Chapter 1

​One of the things I really enjoy about being a PI is getting to be my own boss. As bosses go, I'm a peach. I don't fuss and grump if I get up later, or if I think I'd rather work from home instead of punching in at the office. And that's another perk, no time clock.

If I want an extra cup of coffee, no office spy is making notes on how many trips out of the cubicle I've made that day. Yep, working for me is a hell of a job.

Sometimes I even feel generous enough to pat myself on the back and say, "Good job, Tony. Great job."

Of course, every silver lining has its bit of tarnish here and there.

"Oh, Tonneee… I'm ho-omm…"

And that was mine, Franklin Amadeus Jackson, my housemate and business partner. Also, housekeeper, cook, and occasional nag.

I say nag because Frankie, as he preferred to be called did not like the idea of me sitting around the house when there was plenty of work going to waste. And as for the nagging, it wasn't the type used as comic routines in late-night 1950's sitcom reruns. No, it was more subtle, and considerably more irritating when applied liberally throughout the day. Especially coming from the package it's delivered in.

You see, besides being my housemate and business partner, Frankie is a reformed drag queen who can still fling the diva with the best of them… if the mood takes him, and you can toss that filthy thought right back where it came from. I'm very happily a guy who likes girls.

Frankie is also the entire catalog of contradictions all wrapped up in a nearly seven-foot-tall bundle of chocolate delight. He's a black man who could walk on and into a starting position on the Niner’s front line any time he desires. He's faster than their quickest wide receiver and stronger than their entire defensive line combined. I've seen him run down a former Olympic sprinter who jumped a bail bond and was witness to him humiliating an old west gunslinger. Get me drunk sometimes and I'll tell you the story. He can also cook just about any Iron Chef under the table. My waistline is testimony to that. I used to be able to chase a bad guy up the hill From the Embarcadero to Coit Tower and still have enough wind to tell him why he's wasting the air we could use for other things. Now I have to keep up with the jogging or, with the big guy's cooking, begin shopping at the big portion of the big and tall store. Like I said, contradictions.

Frankie's also a pop culture sponge, and me, I tend to think the Luddites are too liberal. I don't own a car or a driver's license. I also don't own a computer, flat-screen TV, or even a cell phone. Mine is black, made out of Bakelite, is close to a century old, and still works perfectly every time I need it. If I want the news, I read the paper. If I want some entertainment, I'll grab one of the books from my library. Believe me, there's a reason almost all timeless classic movies were based on even more classic books. And then there's the purveyor of nature's most perfect food not too far away, the Anchor Brewing Company, the creators of that golden foaming elixir called beer.

By the way, I'm Tony Mandolin. As the yellow pages' ad says, I find things, all kinds of things. If your pooch has been doggie napped, I bring it home and in one piece. If your grandpa's gold watch went missing, I get it back and leave the one who took it without asking a nice matching set of lumps as a thank you. If there's a dragon to be slain or a damsel in distress, I'm the knight you want on the job. I don't do marital relations though, I may be able to tell the average wet-work boys to stand down without flinching, but I'm no fool.

About fifteen years ago my life went from the mundane to the ridiculous. I took on a case to find a missing twin sister and wound up finding a vampire serial killer. Something clicked and my eyes were opened to the world of the weird that exists all around every one of us. Pixies, fairies, elves, trolls, goblins… they all exist and are in far greater numbers than even the Disney Corporation would be comfortable with.

Most of them are reasonably okay. If you don't bother them, they won't bug you, but some are just plain nasty, rude, and incredibly annoying. A few are dangerous, even when being nice and then there are the ones who think you'd be pretty tasty with a side of beans and a nice chianti.

A few, like the Winter Queen of the fae court, are downright scary, especially when she's considering having Momma Mandolin's baby boy on a leash. And all of them seem to wind up on my doorstep in one fashion or another. That's where the gnomes come in.

