I wrote a book. The publication date is May 29, 2024 (if you’d rather not deal with Amazon, your bookstore can also order it from the distributor Ingram Spark, or print-on-demand if they have the equipment). You can read it for free here, although it’ll be in serial form. My fond hope is that you’ll find it so compelling that you just buy the book instead of waiting 8 months to see what happens. There will be a chapter each week, 33 in all.
In Chapter 20 (notes), Len starts in on his detective work in earnest, with Dan’s help. He’s been asked by Rev. Collins, the minister who runs a charity, Sierra Helpers, to look into some suspicious withdrawals on their account, although the Rev is no help at all in answering Len’s questions. Dan has a clever idea to figure things out, but that leaves Len to implement it. In this chapter, we continue on that theme.
Reading in serial form has a long and honorable history. My cover artist sent me this “Read Like a Victorian” website. Enjoy.
============== A Free Gift fot You ===================
Len spent all afternoon at the police station. He had to tell his story at least five times, as one detective would listen and then get interrupted and sent out on a call, and a new guy would come in and make him say it all again. They were used to listening to citizens who were off their rockers, so he had to overcome that suspicion, too.
Finally, he met an older detective who seemed to be on desk duty, Frank Griffiths, who knew Rev. Collins and his bookkeeper Helen, and was familiar with Sierra Helpers. Frank was sympathetic but had reservations
“I’d like to help with this if I can, since Sierra Helpers does a lot of good work up here. The problem I have, though, Mr. Saunders, is that I don’t see a crime yet. The Reverend has suspicions that money is disappearing, but you can’t point to any.”
“Yeah,” said Len. “That’s the problem I’m having, too. He does handle a lot of cash. There are all these cash withdrawals and transfers, but as far as the Rev knows, any of them could be legit.” Frank looked over the printout again.
“I do see a lot of $250 transfers on Thursdays. Are you sure those are all kosher?”
Len told him about the sticky note with the password on it on Helen’s monitor. To Frank, this was it: Case Closed!
“So is there a reason why you don’t just change the password and tell her not to post it on her monitor anymore?”
“Oh, come on, detective! We want to catch the perp, not just stop the crime, don’t we?”
This was the wrong thing to say, and Len realized it from Frank’s reaction right away. Real life cops must be tired of citizens using TV cop lingo. He corrected himself.
“Sorry, Detective, guess I’ve been watching too many cop shows.”
“That’s OK, Mr. Saunders. We’re used to it. Anyway, I’m not sure what I can do for you right now. Thanks for coming in.” Frank got up from his chair. “I have to get home and drive my mother-in-law to the church for bingo night tonight.”
Len stayed seated. “One more thing: we did have this idea that I need your help for, Detective.” He explained the idea about disabling the account temporarily and that he needed the police to request it.
Frank was tired of this conversation, but he thought as long as it was just a phone call, what the hell. He agreed to call the bank, and showed Len out.
When Len got home, he called Mr. Ambrose at the bank, and told him to expect a call from Detective Griffiths.
“Thank you, Mr. Saunders. What do you want us to do when someone calls about it?”
“Just write down the time and the phone number it’s from. Heather tells me you have Caller ID now.”
“OK, got it. Should we re-enable the account then?”
Len pondered that. He wanted to gather as much information as possible.
“How about after the second call, not the first?”
That night, Len called Dan and gave him an update.
“OK, son, now we just have to wait. Unless you have some other ideas?”
Dan didn’t. He thought it was funny that Len had talked about “the perp” to a real-life detective, though.
“So did Detective Griffiths make a face when you told him you wanted to get the perp?”
“Yeah, it was subtle, but it was there. Then he said he had to leave to take his mother to bingo night or something. People have busy social schedules up here.”
“Sounds like it. OK, well, keep me posted.” He went back to watching Seinfeld.
Next Monday afternoon, Heather called Len.
“Mr. Saunders, we did have a couple calls for customer support on that account. Do you have a pencil ready?” She proceeded to give him the times and phone numbers of the callers.
“I re-enabled the account as you asked. Is there anything else I can do for you?”
“Not right now, Heather. Thank you for your help!” and hung up.
“Now what do I do?” he asked himself. “Who do these numbers belong to? I guess I could just call them and see who answers.”
A moment’s reflection told him that might just alert them. Anyhow, this whole thing was Dan’s idea, so he decided to call him and see what the bright boy wanted to do now.
Dan said, “Hmm… Hmm… There is such a thing as a reverse phone directory, where you start with the phone number and it tells you who owns it. I’m guessing you don’t have one of those, though.”
