Today I had the most intriguing case. It all started when a rather portly gentleman entered my office after hesitantly pushing the glass-paneled door aside. Sweat stains marred the underarms of a wrinkled three-piece suit while his hands nervously clutched at each other like writhing snakes. The top of his scalp glistened in the overhead light, and a thinning fringe of hair ran around it like a monk’s tonsure—referred to in current street slang as a Republican mohawk, I believe. He smelled vaguely of hemp and whiskey.
I leaned back in my chair and crossed one foot over the other atop my battered desk, carefully avoiding kicking my laptop onto the thinly carpeted floor, and waited for whatever it was he had to say.
“Sir,” he began, tremulously, “I wish to hire you to find something for me, something that I appear to have mislaid. Countless groups claimed they could help, but they all contradicted each other, and, frankly, I’m in such a deplorable state now that I’ve nowhere else to turn. I heard about your skills of deductive reasoning from the Internet pages, heard about your reputation for honesty and forthrightness. I’m desperate at this point, sir, and you appear to be the last option available to me. You have no idea how hard it is to find an honest man these days…”
He trailed off into silence, head down, eyes staring vacantly at the floor. His hands had grown still throughout the impassioned plea and now hung loosely at his sides. In all respects, a picture of utter and abject despair.
“Why should I help you?” I asked him bluntly. I do not suffer fools gladly, and his foolishness was beginning to irritate me. “What reason is there for me not to simply tell you to be on your way, along with your obsequious whining?”
“Why, sir, because it is the decent thing to do!” He drew back, affronted. “Do you feel no moral obligation to help those in need? Have you no charitable instinct toward those less fortunate than yourself?”
“I do,” I replied, “but that still doesn’t answer my question. You said you needed my help finding something you misplaced, yet if you but simply retrace your steps, you shall be sure to find it. Tell me again: Why should I help you when I do not feel particularly inclined to do so?”
“Well, I can pay you, pay you vast sums of money; you’ll have more wealth than you could ever imagine.” He squinted narrowly as he peered at me. “I happen to be one of the wealthiest people in the world, and I’m sure I could make some of that lucre trickle down into your coffers.”
I laughed. “Nonsense. You don’t have an actual penny to your name. Try a different tack.”
His face grew flushed as he clenched his fists. “How dare you say that to me, you insolent little brat!” he bellowed. “Where do you get off making such a preposterous claim?”
I raised a hand and began ticking points off on my fingers. “One: Your suit. It’s of a fine make, but that style hasn’t been worn in at least fifteen years, which means it’s from either the back of your closet or a thrift store. It hangs comfortably on the shoulders and neck, which rules out thrift store, but it’s a little tight around the waist, which tells me you got it when you were younger. It was probably a celebratory outfit, based on that particular cut, which is too formal for everyday wear. You’ve worn it often since then, as the shinier patches on the elbows and knees attest, but not recently, which I deduce from the unmistakable aroma of mothballs that even now hangs in the air, and since my office is definitely not the site of a debutante’s ball or any other celebration, that means you’ve pawned off everything else of value that could possibly impress someone.
“Two: Your fingernails are scuffed and dirty and your hair is oily, though neatly combed around the edges in an attempt to hide that fact. The comb itself is a cheap plastic version, the end of which I can see barely sticking out of your right pocket, and multiple teeth are missing. A fastidious man, one who aligns both shirtsleeves to be geometrically precise with his jacket, would keep his hands and hair clean unless he had no other option, and he would replace such a comb at the earliest possible opportunity. The fact you are unable to do so suggests a severe lack of funds, as well as a lack of access to common utilities.
“Three: I can see the outline of several coins and crumpled banknotes in your left trouser pocket but no wallet bulge anywhere, which tells me that you’re running on empty. A wealthy man wouldn’t bother with the coins and wouldn’t be without access to at least some of his wealth at a moment’s notice, especially if he was planning on using that wealth. You’ve tracked in some oil on the bottom of your shoe, yet I don’t hear any keys jingling when you walk, which means you didn’t pick up the oil when you were in a gas station filling up your car; you got it while asking for the change that I mentioned earlier. Except I don’t think you asked for the change, because that brings me to point four.
