Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine 09/01/12 (10 page)

I hurried.

Hobbs stood examining a loose metal hasp at the side of a door. He reached down
and rose with an open padlock in his hand. “Look. Someone has been here before
us.”

Cautioning silence, Hobbs pressed himself to the door and eased it open. The
voices were slightly more distinct, but still faint.

Hobbs turned to eye us. Aiming a finger at Whitey, he pointed sternly at the
ground.
Stay here.

Whitey merely grinned.

Hobbs repeated the motion. His lips formed a hard line.

Whitey made a face, shrugged, finally nodded.

Hobbs stepped through the dark doorway, beckoning me to follow. I did, pushing
the door shut behind me.

We stood a moment, listening. I soon discerned a dim light off to
our
left. We were in a hallway, with boxes stacked against the walls on either side.
Hobbs was already gliding toward the light.

Cursing my own foolishness, I followed. As little as I cared about chasing the
Garden Gnome Bandit, I was even less anxious to get involved with bike thieves.
But in the short time I’d known Hobbs, I’d come to feel responsible for him,
almost like a nurse or an attendant in a sanitarium. Or, perhaps more properly,
as a protector of a brilliant but impractical savant. Hobbs was simply not
equipped to function in this modern world on his own. He required a
Watson,
and I was the closest thing he had.

The hall passed what appeared to be an office, now dark and deserted, and led to
another door. From under the door shone a faint line of light. It was this light
that had guided us from the rear entrance.

The voices grew louder, and I heard occasional laughter.

Hobbs turned the knob, cracked the door, and peered through.

“What do you see?”

After a moment he stepped back, motioning me forward. “Look for yourself.”

Ahead of us was another hallway, also dark, but opening on a large and brightly
lit workspace. The room held at least twenty bicycles, the panel van we’d seen
on Belmont, and a half-dozen young men in greasy T-shirts and do-rags. Some had
chains fixed to their belts, and all looked dangerous.

They were in a jovial mood, drinking beer and smoking marijuana. Celebrating
their successful heist.

Among the bikes, I spotted Lafarge’s silver Cervélo and Whitey’s black Schwinn
with matching pannier bags.

From the hallway behind us, I heard small noises and cringed. Whitey. It was
madness to assume he’d stay put.

“Not a gnome in sight,” I told Hobbs. “Time to call the cops.”

“And give them credit for catching these rascals? Surely not. We have done the
work, and we shall reap the rewards.”

“What’s your plan? Make a citizen’s arrest and march them off to the nearest
pokey?”

So help me, Hobbs seemed to be considering just that when a great racket erupted
behind us. In the dim light, I saw Whitey stepping over a spilled box of bicycle
parts.

Hobbs peered through the crack in the door. “They’re coming, Watson! In future,
you must remember to bring your revolver.”

“Wilder. And I don’t even have a—Never mind! Let’s run!”

But Hobbs had my arm. “Wait! Look!”

I joined him at the crack, and saw the six bike thieves surround a seventh
figure—a man in tight jeans with tattooed snakes running up his arms. Greg
Lafarge. He’d been hiding in the hall ahead of us and was first to be
discovered.

“Quickly,” Hobbs said, “we must rescue him.”

“Why? He’s the Garden Gnome Bandit.”

“If so, he is our bandit, and I prefer to capture him in one piece.”

 
Our plans were quickly made. While Whitey fiddled with the
building’s fuse box, Hobbs and I crouched by the crack in the door. Lafarge’s
gun held the gang at bay, but they were closing from all sides, daring him to
shoot. He might get one or two, but the rest would take a brutal revenge.

I marveled at the man’s attachment to his bike. The Cervélo was a world-class
racer and worth several thousand bucks, but hardly seemed worth risking his life
for. Of course, Lafarge had been prowling the streets stealing garden gnomes, so
we already knew he wasn’t playing with a full deck.

When the lights went out, Hobbs and I charged into the room.

“Police!” Hobbs rapped. “Everyone freeze!”

We punctuated the command by flicking on bike headlamps we’d found in the hall.
The gang members blinked, looking stunned.

“The building is surrounded,” Hobbs said. “Drop your weapons or you will be
shot.”

Wrenches, hammers, and knives clanged to the concrete floor. Lafarge kept his gun
trained on the thieves.

Hobbs said, “You too, Lafarge. Now!”

