January 29 2008

There is quite a bit of violence in traditional children's fairy tales, so many of them could easily be recast as detective stories.  An example is:

The Snow White Caper

The name's Nick Danger and I'm a private shamus who works the Bay Area.  One morning, I sat in my office as I looked out at the shroud of smog that blanketed the city.  I wasn't feeling my best. It might have been the twelve double rum boxcars I'd drunk the night before or the pitcher of gin I'd had with breakfast. Whatever the reason, I was slightly wasted.  Then, she walked in.

I knew right away that she was trouble.  She had a pair of shapely legs and a figure that would have made a Bhuddist monk have naughty thoughts.  She looked at me with her piercing blue eyes and smiled.

"Hello, Mr. Danger," she said.

"You're Snow White."

Her blue eyes widened slightly.

"How did you know that?"

"Look, Angel, I may be a low rent gumshoe, but I read the society pages now and then."

"Very good, Mr. Danger. I want you to find Prince Charming for me. He hasn't been home for two days now and I think he's cheating on me with The Wicked Queen."

"Sorry, but I don't do divorce work."

Snow opened her purse, took out a check and threw it onto my desk.  When I looked at it, the zeros seemed to go on forever.

"Is that enough money to interest you in my case?" Snow asked.

"It's enough to make it my mission in life. I'll get right on it."

"Fine," Snow said.  "Call me when you find my husband."

As she turned and sashayed out of my office, I wondered what Prince Charming could've been thinking.

The rest of my day was routine.  I slapped information out of a few people, dodged slugs fired from two or three passing cars and got beaten to a pulp by two goons in an alley.  All in a day's work. Then I got a hot tip from a bartender that led me to Prince Charming.  He and The Wicked Queen had taken a room at The Passion Pit Motel on the outskirts of town.  I called Snow with the news.

"Thanks," Snow said. "I'll be in touch."  Then she hung up.

That night, I switched on the TV news and saw a story about how Prince Charming and The Wicked Queen had been found dead at The Passion Pit Motel. They'd been riddled by bullets and the motel clerk wasn't being much help to the cops.  All he remembered about the killers was that there were seven of them and none was more than four feet tall.

I went looking for Snow to get some answers, but she'd skipped town already.  I didn't mind so much that I'd been lied to and set up.  That goes with the job. There was something else that bothered me more.  Her check bounced too.

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Maybe you can think of some other fairy tales that could be reworked this way.  Any suggesions?

George

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