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The Puppet Master
The Puppet Master

The Puppet Master

RSilverRSilver

My name is Bud, Bud Insky. I’m a detective.

I handle all the investigations for this one jail of a city’s police department.

Let me start with this one case that I’m working on now.

The year is 1935.

It’s five o’clock in the afternoon and I’m sitting at my desk doing nothing, when I get the call.

“We just picked up a collar for the robbery at the restaurant. We’ll be there in a few minutes.”

I thought to myself “Just great, now I have to do something.”

I’ve been goofing off since I solved my last case and was looking forward to not having to do anything, but now I have to do something.

The cops and the collar arrived and I directed them into an interview room.

I let the two cops go to do whatever they do while I interviewed the collar.

I sat on one side of the table while the collar stood by the door.

“Sit down” I told the collar.

“No, I’d rather stand by the door.”

Great, he has an attitude. Now, what am I going to do?

But I insisted.

“Sit down” I yelled.

He reluctantly sat down opposite me.

“My name is Bud, Bud Insky. What’s your name?”

He wouldn’t answer me. I’ve seen these type before. No talk and all action.

I looked him strait in his eyes and said again “What is your name?”

He must have been thinking real hard because I could see his eyes blinking.

Finally he said “Joe Smith.”

Well, now we’re getting somewhere.

The first thing I wanted to tell him was something very important to me.

“There is an award ceremony for me tonight at eight o’clock. I have three hours to get home, shower, change and be there and all that will take me two and a half hours to do. So you have half an hour to confess and tell me everything so that I’m not late. Got that?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t do nothing. I was minding my own business when these two cops arrested me.” Joe explained.

“From what I was told, your hand was in the register drawer and you were taking all the money.”

“Wrong, wrong, wrong. They told you wrong.” Joe was repeating himself now.

“If you don’t confess soon, I’m going to have you locked up overnight and I won’t get back to you till tomorrow, maybe by lunch time, depending on how much I have to drink tonight. So, you better come clean and save me from having to come back tomorrow.” Bud was trying to make it easy for himself.

“I still didn’t do it and I don’t know who did. That’s it. I don’t know.” Joe insisted.

“Okay, have it your way, but tomorrow if I have a hangover, you’ll be sorry.”

Bud then called for a jailer to take Joe Smith away.

“Put him in the coldest cell we have for tonight.” Bud told the jailer.

“But don’t let him catch a cold. I have little resistance to colds.”

Joe is taken away and Bud leaves for home.

At the award ceremony, Bud mingles with the crowd and starts to enjoy himself.

When they all sit down for dinner, Bud is seated at the head table with the emcee.

They all enjoyed their meals but Bud. Bud had fish for dinner. After which the emcee started to make a speech.

She talked and talked for over an hour and yet she didn’t mention Bud Insky once. She went on about past recipients of the “Best detective of the year” award.

She also talked about the weather and sports, but not one word about Bud Insky.

Finally, after pontificating about anything but the award, she introduced Bud Insky as the next among many future recipients to get the award.

Bud got up from his seat and walked to the microphone and introduced himself.

“My name is Bud, Bud Insky.”

Just as he was say that, something as old as time suddenly hit him. He had been putting it off as much as he could but now it demanded attention.

The next line told the audience the whole story.

“I have, I mean, I can’t wait any longer to say this, because it’s so important to me but I have to go to the rest room, right now.”

And with that, Bud was off to the dungeon of quarter stalls and no change in his pocket.

When he came back, half the audience was gone and the other half didn’t seem interested in what he had to say.

The next day at the jail, he calls for Joe Smith to be brought to the interview room.

The two of them get back together in the room.

“Are you ready to confess?” Bud asks Joe.

“No, not yet. But if you keep going at me, I likely will.”

“I know you did it and you know you did it and we have witnesses who will say anything we want them to say. So, confess and I’ll go easy on you.” Bud said.

“Let me explain, you don’t understand what I go though. I have a condition called Dyslexia. It causes me to read things that aren’t correct. I can’t see letters and numbers the way they’re written. It’s like when I see a one dollar bill, I can’t read it like that. It could be a ten or one hundred dollar bill. The same with a five dollar bill. It could be a five or fifty or five hundred dollar bill.”

“You expect me to believe that? You think I’m an idiot? I’ll believe what I want to believe.”

