The Encyclopedia Brown Encyclopedia

The Browns were waiting in line for Fiona Slocum’s concert. Slocum was Chief Brown’s favorite country western singer. While waiting in line, the three discussed Slocum’s career. That’s where we learned that her first album was successful, but she took some time off after that tour and that this was her comeback tour.

Encyclopedia noticed two police officers heading towards them. The officers told Chief Brown that they were needed. The three were escorted backstage where they were introduced to Colonel Abner Singleton, Slocum’s manager. He explained that the sheet music for Slocum’s latest songs had been stolen. She was planning on performing the song for the first time that night. She was so distraught over the missing sheet music that she needed to be alone. She refused to see anyone. Due to Slocum’s secretive nature, no one knew anything about these songs; even Singleton himself.

Encyclopedia asked if the songs could be rewritten, but they couldn’t. Slocum wrote the music down, but since her memory wasn’t all that great, she was unable to perform without sheet music. She couldn’t even perform songs that she had done hundreds of times before without sheet music.

I’m no doctor, but that seems like a terrible condition. She seems to have some serious brain condition where she has absolutely no muscle memory. It makes me wonder how she was even able to become a successful musician if she couldn’t play any of her music from memory.

Singleton told Chief Brown that there was one suspect. His name was Chuck and he had followed Slocum from city to city. Singleton admitted that Chuck hadn’t done anything illegal. So basically, Chuck was only guilty of being a fan.

Singleton begged Chief Brown to find the sheet music as soon as possible. He said that without her new love songs, Slocum may not get the comeback that she wanted.

Encyclopedia asked how he knew they were love songs if only Slocum knew what the songs were about. Singleton knew that he had been caught. He had heard that Slocum had wanted to fire him as her manager, so Singleton had taken the sheet music. He had hoped that if he was the hero that found the music, he would preserve his job.

Okay, I get that part. He wanted to keep his job. I don’t understand why the police were there.

A singer was claiming that music, that only she saw, was missing. There was no evidence of a break-in or any other wrongdoing. This doesn’t sound like theft, it sounds like the singer just misplaced the music. This doesn’t seem all that out of the ordinary because we’ve already established that Fiona has exceptionally shitty memory. So getting the police involved at that point would be like me calling 911 because I couldn’t remember where I put my keys.

But let’s say that this story takes place in a town where the local police force has nothing better to do and are totally fine with wasting their resources (read: Idaville). That doesn’t explain why Singleton was being helpful to the police.

This is the guy who stole the music and whose plan revolved around him being the one to find the music. Why would the guy whose plan revolved on no police involvement get the the police? Even if Slocum told Singleton to get the police, there was nothing stopping him from lying and saying he did because he was holing herself up in her dressing room. 

If Singleton couldn’t even do this properly, it’s a wonder why Slocum didn’t fire him sooner.

Let’s pretend this wasn’t an inside job and let’s pretend the Idaville PD’s only way of solving cases was hoping Chief Brown’s young son didn’t pick up on someone accidentally giving too much information. What kind of investigation would the police be able to launch if the one person who had access to the music locked herself in a room and refused to be talked to?

Yeah, nothing in this story makes any sense.

Chief Brown was distracted for yet another dinner, because of a case involving a theft at the Idaville Museum. A one-foot-tall statue of the Roman god Mercury was stolen from the museum after it had been closed for the night. Mrs. Brown asked if the museum had security cameras or an alarm system. They did, but there were still three employees inside, so the alarm system had not been armed yet. Someone had shut the cameras off after everyone but the three employees had left.

The three employees being suspected were the Curator of Antiquities, the security guard and the janitor. The curator would be the one of the three who knew how much the statue was worth, but he claimed to have had no idea how to turn the security cameras off. The security guard did know how to shut the cameras off, but he was nowhere near the control room where the switch for the cameras was. The janitor claimed to know nothing about art.

Chief Brown didn’t arrest anyone because each suspect was each other’s alibi. The security guard saw the curator working in his office and saw the janitor washing the floor in the lobby. And both of them saw the janitor rolling the pail away with the mop over his shoulder.

That was a sufficient alibi according to Chief Brown? They saw each other at some point? That doesn’t really work for me. They saw each other working and then went on about their business. It wasn’t as if they were with each other the entire night? Who’s to say that one of them didn’t steal the statue directly after being seen?

