People! They were the most self-centered, self-satisfied creatures on the face of the Earth. They didn't give a damn about each other, they didn't give a damn about this decaying city they had built around themselves and their tawdry dreams, they gave less than a damn about story threads that other people start, and they gave less than a tinker's damn for a hardworking chimp like Chongo...until they needed him. Then it was, "Oh, please, you've got to help me, Mr. Chimp...

("Just call me Chongo...kid.")

But Chongo had to admit he felt more than a flicker of sympathy for this dame, even if she was only some part time steno named Betty Frizzell, and not Nicole Kidman after all. She had to have been desperate to come down here at this hour in the morning, and her fears about her husband were probably justified.

Betty had spilled her guts there in Chongo's office, and with every word it became more and more clear that something unusual had happened to Lenny Frizzell. Turns out Lenny was the model husband. Always attentive and loving. Never stayed out late. Never forget his wife's birthday or their anniversary. Faithful and devoted for these past seven years, Lenny had led a quiet life as a self-employed jewellry engraver over in a little shop on 15th Avenue. Chongo remembered seeing the shop one time, but he'd never gone in.

Well, yesterday evening something had changed in Lenny's life. Somethin big. When he came home, 3 hours later than usual, he was pale and distracted. He had a small package, wrapped in white paper, the kind you might wrap around a gift for your favourite girl, but he wouldn't tell Betty what was in there. She could see he was really upset, and tried to draw him out, but he wouldn't...or couldn't say much. The only thing he did said that gave her any clue was, "I should never have dealt with those baboons!" Then he clammed up and wouldn't say another word about it, except that he had to go out again and make a "delivery". Betty protested. It was 11 pm, and she had no idea where he was going, but Lenny insisted, with the frantic desperation of a man in the final stages of panic. She wept and pleaded, but it did no good. Lenny tore himself from her arms and disappeared out into the black Chicago night...and never returned.

"Did he leave anything behind, a name, an address..." growled Chongo, chewing on his stogie.

"Yes!" blurted Betty. "I found this on the pavement outside the front door."

It was a business card. A fancy card, on good paper. It read: "The Bundolo Club". On the back of the card was scrawled a single word: "persimmons"

Chongo knew about the Bundolo Club. It was a gathering place for some of the toughest, meanest, lowest, rottenest, smelliest gorillas, baboons, and chimps-gone-wrong to ever pollute mainstreet USA. The kind who would sell their own mommas to a travelling circus and try to pawn their dad's skull off to the Smithsonian as a long lost specimen of Piltdown Man or the "missing link". The Bundolo Club was a place you didn't go without a loaded gat and way too much nerve...or a really strong death wish.

And he knew what "bundolo" means. It's common street-ape patois, and it means "kill".