“You mean that the bug spray couple have been arrested?” asked Brutus.
“That’s exactly right!” said Norm, who looked extremely pleased with himself, I saw. “I knew they were guilty, of course. You develop an intuition for these things. But I’m glad that Chase and Odelia finally saw the light and decided to haul them off to jail.”
“How did it happen?” I asked. Knowing Chase, he wouldn’t have arrested the couple without probable cause or plenty of evidence to point to them as the culprits.
“The dumbest thing! They forgot to hide the murder weapon where it wouldn’t be found. It just happened to fall out of that abomination they think resembles a fly!”
“You mean the gun fell out of that big mock-up?” asked Brutus with a laugh.
“That’s right! It fell right at the feet of another guest of the hotel, who immediately had the presence of mind to pick it up and make sure the killers didn’t escape. He pinned them down until the cops arrived and hauled them off to the pokey.” He sighed happily. “Am I glad this ordeal is over. I mean, it’s all well and good to interview a bunch of bugs, but it makes you feel like such a chump, you know? Having to ask a bunch of total strangers a bunch of tough and very personal questions. I don’t know how you guys do it.”
“It takes practice,” said Brutus. “And a certain lack of decorum.”
“And curiosity,” said Harriet. “You have to be a very curious individual to ask a lot of personal questions. But then I’ve always been extremely interested in what makes other people—and pets—tick.”
“So the killers have been arrested?” asked Dooly. “But that’s great! That means our investigation is over!”
“If only we could get out of this office, we might be able to go home,” said Brutus as he glanced at the window that was shut, and the door that was also firmly closed.
“Oh, so you guys are locked up in here, are you?” asked Norm.
“Yeah, the hotel manager didn’t like it that I gave a free concert for the benefit of his guests,” Harriet lamented. “I guess he wants to monopolize all the entertainment, so he can ask for more money. Free entertainment clearly isn’t part of his business plan.”
“I would open the door for you guys, but I’m afraid I don’t have the strength,” said the fly. “Though I could always ask a friend—or a couple of friends.”
“More flies, you mean?” I asked. “I don’t see how that is going to do us any good, Norm.”
“Except when they show up in considerable numbers,” said Harriet. “Like, a couple of thousand flies? That would get the manager’s attention, wouldn’t it?”
We all shared a smile, and Norm said, “I’m on it!” And moments later was buzzing through that same ventilator grille again, on his way to carry out another important mission.
“So great that the murder has been solved,” said Dooley. “Though I wonder why they did it.”
“Probably because the prince proved to be a tough customer,” said Brutus. “He didn’t want to buy their bug spray so they killed him.” He shrugged. “That’s what you get when you read all those books on cold calls and the tough approach to sales and taking no for an answer.”
“It’s probably a new sales technique,” Harriet suggested. “When you can’t close, you threaten to shoot the customer. And when he still doesn’t want to play ball, you kill him.”
I didn’t think this approach would prove a big hit, but then I’m not a salesperson, of course, and I’ve never taken a sales course. Maybe it was de rigueur right now to use tough measures when trying to make a sale. Though I still found it a little odd that this couple, of all people, would have killed the prince. Especially since they claimed to have been standing outside the door when the guy was being shot. Unless they had lied about that, of course. Killers often show a certain reluctance to tell the truth. I guess it comes with the territory.
“How long do you think we’ll have to wait here, Max?” asked Dooley. The four of us had jumped up onto the manager’s desk to have a better overview, and we sat on top of a stack of documents—possibly contracts that needed to be signed, and bills that needed to be paid. Some of them bore the monikers ‘past due,’ ‘overdue’ or even ‘final notice.’
“Well, Norm will have to amass his troops, so that can take a while,” I said. “And also, he has to guide them to this office, which will also take a little time.”
“It won’t be long,” said Harriet confidently. “There are flies everywhere, and they’ll be only too happy to assist a fellow fly in his attempt to spring us from jail.”
A sort of buzzing sound now reached my ears, and I got the impression that Norm was on his way. Very soon an entire horde of flies were pouring through that grille above the door, and the room was starting to fill up with the winged creatures. There were hundreds of them—possibly thousands, and as the four of us hunkered down on the desk to await further proceedings, Norm positioned himself in front of us, a triumphant expression on his tiny face. “Well, what did I tell you? I was going to get you out of here, and I’ve kept my promise!”
“Are these all friends of yours, Norm?” asked Harriet, a sort of awe in her voice.
“Friends? No, this is my family!”
“But… there must be thousands of them.”
Norm shrugged. “I have a fairly small family, but I still love them, you know. Hey, you gotta work with what you’ve got, right?”
We all marveled at the sheer volume of flies filling up the room, and when Norm told us this was just his closest relatives, with the rest of his family all lingering outside the door, I didn’t want to be in the manager’s shoes right now, with his hotel nicely filling up with flies.
I just hoped he’d get the message and open that darn door!
CHAPTER 14
Vesta and Scarlett had managed to get their usual seat on the Star Hotel’s alfresco dining area, and had ordered their usual drinks: a cappuccino for Scarlett and a hot chocolate with plenty of foam and chocolate sprinkles for Vesta. And she was just about to reveal her grand scheme to get rid of those annoying bugs that were eating the lawn when a fly landed on her spoon. She waved it away with an annoyed gesture.
“Isn’t it a little too early in the season to have flies harassing us?” she asked as she watched the annoying insect with a baleful eye.
“It’s never too early in the season for flies, Vesta,” said Scarlett as she took a dainty sip from her cappuccino. “So what’s all this about a new bug spray that Tex is trying out?”
“Well, it doesn’t work, that’s the long and the short of it.” She saw that another fly had descended from the rafters and had taken up position on the table and was eyeing her hot cocoa with a longing eye—or a thousand longing eyes, since flies have those weird facet eyes that make them see a lot of stuff at the same time. A pretty cool feature. Even though she wasn’t a big fan of flies—who is?—she had to admit she had a certain admiration for the creatures.
“Okay, so the bug spray doesn’t work?” Scarlett prompted when she faltered once again.
“Hm? Oh, yeah, it doesn’t. And now our plants are all being devoured by these weird-looking beetles. And so I was thinking that I could ask the cats to open negotiations with the bugs. Maybe convince them to pass along to greener pastures, you know.”
“Can they do that?”
“Oh, absolutely. I mean, there’s nothing those cats of mine can’t do. They’re very clever and extremely resourceful.”
