by Sibel Hodge
“I’ve been asking all the staff if they’ve noticed anything suspicious going on that might be helpful in trying to find the stolen relics. Do you have any information?”
“Do you want to sit down?” He nodded to the chair.
“No, I’m fine. Thanks. I like standing. It’s good for the circulation.”
“Oh. All right. It’s just that you look a bit uncomfortable.”
Uncomfortable? Really? Standing in a room with a formicophilia nutter who dresses up fleas and has teeth like the oldest serial killer known to men and vampires? Who'd have thought it?
“No, I’m fine.” I waved a nonchalant hand through the air and tried to stop it shaking. I could’ve sworn I saw a beetle or something scuttle across the room out the corner of my eye. No, don’t look!
I forced myself to concentrate on Elmer. “So, did you see anyone hanging around the museum, perhaps someone who didn’t belong? Or anyone acting weird?”
I did a mental head slap. All he had to do was look in the mirror to find someone acting weird.
He pursed his thin, dry lips (also grey) and scratched at an insect bite on his neck. “No. I can’t say that I have, but I spend a lot of time down here, cataloguing new species and exhibits. I’m not out on the museum floor very often, except to do talks to school children.”
Scare the shit out of them, more like. “Did you know there’d been an attempt to steal the relics before?”
“Of course. Everyone did.” He scratched his bite harder. “Margaret tried to get Alistair to up security while the exhibit was here, but he said we didn’t have the extra funds for it. They had a blazing row about it one day, and she went over his head to speak to the museum director at the London Natural History Museum, who has overall control over this annexe, too. She shouldn't really have done it. What she should’ve done was speak to Petra Burrows, the lady in London who has control of the overall security for the museums, but Margaret and Petra had some dispute about five years ago when they both worked at the Ornithology Museum in Bath. Margaret knew if she asked Petra for help with extra security, Petra would refuse outright. So, instead, Margaret went over her head, too, and tried to get the director to agree to what she wanted.”
“And did he?”
“No. She was fuming when she came back.” He stopped attacking the bite on his neck and started on one on the back of his hand. It made me want to scratch, too. “And now it’s gone. All for the sake of a few extra measly pounds that could’ve protected it.” He frowned. “Such a shame that we can’t even look after our historical treasures anymore.”
“Did Margaret do that a lot, then? Go over Alistair’s head? It seems like she doesn’t trust his ability to act as curator here.”
“It’s happened several times. She was assistant curator here when the previous curator retired, and she was expecting to be offered the position, but Alistair was brought in instead. She’s been jealous ever since. But Alistair is very good at his job. And he leaves us all alone to get on with our respective collections and research. So I couldn’t ask for more, really.”
I spied movement on the far corner wall. A dark, roundish shape crawled up towards an overflowing bookshelf. Argh! Don’t look! Do not look!!
I scratched my neck. Why is it so hot in here all of a sudden?
“Er…can you think of anything else?” I backed towards the door, feeling itchy all over. Time to make a sharp exit.
“Not really.”
“OK, great! Thanks!” I launched out of the door into the safety of the corridor and power walked away at supersonic speed.
When I got to the top of the stairs at the entrance, I blew out a huge breath trapped deep inside. The explosive sound made Colin turn his attention from supervising the carpenters fitting the hinges to the new, thick oak doors. He smiled, but a hint of something menacing in his eyes made my skin crawl. Or maybe it was because I was still in itchy mode from my encounter with Lurch/Dracula. I couldn’t wait to get out of the place and take a shower—a very long, hot one with a whole pot of Brazil nut exfoliator. Maybe a loofah, too. And Brad with the loofah, doing—
“Do you need any help?” Colin asked, interrupting my daydream.
“Er, yes. Can you tell me where I can find Sally English, please?”
“Head down there and turn right at the display case with the stuffed Madagascan eagle and the black-footed ferret.” As he pointed down the corridor past where the St Nicholas Exhibit had been, the cuff of his shirtsleeve rode up his arm, revealing a tattoo of a spider—a big hairy, black spider with fangs and yellow eyes.
