The Mappleshire mysteries

 

The Vanishing Violin

By Elijah Cornagie

Mappleshire had always been a quiet town, the kind where everyone knew everyone else’s business, yet nothing ever seemed to happen. That was until the morning the legendary Stradivarius vanished from the Mappleshire Music Hall. The priceless violin had been the centerpiece of the annual autumn recital, and now it was gone.

Detective Alistair Gray arrived to find the hall in disarray. Chairs were overturned, sheet music scattered, and the faint scent of cedar lingered in the air. Among the witnesses were:

• Eleanor Whitby, the hall’s caretaker, who claimed she had seen “shadows moving” late at night.

• Victor Langley, a rival musician, whose resentment of the recital winner was no secret.

• Marian Holt, a young prodigy, who had been entrusted with the violin the night before.

• Reverend Collins, who had been supervising the hall’s security as part of his civic duties.

Gray began piecing together the puzzle. The lock on the display case was intact, but there were faint scratches on the floor, suggesting someone had moved the case without opening it conventionally. A small piece of torn sheet music lay near the case, a page from the recital program.

Hours of questioning revealed subtle contradictions. Eleanor claimed she had never left the hall overnight, but a footprint outside the side door suggested otherwise. Victor insisted he was home, yet a witness saw him lurking near the hall’s rear entrance. Marian admitted to practicing late, but could not account for the missing violin. The Reverend appeared unusually nervous when Gray asked about the hall’s security protocols.

After careful investigation, Gray discovered that the missing violin had been hidden inside a hollow compartment in an old piano, moved there by someone hoping to claim insurance. But the question of motive remained — why risk such a crime during the busiest night of the year?

The answer came unexpectedly: the violin contained a small, family heirloom jewel, long thought lost, and the thief had planned to sell it discreetly. The culprit was Reverend Collins, whose family had once owned the jewel. His attempts to cover the theft with misdirection had nearly succeeded, but subtle inconsistencies — a nervous glance, a misplaced key, and the sheet music — revealed the truth.

The violin was returned to the hall, and the jewel safely recovered. Mappleshire breathed a sigh of relief.

Epilogue

Even as the town settled back into its usual quiet rhythm, an unease lingered. At the stroke of midnight, the old clock in the town square, silent for decades, began striking unevenly, each toll echoing like a warning. Detective Gray, standing in the fog, could not shake the feeling that another mystery was already unfolding somewhere in the shadows of Mappleshire.

The town seemed calm, but beneath its streets and within its darkened corners, another secret waited to surface.