Encyclopedia was able to go beyond criticizing his father’s poor police work and was able to figure out who actually stole the statue. He thought it was odd that the janitor, the man whose job it was to keep the floors clean, would carry the mop over his shoulder. That would cause the wet mop to drip on the floor. Why not keep the mop in the pail? Because, according to Encyclopedia’s theory, the janitor had the statue in the pail and there wasn’t room for both the statue and the mop.

How did the janitor get the statue out of the museum? Did he roll the pail all the way home? And then I suppose the janitor’s plot was to find someone who knew the value of the statue who was shady enough to knowingly buy a piece that was stolen from the museum.

I also like how Chief Brown automatically gave the janitor a free pass because he said he knew nothing about art. He wouldn’t need to know anything about art to know that the statue was worth something. It’s a museum. I think it would be a safe assumption to say that everything in the museum is valuable, otherwise it wouldn’t be worth displaying in a museum. It’s not like a museum would display a lot of inexpensive crap to trick those would-be thieves who don’t know anything about art.

Chief Brown had just picked up Encyclopedia from the library when the police radio came alive. A robbery was in progress at the Den of Antiquities. Chief Brown, unsure the nature of the robbery or if anyone was armed, went straight to the scene with his 10-year-old son.

When they arrived, they saw shop owner Roger Cuthbert standing out in front of his store, holding young junk collector Winslow Brant by the arm. Cuthbert was claiming that he had caught Winslow in the act. Chief Brown asked Cuthbert to let Winslow go and suggested that everyone went inside so that they could discuss this with civility.

Inside, Cuthbert explained that he had closed up shop for the day. He had more work to do, so he left to get some coffee. When he returned, he saw Winslow standing in front of the store and that the storefront window was broken. Cuthbert noticed that a set of three medallions, together worth thousands of dollars, had been stolen. The Browns looked and saw the sidewalk covered in broken glass.

Winslow admitted that he was in the store earlier that day and that he was interested in the medallions, but he didn’t steal them. Chief Brown asked Winslow to empty his pockets. Winslow complied, but that did not produce the medallions.

Cuthbert wasn’t convinced. He thought that maybe Winslow had stashed them somewhere, or that he was working with someone else and his partner had them. Already, we know that Cuthbert was lying. He said he caught Winslow in the act, but he obviously didn’t. If he had, Winslow would have still had the medallions on him.

Remember that time when Bugs Meany claimed that he had caught Encyclopedia “red-handed,” and Encyclopedia’s entire defense was, “actually, he used that term incorrectly”? That, for some reason, worked. Here, Cuthbert said he had caught a child in the act, and no one batted an eye despite the fact that he was obviously lying.

Chief Brown changed gears and asked if anything else was missing. Cuthbert didn’t know, but it looked like the only thing that was disturbed was the display case where the medallions were being kept. Cuthbert went back to pinning blame on Winslow and went off with a tirade. When he was done, he excused himself so that he could get a piece of plywood to board up the broken window.

Cuthbert disappeared to the back of the store and Chief Brown closed his notebook. “It doesn’t look good, Cuthbert.” Winslow tried to defend himself saying that he hadn’t stolen anything, but Chief Brown already made his decision.

Apparently, the only evidence the police needed was the fact that he had been near the store when the store owner discovered that the window was broken. It was Chief Brown’s job to close cases, not to use common sense, logic or police work to make sure an innocent boy wasn’t blamed for a crime.

Encyclopedia finally spoke up. The broken glass from the window was on the sidewalk, which meant that the window had been broken from the inside. The only person who could have done that was Cuthbert.

It turned out that Cuthbert faked the robbery of his own store, going so far as to break the window for insurance money. We got tricked here, because normally the insurance fraud stories include someone conspicuously mentioning that the item in question was insured.

Since Winslow had been in the store earlier and Cuthbert knew he was interested in the medallions, Cuthbert decided to just try to put the fake robbery on this child, collect insurance money and then sell the medallions.

Any decent adult in Cuthbert’s situation would look at Winslow and think, “Hey, here’s a kid who likes miscellaneous treasures, and I’m a guy who owns a store that sells that sort of thing. In a way, we’re kindred spirits. I should encourage him to come in more often. Maybe I could teach a few things. Hell, maybe he could become a valuable customer in the future. At the very least, as an adult, I should try to set a good example.”

