style="font-size:15px;"> Moustache could have a look inside without disturbing anybody and when the dog wasn’t found – obviously as there had never been one – she would excuse herself and say it had probably found its own way out and would be home by now. Moustache might be chagrined, but he’d never show it to her, for her father’s sake. Under the cover of her title she was cut out for jobs like this, and if Dubois realized that well, he’d need her to complete the case.
Moustache, however, did not look into the basement door. He immediately marched up the stone steps of the house in question and rang the doorbell.
Cringing, Alkmene waited at the foot of the steps, clenching her hands at this potentially disastrous turn of events.
Nobody came to answer the door.
Moustache rang once more and then came back down to her. He cast a suspicious look at the basement door, then went down the steps to study it up close. ‘There are footprints here,’ he called out. ‘In coal.’
Alkmene smiled nervously. ‘My dog’s?’
‘No, of a man.’ Moustache reached for the short stick attached to his belt and with this assault weapon in hand, he disappeared into the darkness.
Alkmene waited a moment for an anguished cry of pain as the determined sergeant hit an innocent coal delivery man over the head with his stick only to find he had business there and the allegedly missing dog was nowhere in sight.
But there was no sound of grunting, or a struggle, coming from the basement door.
Alkmene paced up and down the pavement, smiling innocently at the passers-by who slowed their steps to stare at her. She wished Moustache wouldn’t take for ever searching that basement. Judging by the time he took, it had to run all the way under the house to the other side, where there might be a backyard. If there was an open door there as well, Moustache might conclude the dog had run out and continue searching on the other side.
Not bad maybe. After all, Dubois needed his time with the constable, to get the information he needed about the murder case. She was curious what the latest might be.
For a moment Alkmene’s thoughts swerved to India where her father would be yelling at his native servants to hold the parasol over his head while he scoured some jungle patch for poisonous plants, having absolutely no idea of the antics of his only daughter whom he believed to be writing some letters or visiting with an innocent female friend.
A sound of heavy metal clattering came from the basement. A voice, suspiciously like that of gruff Moustache, called out in surprise and pain.
Alkmene froze and stared. Had the unsuspecting Moustache run into someone with evil intentions who was now trying to knock him down to flee?
If this attacker appeared from the basement door, could she stop him?
Should she call for more police?
A huffing sound, coughing…
Then Moustache appeared covered in coal dust. He rubbed at his face, leaving stains everywhere.
Alkmene suppressed a burst of laughter to ask demurely, ‘Did you see my dog?’
‘If he is in there, my lady, he will need a bath.’ Moustache coughed again, panting for breath. ‘The place is full of coal like somebody dumped a ton into it.’ His eyes went wide. ‘I do hope they did not do that after your little dog went in. He might have been uh…’
Alkmene forced another smile. ‘My dog is very smart. I am sure he would have run out before he got…into a tight spot. I assume he is on his way home now. I am so sorry for your trouble.’
Moustache tried to dust off his uniform, creating large clouds of black dust in the air. Passers-by shrank into the street or even crossed to the other side to get away from him.
Alkmene said quickly, ‘Thank you. Good day,’ and marched off in the direction of Meade Street. She had her fingers crossed Dubois would not still be sitting there with the constable when Moustache came back into the coffee house.
Although she didn’t doubt he would have laughed his head off if he could have seen his old enemy this way.
When Alkmene trotted up the stairs of Meade Street 33, a delicious scent of something baking wafted towards her. Her stomach growled and she realized she had had nothing since breakfast and running out of the door with the incriminating blackmail letter in her purse.
Instead of Dubois revealing to her which bugger in the Tar Street slums was the alleged convict and helping her set up a trap for the greedy blackmailer, he had told her he was himself the crook in question and denied they could do anything to catch the blackmailer, at least the person behind it all.
Normally that would have been a severe setback, but with Oksana Matejevna’s story about the brooch they had a new lead to the blackmailer’s identity, which was far more exciting than her little trap could ever have been. If Evelyn Steinbeck was involved in the blackmail, it might even provide information as to how Mr Norwhich had died.
Alkmene did wonder though why the blackmailer in the case of the countess had asked for something so specific as this precious gold heirloom while in her case he had simply wanted a hundred pounds.
With that question on her lips, and several more about Dubois’s meet with the constable, she knocked, awaiting his gruff ‘enter’ before opening the door.
Dubois had slipped out of his jacket and had rolled up his shirtsleeves, baring his tanned muscled arms. He stood at the small stove in the corner, the fish hissing as it was swept through the buttered pan by his spatula. The scent was more spicy than fishy, and Alkmene approached with her head tilted. ‘What have you done with it?’
‘Secret recipe,’ Dubois said. ‘Why don’t you uncork the wine?’
He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder at the bottle standing on the plain high table. ‘The corkscrew is beside it.’
Father had one at home where you twisted the corkscrew into the cork, then lowered a steel contraption to keep it in place while by an ingenious little mechanism you lifted the cork out of the bottle’s neck. Alkmene had seen the butler do it countless times and was sure she could have repeated it with ease. But this corkscrew was of a simpler variety. Just insert and pull.
‘Brute strength,’ Dubois said as she was at it in vain.
He left the fish a moment to take the bottle from her hands, clench it between his knees and pull.
Alkmene squinted, waiting for the moment the cork would come loose and Dubois would fall backwards with bottle and all, spilling all their wine.
But no, with a pop the cork came loose, and he managed to balance himself, pull the bottle up and put it on the table. Dropping the corkscrew beside it, he returned to the pan just as the fish was making a sound like it was going to stick to the bottom.
‘Find the glasses, will you?’ he said over his shoulder. ‘In the sideboard.’
Alkmene nodded and went over, sat on her haunches and opened one of the low doors. Inside was a jumble of paper,
