Stalking the Dragon Read online

  Mallory frowned, his nostrils smarting. “What's it burning?”

  “It's rendering lard,” answered Hubert. “We supply it for the whole city.”

  “‘We’?” repeated Mallory.

  “I own both stores.”

  “Okay,” said Mallory. “Take the spell off the zombie and we'll be on our way.”

  “Anything for a friend of the Grundy's,” said Hubert earnestly. “Presto!”

  Mallory stared at Dugan. “I don't notice any difference.”

  “Tell him to move.”

  “Dugan, lift your hand,” said Mallory.

  “Which of them?” responded Dugan, who had clearly lost count of how many he had.

  “Okay, he's functional again,” said Mallory. “So to speak.” He began walking toward the door. “Come on, Dugan,” he said, resisting the urge to add “Heel!”

  He noticed that the shop was almost empty now. When he and Dugan reached the street, he walked up to Dawkins. “Have you been watching the store?”

  “Yes.”

  “How many people have come out since I entered?”

  “Ten or eleven.”

  “There were maybe forty in the place when I walked in,” said Mallory. “There can't be a dozen left.”

  Dawkins struggled with the math for a moment. “What does it all mean?” he asked.

  Mallory looked at the smoke rising from the lard shop's furnace.

  “It means I know why they call him Horrid Hubert,” said the detective.

  CHAPTER 22

  5:16 AM–5:55 AM

  They'd gone three blocks through a forest of skyscrapers which seemed unlikely venues for elixir shops when Dawkins came to a stop.

  “What's the matter?” asked Mallory.

  “I'm trying to remember exactly where the place is,” explained Dawkins. “I stopped going when they stopped serving chocolate sodas.”

  “I never knew chocolate sodas were elixirs,” remarked Mallory.

  “Oh, sure,” said Dawkins. “Sodas, phosphates, and also extra-thick double-chocolate malts.”

  “You make it sound more like an ice cream parlor.”

  “No,” said Dawkins. “They have an elixir for whatever ails you: gout, lumbago, even an unfaithful spouse.”

  “What ails you?” asked Mallory.

  “Hunger, usually.”

  “Well?”

  “Well what?” asked Dawkins.

  “Do you remember which way to go?”

  “No, but there's a flawless method for deciding what course to follow,” explained Dawkins. He spat on his left hand, held it palm up, and then slapped it with his right hand. A small particle of spittle flew into Dugan's left eye.

  “I hope you're not going to tell me that the store is in Dugan's eye,” said Mallory.

  Dawkins frowned. “You know, as many times as I've tried that, it never works.”

  “And that surprises you, does it?”

  “Not anymore,” admitted Dawkins. “But it still disappoints me.”

  Mallory pulled Belle out of his pocket. “Wake up,” he said.

  “Hi, Lover,” she replied. “I was dozing, and I had this dream that you were running your hands all over my naked, pulsating body—and here you are, doing just that.”

  “Has your naked, pulsating body ever worn clothes?”

  “Don't ask such intimate questions in front of strangers.”

  Mallory surveyed his companions. “They are a little stranger than most,” he acknowledged.

  “Less talking and more petting,” said Belle.

  “Less romance and more work,” replied Mallory. “Find the number of the Cut-Rate Elixir Shop, buzz them, and get their address.”

  “Only if you say ‘I lust for you with a passion that knows no bounds.’”

  “Felina,” said Mallory, “see if you can hunt up a phone booth.”

  “All right, all right,” said Belle. “I'll do your bidding—but I warn you, my tears may short me out at any second.”

  “I don't see any tears.”

  “That's because I'm laughing on the outside.”

  “The very best place for it. Now, the address?”

  “In a minute,” answered Belle. “Not everyone's as cruel and unfeeling as you are. Some of them are polite and caring. Some of them try to put a girl at her ease.”

  “Some of them aren't working on a deadline,” said Mallory. “Get me the damned address.”

  There was a sudden earsplitting shriek.

  “What was that?” asked Mallory.

  “You cursed at me,” said Belle. “You humiliated me in front of all these people—and after all we've been to each other.”