No Cuthbert saw Winslow and thought, “Hey, here’s a kid who likes miscellaneous treasures, and I’m a guy who owns a store that sells that sort of thing. I should frame him for a fake robbery so that I can commit insurance fraud.” So far, everyone we’ve met in Idaville with the name Cuthbert has shown themselves to be a total dick.

And I’d like to reiterate the point that Chief Brown almost arrested a boy despite the complete lack of evidence.

The Brown Detective Agency had an unlikely customer one morning; Bugs Meany. He was carrying a carton of eggs. He needed Encyclopedia to guard the eggs and to bring them to the intersection of Main and Elm Streets at 1 p.m. He explained that he’d ask one of his fellow Tigers, but they were all busy.

Encyclopedia opened the carton and it didn’t seem like there was anything special about them; it was a dozen normal looking eggs. He asked why Bugs needed him to bring those specific eggs to that specific location at that specific time, but Bugs answered that it was personal and it wasn’t important for Encyclopedia to know any of that for the job.

When Bugs left, Sally expressed her disbelief and said that she was sure something was up. Encyclopedia, whose naivety dripped through his pores, suggested that Bugs was trying to turn over a new leaf.

Encyclopedia showed up where he was supposed to and soon found out that, yep, it was a trick. Bugs appeared with an unnamed police officer and told some story about how he had seen Encyclopedia carrying a carton of eggs. He said that Encyclopedia looked suspicious, so he followed him and watched as he threw two eggs at windows of a house. Bugs said that Encyclopedia did that to create business for himself, so that his victims would hire him to find out who had done it.

Bugs even pulled out a bag that had pieces of the eggshell as evidence. I’m not sure how that would be evidence of anything, it wasn’t as if the police would be able to match the shells Bugs had with the eggs Encyclopedia had. Bugs’ stupidity knows no limits.

Encyclopedia pointed out that if he had just egged someone’s house, there would have been eggs missing from his carton. Since he was carrying a full carton, it couldn’t have been him. And since Bugs said he had followed him the whole time, Encyclopedia couldn’t have replaced those eggs without him knowing about it.

Bugs confessed to trying to frame Encyclopedia and he “had to clean both the windows at the house as punishment.” Well, yeah. I should freakin’ hope so. Someone egged that innocent person’s home. Either Bugs did it himself or he happened to have found a house that someone had egged and decided to use that fact for his latest attempt to try to frame Encyclopedia. The latter seems pretty far-fetched, so that means that Bugs egged this house.

His only punishment was that he had to clean up the mess that he made himself? Did he get any punishment for framing an innocent person? Or lying to police? How about for egging someone’s house specifically to lie to police about it and frame an innocent person? Extremely lax punishment like this is the very reason why Bugs keeps pulling this shit.

Chief Brown had yet another case he was helpless to solve on his own, so he gave it Encyclopedia to take a swing at it. A robber had hit Terrence’s Stamp Store. I hope that tip of the hat to actor Terence Stamp was on purpose. It seems like an odd celebrity to make a reference to in a book for children, but I suppose when an author writes about a town hit with as many instances of stamp thievery as Idaville, a Terence Stamp joke would be inevitable.

Ten stamps, together worth thousands of dollars, were taken from the store. He took the most valuable stamps that were on display. Three of them were from Europe and six were from the U.S. The other one was an ordinary stamp, the kind used every day to mail a letter. Terrence reported that nothing else was taken from the store, but that the stationery on his desk had been disturbed. He didn’t know if any of the stationery had been taken; he was more concerned about the stamps.

Red Finster was spotted near the store soon after the crime. Chief Brown explained that Finster was “known to fence stolen goods.” That’s kind of an odd way of putting that. I would expect Chief Brown to say “he has a criminal record,” but he didn’t say that. Instead, he said that Finster was “known” to have done that; which implies that the police knew about it, but never arrested Finster for it.

Finster claimed that he was innocent, and the stamps weren’t on him. Finster gave the police permission to search his home without a police warrant, but they couldn’t find them. Chief Brown also said that it was unlikely that Finster was working with someone, because he had always worked alone in the past.

