This is for the very patient Sweetmarly. Thanks for waiting for me for so very long! Special thanks to my Britpicker, mrspencil, and to Wynsom for her valuable support. Many apologies for any confusion- I tried to post this yesterday, but some glitches prevented me. I hope it works this time!
000
"Ian, come here a moment and help me, please, dear," his mother called to him out of Gran's kitchen window. He had been playing catch with Gladstone in the back garden, but he dropped the ball and came in through the back door immediately, followed closely by the loyal red setter. Ian was only six, but he liked to help. Gran said it was a Watson trait, whatever that meant.
"Wow! Your cake exploded, Mum!" Ian gasped, and began to giggle. His mother, the kitchen table, the floor, and little two-year-old Jussie were all liberally sprinkled with dripping yellow batter.
"Justine was 'helping' me stir it," Mum explained. Her voice sounded as patient as ever, but the tight look on her face reminded Ian of when Uncle Sherlock had set the table on fire. Again.
"I mate tate," Jussie affirmed through the thick mess on her mouth. Ian thought the batter running down her face looked like yellow zebra stripes. He wondered if there would be enough batter left over to bake an actual cake.
"I need to take her to the bath to wash off. Can you start cleaning the floor for me? I'm afraid. . . ." Mum looked wordlessly but meaningfully at the door to the sitting room where Gran was sitting in front of the telly.
Gran's hip was not good. If she slipped on the stuff on the floor and fell, it would be bad, Ian knew. She had to walk with a four-footed cane now and couldn't get around easily at all anymore. This was why they all gathered at Baker Street as often as possible—the whole family. Mum once said it was important to spend time with Gran while they still could, and then she got all teary and bit her lip and Dad gave her a hug and looked teary, too. Ian wasn't sure what the mushy stuff was all about, but it was sad that Gran couldn't come to Ian's flat or to Justine's flat anymore.
Ian had used up a whole roll of kitchen paper and Gladstone had helpfully licked up a liberal amount of batter from the floor before his Mum and Jussie finally came back. Mum's apron was soaked and her hair dripped with water. Jussie was fairly damp as well and was laughing.
"I 'plash!" she crowed with glee.
"Darling, could you take Justine up to her mother? I have to make more batter before I can bake this cake." Mum sounded tired. Ian had noticed that sometimes Jussie made everyone sound tired.
"Tate! Tate!" Jussie shrieked. "I 'ave tate!" She was child of few words, but she knew how to make herself understood.
"No, Juss, hush. It's for Scotland Yard," Ian reminded her reasonably. "Your dad's work, remember. It's for your dad."
The toddler quieted at once. "Dada!" Jussie smiled. "Dada 'ave a tate!"
"You have such a calming way about you, Ian," Mum remarked. "You'll make a great doctor one day with your bedside manner."
Ian always felt so warm inside whenever his Mum praised him. But he knew he was going to have to let her down. "I don't wanna be a doctor anymore. I wanna be a detective, like Dad and Uncle Sherlock!"
He thought she would be disappointed, but Mum beamed at him as if he had said just what she'd always wanted to hear. "You'll be a great detective, then! Detectives need a calming manner, too, you know, like your dad has."
Ian frowned. "Uncle Sherlock doesn't got a calming manner," he objected.
"No," Mum grinned, "he has your father's calming manner instead. You'll have the best teachers in the world if you really want to be a detective, but you'll also need a lot of practice. There's been a crime committed here that you can solve for me, and Justine can help."
"I tan help!" Jussie enthused. "I do, too!"
"Look," Mum said, holding a mixing bowl down for Ian to see into. "I mixed up a batch of buttercream icing for my cake an hour ago, and now you can see that a good third of it is gone. Look closely. Can you deduce what the thief used to steal my icing?"
There was trench dug right through the middle of the icing in the bowl. Ian frowned. It was a wide trench- too wide for a normal spoon, much too wide for a human finger. "Something big," he deduced.
