As if by Magic (4 page)

As Dave joined her on the beanbags, Hugo asked if they wanted tea.

‘We have come to see you for a reason,’ Jessica said.

‘I think better after tea,’ he replied, tucking his hair behind his ears. ‘Would you like some?’

‘I suppose.’

‘I have peppermint, camomile, elderflower, red berry, green and ginger. Which would you like?’

‘Er... do you have some normal tea?’

‘I have some breakfast tea somewhere.’

‘That’ll do.’

Dave asked for the same as Hugo exited into the kitchen.

‘I think he’s getting odder,’ Jessica said.

‘He’s always been like this,’ Dave replied, scrunching himself further into the bean bag. ‘When we were at university, we had this three thousand-word essay due on a Friday. He spent all week reading the Torah.’

‘Was it religious education?’

‘No, he did history but reckoned he was getting into character. He refused to eat anything from a pig and started using Yiddish words. It was due at four pm and by ten in the morning, he hadn’t even got up. We woke him and then he wrote this whole thing about Israel in three hours, handed it in, and went back to bed. The next day, he carried on as if the previous week hadn’t happened.’

Hugo soon returned with a tray containing two separate teapots, plus three dainty china cups and saucers. He poured their drinks and then leaned back on to a bean bag.

‘Have you got any milk?’ Jessica asked.

‘I’ve turned the fridge off.’

‘Oh yeah, the no electricity thing... so how did you boil the water?’

‘I’ve got a gas stove.’

‘Isn’t that cheating?’

Hugo shrugged, unconcerned. Jessica took a sip of the tea, which tasted strange black. Dave told the story of the Rubik’s cube in a box and removed it from his jacket pocket, handing it over.

As his fingers twirled quickly over the jumbled colours while barely looking down, Hugo spoke. ‘I’ve visited the Academy of Applied Arts and Crafts in Budapest where Rubik came up with this,’ he said. ‘One of the professors gave me a tour.’

‘Okay...’ Jessica said.

‘Have you ever been?’

‘Surprisingly not,’ she replied, as if the question had been valid.

Hugo handed the cube to Jessica, fully solved. He’d had it in his hands for barely a minute.

She took the “have fun” note out of her pocket and handed it over. Hugo read the words on the front and then flipped it over to check the back before returning it.

‘So can you think of any reason some guy might pay someone else to leave this out in the open in a box with no-one’s name on it?’ Jessica asked.

‘Hmm...’ Hugo took a sip of his tea and ran a hand through his hair, twirling one of the longer strands around a finger before letting it fall. ‘You do realise that’s not just a Rubik’s cube, don’t you?’ he said.

FOUR

Jessica looked at what she thought was a toy in her hand and then at Dave, who shrugged.

‘If it’s not a Rubik’s cube and then what is it?’ she asked.

Hugo put his teacup down and then reached out and took the cube from Jessica. ‘Firstly, an original would have three squares along the sides but this has four.’

Jessica had vaguely thought something wasn’t quite right but hadn’t noticed what.

‘But it’s also heavier and the sides don’t turn as they should,’ Hugo continued, twisting the top row, and popping off the corner cube. He worked his way around until most of the squares were on the white rug between them and then he handed the remains back to Jessica. What was left was a black plastic ball with cross-shaped grooves running horizontally and vertically, and dimples in the remaining curved, raised segments.

‘It still feels heavy,’ she said.

‘Exactly.’

Hugo took the ball back and tried digging his nails into a thin seam that ran around the ball. ‘Do you have a screwdriver?’ he asked.

Jessica patted her pockets as a token gesture, although she didn’t know anyone who would be carrying one around casually. ‘Sorry.’

‘Me either,’ Dave said.

Hugo started looking around the room and then bunny-hopped to his feet, apparently incapable of doing even the simplest things normally. ‘Have you seen my rock collection?’ he asked, while hunting through a drawer behind them.

Jessica got to her feet and looked on the shelves above where Hugo was searching. There was a neat line of stones which all looked identical, the type of thing that littered numerous kerbs everywhere she had ever been. ‘That’s, er, very nice,’ Jessica said.

‘I’m selling it if you’re interested.’

‘You’re all right.’

