The Big Over Easy

by Jasper Fforde

  They were silent for a moment as the lift passed the fourth floor.

  “I understand you’ve applied to join the Guild,” remarked Chymes with a small and patronizing chuckle.

  “Any officer can apply, Friedland.”

  “No need to get defensive, old boy.”

  “I’m not getting defensive.”

  “What will be your figurehead case? Finding sheep for Bo-peep? A failed conviction of three pigs?”

  “I’ll think of something.”

  “Of course you will. I hear Humpty took a nosedive. Suicide?”

  “It’s early days,” replied Jack quickly, not wanting to relinquish any details, no matter how trivial.

  “Humpty…wall…suicide…murder,” muttered Chymes thoughtfully. “Sounds like it could be a corker. Want me to take over?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll swap it for a strangling over in Arborfield.”

  “I said no, Friedland.”

  “Okay, the strangling in Arborfield plus a botulism poisoning by a vicar—with potential sexual intrigue thrown in. Proper stuff, Jack. None of your dozy nurseries.”

  “The answer’s still no. You couldn’t wait to get out of the NCD. Where were the offers of help when Mr. Punch was beating his wife? What about Bluebeard? I could have done with some assistance then.”

  “Listen,” said Chymes as the friendly horse-trading banter vanished abruptly, “let’s cut the crap. I want this investigation—and I will have it.”

  “Which part of ‘no’ don’t you understand?”

  “Is that your final word?”

  “You don’t want to hear my final word.”

  “Well,” said Chymes with a condescending smile, “I hope you won’t regret your decision.”

  The lift stopped at the first floor. Friedland walked out, turned to Jack and said, “Just a spot of advice from an old soldier—don’t build the case up. Word in the station says they should have left some room in Mr. Wolff’s coffin for the NCD.”

  He started to walk away, but Jack wasn’t done.

  “I found the woodcutter’s shotgun,” he said in a low voice. “I want to check to see if it was the murder weapon in the woodcutter case.”

  Friedland halted abruptly, pressed the “door-hold” button and stared at Jack.

  “I don’t think that’s very likely. Haven’t you read the write-up in Amazing Crime? It was the Kiev mafia trying to muscle in on the Reading drug trade via Cleethorpes with the help of several all-powerful and unfeasibly ancient secret societies. It’s a done deal, Jack—Max Zotkin is doing time as we speak.”

  Jack was unfazed. “Even so, I’d like to check. Do you have the cartridges from the murder scene? Skinner can check them against the gun we found.”

  Chymes stared at him for a moment, then appeared to soften. “I’ll have them sent down. Good-bye, Jack.”

  The doors slid shut. Jack closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Suddenly, he remembered why he had never really wanted to be in the Guild.

  9. Back at the office

  van Dumpty, Humperdinck (Humpty) Jehoshaphat Aloysius Stuyvesant. Businessman, philanthropist, large egg. Born/laid 6th June 1939, Oxford, England. Edu: Llanabba Castle. Uni: Christ Church. Career: Lecturer at Balliol, 1959–1964. Chief Financial Controller, Porgia Holdings, Inc., 1965–1969. Head of Reading Prison’s laundry department, 1969–1974. Ogapôga Development Council, 1974–1978. Professor of Children’s Literature, Reading University, 1980–1981. CEO Dumpty Holdings Ltd., 1983–present. CEO World Zinc, PLC, 1985–1991. CEO Splotvian Mineral and Mining Corporation, 1989–1990. Married 1: Lucinda Muffet-Dumpty 1962–1970 (Died). Married 2: Laura Garibaldi, 1984–2002 (Divorced). No children. Hobbies: reading, oology.

  —Mr. Dumpty’s entry in the 2002 edition of Who’s What?

  Mary looked up as Jack entered the room, but Tibbit actually stood, which seemed to her pointlessly correct protocol.

  “Any luck with the shotgun?”

  “You could say that. Remember the Andersen’s Wood murder?”

  “Of course,” replied Mary. “It was titled ‘From Russia with Gloves’ and appeared in Amazing Crime, issue 12, volume 101, reprinted in Friedland Chymes Casebook XVII. It was an extraordinarily complex case. He—”

  She stopped as she saw Jack glaring at her.