“Point four is the revolver sitting in a shoulder holster underneath your left arm. The sweat pattern is distributed in the silhouette of a .356 Magnum, and the powder burns peppering your right hand tell me you’ve used it recently. Your demeanor and appearance don’t indicate any signs of a mugging or other attack, so you must have been the aggressor, and your nonchalant attitude means it’s not a new behavior. Hopefully, for your sake, you didn’t actually use the gun on somebody today.”
I clasped my hands behind my head and continued staring into his now beady eyes. “That is where I ‘get off,’ as you so eloquently put it. You’ve neither the intention to pay me nor the means to do so. Now, I’ll repeat the question one more time: Why should I help you?”
He grinned unpleasantly, drew the revolver, held it waist high, and aimed it at my head. “Because if you don’t, I’ll shoot you.”
“Ahh, I see, so now we get to the heart of the matter. Very well, if that is your price, let us see if I can pay it. Tell me, what is it that you’re looking for?” I swung my feet down and leaned forward, propping my elbows on the desk while steepling my fingers together under my chin.
He took a step toward me, gun still aimed at my temple, and began to speak. “I’ve lost my way,” he stated simply, flatly, angrily. “I used to have the finest houses, the most expensive cars, piles of money, and I can’t find them anymore! They’re all in the hands of foreigners and merchants, taken from under my nose! My family was industrious and hardworking, but now all they do is lie about all day complaining that I’m not providing enough for them—as if I have any choice in the matter! That’s why I had to shoot that poor towelhead! It was for my family! I keep giving them more and more and it’s never enough!”
I sighed and shook my head. “I think I begin to see the problem here. All of your misfortune, all of your complaints, they’re all things someone has perpetrated on you, correct?”
He nodded emphatically, lips pursed together in a thin line.
“Well, it seems that we need to discover whoever this person is, and then we shall have an idea as to how we can recover your well-being. Tell me, why does your family no longer work to provide for themselves?”
“I told you, they can’t work! All the jobs have been taken by the foreigners! No one wants to pay a decent wage anymore for an honest day’s work plus benefits!”
“Surely they must eat, though, correct? Do they grow their own food? Craft their own clothes?”
“Of course not!” He looked shocked. “What do you take us for, savages? There’s a wonderful store we use called Mal-Wart, carries everything we need at the only prices we can afford. I tell you, it’s an absolute lifesaver. Without those low, low deals, there’s no way we’d be able to get by.”
“I see. And how do they pay for these wonderful deals?”
“Well, I give my family money, obviously, though it’s getting harder and harder to find. Most of what I have goes to supply this beautiful girl.” He patted the revolver lovingly. “I don’t know what I’d do without her.”
“I meant how does the store pay for the deals.”
“Oh. Well, um, I guess I never thought about it. That’s a good question.”
I permitted myself a small eye roll while his attention was distracted. “Never mind, never mind, let’s move on. Now, you said that merchants were also to blame, is this correct?”
“Yes, that’s right!” His voice rose in excitement. “I bet it was one of them what took my fortune, turned it to their own scheming means!” He leaned forward conspiratorially. “A lot of companies are run by those Jews, you know.”
“Right. Questions of ownership aside, how, exactly, did these merchants steal from you?”
“Hmm. I couldn’t really point to any particulars, but I know they did it somehow.” He frowned. “They all needed so much help—to make sure their businesses were established; develop new products, land, and resources for exploitation—so of course I gave it to them. They promised me so much in return, you see, and for a while, I got a little back, and life was good, but then all of a sudden, they said they didn’t have any money and couldn’t afford to pay me anymore.”
“And you believed them?”
