Shakey crashed through the door of the bar looking like the last day of February. Shakey wasn’t his real name, of course; any more than my real name is Parson. But he was living up to his moniker at the moment, shaking like a leaf as he saw me and headed for my table. I gave him the fisheye like I suspected something was amiss, as surely it was.

    "What’s with you?" I asked, lifting my beer to my lips.

    "Parson," he said, his squeaky voice an octave higher than its usual coloratura. "Am I glad you’re here. You gotta help me." He sat down, bounced back up, looking around the room like he was casing the joint for a heist, then sat down again. All the while his hands were busy playing an imaginary piccolo, and his eyes danced back and forth like ping pong balls.

    "And how, may I ask, can I be of service?" I asked softly, keenly aware that the gentleman’s nerves were slightly jangled.

    "You gotta loan me five thousand bucks," he said.

    "And you gotta be kidding," I replied without missing a sip. "I haven’t that kind of money on my person. Or, may I add, on any other part of me." I put the beer down, crossed my hands in front of me on the table, and leaned forward until my eyes were level with his. "What is the occasion for the sudden need of five Gs?"

    Shakey looked around again, first over one shoulder, then the other. "I owe Jody."

    I sat back, nonplused. I could not believe my own two ears. "Jody," I said. "Do you mean THE Jody? The Big One with the loan shark operation, which charges 75% interest and breaks thumbs and kneecaps of those who cannot meet his somewhat rigid payment schedule?"

    Shakey nodded. "That’s the one."

    I sighed and leaned back. "Shakey," I said. "I cannot believe that you would do such a thing."

    Shakey waved a bony hand in the air. "I needed the dough fast, Parson. I had a sure thing in the fourth race at Pimlico." He wiped his furrowed brow with the tablecloth and lit up a cigarette.

    I shook my head. "Shakey, Shakey, Shakey," I admonished. "The last time you had a ‘sure thing’, the poor beast expired of heart failure in the starting gate. And I won’t be so uncouth as to mention the horse who ran out of gas in the clubhouse turn and sat down on the jockey, causing grievous damage to the latter’s body and psyche."

    "Bad luck," Shakey said. "It happens to the best of them." He took a drag, blew smoke in my direction, and shook his head. "Besides, what happened is history. As I will be if I don’t come up with five big ones before six PM tomorrow."

    "But surely you must have a little sense in that feeble head of yours," I said. "To use the services of Jody is foolishness beyond even your rather immature impulses. Why even my worthless nephew who at this very moment is making license plates for our beloved Commonwealth knows better than to..."

    Shakey held up a hand. "I don’t need a lecture," he said. "I need five Gs fast, PDQ, pronto or..." he didn’t finish the sentence, and he didn’t have to. I could fill in the blanks without any verbal pictures.

    "And why," I said, "should I be so generous as to help you out of this precipitous situation into which you have gotten yourself with your errant ways?"

    "Because I am your dearest friend. Didn’t I help you out when you got yourself engaged to Lola? Didn’t I hide you out for two weeks until some other poor guy swept her off of her feet and married her for you?"

    I winced at the thought of my youthful folly. And, indeed, Shakey was right. He was a true friend who saved my life at a most crucial time.

    "Well," I said finally, "you are in luck. I have decided to help you."

    Shakey sat up straight and a look of sheer elation came into his beady eyes. "You mean you’ll loan me the moola?" He stood up and leaned forward like he was going to hug me. I pushed my chair back and held up my hand.

    "I didn’t say that," I said. "I told you that I do not have five thousand dollars lying idly about."

    Shakey sat back in his chair, expelling a huge sigh.

    "But," I said hastily, lest he become too despondent and do something desperate, "I have the intellectual capacity to raise the money in no time."

    Shakey looked at me like I had belched at a church social. "What are you talking about?"

    "My friend," I said, drawing myself up to my full height, thus accentuating my words. "I have one of the finest brains in the territory. Why, if you could buy brains in a department store, you would have to go to Gimbel’s to find any the quality of mine."

    Shakey was looking at me with a sick expression on his face that told me he didn’t have the slightest idea what I was talking about. I sighed, disappointed.

    "What I am trying to tell you, my dear, impetuous friend, is that with my superior imagination, complemented by a rather devious nature, I shall be able to convince some poor unsuspecting individual to part with five Gs, or an amount close enough so that you may be spared your thumbs and kneecaps."

    His sickly expression did not change. He continued to stare, mouth open, eyes wide, like a school kid who had just met Superman, or even Lois Lane.

