The dappled sunlight fell softly through my Venetian blinds and reflected off Ray Dunlap’s numerous silver fillings.

"Wider, Ray"

"What?"

"Open your mouth wider."

"What are you doing, Arnie? Moving in?"

"If you want me to look at that tooth, you’re gonna have to open up your..."

"You know, I always wondered why you guys make us wear these little napkins. I feel like I should be ordering Lobster Bisque."

"Ray..."

"You know, my tooth seems better and I do have a train to catch."

Yeah, Ray was obnoxious, but what could I do? I’d known him since my school days and although I never really considered him a friend, he did sort of grow on you.

"Actually, I came to see you about something else. See, I met the girl I’m gonna marry."

"And you wanted to have a double filling ceremony?"

"She’s beautiful, gorgeous. You know my past, Arnie, a new romance every week."

I did know his past pretty well. And what I didn’t know came out under the gas.

"I’ve been around the dance floor a few times, but Cynthia is different. We’d been going out for a couple of weeks and I thought everything was perfect. Then suddenly she tells me she’s gonna see her parents."

"But you didn’t believe her."

"You know me, I’m..."

I wanted to say paranoid, but I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. It’s not good to hurt the feelings of a man who spends 2,000 dollars a year on dental work.

"Anyway, so I followed her."

"How unlike you."

"Her parents are supposed to live in this small town, Dirksville. But she kept on going farther than that. So then I..."

"Ray, I’m a dentist not a psychotherapist. Could you get to the point?"

"Yeah, right. Well, I just sort of thought you could check up on her. After all, you did take that course in being a detective."

"I don’t think it’s good to work for friends, Ray. Let me recommend a good private eye."

"No, I want you. I know you’re not a pro, Arnie, but I’m sure you’d do a great job. I’ll pay whatever you want.

I couldn’t believe it, Ray offering money. I studied his face to see if his brain had been replaced by an alien life form. He never offered to pay for anything. He’d invite you for lunch and you’d end up picking up the tab for him and the two girls he was with. But this time he looked different. There was a hurt expression on his face - like a baby deer whose mother had just been killed. And unfortunately, I always took pity on wounded animals.

"I’m probably crazy to do this, but okay." Although outwardly he was calm, I knew inside he was jumping higher than a Mexican Jumping Bean on steroids.

"Thanks a lot! Look Arnie, I traced her to this lodge in Havenhurst. Just find out what she’s doing there, who she’s with, maybe what she thinks of me and when she’d like to get married."

"Right, Ray."

Saturday was beautiful. You know the kind of day when you feel that life is more than one big hefty bag of problems. As I drove the wind washed over me and I felt twenty again. Ah, this wouldn’t be so bad. I’m getting out into the country, and I’ll be able to practice some of the skills I learned in that detective class.

I took it last year at Denton High. It was a night school course taught by Brett Langley, a professional private eye. My reason? Well, I wanted to add some excitement to my life. When I was a kid I wanted to be Superman and Batman rolled into one. Unfortunately, my parents felt that the money making potential in being a superhero was limited. So I entered the glamorous profession of dentistry. Now don’t get me wrong, I love fixing people’s teeth. I earn a good living and get to meet a lot nice people. But staring into oral cavities all day is not in the top ten on the "wow" scale.

As I turned the corner, I got the distinct impression that a red Dodge was following me. To make sure, I pushed the accelerator to the floor, but the Dodge stuck to me like a baby duck to its mother. Then I slowed my Accord down to a crawl and saw the red roadster do likewise.

Suddenly, to my surprise, the Dodge drove up beside me and a pale blond man pointed to the back of my car. Figuring that something was amiss, I nodded and then moved over to the side of the road. As I left my car, the man appeared again, only this time he had a highly polished gun in his hand -- and it was pointed at my cranium. People were right, drivers were less considerate on the roads than they used to be.

"Where is it?" He asked, none to politely.

"It?"

"Don’t play games with me."

"Wouldn’t dream of it. See I’m really bad at games. Lose at Monopoly every time. But bridge on the other hand...

"Jesus. Just tell me where it is."

He seemed a little testy and I have to admit I was concerned. So I did the only thing possible. I looked over at the road and screamed.

"Oh no, the police."

The driver turned his head towards the imaginary police car and by time he turned back I was almost in my vehicle. He shot a few rounds, but thankfully missed. Lucky for me, because I have a dry cleaner who doesn’t deal well with blood.

