Ask Mr. Tom 30

You might think it was the Columbia Broadcasting System (or possibly the French, who, at any rate, came up with the idea of the police sketch artist. At one time, it had been customary, the world over, to make the victim try to draw a picture of the suspect. When the artist, Picasso, was robbed at knifepoint and provided the gendarmes with a telltale sketch, they ended up arresting a barstool, a nun, a poodle and the Eiffel Tower. That prompted the change of procedure.), but, in the real world, where real cases and real walnuts were not so easy to crack, the first CSI, or Criminal Stuff Investigation, team consisted of a couple wily gumshoes named Gimble and Macy (no relation to the fruit peddlers).

They somehow got the job of tracking down two notorious international bad guys who had been giving INTERPOL, not only fits, but starts. One, a Swedish counterfeiter named Bjorn Bjornson, was notorious for printing and passing a large number of 100,000-kronor notes, which, while they were of the utmost excellence in terms of quality, were, nonetheless, quite bogus inasmuch as no such note had ever been issued by the Swedish government. The other, a Czechoslovakian "germ-free saltine" (that is to say, "safecracker") named Igna¢ő Jones, was wanted by the USSR for heisting from the jewelry case of Moscow's top department store, the famous "Bauble of GUM."

In order to take advantage of the many double occupancy deals that were available only to double occupants in the cruise, travel and on-the-lam industries, the two criminals decided to enter into a cahootinoid arrangement. Eventually their many hops, skips and jumps from justice took them to the Great Smokies, where, they must have figured, they could at least get a good deal on some top-grade American cigs. That is the last the police ever saw of them. In desperation, they turned to Gimble and Macy.

INTERPOL selected the two, chiefly because they were nearby. They were not all that experienced or trained in the field of law enforcement, but they were experienced hunters, so, at least they knew their way around a firearm.

"We'll pay you boys the standard daily rate, plus traveling expenses, which, since those two jokers could have gone anywhere by now, you'll probably need," their liaison explained to them.

"Sounds good t'me," Macy beamed. "So, what're we talkin' about in the way of travelin' expenses?"

"Penny per ten miles, up to a buck fifty a day, for the two of you. The rest has to come outa your own pockets. Sorry, boys, but that's all we can afford. Times are hard, y'know."

"Say, now, much as I'd like to go snooping around Hong Kong for them rascals," Gimble suggested, "maybe we oughta see what there might be to see right here in our own back yard."

"You don't figure they flew the coop?"

"From what I hear, they ain't all that chicken."

After several hours of flailing about the wilderness, the pair came upon two estivating bears. Beside them were the tattered remnants of a tent and other related debris.

"I think we'd better check this out," Macy surmised, "after we kill them bears."

They dispatched the animals and moved in for a closer look. Sure enough, there had been campers at the site, and, sure enough, the bears, a male and a female (although the investigators never were able to determine whether the two animals had been an "item"), had snacked on them. A closer look at the campers' detritus revealed the victims were two adult males. Then an even closer look revealed that they were two adult males on the run. More to the point, the detectives caught on that the bears' dinner menu had consisted of one Swedish counterfeiter and one Czechoslovakian jewel thief.

"Okay, that's fine and dandy," Gimble proclaimed, "but which bear ate which criminal? I want that we should wrap this thing up good and proper."

The boys searched quite a while, looking for any sort of a clue. Then Macy found it: just the thing they were looking for. Lodged in the teeth of the male beast was a shiny gemstone with the same discoloration as the one the Czechoslovakian had pilfered from the Soviets.

"Aha!" he proclaimed. "I just solved the mystery. Now, pardon me if what I say may sound a little flippant, but, through my powers of dee-ductive reasoning, I have concluded that...are you ready for this? The Squarehead is in the female!"