Finster was still in police custody, but Chief Brown knew that he was going to have to release him the following day if the stamps didn’t turn up. I’m not sure of the constitutionality of holding a guy despite the fact that they had acknowledged that there was no evidence that he was the suspect other than his past and the fact that he happened to be near the scene of a crime. I’m not saying that sort of thing doesn’t happen in real life; I’m saying it’s a dick move.

Encyclopedia figured it out. The Terrence’s stationery at his desk was disturbed because Finster was looking for an envelope to mail the loot to himself. That is why the tenth stamp that he stole was a regular one. The following day, the found the envelope Finster had sent himself in his mail, and they were able to arrest him.

That means that Terrence put his regular mailing stamps on display with the valuable stamps. Shouldn’t the regular stamps be kept with his stationery? That’s like Bath & Body Works keeping the soap for the employee restroom on the shelf next to the merchandise.

And I guess the police got lucky that the envelope got delivered to Finster’s house the next day. I suppose it wasn’t impossible, since it was probably going within the same ZIP code. There was still no guarantee, though.

I wonder if the police were actually going to charge Finster this time around, or just release him as they appeared to have done in the past.

Saturday morning, Encyclopedia and Chief Brown went to the high school to watch a track meet. The meet was between Idaville High School and Glenn City High School. It was a foregone conclusion that Idaville was going to kick serious butt at the meet, but people poured in to watch the meet anyway because of the rivalry between Fleet Fletcher and Baldy Jones, who both ran for Idaville.

Baldy earned his name because he shaved his head before each meet, thinking that a bald head helped him run faster. It wasn’t explained how Fleet got his name, but I’m guessing because he was fleet of foot. The meet went on with Baldy and Fleet splitting four of their races.

After the meet, when Encyclopedia and his father were walking to the car, they heard an argument coming from the locker room. The argument had drawn a small crowd, implying that people can walk into the high school locker room and watch teens change their clothes.

Encyclopedia and his father pushed their way to the front of the small crowd attracted that the argument had attracted. (This implies that high-school aged boys were now showering and changing their clothes in plain sight of this 10-year-old boy that was just able to wander in.) When Fleet noticed that Chief Brown was there, he told him to arrest Baldy for taking his stamp collection.

Here, we thought that this was going to be another mystery about someone cheating or sabotaging their rival during the meet, but it turned out to be another case of stamp-theft. Is anyone else concerned about the stamp-theft or the coin-theft rates in this town? It seems to be way above the national average. Idaville is not a friendly place for philatelists or numismatists.

Chief Brown broke the argument up and asked them to tell him what had happened. Fleet explained that after showing and getting dressed, he went into the coach’s office. When he came out, he saw Baldy leaving the locker room with Fleet’s gym bag. Baldy broke in to explain that it was his gym bag and he knew it was because it was holding his stamp collection. Fleet claimed that it was his stamp collection.

So both were claiming to have kept their stamp collection in their gym bag. Why would anyone keep their supposedly valuable stamp collection in their gym bag along with their sweaty socks? Fleet explained that there was a stamp collector in town for just that day, and he wanted to see if he was interested in buying some of his rare stamps.

That still doesn’t explain why the collection would be kept in the same bag as the smelly gym clothes and a damp towel. Also, I’m not sure why the stamp collector needed to be seen in person. This story was published in 2009. Didn’t the Internet never make it to Idaville?

Both of them admitted that the bag didn’t have an ID tag, so there was no way for an outside observer to know whose bag it was. Chief Brown opened the bag and removed the items. There was the stamp collection protected in a plastic folder, a damp towel, soap, deodorant, hair gel and a clean pair of socks.

Chief Brown was puzzled. He didn’t know what to do, so he told them that they would have to wait there until this was all sorted out. Fleet didn’t like the sound of that because that meant he was likely to have missed the stamp collector.

Encyclopedia told his dad to give the bag to Fleet. He knew it belonged to Fleet because it had hair gel in it. If Baldy shaved his head before every meet, then he would have had no need to carry hair gel with him.

Except not really. We know that Baldy shaved his head before every meet. That implies that he let his hair grow at some points, either between meets or during the off-season? While he may not need hair gel in his bag during meets that doesn’t mean he never used it. Who’s to say he doesn’t keep the hair gel in his bag for if and when he needed it? Or maybe he just never got around to removing the gel from his bag; kind of like how I still have an expired library card from a city I don’t live in anymore in my wallet.

