[Chimp!] [Rants!] [Murder!]
The Case of the Naked Nun
BURNT NORTON
Dick Burns was scraping dried blood from his Remington bolt action when his door
blasted open like a dynamited safe.
She stood about five-eleven and was hotter than Satan's pajamas. Even through her
conservative black get-up, Burns bought himself a searing eyeful. She placed a manicured
hand on her hip, slinked into the office. She drifted in like a panther in heat and
looking to paint the town brown. Her skintight blouse clung to her pendulous breasts
like death to a sick gibbon. Burns squinted at her silver dollar-sized nipples poking
through the taut fabric of the dress like Hershey's chocolate kisses. Her bottomless,
bottle green eyes told him yes, but the blood red rosary around her waist said, "Forget
it, Charlie. I'm married to God Jr."
The nun took a final puff from her foot-long cigarette holder, crushed out the gasper
in Burns's crusty shag carpet. She slinked over to his desk, the click-clack of her
rosary sounded like a beaded Chinese curtain in a whorehouse kitchen. She clawed
one of Burns's cheroots out of the lifesize wooden Indian dispenser, sat down across
from Burns, jacknifed her two-percent body fat legs. She smiled, threw a foot up
on his desk, struck a match against her heel. Burns leaned back in his squeaky tubesteel
recliner, caught half a glimpse of her black stocking-clad calves. The nun exhaled,
her cracked ruby lips disappearing in a pool of grey smoke.
A puddle of drool slowly filled Burns's lap. He brushed flecks of dried blood from
his rifle, continued polishing. Burns felt an unfamiliar twinge in his loins, like
a eunuch getting a hard-on.
"Have a cigar, sister."
The nun barked back, "Shut your word hole, jerk. And wipe yourself off. I'm
here to hire a detective, not to make small talk. Where do I find Dick Burns?"
"This time of the day, your best bet is the drunk tank." Burns lifted his
fedora off of the nameplate. She looked down at it, squinted at Burns.
"You're Dick Burns?"
"I'd better be. I'm wearing his underwear."
"Stop, you're killing me. You this funny all the time, fuck?"
"They teach you to talk like that in the convent?"
"They teach us lots of things," she puffed. "Play your cards right,
maybe I'll show you the stations of the cross."
There was nothing in that for Burns, so he let it ride. "And, to what do I owe
the pleasure of this visit, sister? The Vatican hiring P.I.'s to look for the Ark
of the Covenant again?"
"It should be so easy." The nun flicked ash in Burns's cracked Garfield
coffee mug. "I'm being blackmailed, Burns. Somebody has a copy of a skin flick
I made when I was twelve. They're saying if I don't cough up fifty grand, they'll
FedEx it to the Pope."
Dick worked the action of his rifle, lovingly stroked its long, dark barrel. He squinted
at the nun, said "So you want me to shoot this guy?"
"No. Just find him and get the movie back."
"I'll do the Pope for free?"
"Maybe some other time. You busy Easter weekend?"
"That's fine. Fifty frogskins a day, plus expenses. You get to ante up the ammo
and the hooch. The Pope's head'll be my little gift to you."
A look of vague dissatisfaction crossed her face. "I don't have that kind of
money on me, Burns. Maybe we can make some kind of arrangement. You look like your
pew needs some warming." The nun's lips puckered tightly around the dark, anise-soaked
cigar. She stood up, propped a high-heeled foot on his warped metal desk, slowly
began hiking up her skirt.
"See anything you like yet, Dick? You don't mind if I call you 'Dick,' do you
Dick?"
"You can call me 'Barrabas' if you want to, sister. Just put the damn skirt
down and give me some suspects to harass."
"Does little Dickie Wickie know his catechism?" she purred.
"Shut up."
She threw her skirt down in a huff. "What's the matter, Dick? Don't you like
girls? Or maybe you just don't do it with Catholics?"
"We'll work out a payment schedule later, sister. I'd say my rates are pretty
low, considering, but they involve a lot of Vaseline and depilatories. Got a copy
of this video?"
She shook her habit. "After I joined the Little Sisters of No Mercy, I bought
up all the copies and had them burned, all except the one I use in my portfolio.
My extortionist friend filched that."
Burns placed the rifle on the desk, walked around his desk to the nun, snatched the
cigar from her pouting lips. He put it out on his forehead, grabbed her by the shoulders,
kissed her hard. She broke free and smacked him. Drool shot out of the corner of
his mouth.