  “I suppose you know the page number, too?” he asked.

  “Sorry, wasn’t thinking. Seriously, I thought Chymes had found the weapon that killed the woodcutters. After all, it was the discovery of the engraved Holland and Holland that led him on an unnecessarily complex jaunt around Europe before he solved it.”

  “It was never proved it was the weapon. He’s sending the cartridges down so we can check.”

  “But if Humpty’s shotgun was the murder weapon used to kill the woodcutters…”

  “Yes,” replied Jack, “Chymes would be wrong. Unthinkable, isn’t it?”

  Mary thought about agreeing with him wholeheartedly but said instead, “A few things for you.”

  “Shoot.”

  “Mrs. Singh rang with some figures. They can’t be certain, as so much of Humpty’s albumen was washed away by the rain, but indications show he was twenty-six times the legal limit for driving. Even so, she reckons he would still have been conscious—it’s something to do with his coefficient of volume.”

  “That’s one seriously pickled egg,” murmured Jack. “What else?”

  “I’ve been collating the highlights from police databanks along with some background details Baker gleaned from a contact at the the Reading Mercury.”

  “Go on.”

  She looked at her foolscap notepad, cleared her throat and began: “Humperdinck Jehoshaphat Aloysius Stuyvesant van Dumpty was born on the sixth June, 1939,” she read. “His father was Gaylord Llewelyn Stuyvesant van Dumpty, a minor baronet and lecturer in classical Greek at Oxford. There seems to be some doubt over his mother. Schooled at Llanabba Castle, then Christ Church College reading mathematics and children’s literature. He played rugby for Oxford and just missed being chosen to play for England owing to a knee injury.”

  “He’d make a pretty unstoppable player,” said Jack, thinking it would be like trying to tackle a cannonball.

  “As long as he didn’t have to run, on those short legs,” added Mary. “Anyway, he married Lucinda Muffet in 1962, and we don’t hear anything about him until he is asked to leave a lecture post at Balliol in 1964 after being charged with a crooked property deal. Released through lack of evidence, he was not so lucky in 1969, when he was jailed for five years on a charge of money laundering for the Porgia family crime syndicate. He was questioned closely by the Serious Crime Squad about his connections but didn’t talk and, when he was released three years later, was given an apartment, reputedly a gift from Giorgio Porgia himself. His first wife died in a car accident while he was in prison, in 1970. He spent the next few years living and working in Ogapôga and was heard of next in 1978, when he requested asylum at the British consulate in Pôga City. The Ogapôgian government had charged him with smuggling gems, and, following some swift diplomatic dealing, he was deported. He returned to England in 1979 and in 1980 moved to Reading to lecture at the university. Questioned by NCD officers over spinning-wheel profiteering in 1981, then fired from the university in the same year over allegations of embezzlements. In 1984 he married Laura Garibaldi. In 1989 he shifted his interests to world development and raised forty million pounds on a limited-share issue to buy a monopoly on mineral rights in the Splotvian Republic. Six months later a coup there lost him everything when the incoming administration nationalized the land. Investigations followed complaints by the shareholders, but again he was never charged. Made a fortune in zinc between 1985 and 1991, then lost it all in 1993 when he tried to corner the market in talcum powder on the Hong Kong commodities exchange. Questioned about insider trading on the Tokyo stock exchange in 1999 but again, never charged.”

  There was a pause.

  “That
’s all we have.”

  “So…a few investigations and one conviction? For the Porgia money laundering?”

  “I only gave you the highlights. He’s been pulled in for questioning on one hundred twenty-eight occasions, charged twenty-six times, but, as you say, only convicted once.”

  “Well, we knew he was a bit of a crook.”

  “There is a flip side. He has undertaken numerous charitable assignments over the years and has spent a great deal of time raising money for a myriad of good causes, St. Cerebellum’s being a notable favorite.”

  “I’m sure the people defrauded by the Splotvian mineral-rights scam would be overjoyed to hear that. How long had he been an outpatient there?”

  “He’d been a patient there for over four decades,” replied Mary, looking at a note she had made. “His doctor at present is someone named…Quatt.”

  Both Jack and Tibbit stopped what they were doing and stared at her. There was a sudden silence in the room. You could almost hear the skin forming on the custard in the canteen next door.