Okay, let’s say for argument’s sake the bag did belong to Fleet and that Baldy was the thief. Was Baldy’s plan to take Fleet’s bag and leave his own? How did Baldy know what was in Fleet’s bag? Did Fleet tell Baldy that he had valuable stamps in his gym bag or did Baldy just assume that Fleet was carrying the stamp collection in his bag because keeping stamps in your gym bag is totally normal?

Say what you will about this Baldy asshole, at least he didn’t expose his 10-year-old son to naked teenagers.

Rico Ayres’ family had recently moved from Glenn City to the house next to Bugs Meany’s. Rico had invited Encyclopedia over to show off his insect collection, but Encyclopedia noticed that the whole time he was there, Rico spent most of the time showing off his grandmother’s moonstone ring. He also noticed that Rico kept nervously looking out of his window towards Bugs’ house. However, when Encyclopedia asked him about Bugs, Rico said that he hadn’t met the neighbors yet. When Encyclopedia left, he noticed Bugs looking out of the window, watching him.

As Encyclopedia was recounting the story to Sally the following day, a police car pulled up Encyclopedia’s driveway. Officer Lopez, Bugs and Rico stepped out of the car. Bugs pointed at Encyclopedia, telling Lopez that he was the one that Bugs saw leaving Rico’s house.

Lopez asked Encyclopedia if he was at Rico’s house the previous night, and Encyclopedia said that he had gone to Rico’s to see his insect collection. When Encyclopedia asked Rico to back his story up, Rico looked at the ground and mumbled about being at Glenn City the night before.

Bugs then told a story of how he had noticed a light from a flashlight going through Rico’s house the previous night. He thought it was suspicious because he knew that Rico’s family was in Glenn City. After watching the house, he noticed someone crawl out of the window onto the back porch. That’s when he recognized the intruder as Encyclopedia.

Lopez broke in to say that an expensive ring was missing from Rico’s family’s house and that they had reason to believe that someone stole it while the family was out. Since a witness put Encyclopedia in the house at that time, that made Encyclopedia a suspect.

Encyclopedia repeated that he was there with Rico, but Rico once again nervously mumbled that he was in Glenn City at the time.

Bugs went on to say that Encyclopedia wasn’t satisfied with ripping the Ayres family off because he then  went to Bugs’ house. Bugs said that he watched Encyclopedia walk over to the window and put his hands right up against the window to get a look inside. Bugs saw that Encyclopedia had a ring on his finger that matched the description of the ring. In a panic to protect his home from this dangerous thief, Bugs turned on a few lights and made a lot of noise. That sent Encyclopedia running.

Lopez was ready to take Encyclopedia downtown so that they could have this discussion with Chief Brown, but Encyclopedia said that that wasn’t going to be necessary. The reason Encyclopedia gave was kind of bullshit in comparison to other evidence that was plainly obvious.

For starters, did Lopez not realize that Rico was clearly nervous about something? While Bugs was up in Encyclopedia’s face, Rico stood back and stayed out of it. Encyclopedia supposedly broke into Rico’s house, shouldn’t Rico be the angry one? No, instead he stared at the ground, kept quiet and said as little as possible. If I was Lopez, I’d wonder what that was all about.

I’d also wonder where Rico’s parents were for all of this. It didn’t seem like they reported the crime. If they did, they seemed strangely disinterested in taking part in the police investigation of the burglary of their own home. It probably would have made more sense to question them first, and it’s obvious that Lopez didn’t do that.

I say that because there seemed to be a conflict as to where Rico was the previous night. Encyclopedia insisted that Rico was with him at the house, but Rico was unconvincingly saying that he was in Glenn City. If Lopez had asked Mr. or Mrs. Ayres, he would know that Rico was lying and that he was home at the time. Then Lopez would have saved himself the trouble accusing his boss’s son of breaking and entering. Instead, Lopez just proved how shitty of a police officer he was.

