dumpster below, rolled out, and took off hoofing in double-time. We ran, alternately looking over our shoulders, until we reached the street in front of her building. I climbed the stairs behind her, gasping and grasping the rail for support, and thought it funny she didn't tell me to beat it. In fact, she hadn't said a word to me since we hit the vent.

We reached her door, and she fished a key out of her pocket and threw the deadbolt. When the door opened, she went through without a glance towards it, or me. She waved her hand over her shoulder and muttered "Make yourself at home." before dropping her coat to the floor, kicking off her shoes, and disappearing through a door on the far wall. I stood for a minute, thinking how out of place her discarded shoes were in the middle of this tidy space. The place looked like a photo-shoot for "Cheap Apartment Monthly". She must dust constantly. It was then I heard the unmistakable sound of running water, and heard the pipes squeal as she hit the flipper for the shower.

I wandered into the kitchen and grazed through the cupboards until I found what I was looking for, and started up a pot of coffee. I was watching the guy across the street take out his trash when I heard her voice behind me.
"What are you doing?" she asked bluntly
"Just making myself at home" I replied, pouring her a cup of coffee and setting it on the table. She sat across from me, wearing one of those old-lady chenille bathrobes, and she looked positively tired. "So, Nora, tell your Nick here what went down..."

She pulled her knees to her chest, modestly wrapping the robe around herself, and her fingers around the coffee mug. "You saw the note same as me." she started "Theet just said I would be surprised, and boy was I. Why in the world would Condolezza Rice or Schwartz or Whatever-her-name-is be hanging around with those guys? And that roadie, the other night in the pub, he made out like he hated her, but they were chummy as all get out last night. They were working over a map of the festival grounds and performer schedule when I dropped, that much I know, but the only thing I could catch before hand was that she was pissed about a change in the booking that the arab fella wanted, but she felt it didn't have the right aura or something....Maybe we should check out some of the other performers? She seemed really worried about who followed her, and what was happening on the other stages..."

We sat for a moment longer before I asked "What now for you, Nancy Drew?"
"Oh stop it already..." she sighed "I have to get ready for work. Some of us have to punch a clock, you know....Billy will have my ass on a platter if I miss my shift..." she trailed off, looking out the window.
"Okay, just keep your eyes peeled, I'll get in as soon as I can, I have some things to take care of first. Just don't do anything as stupid as the stunt you pulled last night, eh? Leave the detective work to the professionals." I got up and walked to the door, and she followed behind me. When she handed me my hat, I noticed the rope burns on her wrists and softened a little bit. "Hurt much?" I asked.
"Nope." she said "How about your shins?"
"Nope." I lied, and pulled the door closed behind me.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: CarolC
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 03:39 AM

The small woman with the dark hair reflected on the few weeks leading up to her decision to slip the note to Blake Madison. Actually, she thought about the year that she had spent with the folk festival. On the surface, it was a jolly group of people who enjoyed music and a good laugh. She tried to remember when she first started to feel uneasy. It wasn't a sudden thing. More of a gradual dawning of realization that something wasn't quite right, and her more recent realization that she'd gotten in way over her head.

She did her best to not get into the middle of the politics. But she was outspoken from time to time when she couldn't take the petty squabbles that seemed to be constantly brewing between the folkies.

It was little things at first. But after a while, strange things started happening in a big way. Mostly it was strange messages from people she didn't know very well, or even at all. Most of the strange messages were faintly veiled attempts to get information about her. Some of it, information that could be damaging to her or to people she cared about. Including her little friend, Flim Flam, the folkie clown.

But then she got a message from one of the singer/guitar players who had been digging for information about her finances, with information about how she could make sure her wishes were known in the event of her death. She had a strange feeling about this man, almost from the beginning. She instinctively felt uneasy about him, and fearful of his invitations to get her to go to isolated places with him.

But she didn't think too much about all of this until her big altercation with the head public relations man. She had been told that he was a man with a big heart and a lot of compassion. So she didn't worry too much about the flares of temper he displayed from time to time. She figured that was just something she would have to contend with.

But one day, she discovered that the PR man had a burning resentment of anyone who questioned his authority, which she had done from time to time. And he let her know, quite plainly, that he considered her to be a threat. And she had been told that he was not a man to back down when he got himself worked up. That was when she put all of the strange messages together in her mind and realized that she and Flim Flam might be in grave danger. And that was when she decided to leave the note with Blake Madison.

