noir

The following events were narrated by freelance detective William Korton at the Bismark Metropolis Police and Detention Center on February 18^th, 12321. 

[This interview was conducted by Lieutenant H. Danvers and transcribed by John Toperfin as part of an investigation concerning the discovery of Pierrot Le’Fue’s mutilated body on February 16^th, 12321.  William Korton claims to have received a mysterious phone call roughly half an hour before the body was discovered in the Herbert Hoover City Park.  Mr. Korton told his story in present tense.]

“I’m walking to the office.  It’s an early morning in February.  The sky has only just begun to illuminate with dawn.  There are almost no automobiles on the road at this hour.  Snow is banked against the curbs and huddled like puddles of ghost in the shadowed alleys I pass by.  The street lamps are still burning because they aren’t extinguished until the day has completely arrived: ‘The metropolis takes no chances when it comes to darkness.’  You’ll remember that was Mayor Thomas’ campaign winning slogan two months ago.  I like the darkness though.  You know why?  Because I enjoy danger.”

[Korton delivers this last line with a grunting grimace.  Lieutenant Danvers has a visibly hard time stifling his laughter and puts his fist between his teeth.]

“I can see my breath.  It materializes from my mouth as if I was a mini-cloud generator.  I can see that oil lamps are being ignited in the apartments as I walk by the tenement buildings.  Curtains begin to glow.  People are waking up and my ears are aching because of the cold.  I dig my nose into my scarf and stuff my hands in the pockets of my overcoat. 

“When I get to the office, the front door is already unlocked, which means that that abominable Taylor has come in earlier than I this morning and I hope to God the buffoon didn’t spend the night here.  Last thing I need is that bum to transform this office into a home. 

“I push the door closed behind me as I walk in; it creeks and then shuts with a groan that sounds like a death rattle.  The coat room isn’t warmed yet and is still freezing cold.  I can see my breath as I take off my hat, untangle my scarf and shed the overcoat.  I hang each of them up on a separate peg.  I smooth my hair to the side, my hair feeling like strands of milky silk running through my numbed fingers, and I continue on into the main lobby. 

“‘Good morning,’ says Taylor, looking up from his desk.  Taylor is my secretary.  He’s an idiot and as useless as a castrated gigolo, but he looks nice today.  His clothes are surprisingly well put together and his hair is neat.  He might have even brushed his teeth, though this might be my imagination acting up.  I have a deep disgust for Taylor and have no desire to conceal it.

“‘Keep working,’ I tell him, narrowing my eyes as I pass on the way to my private office, flipping through my ring of keys.  Taylor shuffles some obviously random papers and then gets up to follow me.  As I’m trying to unlock the door the key gets jammed and it takes some jiggling to make the door open and the fact that Taylor is looking over my shoulder almost makes my blood boil, but when I finally do get the door open I realize that my office has taken an angelic form this morning.  The dam of night seems to have completely collapsed since I’d entered the building because the sunlight is rushing in through the windows, running along the floor, splashing up against the walls.  My desk is neatly ordered and the brass telephone on it gleans lambent like the Holy Grail itself.  And I can still see my breath, which is a nice touch.  ‘Taylor, have you turned the heat on yet?’

“‘Yes sir,’ he replies, adopting that loathsomely obsequious tone of his, “And the coffee is percolating as we speak.”  He anticipated my next complaint.  I guess the jackass can learn after all.  I walk over to the desk, slip off my suit jacket and sit down in my chair.  Out of habit I move my fountain pen from the left side to the right side of the desk.  It’s like flipping a switch.  I can’t start a day of work without first completing this ritual. 

“‘Any messages?’ I ask, glancing up at Taylor.  He’s standing across the desk from me with his hands folded behind his back like a flamboyantly homosexual soldier at attention.

“‘Umm, yes-’ and then the telephone rings, which cuts him off and I shoo him out of the room by flapping a hand at him.  I let the phone ring a couple more times, then pull it towards me, hefting the metal earpiece off as I lean the console in toward my mouth so as to allow me to have a proper conversation with the caller. 

“‘William Korton,’ I bark professionally.

“‘Mr. Korton?’  The voice on the other end of the phone sounds artificially deep as if it’s trying just a little too hard to sound ominous.  No one says anything for a second or two. 

“‘Speaking,’ I say, finally breaking the silence with my carefully measured word.

“‘I’m in need of a Private Eye.’

“‘You called the right man, Monsieur . . .”

“‘You’ll refer to me as Senior Ésteban,’ he commands.

“‘I don’t like mysteries,’ I warn him.

