Furry Friday Mysteries: Part 2 - An Unexpected Twist....

If you missed part one, click here.

Harlow decided that the first step in solving this mystery would be trying to figure out just who Slim was, and how was he connected to Monty Moriarty.  Sherlock Sam, her famous mystery solving uncle, had discovered that Moriarty had been flooding the market with counterfeit money.  However, he had not been able to deduce why the furry felon had wanted to do so.

A carefully preserved clue.

She retired to the library where she studied the heavy volumes that her dear Uncle had relied on in his day.  She discovered that Slim was well known - but not for the reason she suspected.  Slim, it turns out, was a master of disguise!

"This is startling, da Momma," she confided to me when I joined her later in the study.  She looked out the window, "he could be someone we talk to on a daily basis, and we would not know it."

A moment of clarity, perhaps?

I agreed with her and asked her how she wanted to proceed.  I was dressed for work and would be leaving shortly.

"Go to work, da Momma," she advised sagely.  "I will spend my morning trying to discover why Moriarty and Slim are in Washington."

With those words I left.  I only know the happenings of the day from what Harlow told me later, only after a startling discovery was made.  I have tried my best to capture the days events.

After I left, Harlow returned to the study to review her notes one more time.  She had hoped to track Slim's movements from the time he had left Arizona to his arrival in Washington.  She had no luck and decided to stop by my office to discuss what she had found, or hadn't found. With a sigh she headed into town, stopping for a puppacino along the way.  She took her change from the barista and carefully tucked it into her collar.

Once she got to my office, she nodded at the ranger at the front desk who was currently helping a gentleman wearing a cap and hoodie.  She had a vague feeling she had seen him before.

Where had da Harlow seen him before?

She picked up a book and  quickly purchased it, making sure to ask for her  change in the same denomination the hooded gentleman had given the ranger.  She turned to look for the gentleman, who she knew now to be Slim in a clever disguise, but found he was already gone.

"What is he doing here?" I asked her later.

She was carefully testing the bills given to her as change from both the barista and the sales clerk in my building, working on an idea that had struck her on the way home.

Her intuition proved correct!

She pondered the question for a bit, and then said, "I don't know, da Momma, but I'm beginning to think our coming here wasn't a coincidence!"

She turned to me, her face pale, her voice serious, "The dollar the barista gave me was counterfeit!  Monty Moriarty has begun his plan - his fake currency is in circulation."

Would Moriarty get away with his fiendish plan?

...and then, even more serious, clutching at the arm of my chair "We must hurry, da Momma, and stop Moriarty and Slim!"

The urgency was clear!

 Join us next Friday for Part 3 of our mystery series!  ;)