  “We haven't been anything to each other,” said Mallory. “And ‘all these people’ consists of a walking appetite, a cat-girl, and a zombie.”

  “Details,” sniffed Belle.

  “He's taking my job!” said Felina suddenly, pointing an accusing claw at Dawkins. “You always say that I'm a walking appetite.”

  Mallory sighed deeply. “I wonder if the Grundy could use a security chief?” he muttered.

  “Oh, all right,” said Belle petulantly. “The corner of Forty-eighth and Seventh.”

  “Forty-eighth Street and Seventh Avenue,” said Mallory. “Got it.”

  “No,” she replied. “Forty-eighth Avenue and Seventh Street.”

  “It doesn't exist,” said Mallory.

  “It does, if you know how to get there,” said Dawkins.

  “But you don't,” noted Mallory.

  “But I know you can, because I've been there. That's a start, isn't it?”

  “I know where it is,” said Felina with a triumphant smile.

  “Why do I sense a negotiation in the offing?” said Mallory wryly.

  “I'm happy to take you there, John Justin,” said the cat-girl.

  “Good. Let's go.”

  “For a canary, two ravens, four bald eagles, and a rhinopotamus.”

  “No.”

  “Okay,” she said. “Three bald eagles instead of four.”

  “Forget it.”

  “Forget what?” asked Felina.

  “Never mind,” said Mallory, walking off toward the west.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Forty-eighth Avenue.”

  “You'll never get there if you go that way,” said Felina with a catlike grin.

  “Enlighten me.”

  “You go left for a block, then turn left for a block, then turn left for a block, and then turn left for a block.”

  “We'll wind up right back here.”

  “Okay,” said Felina, turning her back and assiduously licking a forearm. “Do it your own way, and be sure to bring your swimsuit.”

  Mallory stared at her for a long minute, then turned to Harry the Book's two henchmen. “I don't suppose either of you knows how to get to Forty-eighth Avenue?”

  “I'd go to Forty-ninth Avenue and then backtrack a block,” offered Dawkins.

  “Belle?”

  “I don't go to elixir shops,” said the cell phone. “Love is my elixir. You want to sneak off and cuddle for a few minutes?”

  Mallory sighed deeply. “All right, Felina—lead the way.”

  “Three bald eagles,” said the cat-girl.

  “No.”

  “Three hairy eagles?”

  Mallory just stared at her, and finally she sighed and began walking. They went south for a block, then east, then north, and then west…but Mallory noticed that the buildings he passed on the final block weren't the ones he'd seen before, and when Felina came to a stop he looked at the street sign.

  “Forty-eighth Avenue,” he read. “Well, I'll be damned.”

  “Let's sneak off and be damned together,” said Belle.

  “And we're at Ninth Street,” he said, ignoring her. “So the elixir shop should be two blocks to my left.” He turned to Felina. “Right?”

  “Not right—left,” she said, and giggled.

  He began walking
past a row of taverns. One catered to goblins, one to leprechauns, one to trolls, and one to things he thought existed only in his nightmares.

  “Stay close,” he said to Dugan, “just in case we run into one of those creatures.”

  “I'm not happy, John Justin,” announced Felina as they came to Eighth Street.

  “I'm crestfallen,” said Mallory. “What's destroying your happiness this time?”

  “We keep passing stores and none of them are selling the earrings you promised me.”

  “Earrings?” repeated Mallory, puzzled.

  “That the woman was wearing in the wrong places.”

  “We're busy now. I'll get them tomorrow or the next day.”

  She shook her head sadly. “You probably won't live that long.”

  “I may disappoint you and live until I'm ninety,” said Mallory.

  “Then you'd better stop walking,” said Felina.

  Mallory was about to ask why when he heard a roar that made the question redundant.

  Approaching them down the middle of Eighth Street was a dragon which looked exactly like the photos of Fluffy except that it was twenty feet in height and seventy feet in length. Flames shot out of its mouth, twin bursts of smoke came from its nostrils, and it flapped its wings noisily.

  “Stop him!” yelled a voice from half a block away.

