Chapter 2
“The Dame and Dick”
What was I thinking when I let my gaze linger on that scarlet haired dame? I knew she was trouble on four legs and I should’ve just looked away. She was with Presto Rigatoni, one of the most ruthless mob bosses that Manehatten had ever given birth to. For crying out loud, I knew this was doomed to fail from the start.
Presto must’ve thought so too, so he sent over two of his gorillas, a Lyrish pony and a griffon on loan from one of those birdbrained mobsters that came round after the war. They came up to me all casual like, although I could tell they weren’t going to ask me for my opinion on whether or not the Wonderstars are going to win tonight.
“The boss would like a word with ya, boyo,” The Lyrishcolt said, scuffing the floor with a hoof to show he meant no kind word.
I set my glass on the bar counter and casually tossed a few bits the bartender’s way. “Sorry fellas,” I said, stepping off and looking at them with a smile, “the dance card’s full.”
“This ain’t a request ya furry…” The griffon said, casually putting a talon on the piece he was obviously carrying inside his chest. Now I was capable in a fight, but even I didn’t want this place to turn into a shootout. So when they grabbed my legs and dragged me backstage to beat me to next year, I tried to take it like a champ.
I was held against the wall after a few punches were thrown, Presto came out, dressed in a suit bought with money that ran red with blood. The tall Bitallion stallion glared at me, “You have any idea who I am?”
I smirked, trying to keep my cool. “The waiter? Can I file a complaint for the lousy service?”
“You better watch your tongue, boyo,” The Lyrish one said, “lest you wanna lose it.”
“So he’s a wise guy huh?” Presto said, then punched me hard in the stomach, before holding my neck up with that magic of his. “I hate wise guys as much as I hate crumbs who check out my girl. It’s rude, and uncivil.”
“I like to think my mama raised me right and decent…” I snarked back.
“Then let my boys remind you of your manners.” Presto said, letting me go with his magic and gesturing for one of his boys to come over and finish the job.
“Okay boyo,” The Lyrish one said, smirking. “First lesson…” He was about to punch me when I ducked and gave him a nasty buck to the chin. The griffon tried to hold on better to me but I remembered how to fight these fellas. I grabbed him by the head and flipped the bird over over my shoulder, sending him flying into some kitchen ware. I was about to hit him some more when the Lyrish one grabbed me from behind and threw me over one of the counters. I stumbled over, was grabbed by the griffon and thrown out the back door. I rolled and landed in some garbage, the gorillas seemed to have had their fun and walked back into the bar.
I groaned as the pain caught up to me once the adrenaline passed by. I got up, dusted myself off and slapped my fedora on. I tried to get myself up by leaning against the wall, using a protruding brick as a hoof hold, only for it to fall out, leaving a hole. Overall, could’ve been worse…
So there I was, covered in the discards of the special and possibly some discarded bottles of medicine. And the whole time I kept asking, was it worth it?
Redlight suddenly came bursting out the back door...as she stood there I knew the answer to my dumb question...she was worth every punch…
“Are you hurt?” She asked.
“What? This?” I said, trying to save what little pride I had left. “You should’ve seen what my face did to the other guy’s hoof.”
She smiled, and gave out a small laugh that was music to my ears. “So what’s your name tough guy?”
“Does it matter? What good is a name if your going to forget it?” I asked, with a smile.
“I don’t think I can forget you…” She said with a smile so lovely and tender I wanted to just take her right then and there.
But the mood was interrupted by the griffon yelling, “Hey! Doll! You’d better come back in here! Boss doesn’t like you out of sight with his hardware on!”
I then looked around her neck, and sure enough there was a gold medallion across it, pure as gold and sporting a sun without Princess Celestia inside it. There were enough jewels covering it to buy a small island in the Maribbean. Whatever that was, it was apparently worth more to Presto than even the girl who’s wearing it…
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“This medallion is a huge historical artifact,” Twilight said as she was flipping through her entire history section inside the library. I was beside her while Even was continuing to read the diary. “Supposedly, according to what books I had on it, it was a gift from Celestia to Platinum and traded hooves over the years.”
“Until Presto got a hold of it somehow,” Even said.
“Find anything on Presto?” I asked.
“Nothing very flattering,” Twilight said, “I found at least a dozen old newspaper reports about his crimes. Drugs, fixing races, racketeering, all sorts of nasty things that he got away with.”
“And if Historic found it,” I said, “Anypony would have killed him to try and get the medallion. Millions of bits are quite the motive for murder.”
“And Presto would’ve wanted to keep it safe…” Even said, “Then that means…”
“The medallion is still at the Goldilocks!” Twilight said, “All we gotta do is find it and-”
“Problem,” I explained, “The Goldilocks has been closed for years. I remember passing it a few times on patrols.”
