The Adventures of Charlotte Calms - The Turly Christmas Mystery

Chapter 1

Emma Bustle lived in a small American town called Turly. It was a beautiful place. In autumn, the trees turned orange and yellow. In winter a white blanket made of snow covered the colourful houses and people could ride sleighs.

Emma was a young teacher who enjoyed winter for several reasons: one because she loved having snowball fights and riding sleighs with her school colleagues, secondly because she adored hot chocolate in front of a fire after skiing, and above all because of Christmas.

The 1^st of December, Emma brought an Advent Calendar to the high school where she taught English to seventeen year olds. She took it to her classroom and the teenagers thought that it was super cool and that she was a fun teacher.

When the bell rang Emma made her way to the staff room to get her coffee. In the corridor she bumped into her colleague Mark, Mark Moody.

“Hi Mark, what are you teaching today?” asked Emma.

“Oh, I have wood technology. By the way I have Lucas, didn’t you give him detention?”

“Yes, but I really think he got mad and I’m not sure how he’ll be next time I teach him. Do you get along with him?”

“Yes, but anyway I have to leave, I’ll be late! See you later.”

“Bye!”

Emma thought what a good friend Mark was and how helpful he could be.

She took her coffee and worried about Lucas: she was teaching him in one hour.

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Chapter 2

The next day, the post man delivered three letters to her apartment: the first one was about the party that was happening in town, the second one was her friend coming over and the third was a strange letter. She finished reading the first and second one but when she arrived at the third, she looked at it closely. It had small letters cut from a newspaper, and it was not signed – basically it was anonymous. Emma wondered if it might be kids playing around and making fun of her. She scrumpled it up and threw it in the bin.

She drove to school very carefully in the heavy snow, thinking what she might say to Mark about her unusual letter. As she walked into the staff room hoping to find Mark she passed the pigeon holes and spotted a similar letter on the top of her pile of mail. She felt like she was in a roller coaster and she could feel her heart beating in her ears. She snatched the letter from the pigeon hole and called the Calm Detective Agency, using the card which had been delivered to her house. They agreed to have a meeting straight away.

She ran to the carpark, she saw the car and noticed something different but she did not know what. She looked closer and finally figured out what was wrong. The bottom of all four wheels were flattened! The letter had been right. Terrible things were happening to the young teacher.

She phoned a second time and the CDA agreed to send Charlotte Calms, a fifteen-year-old girl detective who could come into the class without causing any suspicion.

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Chapter 3

Emma wondered how this healthy young girl could solve all her problems. Charlotte seemed a bit too young and her ripped jeans made her look like all the other students. But Charlotte seemed very professional as she investigated the car. As soon as Charlotte arrived at the car park, she noticed foot prints in the snow around the tyres of Emma’s car. She analysed the footprints, measured the size and width. Emma watched closely as Charlotte tested the clues about who had vandalised the car. Charlotte stood up and came to Emma.

“I’ve found several clues,” declared the young detective. “The first clue is that there are male footprints, size 10, circling your car. So, it is definitely a man. The second clue is there are nails in the tyres. I am going to take them out and have a closer look at them.”

Charlotte could hardly take them out of the tyres because they had been fired with a nail gun. She managed to take one out after a lot of pulling. She looked at it and succeeded in finding the name of the store the nails had been bought from.

“Alright, I’ve got all the clues from this location, now we need to talk.”

Emma took Charlotte into a private meeting room and locked the door behind her. She showed her the letter she had with her.

“This might be helpful for you, this is why I called you. I ignored the first one thinking it was kids playing around but when I received this one at school, I got very worried.”

Charlotte opened the letter and told Emma her thoughts.

“This letter isn’t written, it is made from cut newspaper letters, there are also spelling mistakes which could suggest that the sender is uneducated… Also in between the glued letters, there is a single strand of dark brown hair,” announced Charlotte. “I have now discovered two more clues. Have you got an idea of the suspects?”

“Yes, I think it might be this strange man that always seems to be spying on me, he also seems to be following me everywhere. It could also be Lucas wanting to take revenge on me after I gave him detention. Sometimes I even think that it might be Mark but I quickly forget about that because Mark is almost my best friend… it is just that a lot of the clues you found seem to point to him… but then I realise that it might be one of the other suspects too. I am really suspicious about the creepy man and Lucas.”

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Chapter 4

The 3^rd of December, Charlotte wanted to know more about the strange man. She drove to Emma’s house guessing that the creepy man would be around. Emma welcomed her.

“Would you like a cup of tea?” asked Emma.

“Yes, I would be delighted,” replied Charlotte.

While Emma was preparing the tea, Charlotte was looking at all the pictures in front of the window.

“Tea is ready! What are you looking at?” asked Emma, looking over Charlotte’s shoulder.

“Oh, I was just looking…”

“That’s it! He’s outside, right now! That is him, the creepy man, outside the window.”

“OK, I have a plan, he is going to look at us and we are going to pretend that we do not know that he is looking at us. When he is on his way home because he will obviously go back to his house, I will follow him and try to at least know his name.”

A few minutes later, Charlotte went to the toilet, she figured out that there was a window. She stood on the toilet and saw that the creepy man was heading somewhere else. Charlotte guessed that he was on his way home.

