Wednesday, 18 September 2013

A Biscuit Crumb Trail of Clues (part 4)

I called Lodders and we hurried across the road to the bank. The bank manager listened to us and then led us into the vault and we waited for Lodders to get here. I went onto the street and pulled a few random people into the vault. When my bumbling policeman friend had arrived, Robin and I started without hesitation. "A vault ten miles beaneath the ground, sealed by a metal door and protected by two guards and security system has a sudden break in where nothing is stolen, unexplainable surely?" I started.
"And where to start?" Asked Robin. "The vault whee nothing had been stolen? What could we find, there'd certainly be no fingerprints!"
"Must we turn to finding a secret entrance, perhaps?"
"Or maybe a alien invasion is the clue!" Cred Robin. They laughed.
"But seriously," I interrupted, "we found our first clue this morning as we ate breakfast."
"And our second when we were tasting samples at the biscuit factory across the road. Can anyone guess what they are?"
They mumbled. I gave it a second and then answered, "A loaf of bread and a burnt cookie of course!"
My audience looked baffled so I continued. "Can anyone here tell the significance of a burnt cookie?"
Lodders raised his hand. "Yes?" I asked him.
"Is is that a burnt cookie would annoy the cookie monster driving him to break into a bank to get more money to buy cookies?"
"No. Nice attempt though. It was actually big bird." Robin replied.
They lauhed again, "Honestly, the only thing that could possibly considered interesting about a burnt cookie is the fact it's burnt." I pointed out.
"I don't understand what's going on?" Asked the bank manager.
"Don't worry. Most people don't when he's talking."." Robin replied.
"The cookie is burnt because it's been in an oven. Now for the clue of the loaf of bread. The loaf was made last night and cooked in an oven that had been on since about twenty minutes past nine. Or exactly twenty three minutes past nine to be precise. Which is the exact time the alarns been going off." I smiled. This was the best bit. The bit where they were confused, relieved and excited all at the same time.
"I did some researching on my phone," interrupted Robin, "nad found an article about strange police stories. Long ago, in a English seaside town called Blackpool, some policemen were called to a lead yard where an alarm had gone off. Across the road was a factory where they made food. Now, the alarm at the lead yard was going off every night at the same time because microwaves emitted from the ovens at this factory were interfering with the alarm system. So we wondered whether this could have happened here. And sure enough it did."
"So who can I arrest?" Asked Lodders.
"Nobody," I replied, "it was an accident."
"Oh. Well thanks Gabriel."
"It's fine, we'll be off now," and so we walked off out of the door and back to my car. A month later the Pavilion Paper was thrown out onto the paving stones of Glasgow with the words, 'Rathbone Investigates' on page eight and with the words, 'A Biscuit Crumb Trail of Clues,' written beneath.

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