She suspected that whoever was trying to kill Condolezza probably just wanted her to stop singing.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 10:27 AM

I walked all the way home, pondering the intricacies of the strange roadie, the Iranian with the big shades, and Condolezza Shwartz. Who was she? What was the damn connection? The two-step in my cerebellum had slowed to a modest fox-trot by the time I came to my corner at Wallow and Eleventh. I was thinking so hard I almost turned the corner. Fortunately, I had stopped instinctively when the traffic light post starated cheeping in the dawn light. Good thing, too.

I looked up to get my bearings and stepped back around the corner, hugging the grimy bricks of the frowsy Woolworth building that anchors my block in the world. The stretch limo was parked across the street from my pad, idling smokily in the cool air, leaking power like Three Mile Island and looking about as out of place as a tree hugger at a NAFTA convention.

The three-hundred-pound driver was snoozing at the wheel, and the back section was hidden by tinted glass.

I had had enough of being pushed around, running, and watching these jerks lay rope-burns on my heart-throbs. I pulled the Belgian automatic out of my pocket and sloped through a couple of alleys that the locals use. Pretty soon I was behind the limo, coming up bent over low and seeing red. I drew up behind the fenders on the streetside and reached slowly for the rear door handle.

Before the slick dude in the shades could drop his Espresso Grande I had slid the door open and was sitting beside him with nine millimeters of P-35 attention locked firmly behind his right temple and my left hand locked onto his neck in a judo hold.

"Move and die, asshole" I whispered. The Muslim sumo wrestler in the front seat didn't stir, and I wondered fleetingly if he was dreaming of paradise or Nirvana, or some impossible relationship.

"Open that door real quiet like, Ayatollah. You and me are going for a little walk, if you want to stay whole....".

He gave me a look that his mother would have used to fry couscous and looked toward the snoozing driver. I prodded his temple with Belgian steel and he opened the door, and I moved him out onto the street and across to my walk-up doorway before he had finished grinding his teeth at me.

Upstairs, I grabbed a coil of 10-base-T wire I had left on the floor a couple of months earlier and wrapped the turkey nto a hard wooden kitchen chair. Hard. Lucky's wrists floated through my mind.

"Okay, Sidhi. Tell me the story, nice and plain. Start with who the hell are you?"

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 10:31 AM

Only Willie MacGates would have the audacity to add electric pickups and a wah wah pedal to bagpipes. He was playing his signature piece, Piece Train. I could hear the screaming and twisting metal. And that was just the audience. I thought that I someone else doesn't Murder this guy, I will. Condolezza would take to this very stage later this day. This venue was sponswered by the manufacturers of Hemp christmas decorations.

Sleep deprivation was taking it toll
As I inspected the Grassy Noel

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 11:51 AM

"My name is Afteh, an indirect descendant of the Prophet, peace be upon him."
"What brings you to our fair shores, Afteh?" I made a gesture as if I was about to pistolwhip him, which is not my style.
"I am here to blow up America, boom, bring nuclear weapon shimmy shimmy under nuclear missile shield in box of Wheaties, or sell bioweapons, or play bridge with Omar Sharif, and steal your women into white slavery, pick one."
"Let me see if I can work this out. You are suggesting that, for instance, because I don't know that the suras of the Koran are assembled in descending order of size, and that Baghdad in the 9th century made Paris look like Boise, Idaho, I am somehow prejudiced against Arabs."
Afteh weighed him up for a moment, and then shrugged. "Oh, alright. You will not understand, but I will tell you anyway."
"Try me. As the poet Rumi says, "What will God try next after he has grown tired of this world?"
"I am a broker, I broker oil for weapons, oil for food, food for oil, and sell what is called indirect oil, oil that is embargoed by the United States, but which the Esso, Shell, etc, can shift around if they do the paperwork right, sell it through third parties, like me."
"Lucrative?" I said.
"Billions," he said. "You have no idea."
"Which brings me to my next question." I was warming to the guy, which is always dangerous. "What are you doing wandering around at, and if my sources are right, investing in, a midscale Folk Festival?"
Afteh chafed in his chair. "Do you think you could loosen these first?"
"No dice." I said. "More."
"The Sheik of Du'uran, by most accounts among the wealthiest men in human history, since his country is a pool of oil dusted over with a thin layer of sand, is renowned for his parties. He has theme parties -- one year it was the Maldive Islands, and he brought the entire population of the Islands to the party for one night. That is his style. Gaudy. He will go to Hell on Judgement Day for wasting his money. The poor will cry against him and Allah will hear."
"It is very early in the morning, Afteh."
"O.K., O.K. I am getting there. Last year he decided on a 60's theme, specifically 1966, and flew in everyone who had had a record in the Billboard top 100 in 1966, and wasn't dead, and had them play."
"Including everyone?"
"Everyone. The Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney, you name it. It took two weeks. Towards the end, they got down to some of the lower names on the list, and one blessed evening they got to Condolezza Schwartz. How can I tell you? She was captivating, mesmerizing, I fell completely for her. She was the only woman for me. Such music, such feeling, such beauty!!! You of course see it. Many cannot. What sadness. What a wrong that must be righted!!!" He strained in his chair like someone who must be off immediately into the streets, proclaiming the news.
I shook my head. I shook it again. The world remained as it was. I shook it again. Nothing. And now my head hurt again. "So you have shacked up with Condolezza???"
He looked shocked and horrified. "Omigod, omigod, no!! Such a woman to condescend to such as I??? Not in my wildest dreams!! Well, perhaps in my wildest dreams, but such are the dreams of princes, not of oil brokers whose hands are filthy with lucre!!"

