By Frampton Jones

The one islander who steadfastly refused to turn a blind eye to crime – Symon Sanderson, has died. Symon was a lone voice for taking murder seriously, in a community that has always tended to treat private killings as a private matter. That he himself has now been deliberately killed is a terrible irony. What is most strange about this whole case, is that Doc Willoughby has become a vocal activist for intervention.

Doc Willoughby made a formal statement to me for publication: “The man was blown up. Who has the resources to do something like that, eh? Clearly it’s the work of Herr Doktor. No longer should we tolerate his careless killing of fellow citizens.”

Doc Willoughby has, in the past, been one of the loudest voices in favour of not interfering with other people’s personal choices around killing.

Symon Sanderson has indeed exploded in a manner that suggests he did not simply eat the wrong thing. Bits of the device thrown at him were found at the scene of his death (by me). Herr Doktor tells me that he is entirely innocent but that someone broke into his lab only a few days ago, and he’s not quite sure what was taken. “There’s a lot of stuff in my lab,” he said, ’it’s hard to keep track of it all.” I asked him how he knew there had been a theft and he said the muddy footprints on the floor and the broken window were a bit of a giveaway. Symon Sanderson had been investigating all of this before his untimely demise. What he learned, we will probably never know.

Witnesses who prefer to remain anonymous claim to have overheard Doc Willoughby shouting in the street only moments before the explosion. It might be a coincidence of course. The Doc has had a terrible run of bad luck with people dying around him for as long as I can remember, although that does seem to have hit a peak in recent weeks, even by his usual standards.

Symon will be missed. Which is also a terrible irony because whoever threw the infernal device didn’t miss him at all.