by Nikki Attree
“Or maybe another option might be to go to the police station with Tommy and show them this photo ...” Annie says, brandishing her mobile with the image of the two-tone Gertrude on the screen. “I’ll report you for dyeing birds, willfully misleading your customers, maltreating the animals here, buying from an unlicensed breeder, receiving stolen goods ...”
Gertrude squawks, triumphantly: “get on down and ...”
“Shut the fuck up!” screams Snake. Then reverting to his menacing hiss: “do what you want darlin, I’ll deny everything. The cops can't touch me. I’ve got a legit business here, unlike your thieving little scumbag friend.”
Tommy scowls at him, raises a fist, and takes a step towards Snake. He’s at least a foot taller than the scrawny shop owner. Annie puts a hand on Tommy’s arm and restrains him.
“OK, I’ll give you an hour to think it over, and then we call the police. Oh yes, I forgot to mention, my brother is an inspector in the Met.”
"Yeah, right, of course he is” mocks Snake. Grinning menacingly, he walks out from behind the counter, and advances towards Annie. Tommy steps between them, crosses his arms, and gives Snake a hard stare. The smaller, older man takes a step back, and at that moment a customer enters the shop.
Annie waits while he serves them. Then, as the customer hands over the money, she says: “right, I’m leaving now. I’ll phone you in an hour. Oh, and by the way, I’ve recorded this conversation. I think the police will be quite interested in it, along with that photo.” She takes her mobile out of her pocket, and snaps another shot of the startled Snake, with the cage beside him.
Panic envelopes his reptilian features. The customer scuttles out of the door looking bemused, and Snake hisses: “OK. Give us the ‘undred quid and you can ‘ave the sodding bird back. I never wanted the bugger in the first place."
Tommy slams the money down on the counter for the second time, and staring hard at Snake, picks up the cage.
“Hey baby, we gonna get on down and boogie the night away!” sings Gertrude, doing a little dance on her perch, as they walk out of the shop.
“Wow, that was like something out of the movies, like” says Tommy, adrenaline coursing through his veins. “We’re like the Dynamic Duo, like” he says excitedly, as they get back into Annie’s car.
Annie can’t help but laugh at this picture of them as the caped-crusader super-heroes of the stolen parrot world. She’s delighted for Edna that they’ve got her beloved Gertrude back, but now the chase is over she has to admit she does feel a bit of an anticlimax, almost as if she needs another adventure to challenge her. She sighs as she thinks about the days that stretch ahead for her in the hippy shop.
“Did you see that drama on TV about the private investigator? You know, that bloke with the shaggy hair what solves all those mysteries?” Tommy asks her. “I’ll tell you what, you’d make a wicked detective! You’re easily as clever as ‘im! But, you know, not solving murders ... a pet detective, like. And if you need help with finding animals, I could give you a hand. You know, be your back-up, like. When you need someone sorting out. Watch your back, like. I won't charge much."
Annie grins. “You’ve got to admire the lad’s cheek,” she thinks. Out loud she says: “well if I did decide to look for more missing pets, and if I was to ask for your help, you certainly wouldn’t get paid for the first six months. Think of it as a kind of community service. Do you understand Tommy?”
“Yeah, whatever, ‘spose so” Tommy says, looking sheepish and shuffling his feet. “Fair enough, I get it. You didn't report me to the police, like."
“And one more thing. We’re going straight round to Edna’s house to return Gertrude, and I expect you to apologise to her, OK?”
“Yeah, right, ‘spose so.”
“And after you’ve done that, I want you to promise to keep that gang of yobs that you hang out with, away from her house. Or else, you’ll have me and your mum to deal with. OK?”
“Yeah, right, ‘spose so. Whatever, like ...”
They arrive at Edna’s house and Annie rings the bell. The old lady opens the door, and when she sees the parrot her face breaks into a huge smile. She stands there, speechless for a moment. Tears well up in her eyes, and she gives Annie a huge hug. Then she hugs Tommy.