I burned rubber and hightailed it out of there. I veered right at the first exit and booted the Accord into an enormous farmhouse. Heart beating a mile a minute, I watched the Dodge speed past, seemingly searching for me. Who he was, what he wanted, I had no idea. In the end I decided it must have been a case of mistaken identity.

I picked up my cell phone and gave the police a description and the man’s licence plate number, casually mentioning that he had exposed himself to me. Do I know how to get even or what? I was about to drive away, when I felt a sharp pain in my side. Having been in the detective business for just a short time, I thought it might be anxiety, fear or just plain nerves. However, as it turns out, I had accidentally left the office with my recently sharpened Gingival Probe in my pocket. Believe me, it’s not the first time.

About an hour later, I arrived at the Havenhurst Resort. However, it wasn’t quite as luxurious as their advertising claimed. The stairs were wobbly, there were loose floorboards and the paint was peeling. If they wanted to give it that "lived in" look they had succeeded. My room was tidy, but the view of the outdoor pool was marred by a window with broken glass. In spite of this, I decided to have a swim. Hopefully, they had cleaned out all the sharks. On the way I checked to see if Cynthia was in her room. But no such luck.

Unlike the rest of the place, the pool exuded a bright and fresh appearance. I swam about twenty laps, felt refreshed and sauntered over to the sunglass-wearing lifeguard.

"So how’s the life saving business?" She removed the specs and showed me deep blue eyes.

"Kinda slow right now."

"If you want I could pretend to drown and you could pretend to save me."

She let out a girlish giggle. "I have a hunch you wouldn’t need my help."

"Actually I do. But for another reason. I’m supposed to meet a Cynthia Bennington here. Do you know her?"

"Sure. She comes everyday for a swim. Doesn’t say much to anyone, but I hear she has a bit of a temper." She stopped herself. "Oops, guess I shouldn’t have said that."

"That’s okay. People have said much worse about yours truly."

I was about to ask her a few more questions when she was approached by a trim elderly woman in a pink robe.

"When’s the class starting, Laura? The girls are getting anxious and who’s this handsome hunk?" She pointed towards me.

"Two o’clock and I don’t know." I took that as my cue and introduced myself to both of them. The woman, Estelle, asked if I’d like to join their Swimmercize class.

"You’d be the only man. Hopefully, that won’t be too much of a handicap for you."

I decided not to participate, got dressed and checked to see if Cynthia had returned. The door slowly opened and I saw what Ray was so enthralled about. She was movie star gorgeous. She had red curly hair, a flawless tan complexion and a figure that indicated seventeen hours of aerobics a day. She wore leather pants that squeaked when she moved. The sound reminded me of my first car.

"Cynthia?"

"Yeah"

"I’m a friend of Ray Dunlap and I, uh, happened to be in the area and..."

"I never want to see that weasel again as long as I live," she snapped.

"What?"

"I’ve been trying to get rid of him from day one, but he just can’t take a hint. He’s a jerk, a boring jerk. Tell him to quit bothering me."

With that, Cynthia slammed the door with a whack that almost knocked out my incisors. I was stunned. But at least I had my answer. She came up here to get away from Ray. I didn’t know how I was gonna break it to him. It seemed that for once he had feelings for a women.

To clear my mind, I decided to ask Lifeguard Laura, to have dinner with me.

As I walked into the pool area, my view of her was blocked by a man’s back. A familiar pale, blond man’s back. At that moment, I realized it probably wasn’t mistaken identity after all. He was after me. I decided the best approach was the direct one. So I cautiously walked over to speak to him. But as soon as I got there, blondie was gone. Like he vanished into another dimension.

Later that night, during dinner, Laura confirmed my hunch about him. She said, he claimed to be a detective and that I was wanted for killing a man. Luckily she didn’t buy it or right now I’d probably be in a prison cell having dinner with a hairy rat. Anyway, for the time being, I decided to forget about all that. I told Laura lots of dental stories and we had an evening of fun and laughs. I even told her about my near-sighted lab partner at College who spent two hours performing route canal on a man’s dentures. Dentistry is my life!

I finally ambled to my room, slightly inebriated. That is, I could probably walk a straight line, but I might have had trouble pronouncing the word cat without stuttering. However, I was alert enough to notice that my door was slightly ajar. I had a hunch someone had snuck into my room. I don’t carry a gun so I put my hand inside my jacket and pretended that I did. I slowly crept into the blackness and saw a figure sitting in my chair. My fingers began to close on the trigger that wasn’t there. Then I quickly turned on the lights, prepared to do battle with whatever psychopathic monster awaited me.

"Ahhh!" He screamed.

