The language of dogs

Laughter came from the living room, following a couple of moments later by a different voice, heavy and slower, saying “I don’t get it.”  Leslie daFox, who had thirty years earlier scripted the show they were watching now, bowed his head as he used the tin-opener on a can of condensed milk, wondering if he shouldn’t feel more angry than depressed.

“Well, it’s because she’s got a hat on, innit?” said the first voice, still laughing slightly.

“Oh,” said the second voice, sounding uncertain.  “Is that funny?”

“Yes!”

“No,” whispered Leslie to himself.  “They’re laughing because they know she’s the Health Inspector but the guys she’s inspecting are so misogynistic that they think she’s escaped from the community care hostel up the road.”

“Here, where’s the murderer gone then?”

Leslie tipped the milk into a saucer and put it down on the floor.  Two burly policemen, one red-faced and slightly out of breath, burst into the kitchen.  They looked relieved when they saw him.

“Did you sneak out of the room?” demanded the red-faced policeman.

“No,” said Leslie.  “I asked you both if you wanted coffee and then told you I was going to make some.  You both watched me leave the room.”

“That sounds sneaky to me,” said the red-faced policeman.  “Hiding in plain sight, that’s called.”

“Only in your lexicon,” said Leslie, aware that neither officer would know what lexicon meant, or would lose face by asking him for a definition.  They reminded him a lot of his community college class, both in aptitude for study and for the length of time he liked spending with them.

“Here, there’s a saucer of milk on the floor,” said the red-faced policeman.  He picked it up and sniffed it.  “Were you going to drink this, Sir?”

“No,” said Leslie.  He was convinced that one day the red-faced policeman was going to ask for a reminder on how to breathe.

“Oh right then,” said the policeman.  He tipped the saucer up and drank the milk.  “Hey, this is the sweet stuff!”

“That was the cat’s milk,” said Leslie.  “There were cat medicine tablets in there.”

“Aha!  You’ve tried murdering a policeman now!”  The other policeman seemed to spring to life all of a sudden at the prospect of finally being able to arrest Leslie for the murders they were convinced he’d committed, despite all the evidence to the contrary.

“I have not,” said Leslie.  “Your colleague picked a saucer up off the floor and drank from it.  That’s rank stupidity and ought to qualify him for a Darwin award.  My actions were peripheral and had a completely different end in mind.”

“I don’t think so, Sir,” began the second policeman, a gleam appearing in his eye.

“Cyrus!”  Leslie’s voice carried throughout his house, and there was a whimper from the laundry-room.  Both policeman turned towards it instantly.

“What was that?”

“The maid,” said Leslie.  “She hides in the washing when you’re here.  She’s getting very wrinkled and agoraphobic, and I may have to sue you over this.”

“You can’t sue us,” said the red-faced policeman promptly.

“I rather think he can,” said a smooth voice, and Cyrus, Leslie’s twenty-three year old lawyer walked into the room.  Both policeman looked angry, but closed their mouths firmly.  “Is there a problem?”

“Another baseless accusation of murder and an attempt to frame me,” said Leslie.  “This time he picked up the cat’s saucer of milk and drank it and her worming tablets.

“If we incorporate your cat as a business I think I can sue them for theft,” said Cyrus, grinning.  “If we can make it a high-tech firm then I might be able to get them on industrial sabotage, if you like?”

“That sounds very tempting,” said Leslie, “but frighteningly expensive.  Can’t you just send them to their rooms for the evening?”

“Can’t let you out of our sight, Sir,” said the red-faced officer immediately.  He appeared to be sweating profusely all of a sudden.  Cyrus eyed him.

“When was the last time they let you out of their sight?” he asked.

“Less than five minutes ago, while I was getting coffee and sorting out the cat’s medicine,” said Leslie.

“Precedent!” yelled Cyrus.  “Go to your rooms!”

The policemen grumbled and argued, but Cyrus prevailed and sent them off to watch the rooms of the house on CCTV instead.

“You don’t have a cat,” said Cyrus after they’d gone.

“I know,” said Leslie.  “But they don’t, for all they’ve been here five months now.

Supermarket shopping

“What are you intending to use that for, Sir?”  It was Policeman 2 speaking, frowning heavily as Leslie went to put a boxed toaster in his trolley.

“I’m not,” he said.  “But if I were, I expect it would be for making toast.  Toasters are a rather one-trick pony, don’t you think?”

“Is that supposed to be funny, Sir?”