“Okay, if you put it like that, Then I admit I did it, I confess. Are you happy, now?” Joe finally gave it up.

“You made my life a lot easier now that you confessed. But tell me one thing. Why now and not last night?”

“Because, because the author wanted you to drag it out of me. He also didn’t want you to brag about it at your award ceremony last night. That’s why I’m confessing now. Because I have no chose but to do what the author tells me to do. Also my name isn’t Joe Smith. It’s John Doe.”

That was a confession for the ages. Bud wormed it, the confession out of John Doe.

“Well, well, now that you confessed, I guess I can wrap up another case, and take credit for making this city safer for its citizens. But I must also tell you it was no picnic for me last night. But tell me the truth. Are you going to plead guilty?”

“Yes, I’ll plead guilty.”

“Good, but if it makes you feel any better, the author wasn’t very kind to me. The whole award ceremony was supposed to be about me and the emcee never even mentioned my name once and I had to go to the rest room right in the middle of my speech without any change in my pocket for a quarter stall. And they served me fish for dinner. Who does that? That’s the author injecting himself into the story. What does that say about me?” Bud was venting now.

The next day, at trial.

The judge asks the defendant how he pleads.

“Not guilty”

The judge then looks at the paperwork.

“He only confessed yesterday and today he’s on trial” The judge is surprised by this.

The prosecution then jumps in.

The author is in a hurry to get this story written, so he sped up the trial.

This is when the author wants you to roll your eyes.

The judge then says to the prosecutor “you must have been up all night getting ready for today. Aren’t you tired, even a little bit?”

“No, your honor. The author gave me a pill to keep me going all day. So I’m ready to start the trial.”

The judge then says “Isn’t it convent that we just happen to have a jury seated and ready for a trial.”

“Once again, the author is in a hurry to get this story over with.” The prosecutor adds.

The judge then says to the prosecutor “Call your first witness.”

The prosecutor then calls Bud Insky, who just happened to be in the courtroom.

He approaches the bailiff, who tells him to raise his right hand and put his left hand on the bible.

“Do you swear to tell the whole truth, nothing but the truth, so help you, God.”

“Yea, yea, yea, blah, blah, blah.”

“Please be seated.”

The prosecutor then asks Mr. Insky to state his name and profession.

“Bud, Bud Insky, award winning detective and crime fighter extraordinary.”

“What can you tell us about this case you’ve worked on?”

“Well, I can tell you it was one of my hardest cases I’ve ever worked. It involved lots of man hours and numerous interviews, including the defendant’s mother. I had to work through unimaginable roadblocks and climb huddles to finally get a confession out of the defendant.”

The prosecutor goes onto say “You sound very proud of yourself. Are you that great a detective as you make yourself out to be?”

“Even better then you could imagine.”

The prosecutor then asks Bud Insky to explain himself.

“Well, like I said, I interviewed his mother about him. I found out what kind of person he is.”

“Please… go on. What kind of person is he?” The prosecutor asks.

“Well, his mother told me he always did what he always does, or ,or” Bud Insky holds out his right hand like it’s on an invisible bible while putting his left hand in the air as if he’s swearing in again.

“He always does what he always did. I can’t remember for sure.”

The prosecutor prods him to go on.

“She also told me that it wouldn’t surprise her for him to do something that wouldn’t surprise her.”

The prosecution goes on.

“So, why is the defendant pleading not guilty when he said he would after he confessed?”

“I really don’t know. In all my years as a detective, every time someone has confessed to me, they always plead guilty. This is the first time someone has changed their mind.”

The prosecutor makes it as plain as the prosecution can.

“Did he do the crime? Did he try and steal money out of the cash register drawer?”

“Yes and yes.”

“No question about it?”

“No question about it!”

The prosecutor looks at the judge and says “no more question.”

The defense lawyer now gets up and starts to question Bud Insky.

“Did his mother really say those things about her son?”

“Yes, she did.”

“Where are your notes about those things?”

“In my head.”

“So you just made them up didn’t you?”

“Objection, your honor. Badgering the witness. Let the defendant explain what, if anything his mother said on the witness stand.”

The judge says “move on.”

“How many years have you been a detective?”

“Oh, gosh. I can’t remember. Give me a chance to talk to the author and get back with you.”

