THE PC AFFAIR - A Comic Mystery of Murder, Mayhem, and Data Processing
by Clyde James Aragon
Who's behind the growing mountain of bizarre murders surrounding a West Coast computer dealer? His wife? Competitors? You?
It's up to William Sullage, private eye, to find out - and that means dodging bullets, bodies, and ludicrous assassins.
Enter, please, a comic world of beautiful women, scheming businessmen, psychic stoolies, innocent bystanders, and cryptic computers where everyone is a suspect and everyone is a target.
No matter who gets shot, no matter who rats on who, no matter who hides what, when the smoke finally clears, Silicon Valley is never going to be the same.
$7.95; 8 1/2" x 5 1/2" paperback, 160 pages; Humor - novel;
Cliff Zone Books ISBN: 0-9648641-1-8; LCCN: 00-092523
and now the first two chapters of THE PC AFFAIR:
Chapter 1
William Sullage, private detective to Silicon Valley, was at his desk in the low-rent district of the Santa Clara Hilton. He lay face down on the oak top pondering the strife-ridden situations of life: industrial espionage, blackmail, his late car payment. A bottle of Old Crow perched beside him, optimistically half full. It was a moment he wanted to last, at least until the pain in his head went away. But it was not to be. The phone was ringing next to his ear, becoming louder and louder until it felt as though he was trapped inside the joy box of Big Ben.
He lifted his head and stared at the phone. His mouth tasted like road kill simmered in barbecue sauce. He unwillingly picked up the receiver. "Yeah?" he whispered into it.
"Mr. Sullage? William Sullage the detective?" asked the frightened voice on the other end of the line.
"Speaking," said Sullage, pulling himself up.
"This is Theodore Tupperman, president of Magic Jack's Computer Gear House, Mr. Sullage. Please come to my house quickly. Someone is trying to kill me."
Sullage took down the address and the directions and was out the door, pausing only to grab a dry Twinkie from his top desk drawer and swill a little Coffeemate from a cup he kept over his filing cabinet.
Tupperman had given his address as Spit Pine Heights, an exclusive section of town in Los Altos. His residence was a two-story mansion stretching over an acre of manicured lawns, shaped hedges, and plastic sheep grazing on the front porch.
Sullage was let in by the butler and ushered to Tupperman's study, a mausoleum-sized room filled with books and cheap marble carvings. Sullage could sense an unnatural tension in the place.
"Mr. Sullage, I'm so glad you're here," said Tupperman, rushing up to shake his hand. He was a balding, slightly-rotund man in his fifties. "Come, I have something to show you."
He pulled Sullage around to the other side of his desk and there, on the floor, lay a dead Pacific Bell technician in a pool of blood. In his hand was what remained of a telephone dial.
"He was here to repair my phone," said Tupperman sadly. "He banged it a little and then it blew up."
"Where'd you get the phone?" asked Sullage, inspecting the body.
"It was a gift from my wife. A Princess Daisy phone. She got it for me last week."
"I don't know," said Sullage, shaking his head. "Sometimes these imported phones aren't any good. I hope she kept her receipt."
"But don't you see, Mr. Sullage, this was an attempt on my life," said Tupperman. "Won't you look into this for me?"
"Sure," said Sullage. "$500 a day plus expenses with a $1,000 retainer."
Tupperman grimaced at the price. "Isn't that a little stiff?" he asked.
"No. I'd say he's at least six feet tall."
"I'm talking about your fee."
"Hey," said Sullage, pulling him aside. "If you want Mercedes detective work at KMart prices get yourself a Yugo."
"Huh?" said Tupperman. Then he changed his mind and agreed with a meek, "Alright."
"Got any idea who wants to off you?" said Sullage, looking around the room.
"Unfortunately, I do," said Tupperman, peering at his feet. "My wife Sylvia."
At that moment, the sweet object of desire entered the room.