Suddenly, I realized that I knew the psychopathic monster. "What the hell are you doing here, Ray?" I said, trying to slow my breathing down.

"I had to find out what was going on."

"There was no need to come. I was going to phone you in the morning."

"Good news."

"Not exactly."

"You made contact with her."

"Yeah, but..."

"What, what?"

"She told me she doesn’t want anything to do with you."

He stared at me, looking like he might need intensive therapy.

"I’m sorry Ray, these things happen."

"It’s impossible. We even discussed marriage. What room is she in?" He raced towards the door.

"Thirteen-ninety-two, but is that a good idea? Especially at 1:30 in the morning. You know she might actually be in bed."

But Ray had already flown out of there, and by the time I caught up to him he was banging on Cynthia’s door as if he was a gorilla trying to get out of his cage. A sleepy version of the girl I’d spoken to earlier, opened it. I covered my ears in preparation for the screaming I was bound to hear, most of it, I was sure, coming from Ray.

"Honey, you’re here. Thank God, come on in."

I watched as she pulled him into her room with a love I hadn’t seen since I was forced to watch Wuthering Heights by an old flame. Then the door slowly shut.

I was surprised. Very surprised. Bewildered! But I didn’t want to puzzle over it now and headed back to my room. I hoped that by morning my confusion would be gone along with the bags underneath my eyes.

The next day I sat in the coffee shop chewing on what they referred to as food. But in my mind, I knew it had been made by one of those Replicators from the future they had on Star Trek. It was dry, tasteless and clumped together. I was trying to get it down as I thought about what had happened the night before. Cynthia seemed somehow different than the first time I’d seen her. But I couldn’t put my finger on why. Then there was the blond man. Again, I had no clue as to the reason he was after me.

As I slurped up the last bit of my French Onion Soup, Ray appeared and sat beside me. He told me that the two of them were back together now and were even discussing marriage. I didn’t understand that either, but I felt that in Ray’s case, it might be better if I didn’t ask any questions.

"So I guess my job is finished here. Call my receptionist, and we’ll get you back in for a cleaning in January."

"Listen Arnie, I have to tell you something." Ray blushed.

"If it’s not about flossing, I’m not sure I want to hear it." He cleared his throat so I knew it was gonna be a long one. Ah, what the heck, I was curious.

"You see, Arnie, I needed some dough. So I hit up Tom, he’s a friend of Cynthia’s. At first I thought he was an okay guy. But then I find out he was a criminal - there’s rumors that he actually killed someone."

"You borrowed money from a murderer?"

"He seemed nice."

"How much?"

"25,000." I’m sure my eyes widened like a tuna fish when he sees a shark.

"I was gonna pay him. Really. But I sort of, uh, gambled it away. Anyway, so that’s why Tom was after you."

"After me?" I thought for a moment. "Tom is a blond guy?"

"Uh huh."

"Ray, I think you left something out here. You’re the one who lost the money, why would he want me?"

"Because he thinks you’re my partner - the money man. "

I guess he could see I was exasperated so he said that we should take a walk and discuss it. As we meandered down the Sycamore lined pathway, Ray explained everything, including the crush he had on his English teacher, when he was in grade six. I was about to tell him that I was leaving the lovely Havenhurst resort and going back to the calmer world of fillings and gas and pulling teeth when suddenly I felt something hard hit my back. I turned around and there was my old pal, the blond man. Of course now I knew his name was Tom and the "something" was his shiny gun.

"Nice to see you again," I said, trying to move out of firing range. But Tom grabbed me by the shirt.

"You ain’t getting away from me, bastard. I spent two hours at police headquarters trying to convince them I ain’t no prevert."

"Just a little fun." I said, giving him one of my thousand watt smiles. But I don’t think he appreciated it.

"I’m asking again, where’s the money?" Tom rammed the gun against my back. I was about to reply when Ray interrupted.

"It’s at the office, Tommy, uh, Tom. Arnie left it there. Remember, Arnie. In the bag, on top of the bookcase, beside the Playboys, next to the Newsweeks." I was amazed by Ray’s imagination. Also his stupidity. Tom laughed. Personally, I didn’t think he had it in him.

"So that means I don’t need you two jokers around anymore, doesn’t it?"

Before we had a chance to respond, he dragged me and Ray over to his Dodge. He tied our arms up and forced us into the back seat. As he drove, we struggled to get free of the ropes, but it was useless. It had only made us exhausted. When we finally stopped, Tom led us into a deserted red bricked building.

He poured kerosene on the floor and threw a match down. He watched for a moment as fire filled the room, then gagged slightly and rushed out.