I gave up. The Cubs were going to win the World Series after all, and Shania Twain was going to receive the Nobel Prize for Physics. Why not?

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 12:11 PM

Time for lunch! :-)

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 12:23 PM

I sent him on his way, after we exchanged a few more pleasantries, his concerns for the safety of La Condolezza (as he referred to her on one occasion), and my warning to call off his gangsters and the heavy crap if he wanted to have a hope of getting my help.

It was 4 in the morning, and my head hurt. I made myself a cup of coffee, laced it with rubbing alcohol for my headache, and sat down to think. To tell you the truth, I was trying to get Lucky in her crappy bathrobe out of my head. When Playboy is going to come out with its "Women in Crappy Bathrobes" special issue, I don't know, but I expect to be at the newstand waiting. Damn the woman.

After a few seconds of that futility, I shook my head again, and went over to my CD player. I took out one of the Condolezza Schwartz CD's that Lucky had left lying around, stuck it into the machine, and picked out number 7 at random. I was feeling unlucky. While the machine whirred into place, I got a look at the entry under the liner notes. It said: "FARMPERSON, I LOVE YOU." And under that it said: "We in the cities, and me personally, need to cherish farmpersons, because they bring us the food we eat, though they are also an integral element in the meateating chain of destruction. Yet this is a song for them, with all their roughewn contradictions!!".
She began to sing:

"O The farmer in the dell,
O The farmer in the dell
Hi Ho, Farm man and farm woman,
From the furrow in your brow to
The furrow under your plough,
You drop great salty tears of sweat,
Which can't be good for the plants, I bet!

(banjo frails pathetically in the distance, then bad bluegrass machine heats up)

WHERE DO OUR ROOTS COME FROM? AND
WHERE DO OUR ROOTS GO TO WHEN THEY ARE GONE?
Oh farmperson on your tractor,
You are such an important factor
In the fields of summer I see burgeoning,
Not from lawyering or surgeoning, oh no, OH NO!!
We cannot lose the farm, or we will lose our lunches!!!
We are losing them in bunches!!!!
But FARMPERSON, CAN YOU TELL ME:
(big harmonica finish)
WHERE DO OUR ROOTS COME FROM? AND WHERE DO OUR ROOTS GO TO WHEN THEY ARE GONE??
With a moomoo lost, and a moomoo gone,
Here no moo, there no moo,
Everywhere no moomoomooMOOMOOMOOMOOMOOMOOOOOOOO!!!!
(Fade).

What can you do? I went to bed.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 12:30 PM

[O, PT, I am enthralled!!! You be DA MANNN!!!. A.]

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: katlaughing
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 04:38 PM

(BRAVO, PT!!!)

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 05:28 PM

Lucky turned up the Ave and walked towards Billy's. Her legs felt like lead from the night before, but when she saw Tracy and Jake standing at the door of the tavern, she quickened her step to meet them.
"Aw, jeez, sorry babe," Tracy started, "I forgot my keys again and then Jake...jeez, you look like hell..." Tracy looked worried for a second and then started to smile.