Mrs. Tupperman was a young, trim blonde with a wild look in her eyes that not even the modest black vinyl miniskirt she was wearing could contain. She eyed Sullage with cool disdain.
"Did you say something?" she asked Tupperman.
"J'accuse," he answered.
"You look like you could use a little Jack LaLanne yourself," she said, tossing her head back. She caught a whiff of dead repairman through her flared nostrils and pointed to Sullage. "Is he the undertaker?"
"No, my love muffin, Mr. Sullage is a private detective. He's here to find out who wants to kill me."
"Well, have fun," she cooed as she slipped on a pair of white driving gloves. "As for me, I'm going out for the evening."
"Another Mary Kay party?" asked Tupperman.
She nodded and was gone.
"All those parties, Mr. Sullage, and she doesn't even have a pink Cadillac to show for it."
"So you think she's out to get you?" snooped Sullage.
"I met her at the store during bargain week. We were giving 50 percent off our stock. She was looking for a computer that would match her curtains," explained Tupperman.
"Phew," whistled Sullage. "50 percent off! Now that's what I call a bargain."
"Yes," agreed Tupperman. "Not only that, but we were giving away power cords to anybody who came in."
"Aaah," said Sullage, whacking his forehead. "How could I have missed that?"
"Anyway, Mr. Sullage, I should have known a marriage between Sylvia and me wouldn't work. She's Apple. I'm IBM. We're just not compatible.
"Silly me. At my age fancying that I could buy love."
"What else is money good for," said Sullage. "That and dependable bodyguard protection. Anyway, I'll get on the case. I should have it solved in the next week or two."
# # #
Chapter 2
This was going to be a tough job for Sullage and for tough jobs he'd need some El Primo information. He headed out to Palo Alto in his 1965 Falcon to a small computer bar called The Glitches where he knew Flackman the stoolie hung out. It was about six now and he was sure to be in.
The Glitches wasn't your typical singles scene computer bar. It was a nice place with ferns and magazine racks where a five spot could get you a pitcher of green beer and an anti-static pizza delivered to your workstation. In the cool stillness of the interior you could hear the soft rustling of keyboard typing and beehive hum of power supplies. There were individual compartments along the tiled aisles.
As Sullage walked along, he could see an occasional occupant hard at work. Poor singles, he thought, though they came here to write a letter, file some data, or work on a home budget, some of them were more than just after-hours computer users. Some had the DTs -data tremens- the telltale quivering manner of word processors who'd had a rough day. Those unfortunates had a Mac on their back.
Sullage came to the end of the hall and found Flackman seated in front of his favorite computer, an Epson with coffee stains on its case.
"What took you so long?" asked Flackman, working on a spreadsheet.
"You knew I was coming?" said Sullage.
"News travels fast on my Rat Line bulletin board."
"So then you know something about Theodore Tupperman," said Sullage.
"Magic Jack? Sure do, Sull."
There was a long moment of silence.
"So what do you know?" asked Sullage finally,
"Refresh my memory," said Flackman, leaning back on his ergonomic chair.
Sullage stuffed a creased $20 bill into the combination ashtray/serial port.
"He made his money selling ds/dd floppies for ds/hd."
"Is that legal?" pressed Sullage.
"Legal as long as nobody x-rays your merchandise," said Flackman caveat emptoraneously.
"What else?" asked Sullage.
"I forget."
Sullage shoved another $20 into the port.
"They say his dame is fooling around with a yuppie computer salesman by the name of Ray. I heard it's getting serious. They want to get matching data bases."
"Where do they hang out?"
"My memory's fading again."
Sullage stuffed his last $20 into the slot.
"Tomorrow's Thursday. The Mary Kay party starts at four at the Motel California."
"Motel California?" asked Sullage incredulously.
"Only an eagle can find that place," said Flackman. "It's a dingy dump on the outskirts of San Jose. Don't blink as you go by or you'll miss it."
Sullage left with a reminder to Flackman to report his tips.
