Case of the Great Cranberry Caper

by Jeffrey M. Poole

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Acknowledgments

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Author’s Note

  What’s Next?

  Case of the

  Great Cranberry Caper

  Corgi Case Files, Book 11

  By

  J.M. Poole

  Sign up for Jeffrey’s newsletter to get all the latest corgi news

  Acknowledgments

  This will mark the first novel released by my new publisher, Secret Staircase Books, an imprint of Columbine Publishing Group. Many thanks to them for giving this (former) indie author a try!

  As always, I need to give thanks to my Posse. You know who you are, and what you’ve done for me. You guys are the best! Diane, Elizabeth, Mefe, Jason, Louise and Caryl. Thanks for taking time out of your busy day to give me a hand.

  I hope you enjoy the story! Happy reading!

  This book is dedicated to the readers.

  Stay safe in this crazy world and, whatever you do, mask up until this pandemic is under control.

  PROLOGUE

  “What did you say it was called, again?” a hesitant voice asked. “Carbonocity, er, carbon …?”

  “A carbonaceous chondrite,” another voice answered. “Pay attention, would you?”

  “I am! That sounds very specific. And, um, what is that, exactly?”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” the second voice grumbled. “You should know about these things by now.”

  “Just pretend for a second that I don’t,” the first voice argued. “Can’t you just tell me what it is?”

  “A carbonaceous chondrite,” Second Voice sighed, as though he had been asked this very question numerous times, “is very primitive. Its chemical composition more closely matches the sun than any other type of chondrite. With me so far?”

  “Uh, sure.”

  “The thing to remember,” Second Voice continued, as he ignored the sarcastic response from his companion, “is that there are different clans and groups of chondrites. Not all are the same, but you already know this, don’t you?”

  “You don’t have to get snarky.”

  “You don’t have a clue what I’m talking about, do you? How did you ever manage to get hired on here as an intern?”

  “I like the stars, okay? Be nice to me.”

  “Or, what? Are you going to tattle to your mother?”

  “Stop treating me like I’m a child.”

  “Then, stop acting like one. Now, are you finished complaining? Are you ready to get to work?”

  “Sure, I guess. Where’s Professor Owens?”

  Second Voice grunted, “He’ll be back soon.”

  “Do you need me to get it?”

  “I already have it,” Second Voice pointed out. “Besides, you aren’t supposed to be messing with his desk, not without direct supervision.”

  “Hey, I may be an intern, but I can be trusted.”

  “Mm-hmm. Sure, you can. Have you seen it yet?”

  “Hmm? Oh, you’re talking about the …? No, I haven’t.”

  “Want a look at where the host came from?”

  The man adjusting the controls on the bank of electronics put his hands in his pockets and stepped away from the counter. Only when the young intern was sitting at the Con, as the observatory staff had jokingly named the huge telescope’s command seat, did a smile appear on the young kid’s face. He looked deferentially at his companion, who nodded permission, before placing a hand on a bank of controls and making a few adjustments.

  The image on the screen sharpened and intensified. A sea of polychromatic pinpricks leapt into focus. A pale green rectangle suddenly appeared on the upper right quadrant. The screen blurred out as the computer redrew the night sky in the selected area. A few more minutes of fine-tuning the image brought a very familiar image to the screen.

  “There you go,” Second Voice said, from behind the command chair. “Based on its trajectory, this baby originated in the Andromeda Galaxy. Now, look over here. See the monitor? I currently have a tiny slice in the magnifier. Now, do you see that? Those striations right there should be able to identify some of the minerals comprising this specimen.”

  “Umm …”

  “Don’t overthink it,” Second Voice instructed. “Just …”

  A loud beeping startled them both. Second Voice hastily retrieved his cell and glanced at the display. Reading the text message which had popped up on the display, he groaned.

  “Everything okay?”

  “Professor Owens is back on campus. He’s demanding a meeting with all department heads.”

  “Ugh. When?”

  “In 30 minutes. We’d best start wrapping up here.”

  The intern hastily vacated the Con while Second Voice took over. Expertly punching buttons and twisting knobs, the giant telescope, and all its accompanying devices and peripherals, including the digital high-res magnifier, powered down. Snapping on a pair of latex gloves, Second Voice retrieved the sample from the magnifier and studied it up close. Then, catching sight of a glittering object sitting unobtrusively near the monitor, Second Voice tsked to himself.

  “What is it?” First Voice asked.

  “Professor Owens would be beside himself if he knew this had been left out,” Second Voice breathed. “Heads would roll.”

  “I could put it away for you. It goes in the Professor’s desk, doesn’t it?”

  “It does, but I’ll do it. It’s very rare.”

  “What do you know about it?” First Voice asked.

  “Well, I can tell you that it’s not from around here. This was found inside NB414.”

  “That? That was inside NB414?”

  “Well, it didn’t look like this. Someone decided to get it cut and polished.”

