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he still could not find the answers to my Mom’s questions.

  The Alarm Company Sales Representative and the technician came from the back room and went over to where the police officer was standing.

  Mom walked over to them and introduced herself as the insurance investigator, “So, how do things look”, Mom asked.

  The Sales Representative, Ms. Kathy Wilson turned to the technician, “Lou why don’t you explain what you found,” she said.

  “Sure,” Lou said, “I just got off the phone with one of the technicians back at the central office and their records show the alarm was not set last night”.

  “That’s not true,” Ron said I set the alarm myself”.

  “Well let me rephrase that,” Lou said, “The alarm was set but them it was taken off line and never reset. The technicians back at the main office conducted some tests and they all indicated that the system was in good working order.

  Before he could finish, Mr. Taylor interrupted, “The thing is unreliable at best”, his voice cracked as he spoke, “sometime the thing turns off by itself and a couple of time when there was a power outage the battery back-up didn’t kick in”.

  Lou was unfazed by Mr. Taylor’s outburst, “The tests that they ran checks out the part of the system at the alarm center.”

  “The alarm sensor on the back door has been removed and I was not able to fine it anywhere in the back room,” Lou said, “The reason the battery back-up didn’t kick in when the power went out is because someone unplugged the charging circuit; I also found the phone line and the internet connection were switched which in effect disconnects the alarm in the store from the company’s alarm center”.

  “I hope you didn’t touch anything,” the police officer said, the detective and fingerprint guy will be here in a little while.

  “I didn’t need to touch anything”, Lou told him, “Both the Internet and the phone cables are special Cat 5 cables, the phone line is a Blue Cable and the Internet cable is a Red Cable. They are color coded that way so they match the connectors on the phone and network box and the alarm control panel”.

  “According to the company records the alarm was not re-set last night”, Ms. Wilson said, “But that could be because the cables were connected incorrectly. Once we can get the system reconnected, we can test the connection to the alarm center and then the center can activate the surveillance cameras”.

  “Does that mean that unless the cameras are activated by the alarm center there is no video of what went on here last night”, Mom ask.

  "Oh no,” Ms. Wilson said, “Once the alarm is activated the camera system automatically begins recording what is going on and that video is stored at the center”.

  “So, since the alarm did not go off the video system was never activated," Mom said.

  “That’s right,” Ms. Wilson said, “so there is no video of what happened here last night”.

  “How lucky for the crooks,” Mom said as if talking to Mr. Taylor.

  Mom was looking over the invoices when a police detective and the finger print guy came in, the detective introduced himself to the officers. They talked for a few minutes then the detective took a quick look around the store and made some notes in his notebook.

  The officer escorted the finger print guy to the back room and the detective walked over to where we were standing, “Hi Maggie, what are you doing here?”, he asked.

  It was Detective Lieutenant James Phillips of the Philadelphia Police Department, my Dad.

  Mom told him that her company insured Mr. Taylor’s store and merchandise. He talked to Mom for a few minutes, made some more notes, and then walked over to Mr. Taylor.

  He only made it about half way when the people from the alarm company approached him. They wanted to know when they could run their test on the alarm system.

  Daddy told one of the police officers to take them to the back of the store and to check with the finger print guys before letting them touch anything.

  Daddy found Mr. Taylor and began asking him some questions.

  The invoices for the computers were very interesting, it seems that Mr. Taylor bought the fifty wide screen laptops and the fifty tablet computers at a rather high price.

  Mom took another look at the sales display. The signs listed the computers for sale at a price that was almost the same as the price Mr. Taylor paid for them.

  Mom found the calculator function on her tablet and did some quick calculations. At the price Mr. Taylor was selling the computers for, while not losing any money he certainly wasn’t making a lot.

  Mr. Taylor had to sell the tablet computers and the wide screen laptops at the same price as his competitors, which meant that if he was lucky he might make two thousand dollars on the computers.

