Outstanding Stories » Mystery

“Mystery” is one of the outstanding stories (sub-junior) of the second biannual International Short Story Contest 2018 written by Sue Ning Chee, Oberthur Primary School, Perth, Australia.

Mystery

One blustery day, the wind’s strong breeze blew ferociously at the little house at the edge of Eglantine road. Inside the tiny house, Rose Paddington was staring at the greenery outside her home, watching the wind blow the trees every minute.

Unluckily, she was soon interrupted by her elder sister, Penny. Penny wasn’t a sister you would want to have. Her furious behaviour constantly interrupted Rose when she was enjoying the view joyfully.

“Rose! Why won’t you have some screen time!” She screaked exasperatedly. Rose gave a long grumpy sigh in response. She and her sister were complete opposites. Even though there was only one difference between the two sisters, it was a humongous difference. Penny loved to sit on the comfy bed every day and glue her menacing eyes to the screen.

On the other hand, Rose didn’t. What she liked to do was read books. From fantasy to reality and fiction and non-fiction, Rose loved books. Every day, she would pick up a book from her desk and flip the pages, as well as reading the wonderful words.

Too bad she shared a room with her older sister. If they were split up, Rose’s life would be amazing with full of fun and books.

After a long sleepless night, Rose pulled herself out of bed and looked at the clock behind her. She quickly rushed towards the bathroom, shouting “I can’t be late!” at the top of her voice, oblivious to her sister’s behaviour.

“Oh! Hello, Miss Slow Coach!” She cackled cruelly. Rose wasn’t surprised to see Penny already dressed and ready. Today, they were going to meet their uncle, the billionaire Samuel Paddington. Rose knew that her rich uncle would not like to see his niece untidy.

When they were ready to get going, Penn grabbed her younger sister’s hand and she pulled her downstairs and out of the front door. “Rose! Can you please hurry up?” shouted Mr and Mrs Paddington outside the rattling oak front door, which was producing a shaking noise, like a furious rattle snake.

Then Mr Paddington pushed Rose into the light blue car and went in after her. Mrs Paddington grabbed the pitch-black wheel and started the car. The usual booming sound erupted in everyone’s ears and the car finally sped off.

Inside the little car, Mr Paddington was frequently checking his mobile phone for any more messages. The phone was brand new and had a glossy blue colour, which almost matched the car. He spotted five unread messages and read them out loud to everyone, including Mrs Paddington, who was still concentrating on driving the car out of the way from some obstacles that tried to overtake it.

Mr Paddington’s messages were from his mother, a friend called Raymond, his mother in law, his boss and last but not least, his brother and the billionaire Samuel. He read them out to his family.

“The first message is, can you come to dinner with me on Friday? (that was from his mother) I am coming to your house to pass you something (that message was from Raymond), I need you to buy me some chocolate from Arch (that was from his mother in law), You need to come to the office today (was from his boss) and I am going to let you and your family stay at my house for two days (was from Uncle Samuel).”

Mr Paddington ignored the other messages, but he took a closer look at his brother’s message and screamed like crazy. “Hey daddy!” screamed Rose from the back seat. Penny soon interrupted. “You are such a baby! Instead of daddy, you should have said father like a proper ten year old!” “Like me!”

Rose just rolled her eyes and kept talking. “Dad, did you just say that we are going to Uncle Samuel’s house today?” “Well, it looks like it.” Her dad replied. At the same time, the car stopped at it tracks.

“We are here!” Mrs Paddington opened the car door and got out. Rose opened the door and looked up. Wow!” she screamed. “Hey! That looks more like a castle! A castle for me, the one and only Penny!” Penny laughed cruelly. As they moved closer, the family saw that the mansion was made of a rich blue type of stone.

Rose stepped towards the door. “We don’t have a key!” she said. Dad walked to the door and rang the doorbell. “Who is there!” a booming voice filled the air. “It’s me, your brother Charles!”

