The 7 Signs

Chapter 3

The fourth day and as to our calculations the fourth sign was to be stacked on the wall. We were with full preparations when the period was about to start then we went to the cleaners and sweepers of bathroom in the cleaning staff room.

We asked them about who was the person who wrote the signs on the wall after the break. Some of them told us that they saw nobody. But one of them told that there was someone he heard someones voice on 12th April. He only heard his voice when he crossed the bathroom sweeping the floors. 

Sweeper explained "After the school finished on 12th I was sweeping the floor and I heard a noise from boy's bathroom."

Charboda asked "What did you see?"

"Nothing! I was given job to clean floors, so I couldn't enter inside. But I could clearly hear his voice!" he said confidently.

Charboda nodded his head then we returned to our class rooms.

 Charboda said "The first sign was written one day before the pencils disappeared!"

"And rest of them?" I asked.

"I suppose, after the break time!" he said.

"It means that first day the culprit was bit careful!" I said

"You can say that way, but he was not that careful." Pointing to the sweeper behind Charboda said "He heard his noise, and we got our clue." Charboda then paused then told me "Now we have to find, who bunked the classes on 12th April."

Some kind of coincidence happened in the computer period when we were sitting. My left side was Charboda and right was Akarsh. Charboda's left was Abhay. We were given an assignment to type an essay on word processor.

When I was writing the essay, Charboda tapped my shoulder, and said "See Abhays's text!"

I saw that Abhay was typing the letters in any other format. "What is it?" I asked.

"Some of the symbols in his text match our signs!" he whispered to me.

I peeped onto his font style it was written as 'Wingdings' on the word pad.

Charboda whispered "We got our cryptic language!"

Later that day after break we two one by one asked teacher to go to the toilet.

Both of us got our language of cryptic and saw the next symbol.

"It means 'penc'." He told me.

"I think we are few steps ahead of the culprit!" I said.

"We should not be over confident because the culprit always.......always tries to be one step ahead of us!" he said.

"We better know that the word would be 'Pencil'." I said.

"Yes, but maybe he is trying to tell us something!" he said.

"Then we should wait and see!" I said.

The next three days no pencils were stolen because whole class didn't have any, but the word at last completed.

And then something arrived in our bag packs! There was a note in Charboda's backpack,when we unfolded. It was a computer typed note. For my readers convenience the letter was like this:-

"Dear Nikhil, I know that both of  you are trying solve the puzzle with my signs; you have unlocked the secret behind it But the game doesn't over with it. Now I shall give you a deal or maybe.....a warning. Solve my given puzzle in 7 days otherwise one of your beloved class mates might face a tragic accident!! And I know you wouldn't want this happen. And if luckily you have solved the puzzle in seven days then I will return the pencils to all of your class mates."

"I think the culprit is trying to fool us!" I said.

"No! First the disappearance of pencils, then the seven signs and now this note! The culprit now...knows about us! He is trying to scare us by giving us this note! He/She would be more careful next time. We need to find the next puzzle before 7 days!" Charboda said excitedly.

"Oh gosh! new beginning!" I said.

"Yep!" Charboda told calmly.

I shrugged my shoulders. I didn't say anything and folded the paper.

.......