The Big Over Easy

Mary’s heart, which had already fallen fairly far, fell farther.

“Well, that’s all I have to say,” said Jack to the sparsely populated room. “Are there any more questions?”

Archibald Fatquack stirred, scribbled in his pad, but said nothing. The reporter from the Reading Daily Eyestrain had moved slowly forward during Jack’s report, until his head was resting on the seat back in front. He began to snore.

“Good. Well, thank you very much for your time. Don’t all rush to get out. You might wake Jim over there.”

“I wasn’t asleep,” said Jim, eyes tightly closed. “I heard every word.”

“Even the bit about the bears escaping into the Oracle Center and eating a balloon seller?”

“Of course,” he murmured, beginning to snore again.

Jack picked up his notes and disappeared through a side door.

“Are there usually this few people for his press conferences?” asked Mary, horrified at the prospect of the career black hole into which she was about to descend like a suicidal rabbit.

“Good Lord, no,” replied Briggs in a shocked tone. “Often he has no press at all.”

He looked at his watch. “Goodness, is that the time? Check in with me first thing tomorrow, and I’ll introduce you to Jack. You’ll like him. Not exactly charismatic, but diligent and generally correct in most… some of his assumptions.”

“Sir, I was wondering—”

Briggs stopped her midsentence, divining precisely what she was about to say. The reason was simple: All the detective sergeants he had ever allocated to Jack said the same thing.

“Look upon it as a baptism of fire. The NCD is good training.”

“For what?”

Briggs had to think for a moment. “Unconventional policing. Your time won’t be wasted. Oh, and one other thing.”

“Yes, sir?”

“Welcome to Reading.”

2. Jack Spratt

The Most Worshipful Guild of Detectives was founded by Holmes in 1896 to look after the best interests of Britain’s most influential and newsworthy detectives. Membership is strictly controlled but pays big dividends: the pick of the best inquiries in England and Wales, an opportunity to “brainstorm” tricky cases with one’s peers, and an exclusive deal with the notoriously choosy editors of Amazing Crime Stories. The Guild’s legal department frequently brokers TV, movie and merchandising deals, and membership usually sways juries in tricky cases. It seems to work well. The only people who don’t like the system are the officers who are non-Guild.

—Excerpt from Inside the Guild of Detectives

Jack drove home that evening with a feeling of frustration that would have been considerably worse had it been unexpected. He and the prosecution had tried to present the pig case as well as they could, but for some reason the jury didn’t buy it. Briggs hadn’t said anything to him yet, but mounting prosecutions such as The Crown v. Three Pigs was undeniably expensive, and after the failed conviction of the con men who perpetrated the celebrated emperor’s new-clothes scam the year before, Jack knew that the Nursery Crime Division would be under closer scrutiny by the bean counters. Not that the NCD was consistently racked with failure—far from it—but the fact was that few of his cases attracted much publicity. And in the all-important climate of increased public confidence, budget accountability and Amazing Crime circulation figures, Friedland’s crowd-pleasing antics were strides ahead of Jack’s misadventures—and hugely profitable for the Reading police force, too. But all of this was scant comfort to Mr. Wolff, who went to his casket unavenged and parboiled.

He drove along Peppard and took the left fork into Kidmore End.