Lucky opened the door and went in back and turned on the lights. There was the faint crackle of neon lights and then the soundsystem engaged:
They said we were above and beyond reproach, but darling,
Every time you approach,
Something inside me says, coach,
I want to be within reproach of you!!!
Which came first, baby, the chicken or the egg?
My love for you is like a chicken omelette, it is so complicated in its origi--

Lucky pulled the plug on the cd player, fished a quarter out of her pocket to feed the Wurlitzer, and in a few moments, the Ramones were butchering "Do Ya Wanna Dance" loud and clear. Much better. She went in the kitchen to unload the dishwasher, and was startled to see Tracy standing there, hand on her hip, still grinning like a dog with a mouthful of bees.

"What?" asked Lucky, with an uneasy feeling she knew where this was going.
"Whaddya mean 'What?'" Tracy grinned "You didn't sleep a wink last night, didja?" Lucky shook her head. "And you left here with that Blake Madison last night, and now you got them purty little bracelets? I never would have figured you for the bondage type..."
Exasperated, Lucky cut her off, "What are you, the hickey-police all of the sudden? Not everything is as exciting as YOUR dates.." The two women laughed and stacked glasses until they heard the bell on the front door jingle. "Aw shit," Lucky grumbled, "I forgot to lock the door...would you get that, Trace?"

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 07:57 PM

Tracy returned to the kitchen,carrying a hefty stack of flyers in the crook of her arm. "Just some kid from the festival, had to drop these off for Billy and use the head." she sighed.
Lucky looked briefly through the listings, when Condolezza's name caught her eye. She folded one of the flyers up and shoved it in her back pocket. Madison might be on to something with this festival nonesense....

Saturday Concerts on the Pepsi "Have a Hempy Christmas" Stage
Sponsored by 1-800-CALL-HOME and Pepsi

10:00-11:00a WILLIE MACGATES: Master of the Windows Named Pipes
11:00-11:10a ROAMING NED LOONBUCKET: Songs He Hasn't Forgotten
11:10-12:00 THE NEW SCHENECTADY KAZOO CHOIR: Fun for all ages!!
12:00-2:00p RASTA FRED'S STEEL DRUM EXTRAVAGANZA AND BIKINI CONTEST: B.Y.O.Bikini!!
2:00-3:00p CHAZ CHESTERTON: Local boy plays folk faves
3:00-4:00p HELLO ASHOKAN: The farewell concert
4:00-5:00p THE INFIDELS: Funk-folk at it's best
5:00-7:00p TOTALLY 'BOB': Wannabes presents a play in three acts on the life of Dylan
7:00-8:00p THEET LOGOS: Banjo stylings
8:00-9:00p CODOLEZZA SCHWARTZ: Folk diva sings her hits under the HempyX- mas Lights

Lucky heard the bell jingle again, and equally cursing Tracy and Pavlov, went out into the tavern....

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 09:18 PM

She pulled the door back harder than she needed to. It hadn't been locked. Reason the doorbell was ringing was the friazzle-haired folky hanging on it by the fingernails of his right hand. His patched Levis showing large freash patches of stain, he was buckled over barely keeping himself half-upright. He wore what must have once been an off-white home-spun collared and bloused peasant shirt. It wasn't off-white. It was bright, bright red.

He tumbled toward her through the doorway gasping a long rattling intake of air, as though he would never get enough. From the color of his face it looked like he wouldn't.

Lucky recognized him as Ned Loonbucket, the oddball singer with the overnight bag shaped like a guitar. She grabbed him by the shoulders as he fell and strained her bag lowering his long, pot-bellied frame to the barrom floor. She fought down a scream and grabbed the nearest touniquet she could find, a bar-towel half soaked in spilled whiskey.

"What the hell," she thought. "It's disinfected, right?"

She tore open the soaked peasant shirt and raised him into a half-sitting position. He was gasping for air again, the rattle in his throat stronger this time than the man himself, stronger than his life. She knew he was going.

"Ned! What happened to you!!" she cried out, shaking and shocked by the cold vision of certain dying in the face of the man she was holding.

"Peeeeepssss-i-i-i-iii!" he whispered, and he weakly raised one hand. It held a matchnook with bright blue lettering on the outside informing the lucky holder, "You Can Advance Your Carrer!!". The folksinger slumpoed in her arms, rolled up his eyes and left the body behind.

She stepped back, horror on her beautiful face, one hand against her mouth, frozen in horror and amazement. Her senses were running double speed and the world was bright, hard, vivid, and much too present. She stared at the small hairs settling down on the dead folky's head, the drips oozing to the floorboards, and time seemed to stand still in a vivid unquenchable moment of pain. Then she noticed the sharp flavor of wet sulphur.