All of that aside, Encyclopedia somehow cleared his name entirely by refuting the most insignificant detail of Bugs’ story. Bugs said that when Encyclopedia put his hands to his window to peer inside the house, Bugs was able to see the ring that Encyclopedia was wearing. Encyclopedia said that it wouldn’t have been possible for Bugs to see what kind of stone was on the ring because of the angling of his hand – not because it was dark outside, thereby making it impossible to be able to properly describe details of a ring worn on the person trying to peek inside his home.

I don’t know. Light availability aside, if Encyclopedia put his hands to the glass, Bugs could have seen what kind of ring Encyclopedia was wearing, depending on the angle of the hands and the positioning of the ring – two details never revealed. And even if Bugs imagined being able to see the ring, this doesn’t disprove the possibility that Encyclopedia didn’t break into the Ayres’ home and steal a ring. Just because he didn’t appear to have the ring it didn’t mean he didn’t break in.

But since Lopez was convinced that the angle of Encyclopedia’s hand was the one piece of evidence needed to exonerate Encyclopedia, the case was over. Rico then confessed and told Lopez what actually happened.

Bugs pretended to be interested in spiders to get close to Rico. After looking at Rico’s bug collection, Bugs bullied Rico into pretending that Encyclopedia had broken into his home and stolen his family’s jewelry. Because that’s how Bugs’ sociopathic mind worked; new neighbors = I can use them to frame the boy I don’t like for a crime that never happened.

I wonder how Mr. and Mrs. Ayres thought about this – assuming they would eventually find out. They had just moved into this new place and their neighbor’s asshole kid already had Rico lying to the police. It’s not a very nice welcome into Idaville, but it’s the sort of thing the family should probably get used to.

Chief Brown was late coming home one evening because there was trouble down at the convention center. The Philatelic Society was in town and someone had stolen two very rare stamps. The good news was that the stamps had already been recovered. However, the police didn’t know who the thief was. I’m not really sure why it mattered. It wasn’t as if the thief was going to get arrested or anything.

First, let me point out how odd it was that when Chief Brown came home from the convention center, Mrs. Brown’s first question was, “What’s happening at the convention center this week?” and not, “What happened?”

Anyway, a stamp dealer named Mr. Sansbury reported that two stamps issued by the Confederate government that belonged to him were taken. There weren’t a lot of suspects because it wasn’t as if the stamps were on display; he had them locked in a small office. He gave three close friends – all collectors themselves – a key to this office so that they could view the stamps in private. After all three friends were in the office, Sansbury noticed that the stamps were missing.

After searching the three friends and finding nothing, Officer Lopez discovered that someone had pulled up a corner of the carpet and put the stamps there. The thief must have hidden them there to be picked up later, knowing that they were going to be searched.

Oh my goodness. I can’t think of a single way anyone would be able to find out who took these stamps. This is impossible to solve. Oh wait, I just thought of a way. In what order did they see these people see the stamps? Did they all see the stamps? Then the last person in the office stole the stamps. If, say, the second person stole the stamps, then the third person would have seen that the stamps were missing and alerted Sansbury right away. Since that didn’t happen, then it should be obvious that the third person in the office was the thief.

Okay, I’m realizing there are a few problems with this theory. First, what if the second person and the third person were co-conspirators and the second one actually stole it and the third one just said he did? No wait, why would the third person voluntarily shoulder all of the suspicion?

I suppose the third person could say he never got a chance to get to the office, thereby shifting the suspicion to whoever was the second on in the office. Or the first of second person could have returned after the third person left so that the third person would have been the prime suspect.

Finding out who was in the office last wasn’t 100% foolproof, but it would have been a very reasonable start.

Call it hindsight, but I know how all of this could have been avoided. Sansbury appeared to have told his three friends about these two stamps he had just acquired. He also gave each friend their own copy of a key to the office and told them to view it privately on their own time. Because I know I’d prefer to have my privacy when I’m looking at old stamps.

What Sansbury should have done was gathered his friends and said, “Hey, guess what. I got two Confederate stamps. Come with me and I’ll show you.” And if someone said that that wasn’t a good time, then Sansbury could have said, “Okay, maybe later.”

Since Sansbury was an idiot inexplicably who happened to have had three spare keys to an office in the convention center – which he also had for some reason – our sleuthing needs to go a bit deeper. Chief Brown shared the statements from the three friends.

