'The Mystery of the Missing Album' by Vinay

Check out how a trio of friends get hold of a missing stamp album!

The Mystery of the Missing Album

In a small village on the borders of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka lived three best friends - Mohan, Akash and Veeresh. Mohan and Akash were studying in 5th grade, and Veeresh was in 6th grade at the local school. The trio could be seen roaming around the village apart from school hours. They loved solving small lost and found cases in the neighbourhood, and even the police were baffled by their shrewdness at such a tender age.

One day, Yogesh, a distant relative of Akash and Veeresh, comes to stay with them. They knew that Yogesh had a hobby of collecting rare stamps. The next morning, a tense Yogesh was searching his baggage. Mohan just then entered Akash and Veeresh’s house. He saw the commotion in the house and learned that Yogesh’s rarest collection of stamp albums was missing!

Now, the Sherlock Holmes in the trio sparked up. Akash thought that Yogesh might have kept it in his native home, but Yogesh confirmed that it was in his hand baggage when he boarded the train to reach the village. So, they started rounding up possible suspects. They knew only two people who had the ability and notion to acquire a stamp album in the village. They were Jonathan and Mani, who knew the value of stamps. Jonathan was a rich man, a philatelist, with a vast collection of rare stamps. Mani was the local post delivery boy and also a philatelist. He used to get stamps from the local villagers from the letters they got.

So now the boys started their inquiry with Jonathan. Jonathan’s house was in the next street from their home. Mohan asked Jonathan if he was at home last night. Jonathan said he had just come back from a family trip to Kodaikanal.

The boys knew Mani well and went to the post office to enquire. They learnt that Mani was in the railway station to collect postal letters the previous night. Mani was busy sorting letters to dispatch them. In between the heaps of unsorted letters, Yogesh found his album. They learnt that someone who found the album on the platform had dropped it in the postbox. Mani, who collected the letters, had helped them solve the problem. They thanked Mani, and Yogesh had his album at last. 

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