  If he was able to sell them at the regular price, or wait until Christmas as Garry said, he would have made over thirty thousand dollars.

  Mr. Taylor got almost hostel when Daddy started questioning him, which by the way is not a good idea under the best of circumstances but if you catch him before he has his coffee, you are in big trouble.

  “This is the third time I have been asked about the break in”, he was yelling, “first the cop, then the insurance dame and now you. I’m the victim remember”.

  “I know just who you are”, Daddy said, “but what I don’t understand is why you are so upset, or why you won’t help us to do our jobs.

  “You see Daddy said, “I know this insurance dame and she is really tough, if the police report isn’t just right she won’t allow payment.”

  “The longer it takes for me to get the information I need,” Daddy said, “the longer it will take for me to finish my report and the longer it takes for me to get my report to the insurance company the longer it will take for you to get your money. I’ll leave it up to you, do you want to be helpful or not”.

  “I’m sorry”, Mr. Taylor said, “this whole thing is just got me all worked up; of course I want to help you with your job, what do you want to know”?

  Mom heard that ‘insurance dame’ remark and when Daddy looked over to where Mom and I were standing she stuck her tongue out at him.

  While Daddy was talking to Mr. Taylor, I told Mom that I wanted to show her something. We walked toward the doorway that led to the back of the store.

  When we got to the doorway, which by the way didn’t have a door only a heavy black curtain, I showed her that with this large display rack right in front of the door someone could very easily pick up an item from one of the shelves and walk right out the back door.

  As Mom had pointed out earlier, the alarm on the backdoor had been disconnected so there would be no alarm if someone opened the back door.

  That little doorbell thing wasn’t anywhere near loud enough for anyone in the store to hear and besides it wasn’t working either.

  Even if there was an alarm on the door with everyone in the front of the store, the crook could be out the back door and half way home by the time anyone realized what had happened.

  Mom said that she would make a note of this and bring it to Mr. Taylor’s attention.

  Everyone in the store jumped when the burglar alarm went off, a few second later the Sales Representative stuck her head out from the back room. “Sorry, we are finished so that won’t happen again.” She said.

  Ms. Wilson and the technician came out of the back room and walked over to where Mom and I were standing. “As you heard the alarm works quite well,” Ms. Wilson said, “Louis replace the missing sensor on the back door and as soon as I opened the door the alarm went off”.

  “There is one other thing,” Louis Miller said, “I had one of the guys back at the alarm center verify that they got the signal and that the cameras were recording”,

  “Was there a problem,” Mom asked?

  “No, everything worked fine,” Louis said, “But when I asked them to call the emergency contact number the phone line that connects to the store alarm system rang”.

  “That why when th
e technician at the alarm center tried to call the emergency number the line was dead,” Ms. Wilson said.

  “And that would be because it was connected to the wrong place on the junction box,“ Mom said.

  “Not exactly,” Ms. Wilson said, “the emergency phone number is supposed to be a number that can be answered by someone with the authorization to cancel a false alarm or to verify that there is a real break-in. Using the alarm system phone number as the emergency phone number is just plain dumb”.

  “There seems to be a lot of that going on around her,” Mom said.

  After Daddy finished with Mr. Taylor, he spoke briefly with Ms. Wilson and then walked over to where Mom and I were standing. “What do you think of all this Maggie”, Daddy asked.

  Mr. Taylor seems very nervous to me,” I said, “but his answers are very well rehearsed. I could understand him being nervous if the robbers came in waving guns around while he was alone in the store, but this was something else”.

  “I agree,” Mom said, “Why don’t we take a little walk; there are a few things I want to show you”.

  I followed them to the back of the store and Mom pointed out a few things and told Daddy that she had a real strong feeling that this was an inside job and a scam to collect the insurance money for the merchandise.

  “Things just didn’t add up,” Daddy said, “the look of the place and the statement that the owner gave, while very well-rehearsed, just didn’t ring true”.

  There were a bunch of things that just didn’t seem right; first, the