Dead Men Scare Me Stupid (5 page)

I was hiding the
evidence of my crimes as fast as I discovered them, but it seemed like a losing
battle. My garage was full, I’d dug as many holes in my yard as I dared – my
gardener was threatening to learn English and quit - and I was renting storage
areas all over the city and packing them full of corpses, stolen money, kidnap
victims, drug paraphernalia, and bogus tax returns.

Then one day I
went too far. That was the day the cops found Amelia Earhart in the trunk of my
car. And that’s when all hell broke loose.

Even though it
was a little the worse for wear, it was definitely Amelia Earhart’s body. It
was wearing a vintage leather flying helmet, one hand held the keys to a 1932
Lockheed Electra, and tags on the body said “If Found Return To Current U.S.
Government” and “This End Up”, which for some reason was on both ends.

This didn’t look
good for me. I would have to answer a lot of tough, searching questions about
this one. This wasn’t just any body. This body was important. This body’s face
was on postage stamps. Of course, it wasn’t all bad. Thanks to the publicity I
would be getting for my monstrous crime, I’d probably get some new clients out
of this. People who wanted me to find their pilots, for example. But I still
didn’t like the looks of it.

The police chief
decided it was time to make his move. There was no point in delaying my arrest
any longer. I would never be more guilty-looking than this. No one ever would.
If he couldn’t get a conviction against me now, with the mountains of evidence
he already had, plus this spectacular new Earhart thing, he wasn’t the chief of
police he thought he was.

Ed and Fred were
in the crowd of onlookers as I was resisting arrest. When I spotted them I
called out: “Hey, if you still want to help me why don’t you kill some of these
cops?”

One of the cops
frowned. “That’s enough of that now.”

I’ve never had
much luck in courtrooms. I’m always guilty, is one problem. The deck is pretty
stacked against us guilty guys right from the start. It’s like they don’t want
to give us a fair trial. Everyone else has an even shot of beating the rap, but
not us, oh no. We get railroaded. And all because we are guilty, and everybody
can prove it. I saw there was an extra large amount of evidence against me this
time – even I said “Jesus!” when I saw it all - so I wasn’t very confident going
into this one.

The lawyer the
court assigned to represent me in this case didn’t inspire much confidence
either. Henry Loser, his name was. Talk about a bad omen! I asked him if it was
pronounced “Loo-zay” or something French like that, but he said no, it was
“Loser”. He said it was an Old English name, from back in the days when they
gave you a surname based on what you did. I asked him if he wanted to discuss
the case with me, maybe get my side of it, but he just said “What’s the point?”
and I said “You got that right”. We didn’t talk much after that.

My trial was a
bit of a three ring circus right from the start. Not only was I there, (I heard
some jurors mutter “Here comes trouble” when I arrived), but the courtroom was
filled to capacity with conspiracy buffs, fans of unsolved crimes, aviation
experts, and other assorted nuts. Some of the more enthusiastic spectators came
to the trial dressed up to look like Amelia Earhart. A few were dressed up to
look like me. Adding an ominous note to the proceedings was a small group of
grim looking men in unfashionable black suits watching the trial from the rear
of the courtroom and occasionally talking in low voices into 1979 vintage cell
phones. I didn’t like the look of them. Of course, I didn’t like any of this.

When it was time
for the trial to begin, the judge cleared his throat and addressed me: “So, Mr.
Burly, according to the statement you gave the police, a couple of…” He looked
at a transcript of my statement. “…little pricks named Ed and Fred put the body
of Amelia Earhart in your car?”

“That is correct,
Your Honor,” I replied. “Fred Cramer and Ed Brannigan. B-r-a-double n…”

“And you had
nothing to do with it?”

“Nothing at all,
Your Honor. I am completely innocent.”

I felt unseen
fingers pull the sides of my mouth out into a huge uncomfortable smile. The
judge seemed to back up a little in his chair, then stared at me for a moment
before resuming.

“And where are
these…” He looked at the transcript again. “…little pricks? Why aren’t they in
the courtroom?”

“They are, Your
Honor,” I said. “Right behind me, with their fingers in my mouth.”