  “You’re joking? Not Dr. Quatt of all people?”

  “I’m missing something here,” she said slowly. “Who is he?”

  “She used to be head of her own genetic research establishment until a scandal involving ethically dubious medical experiments.”

  “What sort of experiments?”

  “Keeping monkey brains alive in jars, reanimating dead tissue—usual stuff. We probably won’t get much sense out of her—she’s as mad as a barrel of skunks.”

  A clerk came in and handed Jack a manila envelope. It contained five black-and-white glossy eight-by-tens and a note from Madeleine to say that he should call her if he was going to be late for dinner.

  “Hah!” said Jack, going through the photographs. “There’s our man!”

  Two of the pictures were of other celebrities with Humpty in the background. In one he was sitting at a table pouring himself a drink, in another walking past, out of focus. The third was of him at the lectern giving some sort of speech.

  “He does look drunk, doesn’t he?” commented Mary.

  The fourth photo was of him shaking hands with a distinguished-looking man in his sixties whom Jack recognized instantly.

  “That’s Solomon Grundy, the CEO of Winsum and Loosum Pharmaceuticals and ninth-wealthiest man in the country. He’ll be pressing flesh and doing the buddy-buddy thing with the Jellyman on Saturday. Who else have we got?”

  The fifth picture was of Humpty gazing a bit unsteadily at the camera while shaking hands with a somber-looking man in his early fifties.

  Jack turned the picture over and read Madeleine’s caption. “‘Local celebrity Mr. Charles Pewter meets local celebrity H. Dumpty at the 2004 Spongg Charity Benefit.’ Charles Pewter. Anyone heard of him?”

  Tibbit disappeared into the next room to find out.

  Jack pinned Dumpty’s photo on the board and stared at it for a moment.

  “Jack?” said Briggs, who had appeared at the door. “Can I have a quick word?”

  “Of course.”

  Briggs beckoned him out of the door and down the corridor a few yards. He looked left and right before speaking and lowered his voice.

  “I’ve just had a call from DCI Chymes—”

  Jack sighed audibly. “No way. No way on God’s own earth, sir. NCD is my jurisdiction. Humpty is my jurisdiction. This is what I do.” He felt his voice rising.

  “I know that,” said Briggs, trying to be conciliatory and authoritarian at the same time, “I just wanted you to reconsider. Chymes is Guild and high-profile. If you let him take over the Humpty investigation, it might bode well for the division.”

  “No, sir. I’ve been shafted once too often by Friedland. You’d have to suspend me before I’d let go.”

  Briggs took a deep breath and stared at him for a moment.

  “Jack, please! Don’t piss Chymes off. If the Guild of Detectives gets involved, it could all get really messy.”

  “Then,” said Jack, “it’s going to get messy. Are we done, sir?”

  Briggs glared at him, then nodded, and Jack departed. He loosened his collar and felt his heart thump inside his chest. Humpty. Something told him it was going to be a tricky one.

  As he walked back in, Tibbit and Mary were waiting for him with a hefty volume of Reading Who’s What? Mary looked at him quizzically, but Jack didn’t say anything.

  “Pewter,” said Tibbit, “Charles Walter. He’s a commodities broker. Has been partnered to Mr. Perkupp at Perkupp and Partners since 1986. Active on the charity scene, married, with one son. Special interests: Victoriana, walking. Lives and works from Brickfield Terrace.”

  Jack picked up the phone and dialed Pewter’s number.

  After only two rings, a woman with a cultured voice answered the phone. “Perkupp and Partners. May I help you?”

  “Yes,” he replied, “this is Detective Inspector Spratt, Nursery Crime Division. I wonder if I might speak to Mr. Pewter?”

  “Certainly, sir. Please wait a moment.”

  She put him on hold, and a rather poor recording of Vivaldi came down the line. A moment later she was back.

  “I’m sorry, sir, Mr. Pewter is in a meeting. Can he call you back?”

  Jack knew when he was being fobbed off.

  “Tell him I’m investigating Humpty Dumpty’s death.”

  There was a short pause, and then a man’s voice came on the line.

  “DI Spratt? My name is Charles Pewter. Perhaps you’d better come around.”

