Ya Can't Catch A Kipper With A Spider Read online

  Ya Can't Catch a Kipper with a Spider

  by: Jonathan Antony Strickland

 

  Have you ever been completely helpless, knowing that at any moment the skinny guy in the black cape wielding the large blood stained scythe was about to come for ya, and there's not a thing ya can do about it. Well I have. I’ve seen him. In fact I’ve seen him on several occasions, but unlike those other suckers who claim to have looked death in the eye…I have not! You see, I've always bested him and made him look the fool.

 

  Fact is, I've beat that bum so many times that lately when I'm in a tight spot and death should come a knocking, all I see now of that sucker is the back of his big boney head receding into the distance.

  Why's that I here you ask?

  Well if ya shut ya mouth for a god-damned minute or two then I'll tell ya why…His shit scarred of me that's why, and that's why I've never looked old buck-nuts in the eye (sockets!).

 

  The names Kirk, full title Kirk "the kipper" McClacket, professional P.I. I'm not just any P.I either; I'm one of the best. That crap A,ve just give ya about death isn’t completely untrue, but although I might not A've seen him (that's if he exists in the first place) I have been in enough tricky situations where A,ve escaped by the skin of ma teeth to realise I’ve got an unnatural knack for the type of work I do.

 

  By the way, you’re probably wondering why a private investigator like maself has picked up the nickname the kipper, well if you would just shut your bloody trap for a second time, then I'll tell ya. Ya see, the longer that Kirk McClacket's on the case and there's no clues of who did what and what did who to whom, I begin my questioning. I do this by throwing up such a stink until the clues start coming out-ta the woodwork, know what I'm saying.

 

  Any way, what I hear is that your interested in hearing about what a top notch P.I like maself gets up to. From what you've told me you think being a P.I is a ll about following husbands or wives after being hired by there partner to see if they are sleeping around a little, got some young buxom mistress dressed in leather that they might occasionally visit on weekends, that sort a thing. Perhaps that what ya think I do is it, well let me tell you something buster, I take on some of the most hard arsed criminals this city (or any other for that matter) has ever seen.

 

  In fact I'll tell ya a story that-al give ya an insight into the kind of character I am. This happened to me only last week when things around ma office had been kind-a quiet. I'd been sitting in ma office all morning hoping that at any minute the phone would ring and I'd get me a nice juicy case to solve with an even nicer juicier pay slip. I sat reading one of those crappy glamour magazines, the ones you get in newsagents that claim to be mags for blokes but only have the minimum amount of tit shots in. The only sound was the electric fan pounding away above me, in ma small office the fan was a godsend as the humidity in there can get quite turgid.

 

  Suddenly I heard footsteps outside ma door, and my ears pricked up when I realised those tootsies had high heels on em. I sat back in my leather swivel chair and put ma feet on ma desk to try and make maself look as cool as possible. It was when she walked through the door and into ma office that I realised this was no slinky babe come to plead with me to help her out. This lass instead resembled an ogre from out of some child’s nightmare with breasts the size of beach balls, although I can guarantee these ones wouldn’t be as half as much fun to play with, unless your one of those sick fucks I was reading about in that magazine I'd just minutes before laid down.

 

  Yer see the real life of a P.I like maself isn’t anything like what you might read about in detective books. All too often reality has this uncanny habit of slapping you hard in the chops when ya least expect it to. The lady in question was certainly bizarre to say the least; she was about five eight and seventeen stone. Covering those considerable curves she wore a tight red leather dress which looked skimpy and revolting on her. Her bare arms and legs were covered in tattoos and bruises, and she had a shock of long red hair that fizzed and shook around her face, then snaked un-sexily down her back. As for her face it looked as though it had seen more than its fare share of knuckles and head-buts. To sum up, she was hideous, and as she looked me straight in the eye, just for a moment I knew what hell must be like.

 

  She marched over to where I sat stunned at ma desk and plomped herself on the edge of it. She put a small red box down upon the desk which began to make unhealthy creaking sounds from her weight.

 

  I decided to make the first move, asking her if I could do anything for her. She smiled at me and a shiver ran down ma spine, however she went on to describe the reason she had come to me, giving me all the crap about how she heard I was the best P.I in the business, at this point I realised she was buttering me up for something.

 

  She proceeded to tell me some bullshit story about how her husband was cheating on her with another women. I am (may I point out) well trained in detecting people who are spouting bullshit at me. I can spot them a mile off. However in this case I didn't pay too much attention to the give-away signs and obvious tells that would have let me know she was speaking crap. There were in fact two reasons why I didn’t suss her out completely straight away, although I did have a sneaking suspicion that something was up. The first was that I did not find it hard to believe that some poor guy who was stuck with this monstrosity (as I now had the pleasance of witnessing at close quarters maself) would want to find something much more appetizing to dip his wick into. Also I tried to avoid making eye contact as much as possible as looking at that fat mush made me want to chuck chunks from ma lunch.

  After she finished her sob story she asked me if I would take her case. I told her my fee and she agreed to pay me straight off, cash up front sort a thing. This is quite unusual as most clients want some kind-a proof that I'm doing ma job on a regular basis (another give-away sign that I completely missed as ma thoughts were only with counting the many queens heads on the pretty sheets of blue shiny paper that would soon be filling ma pockets).

 

  Anyway, whenever I’m offered ma salary up-front, I ain’t gonna argue, so in other words I snatched her hand off as she offered me the money, and in return I offered her a drink to calm down her nerves. May I points out to ya at this point that I’m a bitter drinker, I find spirits too much for ma digestive system, also I am a bit of a regular piss artist around town. I was surprised when she got up and went over to ma drinks cabinet saying that I stay sat in ma seat and relax. I told her what I wanted and she proceeded to pour out ma pint into a glass. I then told the lady to help herself to what she wanted. I do keep the stronger beverages for clients and was expecting her to pour herself a whisky or perhaps a gin with a touch of say…cream soda or the like. This however was no ordinary lady and she instead took out one ma bottles of beer and poured out a large pint of ale into one of ma stolen pint glasses that ad nicked from ma local one time when I'd got completely wrecked (HEY! Stop judging me you snooty piece of shit shovelling shit. The price of beer glasses in Tremwell these days is bloody ridiculous).

 

  She came over and handed me ma drink and I remember thinking to maself, hey maybe ugly fat birds aren’t that bad after all... Sometimes you know I can be a right dumb fucker!

 

  We both lifted our glasses and ar did ma usual trick of downing the pint in one, taking me but a mere few seconds. I was however surprised when she did the same. I remember telling her she was some lady and as I got up to say goodbye to her ma le
gs went from under me. I tried to compose maself and tell her I would ring her as soon as I had some photos of her husband doing the dirty, but found ma words sounded slurred and insensible. I remember hearing her laughing and then I realised the fat cow must-ta slipped something in ta ma drink. A warm feeling came over me and I found maself becoming unusually happy and boisterous as the drug began to take full effect.

 

  Then the fat bitch grabbed me, I'm no weakling and even though she was two stone heavier than maself I could have stilled floored her if it had not been for that damned drug of hers. I found maself fun fighting with her on the floor, in the back of ma mind I knew I should put up a fight against her but the drug made it impossible. Instead I found maself slowly finding the situation more and more amusing by the minute and soon she had lifted me back onto ma