Free The Ho Ho Ho Mystery by Bob Burke Page A

Once we analyse it in the lab we may know more because that, my friend, is what we do.’ Thirty-one points.
    ‘And did your team find anything else?’
    I caught a hint of evasion on his face that he quickly masked with his usual blank demeanour. ‘No, nothing else.’
    There was something, but he wasn’t willing to share. I had to find some way of making him change his mind.
    ‘You see that lady over there?’ I waved in Mrs C’s direction. Crane nodded.
    ‘Well, her husband is the owner of this sleigh and he’s missing. Now her style of dress might have given this away already, especially with you being a CSI and all, but the missing man is Santa Claus and, unless we find him in the next twenty-four hours, there are going to be a lot of very disappointed children all over the world. Do you have kids, Dr Crane?’
    ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Three.’
    It was time to lay on the guilt trip. ‘Do you want to be the one to tell them why they have no presents this year? Why they’ll remember this Christmas Day for the rest of their lives for all the wrong reasons? It might even have a traumatic effect on them. Could you live with that? Could you?’ I could see I was getting to him. The mention of his kids had made a small crack in his calm exterior and I was about to open it wide. ‘This woman has hired me to track down the missing Santa and I’m going to do everything in my power to find him, do you understand?’ Dr Crane swallowed once and nodded. ‘Good, because every little thing that can help me might take me one step closer to ensuring your kids have a happy Christmas. I know you have to observe standard police protocol here but if you’ve found something else – no matter how small – it might be the thing that breaks this case.
    ‘Imagine the satisfaction you’ll get when we find Santa and you’re there helping your kids open their presents, secure in the knowledge that you were the one who gave us that one vital clue.’ My patter was working and I could feel he was about to reveal all – in a manner of speaking.
    ‘Well, there was one other thing, but I’m not even sure it’s relevant. I won’t know for certain until I get it back to the lab.’ No meaningful silences and the glasses stayed firmly on his face. Still stuck on thirty-one points: come on, Crane, cut me some slack. ‘We found this.’ He reached into an evidence bag and pulled something out. He held it out to me for a closer look. ‘Please don’t touch,’ he said. ‘You could compromise the evidence.’
    I looked at what he was holding in his rubber-gloved wing. ‘It looks like a hair,’ I said. From what I could see it was a long cream-coloured hair. It looked too thick and rough to be human, and reindeer didn’t have hair as long as this so it hadn’t come from one of them. Dr Crane ran a feather along the hair. As he did, some particles of fine white dust fell off.
    ‘Any idea what it is?’ I asked.
    ‘Not at the moment,’ Dr Crane replied. ‘It’s not human – unless there was a caveman at the crash site. Based on what I know about animal hair – and I am somewhat of an expert – I don’t think it’s reindeer hair.’
    ‘So what is it and where did it come from?’ I mused. ‘Maybe it’s just coincidence that you found it; after all, it was a national park and I’m sure lots of animals live there.’
    ‘Yes, perhaps, but animals don’t have a tendency to use white powder. That doesn’t seem like something you’d find in the wild, now does it?’
    ‘True, but what is it? It just doesn’t make any sense.’ It was reasonable to assume we weren’t dealing with something that applied talcum powder after showering; or maybe we were, this case was weird enough as it was without adding cosmetics to the equation. I really needed the results of the hair (and the powder) analysis as quickly as possible. I had a feeling that this – when combined with the tobacco – was the clue that might just break the