“Oh, I just can’t thank you two enough for bringing my little Gertie back to me, safe and sound.”
Tommy has the good sense to blush, and Annie tells Edna that the teenage has something to tell her.
“All right dear, but let’s go inside and have a nice cup of tea first. I think there’s some of my special fruitcake left too.”
They all sit down in Edna’s kitchen, and Tommy says his piece. Falteringly, reluctantly, but genuinely. You feel that perhaps this has taught him a lesson, in the nick of time; that maybe things will be different for him from now on. When he reassures Edna that she’ll be having no more trouble from the gang, and sees how happy she is, he appears genuinely moved.
“Let's get on down and boogie, baby!” says Gertrude, delighted to be back in familiar surroundings.
* * *
Later that evening Annie is relaxing at home, mulling over the day’s events. She’s exhausted but elated, although the feeling of anticlimax is still lurking in the background.
Then another of those life-changing thoughts pops into her head: “maybe Tommy’s pet detective thing isn’t such a bad idea after all. I wonder if it might actually work ...?”
The cogs are turning now, as she mulls it over. She knows that she really does need to move on from the hippy shop. She’s bored out of her mind there. That’s the key really: her mind. It’s always been her strength, and her parents and brother are right: it’s not being put to good use ... “except for the past few days” she thinks. “Yep, I reckon I did quite well cracking the mystery of the missing parrot. There again, it was a bit of an open-and-shut case. Not much detective work required, really.”
On the other hand, although perhaps the case hadn’t involved huge amounts of brain power, it had thrown her into some quite tricky situations, and she reckons that she handled herself pretty well. So, basically, what’s needed is a combination of problem-solving and people skills. Maybe she does have the right skill set to be a detective after all. “Rob would be amused anyway. He was saying, just a few days ago, that I’d make a good detective. Perhaps I should call his bluff.”
She must admit, she was quite flattered by her brother’s belief in her problem-solving capabilities, but the idea of joining him in the police force didn’t appeal to her at all. Since leaving her job at the college, she’s been thinking that ideally she’d like to be her own boss. This is partly because of the dubious relationship she had with her previous boss (presumably, you’re less likely to fall out with your boss if she is yourself); but more importantly: she likes being independent, and she thinks that she has what it takes to be freelance.
So, looking at herself as objectively as she can, she decides that yes, she can think her way through a set of clues, and she is good with people ... but what was it that Tommy said in the car? “... you’d make a wicked detective ... but, you know, not solving murders ... a pet detective, like.”
That’s it! He’s right. She can’t really imagine herself up to her elbows in bloody corpses (for much the same reasons that, as we will discover shortly, she could never imagine herself up to her elbows in a cow’s backside); or pointing a gun at someone and muttering: “make my day, punk”; or charging through the mean streets of Stoke Newington in her little Renault Clio, tyres squealing, in hot pursuit of a serial killer. OK, she enjoyed her recent little adventure, but it was hardly the stuff of Hollywood.
Whereas, a pet detective ... what would that involve? Well, the final piece in the skill-set jigsaw would be to be good with animals, and that’s something she’s always been happy with. Ever since she can remember, playing with her first kitten, she’s loved them. For a while she wanted to be a vet, but she couldn’t face the idea of cuttin
g up an animal in surgery (too squeamish), or having to put someone's much loved pet down (too soft). She knows, only too well, how attached people get to their pets. They become part of the family, and in her case it’s quite an extended family, or perhaps it would be better described as a menagerie.
To start with, she has several cats. Exactly how many is debatable since some of them seem to come and go as they like. The oldest, and arguably best loved, is her rescue cat: Sparkle. Then there are the four guinea pigs (Cookie, Crumpet, Cotton Ball and Cream Puff), who were dumped on her by an ex-friend who went on holiday, and never came back to pick them up. They’ve been joined recently, of course, by her niece's three hamsters (she’s hoping that they will only be temporary guests, and that Rob isn’t going to do a runner and leave them with her).