“They were very convincing. They’re the experts, after all; why should I doubt what they tell me? You should see their office buildings—there’s no way an idiot would be able to afford something like that. No, these gentlemen are much more intelligent on these affairs than we’ll ever be, trust me. If they say they don’t have any money, they don’t.”
“Did they do anything illegal? Fraud? Murder?”
“Of course not! They helped write all those laws; there’s no way they could’ve broken them! They know the law back to front! Illegality? Pshaw!”
“What about making them sell some of those buildings to pay you back, or requiring them to pay a percentage of their profit to you?”
“Oh, I couldn’t do that!” He looked shocked. “Why, they’d leave here in an instant and take all their money with them, and then where would I be? No, no, the only way is to help them out a little bit more and hope that will get things turned around properly. They keep telling me it’ll all start trickling down eventually, and soon it’ll be a gushing fountain of wealth! We just have to have faith.”
“…”
“Why are you staring at me?”
“I just wanted to make sure I’d processed all of that correctly in my mind. No money; they’ll take all their wealth; it’s all completely legal—got it. Moving on!”
I tapped my fingers together under my chin, brow furrowed in concentration. “Now, this last question is important and should help me narrow down exactly who is the cause of your misfortune, so I need you to answer completely honestly.”
He nodded eagerly, eyes alight with intensity at the thought of finally discovering the malefactor.
“How educated is your family?”
A quizzical expression flitted around his face before his features settled into a scowl. “Education? What the hell do you need to know that for? I don’t see how that has anything to do with my problem; it’s a case of theft, pure and simple!” He raised the revolver threateningly again, and I could see his finger tighten on the trigger.
“If you could humor me, please, I would greatly appreciate it. One must consider all the facts of a case before making a judgment.”
A tense silence ensued for several seconds before he lowered the gun halfway; the scowl remained on his face. “Well, little Jack and Diane had five years of Sunday schooling and twelve years of high school, but they never really understood much more than their ABC’s. They’re good with the TV theme songs, though. My son Kennedy went to one of those fancy prep schools but got kicked out for molesting some poor girl—luckily, we found a good lawyer to hush that up. Think he graduated from Kennedy’s school actually. Splendid fellow. The rest of the family doesn’t really do a whole lot; they mainly study daytime talk shows. Did you know they do all kinds of science on those? DNA tests and everything.”
“And yourself?”
He sighed heavily. “I graduated magna cum laude from MIT and Harvard, was captain of the debate team and president of the ethics club, and I’m a physician with fifteen different specialties. I also built a spaceship. The family—well, they don’t seem to appreciate learning as much as I did. For the life of me, I can’t figure out why.” His expression grew morose.
“When the children were younger, I gave them all the stimulation they could ask for—television, movies, video games, the best nannies money could buy. I told them over and over how successful they would be if they could just master Wall Street or land in an advertising agency somewhere—look at all their cousins! But they just wanted to live off my achievements, skate by on my success—”
“They’re family! If I don’t take care of them all, some of them might not succeed, and then how would I be able to live with myself? I simply cannot believe how heartless you are! Should I let them fail when I have the means to provide for them? Clearly, you don’t know the first thing about raising a dependent.”
Sweat rivulets trickled down his brow as he finished yelling, and I leaned back in my chair, once again clasping my hands behind my head and stretching out my legs. The sun had slowly gone down during our conversation, and now the orange rays of dusk filled the office and dust motes danced in the air. I stared at him in silence for several minutes, watching him fidget and twitch. Finally, I spoke.
“After reviewing all the facts, both clear and unclear, it seems obvious to me who is responsible for your downward spiral, my good man. However, before we get to that conclusion, I have one more question for you.”
I paused for a moment, taking in the haunting atmosphere of the fading light. There is a truly majestic quality in the shadows that overtake our world in such a regular rhythm, the ebb and flow as old as time. Who truly knows what lurks beneath darkness’s mantle?
“Why are honest men so hard to find?” I asked.
He smiled, and tightened his finger on the trigger.
“Because,” he said, “they keep telling me the truth.”