The Dick Burns Homepage [Chimp!] [Rants!] [Murder!]

The Internet Murders BLACK E-MAIL Dick Burns was busily hammering nails into a nice slab of Virginia pine when the intercom buzzed. "Goddammit Burns. Where the hell are you? I told you to be in my office twenty minutes ago!" "Solly, long numbah. No Burns heah. Is Kim Creenahs." "You want me to come down there and tear you a new" Burns yanked the intercom jack out of the wall, continued hammering. When he was finished, he had a wooden porcupine covered with rusty ten penny spines, blood, sawdust and torn fingernails. He drew a pair of winsome eyes on it with a raw umber crayon, lit up a Gitanes, admired his work. He threw on his seersucker jacket, walked down the corridor to the boss's office. On the way, he stopped at the water fountain, waddled into the bathroom, palmed three copies of the Richard Roundtree commemorative issue of Jet at Kim's ColdwinebeersodaOK? shop, and slapped a screaming toddler on the head with them. Burns booted the boss's door open, made straight for the wet bar, helped himself to a bottle of Old Peckerwood. As he swigged, he glanced towards the window. Silhouetted against the hazy morning sunlight was a distressed, pee-my-damn-ass blonde with trouble written all over her pancake make-up. Cobalt blue eyes stared at him from a Botticelli angel face. She wore a blood red minidress, a shiny black vinyl raincoat, matching pumps. She was the type that could get away with it. The bourbon shot out of Burns's nostrils when he recognized her. "When're you gonna get some cognac in this dump?" he sniffed at the boss, mopping himself up with his suit sleeve and pouring himself another drink. "Shut up. Burns, this is" "Yeah, I know who it is. Any fourteen-year-old with a hard-on and a VCR knows who it is." I extended a bourbon-soaked palm. "How do you do, Ms. Hartley?" "Please, call me Nina," she perked, proffering a professionally sculpted hand. Her nails dripped a malignant shade of crimson and Burns caught a noseful of Calvin Klone's Suppression for Her. By the nibble marks on her toenails, Burns pegged her for the nervous type. She was also the stupid type if she was hiring him. "I'm a big fan of your work, Nina," Burns said, unbuttoning his pants. "Would you mind autographing my" The boss slammed his fist on the desk. "Burns, you idiot! This is serious. Someone has been breaking into Ms. Hartley's home, stealing her soiled unmentionables and sending her obscene e-mails to boot. The sicko's saying he's going to rip off her head and use it as a puppet, unless she agrees to take pictures of herself with a green banana up her ass." "Smells like the same m.o. of the guy who waxed Shauna Grant and John Holmes." Her arms folded, Hartley calmly smoked a ginseng cigarette and nursed a whiskey sour. She hungrily eyed the pronounced, throbbing bulge in Burns's ill-fitting seersucker slacks. "You're familiar with the adult entertainment industry, Mr. Burns?" she asked coyly. "My right hand is. And none of this 'Burns' business. You can call me Dick. Or 'Boom-Boom' if it's Guy Fawkes Day." Burns downed the double bourbon, lovingly stroked the neck of a bottle of absinthe. "Burns here is my best P.I., Ms. Hartley," the boss assured her. "Remember that maniac who tried to kill. the President with a high-powered rifle?" "You solved that case, Dick?" she squealed in admiration. "Not exactly," the boss cut in, "Burns was the maniac with the rifle, but he was shooting some other lunatic who was sneaking up on the President with an icepick. Burns's aim was off by a couple of inches." Hartley sighed, "I'll say. The President had to get a steel plate put in his skull." Burns lit a cigarette, puffed nonchalantly, admired the hammered tin patterns in the ceiling. "Looks pretty sharp on him, I think. Damn shame it sets off the metal detectors in the airport." She sipped her drink uneasily. "Um this is a detective agency, isn't it?" "Burns here knows D.C.'s psychos like the back of his hand," the boss replied hesitantly. Burns put out the cigarette in the back of his hand. Hartley's sphincter clenched so hard, she could have cracked an acorn with it. "Somehow, I can believe that." "I'll find the clown that's bugging you, Nina. But it's gonna cost ya plenty, see?" "Why, Dick whatever do you mean?" she declared, blushing like a debutante at her first dog and pony show. "I mean you're gonna have to step up to the mike, baby. You're gonna have to slap some chalk on the old pool cue if you want to play with the Dickmeister. Big Daddy Burns needs to lay some pipe in a big way, and you're just the little philly to shuck my oysters if you know what I mean." Hartley looked bewildered, like a penguin that's just been hit by a truck. "I wish I knew what the hell you're talking about." "Allow me to demonstrate. Hey boss, mind if we borrow your office for about twenty minutes?" Burns yelled, downing his drink and kicking off his shoes. "Uh, well, I" "We'll try not to get any feces on your carpet. Ain't that right, Nina?" Burns hustled the boss out of the door, locked it behind him. The boss sat in the lobby and fumed for over an hour while he listened angrily to the raging din of seltzer bottles, throaty moans, power tools and snapping rubber. THE CHIMP LADY OF ADAMS MORGAN Burns regained consciousness around noon. