Death Strike - a short story

[Lady Winter Wolf]

Death Strike

Mondays I hate Mondays; anything to do with Mondays. To make it worse, not only was it April Fool’s Day, but the temperature was an unbelievable 94 degrees. It was as though Mother Nature herself was playing a practical joke on the inhabitants of Lonagers Island. The weatherman, on the radio, had predicted a drastic drop in temperature, with imminent thunderstorms. I kept waiting for the disc jockey to explain the joke, but he only played the top forty hits.

The Bowling Center will be absolutely filthy from the late night, Sunday leagues, and I’ll be expected to help clear up, as usual. Spilled cups of stale beer stick to the beige linoleum while crumbled candy wrappers litter the chairs. The maintenance man is busy reading the racing forms, and enjoying his early morning fifth of scotch. At least he will be disinfected before the first bowlers start to wander in.

The Sunrise Bowling Center is a run down shadow of the ornate structure built in 1954. Then, it had been considered modern, ahead of its time, a real palace of entertainment for working class families. The sixty lane Center, the largest on the Island, also contained a billiard and game room, a furnished nursery and a large meeting room adjacent to the snack bar area. The originally bright orange walls were faded to a pale peach color, and the complimentary orange-brown checked rung was extremely worn and soiled. The drop ceiling tiles were yellowed while dark stains attested to a consistently leaky roof.

The “Striker’s Only” lounge was located to the left of the main doors. The cavernous room was paneled with dark wood and lit dimly. Booths lined the walls, sconces with red globes gave very little light above the tables, which was fortunate for those meeting up with someone other than their spouse. The lounge contained a full service bar stocked with every liquor imaginable, and six brands of beer on tap. We suspected that Al, our maintenance man, enjoyed cleaning this room exclusively.

I was in no mood to be housemother today, so I dragged Al away from his racing forms, and set him to work. My first hour, I tidied up the desk area, laying out freshly sharpened pencils and neatly folded score sheets in the bowlers area. This left me about 15 minutes to enjoy a cup of coffee and gossip with the snack bar manager, Louie.

Louie was a short, pudgy fellow, a culinary school dropout, who loved to eat, not create. His thick, black hair, done up in a fiftyish pompadour style, was as greasy as his grill. He reminded everyone of Elvis Presley, in his not so slim days. Louie’s cooking style was as tasteless as the foods he offered for sale. Hotdogs were boiled in a vat of bubbling oil which was changed, if remembered, weekly. In fact, the endless variety of artery killing fried foods on the menu, were dipped into the same grease clodded vat. Any entrees that came from the grill were guaranteed to be covered with a thin, black slime. But whatever cooking talents Louie lacked, he made up for in friendliness, and he knew everything that went on at the Center.

[Lady Winter Wolf]

It seems that last night, Sylvie and Stan got into another screaming match. Sylvie is the program director and has been employed with the Center for the past twenty-two years. She is tall, slim, with the walks and looks of a matured runway model, still lovely for her fifty-four years. She is very possessive about the leagues and takes pride in her membership campaigns. In this age of high unemployment, it is not easy to convince people to give up food money in the name of sport, especially for the sport of bowling. She stresses to the day and night clerks the importance of pushing the leagues. No bowlers, no jobs, as simple as that. Stan, the night manager, has other ideas about the duties of his night crew. Stan is an easy going Louisiana bayou man who loves to lay his money down, and women too. He wants the bowlers to focus on the moment, especially the bar, and winning the pot. The pots are various bets based on high game, series and points over average, and Stan always wants his share. He was not very well liked by either employee or customer.

My co-worker and best friend, Jenny, and I deal with the day leagues. We avoid Sylvie’s banshee screams by just doing as we’re told; it makes life easier. Jenny is a sweetheart and more a sister than friend. We maintain a good relationship inside and out of the Center, while most employees avoid each other. Luckily, our husbands and children also thrive through this relationship.

The day leagues are filled with two distinct types of the annoying side of the human race. The morning is filled with spoiled, brain dead, housewives, toting rude, undisciplined brats to the nursery. These women discuss soap operas as real life issues, and think the Gulf War was with Mexico. The afternoon contains a twenty-four team league of cantankerous seniors who feel we only live to serve.....them. They constantly beg for free coffee and donuts, always supplied by Sylvie, and then complain of the quality.

Three hours have gone by, and the morning is uneventful. Jenny works the nursery, but gratefully helps me with shoe exchanges to get the women out as fast as possible. There’s an hour break for lunch, so we run to McDonald’s for salads. We adore Louie, but not the food. Jenny and I have been at the Center for 10 years, I six months longer than she. We met at the accounting firm we had joined after graduating university. While there, we quickly become friends, and also discovered that we were not meant to be business tycoons. Marriage and children became more important than careers. Jobs at the bowling center came to our lives when our children became full time students; sitting at home alone was too depressing.