“Darn, no, I sure don’t, Dan.”
“Well, we could go to a private detective. They have all kinds of sources.”
“That’s going to cost some money, though, right?” Dan conceded that point. He offered to check on the Internet, just in case those phone numbers appeared anywhere, but wasn’t optimistic that he would find anything. Len said, “Sure, go ahead,” but then said,
“Hey, I have an idea for something you can do!!”
“Ooh, I’m all a-tingle!” Dan said.
“They won’t know your voice, right? So what if you call them and wheedle their name and address out of them?”
“Oh, God. How would I do that?”
“I don’t know, Dan. This was your idea, if you remember. You’ll figure something out.” He gave him the phone numbers.
Dan said, “OK, well, can you send me the regular phone book? That might help if I just get a name.”
Sitting around later watching TV, Len ruminated on everything that happened today. Something Detective Griffiths said suddenly came back to him: “I have to get home and drive my mother-in-law to the church for bingo night tonight.”
“Wait, what day did I see the detective? It was Thursday.”
Bingo on Thursday night, and a lot of the money transfers happen on Thursday. Was this just a coincidence? Probably. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to check it out. “Where do they play bingo?” he wondered. “He said it was a church.”
He called Dan back and told him about the “bingo” idea. Dan thought maybe he could find a bingo game up in the mountains! But really, were the people up there going to announce their bingo games on the Internet? Maybe someday. Not now.
The next day Len walked through downtown Placerville, looking for a likely person to talk to. Finally, he dropped into a few of the antique stores, since they seemed to be empty and run by older people who were probably desperate for conversation. This was a weekday and there were no tourists, so his main problem turned out to be exiting the conversation, not starting it.
Len was an older person himself, so he had no difficulty convincing them that he really did want to play bingo. They all said the First Reformed church off Highway 49 had a regular bingo night every Thursday. It was all for charity, of course, they assured him.
In his last antique store, he had an inspiration: he told Horace, the man running it, that his wife’s sister wanted to find a Seventh Day Adventist group up here. Wow, did that ever set off a gusher of invective! Horace went on for twenty minutes about the Adventists in this area, and how holier-than-thou they were. Horace was a Presbyterian with no patience for these extreme sects. Finally, Len looked at his watch and said he had to get home to his wife.
As Len was leaving, Horace continued his rant with, “These pious, holy people aren’t supposed to do gambling, but I happen to know you can find some of them every week at that bingo game you were asking about!”
Len smiled, thanked Horace for his time, and closed the door before he could go on any further. Then he kicked himself, “I said ‘my wife’ but I’m not wearing a ring! Oh, well.”
* * *
Dan thought he ought to tell Janet what was going on with Len. After all, it was her Dad! She was only a little bit amused.
“He wants you to call a random number, pretend to be someone else, and get their personal information? I think this hobby of his is getting out of hand! Let me call him.”
Walt overheard this and chuckled.
“What’s Dad up to now, hon?”
She told him about the embezzling scheme, if that was even what it was, and how he and Dan were playing Matlock over it. Or maybe they were doing Murder, She Wrote. Walt thought it was the funniest thing he’d heard all day. This irritated her.
“Hey, it’s not funny. He could get hurt messing around like that.”
“What, someone’s going to run him over with their walker? He does have a German Shepherd to protect him now, doesn’t he?”
“Yeah, a retired police dog who can hardly walk.”
She called Len. They argued for a long time, but she finally gave up and just told him to please be careful. She was not happy afterwards and she and Walt didn’t discuss it any further.
* * *
Dan called Cassie and asked if she wanted to help with his phone scam. She agreed immediately. He went over to her apartment on Saturday morning. She was taking a script off the printer.
“Wow, you’re really getting into this detective thing, aren’t you? Do you have lines for me, too?”
Cassie looked excited. “You’re playing the mark. Let’s rehearse this scene before we do the show.”
Dan read the script. “Ooh, you’re using cop lingo, too.” He gave her a nod. She tried to look officious and held her little finger to her mouth and her thumb to her ear.
Cassie said, “Hello, I’m calling from Volcano Telephone. To whom am I speaking, please?”
Dan said, “Who wants to know? Who are you, again?”
“I’m sorry, my name is Heather McCracken with the Volcano Telephone Company. We’re conducting a quality check in your local office, and your number came up on my screen.”
“OK, Heather McCracken, we get a lot of these unsolicited phone calls and our son tells us to just ignore them. So I’m hanging up now.” He slammed down his hand.
He laughed, “How’d I do?”
She said, “Let’s try that again. Hello, I’m calling from Volcano Telephone. To whom am I speaking, please?”