The nun closed her eyes, moaned, "Jesus died for your sins, Dick."
"Save it for vespers." Burns picked his nose. "Who'd want to blackmail
a swell looking babe like you?"
"If I knew that, I wouldn't have to hire you, would I? Fucking idiot."
"Watch your mouth, sister, or I'll blow a new one on the other side of that
stupid hat of yours." Burns picked up his rifle, chambered a round with a smooth,
well-lubricated click, aimed it out the office window at a passing flock of pigeons.
"How's this guy getting in touch with you?"
"Phone calls at the rectory, late at night. He told me to drop the cash off
at the 7-11 on Fourteenth and G tonight."
Burns reached beneath his desk. He grabbed a beat-up attaché case packed full
of counterfeit twenties left over from an FBI sting operation. He'd conveniently
forgotten to return them the Feds. They said he could destroy them. They made the
mistake of not saying how. Burns thought now was as good a time as any. He tossed
in a makeshift Radio Shack pipe bomb, snapped the case shut.
"Drop this off tonight, then run like hell. I'll tail the guy, see where he
takes me. In the meantime, talk to my secretary about putting a trace on your phone."
He slid the attaché across his desk. "You know how to shoot?"
"Shoot? Hell, I was in Beirut in '83. Don't talk to me about shooting."
Burns grinned, reached into his desk, pulled out his hammerless .38 belly gun, said,
"Take it."
"You really are a comedian, Burns. I wouldn't carry a pea shooter like that
for all the lepers in Calcutta." The nun reached beneath her skirt, slipped
out a stainless .45 Wildey Auto-Mag with a laserpoint scope. She slammed in a fresh
clip, yanked back the slide with a forceful snap. "This guy screws with me and
he'll be wearing a hole the size of Saint Peters."
"Try and keep the gunplay down to a minimum, Sister?"
"Sister Cherry."
"Yeah, right. Anyway, drop off the bundle, then hustle out to my apartment,
and hang in the lobby." Burns scribbled his home address on a piece of foolscap,
handed it to her. "You any good with that piece?"
"I practice every day," she whispered, cosying up towards Burns. "I
like the feel of a big, heavy piece, Dick. Something with a lot of weight to it.
Something that gets the job done. I like to feel its firmness in my hand and run
my fingers along its length. Something about the way you squeeze it; the way it erupts;
the way it empties a load. You reading me?"
"Like a Jack Chick tract." Burns threw his arm around her waist, planted
a long dripping one on her thick red lips. She slapped him. He kicked her in the
shins.
"Get the hell out of my office, penguin. And don't forget to say your prayers.
ASH WEDNESDAY
Burns arrived at the rendezvous point at dusk. He killed the engine, coasted the
Plymouth Superbird into a dead space across the street from the Sev. He lit up a
blunt, watched the wretched refuse huddle around the Slurpee machine and pull the
five-fingered discount at the candy rack. Burns popped the safety off of both guns,
tapped his toe in time to Billie Holiday pissing and moaning on the AM receiver.
The nun emerged from the darkness of a side alley, dropped off the briefcase as scheduled.
She wasn't wearing her habit and she looked sweeter than a Chocodile. An shock of
strawberry blonde hair cascaded down her backless dress, stopped just above her massive
hams. From the ends of her fingernails to the tips of her spike heels, she was drenched
in red. Sister Cherry had enough ass to be continued on the next nun. Burns could
see her massive gun bulging from her purse. If this was a Bride of Christ, Burns
wondered if her old man was into wife swapping.
A minute later, a steroid-pumped microcephalic goon in a three piece Armani picked
up the case and calmly walked to his car. It was Rocky "The Pinhead" Colostomi,
a local hood that Burns owed a few punches in the throat. Burns reached for his bullhorn,
threw his head out of the window, yelled "Jig's up, Rocky. Drop the case and
grab some sky."
The pinhead dropped the case and ran like a lactose intolerant tourist at a Velveeta
factory. When he was twenty feet away from the case, Burns hit the detonator. The
case erupted in a fireball of counterfeit notes. The front window of the 7-11 exploded,
showering the immigrant cashier with broken safety glass, barbecue flavored KornNuts
and flaming suitcase debris. Blown off his feet, the goon slid twenty feet across
the pavement. Burns ran after him, grabbed him by the collar and hammered him headfirst
into an '83 Caprice Classic. Burns dragged him back to his car, duct taped his eyes
and hands, tossed him in the trunk. He headed out towards the suburbs.