"I'll give you a clue. My best wooden spoon is missing, too," Mum told him grimly. "I never make my cakes without my wooden spoon."
"'Dam 'poon," Jussie nodded soberly.
Mum choked back a laugh, nearly strangling in the attempt. "WOO-DEN spoon," she corrected Jussie, then muttered under her breath, "Been spending quality time with your Uncle John, have you, dear?"
"'Ooo—dam 'poon," Justine repeated. "I wuv Untoe Zhan."
"I love your Uncle John, too, dear, but you mustn't pick up his bad habits. Now, my detectives, find whoever smells of buttercream and you'll find my missing spoon," Mum told them. "I guarantee it. Off you both go, then, and take Gladstone with you."
"I need more ev'dence, first," Ian reminded her. "Uncle Sherlock says that a good detective uses all his senses. I seen it, but I need more . . . more im-formation."
"You SAW it," Mum sighed. "All right, some evidence for each of you." She grabbed a couple of teaspoons out of a drawer and scooped a bit of icing into each. "Take a good sniff!"
"I 'niffing it," Jussie giggled, sticking her nose into her spoon and getting a liberal amount on her face. "I eating it!" she added, stuffing the entire bowl of the utensil into her mouth. "'Tweam." Fortunately, Ian's mum was at the ready with a damp flannel.
Ian smelled the evidence with care, then tasted the icing with the tip of his tongue, but made certain to leave some in the spoon for future reference. It was no wonder someone had stolen some! Mum always made the best buttercream icing!
"Come on, Juss. Come on, Gladstone," he said in his most business-like manner. "You can be my 'sistants, like Uncle Sherlock is dad's 'sistant. We have to go interrorize people."
He wondered why his Mum was laughing so hard as they left the room.
000
Ian made a beeline for the street door, hoping to find exciting evidence of a break-in. He imagined himself finding the thief who had sneaked into the flat hiding in a cupboard or behind a chair, licking the wooden spoon clean. Perhaps it was a serial burglar! Perhaps there had been a string of cake icing thefts in the neighbourhood and Ian would crack the case! Maybe Scotland Yard had been searching for this criminal for ages, and Ian would be the one to find the answer to the mystery!
But the front door was locked and bolted on the inside as it always was and there was no sign of a break-in. Would the burglar have relocked the door behind him after he entered the building? But how had he unbolted the door in the first place? Ian had himself been outside the back door when the crime had occurred, and so he knew the thief could not have entered that way. The detectives needed more information.
Re-entering Gran's flat, Ian held the spoonful of icing out to Gladstone and told him, "Seek, boy. Good dog." Gladstone, having been trained to search for scents by Sherlock Holmes himself, began to work his way around the sitting room, nose to the floor.
Meanwhile, the first person to question was Gran. Ian was fairly certain Gran would not have taken the buttercream icing or the wooden spoon. With her bad hip and thumping cane, she could not possibly sneak about. But anyone coming into the flat from the front door would have had to pass by her in the sitting room on the way to the kitchen. Ian stood in front of the sofa where Gran was sitting and looked at her somberly. Gran was asleep, her mouth a little open, snoring gently. On the telly, a colourful game show was humming in the background.
"I 'niffing!" Jussie announced, and climbed onto the sofa arm to get close to Gran's face.
Gran's mouth snapped shut and she straightened in her seat when she felt Jussie's hot breath on her cheek. "Not asleep. Just resting a bit," she said defensively. Ian thought that was strange, since no one in the family would begrudge his Gran a little kip.
Jussie had by then deposited herself in her Gran's lap. "Not 'tweam," she announced to Ian, her research complete.
"What is she talking about, dear?" Gran asked Ian. It had become the habit of the family to ask Ian to interpret for Justine, although her speech was becoming clearer.
"Somebody stole some of Mum's buttercream icing," Ian explained.
"Well, that's hardly a surprise," Gran commented, a wry look on her face.
"And her best wooden spoon," Ian added.