Hugo pulled out a small screwdriver kit and they returned to the bean bags. He took out the smallest one and slid it into the gap and then held it in place while using the palm of his other hand to slap down hard. The two halves of the sphere popped open, while a small bubble-wrapped ball dropped on to the floor.

‘A-ha!’ Hugo exclaimed.

Jessica picked up the contents and could feel something hard under the thin layer of plastic. She went to pull the tape off but stopped herself. ‘There are some gloves in my suitcase down in your car,’ she said to Dave. ‘Be a good boy and go get them. And don’t go stealing my underwear.’

Dave frowned at the suggestion but climbed to his feet anyway. ‘You were going to take latex gloves on a weekend away?’

‘Yeah, don’t get your hopes up. You never know when you might need a pair – just like now.’

Within a few minutes, Jessica had carefully removed the tape and put the strips into a zip bag, just in case there were fingerprints or traces of anything else – not that they were investigating anything criminal yet.

Delicately, she uncovered a tiny silver pocket watch. Jessica pushed a button on the side to make the cover flip open. She peered at it closer to bring the numbers around the clock face into focus because the device was so small.

‘Hugo?’ Jessica asked, looking for inspiration, holding the watch in the palm of her hand so he could see it.

‘It’s Victorian,’ he said. ‘If it’s real, then it’s an antique and probably worth a bit. I’ve never seen one that small.’

The silver of the case gleamed in the light from the window as Jessica flipped it over, holding it up for them to see the initials “CP” engraved neatly on the back. ‘At least it’s distinctive,’ Jessica said. ‘If it has been stolen, we should be able to trace it. Whoever paid for it to be left obviously wanted it found – but anyone could have picked it up and kept it as a toy, or it could have been blown up.’

Hugo was nodding approvingly and Jessica looked to him, eyebrows raised. ‘I like their style,’ he said. ‘It’s like a public performance. Maybe this one would have been taken, or blown up or whatever – but perhaps there were other attempts?’

His point was pretty clear – whoever had left it wanted the puzzle to be solved and the watch to be found.

‘Are we still using NMPR?’ Jessica asked, looking towards Dave. She was referring to the National Mobile Property Register, which allowed police forces around the country to check any recovered goods to see if they may have been stolen.

Dave nodded. ‘Yeah, my old mobile phone is listed on there.’

‘Didn’t you just leave that down the pub?’

‘Yes but it still wasn’t there when I went back for it, so someone nicked it.’

‘I guess it’s a fine line between stupidity and theft. Anyway, we’re going to have to call someone to get them to check. Are you on friendly enough terms with anyone to do it quietly as a favour, rather than us having to be quite so obvious about the fact we’re not in Wakefield? Obviously requiring a favour means you won’t be able to ask any females...’

‘I don’t see you with a long list of people who will help you out.’

‘That’s because I don’t want to call in any of my favours yet. I’m trying to build them all up so everyone in the station owes me something and then I can start calling them in big-time.’

Dave left the room to get better reception on his phone and then returned a few minutes later looking puzzled.

‘What’s up?’ Jessica asked.

‘One of the constables is going to check the details of the watch for us but there’s something else – this wasn’t the only plain brown box left in the centre today.’

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Jessica sat with her feet up on the table, reading a poster on the wall. ‘“Lock it or lose it”,’ she said. ‘I wonder how much we paid someone to come up with that slogan.’

‘I’ve got a “Steal a bike, take a hike” over here,’ Dave said, pointing to a poster above his head.

The reception area of the Bootle Street police station was much the same as the one they worked in at Longsight, albeit with far more awareness posters and comfier seats. The station served much of the centre of Manchester with more focus on on-the-street in-uniform policing than they had.

Hugo sat in between them tying and untying his laces, not taking part in the conversation.

‘How about “Don’t let a thief give you grief”?’ Jessica said.

‘There’s a “Don’t be a wally with your wallet” over here with a picture of some bloke leaving it sticking out of his pocket, then another one that says “Don’t make stealing your bike wheely easy”.’

Jessica laughed. ‘We may as well just put out one standard poster that says “Don’t be such an idiot” with a photo of some bloke handing his wallet to a thief and leave it at that. Still, I guess, drunken buffoons will still leave their mobiles in pubs, won’t they?’

