Sherlock Bones 1: Doggone

by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

  “And how did you know that?” Inspector Strange demanded.

  “Elementary,” Bones said again. “A dead body found on the second story; a door locked from within—what other explanation could there be?”

  Huh.

  “The murderer had to get in somehow,” Bones said. “After all, this isn’t some fairy story with magic and little elves, is it? If not by the door, then there must be a window. If the window is on the second story, there must be a ladder to get to the window; for, however tall our murderer might be, he can’t be that tall, not two stories’ worth.”

  Huh again.

  Inspector Strange shook his head in wonder, before continuing. “I leaned out the window and saw a boy down below, on the ground. I asked him if he’d seen a man on the ladder earlier. He said that, yes, that he’d seen a tall man with really tiny feet using it and had assumed him to be a worker. Seeing my expression, the boy said he hoped he hadn’t done anything wrong. I told him that, of course he hadn’t, not unless he included letting a murderer get away with murder.”

  How sensitive.

  “Next,” Inspector Strange said, “I investigated the body.”

  “How had he been killed?” Bones asked. “Not another poisoning, I expect.”

  “How did you know that this one hadn’t been poisoned too, Bones?” Inspector Strange asked.

  “I’m educated.” The dog shrugged. “And I made a guess.”

  “A good one at that.” Inspector Strange nodded firmly. “I found the body by the window. Unlike the body of, er, John Smith in the abandoned building, this one had been stabbed.”

  Oh my. I’m not usually given to queasiness at the thought of death. I’d been through the Cat Wars after all. As a doctor there, I’d seen a lot. But stabbed? It was a bit much.

  “Oh, and one other thing,” Inspector Strange said.

  “Yes?” Bones asked.

  “Much as it kills me to say it, you were right.”

  “Obviously.” The dog snorted. “But about what exactly?”

  “The motive,” Inspector Strange said, “it was revenge.”

  “How do you know that?” I asked.

  “Let me guess,” the dog said, not bothering to wait for Inspector Strange’s response. “Over the secretary’s body was written the German word for ‘revenge,’ RACHE. Despite what I’d told you when we’d seen that written over the first body, you continued to believe that it was an incomplete writing of a woman’s name. But when you saw it a second time, even you couldn’t convince yourself that the writer had once again been interrupted at precisely the same moment. And so, despite your reluctance to admit it, you were forced to see that I was right all along.” He paused. “Am I right?”

  “Sad to say,” Inspector Strange said, “that pretty much sums it up.”

  “Oh, the poor secretary,” I said.

  “Why the poor secretary?” Inspector Strange asked.

  “It’s the way he died,” I said. “I should think it would be bad enough, spending your life working in service to another being.” I paused, looking at Mr. Javier and thinking about what I’d just said. I shook the thought off—it was one for another time. “But then, on top of that, to be murdered just like your employer, as though paying for what he did—”

  “Oh,” Inspector Strange cut me off, “I’d say the secretary had enough of his own sins to pay for.”

  “And what does that mean?” I demanded.

  Instead of answering, Inspector Strange sniffed the air. “Do I smell Chinese food?”

  “Yes,” I said. “We were just sitting down to eat when you came to call.”

  “I am a bit hungry,” he hinted.

  Having had my meal interrupted by news of a second murder, I realized I was still hungry myself.

  “Would you like some?” I offered, leading the way toward the dining area. “We have wonton soup, spareribs, egg rolls, shrimp with—”

  But as I saw when we stepped over the threshold into the dining room, we didn’t have any of those things anymore. All we had were a pile of empty takeout containers and one very full-looking public detective.

  “Inspector!” I said, appalled. “You ate all the food? Yourself?”

  “I’m sorry,” Inspector No One Very Important said with a burp, looking ashamed at his own behavior. “I couldn’t help myself.”

  “Oh, Inspector.” I shook my head. Now what were we going to do? “Mr. Javier!” I bellowed.