Now I know what you’re going to say. It’s not a real spider, right? My rational mind knew that it wasn’t a real spider, but my irrational mind couldn’t apparently tell the difference. My hands started shaking, and all the moisture in my mouth evaporated. A lump formed in my throat, making swallowing difficult. My breathing sped up, and my pulse whooshed in my ears.
Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Just put one foot in front of the other. You’ve been walking for thirty-five years. It should be a piece of cake.
“Nks,” was all I could manage as I got my brain into gear and scurried off, scratching my arms. I needed coffee. Lots and lots of caffeine. And a cake. Chocolate. No, sod that! I was off chocolate after a chocolate-cake-spell disaster. I needed a stiff drink instead. A great big tumbler full of whiskey—or brandy. Maybe even a whole bottle.
As I entered the animal exhibit room, I glanced back at Colin. Was that why I was getting a creepy vibe off him—because he had a tattoo of something I had a phobia of? Was he, in fact, just a very nice and gentle, spider-loving man, or was there something more sinister about him? I wasn’t sure yet. The spider that appeared during Tia’s spell loomed into my head.
After I’d taken some deep, calming breaths, I realized Sally was nowhere to be seen, but I heard a noise coming from a doorway at the back of the room. I wandered through it and into to a storeroom, where I found her rifling through large drawers, mumbling under her breath. She picked up a glass case holding what looked like a chinchilla, nodded to herself, then ticked a piece of paper resting on top of the drawer.
Sally didn’t look like a serial clothes shopper. She looked more like a shop-in-charity-shops shopper. But then, what do I know? Tia was obviously in the fashion know-how, and some of the stuff she wore looked like shower curtains or scuba-diving gear. I guess there was no accounting for taste. Look at Lady Gaga. I’d seen her dressed up like a yeti and a pointy-looking bee, amongst other things. Maybe Elmer wasn’t that weird, after all, in the scheme of things.
“Sally?”
She gasped and spun around, sending the piece of paper fluttering to the floor. “Who are you?” She frowned, looking at me with suspicion.
I introduced myself, and the frown lines softened.
“Oh. Sorry. I suppose this robbery has made everyone a bit jumpy.” She fiddled with her gold necklace. “I already spoke to the police this morning when they arrived.”
“I need to ask some routine questions, too.”
The frown was back in place, but this time, she looked worried. “But I don’t know anything.” Her voice developed a high-pitched whine.
She seemed nervous. Some people did naturally get nervous when talking to the police or to me, but I sensed it was more than that.
“Do you know anything about the theft that might help find the offenders?”
Her neck flushed red. “No. Of course not.” Whiney again but this time defensive as well. “Why would I?”
I paused, studying her, which made her flush even more. In fact, if her flush were a lipstick colour, it would be called Raspberry Glow.
“How much would an exhibit like that be worth, do you think?” I asked.
Her eyes widened. “I don’t know. I’m the animal expert. I didn’t even have time to look at the St Nicholas exhibit yet.”
“Alistair thinks it would be priceless, but everything has a price. I’m guessing it would be worth millions, d
on’t you think?”
She scratched her head and didn’t say anything.
I stared at her—an old technique I'd learned as a police officer. Give someone silence, and they like to fill it.
“I expect so. Probably. Maybe. I should think it might be worth…oh, I don’t know. I’m not sure I could guess…I think…well, possibly a few million,” she babbled.
“And you have some substantial debts at the moment, don’t you? Your house is about to be repossessed. A few million would be a miracle for you, wouldn’t it?”
She took a step back, hand to her cheek. Her mouth flapped open and closed for a few seconds before she slid to the floor, covered her face in her hands, and burst into tears. “It’s not my fault. It’s not my fault. He wanted me to do it.”
“Did you have something to do with the robbery, Sally?” I asked. “If you did, maybe we can sort this out now before it goes any further.” OK, maybe that was a teensy ickle lie. Robbery and theft of ancient artefacts would earn a lot more than a slap on the wrist. We were talking years in prison. Still, I wasn't above a few lies to solve a case. And it was St Nicholas we were talking about here. Santa's skinny alter ego! Christmas icon to millions. “Joy to the world” and all that!
