It had not been more than a handful of months since our last case before my good friend Heisler and I had decided to catch a well-earned break. The affair had been quite the enigma and had taxed the two of us to the limits of our waning sanity.
I suggested that we vacation in Rome — a city of distinct history and fantastic beauty — and our flights were due to leave later in the day. Arriving at Heisler’s apartment I was met with an entirely flustered man.
Heisler was a short, stout, unapologetically German fellow. Time had treated him well, and he had treated himself much more so. Although he looked like he might be more at home running a university, he was one of the brightest minds I had ever met. To see him perturbed was not abnormal, but it was unexpected.
“Whatever is the matter?” I enquired.
“Oh, it’s ever so terrible Manuel.
Ever so terrible indeed” he muttered, so quietly I could barely hear him.
“Not so terrible that you cannot enlighten an old friend of the bother, I hope”.
“It is, Mein Freund.
It is ever so terrible”.
He invited me into the kitchen where he put a kettle on to boil.
“Do you remember the Sergeant we met when we were on safari in Zuzuland?” he asked.
“Why yes, yes I do.
Redhead with a fondness for scotch, correct?
His name escapes me”.
“Willis” Heisler interjected.
“We had been keeping in contact over email.
He had a very keen mind.
Very keen indeed.
Lovely family.”
“You still haven’t informed me of the matter” I said, frustration bearing down on me.
“Willis, you see, had been spending some time in the arctic circle.
Research of some sort” Heisler continued.
I could feel him inching towards a point.
“He was staying in a small town called Ilulissat, in western Greenland.
But he missed the birthday of his husband last week, you see”.
“I’m afraid I don’t, still” I stated.
“Many men miss their spouses’ birthdays.
It hardly seems like a matter for you to be pacing around instead of us getting the train to the airport” I continued.
“Not Willis, Mein Freund, he was an ever so diligent man I had learned.
A man most glued to his diary and regimen, he was”.
I decided to just let the air sit, waiting for him to continue.
“Wie dem auch sei, his husband was rather alarmed by his lack of communication, so he had reached out to him but has received no response” Heisler explained.
“He emailed me this morning requesting my assistance, believing something horrible has befallen his betrothed”.
“I rather don’t think one man forgetting to send a gift basket to his other half warrants your attention, does it?
Have they reached out to the local police?” I exclaimed.
“I thought the same at first, however they have neglected to take an interest in the matter, so my assistance, it was requested.”\
A few moments passed. His last words hanging heavy with the anticipation of disappointment. Deep down I realised that I wasn’t going to get to see the Colosseum.
“And you intend to go and investigate” I eventually said.
“Ja, I believe I must” he responded.
“Well I hope Greenland is nice this time of year” I said over my steaming cup of tea.
A beaming smile washed itself onto Heislers face.
“Fantastisch” he bellowed, slapping me between the shouler blades; knocking half of my tea onto the counter.
“I knew I could count on you.
I will book us on the first flight available”.
A day later, after a lengthy layover in Nuuk, we were standing outside the address given to us by Willis’s partner. Ilulissat was beautiful, if not incredibly cold. Luckily Heisler and I had hiked one or two mountains in our time together, so we had all the cold weather gear we needed for the brutal winds. The air was angry and everything pointed to a storm coming in.
The apartment was painted bright red, which would have made it stand out in almost every other city in the world. In Ilulissat however, every building was a bright hue of one colour or another. Maybe something about living in the cold made one seek some vibrancy in other ways.
Heisler rapped on the door.
No answer followed.
He knocked again, harder this time.
“No answer” I said, pointlessly.
“Try the handle”.
Heisler turned the knob and the door yielded wordlessly.
“It must be a very safe area, it seems” Heisler quipped.
In our over-eagerness to get in from the cold we abandoned manners and shuffled inside.
It did not take long for us to find Heislers friend.
“Mein Gott” Heisler uttered.
The body of the man I remembered as Willis lay motionless on the kitchen floor.
A crimson stain — not dissimilar from the colour of the house I morbidly thought — circled the corpse.
“I guess this explains why he missed his husband’s birthday” I said.
“It does, most certainly” Heisler responded.
“Most certainly indeed”.
I noticed something sticking from Willis’ back.
A small, striped, curved shape.
“Is that…
Is that a candy-cane?” I stated in disbelief as Heisler circled around the body.
“It does appear so, does it not?” he said, crouching down to take a closer look.
As he did, I noticed something behind me caught his eye.
Turning I gasped.
There on the wall behind us, in large black dusty letters, as if written with charcoal, a message read:
Only the naughty pry
Stop looking for us
Or else
“It would appear we have our next case, Mein Freund” Heisler declared behind me.