    "Leonard," I said, using his Christian name, "please shut your mouth and listen closely. I will need your help in this endeavor. But I will try to keep it simple so as to minimize the risk and the associated pain that may result if you should screw up."

    He blinked, closed his mouth and swallowed. I watched in fascination as his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. No one had an Adam’s apple as big or as bouncy as Shakey’s.

    I started to look at my watch, realized that it was no longer a part of my estate, but was in the temporary custody of Big Al, the local pawnbroker. Shifting my eyes to the clock behind the bar, I saw that it was two-fifteen in the afternoon.

    "I want you to leave these premises for the time being," I said." "But you must return at three-thirty. On the dot. Don’t return at three twenty-nine or three thirty-one. Is that clear?"

    Shakey blinked. "What are you gonna do, Parson?"

    "Leave the skull-work to me, my good man. Just be sure you are here at three-thirty. I will be somewhere in this establishment, and will most likely be engaged in conversation with someone who at the moment is unknown to you or me. Stand at the bar or sit nearby so I can talk to you when the occasion presents itself. Got it?"

    "What will you talk to me about?" he asked.

    "That is irrelevant. Just be certain that no matter what I say that you agree with me. And most importantly, you don’t know me."

    "But I..."

    "Now, now," I interrupted. "I must have your complete cooperation if this venture is to succeed. Understand?"

    Shakey blinked and swallowed again, setting off another frenzied dancing of his Adam’s apple.

    "Remember," I said, "you never saw me before in your life."

    Shakey nodded his head, the bewildered expression in his eyes making him appear like a treed chipmunk. I waited a moment, then took him by the arm and turned him toward the door. "Go."

    He headed for the door, stopping from time to time to peer over his shoulder at me. I shooed him on with a wave of my hand.

    I sat back down and put my head in my hands. This was going to be a challenge, I thought. Certainly it would require all the genius that even I could muster. It was going to take more than simple bar bets, trivia questions, and coin tricks to raise the amount of money in question. I ordered another beer and sat back to cogitate.

    Eventually, as I knew it would, a brilliant idea formed in my fertile brain. I drained the last of my beer, plunked the bottle down on the table, and left. I walked swiftly to my humble flat a few blocks away. Tucked away in the corner of my closet was a small black doctor’s bag which I had appropriated some time ago to use on an occasion such as this. I rummaged through the box in the bathroom that served as a medicine chest, finally extracted a bottle of pills and threw them in the bag. I added a box of band aids, a bottle of rubbing alcohol and a few odds and ends to the bag and snapped it shut.

    Glancing in the mirror, I realized that I was wearing a slightly soiled T shirt with a picture of P.T. Barnum on the front and the saying, "There’s One Born Every Minute" on the back. This was hardly appropriate attire for the occasion. Being a man of Spartan tastes, I had to make do with a threadbare suit, short-sleeved dress shirt and string tie. Not very impressive, but in the darkness of the bar it should be adequate.

    Having completed the preliminaries, I went back to the bar, took a table near the back of the room, and waited.

    My patience was rewarded less than a half hour later. I was nursing my third beer when this guy waltzes through the door, smoking a ten dollar cigar and sporting a carnation in the lapel of his Brooks Brothers suit-coat. He reeked of wealth. The ring on his finger was worth more than the last three cars I owned. And the goon who followed him around like a puppy dog carried a rod under his coat that was big enough to do severe damage to a charging elephant.

    The guy looked around the room, squinting through his own cigar smoke, surveying each of us like we were specimens under a microscope. Finally, he took the cigar out of his mouth, flicked the ashes on the floor and plunked himself down at the table next to mine.

    "Whiskey," he said to Mick, the bartender. "And beer for my boy Charlie here." He cocked his head in the general direction of the goon and smiled like a barracuda.

    Mick popped the cap on a bottle of beer, set it on the table, then poured a generous finger of Jack Daniels into a glass.

    The Barracuda nudged the goon in the ribs with his elbow, causing the latter to emit a grunt. "Pay da man," he said.

    The goon pulled out a wad of bills so big that it brought tears to my eyes. He peeled off a C-note and flipped it to Mick.

    The Barracuda obviously had not gained his vast wealth by asserting any intelligence, since it was plain to see that he had none to spare. In fact, the stone in his tie clip was bigger than his brain. I smiled. He would be the perfect foil for my project. Wealthy. Self-assured. Arrogant. And, best of all, dumb.

    The door swung open and Shakey appeared. I looked at the clock. It was three thirty exactly. I nodded, satisfied. At least he did that much right.

