Looking for a UK children’s mystery novel published 1960-1970. Plot revolves around policeman stumped by robberies in which getaway vehicle is Morris Minor/Mini that always disappears. Case solved when officer notices (autistic?) boy who copies down all vehicle registration plate numbers while sitting on overpass daily, and from lists finds that ambulance always goes past shortly after robbery. Turns out the Morris is small enough to fit into ambulance. Officer risks job by insisting on searching every ambulance in vicinity after next robbery, and finds getaway car inside ambulance. Black and white sketch illustrations; probably library binding. Originally found in elementary school library in Southern California before 1974.
Stump the Bookseller
New format, same book stumper solving.
Try this: Patrol Car, by Roderic Jeffries. Involves an Austin Mini and an ambulance.
This is the one! (Confirmed by bookfinder.com search/purchase/re-read after 40+ years) My bad for suggesting autism might be involved; the kid was the officer’s own son, who had joined a fad of recording license plate numbers of passing cars… hard to image that one today, isn’t it?
Was it one of Pat Hutchins Young Lions Mysteries? It’s been so long, I don’t remember the details of the books, but it sounds like something that could have been in one of them, and the drawings sound right. The individual titles are Follow That Bus!, The Mona Lisa Mystery, and the Curse of the Egyptian Mummy.