The Casket Caper - Part Four

Amanda strode purposefully through the Birtwhistle Museum - though perhaps not as inconspicuously as she would have liked. First, she rounded a corner at speed and banged her knee on a badly-placed china pot. Then, while hopping from the scene, she narrowly avoided upending two elderly ladies like skittles. Sharp exhalations and scornful looks followed Amanda as she retreated ruefully.

Now on the second floor, Amanda had lost Lafarge completely. From a map that she clutched, she could see that the crescent-shaped museum offered multiple ways to ascend and descend. There was no quick and foolproof way to methodically sweep every hall. Anxious at losing the duplicitous doctor, Amanda quickened her pace: her world became a blur of picture galleries, silverwork, cut glass and ceramics.

As she crossed from the West wing to the East, Amanda dashed past treasures of the ancient world: brooches, necklaces, axe heads and stone tablets. An impressive Assyrian casket briefly caught her attention as she sped by.  

With only one floor left to search, there was still no sign of Lafarge.

Amanda wondered: had he given her the slip? Surely he had no idea that she was following. She took the back stairs from the Middle East collection, surging up them two at a time, and was mildly out of breath as she stepped out on the third floor. She entered a room of nineteenth century fashion and textiles. The floor was chequered tiles and, as Amanda crossed the room diagonally, her sneakers made a loud and very modern squelching sound. She looked up and saw the room ahead was signposted: The Fossett Collection. An elderly woman curator perched on a chair at the doorway, with the look of someone who had been in position many hours and was ready to go home.

There he was!

Doctor Lafarge stood alone at the far end of a jumbled hall, that was packed with clocks. Amanda held her breath and entered slowly, careful not to squelch with her rubber soles, keeping a pillar between herself and her quarry. She made it safely onto carpet, and sneaked soundlessly within thirty feet of Lafarge. She took cover behind a display cabinet and peered at him through the glass. This was the closest she could get; Amanda's skin prickled and her heart pumped in her ears.

Lafarge himself was preoccupied with an elaborate marble clock, displayed on a plinth. Amanda strained to see more of the clock, but the details were indistinct looking through the glass. Lafarge held the letter he had been studying in his left hand. He reached hesitantly for the clock with his right.

The room was deathly quiet. Amanda tried to slow her breathing lest she gave herself away.

She almost jumped out of her skin next as the silence was pierced by a brief, horn-like sound.

Lafarge recoiled from the clock and turned to look sheepishly over his shoulder. Amanda had realised what had happened and ducked down just in time.

The curator was on her feet and looking curiously across the room. Amanda applied herself to tying an already-tied shoelace. The curator looked elsewhere, presumably in the direction of Lafarge.  

Slow footsteps approached Amanda from the other side of the cabinet. Lafarge no doubt wished to disguise his interest in the clock, affecting the disdain of a bored browser - but he was seconds away from rounding the cabinet and literally stumbling across her! Amanda was caught, momentarily indecisive about whether to remain still or make a break for it.

Back at the entrance, the now upright curator ambled to a window and gazed out. Amanda heard the feet of Lafarge bearing down on her position - she scuttled hurriedly around the corner of the display.

An absurd game of hide and seek followed: forced to stay out of sight, Amanda did a complete circuit of the cabinet on her hands and knees, with Lafarge unknowingly in pursuit.  Only when she regained her original position did the chase subside and the pursuing footsteps wander away.

Amanda breathed a silent sigh of relief and nursed her aching knee. She rubbed dust off her smooth, smart pantyhose and glanced over to the door. The curator was gone: Amanda and the doctor were alone in the Fossett Collection.

The curator’s absence had evidently been noticed by Lafarge, too, and within seconds he was tampering with the clock once more. The alarm sounded again, now in continuous protest. Shocked, Amanda got to her feet and peered around the cabinet, trying to ascertain what he was doing.

Lafarge opened the glass face plate at the front of the clock, then hurriedly forced the large hand around the dial: clockwise, counter-clockwise and clockwise again. Nothing happened. Lafarge seemed frustrated, and referred to the paper before repeating the clock hand movement. The desired result again appeared to elude him.

“Hey you there!” came a cry from the doorway.

Amanda turned and gasped as the curator marched angrily across the room, with a younger, male colleague in tow.

“Just what the hell do you think you’re doing mister?” the curator demanded incredulously.

Lafarge blustered, defensively, “Ohh… eet’s notheeing… uhh, how you say… false alarm?”

“Excuse me? I saw you,” she retorted. “I think it’s time for you to leave.”

“Non, non, this ees not necessary, madame…“ Lafarge raised a hand defensively, but the male curator took him firmly by the elbow.

“Hey!” cried Lafarge indignantly, then adding in French, “fils de pute!”

A brief struggle followed where Lafarge looked around him in outrage, seeking help. For a brief moment, he looked Amanda straight in the eyes – she glanced down instinctively, covering her hand with her face.  Below her, a Victorian mantel clock was suddenly fascinating.  

Across the room, Lafarge calmed down and the embarrassing scene was over. He was led quietly away by the curators.

Amanda looked up, her face flushed. Had Lafarge shown a flicker of recognition? Perhaps – though it mattered less now his plan had been foiled. She decided against following him further. Amanda knew that if he suspected he was under surveillance he would do nothing of interest.

What did interest her, however, was the clock Lafarge had tampered with. Amanda stepped out to examine it as best she could before the curators returned.  Before she could get there, however, something caught her eye.

An envelope and a piece of paper lay on the floor... in the brief scuffle, Lafarge had dropped his letter!

Allowing herself a tiny smile of satisfaction, the young detective bent down and picked it up.