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes, rose quietly from the boss's leatherette futon so as not to wake slumbering Ms. Hartley. He silently rifled through Hartley's purse looking for clues. He found a Louis Vuitton wallet, a crushed pack of Vagina Slimes, two ribbed condoms, a stainless .38 Dingo gun. He removed a business card that read, "Carol O'Toole: Licensed Chimpanzee Nanny." Burns returned the purse's contents, ran his fingers through his hair as he stared at his reflection in the boss's cup of coffee. He walked over, slapped Hartley on her pert, naked ass. "Hey, No more of that!" she screamed. "Shut up. You'll take it and like it." Burns whiffed the business card under her nose, "What the hell is this?" "That's the woman who takes care of my pet monkey, Meese. She comes over to my place whenever I'm out on a shoot." "So, she'd have access to your soiled linens, right?" "Oh, Miss O'Toole wouldn't hurt a" "Honey, when you've been in the biz as long as I have," he said, lighting two cigarettes, " you come to realize that anybody with opposable thumbs is a potential suspect. I've seen eighty-year-old grandmothers slit their kid's throats open with potato peelers; kindergarten tots bludgeon their substitute teachers with broken lunchboxes; Good Humor men" "Alright, I get the point. I just don't think harassing an old woman will amount to anything." Burns stood up, reached into the boss's desk, slipped on a pair of Depends undergarments, snapped the elastic waistband with gusto. "You're paying me to do the thinking, dollface. You just sit back and enjoy the ride. I gotta see a lady about a chimp." He put on his suit, stepped into his worn brown Stacys, slammed a fresh clip into his .45, walked towards the door. Nina rushed to his side, grabbed his arm. "Dick, be careful. Some of those chimps, they they just aren't right!" Burns's eyes darted about nervously. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" She let go of his arm, bowed her head. "Just be careful." "Don't worry baby," he proclaimed, putting on his fedora. "Those knuckle-dragging tree hoppers don't stand a Chinaman's chance against Dick Burns, Ace Detective." Snickering, Burns turned and walked through the plate glass door. BASIC MONKEY On the way to O'Toole's, Burns stopped in at Bob's "Out"-rageous "Meats" and Bail Bonds store on Minnesota Avenue. He got a sweet deal on a diseased macaque with no head. It's genitalia was a writhing mass of lice, blowfly maggots and fleas. An effeminate butcher with a jeweled eyepatch, a blood-caked apron and a lisp you could cut diamonds with paid him a saw buck to drag the thing away. Burns stopped by Schwab's drugstore, bought some potpourri in a can, sprayed the carcass down. Then, he took it for a scrape around to O'Toole's place. He dragged the simian up a steep cement driveway to the front door. The doorbell made a long, gasping sound like an animal with it's nuts caught in a vise. Something with large breasts, a tiny head and no neck wearing a pink flora muumuu and clogs answered the door. "Hi. My name's Dick Burns. A dame named Hartley recommended your services. I'm leaving town for a week to get a lobotomy and I need someone to look after Diderot here. He hasn't been feeling well." "Why, of course, Mr. Burns. My, what a cute little friend you have here." Burns let got of the macaque's hand. It fell to the ground with a dull thud. Things started crawling out of its neck stump. "Looks like Diderot's had a few bad bananas, eh Mr. Burns? Well, I'll have you fixed up in a jiffy! Please step inside, won't you?" Burns took off his hat, followed the morbidly obese woman inside. The drawing room was bare, mildewed, musty; it smelled like a dead swimsuit model that had been left out in the sun too long. Through the maze-like hallways, a broken record player squawked a Joan Baez song. The woman proceeded through a pair of swinging doors into a makeshift operating room. Before he could follow, two chimpanzees grabbed each of Burns's hands, escorted him to the living room and seated him in a leather Virbromatic Barcolounger. A third monkey grabbed Burns's hat, tossed it up onto a jackelope hat rack mounted to the Laura Ashley papered wall. One of the chimps proceeded to the wet bar, climbed onto a stool. O'Toole's voice echoed from the other room above the sound of a Singer sewing machine. "Help yourself to a drink, Mr. Burns." "Straight up." Burns turned to the bar monkey. "Vodka martini. Stirred not shaken. It bruises the gin." The chimp behind the