Part Eleven: A startling discovery

When the head woke that afternoon, all the dizzy ecstasy of that brief moment had been drained from him. Happiness, he thought as he slowly regained consciousness, was like alcohol. It was nice for a while, but if you had too much of it all at once you ended up with one heck of a hangover the next morning. Slowly he sat up, groping for any sturdy objects in roughly the direction he was trying to head. He was in his study, and on the desk was a newspaper that he realised he hadn’t yet read. Picking it up, he surveyed it with half-hearted interest.1 Most of the news was of the usual dismal nature and none of it very eye-catching. They say no news is good news, thought the head gloomily. That would explain why all the news is so awful. Just to illustrate his point to the world in general, he picked a few articles at random:
Graffiti on derelict building, Vandalism levels soar, Dog eats postman, Hamster spontaneously combusts, Local scientists predict Armageddon, Museum reports theft of unidentified artefact…
This last item struck him as odd. He read on:
Mossam Museum yesterday revealed that one of its more mysterious artefacts had been stolen. The object, known to museum staff as ‘The Orb’, is a small pyramid in which is embedded a sphere. Research into the inscriptions on the object has so far proven fruitless, but historians believe it to be cursed. No information is yet known about the material from which it is made, but it appears to consist of a silvery metal of great strength. Anyone knowing the whereabouts of the item is requested to report the matter to the Mossam police station.
Mossam police? Weren't they the ones trying to sort out the mess at the school? And a curse. Hallucinations didn't just, well, happen, did they? The pieces of the puzzle all seemed to be fitting together quite nicely. He would have to tell the police about this, although the prospect of facing up to the inspector again was less than inviting. Mind you, the prospect of having to face up to this damned curse for the rest of his school career was even less inviting. Against all his previous intuition, he went out in search of the inspector.
“So,” said the inspector, who was more than a little suspicious about the headmaster’s new-found talent for deduction, “you think it's not so much a case of who done it as what done it?”
“Even better,” replied the head, who was – in contrast to the inspector – feeling more than a little smug about his triumph over modern policing techniques. “I know what done it, ahem, did it.”
“What?” queried the inspector, his suspicion becoming curiosity. “Any clues are better than none.”
“Well,” whispered the head conspiratorially, leaning in towards the policeman. His smugness tank, having overflowed ages ago, was now spreading havoc around the rest of his brain, especially his common sense, “you know that museum robbery you're dealing with?”
“I most certainly do sir,” confirmed the inspector, now deeply puzzled by this latest non sequitur. “But what has it to do with the murders?”
“Why everything, my good chap!” slurred the head, the smugness having attacked the speech centres of his brain. “This orb you're searching for is the doer of the dones that have been done by the doer of the dones!”
The policeman regarded him quizzically.
“Are you feeling all right, sir?” he asked, looking rather worried. He had stacks of policing duties as it was, without having to deal with a lunatic teacher. “You don't look too good.”
The head's primitive instinct of one-upmanship suddenly kicked in with a vengeance. He wasn't going to ruin it all now, just as he had the advantage! Hurriedly, he straightened up and tried to look knowledgeable.
“Of course I am, man!” he retorted. “Never been better! Anyway,” he continued, putting on a more serious note, “the curse contained within that orb is the cause of all this,”
“What makes you say that, sir?” questioned the policeman warily. The head then proceeded to recount his incident in the janitor's cupboard. At the end, the inspector looked thoughtful for a moment before speaking.
“So, you think there's an accursed relic in the cupboard that's picking everybody off one by one?”
“That's no way to talk about the jan…” began the head, before realising what the inspector meant. “I mean, exactly! You must remove it immediately!”
The inspector sighed. It was going to be a long day.