Chapter 32

After an hour of tailing Bruno, Biff felt he was about to go out of his mind. Bruno had come up with a bike somewhere, which made him extremely difficult to follow. Biff couldn’t keep up on foot and, when he used the prowl car, Bruno would duck into alleys or cut across parking lots to make it difficult for him.

Eventually, he called the Chief for advice. “Hey, Chief, can I impound his bicycle?”

“No. I’ve got a better idea. Why don’t you come back here and borrow a bike from one of the meter maids?”

Biff had no choice but to assent. He didn’t want anyone to see how shaky he was on a bicycle. As a body builder, he was in tip-top shape. But he was also muscle-bound and none too secure balancing a bike.

When Biff returned, he couldn’t find Bruno. However, two of the red-headed speed freaks, Joe Kennedy and Sammy Pearl, were sitting on the low wall in front of the Presbyterian church, razzing him: “Biff, you ride like a pussy.”

“Shut up, you hard-ons, or I’ll bust you.”

They laughed insanely, spurred on by Biff’s obvious annoyance. Finally, they calmed down enough for him to ask, “Have either of you seen the psychic?”

In response, they started wiggling their fingers like stage magicians casting spells, and making horror movie sound effects: “Whheee yuuuuuu zzzzpppp.”

Biff let the bicycle crash to the ground. He set his jaw and approached the teenagers, his hand fondling his nightstick. They pretended to cower in fear, but they did in fact cough up the information he wanted, pointing up the street toward the Chinese restaurant.

Biff wondered how he hadn’t noticed him before, but Bruno was standing on the sidewalk in plain sight, pretending to take a photograph. In fact, he was spying on Judy Cohen, with a pair of miniature binoculars.

“What’s up?” asked Biff.

“Two egg drop, three wonton.”

“That’s funny.”

“I know. Five soup, only four people.”

Biff made a face. “I could arrest you for making a joke like that.”

“You know, you’re right,” said Bruno segueing from Buddy Hackett to Jackie Mason. “I couldn’t agree more. Ethnic jokes are degrading. But let’s be honest about it …” switching on the fly to Milton Berle: “Do you remember the tornado that hit South Jersey?”

“What?”

“It caused $10 million worth of improvements.”

“C’mon, Bruno,” Biff protested. “This is a nice town. Lots of people want to live in a place like this.”

“Yeah, it is nice here,” Bruno agreed, pretending to muse over the glorious quality of life in Gardenfield. In fact, he was timing his transition back to Jackie Mason. “It’s like a Jewish neighborhood. You can go wherever you please. Nobody’s afraid of getting mugged by an accountant.”

“That used to be true,” Biff replied, “before all this trouble started …”

—“Trouble …?” Bruno was teeing up the next one-liner, when an attractive young woman with a baby stroller approached them. “Yoo-wer Bruno X? The sy-kick? I’ve been reading about you in the pay-per!”

Bruno blushed. “You caught me red-handed.” He looked at her carefully. The stroller was a sophisticated piece of machinery and the dog she was walking appeared to be a Maltese poodle, a bad sign. Bruno wondered if she was going to threaten him. Maybe she had a tire iron hidden under the baby’s blanket to bash his head in. Or she might sic the Maltese on him. Many of that breed were known to be as vicious as they were neurotic.

Instead she extended her hand and gave his arm an affectionate squeeze. “I want to thank you fwor what yoo-wer doo-in’ here. My husband would say the same thing if he were here. In fact, everybody we know is behind you. We think it’s harr-ible what they’ve been saying about you in the pay-per. Just ig-noowr them and keep up the good work.” Then she continued on her walk.

Bruno was staggered. He looked at Biff to see if he would confirm what had just happened. Biff must have read his thoughts. He howled with laughter. “You can’t tell if she’s kidding or not, can you?”

The joke was growing stale for Bruno. Better get back to the task at hand. He gave the binoculars to Biff and pointed to the restaurant. “Take a look at this. Can you tell me who those kids are?”

Biff trained the binoculars on the restaurant. “Judy Cohen and her daughters? They’re the ones I’m supposed to keep you away from.”

“Yeah, I recognized them. It’s the other two love-birds I’m asking about.”

“That’s Alison Wales and her boyfriend, the Murphy kid. Everybody calls him Icky.”

“They look pretty cute sitting there together all snuggled up.” Alison had brought her iPod and she was sharing one of the earplugs with Icky. They were sitting together, listening to the same song, swaying slightly, arms around each other’s waists. “It seems I see them everywhere I go. What’s the story with them?”

“Alison’s a college kid. She studies at Penn. She and Icky have been an item all through high school. He’s not going to college though.”

“What’s he do?”

“He’s one of our local scumball speedfreaks. We think he’s trying to set up a meth lab along with those kids sitting on the wall.”

“The red-headed ones?”

“The very same.”

Just then Judy and Mimi emerged from the restaurant with two large bags of takeout.

“Aren’t you going to follow them?” Biff grinned provocatively. He seemed bored, ready for some action.

“What’s the point, Biff?” replied Bruno. “It’s obvious they’re about to go home. If I followed them, you’d follow me and grab me before I could talk to them. I know where they’ll be, so I’m just going to have to ditch you before I go see them.”

“I wouldn’t advise that,” Biff said.

“No, of course you wouldn’t. I’ve been getting a lot of good advice today. All of it free.”

“Not much of a day for you then.”

“No,” Bruno agreed. “And it isn’t over. Not by a long shot.”