"'Dam 'poon!" Jussie yelled happily.
"Tsk, tsk," Gran murmured. "Your Uncle John has a lot to answer for, hasn't he, sweetheart?"
"I wuv Untoe Zhan," Jussie protested, and Gran cuddled her close. "I wuv ooo. I wuv Dada. I wuv Mummy. I wuv .. . ."
Ian ignored Jussie litany of love and took a little pad of notepaper and pencil from his pocket. Dad always made notes on things when he was on a case, and he had given Ian a notebook to practice with. "Did anybody break into the flat this afternoon? Did you see any strangers?"
"Oh, no, dear. No one has been in my flat but family." Gran leaned towards him and said in a conspiratorial whisper, "I think you'll find, dear, that this is an 'inside job',"
Ian frowned. Was Gran accusing a member of their own family of this serious crime? "Are you sure nobody broke in?" He felt tremendously disappointed.
"Think about it, Ian," Gran admonished gently, helping a wiggly Justine to climb down to the floor. "Who knew your Mum was baking a cake with buttercream icing here today? And who would break into a flat just to eat a spoonful of icing and take nothing else?"
"I would! Mum's buttercream icing is the best!" Ian declared.
"I, too!" Jussie agreed, nodding her head vigorously. "'Tweam! I eat tate!"
Gran chuckled warmly. "Nevertheless, dears, I'm afraid you will find that one of our own is the culprit."
Ian sighed, resigned. Gran was probably right. "Come on, 'sistants. We'll have to talk to the others."
It took some time to ascend the stairs, as Jussie's legs were so short that she had to climb up on her hands and knees. Ian thought over the case as they went. It was unsettling to realize that a member of his own family was a common thief. It just seemed so wrong that a crime-fighting family should include a criminal. On the other hand, Ian's list of suspects had just been reduced from every single person in London to a mere four names. He brightened. He might be able to solve this case before dinner!
As they entered his Uncle Sherlock's sitting room, Ian whispered to Jussie, "You check out your dad and I'll check out mine." Then he held the spoonful of icing out to Gladstone and bade him, "Seek."
Ian's dad was at the desk between the two front windows, tapping with painfully slow fingers on the keyboard of his laptop, his greying hair flopping gently over his forehead. A nearly empty cup of coffee was at his elbow. Jussie's dad was slumped down on the sofa, feet on the coffee table, reading the paper with eyeglasses perched on the end of his nose. His coffee cup was balanced precariously on the arm of the sofa. Jussie climbed up beside him, knocking the fortunately empty cup to the floor, and began her investigation. Gladstone obediently scoured the floor with his nose, waving a feathery, red tail. And Ian pulled one of the desk chairs over to his father's side, climbed up, and leant over his shoulder.
"Ian," his dad turned his head to look back at his son. "Are you . . . sniffing me?"
"Yeah," Ian told him frankly.
"I 'niffing, too," Jussie announced, loudly snuffling at her father's face, and knocking off his glasses.
"Yes, you certainly are," Papa Greg leaned away from his daughter's inquiring nose. "The question is, why?"
"Somebody stole Mum's buttercream icing," Ian explained again.
Dad snorted. "Hardly an unexpected development," he observed.
"'Dam 'poon!" Jussie added with feeling.
Papa Greg raised an eyebrow. "I beg your pardon, young lady?"
"What did the child say?" Aunt Molly called from the kitchen, sounding concerned.
"She means Mum's wooden spoon is missing, too," Ian explained quickly. "She's not swearing; she just can't say 'wooden'."
"Aha," Papa Greg nodded. "So you're looking for the missing spoon, then?"
"Whoever smells like buttercream must be the thief," Ian concluded. "I don't smell it on my dad. How about your dad, Jussie?"
"Not 'tweam," Jussie shook her head.
"But you've both been drinking coffee. That could cover up the buttercream smell," Ian thought aloud.
"Very good thinking!" Dad commended him warmly. "In any criminal case, everyone is a suspect until cleared. When did the icing go missing?"