Burns parked the car in an isolated section of Bowie, Maryland. He unlocked the trunk,
heaved the goon into the cold mud, yanked the heat out of the gunsel's suit pocket.
He tore the duct tape from Rocky's mouth, kicked him in the temple. The goon screamed
like a crushed infant. Burns lit a Chesterfield, said, "You've been a naughty
boy, Rocky. You didn't call your Mommy on her birthday." He gave Rocky a swift
one in the ass. "And on top of that, you get busted making the pickup on an
extortion scheme."
Rocky yelled "Who the hell are?"
"I'm the tooth fairy." Burns kicked him in the mouth, wiped the blood and
torn gum off on Rocky's suit. "I'm giving you one chance to make good by me,
Rocky. The nun movie, where is it?"
"Go blow your dog, thamus," Rocky lisped, spitting out eyeteeth and bits
of bone.
Burns grinned, kneeled down, placed the gun against Rocky's foot and fired. It made
a sound like a fart against a folding metal chair. Rocky screamed like Axl Rose with
his nuts slammed in a car door. Acrid smoke flared out of the gaping hole in Rocky's
crocodile skin shoes. It smelled like burnt rubber and smoked salmon.
Burns stood up. "One foot down, one to go. Who's got the nun movie?"
Rocky writhed in the mud in contorted agony. "I don't knowthey don't give me
namth! Tall guy in a dreththinkth like inthenthhangth around in the cathedralthath
all I knowI'm juth the delivery boy! Juth geth me to a doctah, fer crithake!"
Burns walked back to the car, reached into the trunk, grabbed a can of spray paint
and some jumper cables. He stripped Rocky buck naked, looped one end of the cables
around his legs and the other over a thick tree bough. Burns spraypainted, "I'm
onto you, Bishop!" on Rocky's chest. Rocky's dick formed the exclamation point.
He tied the loose end of the cables to the bumper. Burns got into the car, turned
over the engine. As he drove away, Rocky's screaming naked body shot up the tree.
Burns got out, loosened the cables, tied them to a nearby picnic table.
"Keep it down, Rocky. You'll wake up the Goatman."
"AH, BARTLEBY..."
Burns rolled down the window, tossed Rocky's gun into Allen's Pond, drove back
to his slamming crib on Capitol Hill. Sister Cherry was sitting in a wood paneled
station wagon working on her second pack of Luckys. Burns rolled in behind her and
parked. He noticed the light in his apartment was on. He walked over to her, rapped
on the window. She rolled it down.
"The light was on when I got here, Burns. You want we should go up and shoot
their eyes out."
"Hold on thar, Tex. I just had the carpet steam cleaned." Burns pointed
with his forehead. "Follow me."
They walked to the Cool Disco Dan tattooed payphone at the end of the block. Burns
wiped the wax from the earpiece, dialed his home phone number and let it ring until
he got his answering machine. He spoke in a thick Welsh brogue.
"'ere, Barnsey? Eve found out whare tha noon ees. She's a hidin' 'round tha
Hawk 'n Dove tippin lagers, jess around tha corner. Ya gotta hurry queek, man."
Burns hung up. They ran back towards an alley next to the apartment. Somebody killed
the light in Burns's window. A few seconds later, two deacons in Ray Bans emerged
from the building, walked up North Carolina Avenue towards the bar. Burns and the
nun crept up behind them, guns drawn, and pistol whipped the pair. They dragged the
priests into the side alley and shook them down. As they rose, they heard the sounds
of a revolver being cocked. In the darkness, someone cleared their throat.
"Have you accepted Christ as you personal savior?"
THE BABYLONIAN CAPTIVITY
"'Heard you've been a naughty boy, Kevin," the Bishop whispered, a Phillies
blunt clenched between his rotting teeth.
Burns croaked, "My name's not Kevin."
The Bishop jabbed his blocky chin at one of the priests. The priest walked over,
slugged Burns in the gut. Burns spat out something that was covered in blood. He
recognized the priest. It was "Fishhead" George Mallone; the other was
"No-Neck" Semprini, both goons that Burns had sent to the slammer more
times than he'd had sloppy seconds.