“But Historic would’ve had to have gone down there,” Even said, “ Presto has a secret safe in there according to the diary. We should check it out cuz if Presto kept it anywhere, it’s there.”
“Right,” Twilight said, “You two go on ahead, I’ll stay here and see what else I can dig up.”
“In the meantime, Even and I will see what exactly is down the-” I said.
“Down where?” A voice said from behind us.
Standing there was none other than Sparkler, tilting her curious head to look at the three of us. Immediately I could see Even trying to make himself smaller and hide in the diary. Heh, seems your crush came knocking huh Even?
“Oh, hey Sparkler,” Twilight said, walking up to her. “Sorry but we’re a little busy working on the latest case.”
“The murder that happened in that old office?” Sparkler asked. “Yeah, I saw the police, any idea who did it?”
“That’s what we’re about to find out,” I said, “Was there something you needed?”
“Not really,” Sparkler said, “I was just going to return some library books, Mom tends to forget them at times.” She then levitated some books out of her saddle bags, putting them in Twilight’s ‘return’ basket. “But really, I was kind of...sort of...hoping…”
“Hoping what?” I asked.
“Well, see my school is kind of doing this thing, about future careers.” Sparkler explained. “So I was hoping, maybe, you’d let me tag along.”
Even dropped the diary in shock, “What?!”
“You want to tag along?” I said, “But Sparkler, this isn’t a game or some-”
“I know what you’re going to say Mr. Eye.” Sparkler said, firmly. “I know it’s dangerous, but you saved my sister from a fire, and between you and Twilight we all kind of owe you a zillion times over.”
“Bu-but it’s I mean…” Even said, blushing and stammering.
“I’ll be fine Even, and I think it would be great if I spent some time with my friend don’tcha think?” Sparkler said, smiling at the bat pony.
“I...I…” Even stammered.
“If you’re really sure it’s okay with your mother,” I said, pointedly, “I’ll let you tag along, but you do exactly what I say. No crazy heroics or anything, got it? I don’t want your mother to drop a piano on my head for getting you hurt.”
Twilight grimaced at the memory.
“I’ll be fine, this could be fun huh, Even?” Sparkler replied.
“I...yes..it could….” Even said, fiddling with his hooves.
“Great, maybe you can read that cool diary you got there to me on the way,” Sparkler said, turning around. “Just let me grab some things and I’ll meet you guys at the train.”
She walked out and both Twilight and I smiled at the blushing Even. I smiled and slung a leg around Twilight. “I’m starting to see a beautiful pattern here.” I said with a smile.
Twilight smiled and nuzzled me in turn. “Yeah, hopefully she doesn’t have to save him from a fire in order for him to get it,” She said happily.
“So, Even, you going to ask her to prom soon?” I asked, cheekily.
“SHUT IT!!” Even yelled, blushing brightly while the pair of us laughed our flanks off.
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After a short train ride, with Even catching Sparkler up on all that’s going on, we managed to reach the city of Manehatten. After some asking around, we found the old Goldilocks bar… This place had obviously seen a lot of better days. The tables were broken, the bar was dull, and partially collapsed. Behind the bar, the shelves had sagged, and broke, scattering the bottles that were once upon them. Behind the bar was littered with broken glass. Any fabric was moth-eaten, and would probably disintegrate at the least little touch. All the gilding on any of the light fixtures was long gone. Flocked shoddy, and thinner-than-paper gold leaf had turned into rotten piles of dust and sagging tin.
“Yeesh, dust everywhere.” Sparkler said as we came inside. “I can’t believe they haven’t torn it down yet.”
“It’s Manehatten, unless somepony is going to move back in, nopony’s tearing anything down.” I said, running my hoof over the dusty surface of the bar.
“Anyways Even, you were going to continue the story?” Sparkler said.
“Yeah uh..” Even said, then cleared his throat. “Well Case told Chandelier that he found his sister here at Goldilocks.”
“So did Chandelier go meet her sister?” Sparkler asked.
“Well, no he was worried that with Chandelier being an naive girl she’d have trouble handling a mob boss,” Even explained, “So he offered to go and make contact with her.”
“Totally out of the goodness of his heart.” I said, chuckling I then saw some stairs leading down. “I think this is it.”
The stairs creaked in an eerie fashion as we went down into a dilapidated hallway, with what looked like a small break room, and a door at the far end. Opening the door revealed an office space that, like the club, had seen a lot of better days. Wallpaper had long peeled, and the desk that was there was dull, and its veneer was peeling. The carpet had darkened, and could rip with every step.