She pulled the matchbook away from her mouth and glanced at it. The last thing he had done in his most important instant was to hand it to her. Why?

She opened it and saw a single word, scrawled in a childish hand.....

Cosmo

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 25 Jul 01 - 09:20 PM

Strained her BACK!! Her BACK!!! Geeeez!!!

A

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 01:06 AM

I heard about Ned Loonbucket from the guys at the precinct, and I figured the roadies at the festival site were the next logical lead. Undercover work was definitely called for, and as is common knowledge, everything goes better under covers when one has a partner, so I picked up the phone and called Billy's.
"Billy's Keg'n'Cork.." her voice barked in my ear
"Lucky Day, fair shamrock..." I spoke in my best-guy-on-the-planet voice
"Oh gawd, what do you want now, Madison?" she broke in, "I just got finished dealing with the cops and mopping up the last of that folkie, I'm really not in the mood for this.."
I could tell at this point she trusted me about as far as she could fling Billy's BlackVelvet Elvis portrait, which according to eye-witnesses on 'BlueHawaii' night at the tavern, was roughly half a city block...

"Well," I stumbled on "In the oft-touted tradition of truly fine stake-outs and reconnaissance work, I was wondering if you would do me the honour of accompanying me this evening..."
"Give me a break." she interrupted again "It's no small wonder you can't get any dates." There was a brief pause, filled with AT&T's very best static, before I heard her grin across the wires and say, "I'll come by your place about 8, okay?"

Needless to say, 7:59 found me frantically shoving things into closets, kicking various other 'things without homes' under my couch, and generally cursing myself for not getting a maid. When the knock came at the door, I waited to the count of five before opening it, then cursed myself again for not using the peephole. At least that would have prepared my for the sight of Lucky Day in short pants. She walked past, surveying the apartment with a keen eye, then turned to face me.
"You're wearing that?" she pointed to my current folk-like evening ensemble "Why don't you just wear a trench-coat and a fedora? Or better yet, have Billy make you a t-shirt that says "Pay No Attention to the Detective". You want to swing with those roadies, at least put on a pair of jeans or something..."
I excused myself, hoping the jeans weren't on the bottom of the pile in the closet as we discussed the plan of action through the bedroom door. I returned in what, I hoped, was festival attire. Apparently it suited Lucky because she gave a low wolf-whistle as she walked behind me down the stairs, and we made our way to the fairgrounds.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 01:08 AM

On these sponsor nights before the festival, the fairgrounds had all the ambiance of night at Coney Island, complete with a strange rotting seaweed smell that I couldn't quite place, but shrugged off upon seeing the Hempy Christmas Ornament Stage and it's occupants. Lucky trailed on my arm like the tail on a kite, fluttering and making me think that in another life, I'd have carried her books home from school for an entire semester. For almost an hour I was subjected to:
"Aw man, check it out Madison! They have one of those 'Are They Real or Are They Fake' Old-time photo booths!" I nodded somewhat appreciatively, thinking to my self that I'd bet the farm they were real, when she fluttered again, "And a 'Hell's Front Row' hotdog stand! Blister-dawgs and S'mores, you can't beat that combination..." thus followed by a toturous turn on the KWOW Oldies dance floor during which Lucky peered up and me and whispered through some sappy number, "How's your headache?"

After our visits to the 'Go-Go Hamster Petting Zoo' and the booth where they told you your 'True BLUES Name', yours truly: "Herniated Watermelon Polk", and herself: "Dyslexic Passionfruit Taft", grabbed our blister-dawgs and walked past the port-o-lets to a stand of mobile trailers at the edge of the grounds. When we were out of sight of the festival, Lucky turned to face me without a trace of the festival fruitcake I came here with.

"All right," she whispered "We've made our entrance, now where to we go from here?"
"Do you have the matches?" I asked. She showed me the matchbook that she had conveniently tucked in her pocket before the police arrived, and after a brief discussion in very close quarters that I wished would have taken place under different circumstances, we set out to look for COSMO.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 01:24 AM

She needed to talk, and I let her. About Ned Loonbucket's last few seconds in this gig; about his last two syllables, hissing out of him like a hydraulic jack facing the Last Letdown. About the matchbook he gave her with his last act of will. And about the hunting knife with the scarred leather handlegrips the cops had found on the sidewalk outside the bar's front door, where it had fallen from Ned's back as he struggled to pass the message. "Pepsi". "Cosmo".