Before Dave could reply, a uniformed officer strolled into the area and waved them through the door, leading them into an empty interview room. Waiting on the table was an identical brown box to the one Jessica has opened.

‘This was left on Deansgate tram platform this morning,’ the officer said. ‘One of our off-duty lot was catching a tram when he saw it already opened. He dropped it in as lost property. We all thought he was crackers given what’s in it.’

Jessica thought he was going to add: “But you know the type”, although he tailed off. As it was, it was lucky the officer who dropped it off was “the type” to hand everything in and not just bin it. He was also the type who didn’t resort to shutting down transport networks for the sake of a box, which immediately elevated whoever it was in Jessica’s view.

The fact Jessica and Dave had skipped the training day was now something they could not hide from their superiors. Sooner or later, it would have been noticed anyway but, as they were signed off from duty for the three-day weekend, Jessica used one of her favours in order to keep investigating the mystery of the boxes. If it hadn’t been for them being off, things would have just been left. There had been a delay in checking whether the watch had been registered to anyone, so they didn’t know if it was stolen, and, as such, no actual crime had been committed.

Jessica peered into the box and, as with the original, removed a smaller one. Inside that was a third box containing a red plastic cup. The officer told them it had already been handled by numerous people. As she sat down, Jessica put the cup on the table.

‘Hugo?’ Jessica said.

After picking it up, Hugo turned it upside down with a grin, sliding it along the table. ‘This is what we might use to make things disappear and reappear,’ he said, reaching into an inside pocket and taking out two similar cups, one blue, one yellow, and putting them on the table. He sat opposite Jessica with all three cups in a row.

‘Has anyone got a ping pong ball?’ he asked.

Unsurprisingly, neither of them did, although the other officer’s raised eyebrows reminded Jessica that she was becoming dangerously desensitised to questions such as this.

‘How about a ring?’ Hugo added.

Jessica and Dave both looked to the officer, who said nothing while reluctantly removing a wedding ring and passing it to Hugo with a worried look.

Hugo placed it on the table and put the blue cup over the top of it, then shuffled the three around and asked Jessica to pick one. She tapped the top of the blue one but he lifted it from the table revealing an empty space, then showed them it was under the red.

‘Smart arse,’ Jessica said.

Hugo grinned and placed it back under the blue one, then shuffled them around again. Jessica picked the red one, which was blank, while Hugo laughed before revealing it had been under the blue one the whole time.

He put the ring back under the blue one and alternated their positions on the table. ‘Which one?’ he said, looking at Dave.

‘Blue.’

‘Sir?’ Hugo asked, looking at the officer whose ring it was. He was shuffling nervously from side to side, possibly wondering if he was ever going to see the ring again.

‘Red.’

‘You’ve got yellow,’ Hugo said nodding at Jessica and then inviting them to each pick up their cups. All three of them contained nothing underneath, with the uniformed officer audibly gulping. They put the cups back on the table and Hugo started to shuffle them.

‘Last one,’ he said, looking at Jessica. ‘Pick one.’

Jessica tapped the red one.

‘Sure?’

‘Yep.’

‘Really sure?’ Jessica nodded and Hugo started drumming on the table with his free hand before finally lifting the cup to reveal two rings, one on top of the other.

‘Wow,’ said the relieved officer as Hugo handed him his wedding ring.

‘Where did the other one come from? Jessica asked, putting on a glove to pick it up.

Hugo pocketed his two cups and then turned the red one over for them to see. ‘There’s a hidden compartment on the bottom,’ he said. ‘You can control it with magnets. Most stuff like this is sleight of hand but this is another way if you’re trying to conceal something slightly different.’ He tipped the cup upside down and a red plastic disc dropped on to the table, before he turned it back the right way to show them the hidden compartment. Then he dropped the disc back in and tipped it up a second time, when it didn’t fall.

‘Where would you get that from?’ Jessica asked.

‘Maybe a magic shop but probably over the Internet.’

Jessica turned the ring over in her fingers then noticed a small “CP” engraved in the metal. She took out an evidence bag and dropped it in. ‘Dave, you call in and see if we’ve got a match on the watch and I’ll put a few calls in to see if there has been anything else found this morning. I doubt we’ll get anything from the tram station CCTV, so let’s assume it was left by someone else unrelated to the ring itself. We can always check it if something comes up.’