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Initially, Sir Anthony and I could only stare, transfixed, as the "Widow" White removed her shrunken husband from the wooden box. And, following its removal, she placed the little man on her lap like a ventriloquist's dummy!

"Forgive me, gentlemen," she said with a smile: "But, it is time for Daniello to eat. And, he cannot handle the great quantities he used to."

Whereupon, a bowl of soup was brought out, upon a wooden serving tray with collapsible legs. Into this soup, she periodically dipped an eye dropper. And, the now aptly-named Tiny Dan drained its contents as fast as he was able.

It was like watching the world's smallest baby suckling from his mother's breast!

"Extraordinary!" I muttered, half-aloud.

And, Sir Anthony nodded in agreement. He then politely cleared his throat.

"Forgive me, Signora Bianco. But, might I inquire as to how this came about?"

She briefly looked up, and wistfully smiled.

"Combined with his wealth and power, my hubsand's previous physical stature made him...socially magnetic...to women younger than myself. Nor was he averse to their attentions, in that regard. And, last month, it finally proved his undoing."

It seems that Cato Manelli, one of Tiny Dan's lieutenants, had gotten engaged. So, a bachelor party had been held for him, within the private second-floor banquet room of Cassadria's Ristorante. A party replete with the customary female "entertainer."

"I am not so naive as to think my husband could resist such provocative undulations! Thus, he left Milwaukee in the wee morning hours. Accompanied here only by his two most trusted bodyguards...and that snake charmer."

She looked at Mugsy and Sid Pixis as she said this. Then, she told us how the two aforementioned bodyguards had soon heard screams coming from the master bedroom of this former hunting lodge!

"It is a mixed blessing of their profession that they can differentiate between screams of carnal pleasure...and those generated by sheer terror. They rushed upstairs from the kitchen; broke down the bedroom door; and saw Daniello as you now see him. Albeit, dangling over the wide-open jaws of that...that...that empusa!"

Somehow, they overcame their shock and quickly drew their Smith and Wesson revolvers. Sending a total of twelve .38 caliber bullets into the naked torso of Pamela Plaisantine! Yet, all that happened was that she screamed; stuck her forked tongue out at them; and then dove through the bedroom window without even opening it!!

The two bodyguards, upon mentally reliving this, crossed themselves while whispering prayers to the Virgin Mary.

"Now, you see why I have retreated here, with my husband," said the erstwhile widow: "While letting the outside world think he is dead. For, if that empusa decides to redeem her failure..."

"...she'll get a snakeskin full of twelve-gauge buckshot for her trouble," Mugsy declared (with blatant smugness).

As if in perverse rebuttal, the air outside the front door of the lodge was suddenly filled with screams and thunderous blasts. Prompting Sir Anthony and I to run to the living room windows.

There, we saw a creature come out of the water. A creature that I can only describe as a wingless wyvern. Approximately one hundred feet long, with green skin...and raven-black hair.

tbc



tbc
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