Penelope dove for her purse and fumbled around in its depths for her phone.
“Gimme that!” The inmate made a grab for the phone and almost fell over again as Penelope yanked it out of reach.
“No!” Penelope realized that it would be impossible to call 911 while playing keep-away with a desperate man. She resorted to the technique women in need of help have used for millenia. She screamed her head off.
“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” the man hissed as he tried to free himself from the yarn around his ankles.
Penelope kept screaming.
The sound of pounding footsteps rushed toward them from the jail. The escapee gave up on the yarn and took off, hopping and hobbling, Robbie’s half-finished sweater bouncing along behind him.
“Whoa, whoa, settle down, ma’am.” Penelope looked up to see a uniformed officer looming over her. “What seems to be the problem?”
“He’s getting away!” Penelope pointed at the figure in orange hopping down the shadowy sidewalk.
Moments later, the inmate, handcuffed and yelling bloody murder (and a few other words Penelope would not repeat in polite company), shuffled back into the jail in the firm grip of a pair of correctional officers. A female police officer arrived to take Penelope’s statement.
Penelope glanced at her watch. Had this whole ordeal only taken ten minutes? Nevertheless, if she didn’t head home right now, Bill might be worried enough to send out the cavalry. And she did not want him to know that the cavalry was already involved. She explained as much to Officer Connolly, promising to arrive bright and early the next morning to give her statement and, more importantly, retrieve Robbie’s sweater.
“Please don’t cut the yarn if you can help it.”
Officer Connolly spoke into the radio on her shoulder, then listened intently to the static-filled response.
“They said they’ll do their best, Mrs. Perlmutter. My mother is a knitter, so I understand. She tried to teach me, but I’m a lot better with weapons than knitting needles.”
Another officer strode over to them, the size thirteen knitting needles in his hand.
“Are these yours. ma’am?”
Penelope was in too much of a hurry to get home to take the time to explain their role in the current situation.
“Thank you, officer. They must have fallen out of my bag in the struggle.” She smiled and tucked her crimefighting tools back into her knitting bag.
Officer Connolly walked Penelope to her car and gave her one last piece of advice.
“Always park under a streetlight, ma’am. Always.” He shut her door and thumped his hand on the roof of the car to send her on her way.
“Well, I would have, if I’d had time to look for one,” Penelope muttered as she settled herself behind the wheel. She took a moment to send her photos of the counterfeiter to Agent Donovan, then headed for home, where Bill had no doubt started to anxiously eye the clock.
“I’m home!” Penelope sang out as she sailed through the front door. The relief on Bill’s face when he looked up from his newspaper melted her heart. She walked over and kissed the bald spot on the top of his head before she put her knitting bag away. No need to tell this dear man what she’d been up to that night. He worried enough as it was.

Stay tuned for the final installment of THE TOP-SECRET LIFE OF PENELOPE PERLMUTTER, coming next week!