I was in my office on a slow Thursday morning when I got the call. A female voice was on the other end.
"Is this Mike Hammer?"
"That's me," I answered.
"I need you to find some people for me. How much do you charge?"
"A hundred bucks a day plus expenses, " I answered.
"Meet me at Joe's bar in Chappaqua at 3 pm, OK?"
"What's your name?" I asked.
"Hillary," she answered.
"Hillary what?"
She chuckled and hung up.
So just before three I walked into Joe's place, a run-down dive bar in the upscale town of Chappaqua outside New York. Nobody was there except the bartender and this dame at the end of the bar nursing a glass of white wine. I sat at the opposite end and ordered whiskey. The dame was about 70-ish with dishwater bleached hair. She looked like she'd seen her better days. Instead of a flimsy black dress, she was wearing a black pants suit. Everything about her told me she was there to drink-not to hook up with some guy.
"Hey, uh, do you know that dame's name," I asked the bartender.
"Yeah. The name's Hillary. She started showing up last November. She's a regular now."
"Thanks." I slipped over next to her and introduced myself.
"I'm Hammer."
"So I figured," she replied.
"What are you drinking?"
"Chardonnay," she answered.
"Bartender, a chardonnay for the lady."
I asked, "So what can I do for ya, Hillary?"
"I need you to find some people for me."
"That's what you said over the phone. You ain't lookin' to kill'em I hope."
She smiled and took a sip of her wine, but didn't reply.
"OK. So who do you want me to find?"
"They're Macedonians."
"Macedonians? That sounds like some street gang or something."
"Macedonia is a country," she replied sarcastically. "It's in Eastern Europe."
"OK, so now I know. Ya wanna tell me what it's all about?"
She took another sip of wine and continued. "You see, the Macedonians are hackers and are in cahoots with the Russians. They also got a connection with Big Jim Comey."
"Whoa!" I said. "First of all, what's a hacker?"
Hillary looked at me as if I were from another century.
"Let's put it this way. They stole something from me and my friends."
"Money?" I asked.
"No-information."
"OK. Now who is Big Jim Comey?"
"Big Jim runs the FBI, " she said.
"J. Edgar Hoover won't be happy to hear that," I answered.
At this point, Hillary reached into her purse, pulled out a C-note and flipped it to me. I put it in my shirt pocket.
"Now that I'm on your payroll, why don't you tell me what this is all about? Just what is it exactly that these Macedonians, Russians and Big Jim did to you besides steal some information?"
"Look. Don't play dumb, Hammer. This has all been researched and documented by credible sources. You know what they did to me."
"Actually, I don't. Why don't you spell it out?"
"They cost me the election," she said matter of factly.
"What election?"
"President," she answered.
Getting impatient, I persisted. "President of what- the school board?"
"No, damn it," She was getting angry and her voice was rising. "President of the United States."
I finished my drink, took the C-note out of my pocket, handed it back to her, and walked out.
"F-you, Hammer!" A wine glass flew past my ear and crashed on the wall.
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