Free Scene of Crime by Jill McGown

Eric when he had heard the window break.
    “I’m not sure. About ten, quarter past eight. Something like that.”
    “And you went out into the garden?”
    “Yes. Like I said, I thought it was my greenhouse.”
    “I believe you have a security light that’s activated by movement?”
    “Yes.”
    “Did it come on when you went out, or was it already on?”
    Eric didn’t know how much Mr. Jones had actually seen; he might have told the sergeant that the light was already on. Though it went against the grain, he felt obliged to tell the truth. “It was on.”
    “So someone or something must have activated it before you went out to investigate the breaking glass?”
    Eric shrugged. “I suppose so.”
    “How long does it stay on?”
    “Three minutes, if it doesn’t detect any further movement.”
    “And how close does the movement have to be? Would movement in the Bignalls’ garden trigger it?”
    “No. It did, but she complained, of course, so I had to change the setting.”
    “She?”
    “Mrs. Bignall. Whatever I did, she complained. Anyway, now it comes on about a third of the way up the garden, I suppose. And from the side …” He thought about it. “I think it would come on if anyone got within a foot or so of the garage.”
    The young detective looked thoughtful. “So someone running diagonally from the Bignalls’ house over the wall into your garden would trigger it when he crossed your driveway,” he said, almost to himself. “But someone getting into the Bignalls’ garden from yours probably wouldn’t, because they’d probably stay near the back wall.” He looked at Eric. “Does that seem reasonable?”
    Eric agreed that in such a hypothetical situation, that would probably be the case.
    “We have a witness who saw someone leave by your gate. You were in the garden at that moment, according to him, and your light was on. But you didn’t see anything.”
    “No. I was checking out my greenhouse.”
    “Did you hear anything before that?”
    “Like what?”
    “Raised voices?”
    Eric shrugged. “I doubt if I’d notice,” he said. “That mad cow next door is always crying or yelling.” Hesmiled. “You move to a neighborhood like this, you’d think you’d get a bit of peace, wouldn’t you? Not with her next door, you don’t.”
    “How long have you lived here?”
    “Since February. These two next door are always shouting—and she has the nerve to complain about me,” Eric added.
    Sergeant Finch didn’t seem too interested in his squabbles with his neighbors. “Did you hear anything later on?” he asked. “When you were checking out your greenhouse?”
    “Like what?”
    It was the sergeant’s turn to shrug. “I don’t know,” he said. “Running feet, maybe?”
    Eric’s policy had always been to let the police find out things on their own and to give them no help whatsoever, even when he’d been in the job. Besides, the less you told them, the quicker they went away. “I didn’t hear anything,” he said. “I didn’t see anything. I just checked the greenhouse and came back in.”
    “Then why did you shout to whoever it was to stop?”
    If Geoffrey Jones had more to do with his time than spy on his neighbors, Eric reflected, he wouldn’t be in this position. “Someone had broken a window or something,” he said. “I just shouted.”
    “I’m told you shouted, ‘Come back here, you little bugger,’ ” said Finch. “That isn’t just shouting, Mr. Watson. That’s shouting
at
someone.”
    “Buggers,” said Eric. “Plural. It was kids breaking bottles against the wall, I thought. And nothing scares them off more than inviting them to come back and talk to you.”
    “And you didn’t notice the Bignalls’ French window standing open though the house was in darkness?”
    “No.”
    “If you didn’t see someone leaving your garden, didn’t you wonder what had made your security light come on?”
    “No.”
    Finch sighed. “For someone who was a cop and