Everyone teases us about our looks, how we are ringers for twins. Long brown hair, deep brown eyes obscured by glasses, plump, not fat, just fluffy. Our facial features and body builds are similar, but we believe that just comes from being friends for so long and sharing so much. With our husbands, we make up a team on the Monday night Employee’s league.

[Lady Winter Wolf]

The Employee’s league was started by Ted, our general manager, three years ago. He felt that this would bring all the employees closer, especially if their families were also involved. Ted, a farmer’s son from Minnesota, was good natured and too trusting. A Norwegian god, tall and husky with blond, close cropped hair and ice blue eyes, wanted everyone to like each other...he should have known better. Everything was fine with the league when the prizes encompassed vacation trips and appliances. This year was different though, for Stan had convinced Ted to make it a money league. When money is involved, fighting is guaranteed, and Stan is always at the center of it all. Just last week, Stan and Gene, the head mechanic, had a knock-down, drag-out fight over the points over average pot. Big mistake on Stan’s part, since Gene was an ex-boxer. One does not need imagination to know who came out on top, and with the pot.

After the senior league departed, and the complaints ringing in our ears. Jenny and I went to our respective homes to deal with family issues such as getting dinner done, and helping the kids with homework. Luckily, we both had neighbors who enjoyed watching our kids when we had our Monday night league. So with husbands, and equipment, in tow, back to the bowling center we went. Something told me I should have stayed home tonight, and I really should learn to listen to my instincts.

We always tried to arrive about a half hour before practice time; the guys would place their bets on the money pots, and the wives typically stood around chatting. Once the lanes cleared off, we could put the balls on the carousel, and clean the bottoms of our bowling shoes with wire brushes.
We put our dues money in the team envelope which the treasurer collected later on. While the floorboys cleared off the tables, the waitresses went around taking fresh orders. We usually had Anita, a petite blond, with a mouth that could make a salty old sailor blush. ”The usual folks?”; Jenny and I just smiled and nodded our heads. The usual was: a pitcher of beer for the guys, pitcher of diet soda for us gals, an order each of cheese fries, hot wings and nachos with the works. Nobody could accuse us of being health conscious.

At 8:50 pm, the call for practice went over the intercom, the lanes lit up, and we started taking turns practicing our slides across the polished wood, and throwing balls. The floorboys continued to quickly clear tables while the waitresses started bringing completed orders. From the corner of my eye, I noticed that the proshop was closed. This was unusual, since Leo and Grace made sure to be around till around 10pm, in case of a sudden purchase. I guess they needed a break now and then from the place.

[Lady Winter Wolf]

At 9 pm, a halt is called on practice, the pins are reset, computer screens overhead for each pair of lanes have the team information up for viewing, and the real game begins. Tonight is position
night and we, in third place, face off against the fourth place team. The men seem to take it all too seriously while we girls catch up on the latest news. Jenny is planning a basket party, so is
showing off the catalog. Our husbands, Dan and Joe, just shake their heads, and keep reminding us when it’s our turn to roll.

By 10 pm we were just ending the first game, which our team had won, when the thunderstorm began. The rain fell onto the roof like the stamping of hundreds of feet. Since getting the computerized scoreboards, we dreaded storms like this, for we tended to be hit with a power surge and, eventually, blackout. The occasional drip, drip, drip, from leaky spots in the roof, hitting the scoreboards didn’t help either. If we blacked out, we had to wait for Gene to get the auxiliary generator going, and then I had to put the computer system back online again.

Around 10:25 pm Stan, who is bowling on lanes 5 and 6, is paged to the pit area. This is the back part of the building where the machinery is, and Gene has his office. The large storage shed is also available through here as are exits to the rear parking lot.

Five minutes later, give or take a second or two, all hell breaks loose. A tremendous thunderclap sounds over the building, the lights blink, then go black. There are angry shouts and through all the scrambling bodies, I try to push my way to the office located behind lanes 9 and 10. Suddenly, the lights came on in a blaze, making me blink hard. Someone screams ”Oh my god, look down lane 6 ”, and all heads turn.

The clang, clang, clang of the machinery of lane 6 melds with the noise of the other pinsetters resetting. But inside, instead of gleaming white wooden pins, is a horrific sight. In the pinsetter, Stan’s body snapped backward and forward, that it seemed it could easily be broken into two. When it finally came to rest, the head and limbs hung grotesquely limp as on a puppet with tangled strings. Droplets of blood dripped onto the oiled lane, congealing.

