The Mystery of the Vanished Child

Thomas and Buster set off to Jenifer's house as they planed yesterday.

"I can't wait till I meet the others, it seemed to be quiet a long term this year isn't it Buster?" said Thomas joyfully.

In about half an hour they met.

"Hello Jennifer, Phillip, Fred and Anne" Thomas greeted politely.

"Hello!" , everybody said in a chorus.

"Yipee...! It is glad to be back again, now that I am ten, mummy said I can go bicycle rides with you, isn't it going to be fun?" said Anne delightfully.

"I have learnt so many new secret techniques of how to be a detective, I will teach you all of them." said Thomas proudly to everyone.

"Well then show us without waiting for some auspicious time for you to start your secret techniques." Said Phillip who didn't believe Thomas.

"Ok, then bring an orange, a piece of paper and an iron." said Thomas.

Thomas took an ink pen out of his pocket, then he squished the orange into a cup and absorbed the orange juice into ink pen. Then started to write something. After he wrote, he took out the warm iron and rubbed it against the blank sheet. Suddenly the letters appeared out of the blank sheet. Everybody stared at it in astonishment. Thomas was successful. He grinned at the astonished crowd.

"How...how did you do that?" asked all of them, and Thomas told his secret.

"My next trick is called 'how to unlock a locked door', lets begin then" said Thomas proudly as he started.

"Now to begin with, you should lock me in your room Jenifer."

And the whole crowd went to Jenifer's room and locked him inside.

"We will be in the living room waiting for you", said Anne.

"How could he possibly come out of a locked door? Anyway we could play monopoly." Said Fred

So everybody played monopoly and suddenly they heard Thomas coming.

"How did you do that?" asked Anne surprisingly.

"It is like this, I had a newspaper and a piece of wire; I chose Jenifer's room because it didn't have a carpet, so I turned the newspaper to its middle page and slipped it under the door. Then from the wire I pushed the key to the other end, so that it falls without a sound." replied Thomas.

"No wonder you came in so silent, how could you be so smart?" asked Fred in interest.

"Oh! That you know I was first in my class this term and..."

"Oh just shut up!" said Phillip, who didn't like Thomas boasting too much as he usually does.

After the exciting evening, they were to meet at Fred's house after lunch the next day. Thomas left Fred's house late after dinner. While he was going back home, he heard a strange sound. Thomas peeped and he saw a group of men dragging a child who was covered with a blanket. He saw a kidnapping taking place! He sped off to Fred's again and the others were just about to leave and was surprised to see Thomas back again. "Hi Thomas, you seem to be worried. What's the matter?" "I saw a strange thing while I was coming" and he poured the whole story to them. They were indeed surprised.

"Do you think it is a good idea if I just snoop around the place to see what happened?" said Thomas feeling important.

"Oh please don't do that, what if they capture you too." said Anne, who was worried and scared about Thomas's idea.