“Stop him!” he yelled at the top of his lungs.

The fat man Smoke had met at Muskrat’s Auto Rescue and soon after burglarized was pointing right at Smoke and yelling. Smoke was cool. He looked around and shrugged.

“What a wacko,” he said to the man and woman picnicking next to him.

Cops were running out. One galloped up on a horse. They were trying to calm the fat man and get him out of the street. Smoke smiled. This was going to be better than he thought. He zoomed in on Weed. The little retard was crashing and flashing his cymbals, the dude to the left trying to outdo him on the snare drum. Smoke took his time. He didn’t want to slip his hand into the pouch again until the fat man quit pointing at him.

“Somebody do something!” the fat man was screaming as two cops grabbed his arms. “Get him, not me! The kid up there in the Stanley tool belt!”

Pigeon was concerned. He walked out on the street as Bubba struggled with the cops and continued to yell.

“Look, he’s with me,” Pigeon told the cop on the horse.

“Stand back!” the cop yelled at Pigeon.

“It’s his tool belt. You can see the white initials on the buckle. I mean with binoculars you can.” Pigeon wasn’t to be deterred. “The kid stole it.”

Bubba’s binoculars flew off. A pistol fell out of somewhere and clattered to the street. This seemed to upset the cops quite a lot. All of them snatched handcuffs and red pepper spray off their belts. The Godwin band quit playing and froze as some little kid suddenly broke out of formation and rolled his cymbal down the street. Pigeon realized it was Weed.

Chief Hammer had no idea what was going on. The parade halted as what sounded like a huge bronze hubcap rolled toward her car.

“What’s happening?” Hammer asked, standing up in the back seat, trying to see.

West stopped the car.

“GET DOWN!” Brazil yelled as he pushed Hammer to the floor and band members jumped out of the way and the cymbal hit a little dip in the road and picked up speed, loudly flying past, scattering the Mason clowns, sending Sergeant Santa scurrying, almost running the mayor’s car into the crowd. The Florettes dropped their batons.

Jed saw the cymbal coming before Lelia Ehrhart did, and he suddenly threw the red Cadillac into reverse. Azalea bushes jumped off the back seat, clay pots breaking, bees darting out of harm’s way, dirt flying everywhere as streamers of blue ribbons changed direction and flew in Ehrhart’s face.

The blond cop Jed had picked up in the cemetery the other day had just leaped out of Chief Hammer’s car and was running like hell. Jed slammed on the brakes. A pink azalea bush sailed over the back of the front seat and Ehrhart shrieked. The cymbal went screaming past, flashing in the sun like a runaway gold chariot wheel.