Then there are the six exotic fish (Bubbles, Casper, Dexter, Duke, Earl, and Nemo) from the Indian restaurant on the high street. One evening Annie was collecting her takeaway, and the highly stressed owner was threatening to flush them down the toilet, along with the rest of the business, before he went bankrupt. Needless to say, Annie took them home with her curry. Now they’re swimming around in an impressive tank in her living room, and keeping the cats entertained.
Finally (for now anyway) there’s Dougal, the rabbit. He arrived in her front garden one morning, in a cardboard box, with a note saying: ‘My name is Dougal. Please look after me. My owner can't afford me any more. I like carrots, lettuce, and lots of cuddles.’
Annie suspected that Dougal used to belong to one of the students at the college. They all knew that she loved animals, and that she was a bit of a softie. Her animals realise this as well.
The cats, guinea pigs, hamsters, fish, and rabbit all have to be fed, and kept from eating each other. It is indeed a mini menagerie, and involves a fair bit of time and expense, but Annie thinks of them as her extended family, and well worth the effort.
Having ruled out becoming a vet, she eventually got diverted into a teaching career, but she never completely abandoned the idea of working with animals. She’s very much a cat person (not that she has anything against dogs, but she couldn’t see herself as a trainer or a groomer). Of course, as a pet detective she’d have to deal with all kinds of animals: horses, snakes, parrots ... Ah yes, that reminds her - the sheer joy on Edna's face when she saw her beloved Gertie again. That would surely make the job worthwhile.
Tommy's offer to be her back-up (and “watch her back”), wasn’t such a bad idea either. Being a female detective would probably have some advantages, but being able to call on a muscle man (OK, a strapping teenage lad who could put himself around a bit) might come in useful in some situations.
So, it would seem that all the pieces of the jigsaw are in place: she can solve problems by discovering clues; she’s good with people; she loves animals; and she has back-up if things turn nasty (not to mention a brother in the Met). What’s stopping her? Why not give it a go?
And at that exact moment, the ‘Happy Tails Pet Detective Agency’ was conceived, although it would be several more weeks before the birth can be officially registered.
* * *
Fast forward three months and Annie is in business, working from home initially. Of course it’s early days, but she’s survived the birth, the postnatal depression, and ‘Happy Tails’ is just about off life-support now. Of course, there have been a few teething problems. Some bureaucratic, some financial, and some as a result of her easy-going, kind personality.
It wasn’t so much that people took advantage of her, more that she couldn’t bear to let her clients down. She knows how devastated she’d be if any of her furry or scaly posse went missing. So if she can’t find a pet, or worse discovers that it’s ‘kicked the bucket’, she often replaces the missing animal with a look-alike, rather than be the bearer of bad news. Sometimes she spends ages searching the rescue centers for a suitable replacement, or even buying one from a breeder.
This does eat into her profits at first, and things are touch and go for a while, but as she gets better at the job, her success rate steadily improves. She gradually builds a loyal customer base through excellent word-of-mouth recommendations, and it isn’t long before she’s able to move into a little office above a shop on the High Street. From her window, she can look out across the street to the health shop where she used to work. It’s a constant reminder of how far she’s come in the past few months, and how important it is to make a go of the new venture.
Fittingly, the shop below her office is the same pet shop that she’d visited with the photo of Edna’s parrot. The owner, Sid, gave her the tip-off about his shady rival: ‘Da Mutt's Nuts’ and that had been a vital clue in solving her very first case. Now the ‘Happy Tails Pet Detective Agency’ sign is next to the pet shop’s, and she’s become good friends with Sid. They share the same point of view: that working with animals has to be a vocation. As he originally told her, the family pet shop has been there since the sixties, and they are well known amongst Stoke Newington’s animal lovers, so he helps to spread the word. People begin to make increasingly longer journeys to visit ‘Happy Tails’, desperate for Annie to find their missing pets, and she has clients from all over London and even further afield.
