Chief Inspector Doyle frowned again. ‘Excuse me?’
Albert crossed the room to look in the bin but then stopped himself and looked to Rex. ‘Rex, is there anything in this room that smells of Syrup of Ipecac?’
Now CI Doyle’s tone turned incredulous. ‘You’re asking the dog questions?’
When Albert acquired Rex as a pretend assistance dog, he had no idea what skills he came with, or if he was getting a good dog, or a duff one. All he really knew was that Rex would be well trained and obedient, which he was. Increasingly though, Albert was coming to suspect that Rex was something else, something … special.
Rex did not require a fresh sample of air to know the horrible medicine wasn’t here. How to convey that message though?
Albert tried something. ‘Bark if there is, Rex.’
Rex stayed silent.
‘Well that’s scientific proof right there,’ CI Doyle remarked sarcastically.
Albert ignored him. ‘Rex, if you think Alan Crystal was poisoned with Syrup of Ipecac bark once.’
The loud bark in the small office made all three men jump.
‘You’ve finally got it!’ Rex exclaimed. ‘He stank of it, and it was all over the cat’s human.’
The chief inspector was eyeing Albert dubiously. ‘Come now, Mr Smith. I have no time nor patience for parlour tricks. We are investigating a double murder. This is no place for silliness and games.’ Shifting his attention to his constable, he said, ‘Ferris get crime scenes in here. I want this placed pulled apart. If there is something here, I want it found.’
Albert expected as much from the chief inspector. To anyone else … anyone who wasn’t Albert Smith, Rex’s behaviour would just seem like a dog doing tricks. Albert knew otherwise but he wasn’t going to waste time trying to make people believe him. The chief inspector was starting to move toward the door when Albert got his attention with a single bold statement.
‘I think I know what happened to Brian Pumphrey.’
Aligning the Clues
When he made the statement, Albert wasn’t looking at the police officers. Ferris was dutifully following his boss to the door, but both men stopped before they left the office. Albert’s attention was on the jotter pad on Alan’s desk where a series of numbers and words had caught his eye.
The note made no sense that Albert could see, but he also doubted it was random. All written in the same shade of pen and in cascading lines as if written in one go, Albert believed it meant something. Had it been jotted notes, added sporadically as Alan found need to, they would be less neat.
The fifth line down held his gaze – combi 100. It had been underlined twice. Above it was record 2 and above that winner 6.
There were more lines, some of which were just numbers.
‘Mr Smith!’ The chief inspector’s voice cut through Albert’s concentration, making him realise the senior police officer had been calling his name and getting ignored for better than thirty seconds.
Albert looked across the room. ‘I’m sorry, what were you saying?’
A flash of annoyance crossed Chief Inspector Doyle’s face though he remained polite and even tempered when he replied, ‘You made a bold statement, sir. If you know what happened to Brian Pumphrey, you are obliged to share it with me.’
Albert nodded his understanding and scratched his chin. ‘Have your officers located Alan Crystal yet?’
‘That is not an answer to my question, Mr Smith,’ snapped the chief inspector, losing his cool.
Knowing that he was pushing his luck, Albert said, ‘All in good time, Chief Inspector. I think we should dedicate our efforts to finding the missing person.’ Albert heard Doyle’s snort of irritation and impatience, but using a handkerchief, he opened drawers on the desk until he got to the big one at the bottom where he found Alan’s folded clothes.
To change into the red jacket and waistcoat waiting for him on the hanger, he would have needed to take off what he was wearing previously. Now Albert had the means to track the missing person. Finding him relied upon him being close enough for Rex to pick up his scent and follow it, but as he held a neatly folded shirt under Rex’s nose, he suspected Alan hadn’t gone far at all.
Rex sniffed deeply. This was another game the police handlers had taught him at the training academy. It wasn’t his favourite game, largely because he didn’t get to chase or bite anyone, but tracking was still fun, and he always got a reward when he found the target. Back then, it was usually a sock or something similar he was expected to find. However, his human wanted him to find the owner of the shirt today.
‘Go on, boy,’ Albert encouraged. ‘Sniff him out.’
Rex started for the door, intending to go right between the two humans blocking it. However, his human held him back.
‘I’m waiting, Mr Smith.’ The chief inspector thought of himself as a patient man, but the shenanigans with the dog, and then the claim that he knew … what? Who killed Brian Pumphrey? The old man said he knew what happened, which was not the same thing. Regardless, whatever he knew, he needed to share.
Albert only held Rex back for a heartbeat, then urged him on again, letting the dog muscle his way past the police officers’ legs as he said, ‘It will all make a lot more sense once we find Alan Crystal.’ With Rex tugging him along the corridor and back toward the marquee, Albert had to walk sideways to say, ‘I believe you will leave here with a killer in custody, Chief Inspector. Have no fear.’
Then he and Rex were gone from sight and the chief inspector had to hurry after him.
Almost the instant he re-entered the marquee, Albert bumped into Gary.
