The 7 Signs

Chapter 10

Day 1 27rd April (Tuesday)

Today was going to be the last day and the day when the real pencil thief would do something to Utkarsh Our classmate. Yesterday in the evening I tried to call Charboda if he had got any links. But unfortunately his phone was switched off.

When I was standing by my bus stop I saw Charboda coming towards me. As he took my side he greeted me 'Good morning'. His voice was feeling confident and happy.

'I hope he has the answer to the questions!' I said to myself and prayed to god.

In the bus he didn't discuss anything about the case. Whenever I tried to talk, he would change the topic.

When we reached our classroom it was half filled with our classmates. Teacher wasn't there yet. Charboda told me whether the three suspects were there or not. I stood up and looked for them. All seemed to be there sitting on their respective benches.

When our class teacher entered and we all stood up to wish him 'good morning', Then I heard Charboda say "Good morning sirrrrrrrrrrrrrr!" which was quickly identified by our class teacher.

"Who said that!" he shouted.

"I sir!" said Charboda raising his hands.

"Come here! Come here I said!" he shouted angrily.

The whole class laughed, I was shocked. Obediently Charboda left his seat and went towards our teacher.

"Why did you do it!" teacher asked.

"To displease you!" he answered class laughed again.

"Go and stand outside!" shouted teacher.

"Sir please wait for a second! I have other reason to come here!" Charboda said assuringly.

"What is that?" teacher asked.

Charboda whispered something in teacher's ears and after that, the teacher's anger drastically changed.

"Ok! Go and speak" teacher said in agreeable tone and sat on his chair.

We all were shocked by this drama. Charboda stood on the center silently looking at us.

"Good morning my fellow classmates, I am Charboda.... (Everyone laughed) the Detective! And you must be thinking why I did that Good morning stuff. Just to come here and speak....Well, (Charboda started on moving left and right) I and my friend Aditya Tripathi were solving a case related to the pencil theft that you all had previously experienced. And happily we got seriously good number of clues (he paused). As those remarkably good pencils were being stolen by an unknown person. Somebody was making signs in the boy's bathroom, first with crayons and then with paint, each sign was made when few pencils were stolen by the culprit. So the culprit had prove that he was making the signs. They were no ordinary sighs, they were written by some fonts like Wingdings and other sign fonts which are present in the computer in the computer lab. And there is a clue that after 7 days the words were complete!"

Charboda eyed each suspect keenly then he continued "After seven days the signs stopped and I and my friend got a message."

Charboda took a chalk and wrote the first seven signs and then their answer:-

PENCILS

Then he returned and continued speaking "After this, me and my friend became a main targets of that culprit!" He started and showed the class the typed warning that was given by the culprit something bad would happen to one of our classmates. There was repeated whispering going on in the class.

Abhay asked "This text is typed and it could also be written by you, Charboda."

"Yes, you are right Abhay but the typed text and the next seven signs by the culprit show that it was not typed by me and also I am not that foolish to bring this note to you all without proper proofs!" He answered confidently. Abhay sat down then and then

Charboda continued "Then he gave us a puzzle to solve which I said earlier were the puzzle containing seven letters but now with different sign of font and it was unjumbled." Charboda wrote the following signs on the board and then its answer 'Utkarsh'.

Utkarsh was shocked and said "No, It's wrong!"

Charboda said "Let me prove it to you!"

He opened the smart board beside our black board and turned it on. Then he wrote the signs with the MT Extra font then selected all and changed it into English font.

S A T U K R H

U T K A R S H

Utkarsh kept looking at the board and agreed and sat down.

Charboda continued "The first sign on 12th April was written after the school ended and others were written after the lunch break. So the culprit must be the class bunker! So we got the list of all the class bunkers with the help of Mukesh sir As the 6 of them were caught by him."

Charboda gave the sheet to teacher and one by one 6 of them were called. "Now, I got to know that 3 of them were caught first and other three went to the washroom.

The whole class shouted surprisingly.

"Yes and they are Abhishant, Pukul and Darsh." Teacher made non-suspects to sit and the other three to stand. I looked at Rakesh and his expression was of anger. Charboda at last took out the red band from his pocket and showed it to Pukul. "Is it yours?" Pukul was silent but kept and looking at Charboda. "This band was on the place where the signs were written, and the paint used to mark the signs is also imprinted on this band." Charboda said.

Then he came to utkarsh and asked him whose band it was. He tried remembered and told Charboda that it was of Pukul's.

"Are you sure?" I asked.

"Yes, I have seen him wearing it!" said Utkarsh.

"Is it Pukul's?" Charboda shouted in the whole class.

After a few seconds of whispering most of the people nodded 'Yes, it is!'

Charboda kept the band it in his pocket and asked one last question to utkarsh "Were You and Pukul were enemies!"

Utkarsh looked at Pukul in anger and complained to teacher "Sir, one day Pukul threatened me to kill me!"

The teacher looked at Pukul who was crying now.

"Now I only want the answer from you Pukul!" Charboda said.

"He can't do this!" Rakesh shouted. Then looking at Pukul he asked "Did you Pukul? I this fatso (Charboda) telling the truth!!"

Pukul said at last "Charboda is right! I am the Culprit, I stole the pencils!"

Charboda said at last "I got the culprit the case is solved!"

"No it isn't!" I shouted. "Were the pencils?" I asked.

Charboda asked to the teacher "Has this shelf been opened?". "The easiest place to hide the pencils by Pukul, this shelf was close to Pukul's bench so...."As he opened it all the pencils poured out instantly, everyone shouted happily as got their pencils and thanked me and Charboda for it. Then we saw Mukesh sir peeping in our class room.

"You both really were not playing prank with me!" He said and congratulated us for our achievement.

He then told our class teacher to call the parents of Pukul to rusticate him from this school for creating such a blunder. Our respect drastically increased.

Now, nobody called me 'pencil thief' except Ankita who now became the member of our group. Mukesh sir agreed to have friendship with her. Slowly everything was coming back to normal.

But, not for Charboda, He was eagerly waiting for a new adventurous case to come in his hands and be solved. And I still the same boy who will tell you more of such cases in the coming books.

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