Leslie smiled; this was one of the supermarkets that had been embarrassed by the horse-meat in the beef-burgers stories that had been making the newspapers worth reading lately, but he hadn’t actually intended his comment to be a reference to it.  He had already noted a stack of leaflets near the checkouts proudly proclaiming that the supermarket had learned from this experience and wished to tell their customers about the changes they would effect.  He’d ignored them, mostly because he wouldn’t dream of buying meat from a supermarket.

“No,” he said.  “Though now you draw my attention to it, I believe I can make it funny.  You can expect to see it in about three weeks, if you watch Kirsten and Alice.”  Kirsten and Alice was a topical sketch show he submitted material to, and he’d been quite pleased to get a letter from the script editor asking him to submit more and more frequently.

“We’ll be watching you, Sir,” said Policeman 1, trying to do menacing.  Leslie felt that it came off as dull and lifeless, and it reminded him unpleasantly of his days as a drama coach trying to get wooden students to understand that acting was all about being someone else for five minutes.  He’d finally resigned, telling the head of the school that since most of the students there hadn’t worked out who they were themselves there was no hope of getting them to pretend to be anyone else.

“So why are you buying a toaster you don’t intend to use?” asked Policeman 2, the brighter of the pair.  His notebook and pencil appeared as if by magic.

“To give as a gift,” said Leslie.  He’d given up being astonished by the stupidity of his bodyguard, and although he’d entertained the idea for a while that they were trying to wear him down into a confession, he no longer thought that anyone could be that stubborn.  “My wife left me a note this morning saying that it was the housekeeper’s birthday and that I should get her something.”

“A toaster?”

“Why not?”  Leslie shrugged.  “I barely know the woman, and she only ever serves me with cold toast, so perhaps I can be generous while dropping a hint.”

“How about flowers, Sir?  My wife likes flowers.”  Policeman 1 flushed pink as he said this, and Leslie found himself pitying the man.

“I can’t imagine that my wife would be pleased if I gave the housekeeper flowers, officer,” he said.  “She might feel that it was a rather too intimate gift for the staff.  How would you feel if I gave you flowers?”

“I’ve got hayfever,” said Policeman 1.

“So we’d have to consider the intent behind the flowers,” said Policeman 2 quickly.  “That could constitute an attempt at murder, or threatening behaviour!”

“Everything’s murder with you isn’t it?”  Leslie knew he sounded bitter but couldn’t help it.  The policeman had been following him around for nearly 4 months now, and he was losing hope that the police budget crisis would put an end to it.

“Not us, Sir,” said Policeman 2.  “The only murderer here is you, if you’d only be so kind to admit it.”

There was a squeak from the next aisle and the sound of something glass striking the floor and breaking.

“You did that,” said Leslie without rancour.  “You should go and help.”

“And leave you on your own to murder someone?  You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Sir?”

“I’d love to be left alone, yes,” said Leslie.  “I don’t murder people though, and I never have.”

“It’s just coincidence that people keep dying near you, then, Sir?”

“Yes!  A thousand times yes!  Although…” Leslie eyed Policeman 2 up thoughtfully, “This never used to happen until you two arrived.  If we’re going purely on circumstantial evidence then one of you is clearly the murderer, attempting to pin the crime on me.”

“That seems a bit far-fetched, Sir,” said Policeman 2.  Leslie snorted and turned the corner of the aisle.  Sprawled in the next aisle in an expanding pool of blood was a dead young woman.

“Oh God,” he said weakly.  “How did the pair of you manage that then?”  Policeman 2 shot him a filthy look and radioed in for help.

“Yes, he’s murdered another one while we were watching him… no, he didn’t kill her in front of us… no, he didn’t get away from us… no… no… yes… no, well, we were with him and there’s another murdered body in the next… no… yes… well he’s a murderer isn’t he?”  Finally the conversation stopped and Policeman 2 looked at Leslie.  “You’re going to have to come in for questioning.”

Office hours

Leslie DaFox’s office was strictly on a rental basis.  While he was teaching at the Camberwick Community Centre (easily identifiable from miles away by its ziggurat-style construction and Stalinist design ethic) he was granted an office, but the instant his contract expired the elite security force that he was increasingly suspecting came from the same school as the Okrana would lock him out and refuse him entry.  For the moment though, it was the middle of the term and the office was safely his.

