The Gnome Office squad room is unpretentious; two ancient partner desks set at not quite right angles to each other, atop a threadbare carpet, which has seen better days, three one-way windows facing Number 8 Downing Street’s thronging protestors waving their “Gnomes Go Home” banners, and a surfeit of briefing papers covering every surface, each emblazoned with “Urgent: Office of the Prime Minister” and stamped in red with “PLEASE IGNORE – Office of Queen Flaxmain.”
The noise of disco music coming from the Serious Frog Office in the adjacent room seeps through the walls as a dull thrumming, just loud enough to create compression waves in Ironbell’s Bracken-Tea.
“Umros, could you ring the frogs and tell them to turn that racket down?” Inspector Camden Ironbell says as he plumps his flattened seat cushion for the third time that morning.
