“Someone had shamefully abandoned them here late yesterday morning. As soon as we found them, we dutifully took them in. We couldn’t just leave them lying around.”
“So, you took in a lost soul, in a way. I must say your profession seems much more interesting than I would have expected.”
“I can hear your sarcasm, detective. I realize this type of case isn’t exactly routine, but please do everything you can to find—”
“To find whoever it is,” Pilguez grumbled. “Jesus, what on earth did I do to deserve cases like this? So, let me see if I got this right. Someone left an urn in a cemetery—not a totally unreasonable thing to do, when you think about it—”
“Not acemetery, a columbarium,” the manager protested in a pinched tone.
“You locked it up, and it escaped during the night,” the detective continued, as if the manager hadn’t spoken. “Thirty years chasing criminals and now I’m chasing down an urn—so this is what it’s come to. Did it ever occur to you that the urn could maybe contain something other than ashes? Drugs, for example?”
“Impossible. We opened it.”
“Are you absolutely sure? You didn’t ... No, of course not, that would be unseemly. But if there weren’t any drugs inside, why would someone steal something that had been abandoned just hours before?”
“You’re the police officer.”
“More’s the pity! Let’s go back to the beginning, then,” Pilguez said as he took a notebook and pen out of his jacket pocket. “Any idea when the break-in took place?”
“I left my office at eight o’clock, just before the gates closed. Our night watchman makes rounds in the park, but he didn’t notice anything strange. I don’t know any more than that.”
“Theft of a funerary urn from the manager’s office,” Pilguez mumbled as he took notes. “What is it worth?”
“It has only sentimental value, I suppose.”
“Well, it’s going to cost your insurance company a fortune. No surveillance cameras?”
“This is a very nice neighborhood. Our residents are perfectly safe. Or, at least, that’s what we thought until last night. We’ll have some installed, you can take my word for it.”
“Of course. No fingerprints, no video, no identity. Hard to crack a kidnapping case without any leads.”
“A kidnapping?” the manager cried. “Do you think they’ll ask for a ransom?”
“I wouldn’t think so.”
“How can you be sure?”
“They can hardly threaten to kill the hostage. As for negotiating the return of the remains, no one even knows who’s in there.”
The manager nodded and slumped into his chair. “Why, then?”
“That’s a good question. I’ll admit the motive is unclear. Did anything strange happen yesterday? Even the slightest thing being off could put me on the right track.”
The manager stroked his chin and thought hard. “Now that you mention it, our organist had an accident yesterday, and someone replaced him at the last minute.”
“Now that’s the lead I was missing!” the detective exclaimed, slapping his thigh. “Now I’ll be able to solve the case in no time.”
“Really?” the manager and his assistant asked in unison.
“No, of course not. All right. What happened to your organist?”
“He slipped in the shower.”
“Fascinating! Who replaced him?”
“We don’t know that, either. It wasn’t anyone who works for us. Actually, while we’re on the topic, our gardener saw the very same musician in the park the day before.”
“But the urn was left yesterday?”