It didn't add up, and somehow as long as I was walking next Lucky, it didn't matter as much.

We got to the fair and wandered past scores of little booths with rented tables and cheap stereos and bored wannabe entrepreneurs running them. They were selling herbal shampoos, dreamcatchers, tie-dyed brassieres, hand-turned brass doorstops shaped like giant capos, cheap pine carvings of Woody, and hand-painted Zimmerman masks fashioned after the album covers from the Village -- the grimy cherub makes music look. There were Polish sausage and soul-kitchens, corn dogs and hot chitlins, pig's foot and Philly steak sandwiches, tofu burgers and diced kumquat candies. If you could imagine it meaning anything to a folky, there was someone turning a buck on it.

We got to the end of the midway where the big sound stage had been set up. Hippies, flower pots, potted flower children, hempsters, hopsters, and finger-popping Daddio-s littered the ground on tarps and blankets. Further back the older and squarer suffered on pain-designed chairs. Up on the stage, they were running with all the clockwork precision of an untuneable twleve-string. Theet Logos was still up there, flanging away on a five-meter banjo -- I think that's what it was called, anyway. I don't pllay much, like I said, except for horses, and I wasn't looking for grass or roots. Theet looked exactly as he had when Lucky had walked him out of the bar two days before.

With one small difference,

He wasn't wearing the ten-inch hunting knife.

He was singing something about "no-one's behind but the cold birds to moan", as near as I could make it out, and all the overgrown seedlings opn the tarps were nodding and singing along and grooving on the old guy. Well, it takes all kinds.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: CarolC
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 06:20 AM

The diner was almost empty. The small woman with the dark hair sat across a table from Jorge. Jorge was a bizarre mixture of folkie and right-wing reactionary. He enjoyed making the other folkies jumpy describing all of the ways he knew to kill people with musical instruments. Jorge had been a Marine Lieutenant in Vietnam, and had spent almost twenty years as a cop. He had a twisted mind.

"So you want me to take care of someone for you honey?" said Jorge. He fingered his longnecked Seeger banjo lovingly, a look of bloodlust in his eye.

She could see that this conversation was not going to be easy.

"Jorge," she said, "I've got a problem. I need some help. I tried to contact Blake Madison about it but I think he's got his hands pretty full right now." ("Or he wishes he did," she thought.) "I need some advice. I think there's someone who wants to harm me. Maybe even kill me and Flim Flam..."

"No problem honey, I'll take care of it. Just point the bastard out. Do you want it to be slow and painful, or quick and easy?" Jorge lingered almost wistfully over the words 'slow and painful'.

"No Jorge," she said, "I don't want you to kill him. Or even hurt him."

Jorge looked disappointed. He was almost salivating with anticipation. This was clearly a huge letdown. "Well, if you're sure... I can't hurt him, just a little bit? Scare him at least? Maybe give him the old 'bloodless castrator' pep talk?"

"No," she said. "This isn't for fun. It's serious."

"Well, ok honey, but it seems like a waste of my talents, don't you think? What can I do for you?"

She described the strange events of the previous weeks and explained that she wanted to find a way to convince the head PR man that she wasn't worth bothering with. She wanted him to know that harming her would cause more problems than it was worth.

"Well, shit. That's easy enough to do." said Jorge. "You got any pictures of this guy?"

"Yes," she said.

"What about his address and phone number?" asked Jorge.

"I've got his phone number and his e-mail address. I got them off the internet from a website for another music thing he's involved with."

"Well there you go, honey. Write down your concerns and the events as you've described them to me. Then put them, along with the guy's name, phone number, e-mail address, and picture, in a few safe places where the authorities will see them if something happens to you. Then let him know what you've done. Since he's a PR man, I'm willing to bet he'd rather avoid the kind of scrutiny he'll get if something happens to you and his name is the first one that comes up. But shit honey. Not even the bloodless castrator?"

She sighed. "No Jorge. Don't you have some work to do on the 'Folk Singer Flinger'? Or have you perfected the trajectory already? That trebuchet is a nice piece of work. Where were you thinking of flinging them?"

"Well now," he said. "Interesting you should bring that up. I was thinking maybe a nice big steaming vat of horse shit. But I don't know if I can find a vat big enough. Might have to settle for the river..."

