CHAPTER 3 – On it!
<< Part 1
Tears rolled down my cheeks. Mom had come home. It was dark outside, dad had called to say that he would be late. Thank God mom had come soon, or I don’t know what we both would have done. Mom had called the Haffen’s residence, to let them know that she was there, if they needed any help. I can’t believe what had just happened. Just the next week only was his birthday and today……., Ray and I had made him a card, though we know it’s very lame but, he liked homemade cards and things, and thanks to me I am great at crafting. His card was in front of me.
I sighed, “We must go and check in with Chloe.” I said to Ray. She was just going to reply, when mom cut her, “No, they need family time now we mustn’t disturb them.” “But mom, he was her uncle, and she told us that she felt very lonely when her parents are at home.” Cherry said. Yeah, I remembered, I felt a little sorry for her. She didn’t go to school like us but had a home tutor, imagine that! It must be very awful without friends and teachers. “Yeah, she said so.” I said. But mom didn’t allow us.
I went to sleep early that day. And surprisingly Cherry also went to her room, yawning. Generally, I am the one who sleeps the first, Ray is one of the late nighters. And I am amazed to see how all my life she has watched TV , mobiles, computers, and what not, but never got specks. And that’s amazing, mom told me she had gone on her dad. And that pretty much makes sense, she got her amazing silky dark brown hair from dad, but her eyes are light brown, from mom, I got blue eyes from dad. Anyways, I wanted my beauty sleep. So, I freshed up and snuggled on my bed. Today many things happened. We solved a case, we had fun and, well
……..anyways.
“AAAGGHH—” I started to scream but someone closed my mouth.
“Ray!”, I said unable to decide whether I should be happy, to see my sister’s face on my right and not any criminal’s, or to be angry, because she was just going to frighten me to death.
“You–are–a–scared–little–brat! You scared me too, idiot!” She said.
“What was that scream? Are you two okay?” Our mom called out.
“Yeah mom!” I replied.
“Yep, perfect!” Cherry shouted in my ear, giving me another shot of adrenaline.
“You scared me, silly. What is it?” I whispered. “And get out of MY bed, and MY blanket.”
“Oh! Come on, it’s freezing out here. Please?” Ray pleaded, and let me tell you she doesn’t always pleads. Anyways I let her in.
“Now will you please show me a bit of thankfulness and not spoil my covers.
Come on, break it! And tell me!” I said.
“Wait first let your lecture end.” She said rolling her eyes.
Cherry
I told her, what had actually happened and I hadn’t told that to anyone so far, and I had no intention to tell anyone, except Jess. I need her, because this is a very bad situation. How many ever secrets we have from our parents or our friends or anyone. Let me tell you we don’t have anything to hide from each other. And that’s a good thing because we need someone, to share with, our secrets, someone who can understand you the most. And nobody knows me better than Jess. Not even dad.
I was just going to tell her when she interrupted me, “You know something, right? About that….. the thing that happened in front of Mr. Haffen’s house, don’t you?” See I told you.
“It’s, that I saw something.”
“What! No, Ray you know it’s a crime, what did you take? Was it related to
th—-”
“Oh! Shut up! Mom will hear us. And I didn’t take anything. Just listen, he- he– didn’t die…… he was killed. It was a murder Jessy.” I broke it to her in one breath. It was as if a whole lot of weight just got lifted from me. Her face contracted with concentration.
“What? What did you find there that you are telling this?” She said in a slightly breathless voice. I replied
“It was a silent-clear-gun, the one in which you put the poison, or a drug.
And then shoot so that the liquid goes inside the body. 1.5m,
and the person had made the liquid on their own, and I know that CapColl, won’t tell us that. He–”
She finished it, “wouldn’t tell us, till he has solved the case, and we are on
it.”
“Exactly.” I said.
“And don’t call Captain Collin, CapColl”
“What does it matters? Anyways.”
“It matters, because, if we make a habit of it, and mistakenly tell that in front of him. It won’t take much time for him to make sure that we are thrown out of Queens, in the middle of the ocean. “She said.
And I rolled my eyes. “So, we are on it!” I waited for her to reply.
“Yep” she said, “I want that person get arrested as soon as possible who kill–killed, Mr. Haffen. And we will not stop, no matter whoever comes in our way, not even CapColl.”