counter grabbed a bottle of vermouth, poured two shakes into an oversize martini glass, swirled it around counterclockwise, threw the excess into a brass spittoon. He cracked some chips off a block of ice with a short pick, added that to a cut crystal pitcher, stirred it with a foot-long glass swizzle stick. The chimp gingerly poured the drink into the glass, grabbed two different jars of olives from the fridge, slammed them on the counter and screamed. "Green olive, please." The chimp pierced a green olive with a toothpick, plopped it in the drink, placed it on a silver serving platter, walked it over to Burns. Burns took the drink, slipped the monkey a dollar. The monkey gave Burns a dirty look, pocketed the cash. Another chimp offered Burns a bowl of mead roasted macadamias. Burns pushed it away. "No thanks. Any smokes?" The chimp reached into its breast pocket, produced a silver cigarette tin, removed two clove cigarettes. He lit them both with an ornate brass lighter and gave one to Burns. Burns puffed lightly, gave the place a good long stare. The walls were covered with Laura Ashley prints, life-size cardboard cutouts of Karen Finley, Lydia Lunch, and Joan Crawford. A 9x12 velvet Andrew Dworkin poster hung above the fireplace. In the corner stood a Post-it covered computer terminal, a printer and a sprawling array of floppy disks. Burns sipped his martini, rose to go to the computer. The three chimps stood elbow to elbow blocking his way. Burns dropped his cigarette on the tattered polarbear rug, crushed the butt with the heel of his Dr. Martens, lit up one of his own. O'Toole emerged from the operating room dragging Burns's companion behind her. She had expertly sewn a purple Barney head onto Diderot's neck stump. It hung lazily to one side. The dead macaque looked as if he was having a narcoleptic seizure. Burns eyed the couple, sipped his drink. O'Toole stroked Diderot's new head. "There now, good as new. Enjoying your drink, Mr. Burns? "Your butler mixes a wicked martini, Ms. O'Toole. Where'd he learn it? "Oh, Louie's been with me for ages. I ran into him in a cantina in Rumania after Ciauchesciu's fall. He was mixing Molotov slings and antifreeze shooters for a group of Bosnian separatists when I offered him a job in D.C." The monkey finished mixing a banana daiquiri in a blender, poured the dayglo mess into a salted margarita glass, dropped in a paper umbrella. He loped over to O'Toole, handed it to her. She gave Louie a knowing glare. He disappeared through the beaded curtain into the kitchen. "Looks familiar as all get out, " Burns quipped, putting the gasper out in his palm. "He didn't happen to be anywhere near Saigon in '72?" O'Toole beady eyes peered over the rim of her glass, darted about the room nervously. She cleared her throat. It sounded like a hippo with a nightingale caught in its throat. "Why whatever makes you think that, Mr. Burns?" she said with an uncertain laugh. Burns shrugged. "Oh, nothing. It's just that he reminds me of a bartender I knew that used to sling hash 'round Bung Chow Hwa Boulevard in the Gwangchi quarter; a bartender that just happened to be CIA. Used to peddle horse to G.I.'s and run blockades out of the Golden Triangle. Louie wouldn't happen to know anything about that would he?" Burns was starting to feel woozy. He shifted his weight in the easy chair. The room began to tilt at a right angle. Andrea Dworkin started to look good to him. Burns knew he was in trouble. "I can assure you, Mr. Burns, Louie might have worked for some pretty sleazy organizations, but the CIA certainly wasn't not one of them." Burns stood up. The blood rushed from his head like an orthodox jew from a sausage factory. He staggered toward O'Toole, broke into a racehorse sweat. He stared into his drink. "Goddamn monkey slipped me a slipped me a mickey!" Burns dropped the drink, tried to pull his gun. Before he could get it out of his holster, Louie had returned from the kitchen with a sap and introduced it to the back of Burns' skull. A black pothole opened at Burns feet. He drove in screaming. OUT ON A TWIG When Burns came out of the fog, he found himself hog-tied to a chair in O'Toole's basement. He shook his throbbing head, busied himself by trying to release the razor he had built into his street vendor Rolex. After a few minutes work, he tore through his bonds and rubbed his rope burns. he silently climbed the staircase and peered through the crack in the door. O'Toole giggled as she hunted and pecked at her computer terminal. The screen cast the room in an unnatural shade of putrescence green. Behind her, Louie stood holding a tray full of Little Debbies. Burns reached for his guns and came back with two handfuls of nothing. He spied the basement, scrounged up a five-pound bar of lye laundry soap. He used the watch razor to whittle a Mac 10. He reached into the wood stove, scooped out a fistful of soot anr rubbed the soap gun down