  “How?” asked Mallory. “I left my bazooka in my other suit.”

  “Good God, don't hurt him!” said the voice as the dragon melted a mailbox and a parked car. “He's just being playful.”

  “He's got an interesting notion of play,” said Mallory.

  “Just step in front of him and tell him to stop!”

  “You're kidding, right?”

  “There's ten bucks in it for you if you'll do it,” said the voice.

  “Ten bucks won't pay for my casket, let alone my funeral.”

  “Please! I beg of you!”

  “I'll stop him,” offered Felina.

  “Bless you!” said the voice.

  “For two halibut, a dolphin, and a camel.”

  “I can see you now. You're a cat-girl, aren't you? Stop him and I'll give you twenty dollars to spend at the fish market on Sixth Street.”

  Felina reached over and pulled Mallory's handkerchief from his pocket, then stepped out into the street right in front of the dragon. She waved the handkerchief at him, and he practically skidded to a stop and stood there trembling.

  A small man with thick glasses and a shopworn tuxedo raced up to them, gasping for breath. “Thank you, thank you!” he burbled. “I was afraid he might do some damage.”

  Mallory gestured to the car and the mailbox, two molten blobs on the pavement. “You don't call that damage?”

  “No one was in the car,” said the man.

  “No one was in the mailbox either,” said Dawkins.

  The man reached into a pocket, pulled out a twenty-dollar bill, and handed it to Felina. “Thank you, cat-girl,” he said. “I can't have poor Fido tiring himself out before Eastminster.”

  “He's a show dragon?” asked Mallory.

  The man drew himself up to his full, if minimal, height. “Can't you tell?” he said coldly.

  “I thought they were smaller,” said Mallory.

  “They come in all sizes,” said the man. “By the way,” he added, extending a hand, “my name is Alexander Hamilton.”

  “Really?” asked Mallory, taking his hand.

  “Actually, it's Philbert Potts, but people pay attention when I say I'm Hamilton.”

  “Well, I'm glad we could help you, Philbert.”

  “It wouldn't have mattered yesterday,” said Potts, “but the word on the grapevine is that Champion Fluffy is missing, so that means we have a chance. All we have to do is beat”—he gulped—“the Grundy's entry.”

  “Good luck.”

  “Why don't you come by and cheer for us?” suggested Potts.

  Before Mallory could answer, Fido melted a fire hydrant, water gushed out, and Potts explained to the dragon in very gentle tones why that was unacceptable social behavior.

  “Why not just smack him on the nose?” asked Mallory.

  “We have a show tomorrow,” explained Potts. “It wouldn't do to break his spirit.” He unwound a lasso from around his waist, twirled it over his head a few times, and hurled the noose over Fido's head. “I'm sorry we can't stay and visit,” he said, leading the dragon back down Eighth Street, “but we need our rest before the show.”

  “He'd better feed that beast an elephant or two, or it might decide to eat the judge,” remarked Mallory when Potts and Fido were out of earshot.

  “That was a dragon, wasn't it?” said Dugan, looking after it.

  “I'm glad to see you're as quick on the uptake as ever,” said Mallory, crossing the street and heading toward the next corner. Suddenly he stopped

  “What the hell is that?” he said.

  “What is what?” asked Belle.

  “It looks exactly like a gingerbread house out of a fairy tale,” said Mallory.

  “That's the place,” said Dawkins.

  Mallory approached it and saw a sign spelled out on the frosted door in licorice letters: Ye Olde Cut-Rate Elixir Shop.

  Mallory entered, followed by his companions. The interior—walls, counters, shelves, everything—seemed to be made exclusively of cake and candy. A row of bottles, in rocky candy containers, was prominently displayed. A small, wiry, gray-haired woman wearing a print dress, with a knitted shawl wrapped around her shoulders, came out from a back room to greet them.

  “Welcome, welcome, welcome,” she said, putting her knitting and needles into a pocket of her apron. She studied Mallory. “You've come to the right place. She'll never give you a second look until you drink Aunt Granny's Elixir of Sublime Attraction.”