Ray and I both began to cough at the same time. For a moment I lost sight of him as the smoke created a ghostly barrier between us. When it cleared and I could see him again, he was lying prone on the cement. He was still breathing, but his face looked blank, like someone had sucked the spirit right out of his body.

I wasn’t in such good shape either. I could feel the deathly aroma of smoke throughout my lungs, and every muscle in my arms and legs felt paralyzed. As I struggled to get free of the ropes, I fell onto my side. It hurt like hell.

I couldn’t figure out why. Then I remembered - my Gingival Probe. Thank God for pain. The probe, might just come in handy. I maneuvered around until it fell from my pocket. Although my hands were tightly tied, after a few tries I managed to pick it up and manipulate it through the ropes. Little by little they loosened up.

Finally, I was free and quickly leaned over to Ray. He was still breathing, but his face had turned ash gray. I picked him up and carefully, dodging the flames, carried him outside. Just in time. Black smoke filled the street and the entire building collapsed behind us.

I shook him a few times, but his eyes remained closed. I began breathing air into his lungs. At first nothing, then gradually, his breathing became more regular and his eyelids began to twitch. A moment later, they opened. His first words were "Am I dead?"

"No Ray, you’re not. And I have a feeling Tom’s gonna be very disappointed about that."

"I’m sorry, Arnie, I didn’t mean for things to happen this way. I guess it’s cause I’m so jealous of Cynthia."

"It’s okay. Just do me a favor and invite me to your wedding."

I deposited him at a nearby hospital and went back to Havenhurst. As I ran into the lobby, I noticed something very peculiar. Cynthia and Tom were hugging and kissing as they entered her room. And that lingering feeling that something was different about her hit me again. But this time I knew what it was - the tan.

A few moments later, I knocked. The door opened slightly.

"What are you doing here?" asked Cynthia. She was wearing a flimsy silk nightgown with tiny teddy bears on it. How adorable.

"I have to talk to you. It’s about Ray - he’s dead."

"He is?"

I forced the door all the way open and saw Tom lying across the bed in his birthday suit.

"Tom, how you doing, buddy." I said. He immediately held up his gun. With an attitude like that I bet he didn’t get invited to too many parties.

"It’s a shame I didn’t get you both at once, but at least I snuffed out that stupid son of a bitch, Ray. Now it’s your turn." He pointed the gun at my chest. But I wasn’t worried because I had back up. Suddenly, a women’s voice echoed from the hallway.

"Put it away, Tom." Estelle, the lady from the swimming class, jogged in, wearing her robe. I had enlisted her aid and she was more than willing to help a handsome hunk. "It’s only gonna add to the charges. I’ve recorded your confession." She took a small tape recorder out of her pocket.

"You see, Tom," I said. "I thought you’d like to meet the entire Swimmercize class. They’re all here, all twenty four of them and they’ve just been a witness to you saying that you killed Ray."

The ladies, wearing their bathing suits, all rushed into the room, pushing aside Cynthia, who was utterly confused. I took the moment to knock the gun out of Tom’s hands. Then I pulled out the piece of rope that he had used on me and tossed it to Estelle. She was about to tie him up, when she stopped suddenly and stared at his nude body.

"I guess you specialize in small crimes." The women all laughed and then helped Estelle wrap up the guy.

I turned to Cynthia. "Okay, where is she?"

"Who?"

"Your twin sister."

"I don’t know what you’re talking about."

"I see. Well let me explain it this way. When I first saw you, your face was tan. Yet later, when Ray went into your room, your face was much whiter. There was only one explanation. There must be two of you. One who stayed in the room, and the other who sun bathed. So where is she?" She shrugged.

"In the closet."

I swung the door open and found the real Cynthia tied up with a kerchief around her mouth. There was a terrified look in her eyes.

"It’s okay, I’m a friend of Rays."

"Thank goodness." She sniffed.

Later that day, Inspector Davidson arrested Tina, Cynthia’s twin, as well as Tom. Apparently, Tom had a long rap sheet, including murder. He needed Ray’s money to pay off a witness who’d seen him kill someone. So when the money didn’t materialize, he and Tina decided to kidnap Cynthia for ransom. I had a hunch the two sisters weren’t close.

Ray turned out to be fine and probably a lot better after Cynthia hugged and kissed him. As I watched them nuzzling together, I tried to figure out why such a beautiful girl would be attracted to a guy like him. I guess I’d never understand it. It was one of life’s little mysteries. Like how the Tower of Pisa leans, why the sky is blue, or how come we dentists always have magazines in our office that are two years out of date.