It was astonishingly large.  His desk was three times the size he was used to, and as an experiment once he’d tried laying all of his students’ homework out on it, side by side in a neat paper matrix.  It had covered less than half of the available surface area.  His chair had arms, little extrusions on the rear legs to let you tilt it back safely, cushions (not one, but three!), a cup-holder(!) and an adjustable rear-view mirror on a little angle-arm.  There were five full-size bookcases lining the wall opposite his desk, it was a ten second walk from the door to his desk, and it was another three or four second walk from his desk to the windows.  The windows were the only real disappointment, being essentially glassed-over arrow slits, but the glass was rose-tinted and made the world outside look warm and friendly.  There were four filing cabinets, in one drawer of one of which he kept his students’ homework.  In an effort to make more use of the facilities he put his packed lunch in another drawer, and his satchel in a third, but he still worried that it looked like he wasn’t trying.

“This is impressive, Sir,” said Policeman Number 1, looking around him.  “Who did you murder to get this then, eh?”  He laughed in a heavy way that suggested he was really hoping that the clumsy question would elicit a confession from Leslie.

“Oh stop,” said Policeman Number 2.  “Mr. Fox is far too clever to admit to murdering anyone, aren’t you, Sir?”

Leslie said nothing, knowing that Policeman Number 2 was the more subtle of the pair but would still leap up and down like an excited puppy if he thought Leslie was admitting to not admitting to a crime.

“Sit down,” he said instead.  “My office hour starts in five minutes, so we will be here until that finishes.  Students may wish to come and visit and ask questions.  They will be asking questions of me, not you.  Let me repeat that.  They will be asking questions of me and not you.  You should not answer those questions no matter how tempting it might be.  They are here to learn.  You are here to harass me, make crude and lewd suggestions at inappropriate junctures, and waste tax-payers’ money.”

“Speaking of wasting tax-payers’ money,” said Policeman Number 2, “why do you have such a large office when you’re only teaching at a community college?  You could fit three of our offices in here, and that’s forty-eight officers.”

“I wish I knew,” said Leslie, sighing just a touch.  “There is something very odd about this place that I just can’t put my finger on.”

“What exactly is it you wish to put your finger on?”  Policeman Number 1 looked keen and attentive.

“You mean like employing a man who keeps murdering students in his lecture halls?  You can see why we have to be here in your office now, can’t you Sir?”

“Frankly, no.”  Leslie sat down in his chair and then remembered he needed homework from the filing cabinet.  He considered, briefly, asking one of the officers to get it but then decided that he didn’t want to have to explain how to operate a filing cabinet.  He stood up again.  “I’ve murdered no-one, you’ve never proven that I’ve even attacked someone, let along murdered them, and you persist in dogging me instead of conducting a serious investigation!  Good God, Miss Marple was more effective that your police force!”

“And who is she, please?”  Policeman Number 1 had produced his notebook and was writing the name down.  Leslie opened his mouth, but someone knocked on the door.

“Come in!” he shouted, and hauled the filing cabinet drawer open.

“Mr. daFox?”  He recognised the face of the student stood in the doorway looking scared, but he couldn’t remember his name.  The young man had the beginnings of a moustache, little cuts from shaving on his chin, watery grey eyes and a self-inflicted Justin Bieber haircut.

“Come in,” said Leslie.  “And tell these gentlemen your name so they don’t worry that you’re an accomplice.  Then ignore them as best as you can and sit down.  At my desk.”

“Uh, I’m Nigel,” said the young man.  “Nigel Parks.  Which chair, Sir?”  There were four chairs on the side of the desk opposite Leslie’s, and the policemen were picking from another twelve arrayed around the office.

“Any,” said Leslie, dextrous fingers finding Nigel’s last two submitted homeworks.  Neither had scored higher than a C.  “Now, I’ve got some homework to return to you, but first, do you have any other questions about the material we’re covering in class, the lectures in general, or… well, anything I suppose?”

“Why are there policemen following you around?”

Leslie smiled thinly and sat down.  He desperately wanted to say Because I’m an international playboy and suspected jewel thief but he was certain that both the student and the policemen would take him seriously.  It was like being in a badly-written sitcom – which by definition was not one of the ones he’d successfully written and sold in the seventies.  Three of his were still being re-run in Asia today.  “Apparently tax-payers have been over-paying and there’s a budget surplus,” he said.  “They come with the office.  Just ignore them, I do.”

“Oh,” said Nigel.  “Oh.  Well, in that case… er… I was wondering… when do we get to sleep with girls?”

Leslie took a closer look at Nigel, and in the process realised that the young man smelled of stale sweat and, if he wasn’t mistaken, camel.  Wet camel.

“This is a creative writing course,” he said.  “Sleeping with girls is part of the post-graduate syllabus, when you’ve actually written and sold something.  That class starts with an introduction to hygiene and aftershaves.”