Dan said, “Who wants to know? Who are you, again?”
“I’m sorry, sir, my name is Heather McCracken, with the Volcano Telephone Company. I realize you haven’t reported any problems, sir, and if you’ll just give me a minute of your time, I’ll let you go on with your day.”
“OK. What can I do for you, Heather McCracken?”
“Can you give me your name and address, please?”
“Our son tells us to just ignore people calling us like this. So I’m hanging up now.”
She said, “Once more. Hello, I’m calling from Volcano Telephone. To whom am I speaking, please?”
Dan said, “Who wants to know? Who are you, again?”
“I’m sorry, sir, my name is Heather McCracken, with the Volcano Telephone Company. I realize you haven’t reported any problems, sir, and if you’ll just give me a minute of your time, I’ll let you go on with your day.”
“OK. What can I do for you, Heather McCracken?”
“I have a very old directory here that says you are James Harper at 466 Canal Street, Placerville. Is that correct?”
Dan hung up the phone. “OK, that might work. People can’t stand to hear themselves misidentified.” She said, “Hah! Thanks, Dan. Are you ready?”
He gave her a thumbs up and she dialed the first number. He put his ear next to the phone. On the fourth ring, an answering machine picked up.
“Hello, you have reached the home of Fred and Delores Robinson. We are unable to come to the phone right now…” Cassie hung up.
Dan picked up his phone book and thumbed to the R’s. “Great, there are only about a hundred Robinsons.” He found “Fred” and checked the phone number. It matched. “Got it! Now the next one.”
For the second number, someone picked up. They gave each other the thumbs-up.
“Hello?” said a male voice.
“Hello, I’m calling from Volcano Telephone. To whom am I speaking, please?”
“This is Harry. Who did you want?”
Dan tried to keep a straight face as she said, “I’m sorry, sir, my name is Heather McCracken, with the Volcano Telephone Company. I realize you haven’t reported any problems, sir, and if you’ll just give me a minute of your time, I’ll let you go on with your day.”
“OK, what do you want?”
“Thank you so much. I have a very old directory here that says you are James Harper at 466 Canal Street, Placerville. I guess that’s not correct?”
“James who? No, I told you my name is Harry. Harry Redding.”
She had him spell that, then got his address. Cassie heard a voice in the background saying, “Who is it, Harry?”
Cassie said, “OK, thank you so much for your time, Mr. Redding.”
Dan motioned for her to give him the phone. She looked puzzled, but said, “Just a minute, Mr. Redding. My supervisor Mr. Densmore wants to thank you, too.” and handed it to him.
“Good morning, Mr. Redding, thank you very much for helping us out. May we send you a free $10 gift coupon for a local business as a token of our sincere appreciation?”
This time Cassie suppressed a giggle.
Dan verified the address again and then thanked him and hung up.
Success! They high-fived each other. Dan said, “Hey, do you want to call Len?” She dialed him.
“Hello, Mr. Saunders. I have Dan here with me. We have some names for you!”
“Well, hello, Cassie and Dan, my little assistants! What have you ferreted out for me?” She gave him the names and addresses.
“Helen Robinson: that’s the Reverend’s bookkeeper. I don’t know this other person.”
“This was fun. Let me put Dan on.” and handed him the phone.
“Hi, Len. We got it, thanks to Cassie’s persuasive voice here!”
“Wow, you two are amazing. Now I have to figure out who these ‘Redding’ people are.”
Len told Dan about the Thursday bingo games. Dan told him about the $50 bill hypothesis. After some small talk, Dan and Cassie high-fived again and Dan left. Back home, he used his home computer to look up “Redding” in various places on the Internet. Unfortunately, he got back mostly mentions of the city of Redding in California. But he did find a couple bulletin board posts by a guy named James Redding. This guy seemed to be a Computer Science grad student at the Davis campus of the University of California. He read the posts, which were mostly just stuff about local restaurants and bicycling, but he decided to follow up on this guy. Maybe he was Harry’s son, or something?
He concocted an identity for himself and joined that bulletin board. After a couple messages to establish himself as someone who lived in Davis, he tried asking some questions about bicycling up there, claiming his parents were planning to retire there and wondering if it was just too hilly to ride a bike.
Score! James responded. They conversed for a while, and James said his parents lived in that area, too. Dan asked him what there was to do besides enjoying the beautiful scenery, and James said they were devoted to playing bingo! He didn’t understand what the attraction was, but for his mom, it was the center of her social life. Dan sympathized.
He called Len and told them that the Reddings were definitely their prime suspects. This was getting exciting.