Mr. Beckman said that he already had the stamps, which Stansbury was able to confirm. Mrs. Dwyer couldn’t believe that a serious stamp collector would hide such valuable stamps on a damp concrete floor where they could be damaged. Chief Brown said that Mr. Patterson had been searching for those two stamps to complete his collection.

Oh sure. To a novice, it looked like Patterson was the guy, but Encyclopedia wasn’t going to be swayed. Instead he asked what kind of carpet was on the floor. Chief Brown answered, “A standard dark blue carpet for a place like the convention center where there’s lots of foot traffic.”

BOOM! Case solved.

Since it was standard carpeting for a place like the convention center, Encyclopedia assumed that that meant that it was wall-to-wall carpet. And only the person who pulled the carpet up knew what was underneath. Therefore, Dwyer gave herself away when she said that she would never hide stamps on a damp concrete floor.

How does that make the case? Dwyer could have easily have assumed that there was concrete under the carpet. It was a convention center, probably built as efficiently as possible within the past few decades. What else would be under the carpet? Marble? I don’t know. Concrete sounds like a very reasonable assumption.

Dwyer confessed – even though she totally could have gotten away with it based on what little evidence the police decided to pursue – and admitted that while she did worry that hiding the stamps under the carpet would damage them, it was worth the risk. It was apparently worth the risk to lose a close friend by stealing from him, and to be painted as a stamp thief among the philatelist community.

By the way, both of these stamps appear to be readily available on eBay for under $10 each. So no part of this entire story seemed worth anyone’s effort.

Encyclopedia and a bunch of his friends were heading to the estate of Ace Harvey. The retired major-league player who had settled in Idaville had invited all of the town’s youth baseball league players to his home for a picnic.

Harvey was most famous for a game-winning catch that he made in the ninth inning of Game 7 of a World Series. It’s explained that his team won the game with just one catch, so I’m guessing that he robbed the other team of a multi-run walk-off homer, as I think that’s the only way a catch could win a game for a team.

Harvey had the ball signed by all of his teammates and kept it for himself, despite the fact that he had gotten several offers from people who wanted to buy it. Encyclopedia and his friends had hoped to be able to see the baseball – especially Billy Turner. Billy had been in a bit of a slump, and he had hoped that holding the famous baseball would cure him of it.

They got to Harvey’s and saw that the baseball was on display in a locked glass case. Billy stared at it.

The party went on, and Harvey spared no expense to make sure that the kids had a good time. After some time had passed, Billy told Encyclopedia that he couldn’t get his mind off of the ball. He asked Encyclopedia if he thought Harvey would let him hold it. Encyclopedia didn’t think holding the ball would end his slump, but it couldn’t hurt to ask.

Some more time passed, and Encyclopedia didn’t think about the exchange he had with Billy until he saw two police cars park in Harvey’s driveway. When he saw his father go inside the house, Encyclopedia went to see what was going on.

Inside, he saw that the display case had been broken and the baseball was gone. There was broken glass around the case and on the pedestal that had held the baseball. He also saw that Harvey was holding onto Billy’s arm and that Billy’s right hand was injured and he was making sure not to get blood on Harvey’s floor. Harvey accused Billy of breaking into the case, taking the ball and hiding it. Billy denied it saying that he had come in to take another look at the ball, but when he got there, it was already gone. He also said that he cut his hand, but he couldn’t really explain why.

Officer Lopez took Billy to the bathroom for some first aid and Chief Brown asked his son for any information. Encyclopedia said that Billy was interested in the ball, but he couldn’t believe that he would steal the ball. Harvey chimed in and said that Billy did take it, though he couldn’t really explain how or when he did it, nor did he know where Billy hid the ball. He added that he was glad that he just had the ball insured.

Chief Brown told Encyclopedia that it didn’t look good for his friend. Encyclopedia took another look at the inside of the case and asked how many people had a key to the display case. Harvey said that only he did. In fact, he would open it for the maid whenever she cleaned the inside.

Encyclopedia then figured out that Billy didn’t take the ball. Harvey broke the case himself to make it look like someone else took it so that he could collect insurance on it. When he saw Billy standing near the case with his hand bleeding, Harvey thought it would be perfect to pin the blame on him. Encyclopedia knew that’s how that happened because there was glass on the pedestal. If someone had broken the glass and taken the ball off of the pedestal, there wouldn’t have been pieces of glass on the pedestal. He must have opened the case, taken the ball, closed it and then broken the glass.