“Never mind. You said you interviewed hundreds of witnesses, is that correct?”

“Yes”

“Can you name one of them?”

“I threw away my notes because they all came up empty. None of the witnesses witnessed the crime so those interviews became immaterial.”

The defense lawyer went on “How could you call yourself a detective when you didn’t detect anything?”

Bud Insky throws up his left arm and says “That’s the way the author wants it.”

“No more questions.”

The judge says to Bud Insky “You may step down.”

The judge then says “Call your next witness.”

“The prosecution rests, your honor.”

“Defense, call your first witness.”

“The defense calls John Doe.”

John Doe does the same thing as Bud Insky does to swear in.

The defense starts to question the defendant.

“What’s your name?”

“John Doe”

“You’ve heard the detective say things about what your mother thought of you, are they true?”

“No, not at all, not one little bit true.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Well, for one thing, my mother was a rehashed character from an unfinished story the author had written before. My mother had no character development, she couldn’t even tell you her birthday or how old she was or where she lived because, and I say this with my utmost love for her, her character was paper thin.”

“So, she was just a puppet for the author to slam you. Is that correct?”

“Yes”

“And what about all the hard work the detective, Bud Insky, did to prove your guilt?”

“The author is trying to start a new detective series with Bud Insky as the detective sleuth that sells millions of books with thousands of plots and plot twists that make the author look like a genus. The author wants to start a new genre, like pulp fiction, but he wants to call it “Pulp Friction.”

“So, in the end, did you try to steal money out of the cash drawer?”

“No, like I told the detective, I have dyslexia and I was just trying to examine the bills to see what they were, because I can’t tell if a bill is one dollar, ten dollars or one hundred dollars and the same for a five dollar bill. Is it five, fifty or five hundred or with a twenty or two hundred or two thousand. I need to see the bills up close to know I wasn’t being cheated.”

“Thank you, no further questions, your honor.”

“Cross examine.”

The prosecutor gets up.

“Did you confess to the crime, yes or no?”

“Yes”

“No further questions, your honor.”

“Closing arguments, prosecutor, please.”

The prosecutor gets up and walks to the jury box and faces them.

“He confessed to the crime and that should be in itself all you need to convict. His explanation about his mother being paper thin, has nothing to do with this case. I don’t care if she doesn’t know anything about herself. Even her birthday or how old she is or even if she has hemorrhoids. If she passes gas all the time or never takes a bath, doesn’t matter. He did it, end of story. Thank you for finding him guilty, like I know you will.”

With that the prosecutor sits down and the defense gets up and faces the jury.

“His confession was written into this story before it was even written. He had no choice but to confess because the author wanted to make a bad guy out of somebody who had done nothing wrong. If I could, I would charge the author with Abuse of a character to make a detective look good. The author is slamming this man for no reason other than to make Bud Insky, the detective look good. I ask you to find him not guilty. Thank you.”

With that the defense sits down.

The judge then says to the jury “Go and deliberate and come back with a verdict.”

The jury then gets up and went into the jury chamber to come up with a verdict.

Ten minutes later, the jury comes back to the jury box.

The judge then says “That was fast.”

The jury foreman tells the judge “The author didn’t want to waste time with us deliberating. He wants to end this story quickly.”

This is where the author wants the readers to roll their eyes, again.

The judge then asks “what is your verdict?”

“Guilty, your honor.”

Both the prosecutor and defense both say at the same time “I knew it was going to happen.”

The judge then pronounces his sentence.

“I sentence you, John Doe, to fifty years of shame and embarrassment, and ten years in prison.”

Bud Insky jumps up and down and says out loud “I knew I’d get a conviction. I’m the best dam detective there is. That’s why I got my award and I’m going out and kicking ass and taking names because I’m the best. If you don’t believe me just read my next back breaking, hardworking, long hours and genus I use to solve my next case.”

This is where the author wants the readers to look for the new detective series called “Bud Insky.”

Side note to this story is that the case was overturned on appeal based on lack of evidence.

John Doe walked a free man.

Author Notes: This is a story that kept me up night after night until I found the right way to share it with others. I hope you enjoy it.

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About The Author
RSilver
RSilver
About This Story
Audience
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Posted
29 May, 2020
Words
2,748
Read Time
13 mins
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