Read Online Scents and Sensibility by Spencer Quinn - Free Book Online

now? Since you’re playing tennis and all? If Charlie wants to, of course.”
    â€œI do,” said Charlie.
    But maybe not loud enough. “Now you know my tennis schedule?” Leda said. “What a detective you are!”
    She was dead-on right about that. But even I knew her tennis schedule: she was carrying her racket! Leda was making me real nervous, hard to explain how, exactly, and unless she was planning to spill more info on Agatha the cat, I wanted her en route to the tennis court, and pronto.
    Meanwhile, we’d fallen into one of those strange silences you sometimes get, and no one seemed to be in a good mood all of a sudden, except for me. Yes, Agatha was a bothersome new development, but other than that I was tip-top.
    The woman in the car looked over, caught Leda’s eye, and pointed to her watch. Leda adjusted her racket on her shoulder, her eyes going to Bernie, then Charlie—and finally me, for some reason. “All right.” She leaned down and gave Charlie a kiss on the forehead. “You’ll have to be the mature one.”
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    This was living! Me, Bernie, and Charlie zooming through open country in the Porsche. Yes, Charlie had the shotgun seat, and I was on the horrible shelf in back, but it was never as horrible when Charlie was the one up front. Also the sun was shining, but not too hot, and the cooler was loaded with picnic supplies. You can’t ask for more.
    â€œWhere are we going, Dad?” Charlie said.
    â€œWe’re on a case,” said Bernie.
    â€œWow! You’re taking me on a real case?”
    â€œWell, yeah, sort of.”
    â€œAre we gonna catch a bad guy?”
    â€œOh, no, nothing like that. I just want to take a look at something out in the desert.”
    â€œWhat kind of something?”
    â€œA hole in the ground.”
    â€œWith a body in it?”
    Bernie laughed, tousled Charlie’s hair, somehow making the Indian feather thing stand up taller and wackier than before. “Just an empty hole,” Bernie said. “But can you guess what was in it?”
    â€œTreasure!”
    Bernie laughed some more. It was great to see him so happy.
    â€œEasy, big guy.”
    That was me, or at least the front part of me, somehow in the front seat, sort of wedged in between Bernie and Charlie? What a nice surprise! But maybe not now, was that the point? I drew back to the horrible little shelf, tried to make myself comfortable. Sometimes pawing at a seat back makes you more comfortable.
    â€œChet!”
    I got a grip.
    â€œTreasure’s not a bad guess,” Bernie was saying when I tuned back in. “In this case, the treasure was in the form of a cactus.”
    â€œA cactus, Dad?”
    â€œSaguaro,” Bernie said. “Like that one over at three o’clock, only not quite as big. Wonder if it has a chip inside.”
    â€œHuh?”
    â€œSome of them do.”
    â€œChips—like to eat?”
    Bernie laughed again, went into a long explanation about chips, and GPS, and the whole history of mapmaking, which I’m sure was fascinating. When he was done, Charlie said, “Are there chips in the cooler?”
    â€œBarbecue flavored.”
    â€œCan I have some?”
    â€œNow?”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œMom hates that.”
    â€œHates what?”
    â€œMe saying ‘why not.’ She says I say it too much.”
    â€œWhy?”
    Silence. Then all of a sudden Charlie was laughing and laughing. Human laughter is just about the best thing they do, and kid laughter is the best of the best. We pulled over—two-lane blacktop, no traffic, picnic spots out the yingyang—popped open the cooler, and found the chips.
    â€œAnd maybe Chet wants a treat,” Charlie said.
    Charlie: had to love him, and I did.
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    My treat turned out to be a bone from Orlando the butcher. I’ve met a number