  10. Charles peWter

  DANGEROUS PSYCHOPATH CAPTURED

  The incredibly dangerous homicidal maniac known as “the Gingerbreadman” was captured almost single-handedly by Friedland Chymes last night. The cakey lunatic, whose reign of terror has kept Reading in a state of constant fear for the past six months, was brought to book by DI Chymes and some other unnamed officers in a textbook case of inspired investigation. “It really wasn’t that hard,” declared Chymes modestly. “Myself and some colleagues just did what was expected of any member of the police force.” The flour, butter, ginger and sugar psychopath, whose penchant for literally pulling his victims apart, is currently in a secure wing of St. Cerebellum’s, where he will doubtless remain for the rest of his life.

  —From The Toad, March 23, 1984

  Brickfield Terrace was a tree-lined avenue of houses built in the late 1890s and was situated only a few miles from the town center. Mr. Pewter’s house, Jack discovered, was the last one in the street and also seemed to be the only house not dissected into undistinguished flats. As he tugged on the bellpull, he noted an ugly hole where the boot scraper should have been. After a moment, the door opened, and a tall man with Victorian clothes, a large beard and a face like a bloodhound stood on the threshold.

  “If you’re from The Owl,” began Mr. Pewter without waiting to see who either Jack or Mary was, “you spelt my name wrong on the guest list for the Spongg Footcare Charity Benefit. It’s not Pooter but Pewter, as in tankard.”

  His deep voice showed little emotion and was about as salubrious as his features.

  Jack held up his ID card. “Detective Inspector Jack Spratt, Nursery Crime Division. This is Detective Sergeant Mary Mary.”

  “Ah!” he exclaimed. “Mr. Dumpty. You’d better come in.”

  Jack thanked him, and they stepped inside. It was like walking into a museum, for the whole house was decorated and furnished in a middle-class Victorian fashion. There was no expensive furniture; all the pieces were of low-quality boxwood and poor veneer. A pair of plaster of paris antlers painted brown were waiting to be put up on the wall, and fans and other Victorian knickery-knackery filled every vacant space. Mr. Pewter contemplated Jack’s curious gaze with pride.

  “It’s all original, Mr. Spratt. Every single piece, from the screens to the bedstead to the fans on the sideboard. As very little of poor-quality Victorian furniture survives, for obvious reasons, it’s of almost incalculable value. I bought
these plaster of paris antlers at Christie’s last week for seven thousand pounds. I had to beat off stiff competition from Japan; they love this stuff almost as much as I do. Shall we repair to my study?”

  “Please.”

  Mr. Pewter led them through to a library, filled with thousands of antiquarian books.

  “Impressive, eh?”

  “Very,” said Jack. “How did you amass all these?”

  “Well,” said Pewter, “you know the person who always borrows books and never gives them back?”

  “Yes…?”

  “I’m that person.”

  He smiled curiously and offered them both a seat before sitting himself.

  “So how may I help?” he asked.

  “You were at the Spongg Footcare Charity Benefit last night at the Déjà Vu Ballrooms?”

  “I was.”

  “And you spoke with Mr. Dumpty?”

  “Indeed I did, Inspector. Although, to be honest, I didn’t really get much sense out of him.”

  “Was Mr. Dumpty drunk when he arrived?”

  “Mr. Dumpty was a bit drunk all the time. He had a brilliant mind, but he wasted himself. I sat next to him, as I thought I could get him to join one of my self-help groups. You may not know, Mr. Spratt, but I run the Reading Temperance Society. We do what we can for people like Mr. Dumpty, using a combination of group reliance, prayer and electroshock aversion therapy. I spoke to him sternly about his habit when he joined the table.”

  “What did he say?”

  Mr. Pewter coughed politely. “He said, ‘Pass the Bolly, old trout, I’ve got a tongue like the Gobi Desert.’ I refused, and he got Marjorie to pass it over instead. I tried to make him see reason, but he just told me not to be an old, er…”

  “Fart?” inquired Mary helpfully.

  “Exactly so, young lady. I tried again to make him see sense but he became sarcastic. I warned him about that, too, as I also run Reading’s branch of Sarcastics Anonymous—”

  “And after he became sarcastic? Then what happened?”