like it was a slab of babyback ribs. He gave it a gunmetal blue look that would have made Smith and Wesson pee themselves. Dusting himself off, he made for the staircase. Burns inched the door open. The fat lady chuckled at the computer screen. Louie hunched next to her, his back facing Burns. Burns snuck up behind the chimp, threw his arm around the monkey's throat, rammed the soap gun in Louie's ear. The tray of Little Debbies flew across the room. "Anybody move and the spook gets it!" O'Toole spun around in her chair. "What the?" "I don't chew my cabbage twice, sister. Up against the wall! And keep those chunky mitts up and open where I can smell them." O'Toole complied, stepped backwards away from the computer terminal. Burns shook down the monkey, found two .32 automatics. He grabbed the two pistols, chucked the soap gun. O'Toole smirked. "The old whittle-an-automatic-out-of-laundry-soap trick, eh Burns? I should have expected as much. Very cleverfor a dick." "Right back at you. A dipso pal of mine from Mars taught it to me. He also taught me this." Burns placed both feet on the screaming chimp's shoulders and, using both hands, tore the monkey's head off. Seating himself, Burns mounted the head on his left hand and enacted the rubber hose scene from Death of a Salesman. "I didn't peg you for a thespian as well, Burns. It's a shame you chose to use your skills in the service of good instead of evil. A pity that your talents won't save you from the wrath of Buganda!" Burns trained his pistols on O'Toole's head, inched over towards the computer screen. An e-mail was being sent to Bangkok to the effect that all was well, Burns was to be disposed of, and Ms. Hartley would be shipped to Mr. Buganda via Air America. "What the hell is this?" Burns grunted, pointing towards the screen with his chin. O'Toole shrugged. "I don't suppose it matters anymore, Mr. Burns. There's nothing you can do to stop Operation SPOOGE. Even as we speak, my accomplices have kidnapped Ms. Hartley and are taking her chloroformed body to Dulles Airport. She is to be sent to Togo where she shall be the concubine of Prince Abu ben Buganda, a great fan of her pre-1978 work. For my services, I will receive one million Pounds Sterling. But you, sir, are destined to be meat for worms." Burns snapped a cigarette into his mouth, put the barrel of the gun to the tip and fired. He inhaled the fumes deeply. "So, white slavery's your game, eh O'Toole?" Burns sneered. "All of this feminist crap was just some kind of cover story." "Ha, ha, ha! Fortunately no, Mr. Burns. I do consider myself an anarcho-Marxist feminist. I've always known that pornography degrades women. Pathetic dupes like Hartley deserve to be treated like garbage. They demean all women and must be sacrificed. I'm doing the chauvinist world a favor by sending her out of the limelight. Permanently." "And what about free speech, O'Toole? What about everybody's right to do whatever the hell they want to in the privacy of their own home, so long as it doesn't involve underaged kids or stolen pets?" O'Toole hissed, "Typical phallocentric logic. Another deluded chauvinist, naked in a cave, shouting about free speech." "Yeah, we all know that women couldn't possibly identify with the rapist in porn films, as a catharsis, or anything. Yeah, dames only like it missionary style. On their backs. Eyes closed. Thinking of the Empire. Just like the Good Book says. Ain't that right?" O'Toole turned away and wept bitterly. "Mr. Burns, do you know what it's like not to get invited to the prom because you're an overweight, pimply sack of shit? Do you know what it's like never having a date because all the boys think you're a wretched mass of neuroses? I've had it with a world that thinks that make-up and breast implants are the only way to get a man's attention. Those bastards are going to pay! All of them!" As O'Toole ended her tirade, she slipped a derringer from the sleeve of her muumuu into her palm. Quicker than the snap of a camera shutter, she leveled the gun with Burns's head. Burns pulled the triggers of both of his pistols. Nothing happened. O'Toole smiled. "You don't think I'd give a monkey a loaded gun, did you, Mr. Burns? Let alone an ex-CIA monkey?" Burns tossed the empty guns on the floor. "Come clean, O'Toole. I'll see you get ten years. You'll be out in five if you keep your nose clean." She shook her head. "Good bye, Mr. Burns." O'Toole took aim, slowly squeezed the trigger. Her fist erupted in a tongue of flame. She flailed around the room, screeching like a skinned cat in a salt mine. When the smoke cleared, Burns saw that O'Toole's gun hand was blown clean off, leaving a scarlet, smoking stump. She collapsed on the carpet wailing in pain. Nina Hartley emerged from behind the beaded kitchen curtains holding a smoking Dingo gun. "What did I tell you about those monkeys, Burns?" The Dick Burns Homepage [Chimp!] [Rants!] [Murder!]