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the umbrella at the businessman. There was an explosion as Max saw a spout of flame come from the umbrella’s barrel.
    A gunshot! Max clutched at his chest. Had he been hit?
    “You big baby!” The Penguin chided as he waved the umbrella. “Just blanks. Would I go to all this trouble tonight just to kill you? No, I have an entirely other purpose.”
    With that remark, all trace of mirth disappeared from The Penguin’s countenance. He looked serious, solemn, almost respectable.
    “I’m ready, Max,” he continued, his voice much less assured than before. “I’ve been lingering down here too long.” He sighed. “I’m starting to like the smell. Bad sign.”
    He looked into Max’s eyes with his own beady orbs. “It’s high time for me to ascend. To reemerge. With your help, Max, your know-how, your savvy, your acumen.”
    He paused and looked to his circus cronies, who appeared genuinely moved by his admissions.
    “I wasn’t born in a sewer, you know. I come from—” He looked up toward some place far above their current location. “Like you,” The Penguin continued forcefully. “And, like you, I want some respect—a recognition of my basic humanity—an occasional breeze!”
    A couple of the circus gang seemed on the verge of tears.
    “Most of all,” The Penguin went on, his own voice almost breaking, “I want to find out who I am. By finding my parents. Learning my human name. Simple stuff that the good people of Gotham take for granted!”
    Max still couldn’t see this. “And exactly why am I going to help you?”
    The Penguin held out his hand. One of his cronies gave him what must have once been a bright red Christmas stocking, before it got covered by greenish gunk. Oddly enough, it was exactly the same size and shape as those stockings that Max’s aged grandmother had knitted for their mantel.
    No, Shreck thought. It was a coincidence that this particular stocking looked so familiar. There was a name stitched on the stocking. He had to squint to make it out beneath the grime. The name was “Max.”
    “Well,” The Penguin explained, “let’s start with a batch of toxic waste from your clean textile plant.” He pulled a rusty Thermos from the stocking and unscrewed the cap. “There’s a whole lagoon of this crud in the back—”
    He poured out a thick goo from the Thermos onto the ice-covered table. The goo sizzled where it hit.
    Who did this guy think he was trying to blackmail?
    “Yawn,” Max replied in great disinterest. “That could have come from anywhere.”
    “What about the documents that prove you own half the firetraps in Gotham?”
    Max raised a single bored eyebrow. “If there were such documents—and that is not an admission—I would have seen to it that they were shredded.”
    The Penguin again held out his hand. This time, one of the circus goons gave him a stack of something shiny. Max stared. They looked like nothing so much as a stack of shredded papers stuck together with a vast quantity of transparent tape.
    “A lot of tape and a little patience make all the difference,” The Penguin remarked proudly. “By the way, how’s Fred Adkins, your old partner?”
    Max could feel his cool slipping away.
    “Fred,” he murmured.
    Anyone could find out about his chemical plant.
    “Fred?” he asked nonchalantly.
    And it looked like this guy might have reassembled a couple of embarrassing documents.
    But how could he know about Fred?
    “He’s—uh—” Max managed at last, “actually, he’s been on an extended vacation, and—”
    The Penguin nodded happily and reached under the icy table. He pulled out what looked like a human hand, severed at the wrist.
    “Hi, Max!” The Penguin continued, talking from the side of his mouth like some bad ventriloquist. “Remember me? I’m Fred’s hand!”
    But, Max thought, how could he have that? The hand should have been disposed of!
    He caught himself. Just like the chemical waste should have been flushed away, and the