déjà vu had come over me again. I wondered â with a strange sinking feeling in my heart â where have I heard all this before?
âIt sounds as if we are well on the way to solving this case, sir,â opined Bundle, swelling in his chair and taking a deep breath.
âI wish I could be so optimistic,â said Coombes.
âHave you further theories?â asked Bundle. âI should be very glad to hear them.â
Coombes sprang from his chair and hobbled to the window, then turned and faced Bundle. âI think you will learn that young Mr Calvin Hawes was recently a military man with the American forces.â
âYou are right, sir!â cried Bundle. âWe have already learnt that he served as an infantryman with the American army in Afghanistan, and was discharged a year ago.â
âI believe you will find he was lured to Hay-on-Wye by the promise that a young woman was awaiting him here. No doubt he thought her name was Lydia Languish .â
Bundle nodded. âThe bouquet in the poor ladâs hands, is that it? It seems most probable.â
âFew things are more potent to a young man than the promise of sex,â said Coombes. âEven money pales in comparison. What better to lure him all the way across an ocean? Attraction to women is not a sensation I have personally experienced, yet I have observed that for most men it is an overpowering madness. Young men in particular.â
âVery true, sir.â
âIf you succeed in breaking into his email you may well find that he was corresponding, or thought he was corresponding, with Lydia Languish. I donât know how computers work, but I suspect the murderer does, and that he has covered his computer tracks better than he covered his bicycle tracks. So you are unlikely to track him down in that manner. You might, however, enquire of bicycle shops here and in Hereford to learn whether they have in the past week sold a bicycle that leaves tracks like these . . .â Coombes handed the sergeant a small print of a photograph.
âI didnât know you had a computer!â I said. âYou astonish me, Coombes.â
âOne must keep up with the times â difficult as it is to do.â
âWell, tempus fugit , Mr Coombes. I must be off and running,â said Bundle. He rose from his chair, and seemed to fill the room. His white shirt and tie, and the epaulettes on his shirt, made him look very grand.
A moment later he was gone.
âCome, Wilson. I must show you my computer. A very strange little thing it is.â He led me up the stairs to his room.
âI had no idea you had so many books up here too!â I cried, for they were ranged on shelves all round the room, and piled in corners. On the desk was a new laptop computer, and on the side table a small colour printer.
âCertain friends have outfitted me with all the latest machinery,â said he. âI have found the computer somewhat more convenient than notebooks for storing information â although for field work a notebook is indispensable.â
âAnd what, may I ask, is the object of your researches? I have often wondered but been reluctant to ask.â
âReluctance to ask is a very English fault, my dear fellow. But there is no secret. I am trying to catch up with what Iâve missed.â
âIt is something I ought to do myself,â I said. âMuch of life has slid by me unnoticed. Now that I have leisure, I want to try to catch up on what Iâve ignored before. But what exactly are you trying to catch up on?â
âEverything,â said Coombes, and suddenly he looked a bit deflated. âAnd it is a Herculean task.â
âIf you try to catch up on everything, I imagine it would be,â I said.
âI must away to work, Wilson!â he cried, seeming to gather his energy again. He began grabbing volumes from the wall.
I went downstairs, finished my tea,
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