Chaos At Christmas – Episode 18
Chaos At Christmas by Ewan Smith
« Previous Post- 1. Chaos At Christmas: Episode 01
- 1. Chaos At Christmas – Episode 18
They studied the “Wild Meanz Free!!!” banner and speculated on the material it was made from, the type of paint that had been used, the handwriting, the spelling.
“He’s more interested in getting PC Lyons to record things properly than actually finding the penguins,” Geraint muttered.
“And she writes so slowly,” Ferelith groaned. Her eyes narrowed and she looked at Geraint.
Why don’t we slip off and follow the penguins’ trail ourselves?
The two officers were studying the pool with great interest and Sergeant Banks was pointing to something in PC Lyons’s notebook. Geraint nodded. “Good idea.” And they moved quietly away.
Outside the entrance to the drive, they headed for the splatter of white on the pavement that Ferelith had spotted earlier. “There’s another one up ahead,” she said, pointing. “And another.”
Geraint snorted. “They’re not making it exactly difficult for us to follow them.”
“They splatters are all on the pavement,” Ferelith said. “The people who took the penguins must have been herding them, just as you suggested.”
Geraint shook his head in confusion. “Wouldn’t somebody have noticed? It’s not every day that you see a bunch of penguins waddling along the pavement.”
“I guess it happened in the middle of the night when there was hardly any traffic.”
Geraint laughed. “Can you imagine it? Driving home after a late shift at work and spotting that through the car window. You’d think that you were in a dream.”
“Or a nightmare!”
Their laughter was hurriedly brought to a halt. Two police cars were rushing past, their lights flashing. Ferelith and Geraint’s eyes met. A hundred yards or so up ahead, the cars slowed and turned off the road. “They’ve gone into the park,” Geraint said.
Ferelith’s eyes widened. “Do you think…” All at once, they were both running.
Lonsdale Green was a spacious park full of walks, flower beds, bushes and trees. When Ferelith and Geraint reached the entrance, they could see the two police cars parked in the distance, their lights still flashing. “They’re by the pond,” Ferelith gasped, thinking that she wasn’t nearly as fit as she had thought.
“It’s got to be the penguins,” Geraint retorted as they ran on.
The pond at the centre of the park was a popular picnic spot and it made for a delightful pastoral scene. There were always countless ducks, coots and geese paddling about in it, along with the occasional visiting swan. But the people gathered there in amazement that morning had never seen anything like it. Jumping in and out of the pond and splashing around in the water were a dozen rockhopper penguins.
One of the officers shouted.
Stand back, everyone!
“We’re just trying to work out where these penguins might have come from.”
Ferelith made her way forward. “I think I can help you with that, officer.”
A bunch of friendly penguins finding their way into a local park was hardly an everyday situation and it took a while for Ferelith to explain the situation. But while she was doing that, Geraint was on his phone to Angela back at the Manor. Within minutes, she and the other two supervisors had arrived armed with supplies of fresh fish. They were soon gathering up the penguins.
“It’s been decided that we’re going to take them back to the zoo,” Angela explained to Ferelith and Geraint. “Transport is on its way. They’ve had more than enough excitement over the past few days. It’s time that they got back to their normal routine.”
“That’s understandable,” Ferelith nodded. She had noticed a look of relief cross Geraint’s face as he had heard Angela’s news, though he hadn’t said anything. She suspected that he had found having a colony of penguins in his beloved grounds something of a strain to put up with.
She watched as one of the other supervisors kept the penguins calm by handing out small fish from a bag. A thought suddenly occurred to her and she turned to Angela. “Where do you keep your supplies of fish for the penguins?”
Angela frowned. “We have a fridge for them in our campervan. Why?”
“Geraint and I were thinking that the people who freed the penguins might have used fresh fish to lead them away.”
Angela nodded slowly. “That makes sense. I suppose they would have brought the fish with them.”
“You’re probably right,” Ferelith murmured. She wandered off to one side and keyed a number into her phone. A couple of minutes later, she hurried back to Geraint. “I’ve just learnt something very interesting. Last night, two dozen trout disappeared from a fridge in the hotel kitchen.”
He gazed at her in shock. “Hang on. But that means…”
Ferelith nodded. “The penguins may have been freed by people from the hotel.”
The van to collect the penguins and return them to the zoo arrived shortly afterwards. Having said warm goodbyes to Angela and her colleagues, Ferelith and Geraint hurried back to the hotel. A few things were starting to click into place in Ferelith’s mind. “Do you remember when we looked through the CCTV images from last night? There was no footage from one of the cameras at the rear of the hotel.”
Geraint nodded. “I checked it. The camera was working perfectly but a plastic bag had blown over it. The wind, presumably.”
Ferelith gazed at him. “Or was it put there deliberately? That camera covers one of the hotel’s back doors.”
Geraint frowned. “So if anyone had left the hotel through that door during the night then the CCTV cameras wouldn’t have shown it.”
“That’s right.” She nibbled on her lower lip. “I wonder if there’s some other way of finding out if anyone left the hotel via that door.” She gave a sudden gasp and grabbed Geraint’s arm. “I’ve got it. The GroupChat phones!”
In the end, the whole story came out in a rush. Back at the hotel, they found Lyle enjoying a leisurely breakfast. Ferelith explained what they had been up to and asked if there was any way of identifying the whereabouts of the GroupChat phones. He popped a grape into his mouth and nodded. “The phones are fitted with trackers. They can be switched off if the users wish but I suspect that most of them are still switched on.”
“Can the trackers tell if any of the phones were out in the hotel grounds during the night?”
He frowned. “Why do you ask?” His eyes widened in sudden realisation. “You think that guests from the hotel may have freed the penguins?”
“That’s an outrageous suggestion,” Franklyn Boscoby snapped. He had been sitting at the table listening.
But Lyle himself was grinning. “Is it though? I wonder…” He took out his GroupChat phone and began pressing buttons. He laid the phone on the table so that they could all see the screen which showed a map of the hotel’s grounds. “With a bit of luck, this will give the whereabouts of the phones during the night.”
Flashing lines started appearing on the screen. Most of them were concentrated in a small area in the centre, which Lyle explained was the hotel itself. But as they watched, a few lines moved out into the hotel grounds. “They’re gathering at the penguin enclosure!” Ferelith gasped. “Can you identify whose phones they are?”
Lyle nodded. “I certainly can.”