"About an hour ago, I think," Ian ventured.
"Well, I can give your Papa Greg an alibi: he hasn't budged from that sofa since he came from work this afternoon, which was about two hours ago."
Papa Greg was now sitting up straight and bouncing his squealing daughter on his knee. "And I can attest that your father was in the kitchen putting dinner in the oven when I arrived and then he came straight in here to work on his blog. He hasn't gone downstairs at all."
"And I can vouch for them both." Aunt Molly had by now come into the room from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron. "Neither of them has been out of my sight for well over an hour." She had a curl of carrot in her hair. Ian deduced that she was in the middle of mixing a salad. When Aunt Molly helped with dinner, one could easily deduce what she was making by the state of her appearance.
It was hard to believe that his aunt would lie to him, but Ian remained resolutely sceptical. "Let me smell you, Aunt Molly," he demanded, and she agreeably bent over and breathed on her nephew.
"No buttercream on you," he admitted. "But you've been drinking coffee, too. All three of you might be in on it! What if one of you went downstairs and scooped up the icing and then shared it with the other two?"
"A very plausible theory, Ian. Well thought out," Papa Greg commended him.
"But now you must go a step further," Dad said. "We all had opportunity, if we're covering for each other, but do any of us have a motive? Whom is Mum baking the cake for?"
"I bate tate! I did!" Jussie interrupted, annoyed. "I bate tate fo' Dada!"
"Well, you helped, sort of," Ian reminded her, amused. "The cake's for Papa to take to Scotland Yard in the morning."
"So I have no reason to steal the icing that I am going to get anyway," Papa Greg reasoned. "And it's in my interest for the cake to be completed, so I would have no motive to hinder the process."
"I have no motive, either," Dad reminded Ian. "I don't really have a sweet tooth. Eating a scoop of plain icing would make me feel ill, I'm afraid. You know that about me."
"I'm on a diet," Aunt Molly said. "That icing is nothing but sugar and fat. It would go straight to my hips. Of course, you only have my word for that," she added thoughtfully.
"I will testify on your behalf," Papa Greg assured her. "I am only too aware that we have nothing but rabbit food in our flat."
"There is a person in this family, however, who is NOT on a diet, has a tremendous sweet tooth, will not benefit from a cake gifted to Scotland Yard, and furthermore, who adores your mum's buttercream icing," Dad went on. "And in addition, he is the only suspect left."
"And I'm afraid this miscreant is a repeat offender," Papa told him confidentially. "If you can bring him to justice, it will be of great benefit to us all."
Ian was troubled. Uncle Sherlock was a miscreant! Ian didn't know what a miscreant was, but it sounded serious. And a repeat offender! A common thief!
"Where is the suspect? We must interrorize him," he said soberly.
Papa Greg and Aunt Molly both suddenly developed wheezing coughs that Ian strongly suspected covered laughter. Ian turned to his father with questioning eyes.
"I think you meant 'interrogate', Ian," Dad said cheerfully. "But as 'interrorize' exactly describes your Uncle Sherlock's manner of inquiry, I believe I will start using the word in my blog. Thank you!"
"The suspect is in his room," Aunt Molly added. "But I did see him sneaking down the stairs earlier and then sneaking up again."
Ian approached Uncle Sherlock's door with a heavy heart. The thought of accusing his beloved uncle with such a horrible crime was daunting. Jussie had no such qualms, however. She flew to the door and beat against it wildly.
"I tum in! I tum in!" she demanded sternly.
"Well, come in, then," a wry baritone voice countered.
Ian turned the knob and entered first, Jussie close at his elbow. "Sit, Gladstone," he turned and instructed his faithful dog, who whined and sat reluctantly. He adored Uncle Sherlock, too. Uncle Sherlock himself was stretched out on his bed, ankles crossed, one hand behind his head and the other holding his phone over his face, his only movement made by his thumb quickly scrolling.
