asked the Got man.
‘I’m going there to sell nuts to the Gots,’ the second man said.
‘Why?’ asked the Got man.
‘Because they’ve sold all theirs.’
Igon had started to eavesdrop when he heard the words ‘nuts’ and ‘business’.
‘So please tell me about the statue that’s been blown down?’
‘Well, it’s called the Vernon statue,’ the Got man confided. ‘It was blown down in a storm last night and Vernon wasn’t in it.’ He looked at the Gert man through half a wink and then went back to his cube. The Gert man looked nonplussed.
‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘He wasn’t in it?’
‘I said you wouldn’t,’ replied the Got man.
‘Well, may I ask,’ the Gert man said, smiling sarcastically, ‘if, when you put up a statue of someone in Gotcha, do you always put him inside the statue?’
Igon tapped the Got man on the shoulder before he could answer, and asked, ‘Did you say the Vernon statue, the one in Katchem?’
‘Yes,’ the Got man nodded. ‘It blew down last night.’
‘And Vernon was in it?’
‘Are you a Got?’ asked the Got man.
‘Yes,’ replied Igon.
‘No, Vernon wasn’t in it.’
‘Not in it?’ said the incredulous Igon.
The Got man whispered loudly towards Igon, ‘They say he escaped and is after revenge.’ The Got man looked at Igon this time through two half-closed eyes while at the same time nodding slowly.
Meanwhile the Gert man, who had understood not one word of the conversation, thought he would change the subject by asking Igon, ‘What business are you in, young sir?’
‘Nuts,’ Igon replied and after that remark the conversation seemed to peter out.
Igon turned his head back to the window and looked out into the blackness. His eyes focused on the two eyes looking back at him from his own reflection. They were full of fear. As the coach moved along towards Gotcha he felt a shiver run through his body, but it wasn’t a shiver of cold. Igon was frightened, and he knew it. His thoughts were filled with Vernon.
* * *
A new chief inspector of police was brought in to take over the ‘Vernon Problem’ and to make sure that Vernon was caught and punished. His name was Chief Inspector Speekup. Unfortunately he was very deaf, a result of never having dried his ears properly after washing when he was a little boy. At the moment he was busy with the men in the Katchem Police Force, working out how to combat the Vernon Problem. Twenty tall candles had been lit in order, as the Inspector put it, to throw more light on the case. All leave had been cancelled. His team of eight men looked at him with white faces and nervous eyes. He spoke.
‘Men,’ he snapped, as he looked at his eight policemen. ‘We have been chosen.’ He was pressed to perfection in his light brown uniform, his pointed dark brown hat and a cream shoulder cape. He looked like a chocolate cornetto.
‘We have been chosen to apprehend the vicious Vampire, Vernon, and bring him to justice.’
The fear in the men’s eyes grew because they all knew that the Inspector had never caught a criminal in his entire career with the force. He was the joke of the Gotcha police, the joke being, ‘Chief Inspector Speekup couldn’t catch his pants on a nail’. And now here he was after the worst type of criminal, a criminal who had magic on his side, who could escape from anywhere and who couldn’t die unless he was killed in a special way. They all thought the same thing: ‘Fat chance we’ve got of catching Vernon with this fancy-dressed idiot leading us …’
‘And I want him,’ he continued. ‘I want him here in my prison and I want him soon.’ His voice was as dry as a packet of salty crisps. He clicked his heels together.
‘I know what you want,’ was heard quietly from the back line of men. But the Inspector didn’t hear it. He only saw all his men smiling.
‘That’s it, men,’ he said. ‘That’s what I like to see – men who smile in the face of adversity.’ The men began to shuffle their feet. ‘That’s it, men,’ he said again. ‘Keen to get on with it, eh?’
His dry voice took on the sound of a file rasping against iron. He laughed, a rather throaty laugh, like four dice shaken in a tin box. ‘Now, before we go out and get this man, nay, this fiend, are there any questions?’
‘Where do you think he is, Sir?’ asked Number Six.
‘Pardon?’ the Inspector said, putting his hand to his ear.
‘Where do you think Vernon is?’ Number Six asked again.
‘Yes, very good, very good, yes do that,’ the Inspector said, looking at Number Four.
‘Do what, Sir?’ Number Six asked yet again.
‘Well, that’s possible,’ the Inspector said, this time looking directly at policeman Number Three. ‘Are there any more questions? Come along now, you mustn’t be afraid of me just because I’m an officer.’ Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a hand raised by Number Seven. ‘Yes, what is the question?’ he grinned.
‘May I ask whether you heard the first question or not … Sir?’
The Inspector allowed his grin to widen before he spoke.
‘I would say between now and midnight,’ he said, taking out a large pocket watch and showing it to the men. ‘Good question that. I only hope all you other men are as quick and perceptive as that man there.’ He pointed to policeman Number Two. ‘Right, if that’s all you want to know, off you go, as I have work to do. I’m working on a plan.’
The rest of the policemen all looked at each other in an embarrassed way and filed out of the Inspector’s office. Only Sergeant Salt remained behind. When they were completely alone and the door had been closed the Sergeant spoke.
‘Excuse me … Sir … Sir … Inspector, Sir … Excuse me, Sir.’
The Inspector was busy looking at a street map and didn’t seem to hear, so the Sergeant tapped him on the right shoulder.
The Inspector jumped three feet into the air with fright. When he came down he looked at the Sergeant with a sickly grin and said in a voice as dry as autumn leaves, ‘What can I do for you, Corporal?’
‘Sergeant, Sir,’ the Sergeant beamed proudly.
‘Pardon?’
‘Sergeant, Sir. I’m a Sergeant, Sir.’
‘Good idea, no sugar in mine.’
The