“Like where else can he go?” she whispered to herself.

She ran to the kitchen and asked Emma if she could borrow her bike. Guess what the answer was, it was yes of course, so Charlotte jumped on the bike and followed the man who was on his way home.

When the man entered his house, Charlotte discovered that he was holding a book and a pen. Charlotte thought that he might have planed something strange. When he was taking his shoes off he put the note book and pen down. On the note book there was his name.

“I got it; his name is Tom Seeker!” She was so cheerful that on her way to Emma’s house she almost fell!

She announced the news to Emma. Emma was feeling a bit better although she still wanted to vomit.

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Chapter 5

Charlotte wanted to go speak to Emma’s student Lucas, to see if she might get several clues from him. When Charlotte arrived at the school she demanded to speak to Lucas. She brought Lucas to the same private meeting room Emma had brought to her a few days ago.

“Do you know why you are here Mr Cross?” asked Charlotte.

“No, but if it is because of my…”

“Wait, what was that noise, it sounded like windows breaking. Run to the lesson you are supposed to be in now, I will talk to you later,” proclaimed Charlotte.

Charlotte ran to the staff room trying to get some help from the other teachers but when she entered the staff room there was no one there! She ran to Emma’s English room, but it was locked. She remembered that Emma had given her a key to her classroom. When she opened the door, Emma was not there, but there was a newly-broken window and papers everywhere. It looked like Emma had just been robbed! Charlotte quickly called Emma.

“Emma, where are you?”

“I’ve just been to the hairdresser and what is so urgent? Calm down.”

“Well your classroom has just been robbed!”

“Is this a kind of joke, I locked the door, there is no possible way that a person could enter my classroom!”

“Oh, well the windows, there is glass everywhere on the floor, oh and the papers on your shelves and books are all on the floor! At least there is one piece of good news: Lucas cannot be one of the suspects because I was talking to him while all that happened. This afternoon I will go ask the head headteacher if Mark was teaching this morning.”

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Chapter 6

Charlotte drove to school with Emma and walked to the headteacher’s office. She knocked, knock, knock, knock.

“Come in. Oh, Ms Bustle, has there been a problem with a student?”

“Oh, no this is just Charlotte Calms, she helps me, because I have a few problems. In fact, could you help me please?”

“Oh sure, how could I help you?”

“Has Mr Moody been teaching this morning?

“No.”

“Has he been teaching the last few days?”

“No, unfortunately he has not been teaching the last few days but he sent me an email and said that he would be coming to teach this afternoon.”

“Would I be able to talk to him while he is teaching wood technology?” asked Charlotte.

“Yes, sure.”

“OK. Thank you very much.”

They burst out of the door. The head teacher was wondering why they were so excited.

“I am going to talk to him,” exclaimed Charlotte.

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Chapter 7

Mark was teaching wood technology. The headteacher knocked. Knock, knock, knock.

“Come in” exclaimed Mark, a bit worried.

“Charlotte and Emma would like to talk to you,” said the headteacher.

“Ok, sure.”

The head teacher brought them into a different meeting room. They talked and talked but Charlotte realised as they were discussing, that he knew a bit more than he should.

Once they had finished talking, Charlotte had to say something very important to Emma.

“I am really sorry, and I don’t want hurt your feelings, but I realised that Mark was implicated in almost all the clues I found, like the dark brown hair stuck in the anonymous letter. He has dark brown hair.”

“Yes, but it is also the same colour hair as Lucas and Tom.”

“Wait, I did not finish, the nails in the tyres, he is the wood technology teacher. He is the one that uses the nail guns and he is the one that buys…”

“And he is the one that buys his nails in that shop, the name of the shop that you found on the nail you managed to pull out,” finished Emma.

“Exactly, and Mark was not teaching while all this happened.”

“But what happened to Tom then?” asked Emma

“I guess we were wrong and just too frightened of people looking around and trying to discover the world,” replied Charlotte.

Charlotte said to Emma that they really had to explain this whole anonymous letter story to the head teacher and show all their proof that it was Mark. He could that to other teachers or even to students.

So, all happened as they had planned.

“I can’t believe Mark did this to me, he was my best friend,” cried Emma.

“Don’t worry now, it is over now.”

Emma took the bus home with Charlotte. She was still crying.

“Bye, thank you so much for all your help, I would have never made it without you,” exclaimed Emma.

“No worries, but if you need help, well, just call the CDA again but I hope you won’t need to,” added Charlotte. The door of the bus closed, and they had to leave each other once and for all.

When Charlotte came to her house, she found a little female dog that was about four years old. She had no clue what the dog was doing in her house, maybe someone left it for a present or it had escaped from its house. So, she just opened the door and let her out. Then she saw Tom. He ran to that dog and said,

“That is my dog, where was she? I was searching for her for days!”

“Wait, so this whole time you were searching for your dog!”

“Of course, what else did you think I was doing?”

“I thought this whole time you were spying on me but why were you always around my house then?”

“Well I knew she had to be somewhere around here. I am sorry if you took me for a weird man trying to spy on you.”

“No it’s my fault, I am sorry for all of it, I was just scared. Anyway you found your dog and that is what maters,” finished Emma.

The end

By Cookie.07