The Pink Train

by Jeff Baker

(August 21, 2024)

“Well, here’s how we solved it,” the Detective said. “They weren’t smuggling anything on the trains, that was what misled us. The stuff was coming in at the airport. We’d stopped the trains several times but didn’t find any of the contraband.”

“Then what?” The young officer said. He hadn’t been there.

“The trains were flat cars shipping large containers across the country, almost like those storage bins people rent to keep their stuff in. Every color of the rainbow. Red, Green, Yellow. But every now and then they would have a bunch of pink containers. We thought that was what they were shipping the stuff in, but we were wrong. It was a signal.”

“A signal?”the young officer asked.

“Yes, to the guy at the other end. That it was time to tell his guys to go to the airport. It was perfect. No electronics or anything that could be intercepted and it worked perfectly for him.”

“How so?” asked the officer.

“When we knew the signal was coming, we staked him out and followed his men to the airport.”

“What signal?”

“The Detective smiled. “Pink was a color he could easily make out. We found out our suspect was color blind.”

—end—