“Well, you say you are my brother, but how am I supposed to confirm that you really are! Look into the camera on top of you!” The noisy voice erupted from a tiny gadget at the bottom of the door, and Rose’s father looked at the miniscule black camera that was on the gadget.

Suddenly, the door rapidly swung open so quietly that you could hear a pin drop. “Come in.” a mechanical voice spoke. Rose got excited, thinking that was her uncle, but she was wrong.

Instead, the voice turned out to be from a rusty old machine behind her. However, when Rose swivelled around to look at the machine, Penny pulled her into the mansion. Rose let go of her poisonous older sister’s hand and looked around her. It was definitely fit for a king.

Ruby red curtains draped the glossy windows, where you could have a splendid look of the gigantic swimming pool which was a big as the mansion itself! The hallway was a bright green and on the emerald walls were priceless and expensive paintings from talented artists.

However, the most intriguing thing of all was the bright painting at the end of the long hallway. It was a life-sized portrait of a sinister looking man. He had a red flowing cape and wore a suit that was almost covered with jewels. But his eyes stood out clearly. No, they were not kind, vivid eyes, instead they were terrifying cold ones. Just looking at them made Rose want to run out of the mansion. Luckily, she kept her feet rooted to the spot.

As Rose stood she thought. If that picture really was her uncle, what would his daughter be like? Rose got her answer soon enough. Suddenly, there was a loud booming voice, just like the one outside a few minute ago.

A screaming voice shook Rose from her thoughts. “Hello brother, you’ve grown!” “Rose, say hello to your uncle, please!” Rose made her way past Penny and towards her Uncle. When she got her first glimpse of him, she could easily match it to the man in the picture.

His clothes were different, but he had the same cold eyes. “Rose! Say hello to your uncle!” “Hello Uncle Samuel.” Rose muttered. “Hello Rose.” Her uncle replied in a dark chilling tone. “Come on, I will show you your rooms.”

As Rose followed her uncle, she could not help noticing that the picture of her uncle was slightly dangling on the bright emerald coloured wall. “Rose!” Rose quickly followed her family. As she was walking, she passed a cream coloured sofa. A girl was sitting on it, reading something. Uncle Samuel immediately shrieked “Daughter! Say hello to your uncle, aunty and cousins!” The girl turned around. Rose hoped that she didn’t see the same cold eyes like her father’s.

Luckily for Rose, she didn’t. Instead a pair of warm brown eyes stared at Rose. “Hello!” she said in a kind tone. “Julia! Stop what you are doing and go and share you room with her!” Uncle Samuel pointed a long bony finger at Rose. The girl called Julia sighed and got up. She took Rose’s hand and pulled her down the hallway without a word.

However, when they reached a brown door Julia pushed Rose in and followed her. In the room, there was a dusty shelf and two chairs. “Is this your room?” Rose completely shocked by what she saw. This couldn’t be a rich person’s room.

Finally, Rose’s only cousin spoke. “No! This is not my room, this is my secret one!” “Your secret one?” Rose replied, sounding puzzled. “Yes! My father makes me watch television all the time, so to escape from it I need to hide in here!”

“Screen time?” Rose mumbled. “Yes! And I hate television!” Julia replied. “Same!” Rose shouted. “And I think we should go to your room now before your father finds us!” “Yeah! Let’s go!” Julia said. She took Rose’s arm and they both ran forwards. As they ran, Rose asked Julia something. “Julia how did your father become so rich and what job does he have?”

Julia shrugged. “I don’t know! He says he works somewhere in a special lab!” Those few words puzzled Rose. What type of special lab does Uncle Samuel work in! Rose thought. She guessed she would have to find out more about this mysterious mansion first! After that, Rose soon asked another question. “Why is you father so cruel to you?” “He is my step-father” Julia answered. Finally, they reached Julia’s room.

