Failing Kentucky by Frank Sonderborg

 

Failing Kentucky, a bar fallen on hard times. An odd name, but it had a back story. The band Green Ragon had their US tour cancelled, except for a gig in Kentucky. Morry their manager had his 15seconds of fame when he appeared on CNN and told their fans, Failing Kentucky, the tour was finished. The name stuck. The band as usual, fell apart, and reinvented itself as a Surbiton Pub on the outskirts of London.

Griff Lingo entered the dim lit bar. Ed Byrne the comedian was going through his new routine. He was getting some laughs from the sparse crowd. A Punk band was limbering up to go on stage after him. Cal was sitting at the bar, exactly where Lingo was told he would be. A glass of untouched whiskey in front of him. Dressed from head to toe in black. With his long black hair, he looked more of an undertaker on his lunch break than the ex-Jesuit Vatican enforcer monk he’d been. Lingo’s source had warned him about Cal. He’s an unstable element, lives on the edge. He's killed more people than you could count on a cartel calculator. All in God's name of course, until he went freelance. Then the official counting just stopped.

Griff Lingo took a deep breath and sat down beside him. Cal had the flowery scent of a freshly dug grave about him.

Lingo blurted it out. “Mr Cal, I need help. People are trying to kill me. Jeff said you could help me, protect me.”

Cal spoke without turning his head.

“Who? Who exactly are trying to kill you, and why?

“The Russians, I think it’s the Russians. Or it could be the Saudi’s. I’m on a case and I seemed to have kicked open a hornet’s nest. I’m not too sure who it is.”

“It helps to know who’s trying to actually kill you. Stops innocent psychopaths from getting wacked.”

“It’s Russians working for the Saudi’s. I’m sure. Well, nearly sure.”

“Mr Griff Lingo Private Eye. Works for the Chinese, is what I’ve been told,” said Cal in reply.

Lingo, said nothing, just listened to an Ed Byrne joke bombing on stage. Thought, that won’t be going on tour with the rest of his act.

Then he answered. “Look, I take cases all the time. The Chinese are good customers. They pay the rent.”

“I’ll take the job. I don’t need your money. But I will, sometime in the future, ask for a favour. Agreed?”

Lingo just nodded. And knew he had just made a Faustian pact with a demon.

Then he bought two whiskeys to seal the deal. And sunk both.

Cal, he knew didn’t drink alcohol.

The Punk band had started making noise on stage, playing the punk classic, Pretty Vacant.

 “It was liberating,” said Cal to no one in particular.

“What was liberating, not drinking alcohol? Asked Lingo, trying to hear over the punk racket.

“Working for the Vatican,” said Cal. “It’s the question you wanted to ask, isn’t it.”

“No, not really. The less I know about you the better. But as you’ve brought it up. How was it liberating?”

“I signed up, a broken man. They fixed me up. Forgave all my sins. Gave me a job to cleanse the evil from the face of the planet. As I said, it was liberating.”

Jazus thought Lingo, this guy is fucking nuts, but said, “Well, just keep me alive, until this case is over, and that will be more than enough, for me.”