The Bowling Center was crowded with people and yet, was as silent as an empty, abandoned building. Then a scream pierced the silence, shouting and total chaos ensued. Charlie, the junior desk clerk, maintained enough calm to call 911, and then his mother.

Joe, Jenny’s husband, took command of the situation. He was a big, burly ex-Marine with a big heart and an open mind, which helped in his position as first class detective with the LIPD. Tough when he had to be, but always willing to see both sides of a story. He was able to organize the Center’s employees into corralling and calming the bowlers. The police and ambulance arrived speedily, but it was quite apparent that they needed the coroner instead of an ambulance crews. And so the investigation began.

[Lady Winter Wolf]

Uniforms were instructed to guard the entrance to the pit area, and the exits of the Center. Joe had placed a call to headquarters asking for backup in questioning witnesses, and he needed the coroner and a photographer to take care of the scene on lane 6. Until they arrived, Joe went into the main office to set up a base of operations. Might as well use Stan’s office, he won’t be needing it anytime soon.

Stan loved neatness, was always making lists and writing notes to himself. Joe flipped the pages of the day book on the desk, and found some interesting notations. “Rolling rattlers”, “Sparkle little pretties”, “I’m in the money ”, the first could have been a potential bowling team name, but the others had Joe’s interest. Stan’s death may have been an accident, but Joe had a particular funny feeling in his bones, and his hunches usually panned out. Joe needed to interview the employee who had paged Stan to the pit area, and Gene, who worked back there.

As Joe was planning to leave the office, a uniform walked in, carrying evidence in his gloved hands, and with some pertinent information he had obtained. Officer Lewisky had been on the force for four years now, and was hoping to move up the ranks to detective, so it was not unusual for him to try and make points with his superiors. Taking it upon himself, he had started to question the employees upon their whereabouts at the time of the event. He’d gone immediately to Gene after finding out about the phone call supposedly make to Stan, but Gene couldn’t have made the call. At 10:23pm, Gene had been making his way down to lane 40, on the other side of the building, to extract a pin that was jammed within the pinsetter. He could give an accurate time because all calls into the maintenance area were written into a logbook. Officer Lewisky then interviewed the bowlers who had been using that lane, and they verified that they’d seen Gene down in the lane’s pit area just before the lights had flickered out. There would not have been time for him to get down to lane 6, murder Stan, and return to lane 40 before the electricity had come on again. The desk clerk, Charlie, could not swear that it was Gene’s voice which had asked for Stan, only that the male voice had said it was Gene calling. The desk is the center of activity on the main floor, and the noisiest place. Any phone in, or out of, the building could have been used to make the call.






Found in the rear, by lane 6's machinery, was a wet umbrella, a fuchsia colored umbrella with colored stones embedded in the handle. Joe had seen this umbrella, or one very much like it, hanging on the coat rack in the Pro Shop. It belonged to the owner’s wife, Grace, and fuchsia was her favorite color, from her bowling ball to her nail color. He would have to find out how Grace’s umbrella, which was dripping wet, so recently used, had made its way to the back area. But that would have to wait till morning.

[Lady Winter Wolf]

The bowling center opened up on time the next morning, and except tor the closing off of lanes 1-10, it was business as usual. Bowlers and employees alike muttered complaints and compliments as if avoiding the truth of last night would make it untrue. But the uniformed officers guarding the roped off area and the detective milling about made everything very real. Leo and Grace opened the Pro Shop at noon. Getting coffee at the snack bar, Leo tisked over the death, Grace was her usually venomous self. She carried on about Stan’s nosiness and how he had finally been punished for it. No one had any idea on why she was carrying on, and Leo quickly whisked her off to the shop, just in time for Joe’s arrival.

The pro shop was divided into two sections. The customer area was an all glass affair. Various sized trophies was interspersed between bowling balls, and one wondered how the delicate shelving held up under all that weight. The back area contained stock and machinery needed for drilling and etching the bowling balls. Any excess stock was kept in the large storage shed and Leo had a key for the doorlock. There were two access routes to the shed, through the pit area or an outside door from the rear parking lot.

Leo and Grace were a mismatched couple, yet belonged together, and both of Italian heritage. He was tall, well built, even tempered and adored his wife to no end. The funny thing about Leo was, even though he was an excellent pro shop owner, he despised the sport. Grace, on the other hand, was a former champion bowler, and a she devil to boot. Her petite frame housed a mouth which could make a sailor cringe. She worshiped money and its power, and Leo did anything he could to shower her with it.





