(GK: Garrison Keillor, TR: Tim Russell, SS: Sue Scott, TK: Tom Keith)
(GUY NOIR THEME)
SS: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets, but high above the quiet streets, on the twelfth floor of the Acme Building, one man is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions -- Guy Noir, private eye.
(THEME UP AND OUT)
GK: It was one of those cold overcast winter days in St. Paul when you suddenly realize you're never going to weigh 160 pounds again and stroll around the beach in tiny red swim trunks --- you realize it because you're looking down at your breakfast at the House of Hash---(CAFE AMBIANCE)
TK (TEEN): There you go, Mr. Noir. Two eggs over easy, cottage fries, and the 12 ounce sirloin, rare, and a side of French toast and hash browns, and the blueberry bismarck.
GK: Thanks, Brent.
TK (TEEN): No problem.
GK: Didn't I order whole wheat toast with this?
TK (TEEN): Oh, right. I'll go get that.
GK: Thanks.
TK (TEEN): No problem. (FOOTSTEPS AWAY)
GK: Winter in Minnesota, a person naturally ties on the feedbag. The body wants fuel. And in January, going around in their down parkas, everybody looks like they're 600 pounds anyway.
(FOOTSTEPS APPROACH)
TK (TEEN): Here's your whole wheat toast, Mr. Noir.
GK: Thanks, Brent.
TK (TEEN): No problem.
GK: Brent?
TK (TEEN): Yeah?
GK: When I say "thank you," could you try saying "You're welcome" instead of "No problem"?
TK (TEEN): What do you mean?
GK: I mean, it drives me nuts when I've said "Thank you" to hear you say "No problem". I mean, problems have nothing to do with it or no problems --- I'm expressing gratitude and you say "My pleasure, you're welcome, God bless you, whatever" ---- it's just the English language, Brent. Use it. Okay?
TK (TEEN): Sure, Mr. Noir. Whatever.
GK: "Whatever" is a word could stand a little rest, too. You mind?
TK (TEEN): Hey. No problem.
GK: (SIGH) Kids. (BRIDGE) I finished breakfast and headed for the office to lie down. They say it's good to take a nap after a meal. I read that somewhere. A doctor said that. Or a veterinarian, I forget. I was just (EFFORT) getting my feet up on the desk when (KNOCKS ON DOOR)---- Yeah. Come on in, it's unlocked. (DOOR OPEN, CLOSE) (SEXY SAX) She was tall and blonde and she had a look about her that is illegal in certain states. Her neckline and her hemline seemed to meet somewhere ---- I didn't dare let my eyes wander south of her chin for fear they might never come back. She was a woman who could make you hand over nuclear secrets and if you didn't have any, you'd try to make some up.
SS (DEEP HUSKY VOICE): Are you Guy Noir? The private eye?
GK: Yeah. Don't I look like a private eye?
SS: Not really.
GK: What's wrong, sister?
SS: I donno. The eyes maybe. They ought to be narrower.
GK: Narrower. Like that?
SS: That's better. And here--- put that in your mouth.
GK: That's a cigarette.
SS: Exactly.
GK: This is Minnesota.
SS: So? You're a private eye, not a boy scout. (FLICK OF MATCH) (GK INHALES AND EXHALES) That's better.
GK: What can I do for you, ma'am?
SS: It's about my brother. Al. Lives over on Grotto.
GK: What about him?
SS: He owes me money.
GK: Oh yeah? How much?
SS: Couple hundred bucks.
GK: You must be hurtin for dough to want to hire some muscle to shake down your own brother for two hundred bucks.
SS: Maybe I am, maybe I'm not. What's the difference?
GK: Hey, don't I know you? Didn't you used to have a radio show?
SS: Years ago. Ancient history.
GK: "Talking Stocks with Fannie Foxx," wasn't that it?
SS: You got a pretty good memory, mister.
GK: You were the queen of the S&P 500.
SS: Long time ago.
GK: How can you be hard up? You were a financial guru to millions!
SS: My stocks all went in the toilet.
GK: What'd you invest in?
SS: Kleenex, toilet tissue, cigarettes, Tampax----
GK: Too bad. So you want me to lean on your brother Al.
SS: My brother's a grifter who works in the arts. A scam artist. Does conceptual sculpture, performance art, that sort of thing. Now he's got a Wisenheimer grant for a twenty-five thou to write poems about snow.