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 09:34 AM

We walked some more. Neither of us knew whether "Cosmo" was an animal, vegetable, mineral, or folk singer, but it was O.K. For awhile it didn't matter. It was a summer night. Lucky was funny and beautiful, and for a few minutes I could pretend we were an old married couple, except one of us was wearing hot pants. It wasn't like an old Summer Fair, like the one I learned how to play three-card monte in while I should have been manning the Claw many years earlier when I was working my way through reform school, but it was cheesy in its own right. They had those teeensy Christmas lights strung up everywhere that no one had ever seen five years ago, and now every cheap outdoor night spot had them strewn around, but even I had to admit they looked pretty good. I am a sucker for a warm glow against the summer stars from a carnival. You get reminded that life is pretty rinky dink, when it all comes down to it. From cheers to chance we go staggering on, booths with all sorts of attractions are wooing, drumming, bawling. For adults only, there is something special to see: the multiplication of money, nothing concealed, guaranteed to increase your potency, and the rest of it.
Oh, but suppose you walk a little farther, beyond the last of the billboards, plastered with Pepsi signs, that bitter drink that seems so sweet to its drinkers, as long as they are distracted, beyond there, just beyond, the view becomes real. It is quieter, the trees and the night say dark things to each other, and the stars aren't cheesy. The man and the maiden are drawn farther out, into the meadow, the lights behind them coalescing into a warm opal. She leads him on, perhaps he is in love with her, she says: "Let's just walk a little more,", and he says, "Where?" and he is touched by her manner, which has suddenly become formal. Her shoulders, her neck – perhaps she is of noble descent. But then he turns back, and leaves her, waves in parting, but must leave....But why? What's the use? She is a Lament. She is the one who waits upon the newly dead and shows them the vast ruins of loss, the fields of late blooiming grief, and sometimes, when they are ready, she points upwards and they see that they are now under a different sky, filled with the constellations of loss, which she can name -- look, there is the Cradle, there the Window, there the Rider, and from time to time, even in the land of grief, happiness falls like a shooting star..

"Hey, Blake. BLAKE. Hey, remember me?" Lucky says. She clutches a Whack-a-Folkie Prize. "Where the hell did you go?"

"Just thinking, Lucky. Trying to figure out Cosmo."

"You are a bad liar."

"Poetry, Lucky, you and the summer stars bring out the Rilke in me."

She came up close to him, the fuzzy animal stuck under her arm. "You know, Blake, I don't think you are cut out for this line of work."

"Yeah, I know," I said, "but my feet were too flat for the Marines or ballet school."

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 11:24 AM

There's a booth, in the corner, way up in the back. A crowd gathers. There is a frenzy to purchase the hottest souvineer at the festival. Folks of all ages and sizes are leaving the stand with big smiles, wearing a tee shirt. A tee shirt embazoned with a red headed cartoon bird pecking and repeatedly stabbing a folk singer, instantly and undeniably recognizable as none other than the enigmatic Condolezza Schwartz.

If you move a little closer you will notice that the shirts are made from the finest hemp,and you will read caption.

What Woody Would Do!

A little further down the way another booth, doing a brisk business in seven inch switchblades.

It is going to be a busy evening!

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 03:46 PM

Sigh! Musical Interlude:

And she smashed his head through the middle of the banjo,
She left them both well beyond repair,
And the people all said, "That's the way to treat a banjo!"
She cracked his skull with a rosewood chair.

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Amos
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 04:05 PM

We walked past the fringes of the fair, where small groups of folkies and tokies and various other dispossessed spirits dragged their bodies in search of new hope. One had two ukeleles and a sweet potato singing "If You Like A Ukelele Lady, Ukelele Lady Like A-You". Over in another corner there were three shapely girls in dumpy blue denim overalls harmonizing on some song about their young love playing at the ball. We past a grungy clique of guys in leather jackets, Navy peacoats, Army field jackets, anything that looked like they had earned it whether they knew anything or not. They were banging out chords on a couple of cheap Mellotone guitars and singing a raunchy version of "Back Door Man", leering and swigging long-necks from paper bags, several kinds of smoke rising above them in the night sky between the fields and the fairwar. We walked close behind one of more atonal singers, and I noticed, as I passed, that he had four studs climbing up the edge of his right ear. I noticed he looked unkempt, oily-haired and unshaven, not that I was in the best of bloom myself. At least I had Lucky along to add some tone. Then I noticed something else.

His black leathger jacket had chrome studs on the seams, chrome stars on the shoulders, thick chrome zippers in various places, and large flame-patterned letters across the shoulders in back.

