Detective Town is the safest place in the county because no crime goes unsolved. Hell, no crime goes committed. Everyone is a detective, and not one’s gone rotten. The air is full of intrigue, which leads to higher-than-average rates of lung cancer. The lone traffic light in Detective Town has three settings: black, white, and ominous pause. But now there’s a stranger in Detective Town, and he’s got everyone more suspicious than usual.

The newcomer sticks out like a lit match in a blackout because he pokes around at the discarded red herrings rotting in the gutters. Plus, he’s the only one in town without a sidekick. Every detective in Detective Town has a suppressed homoerotic relationship with a sidekick, which remains unconfirmed but clear in subtext. No sidekicks live in Detective Town, but they make the commute.

Unlike the detectives, the stranger doesn’t narrate his internal monologue out loud, which makes it difficult for them to deduce his master plan. So, one by one, each of the 621 residents of Detective Town gift him a framed photo with a hidden camera inside. One by one, the stranger thanks them but declines the gift, saying he doesn’t know anyone in the picture. Awfully convenient. They’ll have to do this the old fashioned way.

After 30 seconds of intense interrogation, the stranger introduces himself as Carl Kowalsky, a 54-year-old plumber from Chicago. He claims he took a wrong turn while driving to visit his mother, which is just what a criminal mastermind who took a wrong turn while driving to visit his mother would say. Carl cunningly suggests they’ve made a mistake and that he’d really like to go home. Likely story.

That night, the detectives host a dinner party to see if Carl will slip up. But no one sits at the table with him; they’re all too busy searching other rooms for evidence. They suspect he poisoned the food anyway. Carl calls it a night and heads out around 8pm to catch the Cubs game. When the clock strikes midnight, all clues point to the butler. But there are no butlers in Detective Town. This isn’t Butler Town.

Eventually, the detectives feel they’ve gathered enough evidence to lock Carl up, but he walks free as a bird. They can’t try anyone in Detective Town; there are no judges, juries, or jailers. Carl makes a beeline for the highway, saying he thinks he’ll get better directions home in Gas Station Attendant Town. The detectives can’t hear him because they’re all monologuing about the ironies of justice with cherrywood pipes in their mouths.