Read The Man Who Shot Lewis Vance for Free Online

not sure why. The only other item of interest in the room was a painted portrait, which may have been Abraham Lincoln, a relative of Mrs. Plaut’s, or a random leftover from a previous tenant. He was a stern, bearded character in a black jacket and string tie, a no-nonsense dark-haired old guy who needed only a cartoon balloon saying “Shape up or ship out.” I had recently taken to calling him Bosco and talking to him, a sure sign of early senility or too close an association with the fringe members of normal society.
    The wicker sewing basket contained more than photographs, but I ignored a receipt for fifty-nine cents for a bottle of Pinaud cologne and plowed on through about twenty photographs and had a second bowl of Wheaties before I gave up. Names were scrawled on the back of the photographs with comments—almost legible—in Mrs. Plaut’s unmistakable hand. I was sure she had taken penmanship lessons from Cotton Mather and used a goose quill.
    I discovered over the next twenty minutes that:
    Uncle Dan Seltz was a distinguished traitor, though in what war and under what circumstances was not clear. It was, however, clear that Uncle Dan Seltz was an expert in disguising himself as a woman. Either that or Mrs. Plaut had been incorrectly labeling the photographs, a prospect that filled me with more dread than the thought of the mummy coming for me.
    Cousin Agnes: her house in Buiose (state unspecified) had burned down, making room for the home of Mrs. Amelia Garpol in the photograph. I assumed the woman in front of the house was either Cousin Agnes, Mrs. Garpol, or that master of disguise, Uncle Dan Seltz.
    Enough. I left the bowl and the photographs on the table, put the bottle of milk back in the refrigerator, set my watch against the Beech-Nut clock, and turned out the light. My watch would now be correct for a few seconds. It had been the one item of my father’s that I had held on to. It didn’t work and couldn’t be fixed, but I couldn’t let it go. It had its own crazy code of time, a code I always thought I might someday break. There was no moonlight from outside, but I knew where the mattress was on the floor and stumbled to it.
    I lay back against the pillow I used behind my head and clutched the second pillow I used to keep me from rolling over on my stomach during the night. An accidental night on my stomach would put my back out of commission for at least four days. This had been a simple truth in the glamorous life of the world’s foremost detective ever since that day a half-dozen years earlier when I had been unlovingly squeezed by a massive Negro gentleman who wanted to talk to Mickey Rooney at a premiere. Unfortunately, it had been my responsibility to keep anyone but Louis B. Mayer away from the Mick.
    Once on my back I knew that the effects of the drugged Pepsi were not completely in my past, nor were the tacos, Wheaties, and beer. Who said a private detective’s life isn’t full of romance, intrigue, and adventure? It must have taken me all of two or three minutes to fall asleep.
    That I would dream was inevitable. That I should remember the dream is unfortunate. I dreamed, at least part of my dream, that I was once again a cop in Glendale. John Wayne and I were on the early night get-your-ass-outta-here run. That was the eight-in-the-evening check to be sure that all Negroes were out of Glendale. They could work there but they had to be on the bus out to Los Angeles or Pasadena before the sun went down. Catholics weren’t exactly welcome either, though they weren’t as easy to run down. Neither were Jews, of which I happened to be one, a fact the Glendale police chief never discovered.
    Well, the Duke, complete with cowboy uniform and horse, and I were routing Negroes when one of them turned and grabbed me in a bear hug. It was the same guy who had gone after Mickey Rooney’s autograph. I called for help but John Wayne was riding off into the sunset. Lewis Vance rose out of the ground