As she rides by

“And that’s it.” He looked at me for a minute, then gazed out of the front window, then lifted one filthy bare foot out of its unlaced boot and looked at it for a while. I took a brief look at it myself, then wished I hadn’t. “And no socks, either, for God’s sake,” I said. “Whoever heard of a Mohawk wearing anklets.” He sheepishly put his foot away again. “But clean,” I said, “is another story. You will have to be clean and a hasty dip in the river will not do, my redskin brother. We’re talking hot water here, we are talking a nice long bath at your lady friend’s, maybe, we’re talking soap and shampoo, kemo sabe.”
    “Aw, Jeez,” he mumbled unhappily.
    He left a few minutes later, with ten of my hard-earned dollars in his pocket as a down payment, after solemnly promising to check back with me Monday or Tuesday afternoon in the week to come. All right. That was done. What next?
    I called Benny the Boy to see if he’d be available for next week. He was out but he’d get back to me, his machine said. I called Mel the Swell. His machine told me he was in San Diego until Friday morning. I called Elroy, my office landlord, who was also a friend and also a budding mogul in local real estate. He was out jogging, his machine told me. Elroy was the only guy I ever met who could jog and roll a joint at the same time. So I called up Sara the Stupe Silvetti. She was in, her mother said, and she’d get her if I hung on. I hung on. Finally I heard her dulcet tones in my ear.
    “Yeah?” she barked.
    “Good afternoon, you sweet child you,” I said suavely. ‘Tis I, the private eye, calling thee, the public nuisance, once again to inject color, life, and adventure into your dreary days.”
    “What makes my days dreary,” she said, “is bald old farts like you pestering me all the time when I’m tryin’ to get some work done.”
    “Work,” I scoffed. “You call looking up rhymes for words like yecch and gross and uppers work? Listen, kid, you want to do a real job of work for a change, one that involves imagination, acting ability, guts, toil, and buried treasure, well, ol’ V. D.’s got something coming up next week that could be a real fun time for you.”
    “Yeah, pops, I bet,” she said. “How about a real lucrative time, forget the fun.”
    “Oh, gee, that’s right,” I said. “You’re not into fun anymore, I forgot, and I deeply apologize. Still dressing like a man?”
    “None of your business,” she said. “So what if I am?”
    “Nothing, dear, nothing,” I said. “It’s just that I’ve got a bunch of old clothes I was going to give to the Salvation Army, but I thought you might be able to use them.”
    “Who wants old Hawaiian shirts?” she said. “Not even the Salvation Army, I bet.” And that’s how little she knows, I thought to myself. Where did she think I got my precious collection from in the first place, Pierre Cardin of Honolulu ? Anyway, after a few more insults had been exchanged, she grudgingly admitted that she might be able to find a few spare moments later in the week to at least drop by and hear what the action was, and how much was in it for her, S. Silvetti .
    “Anytime,” I said warmly. “You know the latchkey is always out for distinguished poetesses chez moi, cherie. It’s even out for you.” At which she blew me a loud, long raspberry, then hung up. What a twerp. Whatever happened to respecting one’s elders and wisers? I always respected my elders and wisers, on those rare occurrences that I stumbled over one. And as for her childish pretense of noninterest every time I offered her some fascinating chore to do for big bucks, well, that wasn’t hard to figure out, she did it just to irritate the shit out of me, she should be so lucky.
    However, exactly what she did get out of working for me, as she always wound up doing, was another question, because, to be honest, the bucks were never really that big, except for once when the little airhead practically blackmailed it out of me. Maybe I’d ask her sometime. Evonne thought it had something to do with her being an orphan and having been brought up by foster parents, which manifested itself in a need to strive, if only in a small occasional way, for a trace more stability and fairness in the world. I figured it was much more likely the noodlehead went on capers with me because anything was more fun than watching raindrops slide down dirty windowpanes and rhyming zucchini with