Also, since Billy was bleeding, he probably would have left a trail of blood to the ball’s hiding place. But there was no trail of blood because he hadn’t gone anywhere. Seriously though, I don’t get why Billy’s hand was bleeding. He must have seen the broken glass and thought, “There are no witnesses here, so I should probably just touch this broken glass. That way I could cut myself and maybe even get blamed for whatever happened here.”

How awful was this one-time sports hero? He intended to commit insurance fraud by pretending that his famous baseball was stolen. On top of that, he invited a bunch of children over with the hope that he would be able blame them for the missing item. And when the police came, he lied to the police and threw this poor injured boy – a long-time fan – under the bus.

This is the third consecutive story where an adult was a complete dick to a child. Idaville sucks.

The Browns were sitting around the dinner table, discussing something they had read in the Idaville News. The story was about local butterfly-aficionado, Mrs. Monarch. Her aunt had gotten her interested in butterflies. I don’t know if she got into butterflies because of her last name or if it was just a coincidence. Monarch had a garden filled with the types of flowers that attracted butterflies.

Chief Brown – well-aware that his police force wasn’t competent enough to serve as a proper deterrent to criminals – said that if Monarch were smart, she would put her brooch in a safe-deposit box in the bank. Literally, the very minute he uttered that sentence, the doorbell rang. Officer Lopez was at the door, letting Chief Brown know that, yes, Monarch reported that her brooch had been stolen. According to the report, a masked man sneaked into Monarch’s house while her butterfly club was meeting in her living room.

That’s a pretty ballsy thief. Sneak into a house full of people, steal a brooch and sneak out. I’d have to say, that would be pretty impressive. Unless, of course, it turned out to be a member of the butterfly club that stole the brooch.

Chief Brown and Encyclopedia went to Monarch’s to investigate. When they got there, Encyclopedia checked out the living room where the group had been at the time. A large picture window gave a view of the oak tree in the front yard, though there were no butterflies to be seen. He then remembered that butterflies only flew around in the sunlight. When it was cloudy, they would hide under leaves and on tree bark.

Officer Rand was on the scene and described what had happened for his superior and his superior’s son. He said that Mrs. Sweeney witnessed the crime take place. Since she was the only witness, he had sent the rest of the club home.

Sweeney said that while the group was watching a butterfly settle in for the night, she went upstairs to use the bathroom. When she got to the top of the stairs, she saw a masked man in Monarch’s bedroom. When the thief looked Sweeney in the eye, she just froze. Sweeney said that she saw the thief take the brooch and go out the window, probably climbing down the far side of the tree, which is why no one downstairs saw him. Sweeney then asked if they would be able to catch the bad guy if they found his fingerprints. Chief Brown answered that that would only be helpful if the fingerprints were already on file.

Encyclopedia noticed Rand’s flashlight near the bedroom window. He picked it up and shook a large tree branch that was within reach from the window and shined the light onto it. About a hundred butterflies flew away.

When Chief Brown told Monarch that he would put an alert out to the local jewelry stores to be on the lookout for the brooch, Encyclopedia knew that that wouldn’t be necessary. How did he know?

Well first of all, what kind of thief would break into a house while it was full of people? Like I said earlier, a ballsy one. However, we’re supposed to believe that this thief also climbed down a tree that was visible from the large window in the living room. Not only was everyone in the living room at the time when this man supposedly fled, everyone was looking out that very window with binoculars. I don’t care how good this guy was, it would have been impossible for him to climb down the far side of the tree and then run away without at least one person seeing him.

Encyclopedia’s point was that if the thief had climbed down the tree, he would have disturbed the butterflies that were on it, and the people downstairs looking at butterflies out the window would have noticed the butterflies flying around, and only then would they have seen the thief. So to review, guy appearing out of nowhere from behind the tree PLUS butterflies, the group would have seen the guy. Guy appearing out of nowhere WITHOUT butterflies, nothing.

The real thief was Sweeney. Since she was such a good person and close friend of Monarch, she decided it wouldn’t at all be shitty of her to steal her friend’s prized possession left to her from her favorite aunt who had recently passed away.