Rose pushed open the heavy bronze doors and gasped in shock when she saw the size of the room. It was about the size of Rose’s backyard! Rose launched herself into the enormous place and then remembered something very important. “Julia?” “What?” “We didn’t pack our bags, so we don’t have any clothes!”

“Oh! I didn’t think about that!” Julia replied. Just then a metal voice erupted from somewhere in the gigantic room. “Don’t worry, we have millions of spare clothes for you and your family!” “Oh dear.” Julia sighed.

“What is the matter?” Rose asked. “Well,” Julia started. “Come on, tell me. Please!” Rose urged her cousin. “Okay then. My dad bought hundreds of security cameras yesterday. Not for security, but to see if I was reading any books.” Julia gave another deep sigh. “Oh! So, what do you do in your spare time?” Rose questioned eagerly. “I just play computer games, that’s it.”

Suddenly, there was another booming voice from the camera in front of the chatting girls. “Julia! Get your cousin ready for dinner and get her some clothes!” “Yes dad.” Julia moaned angrily. She grabbed Rose’s wrist and gently pushed her backwards to a tiny pink bed. “This is your bed!” Julia said excitedly. “I can’t wait to sleep with you!” Rose said. “Here are your clothes!”

Julia tossed a purple bag which was bursting with colourful clothes of all shapes and sizes. “Thanks!” Rose shouted. She caught the bag just in time. That was when the girls’ fun party was interrupted by the same voice from the camera. “Julia, get your cousin dressed and bring her to the dining room!”

“Come on Rose! Start getting ready for dinner!” Julia screamed. “Coming!” Rose panicked in the room and hastily grabbed the bag of clothes, unzipped it, and took a brief look at what was inside. In the bag, Rose found a collection of Summer clothes all stuffed together in on spot. Next to the bundle of Summer clothes, there was a pile of thick, fluffy and warm Winter ones.

Finally, on top of the two seasonal piles of clothes laid Autumn and Spring jumpers, shirts and much more. Rose had to admit, it did take a rather long time to choose what to wear. Luckily, in the next few minutes, which were filled by the talking of the two relatives and the changing of clothes, Rose ended up wearing a pink shirt, a pair of bright blue pants, a woolly jumper and to top it off, a pair of velvet slippers.

“You look like a mixture of all the seasons!” Julia joked when they were ready. “Haha, very funny.” Rose moaned sarcastically. She looked at what Julia was wearing. She had blue silk slippers, a velvet sweater which had the picture of a unicorn on it, bright purple pants and wrapped around her neck was a silk, pale pink scarf.

“Nice.” Rose said jealously. She was bursting with envy inside. Why couldn’t she have those splendid clothes instead of the boring ones she was wearing? “Let’s go and eat dinner Rose!” Julia’s voice broke Rose’s envious thoughts. “Yeah.” Rose moaned.

Julia grabbed her hand and pulled her out of the room, not forgetting to close the oak door. Next, she grabbed her cousin’s hand and pulled her down the hallway, towards the dining room. When Rose was inside the room the first thing she saw that shocked her was the shining dinner table. No, it wasn’t like the boring ones you always see at home and eat at. No way. It was about the size of seven caravans lined up in a row!

However, the thing that shocked Rose the most was what the table was made of. It was shining brightly, so Rose guessed it was made out of gold. Unfortunately, Penny had gotten ready earlier, so when she saw Rose she got up from her gold chair and shrieked, “Well somebody is late today! Haha!”

Rose didn’t like it at all. She wanted to get up and punch her sister in the face, but she knew it wasn’t the right time. “Rose quickly took a seat, trying her hardest to pretend she hadn’t heard a single word.

Julia swiftly moved past Penny to grab the seat next to Rose. “Your sister is cruel.” She whispered after checking nobody had heard her. “Yeah, I know.” replied Rose. “Don’t worry about it, she is always like that. By the way, would you want any siblings in your life Julia?” For some reason, Julia was not listening to her. “Julia!” Rose said a bit louder.

