The sounds of the sunrise city slowly swelled as I struggled to regain consciousness and stop alliterating in my sleep -- with a little help from the glass of water Motli chucked in my face. Startled, I shot up at my desk and saw her dash the entire rest of the pitcher in her own face. She was SO weird, that girl. "Feel better?" I asked, as purple lip gloss drooled down her chin. My words were halting and slurred. "Wow... something warm and fuzzy died in my mouth. I hate that. What did we DO last night?"

Motli wiped her face with the sleeve of her attractive green blouse. "You were slamming down shots for every correct answer on the quiz I gave you, remember?" I nodded, vaguely remembering. "Well," she said, "you learned a LOT last night."

"Shouldn't have made it an open book quiz, I guess." I glanced at my watch. "Holy Moly, Motli, we've got thirty minutes to get to LAX! This Safari Don jerkweed is gonna be nothing but a bad memory if I don't. There's no way I'm gonna make it."

"Not to worry, Acey," Motli said, perking up. "Remember, I've got skills! Meet me downstairs." She dashed out of the office without another word. I didn't know what skills she was talking about, but unless they included the ability to teleport objects through space I didn't see how they were going to be of much use.

I stumbled downstairs and planted myself on the curb with my head between my legs. I didn't even hear the malicious roar cut through the air as Motli screeched to a halt just inches from my toes on a full-dress, flame-and-chrome Hog. I had to admit Motli looked fierce straddling this monster, decked out in purple and green leathers and a barely legal Viking helmet. "Nice bike," I muttered.

"Thanks," she said. "I been saving my dividend payments for years for this baby. Hop on, Acey. I'll get you to the airport on time."

That she did -- if nothing else, the girl could ride. We slid in and out of rush hour traffic like a lab rat chasing stale a stale-cheese reward. Somehow or other (I had my eyes closed) she also managed to get us onto the tarmac and up to the gate where Safari Don's private cargo plane was just about to load the last of the animal cages. Motli skidded to a stop. I ran up the ramp, drew my piece, and shouted "FREEZE!"

There was no one there to freeze except two burly Latinos with a lemur cage between them. "Put... the... lemur... down," I commanded. They did. "Step away from the lemur." Again, they did. I directed them off of the plane and made a quick count of the cages. There were nine, all right, just as there had been listed in Safari Don's day planner. And since both Cashman at the zoo and the manifest on the plane listed only eight animals...

One by one I pulled off the tarps covering the cages. I found a zebra, a sloth, a lemur... until there was only one cage left. I knew what I was gonna find in the ninth cage. I only hoped I was in time. "Motli, get up here!" I yelled. I figured if Rachel was alive inside the last cage she might need a woman's touch to soothe her. I grabbed a fistful of tarp and yanked as hard as I could. BINGO! There was Rachel, wrapped in a leopardskin sarong, and drugged out of her mind, but still alive... which was more than I could say for Safari Don, who was lying next to her in a pool of his own blood, deader than driftwood. A crimson smile had been carved into his handsome face.

"Oh dear," I said. "This certainly puts a new wrinkle in things."

"I'll say. Isn't he supposed to be the villain?" I nodded. "Well, then he's really BAD at it, Acey. That wound ain't self-inflicted, and there's no way the gal could've done it. So...."

Yeah, I thought. So. Looked like I was still on the case.

I found the captain at the front of the plane and told him to radio airport security. Me and Motli sat watching the sloth do nothing until they arrived. "So tell me, Mot. These dividend thingies..." I said, drawing out some numbers on a nearby box. "I noticed when I was going over the late Safari Don's books that they don't show up on an income statement. The Bazaar had 3,500 in revenues and 3,100 expenses, for earnings of 400. But it also paid a 250 dividend and that doesn't show up on the income statement. Why not? Dividends are payments, so what else can they be but expenses?"

1) Dividends do show up on income statements, but are grouped with interest expense. So the 250 dividend is included in the 3,100 expenses.

2) Dividends are not expenses, but distributions of earnings to shareholders.

3) Dividends appear on balance sheets, not income statements.

4) Dividends are paid in stock, not in cash, so are not an expense.

Income Statement information provided by Joe Louderback.

The answer is 2) Dividends are not expenses, but distributions of earnings to shareholders.

Dividends are a deduction in calculating retained earnings, which we recall from episodes on the balance sheet, but because they are distributions of earnings or profits to owners, they are not expenses. One description of an expense is that it is incurred to generate revenues. Dividends do not generate revenues. Dividends appear in the Statement of Retained Earnings, so if Bazaar Safari had begun the year with 1,200 retained earnings, its Statement would show:

Safari Don's Bazaar Safari
Statement of Retained Earnings
(In hundreds of thousands)
Year Ended December 31, 1996

Retained earnings, January 1, 1996   1,200 
Net income                             400 
                                     ------
Subtotal                             1,600 
Dividends                              250 
                                     ------
Retained earnings, December 31, 1996 1,350 

Motli finished up her mind-numbing explanation just as security arrived. We were dragged down to the main office to explain what we knew, which I had to admit wasn't much. There had been no doubt in my mind that Safari Don was bad guy in this scenario, so it had never occurred to me to look elsewhere.

And now I had nowhere else to look. Tomorrow, I'd have to start all over.

Tomorrow: Episode 6:
Back on the Hunt

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