He stared at me
again. “I see no one behind you.”

“No, sir, they
cannot be seen.”

“Why not?”

“Ectoplasm.”

“What?”

“They are ghosts,
Your Honor.”

This threw the
courtroom into an uproar. Everyone began talking at once. As the excitement
grew, one of the spectators who was dressed as Amelia Earhart began running
around the room with his arms stretched out as if he was flying. Most of the
ones who were dressed like me hid their faces in their hands.

While the judge
tried to restore order, I looked around for Ed and Fred. They were still
invisible, but I could sense they were nearby because one of their fingers was
still in my mouth. Then two voices started whispering in my ear.

“Hi, Burly,” said
Fred.

“We thought it
over and decided we haven’t been fair to you,” said Ed. “You didn’t try to get
us killed. If you had, you would have screwed it up. We would have won the
lottery or something instead.”

“That’s right,” I
agreed.

“Or been elected
Pope,” said Fred.

“Sure.”

“We’d both be
lottery-winning Popes by now.”

“Well that’s what
I’ve been trying to tell you.”

“So we’re sorry
for all the trouble we’ve caused you. Really sorry,” said Ed. “Fred here can’t
sleep.”

“I tossed and
turned all night,” said Fred. “I’m gripped with remorse. Want to see?”

“No.”

“We’ll make it up
to you though,” promised Ed. “Don’t worry, we’ll help you beat this rap.”

“Good. It’s about
time somebody started helping me around here. All these courtroom jerks are…”

I suddenly
noticed that all the furor in the courtroom had subsided and everyone was
staring at me. I guess it must have looked kind of crazy, me talking to the air
like that, and making plans with it, and giving it high fives.

It looked even
crazier moments later when my hair started combing itself, dust started being
patted off my jacket, and invisible hands started brushing my teeth. I looked a
lot more presentable that way, I guess, but, like I said, it looked crazy too.

“Ghosts, eh?”
said the judge, doing his best, for the dignity of the court, to ignore the
fact that some unseen force was ironing my shirt, and my head was trying on
different hats by itself.

I spit out some
toothpaste. “Yes, Your Honor, ghosts.”

The judge leafed
through my statement again. “Where did these ‘ghosts’ say they got the body of
Miss Earhart?”

There was some
hurried whispering in my ear.

“Uh… they found
it on the grounds of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo, Your Honor,” I said, “behind
a really old bush.”

There was a
rumble of excitement from the spectators in the courtroom. The dark-suited men
in the back of the room stiffened. The judge banged his gavel until the
courtroom was silent again.

“And… um… did
these ghosts tell you how they knew the body was there?”

There was more hurried
whispering in my ear.

“Er… as I
understand it, they play tennis with the ghost of Miss Earhart every Tuesday.
She told them where her body was hidden during one of these games. And, I don’t
know if it’s important or not, but according to them they beat her pants off
regularly.”

“It’s not
important.”

“The jury will
disregard the part about Miss Earhart’s pants,” I announced.

“I will instruct
the jury, Mr. Burly.”

I shrugged.
“Fine.”

I noticed that
the spectators in the courtroom were beginning to look at me with narrowing
eyes. As much as they wanted to believe anything anybody ever said to them -
the screwier the better as far as they were concerned – apparently my story
wasn’t quite ringing true to them. Only the men in the black suits in the back of
the courtroom seemed to be taking me seriously now. They were taking notes,
making phone calls and eyeing me coldly.

“If what you say
is true,” said the judge, dryly, “this appears to solve a very old mystery.”

“Solving
mysteries is my business, Your Honor,” I said, swaggering a little, giving a
small wave to the jury, and winking at the cops.

At this point,
there was more excited whispering in my ear. I listened for a moment, then
addressed the judge.

“Your Honor, I
can also solve the Judge Crater disappearance mystery at this time, if the
court pleases.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. He’s also
in the trunk of my car. Farther back than the other corpse. Behind the spare
tire.”