By now, Rose was starting to get a bit worried. She decided to try one more time. “JULIA!” “Oh, I’m sorry Rose. My dad made me listen to some music using these gold earphones with the sound on very loudly when you were getting carried away talking.” Julia apologised gently.

“Don’t worry about it.” Rose answered. “THE FOOD IS HERE GIRLS! STOP TALKING RIGHT NOW!” “Sorry!” The girls replied sheepishly. “Good! Now sit up straight and remember not to say a single word when you are eating!” “Yes.” The two girls answered softly, clearly scared of Uncle Samuel.

When Julia’s terrifying step-father finally moved away from the girls, Rose let out a huge sigh of relief. That was when the food came, carried by eleven servants. There were many different types of food! There was a large silver platter which carried, ten fish, twenty chickens, thirty-nine bowls of noodles and rice, and much more!

To Rose, it was like a homemade buffet but with only a few people. “Is this what you eat every day?” Rose asked Julia, impressed. “Yeah! But we always have like a billion leftovers!” Laughed Julia. “NO TALKING!” Uncle Samuel shrieked from the other side of the table.

The girls nodded guiltily and started to take some food. Rose reached for one of the many bowls of rice, but Penny snatched it away from her. Uncle Samuel didn’t even notice a thing!

In the end, Rose ended up eating the noodles and some fish. After that, she grabbed some cherry pie and left with a full tummy. Julia quickly gobbled up her delicious dinner and rushed of to follow Rose. To her surprise, Rose didn’t go to their room. Instead, she turned the opposite direction and then stopped in her tracks.

“What are you doing Rose?” Julia asked, curiosity filling her head. “See that portrait of your dad?” Rose replied. “It is not a portrait.” “What do you mean?” Julia asked again. “It is a secret door!” Rose answered in a hushed tone. “And I think your father is up to something weird.” She added, “What are we going to do then?” Julia said, worried. “We need to open that door and see what is going on!” Rose said joyfully.

After that, she pulled her cousin towards the sinister, mysterious portrait. “Hang on!” Julia said pulling her arm away, “Remember about the security cameras my dad set up?” “Oh!” Rose said, “I forgot about that.”

When both girls were about to give up, Rose’s face suddenly brightened. “Julia let’s go to the servant’s headquarters!” She suddenly stopped speaking. “Your dad built one, right?” “Yes, but why?” “There is no more hope.” “Look on the bright side; we can be disguised as a maid!” Rose shouted joyously.

“Oh!” Julia grinned, “I never thought of that!” She quickly grabbed Rose’s hand and pulled her towards their destination, the maid’s headquarters.

When the girls reached the headquarters, there was not a single servant or maid around. But just to be safe, the cousins tiptoed towards the dressing room so quietly that you could hear a nail drop.

To their dismay, all the clothes were for boys. “Yikes! Your father only likes boys working for him!” Rose whispered. However, they had no choice and went through the pile of clothes to see what to wear. “I look ridiculous!” whined Julia. “Quiet!” hissed Rose, who sounded like a snake.

“Ok!” The two girls tiptoed towards the entrance to the place. They then rushed as fast as they possibly could towards the portrait. Julia opened the door, and Rose got inside, followed by Julia.

The inside of the little room was like a wizard’s kitchen. It was full of disgusting, inky-black smoke, which made the girls cough loudly. “Let’s hide here!” Rose told Julia, beckoning her slowly to a large, empty cabinet. The two girls squeezed into the tiny cabinet, closed the door and waited.

Soon enough, someone came. Both Julia and Rose had no idea who he was. The man wore filthy black boots, a red top, sapphire blue pants, and had a thin, black mask which enclosed his face.

The man slowly but surely walked towards the cabinet examining other interesting things on the way like, a large, silver cauldron that had held a blue bubbling froth, a small silver sheet of melted paper, and many other mysterious things. As he walked closer, Julia began to freak out.