"I 'niff you, 'Lot," Jussie announced, and flung herself at the bed, trying to scale it. But it was too high for her, and her little hands could not gain purchase on the mattress. She scrambled and jumped and squealed, all for naught. Uncle Sherlock watched her without expression for some moments. Finally he swung his legs to the floor and sat up in one smooth motion, scooping his niece into his lap.
"I 'niff you," Jussie repeated, as she raised her little hands to his face, but then she froze. Her eyes grew wide, and then she reached instead for his collar. Tiny thumb and forefinger pinched a little, nondescript, cream-coloured blob from his lapel and drew it to her nose. Justine sniffed the blob. She squished it between her fingers as if studying its texture. Then before Ian could stop her, she popped it into her mouth.
"'Tweam," she pronounced judgement. "It 'tweam." She looked up at her beloved uncle and told him scathingly, "You a feef, 'Lot!"
Uncle Sherlock showed a shocking lack of guilt. "Of course. I've always tasted the buttercream icing. What of it?"
Ian frowned. A confession! "We're detectives, Uncle Sherlock. Mum gave us a case: to find out who ate her buttercream icing. And you're the miscreant!"
Uncle Sherlock looked delighted. "A miscreant! No one's ever called me a miscreant before, although perhaps many have thought it. This is intriguing! Tell me how you have proceeded with the case."
Ian carefully explained to his uncle the steps he and his " 'sistants" had taken in discovering the truth about the icing thief. Sherlock nodded thoughtfully throughout the recitation but did not interrupt.
"Well done!" he commended the young detectives when Ian had concluded his report. "You followed the trail of evidence to its logical end. Unfortunately, you have no proof of my crime, as Justine has destroyed your only physical evidence."
"Yeah, Jussie! You shouldn't eat the ev'dence!" Ian scolded her gently. Jussie only smiled sweetly.
Sherlock mused aloud, "Of course, Mary knew all along that I had taken the icing. She usually plans for it by making twice as much as she needs each time. I wonder why she was upset about it today."
"'Dam 'poon!" Jussie explained earnestly.
Taken aback, Uncle Sherlock chuckled. "What sort of spoon?"
Ian gasped. He had forgotten that detail! His mother had, indeed, not been at all upset about the missing icing. It was the taking of the spoon she had minded.
"Mum wants her wooden spoon back," Ian explained. "It's her best caking-making spoon. Where is it?"
"Aha!" Sherlock nodded, enlightened. "If you could find the wooden spoon, you would have your evidence, wouldn't you? Not only would my having it in my possession be admissible as circumstantial evidence, a bit of forensic investigation could prove my guilt by finding my DNA in the dried spittle on the spoon. I wouldn't deprive you of the experience of discovering it for yourselves for the world!"
This was not a problem for the detective team. Ian held his own spoon out to his dog, still patiently sitting by the door, and said, "Gladstone, seek."
Gladstone did not even need to seek. He had apparently been waiting for his opportunity to prove useful and had already spotted the evidence. Diving under the bed, he wriggled back out with the spoon in his mouth. Proudly, he dropped the damning spoon into his young master's hand.
"Well done, Gladstone!" Ian praised. "You're under arrest, Uncle Sherlock! We caught you with the goods!"
Uncle Sherlock was entirely undismayed. "A fine first effort for a budding detective team," he commended them, looking proud.
"Well done, all of you!" Ian's mother agreed cheerfully from the doorway, beaming on them.
"I find 'tweam. I did," Jussie bragged.
"You have a fine, investigative nose, dear," Mum praised her. "And Ian has a fine, investigative manner. And Sherlock, I will thank you not to take my best wooden spoon from the kitchen next time you steal my buttercream icing," she added.
"I'll keep that in mind," Uncle Sherlock promised, "since we have three such able detectives in the family who will undoubtedly keep me under close surveillance from now on."
"Now if Jussie can just learn to keep the ev'dence out of her mouth," Ian said, aggrieved.