My Own Mystery story

I’m sitting in my office ready for the 4,522nd case to solve.

Yes, me, a child that's only turned 10 this year solved 4,522 mysteries like I have been doing it since I was 3.

You see ever since I was 7 I got online and watched some YouTube. Not just any old videos or cartoons but riddles. Specifically, 7 Second Riddles. By-the-way, 7 Second Riddles is an actual YouTube channel that I actually did watch ever since I was 7. That's what got me into riddles and mysteries. Basically on the channel, there was a scenario and you had 7 seconds to solve it. I didn’t get EVERYTHING right..but..I did get most of them right. Sometimes I got it wrong but realized my answer could have made more sense other then the real answer.

Anyway back to the office. I am sitting down in my chair expecting anybody or anything to come in and inform me of a case I have to solve. Whether it’s an old lady, old man, young man, young lady, a baby, a cat, a dog ANYTHING, I am ready! But nobody comes in. I go to fetch myself a cup of water and that's when Mr Burt (the principal) comes inside my office.

“Detective Aye, I need you now!” He said while gasping for breath.

“Woah, it seems like you ran here, pretty fast.” I said.

“Yes, definitely” Mr Burt replied, panting even louder.

“Well, before I check out the case. Tell me, how important is it to you?” I questioned.

“VERY!”

“What type of case is this? Murder, lost and missing, robbery…” I went on, listing all the types of cases.

“Robbery! But a VERY, VERY serious case of robbery!” Mr Burt said.

It seemed like by the tone of his voice that he couldn’t wait any longer so I just stood up with my cup and told him to show me where the robbery took place. He leadeth me to the staffroom, the teachers vacation area where they can take a break from their students. Suspiciously, I looked around, examining the room but there wasn’t much but coffee spilled everywhere.

“Look, I have no time for some tricks and games. If this isn’t a REAL robbery then I better get going” I said confused about the sight.

“This isn't a real robbery? If this is not a robbery then what is it!” Once again, by the tone of his voice he seemed serious so I said,

“Fine, but all I see is “coffee spill island”. Anyway, do you perhaps know like EXACTLY what the thief took?” I asked with my notebook and pencil out.

“Yes, they drank all my coffee! So now it’s in their belly and I can’t get it back anyway (sniff, sniff) but I HAVE to know who could commit such crime!” Mr Burt said dramatically.

“Mhm, yep. ok, noted. Well now all I gotta do is check for any clues.” I said while writing every word he said before.

I went over to the chairs that the teachers and staff sit on, and there it was. The first HUGE clue. Miss Tuia’s keys!

“Ah, here is one clue already. Miss Tuia’s keys. This could be a real clue or it could be a red herring.” I said, then I asked Mr Burt this,

“Do you know if Miss Tuia possibly left her keys before or not? Meaning did you see it get left there before this case or did you not notice at all?”

“Yes, I was going to give it back but then I went to do something really important and then I came back and saw this mess! I totally forgot about the keys, but yes Miss Tuia did leave them.” I noted all of this down so I wouldn’t make a wrong turn.

“Hmmm, this means the criminal did this VERY fast. Could you make a rough guess of how long you were gone?” I asked.

“Oh, I don’t know but probably around 10 minutes or so?” Mr Burt replied not confidently.

“That's alright, I don’t expect you to time yourself on how long you're gone.” I replied as I noted in BOLD, big words “Mr Burt was gone for 10 minutes!”.

Then we both moved on from there and looked around the rest of the room. I went over to around the middle row of chairs and saw...a….squashed...banana? Really? This wasn’t going to help me one bit. Unless there was going to be a device for a bottom print. Either way a squashed banana wasn’t going to help so I just left it there.

I was just about to move on when Mr Burt stopped me,

“Wait there, Mrs Sio sat there maybe she squashed a banana? Like who wouldn’t if they didn’t realize there was a banana and accidently sat on it.” Mr Burt claimed.

“Oh ok, good job. Noted, well now you check the kitchen and I will check the back of the staff room.” I told him.

“OK, sure,” He replied.

Mr Burt found Mr Goodwin's favorite mug laying on its side on top of the counter!

“AHA! Mr Goodwin's favourite mug, I should’ve known! I am going to keep it right there and look for some more evidence.” Mr Burt said shockingly.

I could hear him from the back of the room and I wrote it down.

“Looks like our number 1 subject is Mr Goodwin,” I successfully said.

“But it could be red herring so then Mr Goodwin can be blamed but it wasn’t him. Somebody must have done it but we will get to that later for now, let's say that he's the number 1 suspect.” I added.

I then kept checking the back and I saw it, bundled up just squished in the corner, Mr Somervilles jumper. I know this because he normally wears a black jumper but most of the time he wears a top and up-to-knee shorts.