“‘That makes absolutely no sense, you’re a detective,’ he growls in accusation.

“I’m momentarily taken aback, but I recover coolly: ‘Think of me as an exterminator, Senior Ésteban,’ (my voice is pure sangfroid now) ‘and think of your mystery as a meddling infestation.  There is nothing this exterminator hates more than roaches and, sir, I will stop at nothing to ruin each of their nasty little lives.’  This brings about another bout of silence.

“‘We-we’re getting off track Mr. Korton,’ the deep voice stutters briefly before regaining its composure, ‘Be at the Herbert Hoover Park in twenty minutes.  I’ll find you.’  I start to object but I realize the line is already dead.  I hang up the earpiece and push the phone back over to the corner of the desk.  I have a foreboding feeling concerning this Senior Ésteban and I stare at my pen contemplatively.  I have, admittedly, little choice but to follow the stranger’s orders as I have been out of work for nearly three weeks.  So, I get up with a sigh and pull out my leather suspender holster and pistol from the desk drawer.  I weave my arms through the suspender loops and secure its latches to my belt, then I stuff the pistol into the holster.  I make sure to leave the safety off.  You can never be too careful.  That’s my motto.”

[Lieutenant Danvers interrupts to ask if Korton has a license to carry a concealed firearm.  Korton looks briefly confused before continuing as if he hadn’t heard the question.]

“Mentally preparing myself for the worse, I straighten up and take a deep breath.  As I exhale, I can no longer see my breath, something I’m already nostalgic about, despite the now warm and rather pleasant atmosphere of the office.  On my way out, I warn Taylor that he’d better keep busy.  He doesn’t say a word, just blinks at me like a deer on valium.  I swear to the maker, if that dirty rat wasn’t my son, I would have fired him years ago.

“Once I’m outside, my breath is visible again.  The temperature rarely rises above freezing during winter in the Metropolis, as you well know.  However, the street I return to is much more animated than the one I had recently left.  The sounds of automobiles and the breeze of passing pedestrians is perhaps the most prevalent of my perceptions. 

“I then consider the time frame that I am operating in.  The park is a fair hike from the office, so I figure I might be slightly late for my meeting with the mysterious caller.”

[Lieutenant Danvers groans and requests that Korton speed the story up.]

“Dear Sir, detail is the juice of a detective’s work.  I will spare nothing.  Now, where was I?  Ah, yes, I’m standing on the crowded street just outside my office.  The Metropolis is alive, purring like the engine of a jet, prancing like a puppy in the farm fields, cavorting like young Werther and Lotte on the ballroom floor well before the dreadful return of that all-too-balanced Albert, and the enormity of these stimuli fills me with such a tremendous vitality, a vitality that swells up in my heart like the sails of a magnanimous ship having just embarked to chart the uncharted seas of an unknown planet! 

“Ironically, the pressure of life’s ephemeral beauty that builds in my chest only accentuates the empty feeling in my stomach, a result of my (suddenly acknowledged) neglect of breakfast this morning.  This spurs me to the indignant conclusion that I have absolutely no obligation to be punctual for the rendezvous with Senior Ésteban, and I decide that I should grab a bite to eat before the meeting.  Luckily, there is a café, a local favorite of mine, en route to the Herbert Hoover Park.

“As I begin walking, I reflect on the tragic irony that, at the times we feel most alive, we also feel the most insatiable appetite.  Had it not been for the electricity running through the metropolis, an electricity that had found its way to my body, an electricity that shocked me into the most reverential vigor (and now I feel like a robot too long on a weak voltage)-“

[Lieutenant Danvers slams his fist into the table and curses, though Korton does not seem to notice.]

“-I might never have realized that I had forgotten to provide myself with humanity’s most important sustenance of all, the sustenance of food.  As I become fully aware of the profound significance of my intellectual reverie, I understand that I must give the bright morning sun the good long stare it deserves, something my mother had repeatedly warned me not to do during the sickly years of my childhood . . .”

[At this point I ceased transcribing.  An hour later, Lieutenant Danvers and I learned that William Korton never actually made it to the Herbert Hoover City Park, therefore rendering him useless in identifying one of the four suspects we are holding in suspicion of the murder of Pierrot Le’Fue.

Besides suggesting that the person on the phone, reportedly self-identified as “Senior Ésteban,” might have been an elderly blonde-haired woman (a “tremendous hunch” as Korton described it), he offered nothing in the way of our case. 

His nine year old daughter, Taylor Anne Korton, has since been placed in a child protection program.]