    It was time for action. I stood up, picked up my bag and stretched. Pretending no interest in the man, I walked past his table. A few feet beyond I stopped and turned.

    "Oh, my God," I said, staring at Barracuda’s neck. "Oh, you poor man."

    Barracuda glared at me over his drink. "What’s da matter wid you?" he growled.

    "Nothing is wrong with me," I replied. "It’s you that has the disease."

    "Disease? What disease?"

    I stepped closer, leaned down and studied his neck. "Oh, yes. You have it. I’m certain."

    He reached a beefy hand up and shoved my face away from his neck. "What are you talkin’ about?"

    "Listen," I said. "I’m a doctor. I specialize in the upper respiratory tracheotomy region of the human body." I paused briefly to let the full effect of my words sink in. He continued to glower, but a look of concern crept into his bleary eyes.

    "So what?" he asked. "I don’t like doctors. They don’t let me do fun things like drink or smoke or eat french fries."

    "I’m not concerned about your eating habits," I said. "But you have a rare disease. So rare in fact, that it didn’t even have a name until two years ago."

    "Oh, yeah?" he said, sitting up straight. "What is it?"

    I sighed. "Lucretia’s Psychedelic Syndrome". I waved a hand. "But that’s unimportant. It is a disease of the throat and neck that manifests itself by a distinct discoloration of the skin." I studied his neck again, grunting from time to time. Finally, I straightened and shook my head. "You have it, all right. No doubt about it."

    "What makes you so sure? I don’t see no discolorization like you say." He pushed his head toward the goon. "Hey, Charlie. Do you see any of that discolorization like this guy here says is there on my neck?"

    The goon frowned into Barracuda’s neck for a minute, then shook his head. "Nope, boss. It don’t look like nothin’ to me."

    "Ah, but you have been associated with him so long that you wouldn’t notice any change." I turned to Shakey who had taken a seat at the table next to us, and sat there trying hard to look like he was someplace else. "Sir," I said to him.

    Shakey looked up.

    "Would you look at this gentleman’s neck, please?"

    Shakey looked at me like I had lost a few buttons, then shrugged and stood up. He frowned at Barracuda’s neck like it was some kind of UFO.

    "Do you see the pallor of his skin?" I asked. "It has a distinctly bluish cast, not like the healthful flesh colored hue of a healthy man."

    Shakey nodded. "Definitely pallored," he said.

    Barracuda snorted. "Get outta here," he said.

    I shook my head ruefully. "If you wish. But I couldn’t sleep knowing that I did not do everything in my power to help alleviate the suffering of a fellow creature such as yourself who is so unfortunate as to be afflicted."

    "Suffering?" He said. "What suffering?"

    "Ah," I said, pursing my lips like one of those PhD type professors. "I failed to tell you that in the latter stages of this disease, great distress is experienced in the torso, feet and aurora borealis of the ears."

    "Yeah?" he said. "How bad does it hurt?"

    I bowed my head silently and passed my hands over my eyes.

    "Dat bad, huh?" he said.

    I nodded.

    He thought for a few minutes, then frowned. "Well I don’t got no disease of da neck like you say. So get outta here before Charlie’s finger gets itchy to pull a trigger what he has on his gun even as I speak."

    I squared my shoulders. "As you wish," I said., "but I would be remiss if I didn’t investigate this further. Just a few questions, and then I shall take my leave."

    He started to protest, but I held up my hand. "Follow my hand with your eyes." I moved my hand back and forth in front of his face. His eyes followed dutifully.

    I pursed my lips and clucked.

    "What’s da matter?" he asked.

    "Your eyes," I said. "They don’t synchronize, but move in their own orbital structure as if they were from two different persons. That’s a symptom of the disease."

    He looked worried. I pressed on. "When you sleep at night, do you sleep on your back or your stomach?"

    "Neither,," he said. "I sleep on my side."

    "Right side?"

    "Yeah."

    "That’s it! I was afraid of that," I said. "You have the disease just as sure as I am standing here."

    Barracuda tugged at his nose thoughtfully, then straightened his tie, eyeing me all the while.

    "Are you really a sawbones?"

    "Of course."

    Another tug of the nose. Then he looked me in the eye. "I don’t believe ya."

    "My dear man," I said. "I have a degree from the University of Kodiak, majoring in the Science of Metaphysical and Biodegradable Isometrics. And you are a very sick man."

    That got his attention. "Yeah?" he said in a more subdued tone. "And you say I got this terrible disease, ‘Licorice Delicatessen’?"

