A truck drives up slowly and parks by my burned out car.  Looks like John has arrived, that’s his truck that ran us off the road all right.  And wrecked my car, added Lydia.  John came bursting into the living room holding a gun!  I said you should carry a gun, screamed Lydia!  Aha, said John, okay, who’s the woman?  She claims to be Lydia Baker, great granddaughter of Mrs. Baker and the only living relative, I said.  That’s a lie!  You said you found the gold, not some lying thief!  What?  You never told me about finding the gold, yelled Lydia.  Naturally not, I had to make sure I could trust you first, now I know I can.

Tell me where the gold is or I shoot that liar, growled John.  Now John was rather large, 6ft, 4 inches tall and about 280 pounds.  Which makes him quite a bit bigger than me.  Plus he has a gun, he definitely has the advantage.  Obviously you’re not Mrs. Baker’s great grandson, I said.  Of course not, said John, I was the lawyer for Lydia’s parents, that’s how I found out about the gold.  And you killed them so you could claim the gold yourself, I said.  Yeah, and I would have killed her too, but I could never find her.  I was beginning to think she was the one playing ghost out here, but I couldn’t be sure.

The other 2 investigators believed in ghosts and were scared away from here, that’s why I asked if you believed in ghosts.  Now, talk, or she dies!  I said “meow” nice and loud, which kind of took John by surprise and suddenly John screams a loud high pitched scream!  Poor John.  His t-shirt was no match for Muffin’s 18 claws digging deeply into his back.  That gave me the opportunity to grab his gun just as the police came rushing in.  They quickly had John handcuffed and took him out to one of the cars.

Poor Lydia looked kind of shaken up, but she managed to tell the remaining officers what had been going on.  I told everything that I had discovered and Muffin, who was sitting on my shoulder now, got her meows in too.  After that came the part about the gold.  Meow, meow?  Sorry Muffin, I couldn’t tell you in case someone was listening to us. I actually found the gold fairly quickly, but I never quite trusted John and I wanted to find out who was playing ghost and why.  I figured the “ghost” must be part of this mystery somehow.

I took everyone into the dining room, the gold is right here, I said, in these dishes.  I knew the dishes were too heavy for china and the pattern on 2 of the plates didn’t match the rest of the dishes, it was close, but not quite right.  So I scraped the back of a plate and the paint came off revealing the shining gold beneath.  All this time, said Lydia, and the gold was right in front of me.  Fortunately I know a little about antique dishes, I said. Thank you for finding the gold, said Lydia, and I will buy you another car!

Well Muffin, we certainly solved that case quickly.  Lydia got enough money to pay off her debts and she will be able to open her art gallery too.  Plus, she paid us so we could buy a new car.  Meow?  Okay, it’s a used car, but it’s better than our last one.  Meow, meow (true, this one has a floor).  That’s right, and with a little work it will be like new. At least it’s all in one piece this time.  Meow.  Okay, it’s missing a few pieces, but nothing major.  Meow?  What do you mean, it needs tires, it has tires.  Meow?  Yes, tires should have tread, these tires have tread.  Meow? (where is the tread hiding?).  Ha, ha, just wait, it will be nice, and for now, walking is good exercise.

Fine, you can sit on my shoulder for a while.  Why don’t we pick up a pizza on the way home?  Meow! (great idea!).  And guess what?  A new case came in for us this morning while you were napping.  And for this one we get to travel all the way to…

Stay around for another exciting mystery with 20/20 Investigations, Inc.

Steve and Muffin.

© 2020 Steve McLeod.