“How did the date go?”
“Probably the oddest I’ve ever been on. I think our two species are so fundamentally different that any form of physical bond between us is almost inconceivable. Still, he’s fun to be with—and his family is completely nuts. His brother’s called Graham, he has a dopey sister named Daisy, and he—”
Mary realized that she had been gushing a little too much and stopped. Jack hid a smile, and she took a sip of coffee.
“So… what’s going on Jack?”
“Everything. If we don’t get to the bottom of it all within the next twelve hours, then I’m a dead man.”
Mary’s eyes narrowed. “You were serious about all that Bartholomew-being-innocent stuff last night?”
“Absolutely. There’s something rotten in the city of Reading, and it’s up to the NCD to do something about it.”
“So where does the twelve-hour death thing enter into it?”
“Because that’s how long it’ll be before Danvers or Briggs starts checking Bartholomew’s phone records and… and… finds out that it was me who tipped him off.”
Mary was stunned. She couldn’t quite believe it.
“You called him so he could escape?”
“I did.”
“Jack—that’s not good. In fact, it’s very much worse than not good—it’s illegal. Really illegal. You’ll be bounced out of the force and banged up into the bargain.”
“I had to do it to save his life. He didn’t kill Goldilocks. He’s the patsy, the fall guy. And like all fall guys in a frame-up, he won’t live twenty-four hours. If I hadn’t told him to run, we would have found him hanging by his pajama cord with a convenient confession close by. Everyone walks away, and Goldilocks’s murderer goes free. More important, the reason for her death remains secret.”
“So… she wasn’t killed over illegal porridge quotas?”
“Of course not. They were both good friends to bears. They were into that harmless little scam together—easing the burden of the average bear by free handouts of porridge midmonth. They were working together when photographed at the Coley Park Bart-Mart—and with Vinnie Craps in the background, monitoring them.”
“I get it. So who framed him?”
Jack paused for a minute. “NS-4. I thought at first they were protecting him, but they weren’t—they were setting him up to take the blame for Goldy’s death. They planted the Post-it note in the three bears’ house about Bartholomew meeting Goldilocks on Saturday morning, and they knew he wouldn’t have an alibi for that time period.”
“How did you know it was a plant?”
“Easy. The note referred to ‘Andersen’s Wood.’ Ed never called it a wood. It was always a forest.”
“As you say,” breathed Mary, feeling a bit stupid that she hadn’t spotted it, “easy. But NS-4? That means this is all wrapped in that dodgy beast known as ‘national interest.’"
“National interest be damned,” replied Jack. “Goldilocks is dead, and the Bruins are fighting for their lives. I tell you, someone’s going to go down for this.”
“Are you going to take it to Briggs?”
Jack sighed. “I can’t. He’s a good cop, but he’s politically motivated. He’ll blab to the seventh floor, and the shutters will bang down tight. As long as NS-4 thinks we’ve bought into the whole Bartholomew/porridge scenario, then we’re safe. Any hint that we’re not and the pair of us could find ourselves in a trillion pieces at SommeWorld—or somewhere equally imaginative.”
“Good morning,” said a voice from the door. It was Ashley, dressed only in a pair of yellow boxer shorts. “The short pauses and nervous intakes of breath woke me up.”
“There’s some cooking oil in the cupboard,” said Mary. Ash poured himself a glass of oil and sat down.
“So if Bartholomew didn’t kill Goldilocks,” said Mary, “who did?”
“There was someone else in the cottage that morning.”
“Why do you think that?”
“Because of the porridge temperature differential. It’s been bothering me for days. How could the three bears’ porridge be at such widely varying temperatures when it was all poured at the same time?”
“I don’t know,” said Mary. “Because… of the different bowl sizes?”
“The Guv’nor’s right,” remarked Ashley. “From a thermodynamic point of view, that’s just not possible. The bowl with the smallest volume would cool fastest, making Junior’s the coolest—yet his was warmer than Mrs. Bruin’s.”
“Perhaps it’s about surface area?” suggested Mary.
“If that was the case, then Ed’s would have been cooler,” replied Ashley.
“Exactly,” said Jack. “This is the scenario as I see it: Goldilocks is investigating the murder of champion cucumber growers around the globe. She is talking to someone who may or may not be a long-dead scientist named McGuffin, who, aside from taking a cheery delight in blowing things up, also dabbled in cucumbers and was connected for a time to QuangTech. Every serious world-championship contender has had his cucumber strain destroyed and himself with it. She is about to go public with what she found out—but someone wants to keep her quiet at all costs and lures her to the three bears’ cottage on Saturday morning by telling her Bartholomew will be waiting for her.”
“How do you know they used Bartholomew as the lure?”
“She was naked in bed when the three bears found her.”
“Of course. And the porridge?”
“I’m coming to that. Her assailant tells her to be there at eight-fifteen, and he arrives just after the three bears left for their walk but just before Goldilocks arrived. He waits—but the smell of porridge is too tempting, and he eats the coolest porridge—baby bear’s. Then he refills it. But… he’s still hungry, so he eats father bear’s porridge, too. And then he refills that.”
“I get it,” said Mary. “So when Goldilocks arrives and tastes the porridge, father bear’s is too hot because it’s just been poured, mother bear’s is too cold because it was the original pouring, but baby bear’s was just right—and that’s the one she ate.”
“But then… who was there that morning?” asked Ashley.
“Who can’t resist porridge?”
“Bears.”
“But there’s a problem,” observed Mary. “Bears are essentially peaceful, and Goldy’s Friend to Bears status would have protected her. And besides, why didn’t they tell you about him? His scent would have been all over the house.”