    "You have all the classic symptoms," I said, overlooking the mispronunciation, "But there is one final test which will remove all doubt." While I talked I reached in my pocket and unsnapped a safety pin which I normally use to plug up the hole so my money doesn’t spill out, on the occasions when I have money to spill. I hid the pin in my left hand. With my right hand I pressed his neck.

    "When I touch the upper neck just under the chin you will feel a sharp pain in your thigh if you have this disease," I said. Slowly I ran my fingers up his neck. When I reached his chin, I jabbed the pin into his thigh.

    He jumped and howled. The goon leaped out of the chair and started for me, but Barracuda waved for him to sit down.

    "I got the disease," he said, and for a minute I thought he was going to cry. "Is it serious?"

    I let my shoulders droop in mock despair. "I’m afraid so."

    "How bad?"

    "Indeed," I said, "if you don’t treat it you may have two, perhaps three months to live."

    "Two or t’ree months! You gotta help me, Doc."

    I smiled brightly. "You are indeed a lucky man, sir," I said. "Not only did you have the good fortune of coming into this fine establishment at the very moment when I did. But you did it at such a time when there has been a major breakthrough in a cure for this most insidious disease."

    Barracuda’s eyes bored into my face as I talked. It was apparent from his expression that he only comprehended a very small portion of what I had said. But at the mention of the word, "cure", his eyes lit up and his fish smile creased his face.

    "Mind you, this drug is still experimental, but it works on lab rats."

    "Where can I get dis drug?"

    I smiled. "I happen to have some with me," I said. "I am just coming back from a medical convention in Boston where the researchers presented a paper on this very disease."

    "Let me have it," he said, reaching for my bag.

    I pushed his hand away. "As I said, it’s a new drug. And terribly expensive."

    "I don’t care how much it costs," Barracuda said. "I ain’t gonna die. Let’s have it."

    I rubbed my chin and frowned thoughtfully. Then I reached in my bag and took out the bottle of pills that I had found in my medicine chest. I held it up to the light and turned it in my hand while Barracuda watched intently.

    "Is that them?" he said, licking his lips.

    "Yes," I said. "The last of my stock."

    "How much?" he asked.

    I opened the bottle and poured the pills into my hand. I counted them out. "There are seventeen here," I said. "That is more than you need. You should take one pill a day for two weeks. Fourteen days, fourteen pills," I added lest he couldn’t count that high.

    "How much?" he repeated.

    "They cost five hundred dollars apiece," I said.

    "What?" he exploded and stood up. "Dem look like plain asperns to me."

    I replaced the pills in the bottle and put the cap on. "As I stated early on, sir, these are rare and valuable pills. The only place this drug is found is in the upper mountain regions of the Andes. It’s a two day trip by llama."

    Dropping the pills in my bag, I stood up. "I am sorry that you cannot afford these pills. My deepest sympathies to you and those whom you will leave behind as you depart this earth and go to your reward--whatever that may be."

    I started to leave. "Just a minute," he yelled. He turned to the goon. "How much money ya got on ya, Charlie?"

    Charlie pulled the roll from his pocket and peeled off the bills one by one. "Five thousand-seven hundred dollars, boss," he said.

    I extracted the pills from the bag and held them out to the Barracuda. "Out of the goodness of my heart and my earnest desire not to see a fellow human being expire for the lack of a few paltry thousand dollars, I will let you have these pills." I opened the bottle, counted out three pills, and put them in my pocket. Then I handed the bottle to the barracuda.

    I thought he was going to kiss me. I stepped back to avoid that possibility, while pocketing the money. "Remember, now," I said. "Take one pill a day, at dinner, and drink plenty of water."

    Barracuda cringed at the prospect, and I suspected it was the water as much as the pills that caused his dismay. I bowed courteously from the waist, picked up my bag, and left.

    I was safely entrenched in my walkup flat, counting the money for the third time, when Shakey arrived, smiling from ear to ear. He grabbed me in a bear hug and appeared ready to kiss me when I broke free.

    "You’re a genius!" he shouted. "I am forever in your debt."

    I nodded agreement at both of his utterances. "Yes, I know. But what are friends for if you cannot count on them to help you in your darkest hours?"

    I counted out the money, stopping when I reached five grand. With a flourish I held the dough out to Shakey while pocketing the remaining seven hundred for services rendered. "Now, post haste yourself over to Jody’s while you are still able to walk upright," I said. "And don’t go by the race track on your way."

    It was some time after Shakey had departed that it occurred to me what those pills were. They had strong laxative qualities about them that I failed to mention to the Barracuda. Ah, but I suppose by now that he has discovered that for himself. I trust it did not cause him too much discomfort.