The Time Machine Did It

by John Swartzwelder

Frank Burly is my name. Okay, it's not my name. I lied about that. My name is Edward R. Torgeson Jr. I changed it for the business. You've got to have a tough sounding name if you want people to hire you as a private detective out of a phone book. I chose one that would give prospective clients the idea that I was a burly kind of man, the kind of man who would have the strength and endurance to solve their cases for them, and who would be frank with them at all times. Hence the name.

Kids have too much money these days, if you ask me. Anyway, he was right about the trouble. It started in a vacant lot with the usual name calling and shoving; the same kind of thing that I heard started World War I.

I had cards printed up saying I'm a private eye, so I guess until someone prints up some cards saying I'm not, I am.

I wasn't interested in looking into it any further anyway. Call me disinquisitive, if you like, if there is such a word, but if what I had seen in the diner was part of some fascinating seemingly insolvable crime, I didn't want any part of it. The thing about fascinating seemingly insolvable crimes is that they don't pay any better than crimes you can understand. You've got to pick and choose in this business is all I'm saying.

Call me disinquisitive, if you like, if there is such a word, but if what I had seen in the diner was part of some fascinating seemingly insolvable crime, I didn't want any part of it. The thing about fascinating seemingly insolvable crimes is that they don't pay any better than crimes you can understand. You've got to pick and choose in this business is all I'm saying.

I try to maintain a positive attitude at all times, because clients notice little things like that, and if you’re frowning and crying all the time and saying “why? why?”, they get worried. So I try to stay upbeat.

She was reading one of those love magazines that tell you what love is like.

On another wall was a sign that said "DO IT TOMORROW". I got it cheap because it's bad advice.

I made a circular motion with my finger around my temple to indicate I thought this guy was crazy, forgetting that there was no one in the room to see this circular motion except him. He saw it and frowned.

Sometimes my clients have to explain their problems to me more than once. I don't charge them for that. It's part of the service, I figure. If the case is really complicated, I might ask a smarter detective, or the guy who runs the elevator, to sit in and simplify the whole thing for me. You can't be vain about these things. You can only bluff your client for so long, then you have to admit you didn't understand what he was talking about and you've forgotten his name, and to please start again.

Halfway down the street I spotted a small time crook I knew named Small-Time Charlie. He was walking down the street carrying a briefcase. I wondered about this, because criminals do not generally carry briefcases. It doesn't match the rest of their costume. I wondered if this was some new fad, like when criminals briefly went to the see-through mask.

I kept questioning him for awhile, but I wasn't getting anywhere. He had an answer for everything, even if most of the answers were "none of your business, Burly" or "you already asked that, stupid".

It’s said that the first person who raises a hand in violence is the person who’s run out of ideas. That’s usually me. I run out of ideas fast. Violence I’ve got plenty of.

They worked me over a little longer – trying out various brands of tear gas and suspect kicking boots on me – you can’t beat that kind of “in the field” testing - then they spent a half hour pushing me off the tops of file cabinets. I don’t know what that was about. I would have broken down and talked after awhile, but, like I said, they didn't seem to want to know anything. So I confined my comments to the occasional request that they quit it.

I couldn’t figure out why Charlie – clearly the bad guy here - had gotten such good treatment while I – the good man - had been knocked all over the lot. I also wondered where the police got all those valuable paintings they had on the walls. And where some of the policemen got those top hats they were wearing. The whole thing was a mystery to me. But then, most things are. I guess it’s lucky for me I’m a detective.

Now I've seen detectives on TV work that same con with 100% success. It works every time for them. I've tried to talk to statisticians about my unbelievable 0% success rate - I mean what are the odds of that? - but they say they're not interested. Even though it's their specialty! That's what's wrong with America today, I guess. Something like that. I know something's wrong with America. Maybe that's it.

I wasn't particularly happy to see Sgt. Dodge. No one ever was. He had a disconcerting habit of pinching your face between his thumb and forefinger when he was talking to you, so he could be sure you were paying attention to him. I didn't like that approach. Nobody did. Not even the Mayor.

This was two friendly warnings I had received in one 24 hour time period. A personal best. But friendly warnings aren’t always as friendly as they sound. That night I wrote the word "yikes" in my diary.

I hung around the bar, listening to the various furtive conversations that were going on around me. A couple of guys near me were planning a big heist, apparently. After awhile, they noticed I was listening in, partly because I kept asking them to repeat things. I’ve got to quit doing that. That’s a real tipoff.

While this invitation was being delivered, the leader of the group absently picked lint off my shoulder and eyelashes off my eyelids. This helped me come to my decision. I would go along with them. I said a well lighted area might be a fun place to go, maybe someplace with a lot of witnesses, but they said they would choose the destination.

I tried to lose them by taking off at full speed down the street, suddenly spinning around and then racing past them the other way. I found out that doesn't work when you're on foot. You need a car for that. They just grabbed me by the neck as I went by.

I was sleeping like a baby – waking up every three hours screaming and crapping my pants.

We sat down on the couch. She held me close and whispered in my ear how wonderful I was. Since I'm not wonderful, I was pretty sure this was a trap. So I figured I'd better grope her as much as I could before they sprung the trap. You've got to take what you can get in this life.

Then I saw a geeky old guy with glasses, wearing a smock that had "Professor Groggins" embroidered above the pocket. I was getting sick of everybody I met being named Professor Groggins, but something told me this was the real Professor Groggins. And that something was him.

It has always amazed me how angry people can get at my stupidity. How do they think I feel? They only have to be around me a couple of hours at a time. I've got me all day.

Which meant I'd be about 100 years old when I got back to my detective business. I might not be so burly by then. Might have to change my name. Frank Rickety, or Frank Coughy, or something. I’d still be frank with my clients though, so my first name wouldn’t have to change.

But the thing people should know about me when they swear me to secrecy is that I don't have a good memory. The first thing I forget is that it's a secret. The second thing I forget is who told me this secret. The third and final thing I forget is the secret itself. So if you tell me something in the strictest secrecy, you're guaranteeing that eventually everyone in the world will know this secret except me.

The Pellagras were at the forefront of what has been called the Golden Age Of Criminal Architecture. Their buildings didn’t stay up for long; some only lasted a couple of days before the wind knocked them over, or some wise guy kicked the first story out from under the building. But that didn't bother the Pellagras. They’d already gotten their money. And it certainly didn’t bother Thomas Dewey Mandible The 1st. He just took the money, stamped the permits, then chuckled all the way to the bank. But not to a bank constructed by the Pellagra family.

He became very rich very fast. After this, he never did another dishonest thing in his life, partly because he didn’t have to, but mostly because of vanity. Now that he was rich, he wanted to be respected, even beloved, by all.

Groggins confidently started to explain this phenomenon, but soon realized he had already gone way past what he actually knew on the subject, and was now in the magical realm of bullshit. At that point he stopped trying to explain it and just said he didn't know.

This must be one of those rare instances, that comes along maybe once in a generation, when the government is full of shit.