Lafarge swung his head toward us. “Me? Are you nuts? Just who are you guys?”

“Inspector Doyle,” Hobbs said, “and Sergeant Watson. Now kindly place your pistol
on the floor.”

A gang member made a sudden dash toward the truck.

“Halt!” I shouted.

But the guy was already in the cab. The van’s big headlights lit the room,
clearly illuminating Hobbs and me. And, right beside me, Whitey.

“Cops, hell!” someone shouted. “They don’t even have guns.”

The gang boiled into action, scooping weapons from the floor and surging toward
us.

I looked at Hobbs, received a quick shrug, and started dodging blows. The next
few minutes were chaos, made somewhat surreal by the illumination of the truck
lights. The fight swirled in and out of the darkness, making it impossible to
tell where the next punch, kick, or tire iron was coming from. Hobbs went into
his
baritsu
stance, looking much like a praying mantis. He moved not at
all until a foe was nearly upon him. Then an arm or leg would shoot out and a
gang member would go flying back into the darkness. Having no such skill, I
employed fists, feet, and elbows long enough to get my hands on a better weapon.
Since all the small ones were taken, I darted to the line of bikes and culled
Lafarge’s from the herd.

The carbon-framed Cervélo was so light it seemed to float in my hands, and I
raised it effortlessly above my head, then swung sideways at an onrushing gang
member. Light as it was, the bike had plenty of sharp edges, and caught the guy
in the neck, sending him sprawling.

Feeling the rush now, I channeled Jackie Chan, calling my enemies to attack me
and smacking them aside with ease.

Whitey became a creature of the shadows. Gripping a loose set of handlebars, he
darted out when least expected to whack a guy in the head or knee before
scuttling back into the darkness.

Lafarge, reluctant to fire his gun, employed fists instead, delivering quick,
clean jabs and ferocious straightarms that cracked against the gangsters’ jaws.
All the while he danced, and even seemed to be humming to himself.

My blood was up, a sort of high I had never experienced, and I was ready to take
on the world, when suddenly it was over. Beside me, Hobbs was still in
baritsu
stance. The six bike thieves lay sprawled at our feet,
while Lafarge trained his gun on them. Whitey emerged from the shadows and
hurried to his Schwinn, kneeling to inspect it for damage.

Lafarge swung his head to glare at me, then at Hobbs. “Now. Who are you
guys?”

“We,” said Hobbs, “are the men who will put you behind bars.”

Lafarge smiled at him. “Funny. I have the same plans for you.”

 
Lafarge, it developed, was an undercover cop, and when his buddies
in blue arrived he announced the bust would have gone smoothly if we three
hadn’t bungled in and alerted the gang to his presence.

As he said this, I looked hard at Whitey and thought to say something, but Hobbs
caught my eye and shook his head. Whitey had been about to leave when the cops
burst in and ordered him to stick around. He now leaned on his bike, looking
bored.

Lafarge had been after the bike ring for months. The cops had known it was a big
operation, extending north to Seattle, east to Spokane, and south to Eugene, but
had no solid proof until this bust.

“I take it, then,” Hobbs said to Lafarge, “that you are not the Garden Gnome
Bandit.”

“Is that what you clowns thought?” Lafarge had a good laugh.

Hobbs bristled, but I had no argument. We really had made fools of ourselves.

“The city,” Lafarge said, “will be much safer with you two off the streets.
Interfering with a police operation will get you serious time.”

Hobbs’s mouth dropped open. “But it was we who saved you from these villains.
Without our assistance, they would have escaped. You might well be dead.”

“This for that,” Lafarge said, thumbing his nose. He went back to making notes on
a report.

Hobbs, looking dejected, sat on a wooden crate and stared gloomily about.

I strolled over to Lafarge. “We need to talk. Privately.”

Lafarge rolled his eyes, but finally agreed, and we retired to the warehouse
office.

He fixed me with his best cop glare. “What?”

“You assaulted me last night at Cartopia. Before witnesses.”

He flushed. “Sorry about that. Candy . . . well, I’m just not over her yet. You
know how it is.”

“I know how it is with the media. They love police brutality. Brings out all the
crazies. Along with marches, petitions, lawsuits, investigations . . .”

Lafarge glowered at me. “What do you want?”

I told him. He sputtered, argued, pleaded, even threatened, but in the end he
agreed.