The writing on his coat caught the light from the midway as he writhed around, drinking and laughing. Five letters in bright orange, dull crimson and black, hanging off his scapulae like some kind of cosmic advertisement, curved around a deep purple skull with green eye sockets. Five letters...

Cosmo

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 04:53 PM

Music wafting from the "L.L. Bean Stage"

My Beamer needs a tune up, I'm out of cuban cigars
My Beamer needs a tune up, I'm out of cuban cigars
So I gotta smoke cheap tocacco And drive domestic cars

My girl friend needs a surgeon to make her like her self
My girl friend needs a surgeon to make her like her self
Not satisfied with Nature, she'll buy beauty from a shelf

Who says you can't have wealth and really feel the blues
It take courage to pick a guitar whenyou got so much to lose
I'm just a pampered rich boy
Singing
Siiiiiingin
Siiiiiingiiiiing

The caaaauuuuuucaaaaiiiisiiiiiooooonnnnn Bluuuuuuuuuueeeeees

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: GUEST,Songster Bob
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 05:04 PM

Chapter Two:

... interval ...

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: JenEllen
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 05:16 PM

I held Lucky's arm tight, a little too tight, for she looked up at me with those baby-blues sending out their "whotthehell is wrong with you" vibe. I kept walking.

That's the way it always goes, folks. Not five minutes ago I was sitting in the dark of night, lit by stars, and sucking spun sugar off the end of Lucky's fingers, with the biggest break in the case thusfar drinking beer out of a sack not 50 yards away.

"I am a back door man
I am a back door man
Well the, men don't know, but little girls understand.."

I, somewhat nonchalantly, dragged Lucky behind a flea market tent, and she jerked her arm out of my grasp and turned to face me.
"You mind telling me what that was all about?" she asked
I turned her to face the crowd and whispered in her ear, "That bunch over there, the army surplus store? You see them?" She nodded, the movement giving me a whiff of her perfume, "That greasy one on the ground? I think that's our man.."
"How do you know?" she asked, but then nodded again and whispered "Oh!" as Cosmo turned to fish a beer out from under the blanket, giving her full view of leather.

"What do we do now?" she whispered to me over her shoulder.
I could detect the slightest trace of cotton candy on her lip, and I could think of a few things to put on my to-do list, but I figured she was talking about the case, so I replied, "We wait.."
"But what if that's not 'the' Cosmo? And we're wasting a lot of time following around some thrift-store joker who's only crime is murdering a perfectly good song?"
I couldn't fault her logic, but I was still skeptical and that blister-dawg was eating holes in my stomach, "So what you're telling me is that we should just go up and ask him if he's murdered anyone today?"
"You have a better idea?" With that, she reached into my shirtpocket, retrieved my cigarettes, and tapped one out into her fingers. "I'll only be a minute," she looked up at me deathly serious and followed with, " and watch my back, eh?"

So simple. It was like using a t-bone steak to fish for Rottweilers. Lucky walked around the flea market tent, looking coyly at the Dirty Everything Gang, and proceeded to paw through a stack of used Kingston Trio LP's on the table. The singing got a little louder, and a little raunchier, and she looked over her shoulder again. What is that? Are they born with that? Look up, look down, look back up, half smile, flip of the hair and voila. Our man covered the distance in roughly half the speed of smell, and was standing beside Lucky. A smile, a little more of the hair flip, and draw out the cigarette.

He fished around in his many zippered pockets, and produced a book of matches. He lit her cigarette, and was making his move. Ah, but she counters with the slight hand wave and the 'well, I'm here with some friends, but maybe I'll see you around' look over her shoulder to the crowd. Our man went for macho, that's what leather men do in those situations, and he pulled Lucky close enough to slip the matches in her back pocket and give her a swat. She giggled, and turned around to leave, waving and looking over her shoulder as she walked back behind the tent.

She looked up at me, evidently disgusted, which was no big surprise, and said, "Can we go home now? I feel like I need to be disinfected..." She handed me the matchbook, and I opened it to reveal the name of our mystery guest in the same child-like scrawl.
"Oh, not just yet Lucky..." I could feel the bloodhound in my soul start to howl. "I promise you the biggest bubble bath in town, and I'll wash your back, hell, I'll even wash your front," She rolled her eyes and looked disgusted all over again, mental note to not be 'cute' "But for now, we hang right here...."

Subject: RE: Murder At The Folk Festival!!
From: Jim the Bart
Date: 26 Jul 01 - 05:25 PM

And then, and then. . .