Brownie and the Dame Read Online Free Page B

a long time ‘til Christmas,” Miz Adelia bemoaned.
    “I will find the missing implement,” Brownie declared.
    The phone rang.
    Miz Adelia answered it, and Brownie blatantly listened to the one-sided conversation. “Oh hey, you must have your special hearing hat on,” she said. “Uh-huh. Pokerama this week?” She glanced at Miz Demetrice who shrugged. “It’s at the Oose-May-Odge-Lay Ursday-Thay.”
    “I speak pig Latin eloquently. Also Klingon and a little Elfish,” Brownie said.
    “Do the Boy Scouts have a badge for that?” Miz Demetrice asked.
    “No, but I’ll suggest it.”
    “I got a missing spatula here,” Miz Adelia was saying. “I guess I don’t really got it, but it’s missing all the same.” She paused to listen to the other person. “Well, I reckon I know a spatula ain’t high on the order of stolen things.” Pause. “Did I misplace it? Do I seem the type to misplace a cooking implement?” Miz Adelia paused to look at Brownie and added to the person on the phone, “Not that it’s an ‘implement.’ It’s a WMF Stainless Steel, Slotted Spatula from Williams-Sonoma. It’s dishwasher safe. Shore, that’s important.”
    While she spoke, Miz Adelia stuck the portable phone between her face and her shoulder and neatly arranged pancakes on a plate. She gestured at Brownie, and he took it to mean that he should fetch the butter and syrup, as well as utensils. Brownie didn’t mind. He was hungry. Being a gumshoe was hard work.
    “Oh?” Miz Adelia said. “I reckon I know you can’t polygraph the people who’ve been in this house. We had the Spring walk-through not two weeks ago, and those folk put their fingers on everything. One fella was molesting my best sauté pan.” Pause. “Well, he wasn’t molesting it. But I think he was thinking about sticking it down his pants.”
    Miz Demetrice chuckled.
    Brownie thought, And we’ll come back to that later.
    “He’s lucky I dint take it away from him and brain his pea-sized head. I was as mad as a wet hen without a towel.”
    “Klingon?” Miz Demetrice asked Brownie. “Really?”
    “ nuqDaq ‘oH puchpa ‘ e ’ ” Brownie said quickly.
    “I’m somewhat lacking on my Klingon, dear,” Miz Demetrice prompted him.
    “‘Where is the bathroom?’” Brownie translated. “Also there’s Hab SoS1I’ Quch! ”
    Miz Demetrice arched an eyebrow in query.
    “‘Your mother has a smooth forehead!’” Brownie explained. “It’s actually a Klingon insult, but for humans I reckon that’s a good thing.” After he had put butter, syrup, and forks on the table, he went back for the pancakes. By that time, there were two plates, and Miz Adelia was working on the third, while still talking to the person on the phone.
    “I know you cain’t find that fella and ask him did he take my spatula. I suppose I’ll get another one. But I’m mighty unhappy about that spatula,” Miz Adelia said. “Did you call just about the you-know-what on you-know-when? No?”
    “Ah,” Brownie said as he sat down at the table with the pancakes in front of him. “A stack of wheats. Just what a growing gumshoe needs.”
    “Come ahead,” Miz Adelia said to the person on the other end of the line. “I think we can handle two of them. They’ll probably keep each other busy. Don’t that chile like police work and all?”
    “Police work?” Brownie’s head came up. “What’s all this then?”
    “Syrup, dear?” Miz Demetrice enquired politely.
    “Shore,” Miz Adelia said and then asked plaintively, “And you won’t dust for prints here?” She listened for a minute and said, “I know. I know. But I liked that spatula. It was made out of Cromargan.” Pause. “That’s an exceptional durable stainless steel. I like to cook, you know. Bitchin’ Kitchen is my very favorite. Next to Pawn Stars , but they don’t cook on that one.”
    Brownie poured syrup on his pancakes. In fact, he made the pancakes drown in deep pools of maple goodness. When he