The Big Over Easy

“Right. Humpty uses the gold to buy thirty-eight percent of Spongg stock, but for the last year he has been in hiding at Grimm’s Road. On Sunday night he has a voluble argument with a Miss Bessie Brooks, who we can’t find, goes to the Spongg Charity Benefit, gets completely plastered and offers his entire Spongg holding to Solomon Grundy. Grundy turns him down flat, and Humpty tells him that his stock will be worth a lot more ‘this time next year.’ Humpty then blurts out that he will pledge fifty million to rebuild St. Cerebellum’s, is taken home in Randolph Spongg’s own car and six hours later he’s shot dead.”

“He thought the share price would go up,” observed Mary.

“Exactly. Spongg prices are dropping daily, but he’s still buying, so he knows something we don’t. He goes to sit on his wall to sleep off the booze, and someone comes up behind him and shoots from a range of three to four feet with a .44 caliber. What did Mrs. Singh say the time of death was?”

“Between one and three A.M.”

“Right. Humpty collapses stone dead into the backyard of 28, Grimm’s Road, where he is discovered by his landlady at seven-thirty A.M. It was raining, so a lot of evidence has been washed away. The following day his ex-wife confesses to his murder and then kills herself—she didn’t do it but must have thought she had. The twenty-eight-foot-long hair came from Mrs. Grundy, who was having an affair with Humpty. Grundy knew about it and said he didn’t mind, which kind of throws the jealous-husband motive out the window.”

He stopped and looked at them all.

“I don’t think we’re halfway there yet. Any questions?”

“Wee Willie Winkie,” said Gretel.

“A good point. Winkie was Humpty’s next-door neighbor and is violently murdered early this morning. It’s possible he saw something and tried to blackmail them, but we don’t know for sure. Same as this white van that was seen outside Humpty’s and also where we found Winkie. Bear it in mind, but it could be nothing.”

“Don’t Winsum and Loosum’s use white vans?”

“Yes—and half the companies in Berkshire. Any questions?”

There weren’t. They all knew what they had to do.

“One other thing,” said Jack. “A certain DCI named Friedland Chymes wants to take over this investigation and will do almost anything to do so. I want all approaches from him or a member of his staff reported to me. Let’s keep gossip to a minimum, too. Okay, that’s it. Find me Thomm and where Humpty has been living this past year, and we need to speak to Bessie Brooks.”

There was an unseemly rush for the only available chairs. Gretel, as usual, won.

“What do you think about Winkie?” asked Jack.

“I’m not sure,” replied Mary. “If he’d been shot with a .44 caliber, I might be a bit more positive. He might simply have been mugged; the fifty-pound notes could have been his.”

“I agree. Listen: If we can discover Humpty’s plan for raising his share value, we’ll find the motive for killing him.”

“Then why don’t we speak to Spongg again?” suggested Mary. “After all, he stood to gain far more than Humpty ever did from a hike in the share prices.”

28. Castle Spongg