Spontoon Island
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9 October 2007
| "Valentines Dazed"
by E.O. Costello, M. Mitchell Marmel, & Walter D. Reimer Chapter 9 I spent the waning days of January on two fronts: one was preparing for that little jaunt to Honolulu. The second was trying to fix things so that I'd be able to pilot my own aircraft there. Most of this was spent marshalling the facts for both accidents. Luckily, Mutual of Ocelot was proving helpful, and supplied copies of their reports and certificates on the accident. I was hoping that would impress the Safety Board. I had also consulted with a Thomas Vison, Esq., one of the leading lawyers in the islands a couple days after receiving the summons. Lodge had reminded me that Vison had represented Reggie's father before the magistrates back in October, and had managed to get him off with a fine, in spite of having committed a public disturbance that would surprise even his son, no stranger to livening up a morning. Vison had listened to my tale and shrugged his shoulders. "You must not be too worried, Mr. duCleds. While we in the Spontoons are a bit ahead of the curve in having this sort of an investigatory body, we do, ahem, need to raise the standards a bit." I had begged enlightenment. Vison went over to a file cabinet, and after a minute or so, pulled up a file. It was the findings of a STSB hearing about six months ago, involving another plane crash. One paragraph was indicated to me by a musteline forefinger. "The cause of the accident in question was traceable to the fact that the plane hit the ground." One saw Vison's point, but I still didn't feel over-confident. *****
Until the full details of my piece de resistance were figured out, it was best to, as they say, whet the appetite. I pointed out to Br'er Bird that there were certain advantages to the fact that La Cupcake was resident across the hall. It made for interesting possibilities with the camera. The stork smote the air with a wing. "By golly, Mr. Buckhorn, you've rung the bell and get your choice of cigar or kewpie doll! All ol' Bernie has to do is take out his trusty flash camera, and we'll wrap this case up in a jif-jif-jiffy!" The end result was that, at an appropriate hour of the evening, Phlatphut Phlute (with a Phloy-Phloy) had "borrowed" not only the window cleaner's outfit, but his scaffold contraption as well. "Ya gotta get up pretty early in the mornin' to fox ol' Bernie Phlute, Mr. Buckhorn. This disguise is impenetrable." Actually, the disguise was probably quite penetrable, especially with regard to rain, as its original owner was of a decidedly different build that Mr. Phlute. "I don't mean to criticize, Mr. Phlute, but surely 11 o'clock is an odd hour for a window-cleaner to show up for work." "That's the real clever part about it, Mr. Buckhorn. Who's gonna expect a window-cleaner at that hour? It's all in the element of surprise, as it says in the Detective's Handbook." The element of surprise can cut both ways. I speak from bitter experience, having once, at Andover, loaded a chap's soup with Tabasco sauce, only to have the bouillon switched on me. Such are the risks of this kind of activity. In any event, I brought out a lawn chair and set it up in the front lawn, with a flagon of cold orange juice to keep me company. Sure enough, bang on time, I could see Phlute winch himself down, using the scaffolding. He paused right outside one of the windows of the de Ciervos suite, and started to take out his camera. He was setting up his first shot, when the window was thrown open with a crash, and a voice boomed out into the night. "Who you?" The voice was recognizable as Senor de Ciervos', and given the briskness of the enquiry, it was clear that he found the whole manner suspicious. I could hear some sort of reply from Phlute, before the conversation took an ominous turn. "If you the cleaner of the windows, why you have camera?!" Ten marks out of ten for that one. Pity I didn't hear the answer. Well, there wasn't much of a verbal answer, though it did shed some light. Most notably by means of the flash attachment to the camera. A loud bellow of cervine rage echoed across the lawn, and there was a lunge into the night. There were a few problems with this strategy. One was that the light had blinded Senor de Ciervos. The second was that Phlute, with admirable quickness of mind, had briskly raised the scaffolding sufficiently that there was nothing but the still, night air between Senor de Ciervos and the rose bushes below. The still, night air was rent with the surprised howl of a buck discovering that fate had shortchanged him. The howl was cut short by the sound of rosebushes catching my brother cervine in a thorny embrace. I felt it best to leave my post, and render what first aid I could to the aforesaid brother cervine. Luckily, all this required was quite a bit of iodine, and a wad of cotton stuffed in his mouth to keep him quiet. Phlute was pacing the floor of my suite when I returned. "Well, goshdarnit, a fella can't do any investigatin', if his client keeps on interferin' like that. Shucks, I'll bet I almost had the goods on Mr. duCleds that time, I can feel it." *****
"Inocenta?" "Si, mi amor?" "I'm trying to write out something here. What are you doing?" "Pouf. Why *you* write? You give the dictating of the words to Inocenta, Leslie-puppy. Inocenta take them down in the little notebook." "Inocenta, I can't write, and I can't dictate, when you're sitting on my lap. What's more, you don't *have* a notebook on you." "Pouf! How *you* know, wise-puppy, that Inocenta no have the notebookie on her person?" "Like this." "Waaahah! Bad Leslie-puppy! Is not being fair! How you like it if you Inocenta try to find the notebookie on *you*?" "Heh-heh, why don't you...hey, did you hear something, just now?" "Hmmmmmmm?" "That noise, from outside." "That? Oh, that is Papi. Inocenta recognize the yell of her Papi anywhere." "Well, what's he doing?" "He not having fun, like his Inocenta. Hmmm. There is not the notebookie...*there*." "Aaaahah. Hey, cut it out, Inocenta." "You want Inocenta to stop searching her Leslie-puppy?" "Um. No." "Inocenta no think so." next |