Sally took an almighty sniff and wiped her cheeks on the back of her hands. “I didn’t have anything to do with the robbery. I swear.” She blinked rapidly. “On my cat’s life.”
I could see how a non-cat person might not take a declaration like that with the seriousness it deserved, but as a cat lover and owner of my own ginger furball, whom I talk to on a regular basis—yes, he answers me, too!—I could totally see where she was coming from. But was she telling the truth? Even if she wasn’t involved in the robbery, she was definitely hiding something.
“So what's going on, then?”
“It was the money,” she wailed. “I only did it for the money. I was in so much debt and…”—she sniffed—“…and he wanted me to.”
“Who wanted you to do what, exactly?”
“He knew about my debts. He found me crying in my office one day as I was worrying about how to pay it all back. I’ve tried to stop spending—honestly, I have—but I think I have this addiction or something. It’s uncontrollable.” She wiped at more tears forming in the corner of her eyes. “He’d always liked me, you see. I mean, I liked him, too, but only as a friend. Not in that way. But then he said there could be a way we could help each other. He’s got this weird…fetish thing. He likes to have his wrists and ankles tied to a post in his garden shed and then have insects poured onto him. Especially his…” She nodded in my general crotch area. “His, you know. His thingy.”
Formicophilia. Ick!
I fought the urge to gag. I didn’t know which was worse: imagining Elmer naked or having insects crawling all over my bits and bobs, biting me. They were both pretty disturbing.
“So, he said if I tied him up and handled the insect things, he’d pay me. I mean, it was gross and disgusting. I’d never heard of anything like it.” She pulled a horrified face. “But he said he’d pay me five hundred pounds a time! That’s a lot of money, and I really needed it to stop my house getting repossessed.”
I didn’t say anything for a while, which was unusual for me. Elmer's formicophilia had actually rendered me speechless.
I pressed the back of my hand to my mouth, willing my breakfast to stay down. “Wow. That’s…er…um…” I didn’t know what the hell it was, actually.
I knew what it wasn’t, though. Sally and Elmer's insect arrangement might have been odd—OK, more than odd. Downright freaky, and that’s being polite—but I was pretty sure Sally's body language said she was telling the truth about her lack of involvement in the robbery.
So exactly who had been involved?
Chapter 4
I perched on the edge of Hacker’s desk, watching him type gobbledygook commands into one of his computers as I sipped a triple espresso and stuffed down my fourth mince pie. At least my hands had stopped shaking after all the spider incidents in a single day. Although they would probably start again after the caffeine and sugar hit.
“Do you know how much crap that’s got in it?” Hacker nodded to my feast.
Hacker and Brad were big on healthy eating.
“Yes, but it’s Christmas. It’s actually the law that you have to eat ten mince pies a day. Or ten slices of Christmas cake. Ten is a holy number, apparently.” I shrugged.
“You’ve eaten ten mince pies?” Brad walked into the office, carrying a Tupperware box, shaking his head.
“Not yet, but I’m working on it.”
“That is just wrong.” He sat at my office chair opposite. “Did you know sugar is worse for you than even tobacco or alcohol?”
“No. But now you’ve said that, I think I really need a whiskey or something to go with it. It’s been a freaky morning. Or—I know! Eggnog. Shouldn't we have eggnog on Christmas Eve?” I tilted my head. “Hmm…maybe I can suggest to Starbucks that they do a special eggnogaccino. Coffee and alcohol together. Heaven.”
Brad sighed. He was always trying to curb my unhealthy lifestyle, but it never worked. My five-a-day usually consisted of fruit-flavoured sweets. He held out the Tupperware box to Hacker. “Falafel with alfalfa sprouts and wheatgrass powder?”
Hacker leaned forward and took a grey ball with lumps of what looked like dead flies in it. “Mmmm. Yummy.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Yummy? Seriously? You’re eating grass and sprouts, and that’s yummy?”
