Muddy got to his knees, but the weight of the hookah kept his head tilted on the ground. He grabbed the hookah handles, and as he straightened to his knees, he lifted his head upright with a grunt.
Theodore asked, “What’s that thing on your head?”
“It’s a hookah, master, a water pipe, and I cannot get it off.” Muddy pulled as hard as he dared, then moaned and sucked in a sizzling breath of pain.
“Does it hurt?”
Muddy nodded—a foolish move. His forehead banged against the hookah twice. Startled, he fell backward this time. He lay there, sprawled on his back, seeing an ocean of stars flash before his eyes like fireflies.
After a dizzy second or two, he answered in the quietest voice he could, “It only hurts if I try to pull it off, speak, or fall on it.”
It was tensely quiet, too quiet, which made Muddy wonder exactly where Hank and his knife were.
“I wish...” Theodore cried out suddenly, “I wish the hookah was off Muddy’s head!”
A second later, the hookah disappeared in a puff of purple smoke.
* * *
Hank stareddownat some crackpot wearing earrings and stupid pants. The man was lying face up in the sand. He looked up at everyone, one by one, then lifted his fingers and wiggled them. “Howdy, folks.”
“Don’t move,” Hank warned, shifting closer and slowly waving the knife with the street skill he’d learned some thirty years before.
The man looked at Hank, then at the knife blade, which caught a flash of sunlight. His stunned eyes filled with fear and grew huge. He shook so hard that the small golden hoop earrings he wore in each ear quivered.
He was dark skinned and big nosed, with thick eyebrows, dark eyes, and a pointed chin covered with a small black goatee—the same color as his hair, which stuck out from his head like the spiky leaves of an island pineapple.
Even though he lay flat on the ground, his stomach was paunchy. He wore a spangled multicolored vest that Hank couldn’t imagine any man coming near—even for a bucketful of sawbucks—and a wide sissy belt that went with those fluffy purple pants.
It got worse. His shoes were some shiny green and blue fabric, like a woman’s fancy dress, all froufrou and shimmery. Hank looked down at the chump’s feet and almost groaned aloud. The toes of the shoes were curled up. And if that wasn’t bad enough, bells dangled from the tips like brass dingleberries.
Hank stared at the man’s wrists, which were banded with wide bracelets made of what was, to Hank’s practiced eye, eighteen-karat gold and worth at least a few months of living expenses. High living expenses.
Hank took a long and assessing look back up to the genie’s face. His dark eyes were wide and cautious, watching every motion Hank made. The guy’s face and neck were red from holding his breath.
“Stand up.” Hank gestured with the knife, and the chump was on his feet before those bells on his toes could ring.
Even though he looked like a nut, there was something harmless about him. Probably because he was shaking so badly his earrings and gaudy vest shimmied. It was hard to believe there could be any imminent danger from someone who wore the same pants as the belly dancer at Club Morocco.
Hank raised the knife and cast a quick glance at Smitty. She sat on a rock, her mouth open and her face pale. He turned back. “Okay, chump. Spill it.”
“What?”
“Your game.”
The guy frowned. “Chess? Badminton? Base—”
Hank took a step closer. “I’m no fool. What are you? Some kind of mesmerist? Magician? What?”
“I told you. I’m a genie.”
“Yeah and I told you I’m Sinbad.”
“Actually, you said you were Aladdin—”
Hank pressed the knife against the man’s neck.
“Sinbad,” he babbled in a rush. “I’m an ignorant fool who must have heard you wrong.”
