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Fat chance the police would put every last available officer on a case as inconsequential as the theft of a few gnomes. Still, he’d hoped for more. After all, he’d practically been feeding Alec from his own purse ever since the man’s wife died, and he’d clasped Chase to his bosom, even going so far as to allow the young man to call him ‘Dad.’

He shuddered at the thought, then spotted movement from the corner of his eye and wandered over to the fence that separated his patch of suburban heaven from the next.

“Hey, Ted,” he said a little morosely as he leaned on the fence and addressed his neighbor Ted Trapper, who was busy polishing one of his own garden gnomes.

It was a hobby both men shared, and Tex liked to think it had brought them closer.

“Hey, Tex,” said Ted, looking a lot happier than Tex was feeling. “How was your day?”

“So so,” said Tex. “Yours?”

“Oh, you know. Dealing with office politics all day long doesn’t exactly uplift and inspire. But then I come home to find these sweet precious babies and any thought of strangling my psychopathic boss goes right out the window and I’m sane again.”

Tex idly glanced in the direction of Ted’s ‘babies’ and was surprised to find that they looked almost exactly like his own, now absent gnomes.

“Say, Ted. Your collection seems to have grown considerably,” he said, staring at one gnome that looked the spitting image of the crowning piece of his own collection. It was one of those fat jolly gnomes with its face stuck in a rictus grin and its apple-cheeked features just a little too happy for comfort. In fact he could probably feature in a Patterson novel as a serial killer about to slay victim twenty-three in a most gruesome manner.

“Yeah, I’ve been splurging,” said Ted, sounding a little guilty but not much. “Marcie isn’t too happy about it, let me tell you. And I did promise her I’d stop now. She feels my collection is about as big as she’ll tolerate, so there’s that. And some of these guys don’t come cheap.” He chuckled. “Listen to me go on. Of course I don’t have to tell you. You have some of the nicest gnomes in the neighborhood. Pride of your collection and all that. I have to confess, though, Tex, that living next door to you and seeing your frankly fantastic collection has given me that boost to go the extra mile myself.” He grinned. “Nothing like a bit of healthy competition between neighbors, eh?”

A look of suspicion had traveled up Tex’s face and he now asked, “Can I see that big one over there for a moment, Ted? Yeah, the one with the pea-green bib.”

Ted dutifully handed Tex the big gnome with the pea-green bib and Tex turned it over in his hands. When he saw the big red T on the gnome’s undercarriage he snorted wildly.

“What’s wrong, Tex?” said Ted, cautiously taking the gnome from his neighbor’s hands.

But Tex was too overwhelmed for speech. Instead he was breathing loudly through both nostrils, like a bull about to charge a matador and gore him.

“Do you want me to get you a doctor?” Ted laughed and slapped his brow. “Oh, silly me. You are a doctor! What am I saying?”

Tex finally found speech again, but when he opened his mouth, expecting fire and brimstone to pour out, instead a long drawn-out scream erupted:“THIEEEEEEEEEF!”

“What?” said Ted, stepping back a few paces.

“YOU’RE A THIEF!” Tex screamed at the top of his lungs. “YOU STOLE MY GNOMES!”

“What? I did not!” said Ted, retreating even further from his fire-breathing neighbor.

“That is my gnome and you know it!”

“Are you crazy? This is my gnome,” said Ted, cradling the gnome, as one would a baby.

“It still has the big red T I wrote on the bottom! Check it!”

Ted checked it and frowned.“Gee. There is a T.”

“That’s my T! I write T on all of my gnomes. T for Tex. So I can catch filthy thieves like you in the act—THIEEEEEEEF!”

“But, Tex, really,” said the man, growing a little white around the nostrils. It’s never pleasant to be accused of theft, and especially not by a neighbor having gone berserk.

“You stole my gnomes—confess, you THIEF!”

“What’s going on here?” asked Marcie, coming out of the house, wiping her hands on a dishtowel.

“Tex says I stole his gnome,” said Ted, now looking like a kicked puppy.

“Is this true, Tex? Are you accusing my husband of being a thief?”

“Yes, Marcie, I am,” said Tex. “Because that’s what your husband is. A filthy THIEF!”

“Oh, will you stop shouting,” said Marcie with a frown.

“He says I stole this gnome,” said Ted, showing his wife the gnome in question.

“There’s a big letter T on the bottom of that gnome. I wrote that,” said Tex, breathing stertorously. If a doctor had been present, and that doctor had been a different doctor from the one now looking close to a heart attack, he would probably have advised Tex to take it easy. But since therewasn’t, it was up to Marcie to take the sensible approach.