... at the crazy caption comics cluedunnit ...
I was aiming for
fifteen minutes, expecting thirty, and hoping for twenty. I even had a
plan, if you can call some notes scrawled on the back of some old
photocopies a plan. The beer glasses I'd got from the dame at the bar.
The books from this shop where I know the manager. And as for the rest,
well, let's just say it had been highly educational, getting hold of the
contents of the three bags by my feet.
I was betting not many people in the room knew where to get hold of a pair of cheap handcuffs on a Sunday morning in Oxford.
It's little thoughts like that which help hold you together when you're
staring down a roomful of types who are older, smarter, cooler, younger,
harder or just way more talented than you are. I know where the
handcuffs are. I've got the gun. The gun, and a big fucking mouth, and
before I know what's up I'm ranting and waving my piece around and
jumping on the goddamn furniture, even, but you've got to do it because
right here, right now, it's all down to whatever gets the job done. And
right now I need them spilling the beans about what they think's up with
this story and if that means making a fool of myself, well, so be it.
And, in the end, they all talk.