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untucked at the waist and his sleeves rolled up to reveal melon-size biceps. He wore no badge or gun, and as he approached Wilson, his stifled yawn indicated he’d either been fast asleep or well on his way. He didn’t look very happy.
    “Shut up, Kemp, you damn fool. What on earth are you yelling at?”
    “You’ve got to get me out of here. I’m starting to go nuts caged up in this damn jail. You’ve got your keys with you, right, Mack?” Wilson pleaded, using his hands to mimic an invisible key being twisted into an invisible lock.
    Officer Byron MacKenzie, Big Mack to his friends, was in a foul mood. He’d been offered free tickets to a great jazz concert in Pittsburgh, and had been forced to pass because he hadn’t been able to get anyone to change shifts. He’d been close to calling in sick and going to the show anyway, but at the last minute he canceled out and grudgingly headed to work. He’d done the right thing showing up for duty, but that didn’t mean he had to pretend to be a happy camper. He was certainly in no mood to stand and argue all night with the town drunk.
    “First of all, I don’t think three tiny holding cells squeezed into the backroom of this building would constitute much of a jail. Second, even if you do consider this a jail, get it through your thick head real quick I’m not a guard. I’m a police officer, and a pissed off one at that. Third, things will go a lot smoother for both of us if you’d just lie down and keep quiet. You’re not going anywhere, so shut the fuck up, dig?”
    “Ah come on, Mack, what’s the deal? I’ve been in here long enough to sober up. Usually, someone would have woken me up and tossed me long ago. What’s happening?”
    “What’s happening, Kemp, is this time you’re not just having a nice little snooze in the tank. This time you’re being charged.”
    “Charged!” Wilson replied, astonished.
    “Yeah, charged. You know, as in this time you fucked up royally. I heard Reggie Morris and his wife just about blew the roof off this place this afternoon after your little magic show at their place.”
    Wilson’s memory, as always when he drank too much, wasn’t all that good. He remembered his red nose kept falling off and maybe he broke a lamp. Touching his sore face, he recalled his encounter with Reggie’s fist, but after that, his mind drew a blank. He had no recollection of how he’d gotten out of the Morris house, or how he’d eventually ended up in the confines of this cramped and unappealing cell.
    “What are they charging me with, Mack?”
    “Drunk and disorderly, malicious damage, and anything else the chief can think of. Morris really tore a chunk out of the chief’s ass. He’s mad as hell. You’ll be awful lucky if the Morrises don’t turn around and sue you on top of all this. I guess you practically wrecked their place, not to mention probably giving their kid a bad complex about birthday parties and clowns that might stay with him for freakin’ life.”
    A vision flashed in Wilson’s head of Archie, a turtle he’d recently bought, tumbling out of his pocket and landing into a big bowl of ice cream. He wasn’t sure if that had really happened, so he just pushed the thought aside. Probably for the best.
    “How long do I have to stay here?” he finally asked.
    “Hard to say really. You might have to hang around until Monday, when the chief comes back to work.”
    “Monday! You’ve got to be kidding? Today’s only…ahh…Monday’s not for another…let’s see—” He’dforgotten what day of the week today was, so he quickly changed the topic. “What about bail, Mack? Can I get out if I post bail?”
    “It’s about eleven o’clock on Friday night, if you’d like to know. Look Wilson, we’re not playing twenty questions here; it takes a judge to set a bail amount, man, and trust me, amigo, no one is getting the judge out of bed tonight. ’Sides, even if they end up setting bail at a measly hundred bucks,