I smiled, “That’s the spirit!” This is the reason, I love her. She is great. And you don’t get to hear that frequently.
*-*-*
CHAPTER 4 – Starting on
“Come on, faster! We will be late, AGAIN! Fast Jess. Jess?, JESSY DO IT FAST!”I shouted,
“Coming, WAIT! CAN’T YOU HAVE PATIENCE?” Yeah whatever? I am waiting here for like ages!
“NO! WE ARE ALREADY LATE FOR SCHOOL, FAST!”, Why does she has to do soo much make up? Literally we are going to school!
“W-A-I-T! JUST A BIT MORE RAY!” She shouted. Ok that’s enough! I will give my whole savings to her if I forget to throw her makeup kit out of the window today evening!
“Oooh! Stop shouting you both!” Mom broke in the shouting,
“THERE IS NO TIME TO STOP! WE ARE RUNNING LATE!” Dad shouted.
“COMING! OH! I FORGOT MY SKETCH BOOK!” Jess shouted. Oh! Come on Jess again FORGOT! We are LATE!
“OHNO! OHNO! I have to go now sorry can’t eat the breakfast!” Dad again shouted, actually it’s a good decision, the eggs are really bad.
“WAIT I DIDN’T TAKE MY TAB, I HAVE ALL THE DOCUMENTS IN IT!” This time it was mom. Wow now mom is shouting, where is Jessy? Oh! My practical book!
“OH, GREAT I FORGOT MY PRACTICAL BOOK! WAIT!” I shouted.
“NOW WHO IS LATE!?” Jess shouted back, grinning. I smacked her on her arm while going up.
“FASTER GIRLS! “This time it’s dad. I got my book, and I was running down
the stairs, but———-
“NO HONEY! Wait there is water on the floor!———”
“AAAAAAAAGGGHAAAAA! Couldn’t you have told a bit faster Mom? Ugh! It hurts!” I said. It really did! Aagh! Jessy started laughing. Wait she will get back for this!
Jessy
Well the morning was a bit of mess. You must have seen, anyways. We were a bit late and our classes had started. We had to do a bit detentions for being late and, well not doing our homework. And I would better keep that a secret. Because if mom knows about this, it won’t go very well, did I tell you that our mom is way much strict. We were on our cases in nights and in days, we mostly were too sleepy to do it. Ray had gotten a bit more homework left than me so she had to do an extra half an hour, for detention. While I was waiting, I was trying to figure out how to start our investigation, on Mr. Haffen’s murder case.
Mr. Haffen’s brother’s name, aka Chloe’s dad’s name, is Mr.Lore Halperin. And the truth is that Mr. Halperin is a step brother of Mr Haffen. And that’s a pretty new news. Ray and I made fun that Mr. Lore didn’t like his last name and so he changed it. But now here is the truth. By the way Cherry will find more news in the internet of their family than I just found, because this was just written on the outer page, Ray will dig in.
“I knew that ages ago!” Ray replied me, when I told her about Mr. Halperin’s name and about his and Mr. Haffen’s relationship.
“Then why didn’t you tell me that earlier?” I demanded, “From how long did you know this? That’s unfair!”
“Relax! Just last night.” She said shaking her head.
“And why was it kept a secret? May I have the pardon to know?” I asked rolling my eyes.
“Nope, you don’t have.” And then she started laughing. Sometimes she
is such a creep!
We were walking back home. It was evening now and I was hungry. Ray must be too, because with every step she was increasing her pace. I had money, but I didn’t want to spend it on dry cream buns, when I could get something better at home. And I was pretty sure that Ray didn’t had any money, she has never learnt to save, — or share, as a matter of fact.
“Want to go and check out the crime scene?” She asked.
“Um…. yeah, I haven’t seen the place yet, maybe we will get some clues.”
I replied forgetting my hunger.
“Yeah, definitely after the police has done all the checking and picking, right? I think we will find a dropped mobile, maybe of the murderer. Or the ID of him. We may even get the gun. What do you say?” She asked
sarcastically.
“Oh, shut up! And we don’t yet know If it’s a he or she.” I replied. Thinking, that what a cruel thing to do, for a girl!
