Lost Claws – Bentley 32

[For back story go here: Story so far at 17 Sept 2020 and mainly this one.]

[Relevant back story also in embedded links.]

Bentley did not know what to do next. It had been a tiring day all told, and there were too many unanswered questions or answers that just provoked more questions for him to consider. He had two main areas to worry about. One was Fred Thimble and the ongoing search for the ring, the other was his apparently disappeared cat who went by the name Covid, a name which he'd given the feline last April and which, like the pandemic, had unfortunately stuck around.

These two issues were linked by Jaggers. Jaggers, Bentley felt sure, had taken his cat in order to force Bentley to produce the ring he wanted. Unfortunately Bentley still had no ring and alongside this he had no idea where Jaggers might be or... Anything really. Natalie, his granddaughter was still optimistic that the cat's disappearance might have nothing to do with Jaggers.

"She could have just wandered off," she said. "Got trapped somewhere. We should put up posters."

"Yes, posters," agreed Bentley in his disagreeing voice. "Picture of the cat and the phrase 'Wanted: Covid'. Sure that'll go down a bomb.

"Well, what was she called before?" asked Natalie.

"Ginger Spice."

"Hm," said Natalie. "We could ask door to door."

"I should have just kept calling her Beatrice like she was when I got her," muttered Bentley. 

In any case the current lockdown situation made Bentley wary as to whether going door to door was actually legal, even though he admitted going to York on a wild escapade for a ring was also perhaps a little above the line. Which brought him on to Fred Thimble.

Fred's call had come in just as they arrived back at Bentley's flat. Rather than get into the whole conversation there and then, they arranged a follow up call when they could all concentrate on the matter in hand. This was just as well since when Thimble did come on the line his input was meandering, random and while no doubt helpful to some extent, finding the bits that were helpful was going to prove a task.

Bentley was right, if there was something going on somewhere, Fred Thimble knew about it. Trouble was he just didn't know when to shut up about it.

"Course I remember you, Bentley you old fool," he began, less than helpfully thought Natalie and Bentley. "That evening shift where you let the 19.07 go early and got an earful and I held them at the points and that made the 19.15 late – you remember that? Nice bit of time-keeping from you I'm guessing but these things always have repercussions. Old man Harrison – he was the time-keeping king except he had so many side deals going on it just got ridiculous. You know he was selling rail memorabilia to collectors? Only thing was he'd sell it on site and then he'd have to unscrew it or take it down at the dead of night and pretend it got vandalised. Knew where the CCTV cameras were as well, and bribed McCormack whose job it was to watch the monitors – mind you, everyone bribed McCormack for something or other..."

"This is jolly interesting, Fred," said Bentley into the speakerphone, "But of no use at all. I need to know if you remember my son Lawrence. A while back. Came up threre. Might of had a ring, maybe tried to sell it to someone. It's a long shot and everything, but if he we're trying to sell it it's the kind of thing I reckon you'd have heard about."

"What do you want to know about a ring for?" asked Thimble, as if it were the last thing anyone would ever want to think about ever.

"It has value," said Bentley. 

"Oh yes?" said Thimble. "Sentimental or actual?"

"Sentimental. Very much so."

"It belonged to my grandmother," said Natalie. 

"Ah, your boy Lawrence had a load of schemes going on, chip off the old block, right? But no, no, never saw a ring. Could get you a few mind you. Railway themed and everything. Old Jake Larson, he was a jeweller, you remember him? A jeweller or a thief..."

"I'm sorry to cut in but..: said Natalie.

"Do you want to hear about Larson or not?"

"Is he relevant to my grandmother's ring?"

"It's relevant to A ring," emphasised Thimble. "And that relevance is the first part of your two-part ticket to ride to the destination where you may wish to alight."

Natalie looked in exasperation at Bentley. She mouthed 'what is he on'? And Bentley mouthed back 'he's always been like this.'

So they sat through the full story about Old Jake Larson, and Larson's kid Jason and Jason's sister with the wooden leg who somehow managed to sue York Railway Station for negligence even though no one ever knew what they'd actually been negligent about.

Forty five minutes later they hung up. Natalie sighed again.

"Well, that's conclusive, if you ask me," said Bentley. "Thimble's definitely got the ring. Now we just have to get it back from him without leaving the house. Any ideas?"

"Makes no sense to me," she said. "Might as well go out and look for the cat."