* * *
Her big break came when she was asked to investigate an unsolved crime at the world’s most prestigious dog show: ‘Crofts’. In fact it had happened just after Annie and Jack had spent the afternoon of their first date at the show. They had actually seen the victim in the ring, and might even have been there when the crime was committed!
One of the star contestants, a Yorkshire Terrier with the stage name: ‘Big-Ben Prince Great-Balls-of-Fire, the elder’ (or just 'Snooty’ for short), had died in suspicious circumstances, just after he’d been chosen as top dog in his group. An autopsy later revealed traces of poison in his body, and it was widely reported because Crofts was on prime time TV every evening.
His owner: Mrs Sophie Ashley-Turner, a well known breeder, was convinced that Snooty had been murdered by a rival competitor jealous of his success, but the police had been unable to shed any light on the mystery. They’d interviewed all the rival breeders, but there was no evidence linking any of them to Snooty’s death. The CCTV camera footage showed that the only person feeding the dog was the owner herself. They came to the conclusion that if Snooty had been poisoned, it must have happened away from the show. Perhaps the dog had accidentally eaten something it shouldn’t. In any case, they weren’t prepared to commit any more time or manpower to the investigation.
This conclusion was welcomed by Crofts, who were horrified at the negative publicity, and had been doing their best to limit the damage. Mrs Ashley-Turner was convinced that they had pressured the police to close the case and hush things up. In desperation, she contacted Annie to see if the private detective could find the killer.
Annie had seen the story on the news, and had already been thinking about it. She remembered how tense the atmosphere was as the dogs were being judged, and how annoyed the audience had been that she and Jack were not taking it seriously. It had seemed to her at the time that the human contestants were more than merely serious about winning. It was their obsession. Crofts was their Olympics, and perhaps some of them would do anything to win. She could imagine the despair, bitterness, and envy if their star pooch had been beaten. So she hadn’t really been too surprised when the story of Snooty’s suspicious death had broken.
The story soon faded from the news when the police failed to solve the case, but Annie hadn’t forgotten about it. She mentioned it to her brother, and asked him why his colleagues weren’t doing more to find the culprit. He shrugged, said that they had rather more important criminals to catch, and joked that she might be better qualified to investigate a dead dog herself.
Then Mrs Ashley-Turner contacted her. When Annie told Robert about the generous fee, and the five figure reward, he was rather less sarcastic. “Blimey, I had no idea that a dog was worth that much!” he
gasped, when she phoned him. “Maybe I should forget about catching bank robbers, and go into business with my little sister.”
“Actually Rob, perhaps you can help me catch Snooty’s killer. I’m going to need access to the CCTV tapes, the interviews, and the statements. Is there any way that you might be able to get them for me?”
He wasn’t sure. It wasn’t his team - they were busy chasing a gang of international drug smugglers, and it wasn’t a good time. They were expecting a shipment at any time ...
“What about the hamsters?” she countered, reminding him that he owed her a favour, and might need a hamster-sitter again. He sighed, told her that she was certainly “dogged”, and said that he’d see what he could do.
A few days later she had the tapes. She spent the next few weeks painstakingly going through everything, but there were no new clues or leads (very important for a pet detective to have a supply of leads). She was on the point of giving up and admitting defeat, when she noticed something not quite right about the final CCTV tape. Something that the police hadn’t spotted.
She re-checked the penultimate days’s footage, fast forwarding to the end of the afternoon. Then the final day’s tape again. There it was: three minutes were identical. Not just similar (most of the hours of footage were extremely repetitious), but identical in every detail. The only explanation was that someone had copied three minutes from one tape and edited it into the other.
It was hardly surprising that no-one had noticed the anomaly. The hundred and twenty hours of video were mind-numbingly boring. Dogs asleep in cages, peeing, licking themselves ... not the most scintillating viewing. Occasionally the tedium would be interrupted by a human grooming their pooch, or giving it food. Of course, these moments had been carefully scrutinised, and had lead the police to conclude that no-one had interfered with Snooty’s food. But Annie knew different. Someone had tampered with the CCTV footage, and there could only be one reason for doing it.
