Once again, Decoder Ring Theater presents another page from the casebook of that Master of Mystery,

that's Sultan of Sleothing, Martin Bracknell's immortal detective, Black Jack Justice,

starring Christopher Mott as Jack and Andrea Lyons as Trixie Dixon Girl Detective.

There's a popular notion that passes for wisdom that says it's better to deal with the devil you know than the devil you don't.

Aside from making a nifty, if underused slogan for re-election campaigns everywhere,

I've never really seen the logic of that one.

Not that there are many old saws that you couldn't argue with, given the time and inclination.

Red sky at night, sailors delight, red sky at morning, sailors take morning, for instance.

Oh, I know full well that it refers to atmospheric conditions and the predicting of inclement weather patterns,

but it's also dangerously dependent on how you interpret sailors' delight.

Or maybe that's just me.

But as for our devils, known and otherwise, there was an onion in that ointment, too.

If you deal with the devil you know, there is a comfort level to it. You have a general idea of what you're in for and how badly you're likely to come out. But there's always a chance, isn't there? Always an outside chance that the other devil, the one you don't know, isn't a devil at all, but a door-to-door pitchfork salesman with a bad skin condition. And if you don't spin the wheel, you'll never know, will you?

Naturally, the preferred modus operandi would be to not deal with any sort of devil at all.

To be the sort that favors plain speaking, honest dealing, and possible pious living for good measure.

But the only chance there was of that ever happening would be for old

square John I to replace the hand-painted sign on the smoked glass window that read Justice and Dixon

private investigations with another one that said, gone fishing forever, please drop dead. And barring

divine intervention or the demise of wealthy and previously unknown uncles, it didn't look like we were

ever going to hang that one up.

It had been a typical case,

in that we'd floundered around blind for a while

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