Albert scrunched up his face. ‘I’m not sure. I feel like I have missed something. We all know that Alan Crystal is acting strange, and that he was attacked by a man with a baton, and then managed to accidentally ingest something that made him terribly sick yesterday. I am beginning to wonder if the three things are connected.’ He didn’t mention the man in the black leather jacket; Gary was too sceptical already.
‘Connected how?’ asked Wilson.
All Albert could do was shrug. ‘If we knew that, we might know why Brian Pumphrey went into the mixer and couldn’t get out, and we might know why Jordan Banks was stabbed.’
With a little steel in his voice, Gary said, ‘Maybe it’s time we had a chat with Mr Crystal. Perhaps he can shed some light on what is going on.’
Albert eyed his son sceptically. ‘Getting interested now are you, Gary? I thought you didn’t want to be involved in local affairs.’ Gary was about to answer, but Albert had more to say. ‘I don’t think we can quiz him yet: we don’t know anything.’
‘Jordan Banks does not own a moped,’ Sophie announced. ‘I suppose that doesn’t mean he couldn’t get hold of one, but there isn’t one registered to him.’
Albert accepted the news with a nod. ‘Alan Crystal was convenient with the truth about the mugging yesterday. He was carrying a large amount of cash with him, but I’m not sure I believed his explanation that it was the prize money. The mugger went for the briefcase as if he knew what was in it. There’s something else too …’ he tailed off without finishing his sentence.
Gary couldn’t help himself from asking, ‘What, Dad? What something else is there?’
Albert’s forehead pinched with annoyance at his son’s tone. ‘The man in the black leather jacket. I saw him three times yesterday, starting in the alley where Alan was mugged. Three is too many, especially since two of them were in the vicinity of the museum.’
Gary drew in a breath and let it go. ‘You think he could be the thief?’
‘What thief?’ asked PC Hendrix.
Gary looked her way. ‘The museum had suffered a number of thefts. Artefacts, which ought to have no value, have been stolen along with more easily shifted items such as a computer and an office printer.’
‘I don’t think it has anything to do with the murders,’ stated Albert. ‘At least, I cannot work out how to connect the two. The thief, if we focus on that for a moment, must be someone with access to the building because there is no sign of forced entry, the curator told us. The man in the black leather jacket is something different.’
‘Either way,’ said Gary, wiping his hands on a cloth to clean them. ‘I think it’s time we spoke with Mr Crystal.’
Albert was quiet for a moment, thinking about what might be missing from the puzzle. Something was, that he knew for certain, but without a clue to steer him, he didn’t know which way to look. Glancing at Sophie, he asked, ‘Is one of your colleagues following him?’
Smoking Hot Oil
The answer to his question turned out to be yes, but also no. Neither officer could currently locate the man in the bright red jacket and waistcoat. It seemed ridiculous that he could be hard to find given how utterly he stood out, but that was their report. According to the other officers here in plain clothes, Alan Crystal was nowhere to be found. He was at the competition floor one moment but gone the next. They had been searching for him for several minutes with no success.
Albert didn’t like that news at all. Before he could make a decision about what to do about it, Sarah, the woman with the unkempt hair and the clipboard rushed up to the edge of the world record food prep area.
‘I say,’ she called, waving her arm to get attention. ‘I say.’
Albert looked her way, wondering what she might want so urgently and discovering it was distinctly him that she was looking at. He pointed a thumb at his own body in question.
‘Yes,’ said Sarah. ‘You were with Alan yesterday. Have you seen him in the last few minutes? The next round of puddings needs to be judged and he seems to have vanished.’ She was doing the very British thing of playing down the utter panic she felt.
Albert shook his head. ‘Sorry, no. I haven’t seen him in more than an hour.’ That wasn’t strictly true because often when he looked up, he could see the man’s bright red jacket moving somewhere in the crowd.
‘Bother,’ she muttered, which was a posh British substitute for many words that wouldn’t make it into print. ‘I shall have to ask Amber to step in.’ Still muttering to herself, she bustled away looking harried and stressed.
Just then, Dave 2 popped his head back through the flap of the marquee, sending a waft of cool autumn air inside. ‘Is your last batch ready?’
‘Last?’ echoed Gary.
Dave 2 beamed. ‘Yeah! That’s it. The other teams,’ there were four of them all making the batter to get it ready, ‘are all doing their last ones too. We have enough, so now it’s time to start the pour.’
‘Oh, thank heavens,’ said Wilson, who probably wasn’t going to want eggs for breakfast for a while.
Whether it was fatigue induced madness or stress pumping adrenalin through his veins, Dave 2 was vibrating with excitement. ‘If you drop that batch off at the mixer, come outside and you can see it. This is either going to work brilliantly or be a complete disaster. The oil in the pan is smoking hot now, though it’s making the fire brigade a little nervous, truth be told. You know what? I think this might just work.’