  “Yes, Boss?”

  I jumped back a step. The way he could now just suddenly appear in a room did take some getting used to.

  “I’ll need you to get us some more food,” I said, “since some of us can’t seem to control ourselves.”

  “The takeout, Boss?” Mr. Javier was eager. “Can we do the takeout again, please?”

  “Yes, fine, whatever you want,” I said brusquely. “Just not Chinese again. That didn’t work out so well the first time.”

  “Right away, Boss.”

  And he was gone.

  To his credit, the crash was a little quieter this time.

  “Now where were we?” I asked as we four took seats at the dining room table, still covered with empty takeout containers.

  “Inspector Strange was about to explain to us what he meant when he said the secretary had his own sins to pay for,” the dog provided.

  “Yes,” Inspector Strange said. “Funny thing. Outside of the dead body and the message on the wall, there was hardly anything else in the room. In fact, the only things the secretary had on him were a book and a pipe—smoking is a filthy habit—and a box with pills in it.”

  “Pills?” Bones said.

  “Huh,” Inspector Strange said. “I’d have guessed you would be more curious about the book.”

  “Why would I be curious about the book?”

  “Because it might be an important clue? Don’t you even want to know the title?”

  The dog snorted. “The only thing the presence of the book indicates is that the secretary hated waiting in line, and always brought a book with him whenever he went anywhere in order to keep his mind occupied. Which is exactly what I do. It’s a habit I highly recommend. Of course, now that I have Mr. Javier, I shouldn’t think I’d need to worry about doing my own shopping anymore.”

  “You don’t have Mr. Ja—” I began to object.

  But the dog cut me off. “No, the book doesn’t signify anything more than that the secretary had an active mind. Of the three items mentioned, the only one that does potentially signify anything are those pills. Now, what did you do with them? Bring them to the lab? Have them analyzed?”

  “No.” Inspector Strange produced a pillbox. “I have them right here.”

  “You have them right … Are you insane?”

  “Why is it that, at least once every case, you ask me that question?”

  “Because I suspect it might be true?” The dog shook his head. “I can’t believe you are just strolling around the city with what is undoubtedly the best clue we’ve uncovered yet.”

  “We’ve—” Inspector Strange began to object.

  But the dog cut him off with a snap of the paw. “Hand that over, please.”

  Inspector Strange obeyed.

  Bones opened the lid on the pillbox, studied the contents inside.

  “Unless I’m wrong,” he said, “and that’s highly unlikely, one or more of these pills contain poison.”

  “How can you be sure?” I asked.

  “That’s the thing,” the dog said. “Without further testing, it’s impossible to know for certain.”

  He shifted his attention from the pillbox to everyone sitting around him at the table, considering each of us in turn.

  “So,” he said finally with a grin so wide he could have swallowed a small cat, “who wants to volunteer?”

  The three of us stared at the dog, our mouths hanging open.

  I was the first to recover.

/>   “You want to use one of us … as a guinea pig? You want one of us … to volunteer to take poison? You can’t be serious!”

  “Of course not, my dear Catson,” the dog said. And there was that wide grin again. “Well, maybe just a bit.”

  “Do you think those might be what killed er, John Smith?” I said. “If so, I can simply sniff them for you. If they smell of almonds, there’s our answer.”

  “Ah, but what if they smell of almonds and yet they’re not laced with cyanide?” he said. “What if they’re simply some harmless almond-scented pills? No, I’m afraid we need more conclusive evidence here than your nose can provide.”

  Before I could respond, the dog rose from his seat at the table, pocketing the pillbox in the palm of his paw.

  “Where are you going with those pills?” I said as he began to move away from the table.

  “Well,” he said, as though the answer must be obvious, “if I can’t get any volunteers here, I shall have to look elsewhere, won’t I?”

  “Where are you going?” I called, more desperately. But he was soon through the doorway and out of view, his voice traveling back to us:

  “I need to see a dog about a man.”

