“Mr. Gerrat?” A hand gestures from behind a door for me to come inside. I oblige, and walk through to be greeted by the owner of the arm and manager of the Pinkertons, a salt-and-pepper haired man in a similarly coloured suit and tie. He offers his hand, which I shake, and he directs me to a seat opposite his. His table’s organised inhumanly tidily, and he’s even got one of those Newton’s Cradles.
“So, Mr. Gerrat. I’ve heard that you’re an...interesting case.”
Oh boy.
“In what ways?” I ask, knowing full well what ways he was about to refer to.
“Well, for starters, your record. For someone who claims to be a ‘Freelance spy’, you spend a lot more time on breaking into buildings for the hell of it.”
“White-hat infiltration is a legitimate business, though.”
“I might have been fine with that of your definition of ‘infiltration’ involved stealth and surveillance rather than smacking the lights out of everyone you meet.”
“Uh...Yeah…”I shift in my seat.
“And I’ve heard you’ve started claiming bounties as well?”
“Only Rhett Jones, and I’m not planning on doing anymore.” I lie, trying to salvage this seemingly-lost interview.
“Alright.” The man’s shoulders sag, seemingly exasperated. “Mr. Gerrat? If this company was still in its early days, and we needed someone to settle revolting workers, you might have had a shot. We’ve changed from that. We’re not looking for ruffians who are good at getting their hands dirty. We’re looking for professionals. Someone who can refrain from breaking someone’s nose when infiltrating a company to get information on the employees. I know you HAVE worked on some cases, to reasonable success. However, you just seem too...volatile.”
I nod, not sure if I should say anything.
“I’m sorry, but I’ll have to reject your offer to join us.” He concludes.
‘Okay, that’s fine,’ I thought, stepping out of the Pinkertons building and into the mango afternoon light. ‘It’s perfectly reasonable that he decided to refuse my application. It was a good decision and I respect him for it.’ Doesn’t change the fact that I’m livid over it. Couldn’t he at least have given me a job as a bodyguard? I could be a bodyguard. He knows I’m good at incapacitating people, considering he managed to dig up my entire job record. Wait, how did he even find all that out? The only person who keeps any record of my work is...me…
I fumble with the keys to get my apartment door unlocked. After trying every wrong key on the chain, I finally get the door open.
Everything looks fine. My spare trenchcoat’s propped up on the coathanger like it should be. My desk still has all of my folders strewn about in the order I left them. The windows and blinds haven’t seemed to be tampered with, the light’s still as dingy as always, and nothing else had been moved from what I can tell. Either the Pinkertons are that damn good at their job, which I can definitely believe, or they weren’t here at all. Sighing, I collapse on the now-groaning couch and try to watch TV.
My eyes start to open, and it’s pitch black. I startledly sit up, and my hat falls falls from my face, revealing a slightly less dark apartment. The TV’s still on, playing some hospital soap opera, and I think my phone’s buzzing from my pants pocket. Pulling it out to check, it tells me I’ve received a text from an anonymous sender. Hoping this warrants waking me up at god-knows-when, I read the text.
“I need to talk with you. Meet me at the Fowler Park entrance at midnight.”
Because waiting outside the locked entrance to a park that won’t be opened for hours isn’t conspicuous at all. At least it can’t be a set up; Anyone trying to do me in would have more sense than to meet me in front of a street. I turn off the TV, feel around the room until I find the door, and head out, asking the receptionist of the building to inform anyone who asks that I’m heading to the bar on the opposite side of town.
Fowler Park is only a few blocks away from where I live, so I arrive at the giant chained-up gates in a matter of minutes. As I jog beside the moss-laden brick walls of the park to the entrance, I spot a figure leaning against the gate in a black double-breasted jacket. Any mention of his conspicuous attire would be hypocritical considering my usual gear, so I just lean beside him.
“You’re late,” He comments.
“You DID text me in the dead of night, expecting me to wake up and get here in 5 minutes,” I retort, glaring at him.
“Fair enough, sorry.” He sags his shoulders and looks down.
“Next time, call beforehand. Now who are you and what do you want?”
“Well, you see, a friend of mine went missing recently an-”
“You woke me up for something you could have gotten the police or Pinkertons onto?”
“Th-that’s the thing,” He stutters. “H-He was investigating the Pinkertons when he disappeared.”
“Why was he doing that?”
“I-I can’t say.” Probably a P.I. hired by someone to dig up some dirt on the Pinkertons.
“So you want me to find your friend by doing the exact same thing he did to get in trouble in the first place?”
“Well, you could just break into their building and look for info on-”
“If it were that easy, your friend would be fine.”
“But he’s not a professional like you.” Now, I wouldn’t go as far as to say professional, but…
“It’s a maybe.”
“Really?”
“Depending on how much you pay me.”
$30000. Compared to my usual payments, this was massive. He was willing to pay half of it up front, but I went against it; I’m only going to be able to use the money if I don’t get caught. Everything’s been going surprisingly well so far, though. One of the watchmen had the front door keys on him, and from there I only ran into a dozen security guards to get to their archives. There’s no way in hell I’ll guess the passwords on the computers, so I sigh and get to work on the wall of filing cabinets, unlocking them with the key held by the guy stationed outside the door. After a thankfully short time of flipping through files, I eventually got to what I was looking for; Jason Jenson, my client’s MIA friend. It states that he was a private investigator (called it) who was planning to steal something from the Pinkertons building, as evident from the pictures of crudely drawn floor plans in the file. It’s then mentioned that he was caught hours after his plans came to light, although there’s no mention as to where. I flip to the last page of the report.
Stay out of our business, Gerrat.
They knew I was coming? Granted, they’re the Pinkertons, but I only got asked to do this job an hour ago. I’ve already left the archives, sprinting to where I pray some kind of back exit is. If they knew about my job here, then they must have called in the police or something. Thankfully, I find a fire exit leading out into an alley, allowing me to evacuate before any called-in cops make it to the Pinkertons building.
It’s 10 AM, and everything’s done and dusted. After falling onto my bed as soon as I got home, I sent my client the info I got over the phone, omitting the Pinkertons’ message for me. He thanked me for giving him the info, even if he still had no idea where he was now. He informed me that the money should be in my business account in a matter of hours. I sip the coffee I made during the call and smile at the fortune I made myself. My phone rumbles again, and I pull it out to find a call from a private number. If It’s who I think it is, this isn’t going to be a fun call, but ignoring them would be much worse. I answer the call..
“Had fun last night, Gerrat?”
“Look, it wasn’t anything personal, the job just happened to come up last night.” I explain.
“I know. I organised the whole thing.”
“...You did?” Explains how they knew I was coming on such short notice. “Why?”
“First, we wanted to examine your techniques firsthand. You may be excessively violent, but we wanted to see if you were at least GOOD at it.”
“Second,” He continues, “I decided having a recording of a freelance spy breaking into our establishment would be a good threat if said spy decides to turn against us.”
So they’re blackmailing me. Typical. Despite everything I’m being told right now, I really only have one question.
“Do I still get paid?”
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