As we neared the house, I got a strange creepy feeling, as if someone was watching us. Ray and I looked around to make sure no one was looking, so that we will remain unseen, which will cause less suspicions. There was a chalked figure outline of the body and, the place was taped. It was at the side path. The lines were drawn and it looked as if Mr. Haffen was running from something— or someone, and his direction showed that he was coming out from his own house! Now that’s weird. Why would someone be afraid of something in their own house, if it wasn’t for some intruder.
That’s when Ray interrupted my thoughts.
“He was running out of his own house. And he had mud on his shoes, that means that he was doing gardening.” She said thoughtfully.
“Yep. We know that he loved plants. But the question is why was he running out of his own house? I mean that if he saw some intruder, then he should have shouted for his servants, or should have rushed inside his house, but no! He was coming out. How does that make any sense? I thought that your home should have been the safest place! And he also had a password lock, it means that nobody could come in until you were a very good hacker or a–” she finished my sentence.
Cherry
“–family member, exactly! So, it means that from whoever Mr. Haffen was running from, was one of his family, or any servant, who had the password!” I completed her sentence, feeling excited for having this new way open in front of us. “So that means that our culprit is one of the people living in the house!” I said, and that brought a jolt of realization in my stomach, that the murderer was someone close to Mr. Haffen. We both stood in silence for a while, lost in our own chain of thoughts. Until, we heard a very loud banging of door, which made us both jump, and make moves to hide. But we were late, and by the way there are no great hiding places on an open street…..are there? We both looked embarrassingly at each other and then, at the both surprised, and annoyed face of CapColl.
My mind went blank. Ok, that’s not the first thing a good detective does when she thinks that she is going to get into a trouble, but I was totally surprised to see him there. But then when I looked around I noticed a police car, parked at the side of the house. How couldn’t have we noticed it? We stared into his angry, no nonsense face for a while, but then—
“Well? What are you both doing here?” He asked in his loud and clear voice. “We- we- are here— I–” I stammered. Well, I am not that good in making stories in crises times. Captain Collin’s burrows furrowed with suspicion. “What are you both doing here?” He repeated, this time his angry voice coming more clearly.
“We were just thinking of meeting, Chloe. Just, you know…… after what happened. We thought that she will feel better if she has company. So, we came here.” Jess answered, without missing a beat. Well she is a great actor–, or you could say a great liar.
Anyways, she saved the day. I joined in,
“Yeah, yes, yes.”
I didn’t think a single bit that Captain Collin believed us, but anyway he left with his fellow workers. Mr. Brown was also among them, he winked at us before getting in the car. He is the greatest detective
I have ever met. He is also the one from whom Jess and I got the inspiration of becoming detectives ourselves. I heaved a sigh of relief, as I watched the cab pull out of the drive way and then leave.
“I saved us both,” Jess bragged, “through my skills!”
“Yeah, your great skills of lying” I replied smiling as Jess started to defend herself. It’s sometimes easy to mess with my sis. I didn’t tell her that she really did save our day, though I knew she did.
Now as Jessy had told about visiting Chloe, we thought that we really should pay her a visit. Just as I was going to ring the bell, my cell buzzed. I picked up, and answered, to find my mom’s voice come shrieking from the other
line,
“Where are you both! I have been waiting for such a long time! Where are you?” She seemed to be in a very bad mood, and that’s something VERY bad.
“Jess! No! We have to go, mom’s home, and she is very angry!” I whispered to her just as she was going to press the bell button. And then I spoke back in the cell, “Um… yeah mom, um we are… ah…. coming!” And I ended the
call.
We were running down the street, and finally we reached home, mom’s car was parked on our down park.
“Oh no! It’s 6! No matter she is so mad.” Jess said looking at her watch. “Wait! What do we tell her? Where were we? We can’t tell her that we went to Chloe’s, because we didn’t even meet her.” I asked her, because I didn’t want any other causes to make mom angrier!
“Yeah,” She said, and then sighed, making me feel uncomfortable because I knew what was coming,
“Well, then I guess we have to tell her that we got detentions.” I spoke our thought. And she nodded. We entered our hall, and saw our mom sitting on the sofa with her phone on her hand and, oh man! She looked angry. And when I say angry, let me tell you that our mom is normally a very cool person, but when she is angry, nothing else remains normal.
*-*-*
Part 3>>
By Hiya Pahari, Mumbai, India
[…] Part 2 >> […]