  “That may well be, but I came here for—”

  “I know,” interrupted the old woman. “Your boss puts you down, insults you in front of your workmates, makes you feel inferior. Aunt Granny's Elixir of Righteous Revenge will fix that in no time.”

  “You're Aunt Granny?”

  “The one and only,” she replied proudly.

  “I don't suppose you'd like to let me get a whole sentence out before interrupting?” said Mallory.

  “Feeling oppressed and inferior?” said Aunt Granny. “You need my Elixir of Dynamic Compensation.”

  Mallory simply stared at her, unwilling to keep being interrupted all night.

  “Cat got your tongue?” suggested Aunt Granny.

  “Why would I want his tongue?” asked Felina curiously.

  “Sorry, cat-thing,” said the old lady. “Nothing personal.”

  “I need some information,” said Mallory.

  “You also need a better suit, a shave, breath mints, and a haircut,” noted Aunt Granny. “I'm saying this for your own good, you know.”

  “That sounds like an Aunt Granny, all right,” said Mallory.

  “No backtalk from you,” said Aunt Granny, “or I'll drink my Elixir of Sensual Perfection and become the most desirable and most unattainable creature you ever saw. You'll go crazy with lust, and kill yourself when you can't have me.”

  “And I'll kill him if he can,” said Belle.

  “Your chest has a mind of its own,” observed Aunt Granny. “Does it often contradict you?”

  “We have a deep and ongoing romance,” said Belle.

  Aunt Granny took a step back. “Your chest doesn't need an elixir so much as a tranquilizer.”

  “Can we get back to the subject?” said Mallory.

  “Which subject was that—your chest or your appearance?”

  “My information.”

  “Okay, I'm listening,” said Aunt Granny.

  “I'm not offering it, I'm asking for it,” said Mallory, starting to grow annoyed.

  “Fine. I'll give you the best information I have,” she replied. “Buy low, sell high. Never bet on claimers who are moving up in class. Stay out of commodi
ties.”

  “Are you through?” said Mallory.

  “My goodness, how much information do you want?”

  “You had a client tonight, big fellow with horns growing out of his head.”

  “Ah, yes, Mr. Earp.”

  “Wyatt?”

  “How did you know?” she asked.

  “A shot in the dark,” said Mallory. “What did he buy?”

  “Aunt Granny's Elixir of Magnesia.”

  “What the hell is that?”

  “It calms the stomach. He seemed very nervous.”

  “Not without cause,” said the detective. “Did you notice if he happened to have a small dragon with him?”

  “No,” she replied. “All he had was a small suitcase with ventilation holes at each end.”

  “Did he say where he was going next?”

  Aunt Granny shook her head. “No.”

  Mallory frowned. “He can't leave town, because he has to be here to collect his bets. So he's hiding somewhere in Manhattan.”

  “That narrows it down to maybe four million apartments, condos, and hotel rooms,” said the old lady. “Maybe you should consider buying a bottle of Aunt Granny's Elixir of Unexcelled Cerebration.”

  “I'll take a rain check,” said Mallory.

  “Your loss,” said Aunt Granny. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”

  “Not unless you can tell me where he's hiding.”

  “What have you done to make him so afraid of you?”

  “Nothing compared to what a consortium of bookies is going to do to him if he stays hidden until dinnertime tomorrow…I mean today.”

  “Have you had any sleep, young man?” asked Aunt Granny.

  “No, and no.”

  “I only asked you one question.”

  “No, I haven't had any sleep, and no, I'm not a young man.”

  “I'll tell you what,” she said, reaching behind a counter and pulling out a small bottle. “I'm going to give you a gift.”

  “What is it?” asked Mallory, staring at the bottle.

  “Aunt Granny's Elixir of Singular Concentration. It will keep you alert.”

  “So would a cup of coffee,” said Mallory.

  “But my elixir doesn't require cream, sugar, or a cheese Danish,” she replied. “It's all the rage in Bohemian coffeehouses down in the Village.”

  “Thanks,” he said, resisting the urge to ask her which Village, and starting to put it in a pocket.