  “Wow. Do they all have something like that in them?” First Voice asked. “I never would have likened them to oysters.”

  Second Voice shrugged. “That’s what we’re doing: analyzing. Once we identify all the compounds, then we can get a better idea of where it came from, what it has seen, and so on.”

  “How often do they contain those things?” First Voice asked.

  “As you may, or may not, be able to tell, specimens this size are exceedingly rare.”

  “Where did this one strike? Does anyone know? Northern or Southern hemisphere?”

  “Northern,” Second Voice answered.

  “Where?” the intern pressed.

  “One of the Canadian provinces. New Brunswick, hence the ‘NB’ of its name.”

  “Oh. I just now got that.”

  “Make sure your station is powered down,” Second Voice ordered. “The Prof wants to meet with us in the conference room. We can’t leave everything out in the open like this.”

  A second round of angry beeping occurred. Once more, Second Voice fished his phone out of his pocket and glanced at the display. This time, he stifled a curse.

  “It’s Professor Owens. I have to take this.”

  “Go. I can finish here. We don’t want the Prof to be mad at us. He has a temper.”

  “Don’t I know it. Are you sure?”

  “Of course. I’ll see you guys in the conference room.”

  Now that he was alone, the intern began to whistle while he started shutting off the smaller pieces of electronic equipment. Computers, printers, and microscopes were deactivated, one
by one, as the intern moved from station to station. Coming full circle back to the Con, his eyes fell on the digital magnifier and what was still on it. His eyes shot open with surprise.

  Had his companion, Professor Owen’s favorite grad student, been distracted by the call?

  Holding the object up to the nearest light, the intern suddenly smiled as a thought came to him. He snatched up the object and hurried out of the observatory, stopping only long enough to secure the telescope room.

  He had made it all the way to the observatory’s front entrance before an alarm began to wail. Who had sounded the alarm? How could they have discovered it was missing so quickly? The only explanation was that someone had stopped back by the professor’s office. Someone must have decided he was untrustworthy. Then again, to their credit, he did just steal the blasted thing. However, this wasn’t planned. He hadn’t woken up this morning with the intent on stealing anything from anybody.

  It was just there, waiting to be taken.

  Stifling a curse, the intern looked down at the object clutched tightly in his hand and moaned. Perhaps this wasn’t such a good idea after all? What was he going to do?

  He knew full well that, if he should be caught with this particular specimen in his possession, then his career would be ruined. More than likely, it meant he would be looking at possible incarceration for life. He had to hide it, but the question was, where? Where could he stash this blasted thing so that he could collect it at a later date?

  Sirens sounded in the distance. Frantic and desperate, the young intern scanned his immediate surroundings, hoping an idea would come. There had to be somewhere he could stash this thing. Where could he put it so that he could reclaim it at a later date?

  As luck would have it, a solution presented itself in remarkable time. The intern began to run.

  ONE

  Nothing in this beautiful world of ours could possibly compare to the majesty of the Pacific Northwest during autumn. That’s in my own humble opinion, of course. Add on the fact that it was the first week of November, and my fiancée and I were strolling—hand-in-hand—through Cider Fest, a harvest festival which lasted several months, and I could easily believe I was in paradise.

  For those of you who may not know me, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Zachary Anderson, although my friends call me Zack. I live in picturesque Pomme Valley, Oregon, which is located in the southwestern area of the state. We’re about twenty miles west of Medford, and a little under thirty miles to the east of Grants Pass.

  Now, many of you are probably not familiar enough with our fair state to know where that’s at, let alone having even heard of Pomme Valley. What I can tell you is that we’re pretty much at the bottom of the state, while directly above us … make that over 400 miles directly above us, is Portland. PV (as the locals call it) is barely a blip on the map, with a population of less than 3,000, yet during the last two months of the year, our population can easily triple—or quadruple—on the weekends. That was why it was practically standing room only at the merchant stalls. Everyone wanted to be outside, enjoying the weather. Everyone wanted to get into the spirit of the upcoming holidays.

  Poor Sherlock and Watson had to resort to … look at that. I’m getting ahead of myself again. Alrighty, let’s fix that. I need to finish the intros. You know who I am, so let me introduce my fiancée, Jillian. Jillian Cooper, age classified, is the owner of Cookbook Nook and probably the wealthiest woman living on the West Coast. Much to her credit, she doesn’t flaunt her wealth, or throw it in peoples’ faces. Much the opposite. Jillian took it upon herself to help her friends open their own businesses, while acting like a silent partner. Even she doesn’t know how many companies she has had a hand in starting up.

  Before I go any further, I feel I should set the record straight. If you think I’m only with Jillian because of her financial status, then think again. I may not be as loaded as she is, but my own financial security is better than most. Not only am I a successful romance novelist, but the private winery that I own is bringing in a hefty profit, too. In fact, there have been a few months where the wine sales have exceeded book sales, which isn’t an easy feat.