“Yes, the next suspect.” I said as I triple checked extra carefully of the rest of the staffroom.

“I don’t see anything else in the kitchen anymore, what about you, detective Aye?”

“Hm, don’t see anything either. Looks like there's no more clues. All we have to do is go to my office\lab and test to make sure that these fingerprints belong to the right person we think it belongs to.” I told him.

So we made our way for the lab. I got out the machine and I tested the finger prints. First I tried Mr Goodwin's mug, but I expected his finger prints on their cause it’s his favourite mug! So I got my machine to make a call out.

“Mr Goodwin, Mr Goodwin please report to detective Ayes office. We need you NOW!” I said.

Meanwhile Mr Goodwin’s reaction was like this,

“Mr Goodwin, Mr Goodwin please report to detective Ayes office. We need you NOW!”

“HUH? M-m-m-m-me? Oh no, what have I done! I am going to Ayes office? But who knows it could be a good thing?” He tried to assure himself.

“Class it won’t take too long, just do your work please and be sensible.”

Mr Goodwin made his way along the classroom, out the door, into the foyer and into detective Ayes office.

“So, long-story-short. Mr Burt came to me to report a crime, a robbery and a thief who stole, well drank all of his coffee. We found your favorite mug laying on the counter and it’s full of coffee. What do you have to say?”

“That’s strange, I didn’t have coffee, well I did in the morning but then I swear I washed my mug clean and I haven’t had coffee today ever since!” Mr Goodwin said bringing up his alibi.

“Hmm, Mr Burt? Do you say this could be true?”

“Hm, yes. I did see him in the staff room drinking coffee and I did see him wash it. I didn’t see him after that so I think that's true” Mr Burt replied.

“This means somebody set you up, or you could be lying. You are going to stay here until the case is solved.”

Then I took out Mr Somervilles jumper. I didn’t need to even think so I called him to my office.

Once he came, this is what he said,

“Hi, um, I am so sorry but I don’t remember doing anything wrong.” He said with a shiver in his voice.

“Well I don’t know if that's true that's why I called you here. Mr Burt reported a case of robbery. Somebody drank all his coffee. I found your jacket in the crime scene. Did you forget it or what?”

“Oh! My jacket! I totally forgot and I barely realized. Well no, I don’t remember going to the staffroom for coffee. Well actually I did but I went straight out with my coffee cup to my office so it couldn’t have been me!” He replied.

“HM, true, true. You always do bring your cup to your office. Ok, but you're still staying here just-in-case.”

Next was Miss Tuia’s keys.

“Miss Tuia, Mr Burt has reported a robbery this late morning. He has said that somebody drank all his coffee and now it’s gone. We found your keys in the chair you sat on. Luckily, Mr Burt declaimed that you forgot about them. But did you purposely forget about them and wait for Mr Burt to exit the room so you could enjoy coffee?” I asked suspiciously.

“My keys, oh I forgot them? That’s unlike me. Well good thing nothings wrong with them. Oh and no. I just went to the staffroom for some biscuits to start my day off.” Miss Tuia replied pretty surely. Because of that I let her go and join Mr Goodwin and Mr Somerville. But now it was up to the last, final and weirdest piece of evidence. The squashed banana.

I brang up Mrs Sio because Mr Burt said that Mrs Sio sat on the exact chair we found the banana on.

“No, that wasn’t me. Like why would it be me?” Mrs Sio replied quickly and nervously. This could be genuine nervousness or because she got nervous now because I was onto her. The most unlikely piece of evidence could just do the job.

I asked her,

“Are you sure you didn’t enter the crime scene?”

“Positive, yeah” She replied.

That's when I could tell it was her!

“It’s you! You entered the staffroom, sat on the banana to make me go on the wrong path! You then drank all the coffee and put some in Mr Goodwin’s cup to get it to look like he did it! Then you were in a rush and just left the cup lying on its side, making it look like it was Mr Goodwin even more!” I confronted.

“(gulp) Ok! It w-w-w-was me. I’m sorry but Mr Burt would NEVER let me drink all the coffee so I just drank it all.” She blurted out.

“Well now that you know who did it Mr Burt you guys may be on your way.”

“Wait, and me too?” Asked Mrs Sio.

“Yes”

“But, but isn’t she going to get punished?” Mr Burt said.

“No, why?”

“She drank all the c-c-coffee!”

“Oh, remember you said this, the coffees in their belly now, so I can't get it back anyway. But please just figure out who did it. So I did and now you know so you may exit the room because if you take a look outside there is a whole line of people waiting for me.” I said correctly. 

"What? It is right though, If you were paying attention you would also have known."

So all of them, even Mrs Sio left my room and I welcomed the next guest.

“Santa claus?”

“Yes, I am here to inform you that somebody smashed up my workshop. There is an elf hat, reindeers footprints, cookie crumbs and a broken window”....