“Chandelier agreed to the meeting,” Even said as he followed behind me downstairs. “But still insisted that Case not tell Red due to all the animosity back home.”
“Hey!” Sparkler walked over and lifted a crowbar off the floor, “I’m guessing this is what Historic used to pry open the safe.”
Even looked up and saw the open safe, he peeked inside and then sneezed when a cloud of dust was kicked up. “Nah, nothing’s been in here in years. Guess Historic missed out.”
“If that was the secret safe,” I said, and looked around some more. “Most ponies keep two safes, one that was easy to find to store minor valuables…”
Even blinked and opened the journal, “And another that was harder to find that hid special objects!”
“Like priceless medallions,” Sparkler said with a smile.
“Okay, I think we’ll find it if we dig in the story, I read ahead,” Even explained. “So five days after they met, Case and Red were absolutely in love.”
“After five days?” I said, tilting my head.
“Hey, ponies didn’t waste time in the 940s,” Sparkler said with a chuckle.
“They were so in love,” Even said, putting the journal on the desk for us all to see, “that they were willing to risk it all. It happened backstage...”
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We had to steal a moment backstage. It was hard because she was Presto’s girl. He was always watching her. As we gazed into one another's eyes...Sparkler… My heart quick-
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“Did you just say Sparkler?” Sparkler asked, looking wide eyed at Even.
Even’s face turned red, and he started blubbering again.
“Don’t tell me you’re imagining you as the P.I. and her as the gangster’s girl…” I said, trying soooo hard not to laugh.
Sparkler put a hoof to her mouth, clearing trying to suppress a giggle at Even’s embarrassed face.
“My uh, no I wasn’t! I just uh goofed!” Even yelled at me.
“Goofed was right…” Sparkler said, smiling.
“So, anyways, let’s keep reading…” Even said, firmly.
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We were about to affirm the love we held so dear. We were going to kiss, seal the deal when…
“HEY!” We both stiffened when we saw Presto’s goons coming out way. The Lyrish pony smirked, “Hey boyo, you must be a slow learner.”
I braced myself for another brawl, something told me I wasn’t going to get out of this one with just a few scars and the old shrapnel wound kicking up. We heard applause outside and Muimbaji, that zebra singing girl moved through the curtains, walked down the steps and smiled at me. “There’s my baby,” She then planted one right on me, in full view of both Red and the two goons.
“He’s with you?” The griffon asked, shocked that a zebra had the audacity to lay one on a pony.
“Yes, and I would appreciate it if you boys wouldn’t mop the floor with him,” Muimbaji said with more courage than I had in my whole body. She knew exactly what she was risking my doing this. Girl like her doesn’t get in easy to places like this, and it ain’t because of her singing.
“Weren’t for nothing,” the Lyrish pony said, “But you might wanna keep this on the hush hush. Presto’s not too keen on there being stripes mixing in with pony laundry.”
“Then I suppose we keep this our little secret then,” I said, straightening my tie.
The two gorillas high-tailed it out of there, but kept their glares. They would be back for sure. I owed that zebra girl my life, and she was about to make sure I knew it.
“I can’t believe how stupid both of you are being. If Presto finds out he’ll have you both butchered and tossed into the river faster than a dragon at an all you can eat gem buffet,” Muimbaji said with a huff.
“It’s worth it, Muim,” Red reassured, slinging a leg round me.
Muimbaji rolled her eyes. “You both are just a walking fairy tale.” She then went off, ranting in her native tongue. I thanked Celestia that I didn’t understand Zebracan. Red and I moved to one of the dressing rooms and locked the door. Hopefully it would keep any eaves from dropping. I sighed and shook my head, “She’s right Red, we can’t stay here. If Presto finds out-”
“We gotta get away from here,” Red said, sighing. “From Presto, all of it.”
“Nice of a thought that is there’s still a very big problem,” I said to her, “We can leave town right now and make for a train to Hicksville or somethin’, but how far will we get? I only make so much on a P.I.s earnings.”
Red then thought for a moment, then put a hoof on the medallion round her neck. “We got all the money we need, if we just sell this…”
“Are you daffy?” I said, “You got at least two bodies on ya whenever you wear that thing.”
Red smiled a little and sighed, “To think, back when I was a cigar girl I saw Presto’s old girl come in with this and all I could think of was that I wanted it. Pretty soon I was this girl and it was mine. Didn’t take long to figure out it wasn’t a necklace...but a gilded, jeweled noose...”
I walked up to her, put a hoof on her cheek and said oh so sweet and gentle like, “We’ll turn that noose into a life line.” At her smile I tilted my head thoughtfully. “Only question is how?”
Red then said, “When I’m not wearing it, Presto keeps it in a secret safe and I know where it is…”