but when I did, the disguise as a War veteran worked well. Such was the stigma, most folk simply averted their gaze when they saw one.
There was a knock on the caravan door. I opened it and Calamity burst in.
'Take your time, won't you?'
'Sorry, I didn't hear you.'
'It's freezing out there, like the middle of winter.'
'It's all right, I've made coffee, that will warm you up.'
She took off her anorak and walked over to the table. 'I've made some progress.'
'Oh yeah?'
'It could be the breakthrough we've been waiting for.'
She opened her school satchel and pulled out three books. I picked them up and read the titles.
'I got them from the school library. You won't believe who was the last person to borrow them.'
'Brainbocs?'
'No. Guess again.'
'Sorry, chum, that's my best effort.'
'You won't believe it.'
'Amaze me.'
'Evans the Boot!'
I picked up the
'I don't think so. Look at the title page.'
Obediently I opened the book. Letters were missing from the title page, crudely cut out with scissors leaving jagged edges.
'He got into trouble for it, you see. That's how I knew. I remember hearing this story ages ago about how he turned up at the library one day and borrowed all these weird books. And then when he returned them he'd cut them up. So I checked on his record which ones they were.'
I opened the other two books; each one had been vandalised in the same way.
'OK, clever-clogs, what does it mean?'
As if impatiently waiting for this question she took out a piece of paper and unfolded it.
'These are the letters he cut out: O.V.E.N.L.O.O.P.S.'
'You still got me.'
'Rearrange them.'
I stared at the paper for a second and then it hit me. 'Lovespoon!'
'That's right!'
'So what does it all mean?'
'What do people use cut-out letters for?'
I shrugged.
'Blackmail notes of course. He was blackmailing the Welsh teacher. No wonder they did him in.'
I thought about the significance of it for a few seconds but it did little to lift my depression.
'Don't get carried away with excitement will you?'
'Sorry, Calamity, I'm sitting here wanted for the murder of a prostitute. It's difficult to get excited about things.'
'But this is the way we're going to clear your name.'
'I don't see how.'
'Evans was blackmailing Lovespoon. Why? Because he copied Brainbocs's homework and found out something incriminating about the teacher. What else do we know about Evans? He stole a rare tea cosy from the Museum. Now it's my guess these two facts are related.'
'Sure, but what's the link?'
'I don't know. We haven't got all the pieces of the jigsaw yet.'
'But it doesn't really take us forwards. We already know why Lovespoon killed Evans.'
She looked at me, the frustration bringing tears to her eyes. 'We have to explore every angle, Louie. We have to be thorough, we're building a case, sod it!'
'OK. What else have you got?'
She pushed the books away and placed her palms flat down on the table. 'Operation 'stove-search' not so good. Bianca could have hidden the essay in any number of stoves. I tried yours but Mrs Llantrisant wouldn't let me into the kitchen. She said you wouldn't be needing a stove, clean or otherwise, where you were going. It would be bread and water down at Cwmtydu Prison for you from now on.'
'I'm touched she has so much confidence in me.'
'She said, 'You never really know anyone, do you?' Then I went to Bianca's flat and tried there but it was cordoned off and the policeman wouldn't let me in. I said I'd come to clean the stove and he said he'd never heard such a load of codswallop in all his life. I waited till he was replaced by another policeman. Then I tried again and this time I said I wanted to go and see my auntie who lived above Bianca and was ninety years old and very frail and I had to check up on her now and again just to make sure she wasn't dead.'
My eyes widened at that one, but I said nothing.
'So he let me in and I sneaked into Bianca's flat and just as I was checking the stove the first policeman turned up and caught me. He drags me downstairs saying he's going to give me a good hiding and down at the bottom when we got to the gate the other policeman looks up and says, 'Sarge, I've heard it all now, there's a woman here who wants to clean the stove!' And do you know who it was? It was Mrs Llantrisant!'
This time we both looked at each other and stared.
'Mrs Llantrisant?'
She nodded
'I don't like the sound of that. Not at all.'
'Not much chance of it being coincidence is there?'
'I'm afraid not. So then what happened?'
'I bit the policeman's hand and ran for it.' She paused and then said, 'Are you angry?'
I blinked in puzzlement. 'Angry? What for?'
'Because I gave the game away.'
'No you didn't!'
'I did. Because of me she found out we were looking in stoves. I screwed up.'
I punched her playfully in the arm. 'Kid you did a brilliant job. I really take my hat off to you and one day — maybe next week — you are going to be a famous private eye.'
Her face brightened. 'Well I'd better get back to them stoves.'
I raised a hand. 'Don't worry about the stoves.'
'No?'
'By my reckoning, counting out my stove and Bianca's which you have checked, there must be about 3,998 left in town. It's hopeless.'
She blew a raspberry. 'What sort of talk is that?'
'Look, the way my luck is going, it will start snowing soon and then every stove in town will be lit up anyway.'
She picked up her coat. 'We don't need to check every stove in town. We just have to work out what her movements were and check the ones she would have had access to. It's simple.'
Later that afternoon I decided to go out. It was not a clever thing to do with half the countryside looking for me, but I decided, what the hell. I might as well be arrested as sit in the caravan doing nothing. I tied the old coat on with the packing string and covered my hands and face with soil. It was bitterly cold out so I stuffed crumpled-up newspaper inside my coat as insulation. Lastly, and this was something I hated most of all, I smeared myself with a liquid I had prepared from rotting fish, boiled cabbage and mouldy cheese. It was the nearest I could get to that