Joe was tactful questioning the two, for he knew how easily Grace could fly off the handle. Neither had noticed the umbrella has disappeared, and since it was not raining when they left last night, neither thought of taking it. Leo excused himself to the back room, as he said he had a few bowling balls that needed to be replugged and returned to the manufacturer.

Grace could not keep still while Leo was questioned and started to dust the glass shelving. As her head moved, the lights glittered off the diamond earrings that dangled from her earlobes. The filigree silver lace held a large oval shaped stone, and Joe thought they probably cost a bundle, since Grace would never be caught dead in costume jewelry. Joe said his goodbyes and went back to the station house to go over any more evidence that had come in.

The coroner’s report listed the details of Stan’s death so matter of factly. Crushed spine, severe internal injuries, all consistent with being trapped and mangled by the pinsetter. However, there was a nickle sized indentation between the shoulder blades which could not be accounted for. Joe pondered over the finding of the umbrella, and Stan’s cryptic notes; he also went over the interviews of the employees and customers. Something nagged at his brain, but he wasn’t sure if it was relevant or not. After making a couple of phone calls, Joe grabbed his coat and headed back to the bowling center.......the storage shed needed to be reexamined, by his eyes this time.

[Lady Winter Wolf]

The shed was a wasteland of damaged equipment, and shelving held piles of napkins to tons of bowling balls. It was the latter that Joe went to and he noticed how new, clear tape lay over the manufacturer’s own. Using his pocket knife, Joe slit open one box and then a second. Both contained new balls, but each ball had three grey circles, where holes had once been. Lifting one ball from the first box, he moved it around in his hands, but could not see anything unusual, except for the replugged holes. Replugged holes, and Joe remembered Leo saying that he did this before sending back damaged balls to the manufacturer, yet here lay these two filled boxes. He went to put the ball back in the box, but it slipped from his fingers and fell to the concrete floor with a loud thud. Lifting it back up, Joe suddenly heard it, a small rattling sound. He lifted the ball closer to his ear and shook it, yes, rattling coming from inside the ball. Taking a hint from Stan’s notes, he used his cellphone to call the squad room and inform his lieutenant of what he had discovered.

A warrant was issued to obtain all the sealed boxes from the storage shed, and to search for and seize any that were in the pro shop. The crime lab went through each box, eight total, drilling the holes open carefully and finding sparkling treasure inside them. With this information, Joe was able to review his robbery files concerning jewelry, and he found a photo of some very interesting earrings, filagree silver lace with oval diamonds. Joe, with a squad car following behind, sped over to Leo and Grace’s home, catching them just as they were getting ready to leave for the airport.









The next night, Jenny and Joe came over for dinner, and Joe gave us the entire story. Stan had been noticing all the expensive jewelry Grace liked to wear. He had to discover how Leo could afford it all, since the bowling business was not that great. Leo was able to find out when the upper class bowlers were at the Center and, thereby, rob their homes. He only took small pieces which would fit into the plugged holes. But every once in a while, a large piece would go to his precious Grace.......he just couldn’t deny her. The “damaged” balls were shipped, not back to the manufacturer, but to his brother in Texas, who sold the goods for cash. Stan, being the nosy man that he was, wondered why Leo reshipped to his manufacturer so often, and decided to examine one of the boxes on his own. He confronted Leo and Grace with what he found, and told them that he would be getting a share of the profits, since he was now an equal partner. He was a reasonable man, he informed them, and could keep his mouth shut.....for a price.

Grace had no intention of sharing with anyone, especially a sleeze like Stan, so she concocted a plan to kill him. Leaving the center before 9 pm, Leo and Grace had a quick meal at the local diner, where they were well know, and made sure to let people know they were going straight home. However, they made their way back to the center, hiding in the shed until they heard Gene paged away from his office. Calling the center, Leo was able to get Stan to go back to the pit area, where he met him, and pretended to agree to the “partnership”. While Leo kept Stan facing away from the outside rear door, Grace snuck up behind and shoved the tip of her umbrella, hard, into Stan’s back. Lurching forward, Leo tripped Stan’s feet, sending him falling into lane 6's machinery. But the electricity went out unexpectantly, Leo panicked, ran towards where he knew the door to be, bumping into Grace and dislodging the umbrella from her hands. Not wanting to search for it in the dark, and especially not wanting to be caught back there when the lights returned on, they high tailed it back home. Grace was still wearing the stolen earrings when the police arrested her, and the district attorney felt the case was an open and shut one.

Funny thing though, a help wanted ad for Stan’s position appeared in tonight’s newspaper.

The End.

[MjolnirH]

I like this story, it makes me hungary for deep fried hot dogs ;D

but seriously, a good short murder/mystery