Brad popped one into his mouth and chewed. “Delicious.” He nodded in an over-exaggerated way.
“Yeah, right.” I popped the last piece of mince pie in my mouth. “Mmm. Awww. Oooh. Soooo good,” I said in between chews.
Hacker finished eating, leaned back in his chair, then swivelled it to face us. “OK, so I did a check on Colin Prescott. He rents a two-bedroomed house and lives a pretty quiet lifestyle. He goes to the gym three times a week. He’s got no girlfriend. No vices that cost a lot of money and no debts. He’s worked at the London branch of the Natural History Museum for two years as a security guard. His staff appraisals are glowing and say he’s contentious, always on time, and never had a day off sick.”
“The perfect employee?” I thought about those eyes, and the way he stared that made me doubt that. “Maybe too perfect on paper.”
“Exactly.” Hacker grinned. “Two and a half years ago, he was on trial for the burglary of a stately home. He and a group of four other men were charged with stealing antiques and artwork. They were all acquitted, though, so he doesn’t have a criminal record.”
“And then he gets a job in a museum, where there’s lots of antiques and artwork?” Brad raised an eyebrow.
“He could’ve turned over a new leaf, I suppose,” I said. “Although, I doubt it. There was definitely something dodgy about him. Mind you, there was something dodgy about most of the staff.”
“Had he ever worked at the Hertford Museum as a security guard?” Brad asked.
“No. They’ve never had security guards at that museum, only the London one,” I said. “But when he gave me directions to see one of the staff members, he said some very specific details. He said, 'Turn right at the display case with the stuffed Madagascan eagle and the black-footed ferret.' If that was his first day up there, why was he so familiar with things?”
“Maybe he’d cased the place,” Brad said.
“Can I see the CCTV footage of the actual robbery?” I asked.
“Sure.” Hacker’s fingers dashed across the keys, and a black-and-white video popped up on the screen. “I haven’t had a chance to go through it again in more detail yet.”
It unfolded in front of our eyes exactly as Hacker had told me earlier. Four men in a Land Rover rammed the doors. There was no sound, but I could see two of them shouting to each other before they ran through the gaping hole that used to be the door. Then the video switched to the St Nicholas exhibit room, with clear shots of the burglar
s smashing the glass display cases with hammers, grabbing the artefacts, and shoving them in sacks before running out of the room. The next shot was from the camera above the door again, and it showed them running past the mangled Land Rover before disappearing from view. The final shot was taken from a camera pointing away from the building that showed them bundling into the other stolen Land Rover, which wheel-spun down the driveway.
“Let me see it again.” I leaned in closer as Hacker pressed play.
When it got to the men smashing the display cases, I shouted, “There! Stop it!”
Hacker stopped the frame.
“Now go back a bit.”
He rewound it slowly.
“Yes, that’s it. Hold it. Can you zoom in there?” I leaned forward, squinting, pointing to one of the men.
“Yep.” Hacker magnified the image.
“What can you see?” Brad peered over my shoulder.
“Zoom in on his right wrist.”
And that’s when I came face to face with the spider tattoo again. I shuddered and pointed. “That’s Colin. He’s got this”—I scrunched up my face—“gross spider tattoo.” At least seeing it on the screen seemed to lessen my phobia a little, although having said that, I did get up then and stand behind Brad. I wrapped my arms round his waist and leaned my forehead on his shoulder, with my eyes squeezed shut so I didn’t have to see the bugger anymore.
“You’re sure it’s exactly the same? There are probably thousands of people with spider tattoos out there.” Brad covered his arms with mine and stroked my skin.
“What? Are they mad? I could think of much nicer things to get done,” I shrieked.
“You’d probably get a chocolate cake tattooed,” Hacker said. “Or a pizza.”
I was guessing he was talking to me since I still had my eyes closed. “Nope, it’s definitely the same. I saw the horrible fangy things.”
“We need to pay a little visit to Colin, then.” Brad said.
“I can’t go anywhere until you get…that thing…off the screen.” My voice came out muffled, distorted by Brad’s back.