Sullage went home and spent the rest of the night accessing the National Private Eye Information Bank on the Internet. He discovered that Tupperman's store burned down three times in one year, all attributed to lightning. He found out that Sylvia Tupperman had Mafia connections and couldn't spell the word 'Ferrari.' He learned that Ray, her boyfriend, wore custom-fitted boxer shorts and wouldn't shop at Penney's.
The next day he drove out to San Jose. On the way, his car phone rang. He pulled open his glove compartment and out popped his Bugs Bunny cellular telephone. "What's up, Doc?" he barked into Bugs' feet.
"Mr. Sullage, it's Tupperman," said the weak voice at the other end. "They tried again. Jordan, my butler, has been electrocuted and my poodle is floating face down in the pool."
Sullage's blood pressure shot straight up. He hated that kind of stuff. Killing domestic help was one thing but when you started bumping off family pets, well, that's taking murder a bit too far.
"Stay away from your front window," ordered Sullage. "Lock your doors, leave the lights on, call the cops, and hide out inside your freezer. I'm working on this."
"Thank you, Mr. Sullage, I knew I could depend on you," said Tupperman gratefully. "Ciao."
Tupperman's good-bye stuck in Sullage's craw like a bad bunch of lasagna. He thought the dog was a poodle.
Flackman wasn't kidding about the Motel California being a dingy place. The tumbleweeds in the parking lot looked like trees. He fought his way through the forest to the check-in office and only hoped he hadn't parked in a handicap zone.
Suddenly Sullage's day bloomed with possibilities when he saw the girl at the registration desk. She was a peroxide brunette. Her hair was daringly frosted, probably Pillsbury out of the can, and her short motel dress clung sexily to her svelte body.
To further list her attributes, she had a mole on her left cheek, a bosom to make a cantaloupe salesman's mouth water, and a body that had more curves than the California Angels pitching staff. But what Sullage really admired about her was her straight white teeth. A tribute to modern orthodontics.
The nameplate on her desk read Destiny Dorain.
"May I help you?" she asked.
Sullage's tongue swelled up to the size of a Washington apple. All he could say was, "Duh-duh-duh-duh-duh."
"Let me guess," coaxed Destiny Dorain. "You're a lonely traveler, a cheating husband, or a religious leader in search of a quiet vacation spot."
Sullage regained his cool.
"None of the above," he said boldly. "William Sullage, private eye."
"Private eye, huh?" she said. "How private?"
"Babe, my eyes are so private even I can't see 'em."
She gave him a coy smile that sort of said, "Oh, Sullage, you're so full of it." Either that or she had an aardvark caught in her teeth.
"So who are you looking for?" she asked.
"Mr. and Mrs. John Smith," he answered, leaning over the counter to examine how exceptionally fine Destiny Dorain's legs really were.
She leafed through her registration book and came to a name. "There's only one Mr. and Mrs. John Smith here today. Room 204. It's a nice room, too. It's the only one with air-conditioning.
"I shouldn't be telling you this. Will you be discreet?"
"Discreet is my middle name," said Sullage, pulling out his ID.
"What an odd middle name you have," she said, admiring his driver's license photo.
"So tell me, have you ever heard of Magic Jack's Gear House?" he asked.
"Who?" she answered innocently.
He liked her. She reminded him of his Aunt Selma who was bright but never could get the hang of an electric toaster.
"Destiny," said Sullage wolfishly. "What say we get together, maybe go over to my place, listen to a little romantic music, do some skinny-dipping in my hot tub and, later, I can show you my hickey collection."
She gave him a shocked look.
"I'm not that kind of girl!" she protested.
"You don't like Mantovanni?"
Sullage gave her an I'll-be-back wink and headed for room 204.
# # #
from THE PC AFFAIR by Clyde James Aragon
$7.95 paperback
available from Cliff Zone Books
1808 Cherokee Road NW
Albuquerque, New Mexico 87107
