Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Vol. 8, No. 6, May 1961

The Dog with the Curly Tail by Julian Symons

A dazzling crime thriller in miniature... by one of England’s mystery story greats.

Commissionaire William Jones stood outside the offices of British Commercial Pictures in Deal Street, just off Piccadilly, and considered the scene and people before him with his usual air of expectancy. Behind Jones’ gold braid and old-fashioned, Victorian mustache beat a romantic heart. He had taken this job in the hope that he would be able to obtain promotion, and perhaps a screen career, by some notable act of gallantry like rescuing a film starlet in distress.

In six months nothing remotely like that had come his way, but he never ceased to hope. Jones twirled his mustache and looked up and down the street. Nothing exciting met his gaze.

On the other side of the street some valuable article of jewelry was being taken out of the barred window of Meyerhold’s. And nearby a liver-colored toy spaniel with a curly tail and a collecting box round its neck sat on a chair while its owner ground out a tune on a barrel organ. Just outside Brace and Stone, the tailors, a man sat in a car with its motor running.

And there went Mr. Francis Quarles’s progress down Deal Street. He was such a large and impressive-looking man, he carried his bulk with such an air of authority, and he was followed by such a very small dog. Jones observed with admiration, as he had done on other days when Mr. Quarles took his dog Pinch for a walk, the animal’s exuberant but unquestionably very genuine devotion to his master.

Pinch followed two paces behind Quarles, never deviated for an instant, even at the call of lamp posts, from his master’s course. Then something happened which made Jones forget all about the big man with the little dog.

A man walked quickly out of the jeweller’s shop. Out in the street he began to run. In the shop doorway appeared the figure of Hans Meyerhold, who shouted in stentorian voice: “Stop thief! Police! Stop him! Help!”

Jones saw his chance. The man ran past the barrel organ owner and had just reached the door of the waiting car when Jones was on him. His tackle was expert.

The man was tall, fair and aristocratic-looking, and he expressed his indignation forcibly. “An absolutely unprovoked assault. You’ll pay for this, my man — or your employers will.”

Jones appealed to Meyerhold. “You called out ‘Stop thief,’ isn’t that right?”

Meyerhold nodded solemnly. “Perfectly right.” To the policeman who had come up he explained. “This man came in and looked at some stones. I take a diamond necklace out of the window for him. He had not left the shop a moment before I see that for my necklace he has substituted paste.”

Jones noticed that Quarles had returned and was pushing his way through the crowd.

Meyerhold greeted him joyfully and the policeman said: “Hello, Mr. Quarles. You’re right on the spot.”

The driver of the car was dark and spoke with a slight drawl. “Look here, Arnold, this is a lot of nonsense, but the quickest way out of it is to let them search you.”

He turned to Jones. “Forget that stuff about assault. You were doing what you thought was right. But you can testify that if my friend did take this necklace it must be in his possession now. He’s had no chance to get rid of it.”

Jones agreed unwillingly. This business of being a hero didn’t seem quite as simple as he had thought.

“Just to keep you company, Arnold, I’ll let myself be searched, too,” said the dark man. He got out of the car.

“Seems fair enough,” said the policeman.

Meyerhold exploded. “It is not fair enough. He changed over my necklace, and if he has got rid of it now it is by some devil’s trick.”

“I’ve changed my mind, officer,” Arnold said. “I’ll not only permit myself to be searched, I demand to be searched, and if you don’t find a diamond necklace on me I’ll ask you to draw the obvious conclusion. It wouldn’t be the first time a jeweller had tried to fake a robbery and frame an innocent customer.”

Meyerhold’s face was purple with fury. The policeman asserted his authority. “Let’s keep calm. If you’ll come along to Mr. Meyerhold’s shop perhaps we can get this straightened out. Would you care to come along, Mr. Quarles?”

But Francis Quarles was not paying attention to the two men or the policeman. He was looking at Pinch, who was some yards up the street, and was behaving towards the liver-colored toy spaniel with an affectionate playfulness embarrassing both to the spaniel and its owner, who was now pushing his barrel organ up the street.

“The collecting-box has gone from round its neck,” Quarles said. Turning to Jones he went on: “I’d suggest that you perform another of your excellent flying tackles on that organ-grinder and then open that attache case he is holding so tightly.”

Jones dashed forward and dived again. The organ grinder measured his length on the pavement. The attache case flew from his grasp and burst open. Out of it fell a necklace which glittered in the light. Out of it also came — a liver-colored toy spaniel with a curly tail.

Afterwards, Francis Quarles said to Jones. “Meyerhold will certainly give you a substantial reward for the recover of his necklace. And I shall speak to my friend, Sir Alan MacIntyre, of British Commercial Pictures, about you. That tackle would look splendid on the screen.”

Jones, a modest young man, blushed. “I still don’t understand what happened.”

Quarles explained: “There were two dogs. It has all been prearranged. The thief dropped the necklace into the collecting box, and at a word from the organ grinder the two dogs changed places. They’d been trained to do so.”

“But how did you know it wasn’t the same dog?”

“Pinch told me.” And when Jones looked mystified, Quarles continued: “When Pinch walked down Deal Street with me he paid no attention to the toy spaniel. When we came back he rushed away from me to go after it. Can’t you guess why?”

A light dawned on Jones. “The second dog was—”

“Precisely. The female of the species, my dear young man, is irresistible to Pinch. He left me for her and neatly solved a puzzle.”