This created an
even bigger sensation in the courtroom. The trial was recessed for an hour
while my impounded car was checked out by the police again. They tore the whole
thing apart, right down to the axles, then they opened the trunk. The body of
Judge Crater was found exactly where Ed and Fred said it would be. It was right
there behind the spare tire, right under Ambrose Bierce. The afternoon papers
screamed the headline: “More Bodies Found In Death Trunk!”

I was hoping that
solving all these age-old mysteries would help me out in my trial, make the law
see me in a more favorable light. Like some kind of an Indiana Jones type
character. Instead, I just seemed like a nut who had a graveyard in his car.

My trial
continued throughout the rest of the afternoon, but I won’t bore you with all
the details. It was just a lot of irrefutable evidence being brought out
against me, and the prosecutor making a monkey out of me on the stand, and the
judge asking my lawyer if he wanted to object to anything, and my lawyer
replying “Why bother?” and “Leave me alone”. And all of it was punctuated with
strange looking actions on my part: my pants pressing themselves, my eyebrows
being plucked by an unseen hand until I looked like a movie star, key evidence
mysteriously floating into my inside coat pocket and having to be retrieved by
the bailiff, the jury members being prodded in the ribs by unseen elbows when I
accidentally got off a good crack, and so on.

At the conclusion
of the trial, the jury only got halfway up out of their seats before they had
finished their deliberations and started sitting back down again. They wouldn’t
look at me, which I took as a good sign.

The foreman stood
up. “We find the defendant, Frank Burly, innocent…”

There was an
explosion of stunned cursing behind me. “This is bullshit!” the voice howled.

“What did you
say, Mr. Burly?” asked the judge.

“Nothing, Your
Honor.”

“Did you say
something was bullshit?”

“No, Your Honor.”

“Then may we
proceed?”

“Please.”

The judge nodded
to the jury foreman, who resumed reading the verdict.

“We find the
defendant, Frank Burly, innocent by reason of insanity.”

“You see,” I told
the cop who had arrested me, “I told you I was innocent.”

As I was being
led out of the courtroom in a straightjacket, I looked back and saw Ed and
Fred, now fully materialized, shaking hands with the horrified jury foreman, and
beaming over at me. It suddenly occurred to me that they hadn’t been here to
help me at all! They had just shown up to make sure my trial went badly. And I
had fallen for it.

When they began
fading away, the last thing that disappeared were their two malicious smiles,
which hung there in the air for a few moments after they were gone. I don’t
know what made me madder, ruining my life or plagiarizing Alice in Wonderland
like that. Ruining my life, I guess.

The asylum they
put me in had been originally called the Central City Loony Bin, but in the
1970’s the name was changed to J.J.Nutball’s Gibber Palace, a trendy name
designed to get more young people into the place. The advertising man who came
up with the name said that it was “Now”, and would increase traffic and
generate added revenue “Soon”, but it never did. A few more young people did go
insane, but some of the older nuts were turned off by the name change and got
better. Financially, it ended up being pretty much a wash.

Recently the name
had been changed back, but, in a nod to political correctness, it was now
called the Central City Special Bin. Inmates were treated as if they were
normal fully functioning members of society, who just needed a special bin to
live in. There was nothing “wrong” with them. They were the same as everybody
else. This modern way of looking at the problem meant the staff didn’t have to
treat their patients, or cure them, or even watch them particularly. Just chuck
them in their Special Place, and slam and lock their Special Door. Made things
a lot easier for the staff. Pretty smart, I thought.

When I was
checked into the place, they took away my street clothes and gave me a pair of
special coveralls to wear. These had no sharp zippers that might pinch my skin,
or any buttons that I could accidentally choke on - no way to get them off at
all. And they were a bright orange color, so I would be in a good orangey mood
whenever I looked down at what I was wearing, and would be less likely to do
something “special”. Despite all these precautions, I noticed they let me keep
my belt.

“Aren’t you going
to take away my belt so I won’t hang myself?” I asked.

“Usually we do,”
said a member of the staff, “but we’re a little overcrowded right now. So it’s
either build another wing or let the inmates keep their belts. If you lose
yours, you can get another one from the Belt Lady.”