Fantasy fiction; Science fiction; Subconsciousness -- Fiction
"Hey, man," a voice said, "I've been lookin' for you everywheres."
Marc hastily lowered his glasses. He glanced down to find a familiar
shifty-eyed, weasel-like face peering up at him.
"You!" he said.
"Yeah, man," the diminutive peddler of lewd pictures grinned. "You
still got the cool stuff, huh?"
"The cool stuff?" Marc said with sudden stiffness. "If you mean that
collection of disgusting pictures, no I haven't got them. At the
moment, I believe they're listed as Exhibit A in the case of The People
against Marcus G. Pillsworth."
"Man!" the little man wailed. "You mean somebody goofed and the cops
got 'em?"
"Precisely," Marc said frigidly.
"Who's this Pillsworth cube?"
Marc drew himself up into a living tower of glowering hauteur. "I am
Marcus G. Pillsworth," he said nastily.
"You!" the little man said. "You got hooked with the goods?"
"I got hooked," Marc said flatly, "with the goods just where you
planted it on me."
"Jeez!" the little man cried despairingly. "You just can't rely on
nobody no more." He chewed his lip for a moment, then looked up at Marc
anxiously. "What about the French Elixir? Did the bulls heist that,
too?"
"French Elixir?" Marc said. "I don't know anything about your French
Elixir."
"The hell you don't, man," the little man said. "I faded it into your
coat pocket. Did they find it?"
Marc paused. A chill of apprehension skittered up his spine. "Into my
coat pocket," he said. "A small brown bottle?"
"It wasn't a big blue jug," the little man said impatiently. "You still
got it?"
Marc reached into his pocket and pulled out, first one brown bottle,
then another. They were almost identical except that the liquid in the
one marked 'French Elixir' had been depleted by approximately one
fourth.
"Good night!" Marc yelled. "I drank the wrong stuff!"
"You drank the Elixir!" the little man said. He snatched the bottle
from Marc's hand. "You _drank_ it?"
"I said I drank it," Marc said distractedly.
"Then, you owe me twenty bucks, man. That bottle of genuine,
hard-to-get French Elixir sells for fifty, sixty dollars." He held out
his hand. "Pad my palm, friend."
"I certainly will not pad your palm," Marc said indignantly. "Do you
know what that stuff's done to me?"
"Huh?" The little man paused reflectively. "How should I know what
it done," he said. "They say all sorts of stuff could happen to you,
according to how you're repressed." He regarded Marc interestedly.
"What happened?"
"I've got X-ray eyes!" Marc said dramatically. "That's what happened."
The little man looked at him skeptically. "What's X-ray eyes?"
"When I look at people," Marc said, "I see right through their clothes.
If I didn't have these glasses on everyone on this street would be
stark naked."
* * * * *
The little man made a thin whistling sound, then began to chuckle.
"Lord, man," he laughed, "you ain't got X-ray eyes, you just got a
dirty mind!"
"What!" Marc said.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account