BLUE BLOOD CELL CONTEST
FIRST PLACE WINNER:

The Stolen Car Report

by

Suzanne Lunsford

“Hello! hello! Is this the police station?” Mildred H. Dillingsworth is standing in Parking Level B of the Middletown Convention Center . In her left arm she grasps a potted “Radiant Princess” rose bush recently purchased at the Annual Flower Show, from which she and Jocelyn, her best friend and fellow garden club member, have just emerged. In her right hand she holds a rarely used cell phone her husband gave her for use in an emergency. Both ladies are highly agitated because Mildred's car appears to be missing from the parking space where they left it two hours ago.

“Yes, ma'm,” comes a flat voice at the other end of the telephone. “Officer Mealy speaking. How can I help you?”

“Oh, officer, I pray that you can. My car has been stolen.”

The man on the receiving end jerks to attention and reaches into his desk drawer to retrieve a pad of paper and a pen. His superior, Sergeant Stoutman, has just reprimanded him for an error in a break-in report and is standing at the door listening intently to the conversation. Hoping to redeem himself, the officer says, “Now don't get excited, lady. I'll need some information about your car, but first of all . . .”

Mildred almost drops the pot containing her rose bush, shrieks “Ouch,” when a wicked little thorn on her “Radiant Princess” bush jabs her arm. In the shuffle, the phone slides from her ear, so she doesn't hear Officer Mealy say, “. . . tell me your name and telephone number.”

“It's Blue,” sputters Mildred. Putting her hand over the receiver, she whispers to Jocelyn. “He's asking me about the color of the car. I'd say it's a periwinkle blue, wouldn't you? Or you might call it a bachelor-button purple? No, no, it's definitely blue.

“Blue!” says the officer with puzzlement in his voice. “How do you spell that?”

“Well,” says Mildred, pressing her lips together in concentration. “B-L-U-E.”

Jocelyn throws her a quizzical look.

Officer Mealy writes down the word carefully, looks at it for a few moments, and shakes his head in bewilderment. “You did say ‘Blue?'”

Yes, it's definitely blue.

“How about the rest, Lady. Do you have a middle name?” Officer Mealy holds his hand poised over his pad.

At this point Jocelyn notices that Mildred has pricked herself with the rose bush thorn and frantically tries to get her attention. “Look!” she gestures, whispering into her friend's ear. “Careful not to get that on your blouse, or you'll get a stain.”

“What is it?” hisses Mildred, reacting to the excitement in Jocelyn's voice. Then she sees a scarlet drop forming on her forearm, and shrieks, “Blood!” “Ohmygod, it's blood.”

“What's that?” says Officer Mealy, his fingers stiffening around the pen. “Blood? Did you say Blood?”

“Yes, blood.” She passes the rose bush to Jocelyn, and rummages through her handbag for a tissue.

“How do you spell that?” asks the officer.

“Spell what,” asks Mildred, dabbing at her wound.

“Blood.”

“Oh, gracious. The regular old way. B-L-O-O-D.”

Sergeant Stoutman, still leaning against the door, frowns his disapproval of the way this conversation is going. He reaches to take the receiver from Officer Mealy and shoots him a look that says. You bumbling idiot. You can't be trusted with the simplest task. Reading out loud the name scribbled on the pad, the sergeant shakes his head in disgust and gives the officer a withering look.

“Excuse me, Ma'm. This is Sergeant Stoutman speaking. I want to get something straight. Are you, uh . . . Blue Blood?”

“Oh, my,” trills Mildred. Then affecting her best British accent, she says. “Well, yes. I am indeed blue blood. Aren't you the clever one to pick up on that? I'm actually vedy vedy blue blood.

“Okay, if you say so” says the sergeant, and with a shrug hands the receiver back to Officer Mealy. “You win this time,” he grumbles. Still shaking his head, he walks out of the room.

Mildred continues, “My great, great grandfather was a duke of something or other. Not Edinburgh , I guess, but some other castle over there. Maybe it was in Ireland . So, yes, you are quite correct in your assumption that I'm a blue blood.” Than as an afterthought, she adds, “But only on my mother's side.”

Officer Mealy twirls the telephone in his hand and smiles to himself over his small triumph with the sergeant. Speaking into the receiver once again, he says, “Ma'm, now I just need your last name and after that we'll get on to the particulars of your stolen automobile.”

Mildred shakes the phone, and looks helplessly at Jocelyn. “Something's wrong with this thing. I can barely make how what the policeman is saying. Maybe it's running out of battery. That's the problem with these blasted little teensy-weensy telephones, . . . whatever they're called. I can never remember.

Sensing a problem, Officer Mealy shouts into his receiver, “What's your last name, lady?”

Mildred continues to diddle with the phone, then tentatively places it back to her ear.

Jocelyn smiles indulgently at her old friend, and says under her breath. “It's called a cell.”

“Yes,” says Mildred, nodding a thank you to her pal. “Cell, that's it. Cell.”

The officer takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “How do you spell that? With a C?”

Meanwhile, Jocelyn has wandered a few yards away to peer over the vast collection of cars spread out in the cavernous parking garage. Pointing to a blue car halfway down the row closest to her, she calls out. “Mildred, isn't that your car over there.”

“It can't be, because I remember distinctly that I parked right next to a bright yellow Volkswagen. Don't you recall that I commented on it being the same shade as a sunflower?”

“I'm sure that's your car, Mildred. The yellow car has left, and now your car's all by itself.

Yes, yes, you're right. That is my car. Speaking into the receiver, she says, “Oh, officer, thank you for your time. You've been ever so kind. I'm terribly sorry to have bothered you, but . . . I just found my car. I guess it wasn't stolen after all. Well, toodle ooh.”

Officer Mealy finishes scribbling on his pad, then leans back in his chair and studies the writing. “Blue Blood Cell,” he mutters, and tosses the paper into the waste paper basket. ”Now that's one helluva name.”

END