However, when the mystery man reached the wooden cabinet, Julia could not take it anymore. She burst the cabinet door open and sprinted towards the man, while letting out and infuriating battle cry that rang through the silent room.

The man on the other hand, was so shocked that he ripped his mask of in horror. Rose took the chance to see who the mysterious man was, though she was doubtful that it would be someone she knew.

Little did Rose know that she was wrong. The man behind the mask had cold eyes that gave a sharp piercing stare to whoever they saw. Julia spun around. “Dad!” She screaked. Then she whispered, “What have you done?”

Unluckily, instead of giving a huge smile to his daughter, the man was burning with rage. “What are you doing here? Get out of this room this instant!” Uncle Samuel shrieked. Fortunately for Julia, Uncle Samuel didn’t know that Rose had secretly gotten out of the large cabinet and was now crawling towards one of the chamber pots. She smelled one of the bubbling mixtures and thought it smelled money.

Rose took another sniff of a different pink, frothy mixture and realised that it also smelt like money! “What is going on!” she whispered.

Suddenly, Rose realised what her Uncle had been up to! He didn’t actually earn the money, he made it! “No wonder he is so rich.” Rose muttered. Then, she realised that her cousin was in trouble! Rose needed to do something.

Suddenly, Rose saw something important that she might need! As quickly and as silently as she could, Rose tiptoed towards a large glass cabinet that had a white sign. Smash Open Glass in an Emergency.

Rose knew that it was an emergency now! She grabbed a heavy metal spoon and smashed the glass, which made a rather loud sound. Slowly, Uncle Samuel turned around. Rose swiftly grabbed a large chamber pot, a bottle of one of her uncle’s concoctions and ducked down.

Finally free from her step-father’s rough grip, Julia ran towards Rose, who motioned for Julia to jump into the chamber pot. After that Rose grabbed a large, heavy spoon and pushed the pot out of the room. Luckily, it went surprisingly fast and Rose leaped in. She then used the spoon like an oar, so that they could change direction.

Unfortunately, the girls could hear Uncle Samuel chasing them. They had forgotten to change clothes, which was rather embarrassing. They had also forgotten that it was midnight, so no one could help them.

Suddenly, something struck a cord in Rose’s brain. “Julia, do you have a phone?” Julia nodded. “Why?” she questioned. “We need to call the police!”

RING, RING! “The police have said that they are on their way!” Grinned Julia. “That is awesome news!” Rose replied, over the loud sound of the chamber pot, which was now thundering down the stairs.

Uncle Samuel followed, not far behind. Suddenly, when they reached the bottom of the stairs the door burst open. “Where is the criminal!” a rough voice screamed. “There!” Rose shrieked pointing to Uncle Samuel.

“Do you have proof?” The police asked. “Yes!” Rose replied, panting and out of breath. She pulled the bottle of liquid out of her pocket and gave it to the head police. Then she whispered, “We are dressed like boys because we had to hide from his security cameras!”

Rose pointed at Uncle Samuel, who was now being handcuffed by one of the police. The chief nodded and smiled brightly. “Do you have parents and where are they?” he asked. “They don’t know anything about it and they are sleeping.” Julia said.

They next thing that the chief said flabbergasted the girls completely. “As a reward for your hard work, I am going to let you keep this mansion.” “The girls looked at each other. “Thank you so much!” Julia screamed.

Rose’s cousin jumped up and down in excitement. Suddenly Rose heard a familiar voice. “What is going on over here?” it was Rose’s dad. “Well…” Rose began. Luckily, Julia explained all of it to him. “That means you can live with us!” Rose grinned. “Yeah!” Penny added.

“Yes you may, but we have to bring all our things here from our old house first.” Rose’s mother said. “I don’t mind!” Julia giggled. After that, the five of them headed towards the entrance of the mansion.

Rose smiled. She had found a new life, new friends and even a new beginning! But it was just the start of it!