Bob Burke - The Curds and Whey Mystery

‘Yeah. Maybe now we sort him out,’

The first gnome rushed at me and then goggled in surprise as he was suddenly grabbed by the neck and swung sideways. As his colleague ran out after him, he suffered the same fate. Both had failed to notice the two rather large creatures that stood on either side of the door. We hadn’t come unprepared.

‘Ah, you haven’t met my associates, Mr Lewis and Mr Carroll,’ I said, indicating the two massive ogres each of whom was dangling a gnome by the neck. Well, did you really think I was just going to walk into Edna’s unprepared – magic restraining order or not? I’m not that stupid.

Both gnomes gurgled something which might have been, ‘Please let us go, we are in considerable discomfort,’ or might just as easily have been, ‘We are delighted to make the acquaintance of these two large gentlemen you cleverly brought with you as protection.’ It was hard to tell, but one thing was for sure, they weren’t in a position to do anything threatening to either Miss Muffet or me. Mr Lewis and Mr Carroll had that kind of effect. Each was over eight feet tall and, when squeezed into a black tuxedo, looked very intimidating indeed. I had brought them with me exactly for this kind of situation.

‘Gentlemen, I think you can put them down. I don’t believe they will be too much trouble from now on.’

Both gnomes tried to nod their agreement – but it’s difficult to nod when your neck is being tightly clenched by a hand the size of a beach ball.

At my signal, both of them were dumped unceremoniously on the ground, where they lay in a gnomish heap, blubbering and trying to skulk away. I almost felt sorry for them – almost.

‘Okay chaps, let’s go find Edna.’ The ogres squeezed through the door after us as we entered the house. As we made our away across the wide lobby, gnomes and orcs scattered in all directions, clearly not wanting to engage our group in any form of physical contact. I can’t say I blamed them; my minders had that effect on people.

Edna’s office wasn’t too difficult to find simply because it was the room that the loud voice screaming, ‘Who the blazes is interrupting my telephone call?’ was emanating from. Looking a lot braver than I actually was, I took a deep breath and swung open the office door.

Edna sat behind an ornate desk with a phone to her ear. As soon as she saw me she told whoever was on the other end of the line that she’d call them back and hung up.

‘Well, well, well, if it isn’t Harry Pigg, the world’s greatest detective,’ she sneered. Then she saw Miss Muffet. ‘And look who’s with him: Little Miss Muffet. Hey darling, seen any spiders lately?’

I decided that cutting to the chase was the best option. ‘Okay Edna, we know what you’re at,’ I said. ‘And just so as you know, Miss Muffet isn’t selling, regardless of how you try to intimidate her.’

‘Why, Harry, I have no idea what you’re talking about. Why would I want to buy that tatty B&B? Tourist accommodation isn’t really my style.’

‘No, but building roads is,’ I replied. ‘I’ve seen the plans. Without Miss Muffet’s house, your construction company can’t complete that new motorway. It’ll be very bad for your reputation if you don’t; not to mention all the money you’ll lose if the work doesn’t finish on time. Maybe that’s why you’re trying to encourage her to sell up.’

To my surprise, Edna didn’t seem at all worried that she’d been rumbled; in fact, she seemed unusually calm. An uneasy feeling started to gnaw at my stomach – and it wasn’t because of what I’d had for breakfast. Something was very wrong here.

‘From what I hear, things aren’t too good in the local B&B trade. Strikes me that an infestation of spiders would be really bad for business,’ she said. ‘I could even see the health inspectors closing the premises down. Now that would be unfortunate. But if it did happen, I’d certainly feel for the owner. Losing your business is a terrible thing.’

‘Indeed, but, of course, if it did close and you did buy it, you couldn’t knock it down so your motorway could go through.’

‘Sorry, Pigg, I have no idea what you mean.’

‘Come on Edna, cut the nonsense. This is me, Harry Pigg, you’re talking to. I know exactly what you’re at.’

‘No, I don’t think you do,’ Edna said, with the faintest of smiles beginning to smear her singularly unattractive features.

I decided to play my trump card so as to avoid an unnecessary ‘oh yes I do’, ‘oh no you don’t’ conversation.

‘Look, let’s not play around any more. You want Miss Muffet out so you can build your road; she’s not moving, so you’re trying to scare her, but I’ve discovered that no matter what you do, you won’t be able to demolish her house because…’ – I whipped a copy of the day’s newspaper out of my pocket like a cheap magician pulling a rabbit from his hat – ‘tuffets are protected under Grimmtown bye-laws. They won’t let you touch that house.’ I was almost tempted to follow it with a ta-dah and a cheesy bow, but I figured Edna mightn’t take too kindly to my theatricals.

To be honest, her reaction left a lot to be desired. Instead of gnashing her teeth and raging around the room in frustration at her scheme being thwarted, she sat at her desk looking at me as if I was a particularly interesting specimen of insect. The feeling that she knew something I didn’t grew stronger.

‘Tuffets, eh? Now that’s a bit of a nuisance and no mistake,’ she said. ‘What specific tuffet are you talking about?’

‘The tuffet in the back garden of the B&B; the one that Miss Muffet’s family have been sitting on to eat their curds and whey for generations. Surely you’ve heard the song ‘Little Miss Muffet sat on a tuffet...’ and so on. Tuffets are considered to be of immense historic importance, so they cannot be dug up, built over or altered in any way. It was in the paper. So even if you get the building, you still won’t be able to build your road through it. Or if you do, I suspect you’ll be neck deep in lawyers, archaeologists, environmentalists and politicians, all of whom will tie you up in enough red-tape to stall the building work for years.’

Edna grinned – the ‘I have you now and you’re not going to like it’ grin. She slumped back into her chair and pressed a button on the desk. Seconds later a well-dressed and superior-looking gentleman entered the room carrying a folder. He had bureaucrat written all over him. ‘You rang, ma’am,’ he said, nose in the air.

‘Tuffets, Laurence. They are protected, aren’t they?’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ he replied. He was very well spoken.

‘And that includes the tuffet in the Curds and Whey B&B?’

‘Why, yes, ma’am.’

‘The tuffet that we investigated when we were planning the motorway?’

‘Why, yes again, ma’am.’ He seemed to be enjoying this almost as much as Edna. I could sense she was about to spring her surprise and I knew it wouldn’t be pleasant.

‘The self-same tuffet that we agreed not to disturb and altered our plans so the motorway would go over and not through the premises?’

‘Ma’am, you are, of course, correct once more.’ And he looked at me and smirked.

Over the B&B?

Not through? Over?

Edna slapped the desktop and howled with glee. It was as if she could read my thoughts – which probably wasn’t all that difficult as the expression on my face gave them away.

‘Yes, Harry, over the B&B. So you see, we didn’t need to put Miss Muffet out of business at all. In fact, she was never going to interfere with our plans. I do believe you’ve had a wasted journey – at least from your perspective. From my point of view, I don’t think it’s been wasted at all. In fact, I’ve quite enjoyed our little tête-à-tête. It certainly makes up for the last time we met.’