illustration

illustration

AAAAA

Detective Gordon went to bed. Just as the sun rose, he fell asleep. At the same time, Buffy got up. It was a little sad that they didn’t overlap. But it was good that there was always a police officer awake at the police station.

Gordon immediately began to dream about when he was a small toad. He was podgy, wearing blue shorts and holding his mother’s hand. He was very happy.

Buffy enjoyed being the only one awake at the police station. She sat at the desk and stamped paper. Out with the stamp. A little bit up. No. A little down. That’s right. Press: Kla-dunk! And another one beside it: Kla-dunk!

She pretended that a visitor came in and that she was the chief. She made a face that meant she was very busy.

“My name is Police Chief Buffy,” she said. “What have we here then?”

Then she tried it again:

“I am the well-known Detective Buffy! One moment, I will just finish my stamping…”

After that she wrote on the paper. She drew a lot of small tents.

AAAAAA.

“Aah!” she said and made a salute.

By now she was ready to write more letters. She ran into the prison and tried to wake Gordon by repeatedly tugging at his arm.

“Are there more letters? How many are there?”

At last Gordon managed to understand what she was talking about.

“There are twenty-six,” he mumbled sleepily.

“Only that many?” said Buffy with relief. “It won’t take me long to learn them. What are they?”

“There’s an S,” said Gordon with a yawn. “It looks like a snake.”

“No, oooh!”

illustration

“Then there’s an M, which is a mountain. And a P, which looks like an axe. And there’s an important sign in the law meaning paragraph, which looks like a pretzel. §.”

illustration

Back to the desk. Buffy drew mountains on a new piece of paper. And small tents beside the mountains. She drew axes, in case the people living in the tents needed to chop wood.

MMMAAAPPP. What fun they were having on their camping expedition…

It became a little story that began nicely and finished not quite so nicely.

MMMAAAPPPS.

“Hello there, nasty snake!” she said in a loud voice. “I am the famous Detective Buffy. Leave the camping ground at once!”

illustration

Then she drew a § and stamped the paper. Kla-dunk!

All day long, Buffy sat and drew and stamped.

“I’m writing and kla-dunking the whole day long!” she hummed to herself.

illustration

Meanwhile Detective Gordon was dreaming. He was walking beside a stream, hand in hand with his mother. When they stopped on the riverbank, she made him a cake-picnic. “My little Gordy-pops, you’re the cutest in the whole world!”

“Da, da, da,” replied the detective, who was very little then. He was given a glass of juice with a straw, and he couldn’t help making bubbles. “But sweetheart, don’t do that!” said his mother gently.

What a lovely dream…

But towards evening something happened. Bang! The door to the police station flew open. The detective sat straight up in bed and Buffy hopped up from her chair.

A stone flew in and landed on the police-station floor. What was going on?

Buffy reached it first and found a piece of paper crumpled around the stone. She smoothed out the paper. But she couldn’t understand it. There were no axes or snakes in the writing. Only a mountain, maybe upside down.

She hurried over to give the note to the detective. CROW was written on the paper.

illustration

“An anonymous letter!” said the detective sleepily. “Someone wants to inform on a thief, but doesn’t dare tell us their own name. Who can have written this?”

Buffy took the paper and sniffed it. It smelled of wool, carrots, and torn grass.

“It’s the rabbit!” she called.

“Bravo!” said Gordon.

The police friends hurried to the door, the detective in his pajamas.

“We shouldn’t take the pistol, should we?” asked Buffy as she passed the glass cabinet where it was locked away.

“No, we shall never take it!” answered Gordon. “The pistol is dangerous. The police must guard it carefully.”

illustration

And so out through the door! A little way away they saw the rabbit. He was trying to look innocent, standing and whistling and looking up at the sky.

“Catch him!” called Buffy as they hurried over.

The detective managed to grab the rabbit’s soft tail.

“I don’t dare say anything!” squeaked the rabbit.

He wriggled his tail out of the detective’s grip and hopped away. He disappeared so quickly that no one could catch up with him.

Gordon tripped and happened to hit himself on the head with his own arm. He sat on the ground and tears welled in his eyes. He cried quietly.

Buffy patted his forehead where it hurt.

“Ow-ow-ow,” said Gordon.

So they limped back to the police station. Gordon supported himself on Buffy. Teardrops marked a trail on the ground all the way to Gordon’s bed.

illustration