  While the inspectors shouted their outrage (Strange: “How dare he take off without consulting us!”) and grumbled their displeasure (No One Very Important: “It’s our case too, you know”), I spent several minutes considering whether to take a nap.

  I was so tired, but I wasn’t accustomed to napping with a human in the house, never mind two humans. What if, while I was sleeping, they tried to pet me? Or, worse, pick me up and place me in their laps?

  I shuddered at the thought.

  Tired, hungry. Hungry, tired. I’d never been so much of either in my life, let alone both at the same time, not even during the Cat Wars.

  I considered excusing myself and disappearing into one of the bedrooms, which I almost never use, the cushion in front of the bay window being so much nicer for napping. Surely, behind closed doors, I could rest for a bit, safe from the threat of being petted or picked up? And, you know, maybe I’d find a little something to snack on back there?

  I was about to do just that, when a lot of activity happened all at once.

  First, Mr. Javier came back with his beloved takeout.

  “I got Lebanese, Boss!” the turtle announced. “This time, I got Lebanese!”

  He began excitedly taking containers out of his big bag.

  “I got the baba ghanouj,” he said, “and the kibbeh, and the hummus, and the tabbouleh, and for you, the shish taouk, which are like grilled chicken skewers—”

  Except for the part about the chicken, I had no idea what he was talking about. It was all Lebanese to me. But it all smelled so heavenly, and I was so hungry, I didn’t care what I was eating.

  I was just reaching for a carton when the doorbell rang.

  “Should I get that, Boss?” Mr. Javier asked, looking torn. I could well understand why he should feel that way. After all, he must be hungry too.

  “Just keep dishing up the food, Mr. Javier.” I waved a fork at him. “I can’t imagine who that could be at this hour. And look around you: Anyone who should be inside is already right here.”

  Then it hit me:

  The dog still wasn’t back.

  And then it came to me, the last thing the dog had said before he headed out the door was: “I need to see a dog about a man.”

  What had he meant? Where had he gone and where was he now?

  “If no one else is going to get that, I suppose I’ll have to,” the dog called from somewhere in the house.

  Wait a second. When had the dog returned? And why was the dog roaming freely around the rest of my house?

  Before I could yell or object, he bounded through the room and down the stairs to open the door, returning accompanied by …

  “Puppies?” I cried. “What are all these puppies doing in my house?”

  I rubbed at my eyes.

  But no matter how hard I rubbed, every time I opened my eyes, the puppies were still there.

  I counted: one, two, three, four, five, six. If I had to take a guess, I’d say they were Cocker Spaniels. They looked ridiculous, all so small, as they bounded around Bones.

  I wanted to believe this was just a hallucination brought on by lack of food or sleep.

  Puppies? In my house?

  “I did tell you,” Bones said with a wry smile, “that I had to see a dog about a man.”

  “A dog, fine,” I said. “One dog.” Then I pointed at the sestet. “But that’s not one, it’s six. And it’s not a dog, it’s puppies.”

  And, those puppies were having a field day, scampering all over my home, snuffling their snouts through all of my possessions.

  “I suppose you’re right, my dear Catson. But if I’d said ‘I need to see six puppies about a man,’ it wouldn’t have really had the same ring to it, would it?”

  “Just a second, Bones,” I said, holding up a paw to stop him from doing anything rash. Even if I didn’t like the idea of having puppies in my home, I didn’t want to see them murdered right in front of me either. Which is exactly what Bones was about to do. He would administer the various tablets from the pillbox to the various little puppies and then watch to see if any—all?—fell down dead.

  “Just a second what?” Bones asked with some irritation.

  “Just a second for me to cover my eyes,” I said, squeezing them shut. Almost instantly, though, I snapped them back open again. I couldn’t believe how cowardly I was being. Was I just going to stand there, eyes squeezed shut, while Bones killed relatively innocent puppies in the name of scientific research? I had been to the Cat Wars. I was made of sterner stuff than this.

