Hound of the Buskerville

Written by Laird Long

There was a knock on the door of 222c Butcher Street. The maid promptly answered the summons, ushered a large, sheepskin-jacketed man and a petite, lab-coated woman into the private study of full-time eccentric and part-time detective Sir Loch Hoames.

“Ah!” Hoames exclaimed, setting aside his cello and leaping out of his chair by the artificial fire. “Dr. Watt-Sun!” He vigorously shook hands with the married veterinarian who operated an animal clinic three doors down from his rooms.

“Sir Loch,” she responded pleasantly, “I’d like you to meet Kinnair McMurray. He’s a”

“Sheepsman, of course,” Sir Loch interjected, examining the stout, ruddy-complexioned fellow. “He operates a hundred-acre gorse farm this side of Glasgow, on which he tends to two-hundred head of sheep and lambs. Married, with four young children, proud owner of a late-model lorry. You’ve been shearing early this year, sir, due to your heavy debt load. But your dog has gone missing, and you’d like me to find him.”

“Astounding!” Kinnair exulted. “How did you know all that?”

“Elementary. Right, my dear Watt-Sun? You see, I’m one of the silent partners who hold the note on your ancestral McMurray farm, and, as such, am privy to all of your assets and liabilities and family history. As for the rest,” Sir Loch waved his hand, “well, the excess wool on your coat attests to your recent shearing activities, and the presence of Scotland-renowned canine expert Dr. Watt-Sun attests to your mission.”

“Amazing!” the man marveled.

“But enough chit-chat,” Sir Loch said. “How and when did your dog happen to go missing, sir?”

Kinnair explained to the amateur sleuth how just three days earlier he had allowed a traveling troupe of four buskers to camp in a corner of his field for the night – a mime, a stilt-walker, a living statue and a balloon twister. The following morning, the troupe had vanished, along with Rover.

“He’s me best sheep-herding dog, is Rover,” Kinnair lamented. “No other dog reacts to my oral commands better or quicker.”

“To Edinburgh!” Hoames suddenly exclaimed, donning his deerstalker.

Before Dr. Watt-Sun could question or protest, he added, “The Edinburgh Festival Fringe has just commenced, and it is most certainly to that three-week carnival of plays, performances and antics that our troupe has trekked.”

Within the hour, Dr. Watt-Sun and Sir Loch were disembarking from the express train to the Scottish capital. They made haste for the large encampment of entertainers known annually as Buskerville; a vast tent city to rival any Depression-era Hooverville. It was where the more cash-strapped fringe performers lived during the length of the festival.

Sir Loch had disguised himself whilst on the train. He was decked out now in a green leotard, multi-pronged red-and-white belled headgear and Aladdin-like slippers. So attired as a frolicsome court jester and armed with a musical recorder and the detailed physical descriptions Kinnair had supplied of the suspect performers, he sought to infiltrate the camp.

“Who might you be?” a burly juggler demanded to know, blocking his way. The man was juggling several large clubs, and it was obvious he knew how to use them for more than just show. Other camp denizens quickly surrounded the interloper, as well.

Sir Loch immediately began cavorting about, gesticulating wildly, pratfalling constantly, raising a smile even on the scowled lips of the juggler. Then he wetted his own lips, affixed them to the recorder. A most heartrending version of Greensleeves piped out of the shrill instrument, tearing the eyes of his audience and convincing them of his authenticity. He was welcomed into the camp, along with his companion, Nurse Mirth (a/k/a Dr. Watt-Sun).

Once within the enclave, Sir Loch flipped a switch on the underside of his pearl-white recorder and piped a note only a canine audience could appreciate. The dog whistle did the trick as hounds of all shapes and sizes came bounding down the rows of tents almost barreling the detective and doctor over. Watt-Sun quickly identified Rover from her veterinarian dealings with the pooch and collared and leashed the animal.

“And now to apprehend the dognapper,” Sir Loch remarked.

They located the mime first, attempting to escape from an invisible box. He was speechless in the face of Sir Loch’s pointed questions, his lily-white face the picture of innocence. Rover licked one of the man’s feet, and the mime yelled at the dog, but since there were no actual words, Rover paid no attention. Sir Loch suddenly spun around, his bells jangling and stared upwards at the stilt-walker looking down upon the proceedings. “You there with your head in the clouds,” he questioned, “you didn’t steal this dog from the McMurray farm, did you?”

“That dog? No,” the giant replied from twenty feet up. “What use would I have for such a small dog?”

Sir Loch gestured at the duct tape wrapped tightly around the left wooden leg of the towering man. “Broke your leg recently, I see.”

“Yeah, some little kid got tangled up in my feet a couple of weeks ago, made me stumble and snap a leg.”

“Indeed. It must be difficult to keep track of youngsters from such a height.”

The man started striding away, and Rover barked wildly at a Chihuahua that was directly in the path of the lumbering giant, scaring the miniature dog away just before it was trampled.

Dr. Watt-Sun screamed.

Sir Loch whirled about. He observed that the vet had bumped into what looked amazingly like a Greek statue. Until the statue had moved, catching the good doctor in his muscled arms.

“The living statue, I presume?” Sir Loch commented, scrutinizing the half-naked, grey-painted man. “And what do you know of the theft of Kinnair McMurray’s dog?”

But the man had turned to stone again, striking an Apollo-like pose.

Rover sniffed at the ‘statue’s’ leg, then lifted one of his own.

“Hey!” the stony-faced performer yelled, jumping backwards before the dog could do any business.

Both Rover’s and Sir Loch’s ears suddenly cocked, as they heard the unmistakable huffing and puffing of someone blowing up a balloon. Sure enough, three tent rows over, they came upon the balloon twister, the fourth member of the troupe who’d once occupied a small corner of Kinnair McMurray’s land. She stilled her lungs when Hoames, Watt-Sun and Rover approached, her balloon half-filled.

There were other performers standing about watching the woman, and Rover began barking at them, his herding instincts getting the better of him. He nipped at their heels, forming the throng up into an orderly crowd in front of the balloon artist.

“Hmmm,” Sir Loch mused aloud, “that kind of canine talent would come in handy for gathering a crowd together – a paying crowd. Wouldn’t it, twister?”

She shrugged, pursing her lips and puffing again. Rover watched, wide-eyed, as the rubber inflated. But when the balloon sculptor started making with the squeaky manipulations that rapidly twisted the white and black balloon into a spotted Dalmatian, Rover yelped and tried to run off in the opposite direction.

Holding tight to the dog’s leash, Dr. Watt-Sun said, “I don’t see how we’re ever going to figure out who took Rover, Hoames.”

“Ha!” Sir Loch exclaimed. “I’m afraid you’re barking up the wrong tree there, my dear Watt-Sun. For I’ve already determined the identity of the mangy culprit.”