My house, bought from the fees collected during that case with the vampire because every mob boss in the city decided to toss money my way, not to mention the father of the twins who had more money than the feds, sits in a quiet southwestern facing neighborhood a few blocks south of the Haight. It's a small neighborhood, consisting of four Victorian homes that survived the 1906 big one. Across the street is a park, mainly a space with grass on it for the dogs to run, bark and do their business. That’s the park where Greystoke gets his walkies and socializes with the other pooches, exchanging doggie gossip and doing the dog equivalent of shaking hands, nose to bottom.

Because the house has a nice front yard and a decent view, I will sometimes sit in one of the two chairs I had put into the yard near the azalea bushes fronting the house. I say put into because that’s what I mean. They're wrought iron with redwood slats and mounted into concrete plugs that go four feet down into the topsoil. One night I was woken up when a couple of kids who thought it'd be cool to cart off my chairs tried to lift them. I think they still have to make regular visits to the chiropractor.

"My, my, my, my, but the garden sure looks like it could use some tender loving care," Frankie murmured from the porch.

"Like I said, earlier, big guy," I said, continuing to enjoy the view, "I'll take on a new case when I feel like it. Consider me to be on vacation."

"But… it's been nearly six months!" Frankie exclaimed, exasperation dripping from every syllable.

I leaned back so I could look up at him, and asked, "Am I running out of money?"

"Oh, good god, no," He replied, "The way you don't spend money, you'd have to outlive Bain to go through it all."

Bain was Landau Bain's last name. He's a wizard which also explains why he can talk about William Shakespeare from personal experience. He's also a moody alcoholic and sometimes scarier than any of the fae because of it. The money, on the other hand, came from Dracula, yes, that Dracula, who's actually a pretty nice guy. It was during that case where I was tasked with having to help Bain kill a dragon.

The vampire paid me for helping find his nephew in gold. Lots and lots of gold, but not the new and shiny American Eagles or British Sovereigns. No, pirate gold from the days of the Spanish Empire, which added a zero to the total value if I sold them as collector's pieces than just for the metal. Momma Mandolin's boy was rolling in it.

Frankie then sniffed, "Well… I think an agent of heaven would be out there righting wrongs and slaying demons."

Yeah, that's the other thing. After the last case where I was actually involved in killing a demon… okay so now it's two. I still say I had help, so why do I have to be tagged with the idiotic title, Demon Slayer?

Anyway, Michael, the angel. That's the guy, flaming sword, wings, impressive as hell…umm, anything, told me that I'd passed some kind of test and would be called upon when the need arose, yadda, yadda, yadda. I guess, so far, need had not woken up and I was enjoying the time off.

Then the big guy asked, "What about Captain Monahan? I haven't seen or heard from him in weeks! Maybe he has a case or three needing solving."

I was beginning to think this was boredom talking and not Frankie's inner nag.

I said, "Pat's a busy man, Frankie. And face it, being a PI, I'm way down there on the urgent call list where the police are concerned."

Pat Monahan was, for all intents and purposes my only real friend on the police force. In fact, our friendship goes back to the days we were still living with our parents. We went to high school together. After some college, he went one way and I went the other, but we still remained friends. Umm, mostly. Pat tends to take his work a lot more seriously than I do, especially the stuff with paperwork and policies attached.

Back when I was just beginning as a Private Investigator, Pat was a Police Lieutenant, and just about the only honest one in that department at the time. The leads in the case led right into the heart of that department and then headed upstairs.

There's a saying about a certain scatological river that flows downhill. My investigation exploded the dam supplying it, putting many of the top cops over Pat into prison, forcibly retiring most of the ones heading the police department, and making me an instant pariah, but I did manage to put enough evidence under the judges' noses proving Monahan was innocent of any corruption. That saved his job, but it also didn't make him many friends.

That was then. This is now. Pat's no longer one of the lieutenants, he's the Captain and, because of a little help from me and mine, he's got more closed cases than the rest of the departments combined. That makes him too visible and too necessary to replace, not that a few of the elites haven't tried. But that's for another day.

Let me tell you about the gnomes.

♦​♦​♦