Free Friday Barnes 3 by R. A. Spratt

good mother to my veggies.’ Mrs Wainscott looked fondly out at the expanse of her impressive vegetable garden.
    â€˜I don’t think you can,’ said Melanie.
    Friday stood on her foot.
    â€˜Ow!’ said Melanie.
    â€˜Shhh,’ said Friday.
    â€˜What?’ asked Melanie. ‘No amount of home-grown tomatoes makes up for a neglected childhood.’
    â€˜We’re not here about that,’ said Friday. ‘We’re here about the diamonds.’
    â€˜Is it all right if Friday and Bernie take a look around?’ asked Ian.
    â€˜Of course, dear,’ said Mrs Wainscott. ‘But be careful of the lettuce patch. I put down fresh pig muck this morning and it’s smelling a bit ripe.’
    Friday and Uncle Bernie searched everywhere on the Wainscott property – all the places that people think are secret but are actually commonly used by everyone else trying to hide things. They checked the freezer, the flour jar, cavities in the tops of doors, under the carpet, and inside sofa cushions. Uncle Bernie even used a radio-imaging detector he had borrowed from work to search all the walls and ceiling spaces.
    They found lots of stuff – eleven dollars and forty-one cents in loose change, Mrs Wainscott’s spare car keys, a photo of Ian with a mullet haircut, which Friday regarded as priceless – but no diamonds.
    â€˜They’ve got to be here somewhere,’ said Friday. ‘Do you have any lollipops?’
    â€˜Why?’ asked Ian. ‘Do you think Dad hid the diamonds inside candy?’
    â€˜No,’ said Friday. ‘Lollipops help me think. It’s the calorie boost. The sugar stimulates cognitive activity.’
    â€˜They’ve got ice-cream,’ said Uncle Bernie. ‘I saw it when I was searching through the frozen peas packet.’
    So Ian, Friday, Uncle Bernie and Melanie sat down and had a bowl of ice-cream each while they considered the problem.
    â€˜It could be a purloined letter scenario,’ said Friday.
    â€˜What’s that?’ asked Melanie.
    â€˜A literary reference to Edgar Allan Poe,’ said Uncle Bernie.
    â€˜It’s a story about a man who hid a letter in a letter rack because it was so obvious that no-one would think of looking there,’ said Friday.
    â€˜But where is somewhere so obvious you wouldn’t think of looking for a diamond?’ asked Melanie. ‘You don’t have a diamond rack, do you?’
    â€˜No,’ said Ian.
    â€˜Maybe the chandelier,’ said Uncle Bernie. ‘You could hang the stones amongst the cut glass and no-one would notice them.’
    â€˜That’s a good idea,’ said Melanie.
    â€˜Except we don’t have a chandelier,’ said Ian.
    â€˜We have to try to think like Mr Wainscott,’ said Friday.
    â€˜You think you can mind-meld with a forty-nine-year-old convicted jewel thief?’ asked Ian.
    â€˜Your father thinks he is cleverer than everyone else,’ said Friday.
    â€˜To be fair,’ said Ian, ‘most of the time, he’s right.’
    â€˜He’s also got a sense of humour and a flair for dramatic gestures,’ said Friday to herself now, muttering a series of rhetorical questions. ‘The last I saw him he hid a massive diamond in his shoe. Now, where would he hide a series of small diamonds? People refer to diamonds as glass, but they also refer to them as rocks …’
    Friday leapt to her feet.
    â€˜What is it?’ said Ian.
    â€˜Rocky!’ said Friday.
    â€˜Huh?’ asked Ian.
    â€˜He hid his rocks with Rocky,’ said Friday. ‘The pun would have been impossible for him to resist!’

Chapter 11

The Savage Dog
    Moments later they all had their faces pressed to the living room window, watching Rocky out in the garden. Rocky was mindlessly savaging an azalea bush.
    â€˜Look at his collar,’ said Friday. ‘Those aren’t rhinestones. They’re too sparkly.