“Why would you use hairspray on their faces?” Scarlett whispered back.
“I read online that hairspray is the secret to great skin.”
“Oh, Vesta,” said Scarlett with a sigh.
Dooley directed a look of concern at the house. “Do you think Uncle Alec and Chase will be fine? They both looked sick.”
“It’s just a little bug spray,” said Harriet. “They’ll live.” She produced another bubble. “Okay, so now you have to tell us all about the case, Max. This hotel manager. What was that all about, huh? Shouldn’t a hotel manager take care of his guests, not murder them?”
“Yeah, killing guests is not in the job description,” said Brutus.
“In the case of Garland McNerlin,” I said, “it wasn’t in his job description either. But apparently the man suffered from a serious gambling addiction and had accumulated a large debt that he couldn’t possibly pay off unless he sold the hotel, which he didn’t want to do. Remember the overdue bills piling up on his desk? The man was in debt up to his ears. And so the people he owed money to suggested a way of making his problems go away and put him in touch with the Abou-Yamen secret service, who were looking for a way to get rid of Prince Abdullah, whom they blamed for the calamity that had befallen their country.”
“And so Garland shot the prince?” asked Harriet.
“He did, yeah. To gain access to the prince’s room was a cinch for him as he could print a key card and not make it show up on the database. He also tampered with the CCTV by removing the crucial minutes he was in the prince’s room from the footage. All in all he perpetrated the perfect crime. And to top it off he placed the blame on the hapless bug spray people, with whom the Abou-Yamens also had a score to settle. Two birds killed in one stone.”
“And Rogelio?” asked Dooley. “Why did they try and kill that nice Rogelio?”
“Because Prince Abdullah wanted his inheritance back, and his rightful position in the monarchy. And so he was going to fight for his right to inherit, with Rogelio in his corner.”
“And the Abou-Yamens couldn’t have that?” asked Harriet.
“I think Prince Abdullah had created such a mess that the mere mention of his name caused the king of Abou-Yamen to have apoplexy. He hated his grandson so much he wanted him gone in the worst way possible, and every person associated with him.”
“Poor Rogelio. He should never have taken the prince’s call.”
“So Marjorie Collett?” said Brutus.
“Doesn’t exist,” I said.
“But how did you find out, Max?” asked Harriet.
“Yes, tell us all about that brainwave, Max,” said Dooley.
“I think the spark was the sausage,” I said.
Dooley seemed disappointed. “I thought the spark was me?”
“Well, you and the sausage,” I amended.
“I don’t get it,” said Brutus. “What sausage? What are you talking about?”
“Remember Norm’s friend the cockroach? He said the prince had dropped a piece of pork sausage on the floor. But in Abou-Yamen pork is strictly forbidden. It told me that Prince Abdullah was a bad boy who didn’t like to follow the rules of his country too closely. And then there was the fact that he had been caught pickpocketing from the General Store. To me that painted a picture of a royal who was off the reservation. And then there was that message written on the prince’s bathroom mirror. ‘You’ll pay for this.’ Which made me wonder if there was a connection between the famine that had hit Abou-Yamen and the bug spray the prince had imported. Chase made a couple of calls and discovered that Prince Abdullah had been disinherited by his grandfather and kicked out of the country. He was persona non grata.”
“Poor prince,” said Dooley feelingly. “To be kicked out of the country by his own family.”
“And being murdered by his own family,” Brutus pointed out.
“There were probably other transgressions that we will never know about,” I said. “Suffice it to say that the royal house of Abou-Yamen felt that Prince Abdullah had disgraced them. And so he had to die. And who better to task with the murder than a hotel manager in debt?”
“And two not-too-bright crooks,” Brutus added. “To get rid of the prince’s lawyer.”
“It didn’t hurt that Garland McNerlin is an ex-marine,” I said. Something else Chase’s investigation had discovered. It certainly explained the man’s proficiency with firearms.
“I still think it’s all very sad,” Dooley insisted. “Just because the prince liked to eat sausage from time to time…”
“And caused a famine in his country,” I pointed out. “And did who knows what else.”
“Still. They could have forgiven him and allowed him to return to the bosom of the family. The prodigal son, you know.” He sighed. “Everybody loves a bad boy, don’t they?”
“Not the people of Abou-Yamen, apparently.”
Tex supplied us with some more tasty grub, and smiled when he saw the reception his creations were receiving. “I’ll go and make some more,” he promised.
Chase and Uncle Alec had returned from their urgent visit to the bathroom. They still looked a little green around the gills, and their appetite seemed to have taken a hit. We didn’t mind. It just meant there was more for the rest of us. And judging from Harriet, apart from some bubble action, they would soon be right as rain again. After all, it isn’t just us who have to suffer when Gran gets some bee in her bonnet. Both the benefits and the drawbacks of living with a woman like Vesta Muffin should be spread fairly amongst her nearest and dearest.
Just then, Norm settled on the swing next to me. He looked complacent, I thought.
“It’s done,” he announced. “One hundred kiddies, waiting to hatch.”
“Hatch?” I asked.
“Yeah, they’re in the larval state now. Soon they’ll become pupae and then they hatch.” He sighed happily. “Oh, you guys, it’s such a great feeling to be a dad! There’s nothing like it!”
“Where… where did Norma deposit these larvae of hers?” I asked, suddenly getting an awful suspicion. One hundred larvae had to feed, didn’t they? And they were clearly somewhere nearby, or Norm wouldn’t be sitting there chatting with us.
“Like I told you, she found a great place,” said Norm.