Burns was bound to a chair in the Bishop's office in the Shrine of the Immaculate
Conception. The Bishop was wearing the usual vestments: white, jewel inlaid frock,
miter staff, Doc Martens. He had a chin you could open beer bottles with and a scar
that ran from his left temple to his right earlobe. Sister Cherry was sitting in
the Bishop's lap. She was back in her nun get-up, this time sporting a leather minidress
and fishnets. The Bishop slipped a Gregorian chant tape into his boom box, turned
up volume.
"I don't like private skulks roughing up my boys," he whispered, stroking
the nun's inner thigh. "And I sure as hell don't like them nosing around my
bishopric."
Burns shook his head. "I'm proud of you, Bishop; working your way up from pushing
smack and scalping 'Skins tickets. Now you're working for Rome."
"Rome's diversifying, baby. Everything from black market adoption to organ harvesting.
The church is a growth industry. I'm just a venture capitalist."
" in a dress," Burns added.
The Bishop made the chin motion again. Fishhead planted another one in Burns's gut.
This one hit home; Burns peed himself. He coughed up part of yesterday's lunch. Burns
hacked, "Starting to look like the bitch set me up, eh Bishop?"
"Cherry here has been born again. We're gonna clock mucho diniero with that
movie of hers. Teenage Catholic Sluts in Heat , starring Cherry the Fellatrix Nun.
Whatya think?"
"I think you're sicker than fourteen motherfuckers, Bishop. Soon as I'm outta
here, I'm gonna nail you and your whole syndicate to a goddamn tree."
Cherry winked at Burns, pulled out her mag and fired at Fishhead, blowing his shoulder
blade all over the picture of Pius XII on the opposite wall. No Neck went for his
artillery. Cherry turned, aimed, fired. He took the round in his elbow, blasting
his forearm off and sending the splintered limb spinning across the linoleum. Both
priests writhed on the floor like a pair of slugs in a salt mine, blood rhythmically
spurting to the beat of the Gregorian chants. Cherry turned the gun on the Bishop.
She motioned him over to his bleeding comrades. She grabbed a John Paul II letter
opener, slipped over to Burns and cut his ropes.
"I shoulda known you'd pull a stunt like this, Cherry," the Bishop spat.
"Mommy always told me never to trust a woman with a rosary."
The nun snapped back, "Tell it to the College of Cardinals, Bishop. You've just
sold your last indulgence."
The Bishop sneered, "This won't be the first time you've underestimated a man
in a dress, Burns." He darted for the door, sprinted up the quarter mile aisle
of the cathedral.
Burns shook off his ropes, grabbed Cherry. They both took off after the bishop's
heels. The Bishop looked behind as he ran to the one of the exits. He darted from
one to the other. Locked. He looked towards the altar. Some construction was being
done on the three-story crucifix. The Bishop made for the scaffolding, slipping on
the dusty plastic protective sheeting. Burns and Cherry dashed towards the altar.
The nun cocked her automatic. "Eat this, ya goddamn papist pornmerchant!"
The nun opened fire, blasting the Bishop's left heel out from under him. He wailed
like stuck cat but kept climbing. Burns tore past a construction table littered with
power tools, did a double take, grabbed a nail gun and slammed in a strip of caps.
"You're coming downtown, Bishop," he hollered. His voice echoed through
the deserted cathedral.
"You're not taking me anywhere, Burns. I'll see you in Gehenna." He propped
his good foot on Christ's face, pushed himself up past his thorn crowned head.
Burns squirreled up the scaffolding after him, firing nails as he went. The Bishop
reached the gilded halo, had nowhere to turn. Burns put the clergyman in his sights,
held his breath, squeezed the trigger. Two nails pierced the Bishop's wrists and
feet. He hung from the Savior's head like a good Christian. Burns went up after him,
frisked him and found the video stuffed up the Bishop's dress. Before he climbed
back down, he gave the Bishop a big kiss.
"You should have taken up woodworking, Burns," the nun yelled from below.
Burns tossed the video down to her, hopped off the cross. She handed the tape back
to him.
"Here Burns," she purred, "maybe we can watch it together at your
place over drinks?" She grabbed his ass, dug in her fingernails. Burns smiled,
cracked the cassette in half, ripping the tape out.
"No thanks, sister." Burns said, smiling. "I gave that up for Lent."
She folded her arms, scowled, "Faggot."
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