Ms Wren's silver watch has vanished from her upstairs sitting room. She was at home all afternoon, and nobody came past her. Puz arrives to find an empty watch case, an upset neighbour and a room that has kept its secret.
An empty case
The watch had belonged to Ms Wren's grandfather. A jeweller had recently told her it was valuable, but she loved it for its familiar ticking. After winding it that afternoon, she left it in its open navy case on the sitting-room table. Then she went to the kitchen to wait for a cake to finish baking.
Ten minutes later, she returned. The case was empty. She searched the table and floor, then called Puz. Nobody else lived in the flat, and she had received no visitors that afternoon.
The way through the flat
The front door was still bolted from the inside, with no damage to it. The only indoor way into the sitting room was along a short hall. Ms Wren had spent those ten minutes seated at the kitchen table, facing that hall through the open kitchen doorway. Nobody had crossed it.
The glazed door from the sitting room to its small balcony was wide open for fresh air. Every other window in the flat was fastened from inside. Ms Wren had heard no crash or cry, only the music from the town fair farther down the street.
A look from outside
Puz and Ms Wren went down to the pavement. Her flat occupied the top floor of a three-storey building. Its balcony stood directly below the edge of the flat roof. There was no neighbouring balcony or nearby tree within reach.
A fixed iron ladder on the building's end wall led from the ground to the roof. It was used for maintenance. It did not pass the balcony: that was round the corner on the front of the building.
Ms Wren remembered a travelling performer at the fair who could climb up and down a hanging rope. Puz noted the detail. Knowing how to climb was a reason to ask questions, not proof that the performer had taken the watch.
Two fresh marks
Puz asked the building caretaker to inspect the roof safely. The caretaker sent photographs: a heavy iron ring fixed into the roof had several pale-blue strands caught on it. At the roof edge directly above Ms Wren's balcony was a fresh, narrow groove through the dusty surface. The caretaker had not noticed either mark during the previous day's inspection.
The photographs showed no abandoned equipment. Puz laid them beside a sketch of the building. The watch was small enough to fit in a coat pocket. How could someone have entered the sitting room and left with it, and which clues supported that route?