GK: Twenty-five large, huh?
SS: They think he's a genius.
GK: Well. Goody for him.
SS: I think he's a jerk.
GK: And you want me to go over and collect your two-hundred.
SS: I want you to find the check from the Wisenheimer Foundation and bring it to me so I can invest the money in securities and in a year or so I'll give him the twenty-five large back.
GK: Aha.
SS: With any luck I'll be back on my feet in a year and I'll be able to start my weight-loss show.
GK: I don't usually get involved in larceny, Miss Foxx.
SS: (SEDUCTIVE) I appreciate your willingness to listen. A blonde like me ---- who likes to dress like this ---- it's hard to get men to take us seriously. You're the sort of guy I could get real close to real quick.
GK: I was just heading out the door. (BRIDGE)
GK: The address she gave me was a walk-up rental over on Grotto. Stucco place. Kind of dark inside. (STEPS) The sort of low-rent place with walls so thin, when you chop onions they cry next door. I made my way up the stairs. Whoever lived there was saving a lot on lightbulbs. (KNOCKS)
TR (INSIDE): Yeah? Who is it?
GK: It's Guy Noir, Al. Your sister sent me.
TR (INSIDE): Oh. Right. Let me unlock the door! (SERIES OF FIVE LOCKS AND CHAINS) (DOOR OPEN) There. Come on in.
GK: Pretty security conscious, I see.
TR: Well, with people from Minneapolis coming over here now, you can't be too careful.
GK: I see you're something of a furniture collector.
TR: Antiques are my hobby, Mr. Noir. I buy and sell ---
GK: Looks like a Shaker sideboard.
TR: Credenza. French credenz. That's a sideboard there, this is a credenza.
GK: Nice credenza.
TR: It's French.
GK: How old is that chest of drawers?
TR: The armoire, you mean?
GK: That big thing there----
TR: That's an armoire. 18th Century. French.
GK: Is that made by the same one who made this bureau----?
TR: Hutch.
GK: This is a hutch?
TR: It's a hutch. English.
GK: In our home, that sort of thing was referred to as a bureau. Or a commode.
TR: This is a hutch.
GK: Often there's more than one term for something.
TR: I'm telling you. It's a hutch. Trust me. I'm a collector.
GK: And this large cabinet-type piece of furniture here---?
TR: What are you pointing at?
GK: This.
TR: I can't see. What is it?
GK: In my day, this was referred to as a wardrobe.
TR: You mean that chiffonier?
GK: Okay.
TR: That's a wardrobe there. This is a chiffonier. You see the difference?
GK: How much is the chiffonier?
TR: It's not for sale.
GK: And the cedar chest?
TR: It's not cedar.
GK: The chest then.
TR: Not for sale either.
GK: Or the buffet?
TR: You mean the highboy?
GK: This cabinet, whatever you choose to call it.
TR: That's not a cabinet. This is a cabinet.
GK: That is a commode.
TR: I beg your pardon.
GK: A commode.
TR: A commode is a chamber pot.
GK: Commode is also a cabinet.
TR: It's a toilet.
GK: In our home, we kept tablecloths and napkins in a commode.
TR: It's a free country, Mr. Noir. If you want to put napkins in the toilet, that's up to you.
GK: You know, my interest in furniture is diminishing by the minute.
TR: You can tell this isn't a commode by looking inside it. Look. (HE TUGS ON DOOR) Door's stuck. (BIG TUG.) (CREAK OF LARGE FURNITURE LEANING) Oh no! Oh no! (FURNITURE FALLS, CRUNCHING)
GK: You want me to lift that commode off you, Al?
TR (GROANING): It's...a...cabinet.
GK: What's this on the wall behind the cabinet? Looks like a safe, Al. You put the check from Wisenheimer in the safe?
TR: Yeah.
GK: Good boy. Remember the combination? Think.
TR: I'm thinking.
GK: Numbers, Al. Think numbers.
TR: Four?
GK: I need more numbers.
TR: Three?
GK: Yeah. Probably three numbers. (BRIDGE)
GK: (DIALING TELEPHONE. RING AT OTHER END.) Miss Foxx? Your brother Al has been injured by a falling commode.
SS (ON PHONE): Did you find the check?
GK: Not yet.
SS (ON PHONE): Is he okay?
