Penny Pass the Story - Part 10

Polanski, the too handsome cop, with a face you wouldn’t forget, stepped into the Sheriff’s office.

“You look baffled, Chief. What’s up?

Sheriff Milton wasn't born yesterday: he wasn't yet ready to reveal what was on his mind to anybody, let alone to this rookie.

He kept his cards close to his chest and maintained a poker face.

No one could have guessed that this fat slob in charge of the Morning Heights police precinct
was not the figure of fun that everyone ridiculed for his eccentric behaviour, but an astute individual.

He was an undercover FBI agent instructed to investigate a reported link between local hoodlums and an international criminal organisation, which made attractive offers that one could not refuse

The residents of this (once) quiet hamlet remembered him as an overweight child who in his teens had left home and gone to California in search of adventure.

When he returned, and people heard he had trained at a prestigious police academy, they voted for the local boy to be their sheriff.

In retrospect, it seemed the wrong decision they ever made because as soon as he plonked his bum on the comfiest chair in the office, he hardly moved, eating chocolate donuts and drinking coffee in styrofoam cups.

When urged, usually by his deputy Marandina,
he would make a show of attending the incident scenes.

Now, Jake Marandina was a different kettle of fish.

A Caribbean American, he was well-liked for his sunny disposition and known to be efficient in his duties, always happy to carry on the donkey work ungrudgingly.

Milton had disclosed to him of being undercover to gain his cooperation, and Marandina made sure that the public's perception was that they were at odds with each other.

The sheriff's first job was an interview with a Mr. Amos Snodgrass, suspected of being a paedophile, as he had been seen many times at the gates of the Hawthorns elementary school.

He accepted the explanation that this old gentleman was in love with a young teacher at the school, but did not have the courage to ask her out.

In the course of his interrogation, the lawman spotted a beautiful Persian carpet.

“Nice rug,” he said, “is it a reproduction?”

“Not at all”, was the reply, “it is genuine, and it once belonged to the Shah Tamasp I.”

“You see”, he continued, “I ama rich man and a collector of antiquities.”

To show he was telling the truth, he opened a safe, hidden behind the wallpaper.

It was chock-a-block with medieval maps, gold jewellery, bundles of money, and documents.

Gideon Milton wondered how the man could be so naïve as to show this treasure to a stranger, unless he was intending to bribe an officer of the law.

By pretending that he was a corrupt cop, open to backhanders, he gained the confidence of Amos who let it slip that he was the secpnd in command of a gang that dabbled in all sorts of criminal activities but the head was Jack Seville,  a former Security Officer at the Louvre in Paris, from where the medieval maps and jewels belonging to French Royalty had been stolen.
“In my youth”, he sighed, “I wished to be an artist. I became an engraver so skilled that I was able to reproduce a perfect 50 dollar bill.
It was exhibited at the Smithsonian National Museum, and my reputation spread throughout the world.”

“My misfortune was that Seville had learned of my talent, and one day he, and his confederate Pavel, visited me and handed me some printing plates and a load of watermarked paper. All I had to do was to etch various denominations of banknotes and print and distribute counterfeit money.”

“I had two choices: accept the proposition, which would be rewarded with the valuables from the Parisian museum, or a premature demise.”

Gideon Milton nodded in sympathy at Amos' dilemma.

“Surely it was too big a job for just one man ”, he said.

“Spot on”, the old rascal replied, “I had to recruit helpers.”

The sheriff stopped his questioning; he didn't want Snodgrass to become suspicious.

“Well, thanks for the nice chat. I'll be in touch,” he said and left.

Things were making sense now. 

The previous month, one of his officers, Curtis Padget (brother of Jenny, who thought she was God's gift to men and had several lovers), had gone to the General Stores and bought a Stetson, which he tried to pay with a dud 50-dollar note.

Accused of being a forger, he had run out in disgrace and escaped to another state.

The sheriff didn't have a chance to keep in touch with Snodgrass, as promised, because the following day, he was called to investigate the possibility of his kidnapping or murder.

The house was empty, and so was the safe.

Milton was sure he had legged it with the loot, but could not be more wrong.

A black SUV had gone by at speed, and a body had been thrown out.

Jenny was the first to reach the inert man lying on the floor.

“ The plates”, he whispered before he exhaled his last breath.

She knew what he meant. The lithographic plates kept at Gerry's Printing Works had to be retrieved before Seville, and Pavel got their clutches on them.

One thought occurred simultaneously to Jenny Paget and the sheriff; the corpse lying there could only mean that the criminals' associates of Snodgrass had become worried by the fact that the old man's suspicious behaviour had attracted the attention of law enforcement and was the weakest link that could lead to the end of their enterprise.

Somebody had made sure that he kept his mouth shut.

Jenny was terrified that she would end up like poor Amos. She, too, had, in the past, been threatened by Pavel to toe the line or suffer the consequences.

It was imperative that she, her daughter, and her lover, Oliver, escaped to a place of safety.

She got in her orange Volkswagen Beetle and, driving like a bat out of hell, she went out of town, stopped at Gerry's printing works, and some time later drove back to her house.

Maeandina had spotted the colourful Beetle going hell for leather and promptly followed it in a patrol car.

When he reached Jenny's bungalow, her car was parked on the driveway, and she was nowhere to be seen, but he could here fvoices rom inside.

The front door was open, and the Deputy Sheriff went in stealthily.

In the front room, Oliver and Jenny were talking animatedly.

“We have to leave immediately, Oliver. Amos is dead.”

The Deputy  burst into the room and asked:

“Which one of you two killed Snodgrass?”

“Neither”, said the Padgets in unison.

Those were the last words Jake  Marandina heard before becoming unconscious after he was hit by a blunt object.

He woke up, tied to a chair. His mobile phone was ringing.

“Answer it, but don't say where you are”, he was warned.

He nodded and spoke. “Oh, hello, chief. I'm on my way to buy donuts and should be with you soon.”

The Sheriff had located Marandina's phone through the built-in GPS and knew that he was at Jenny's place in some kind of trouble.

With a couple of armed seasoned officers. He rushed to the Padget house.

Outside it a black SUV was standing next to the Beetle.

Through the open window, they could hear menacing words directed at Jake.

“No, you nincompoop, it wasn't them two who killed Snodgrass. It was I, Pavel.”

He laughed, but the laugh faded when he turned round and saw three cops pointing their guns at him.

“Hello Pavel Polanski. You wanted to know what was baffling me. It was the identity of the policeman who was seen with Snodgrass before his untimely death. Now I know.”