“With one condition,” he said. “You stay the hell away from Candy.”

I didn’t like that. But all in all, I was getting the best of the bargain.

I said, “Deal.”

 
Hobbs, Whitey, and I left together through the big garage door.

“Congratulations,” I told Hobbs. “You solved the Northwest Bike Ring Case.”

“I did?”

“That’s what Lafarge will tell everyone. He was acting on information provided by
local consulting detective Mr. Skyler Hobbs.”

“I thought he was arresting us.”

“You misjudged him. He’s a swell guy at heart.”

Hobbs eyed me queerly, but offered no argument.

“Be seeing you,” Whitey said. “Call when you have more twenties.”

He looped a leg over his Schwinn and was about to pedal off when Hobbs clamped a
hand on the rear rack, holding the bike in place.

“A moment, if you please. We have unfinished business.”

Whitey squinted at him. “I thought you were broke.”

“You were paid,” Hobbs said, “to assist me in catching the Garden Gnome
Bandit.”

“And you blew it. Not my problem.”

“Isn’t it?”

Whitey’s face tightened. He looked ready to cry again.

“Hobbs,” I said, “you’re scaring him. You want him pulling that bawling act with
the cops?”

“Hardly a concern.” Still holding the bike, Hobbs ripped open the Velcro strap on
one of Whitey’s pannier bags. With a flourish, he reached in and pulled out an
ugly little garden gnome. “Not when he’s the bandit.”

 
The ride across town was noisy. Despite the kid’s protestations,
Hobbs was determined to lay the matter before his parents before deciding how to
proceed. Whitey had at first denied the charge, but faced with the evidence of
two more gnomes and a black hoodie, he gave that up. He then claimed to have no
parents, so we could not possibly speak with them, but Hobbs badgered him until
he directed us to a quaint old house on SE 16th, only a few doors off
Hawthorne.

“What tipped you off?” Whitey wanted to know.

Hobbs looked smug. “Lint,” he said, “and beauty bark.”

Whitey just stared.

“When I saw you on the sidewalk after your bicycle was stolen, you had black
cotton fuzz in your hair, indicative of a hood. And your jeans bore traces of
bark dust, showing you had been kneeling in someone’s garden.”

Whitey’s shoulders slumped. “What if I promise never to do it again?”

“A good start,” Hobbs said. “Now please escort us in, or the good doctor will
sound his horn and raise the entire neighborhood.”

So in we went. Hobbs carried one of the hot gnomes as evidence, while I toted the
others.

The door opened onto a dark entryway, with stairs on one side and a living room
on the other.

Head hanging, Whitey led us toward the back of the house, where he knocked softly
at a door. “Grandma? It’s Harold. I’m home.”

Hobbs and I shared a look. I wrinkled my nose. Harold. No wonder he preferred
Whitey.

A weak voice answered from within, but I could not discern the words. Whitey led
us in, pausing at a dresser to switch on a lamp.

“I brought visitors, Grandma. Look.”

On a frilly white bed lay a woman with tufts of grey hair protruding from an
old-fashioned nightcap. Thin, mottled arms extended from the sleeves of a
flowered nightdress, while a thick quilt was bunched beneath her chin.

At the sight of us, her eyes brightened and twenty years seemed to fall away. Her
smile was enough to warm the hardest heart.

“Oh!” she said. “How delightful. What are their names?”

Hobbs gave a short bow. “I am honored to be Mr. Skyler Hobbs, madam, and this is
my good friend Dr., uh . . .”

“Wilder,” I said. “Pleased to meet you.”

The woman continued to beam, but I noted something strange. She was not looking
at our faces, but at the gnomes in our hands.

Whitey stepped back, taking the one Hobbs held. “This,” he told his grandmother,
“is Percival. He’s a carpenter. You can tell by the little hammer.”

“Hello, Percival,” the woman said warmly. “You are most welcome here.”

“And these guys,” Whitey said, “are his brothers Ernest and Murgatroyd.”

“Welcome to you all,” she said. “Harold, you’ll show them where they can
sleep?”

“Certainly, Grandma. Let’s check on the others, shall we?”

“Oh yes. Let’s.”

Whitey looked at us and winked. Striding around the bed, he found a cord and
pulled it, causing a frilly curtain to slide away. Through panes of glass I saw
moonlit trees and bushes, but could make out little detail.