  As if those two sets of responsibilities weren’t enough to keep me busy, I held down a third job: police consultant. Thankfully, the third job really doesn’t require me to do too much. You see, that would fall to my two dogs, Sherlock and Watson.

  Just like their namesakes, my two dogs solve crimes. Don’t laugh, I’m serious. Those two corgis are capable of … hey, I said no laughing! And yes, you heard right. Sherlock and Watson are corgis. They are, without a doubt, some of the most unintimidating looking dogs I have ever encountered. However, they are also some of the smartest. What can I say? Here, in PV, my dogs are very well known.

  Let me give you a few examples.

  For starters, Sherlock kept my rear out of jail when I first moved here. The police thought I had committed a murder and, thankfully it was proven without a shadow of a doubt that I couldn’t have been responsible. Oh, let’s see. What’s another good example? Well, how about tracking down the guy responsible for stealing presents at Christmas? Or discovering who was responsible for the death of a well-known SCUBA diver while we were vacationing in Monterey, CA?

  Trust me, the list goes on and on. I can’t even begin to imagine how the dogs are able to do it. Somehow, and I’ve never been able to determine how, whenever we’re working a case, or are assisting Vance with one of his, Sherlock and Watson will inevitably be drawn to something that appears to be unrelated. After the case has been solved, however, and we start reviewing all our ‘corgi clues’, as we call them, then we can see that the dogs were easily two steps ahead of us at all times.

  How? How do they do it? How could they know a passing car is being driven by a murder suspect? How do they know a dog-napped cocker spaniel was being held in the root cellar of a house they’ve never seen before?

  The list goes on and on. As many times as I say that I’m determined to figure out the significance of the corgi clues before the case is over, I have yet to do so. At least I can say that I’m not the only one who is (clearly) slow on the uptake. Vance and I have wasted countless hours poring through photographs, or revisiting locales in town where the dogs have expressed interest, or …

  Look at that. I just realized I had forgotten someone.

  Vance Samuelson is a very good friend of mine who happens to live here, in PV. He’s a detective on the police force and is the one responsible for bringing me and the dogs in on cases whenever he needs a helping hand. Or paw. Vance is married to a woman by the name of Tori, who’s a teacher at the local high school. She’s incredibly intelligent, funny, and someone not to cross if she, or anyone in her family, is threatened in any way, shape, or form. Vance and Tori have two daughters, Victoria and Tiffany.

  So, yes, you could say I lead an idyllic life in my little town here in the great state of Oregon. Life was good, it was treating me well, and I can’t complain. If you would have known me a few years ago, you would know that my life, then, was nowhere close to the Utopia I was in now.

  A little over two years ago, I was married to a wonderful woman by the name of Samantha Masters. She was my high school sweetheart, and we enjoyed a little over twenty years together. That, unfortunately, came to a screeching halt when Samantha was killed in a head-on collision in what I had thought was an accident, only it was proved—later—to be premeditated murder. Thankfully, that painful story has already been told, and I don’t need to tell it again.

  So, why bring it up? It’s to give you some insight as to what I have in common with my current fiancée. Jillian was also married once before, and like me, she was widowed. Her husband, Michael, succumbed to cancer a few years before I lost my Samantha, and like me, she was simply trying to piece her life back together.

  Then, the Fates decided to bring us together. I inherited my winery from a distant relative on my late wife’s side of the family, which precipitated
my move to Oregon. Jillian and I met, while I was investigating who would want to frame me for murder, and the rest, as they say, is history.

  She and I hit it off so well that it startled the both of us. I, for one, couldn’t believe that lightning could strike the same person twice. But, I’m happy to say, we enjoy each other’s company, share many common interests, and have fallen head over heels for the other.

  Like I said, life is good.

  Returning back to the present day, here we were, walking hand-in-hand, through what had to be our favorite festival of the year. To be fair, our little town didn’t have that many festivals, but this particular one was a doozy. It lasted at least three months long and involved just about every farm in the surrounding area, which included PV, Grants Pass, and Medford.

  Farm fresh produce was available at roadside stands, which seemed to be around every bend in the road. The larger farms had dedicated barns and warehouses converted to storefronts. A few of the really big farms enjoyed the festivities so much that they not only opened up their shops, but rented out barn space and parts of their land. Why? Well, local merchants would set up shop and sell whatever they made: cutting boards, hand-crafted decorations, quilts, and so on. If you were looking for something, then you’d better believe someone here was trying to sell it to you.

  Each progressive year, Cider Fest seemed to grow bigger. Around five years ago, I’m told, one of the farms decided to incorporate a corn maze into their available attractions. And yes, if you’re familiar with my history, it’s the very same one that Vance and I became hopelessly lost in, although we both maintain we had simply lost our bearings. Vance insisted he couldn’t get lost. I insisted I could get lost anywhere, at any time. Care to guess who won that particular argument? Vance’s only response was that some of my crappy sense of direction had to have rubbed off on him.