“Oh.  Oh.  Well, is it still ok to sleep with boys in this class?”  Leslie’s jaw dropped before he could catch himself, so he desperately improvised it into a yawn.  “Only, Dave keeps telling me that we have to be sleeping with people if we’re real writers, and I think he’s kind of interested –“

Leslie leaned back in his chair, the extensions catching him and supporting him safely, and listened to a ten minute description of a love-life that would leave rabbits confused and frustrated.  At the end of it he reflected that he now had no idea what Nigel would or wouldn’t sleep with, and if he’d enjoy any of it anyway, and that this in no way made his, Leslie’s, life any better.

“Why don’t you write about this?” he said.  “Look, here’s your last homework.  Dreadful.  If I didn’t know you were paying for this course I’d think you were doing this deliberately to punish me.  Do you see on page two, that–“

“Excuse me?”  Policeman Number 2 held up a hand.

“What?” Leslie glared at him, using the same stare that had reduced his housekeeper to tears and impelled her to hide in the piles of wet laundry.

“Can he repeat everything after the bit about the tortoise, please?  We didn’t get it all down.”

“What?”

“Sure,” said Nigel looking animated.  “Did you get the ketchup bottle–“

“Yes!” said the Policemen in unison.

“That’s kind of why we missed bits after that,” said Policeman Number 2.  “But we have to take notes on everything that’s said around you, Mr. daFox.”

Leslie’s palm slapped audibly against his face.

“Go on,” he said, his voice dull and lifeless.  “Tell them again.” 

Little Haversham Police Station

Little Haversham Police Station had a car park that was three times larger than it needed to be for the number of cars in it so Miss Flava pulled easily into a space that was one of a bank of six.  She turned the engine off, and looked at her boss, who had unbuckled his seat-belt but so far not got out.  Since he often managed to get the passenger door open before she'd finished parking, she was wondering what the matter was.
"The barrier should have been down," said Playfair.  The barrier to the car-park had been up, allowing anyone to come in and park.  Or, as Playfair was now considering, come into and plant bombs underneath police cars.
"I think that's more of a London worry," said Miss Flava.  "Out here I don't think they have to worry too much about terrorists.  Lost livestock, pensioners, and a lack of traffic wardens seem to be Little Haversham's main concerns this year."
"If you start sloppy you stay sloppy," said Playfair.  "And that applies to many areas of life."
Miss Flava got out of the car rather than ask him what he meant by that, and he slowly followed suit.  The car-park was black tarmac with painted white lines, and a space near the door had the letters CC painted in front of it.  There were six cars already there, not counting her own, and they all lined up neatly as close to the door without infringing on the labelled space as they could get.  Four were patrol cars, and the other two were unwashed and looked as though they hadn't been driven in a while.  Three sides of the car-park were lined with trees, with the fourth side being the side of the police-station and the short drive they'd come up.  Birds sang and whistled in the trees, and there was a rustle and a scamper that might have been squirrels.  Miss Flava found herself feeling oddly relaxed.
Playfair strode across the car-park and examined the door in the side of the building.
"Locked," he said, with some satisfaction.  "Though I think I can probably get it open if you've got a credit card...?"
"No, Playfair," said Miss Flava.  "Let's go round to the front desk and introduce ourselves.  You're not here for an inspection, we're here to solve a murder."
Playfair looked a little disappointed, but fell into step alongside Miss Flava as they walked round the building to the front door.  His gaze constantly swept the path, the side of the building, and the fence that separated the drive from the road, but didn't find anything else to comment on.  The front doors opened with a squeak, and Playfair rang the bell on the counter several times with the flat of his hand.  The officer who'd been stood at the front desk had to wait, with his mouth open, until the ringing died away.
"I'm right here, Sir," he said, his voice indicating disapproval.  "There was no need to ring the bell, was there?"
Miss Flava cringed inwardly.  Telling Playfair off might have worked, but asking him to agree with the telling off was an invitation to an argument.
"I was testing it to see if it worked," said Playfair.  "I know what you provincial lot are like, you put a dummy bell on the counter and then all go off down the pub for lunch, and lunch ends slightly after your shift."
"I wasn't at the pub though," said the officer, with what Miss Flava felt was commendable patience.
"And the bell worked, so there's two surprises in two minutes," said Playfair.
"What can I help you with?"
"Detective Inspector Playfair," said Playfair, producing his Oyster card from his pocket and looking at it as though it had deliberately become the wrong card.
"Now him I can't help you with," said the officer.  "You'll have to sort that out yourself."
"No," said Miss Flava while Playfair sorted the contents of his pockets onto the counter.  'He is DI Playfair, and I'm Miss Flava."  Her warrant card appeared like magic, while Playfair had only managed to find string and, by the looks of things, sealing wax.
"Oh," said the man behind the counter, his face visibly falling.  "Bugger."