GK: In what sense?
SS (ON PHONE): I'll be right over. (HURRY BRIDGE) (DOOR OPEN, FOOTSTEPS)
SS: Where is he?
GK: He was taken to the hospital, ma'am. He'll be all right.
SS: Who's this?
GK: This is Tumbling Tommy, the Kokomo Kid.
TK: Hi.
GK: Best safecracker in the business.
SS: You think that----
GK: I do. I'd bet anything that the check from the Wisenheimer Foundation is in that wall safe. Go to it, Tommy.
TK: Awright. (TURNING KNOB) I don't know what I'm doin here, though. I'm tryin' to get out of this business. (MORE KNOB) Want to find myself a small town somewhere with white houses behind white picket fences. Settle down. Start a new life.
GK: As what? Your talent is safe-cracking and lock-picking, Tommy. In small towns, nothing is locked. You'd go nuts. (KNOB TURNS, SAFE DOOR OPENS) Hey. You got it. Lookit there.
SS: (CRANING) You see anything?
GK: There's something in there.
(POUNDING ON DOOR, WOOD BREAKAGE. HUSTLE AND CLOMPING)
TR (COP): Okay. Hands in the air. On the floor. Caught you red-handed.
GK: Officer, this isn't what it looks like.
TR (COP): On the floor.
SS: Officer, this man threw a credenza at my brother and put him in the hospital and now he's forced me to----
TR (COP): Stifle it, sister. And you----I said, On the floor.
GK: Okay, okay. I'm an older guy, it takes me longer to get face down on the floor.
TR (COP): And none of your lip. Face down. On the floor.
GK: How come Tumbling Tommy doesn't have to lie facedown on the floor?
TR (COP): None of your beeswax.
GK: You snitched on us, didn't you, Tommy? You weasel.
TK: I hadda do it, Guy. Otherwise, they'da sent me back to the Big House.
GK: Listen, officer. I can explain everything.
TR: What is this? All that's in the safe is a piece of paper.
GK: A check?
TR: A poem. Entitled "Snow".
GK: A poem?
TR: Shut up. (HE READS) Snow...
I stop here to look at the woods which are full of snow,
The woods of a guy I know. He lives in the village. I just like looking at it. My horse thinks I'm nuts.
It's the darkest evening of the year, December 21st,
And the woods are lovely, dark, and they go on for a long way,
But I said I'd be home soon and I got a few more miles to go, so I better get a move on.
GK: That's it?
TR: That's all he wrote.
GK: For that I gotta get handcuffed and go to the station?
TR: On your feet, gumshoe. (BRIDGE)
GK: It was a long wasted afternoon sitting around waiting in offices before they finally let me go and I limped over to the Five Spot to try to regain my humanity. (DOOR OPEN,JINGLE, CLOSE. FOOTSTEPS)
TR (JIMMY): Hey Guy, how's it goin?
GK: Not so great, Jimmy. Not so great.
TR (JIMMY): What's the matter? You having a bad hair day?
GK: At my point in life, there's no such thing as bad hair, Jimmy. Anything you got is great. Gimme the usual.
TR (JIMMY): One Martini with a soybean, coming up.
GK: And a couple drops of paint thinner, too. To cut the gin.
TR (JIMMY): You got it. (HE STARTS POURING, MIXING)
GK: I don't know why I keep trying to please women, Jimmy. I don't get it. I guess it's something about my generation. The door-opening generation. A woman asks me for something, wants me to go here, do this, I do it, no questions, and it almost always turns out to be a big mistake.
TR (JIMMY): Yeah, you need to find yourself a nice broad, marry her, and settle down.
GK: Right. But who is she?
TR (JIMMY): (SHAKING MARTINI) She's drop-dead beautiful, she's filthy rich, she's a fabulous dancer, she's good at household repairs, and she has a strange and powerful obsession with heavy-set guys in their fifties. (POURS DRINK) There's your Martini.
GK: Thanks.
TR (JIMMY): No problem.
GK: Do me a favor. Don't say "No problem," okay???
TR (JIMMY): Okay. Whatever.
(THEME MUSIC)
SS: A dark night in the city that knows how to keep its secrets, but a light shines on the 12th floor of the Acme Building -- Guy Noir, Private Eye. (THEME UP AND OUT)
(c) 2001 by Garrison Keillor