Page 19 of The Alibi Club

“Oh yeah? Good ones, I hope.” Theo smiled. He seemed chivalrous. Maybe it was the Crocs Theo was wearing that put Jamie off. Maybe.

You’re on a date! Be normal, you freak! Jamie pushed away her annoying intuition and took his arm as he guided her into the dark entryway.

He knocked on the door. A small window opened and Theo said, “Mad Hatter.”

The heavy door swung in and they strode into the bar. He looked at Jamie. “You need a password, isn’t that cool?”

Jamie half-heartedly smiled. The last thing I need is to remember another password to get a drink. She walked inside and as her eyes adjusted to the darkness, Jamie could smell orange peel, the musty scent of old books, and new leather.

A polished dark walnut bar ran the length of the room on the right-hand side. Edison lamps were strategically placed around the room to create a glow more than actually cast light. On the left, rich brown leather sofas sat facing each other.

When Jamie looked up to the walls, she began to see all manner of mounted animal heads. There was your basic taxidermy represented: deer, elk, and various trout families. But upon closer inspection, there were some bizarre additions. She stood there trying to take it all in when Theo interrupted. Little alarm bells were going off in her ears.

“The house special is a Maple Old Fashioned. Would you like one?”

“Uh, sure.”

Theo led Jamie to two barstools. She took a seat and gazed back at the walls, trying to grasp what she was seeing. This was taxidermy on overdrive. Some of the stuffed creatures were given human accoutrements. A wolverine with an eyeglass holding a book, a rabbit with a martini shaker, two foxes with ping-pong paddles.

“So, you like the place?” Theo asked.

Jamie looked around, cataloging the dozens of carcasses that had been stuffed, shellacked, and mounted on the walls. A bronzed turtle rested on the coffee table next to a stuffed squirrel who was holding a candy dish. She tore her eyes away from the menagerie of dead critters and drew her attention back to Theo, who handed her a drink. Brown liquor, little cherry, huge ice cube that hadn’t even started to melt yet.

“It’s really…” she wanted to say creepy but decided that might be too rude, so she went with “interesting.” She motioned to the walls.

“Ah, it’s an incredible collection, if I do say so myself.” Theo grinned as he regarded the walls.

Jamie sensed something. “Wait a minute. Are these yours?”

Theo bowed like a prince. “I am the artist responsible for all the work you see before you.”

“The art?”

“Yes, I do all my own work. I have a deep and abiding love for taxidermy.” He led her by the arm toward the back of the bar. “Let me show you my favorite.”

She warily allowed herself to be steered to the darker recesses of the bar, her head on a swivel trying to locate the nearest exit just in case. “So, I presume you hunt these animals and stuff them?” she asked.

“Everyone has a hobby, right?” he said brightly. He stopped and pointed to yet another poor animal head. But this time it was a chihuahua. The little gold plate next to the poor glass-eyed dog read Lola.

“You shot and stuffed your dog?” Jamie’s mouth hung agape until she had to use her hand to close it.

He chuckled. “I didn’t shoot her. Are you crazy?”

Jamie muttered under her breath, “I am definitely not this crazy,” as the hair rose on the back of her neck.

Theo raised his hand to pet the tiny dog head. Jamie shuddered. Theo continued, “I had her euthanized at the end, then I took her home, removed all her internal organs, and—”

“Please don’t say you had fava beans and a nice chianti,” Jamie interrupted.

“Ha! You’re funny—then I had her freeze-dried over a series of months, painstakingly added every hair back on to her head, and voilà! Lola is back with us.”

“She sure is.” Jamie gave a wan smile and started sweating as she worked out how she was going to get the fuck out of here without making it weird, or alerting Theo the Chihuahua Slayer to her flee response. Lord knows what kind of dungeon existed under this bar. At the moment, Theo seemed unaware of how appalling she found all this. In fact, he might have mistaken her reaction as curiosity.

“The art of preserving animals, including pets, dates back to ancient times,” Theo began. “Cleopatra had several of her lions preserved. In the Victorian era, it was in vogue for affluent families to have their hunting dogs preserved. In fact, Lewis Carroll was rumored to have had the Cheshire Cat—real name Wallace—from Alice in Wonderland stuffed and placed on the piano for inspiration.” Theo led her back to their barstools and Jamie followed, thrilled to be closer to the door.

“Fascinating,” Jamie said as her eyes continued to take in his expansive macabre collection. She spotted a stuffed manatee, the gentle sea cow of the ocean, propped up, arms holding a serving tray, smiling in the corner. Weren’t they endangered? She couldn’t help herself. “But, aren’t manatees federally protected because they’re endangered?”

Theo smiled at her and she saw the smallest twitch on his upper lip, his eyes fixed and slightly glassy, as if caught with an ax in his hand. “No, no, no, no, they’re merely considered vulnerable. I had a permit.”