Detective Gordon: The First Case
Page 4
Buffy pointed out the window.
“I can’t believe it. How happy I am,” said the squirrel, almost in tears. “At last, my sorrow is over!”
The detective shook his head and poured tea into three cups.
Then the squirrel’s face changed. Suddenly he looked grim.
“Those wretched thieves,” he said. “Where are those thieving wretches?”
“The thieves have been caught, have admitted their crime, and paid their debt,” said the detective. “They’re sitting, to some degree, in prison. But one can say that they are, yes, that they’re completely…away.”
“Completely away?”
“Drink some tea,” said the detective.
“And eat a little cake!”
The squirrel ate a whole cake and asked for another. The cakes tasted so good and he loved blackcurrant jam, he said. It was almost as good as nuts. When he had finished eating he looked a little happier.
“I don’t entirely understand,” he said, blowing on his tea.
“One doesn’t need to understand,” said the detective, “as long as one feels that everything is all right.”
The squirrel drank his tea.
“But I still want to see the thieves,” he said. “I want to see what a thief looks like!”
The detective went and fetched the little mirror from the wall. The squirrel took it in confusion. He had never seen a mirror before. He didn’t like modern gadgets.
He looked at the face in the mirror. He had never seen himself properly before. He glared at the image.
“He looks angry and a bit stingy and greedy!” said the squirrel.
“Yes,” said the detective, “he can look a bit like that. But I think he can also look happy and kind.”
The squirrel brightened a little.
“Perhaps,” he said, when he looked at the image. “Perhaps somewhat kind.”
The squirrel handed back the mirror.
“I don’t understand modern contraptions. They make me dizzy,” said the squirrel, going on his way. “Good night!”
“Good night, good night!”
The detective and Buffy remained behind the desk, drinking their tea.
They could hear the squirrel’s voice out in the snow: “104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109…”
Three wishes.
Detective Gordon and Buffy felt very pleased with themselves as they sat side by side behind the desk. They were very happy. But they tried to look serious and important, like proper police officers.
Suddenly the squirrel turned up again. He’d brought a very big nut that he wanted to give them as a present.
The detective and Buffy nodded at him somewhat solemnly. Sitting there, they wanted to look serious and important.
“This is a particularly fine and unusual nut I’m giving you as a present,” said the squirrel. “A special gift. Almost certainly a double nut, and I’m missing it already, but I wanted to thank you very much.”
He laid the hazelnut on the desk and bowed. The detective and Buffy bowed also. When the squirrel had closed the door behind him, Buffy took the nut and gnawed a large, beautifully even hole in its top. She stuck in her slender arm. And pulled out two nuts.
“A double nut,” she said happily. “That means you can wish for two things.”
Buffy said she thought it best that the detective made the wishes. She wanted them to be for important things to do with police work, not just silly little things. Therefore someone with long experience should do the wishing.
Detective Gordon smiled solemnly, pressed his hands together, and cleared his throat.
“We two police wish for an end to crime. A good police district has no crime!”
“But don’t we want lots of terrible thieves to catch?” asked Buffy. “Many difficult and exciting cases to solve?”
“No. The best thing would be if nothing happened, nothing at all!”
Buffy thought for a bit and nodded.
The detective thought about the fire, his tea cup, and the cake tins, and he sighed.
“We two police also wish not to apply punishments. The best case is when thieves punish themselves a little bit. And it’s best for a prison to be comfortable. Where someone without a home can live. A police assistant, perhaps…”
Buffy agreed with all of this and the more she thought about it, the happier she felt.
The detective started to think about bed and was ready to nod off and fall asleep.
“You can wish for one more very small thing,” said Buffy.
“In that case, I wish only that we can sleep in tomorrow for a long time.”
The detective took out a piece of paper and wrote down the two real wishes:
“Let’s both stamp it!” cried Buffy.
Together they took out the stamp and placed it on the paper. Buffy moved it a little to the right. The detective moved it a little to the left. Then they both pressed as hard as they could. KLA-DUNK!
“I shall keep this paper in the drawer for important notes,” said the detective.
The two police friends shared a smile.
Together they had solved their first case.
Copyright
Print edition first published in 2015 by Gecko Press
This e-book edition published in 2015 by Gecko Press
PO Box 9335, Marion Square, Wellington 6141, New Zealand
info@geckopress.com
English language edition © Gecko Press Ltd 2015
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted or utilized in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise without the prior written permission of the publisher.
First American edition published in 2015 by Gecko Press USA, an imprint of Gecko Press Ltd. A catalog record for this book is available from the US Library of Congress.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of New Zealand.
Original title: Kommissarie Gordon: Det första fallet
Text © Ulf Nilsson 2012
Illustrations © Gitte Spee 2012
First published by Bonnier Carlsen, Stockholm, Sweden Published in the English language by arrangement with Bonnier Group Agency, Stockholm, Sweden
The cost of this translation was defrayed by a subsidy from the Swedish Arts Council, gratefully acknowledged.
Translated by Julia Marshall
Edited by Penelope Todd
Hardback (USA) ISBN: 978–1–927271–49–0
Paperback ISBN: 978–1–927271–50–6
E-book ISBNs: 978–1–927271–69–8 (epub); 978–1–927271–71–1 (mobi); 978–1–927271–72–8 (PDF)
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