  “I won’t let you hurt them!” I said, throwing my body between the dog and the puppies, spreading my arms wide to protectively shield them behind me. I couldn’t believe I was about to try to save puppies, but there you have it.

  “What are you talking about, my dear Catson?” Bones demanded, more irritable still.

  “Yes, what is she talking about?” Inspector Strange asked Bones.

  Oh. The humans. For a moment, I’d forgotten they were there. Particularly Inspector No One Very Important, as he didn’t really say very much. Although he ate plenty.

  “You know,” Inspector Strange added, “her reactions to things are often so strange, I sometimes have trouble remembering, let alone believing, that she’s a real doctor.”

  Oh! Who was he to be calling anyone else strange?

  “You were about to kill them!” I cried, raising a paw in accusation and pointing it straight at the dog’s face. “You were going to give the puppies those pills so you could see which ones wound up dead! I simply won’t have it in my house!”

  Bones burst out laughing. “Don’t be absurd!”

  “I fail to see how—”

  “I wasn’t going to harm the puppies.” The dog continued to chuckle, completely unable to contain his mirth. “I wasn’t going to kill them!”

  “You weren’t?” I dropped my paws. “What then?”

  “I was merely going to introduce you to my young associates,” he said.

  “Them? They’re your”—I could barely bring myself to choke out the words—“young associates?”

  “Of course.” He turned to the puppies. “Boys, may I introduce to you Dr. Jane Catson.”

  And he proceeded to go through what by now had become his usual dog-and-pony show, trotted out whenever introducing me to someone new. You know: “This is my partner”; “Yes, the cat’s a doctor”; “Yes, the doctor’s a girl”; and “blah, blah, blah.”

  Apparently, in this scenario, I was the pony.

  “Stop, Bones. I know who I am,” I said, irritable now. “But who are they? And what are they doing in my house?”

  “Why, they’re the Baker Street Regulars, aren’t they?” he said, as though the answer must be obviou
s. How thoroughly annoying. Not to mention, that the street he’d named happened to be the very same one in my address, and yet I’d never heard of these puppies before now.

  “The Baker Street who?” I demanded.

  “Well, they used to be known as the Cambridge Street Regulars,” he said, naming the street upon which resided Our Mutual Friend, the one who had essentially started this whole mess in the first place. “But,” Bones continued, “it doesn’t make much sense, does it, for me to keep referring to them like that when I live here now.”

  “You do not now—”

  “I sometimes use the Baker Street Regulars to help out with my cases. They’re all strays, every last one. It’s good for them to have something useful to do. Keeps them off the streets. Of course, technically, being strays, they’re always on the streets. Well, except for right now.”

  “I’m sure they must be quite helpful,” I said, already feeling a headache building.

  “Oh, we are, sir!” one of the young pups piped up. But then he looked embarrassed as he corrected, “I mean, ma’am.”

  “This cheeky young pup,” said Bones proudly, “is Waggins. You might say he’s the leader of the pack.”

  “Pleased to meet you, I’m sure,” I said dryly.

  I noticed that while Bones had introduced me to his young associates, he hadn’t bothered to introduce them to the humans. It was nice to think I was getting special treatment. But I couldn’t let such rudeness stand.

  “Don’t you think,” I said to Bones, “that it would only be polite for you to introduce your little friends to Inspector Strange and Inspector, er, too?”

  “No need,” Inspector Strange said. “We’ve all met before, many times.”

  I went straight from feeling special to feeling like an outsider in my own home. Well, at the very least, I could still be a good host. Plus, my stomach was growling.

  “In that case,” I said, “since we’re all friends here now, or something approximating it, perhaps we should share a meal together. Mr. Javier jetted out for Lebanese and while I haven’t had the chance to taste any of it yet, I can assure you it all looks most delicious—”