interregnum

Leslie daFox was thinking about ziggurats as he climbed the steps of the Stalinist Camberwick Community Centre.  There was something about the sheer mass of the Community Centre that made him think of an ancient step pyramid whose top was reserved for human sacrifice.  He could, if he tried, imagine a woman with coffee-coloured skin wearing a feathered and beaded headdress holding a bronze dagger aloft, poised above the virgin's navel, ready to descend and elevate the pure young man below to the heavens, to join the gods and bless his former people.
"Bronze is a silly choice for the dagger," he said, mostly to himself.  "It would blunt in no time, probably while you're still trying to get through the rib-cage to reach the heart.  Flint now, that would do the trick.  Or possibly that black glass stuff, that might be available in the South Americas at that time."
"What's that sir?" said Policeman number one, who was huffing and puffing on Leslie's left side.
"He was saying that glass is better than bronze," said Policeman number two helpfully.  He was having no trouble with the steps at all and was actually taking them two at a time.  Both policemen were still dogging Leslie's every move while the death of two students in his class was investigated.  He'd even had to let them bring their sleeping bags into his conservatory so that they could guard him from inside the house, which was tantamount to admitting that they suspected him.  Though their pouncing on him last time he'd made a slightly off-colour remark was better evidence.
"Why... why is glass better than bronze?" gasped Policeman number one.  They reached the top of the steps and he leaned his hands on his knees, bending forward and going puce.
"You can use it to make windows," said Leslie.  "The trouble with bronze for windows is that it's too noisy; every time the wind blows it vibrates and either clatters or gongs, depending on how thin you made the sheets."
"Right," said Policeman number one, his chest heaving like a hyperactive blacksmith's bellows.  "That... that makes... sense!"
No, it doesn't thought Leslie, leading the way to the main doors.  Windows are made of glass because it's transparent, you nitwit.  Bronze would never work for windows.
"Good morning, sir!" said one of the security guards at the towering portals that allowed entrance into the Community Centre.  Leslie smiled, full of false bonhomie, and greeted the guard back.  They were the most frightening clever and well educated body of men he'd ever met, and he was worried that they might actually be cleverer than him.  He was also puzzled that they were exclusively male.
He led the way across the main hallway, initially heading for the lift.  Then, feeling mean, he paused and turned left at a small door and took the spiral staircase up the three floors to the lecture hall he was using.  Policeman number two took the front position, and Policeman number one gave up after about six steps and sat down.  At the top Policeman number two looked puzzled.
"Where's Joe?" he said.
"He sat down," said Leslie.  "He'll catch us up when he's caught his breath."
"There's got to be two of us guarding you at all times!  You're a menace to society!"
"Thanks.  For my script-writing?  My short-story collections?  Some of my novels?"
"For murdering two of your students in broad daylight, actually, sir.  We know you did it, we just have to find the evidence."
"When I wrote police procedurals," said Leslie carefully, "I was told that it was the other way around.  First you find the evidence, and then you hound the culprit.  Not pick a culprit and hound him until he provides you with some evidence."
"You've never watched Columbo, have you sir?" said the Policeman sounding sympathetic.
"Actually I have," said Leslie.  "And I turned down the opportunity to write for it too; I felt that any script with words longer than two syllables would be too far above the target demographic."
"Oh I see!  You had your targets picked out even back then, did you sir?"  The policeman produced a notebook from a pocket and started scribbling in it with a little black pencil.  Leslie sighed and tried to go the lecture hall.
"No, wait there, please sir."  Policeman number two extended a muscular arm and held Leslie in place.  "There have to be two of us guarding you at all times."
"I'll be late for the class," said Leslie.  "What if someone's been murdered by the time we get there?"
"That would be very clever of you, sir," said Policeman number two.  "Murdering someone when I'm here watching you the whole time."
"Yes, wouldn't it?" said Leslie.  He was starting to wish he'd never given up smoking, even though it was nine and a half years ago now.  There was a wheezing noise from below, suggesting that Policeman number one was finally making the ascent.  When he staggered the last couple of steps two minutes later Policeman number two finally let go of Leslie and he could lead them into the lecture hall.
In the middle of the floor, surrounding by aghast and appalled students, was a dead body and a lake of blood.