Cookie Jar Mystery: Granny’s bakery vault was broken into. Clues left behind indicate 6 suspects. Join Sally as she unravels the mystery of, “Who stole from the Cookie Jar?”

Synopsis: My talented friend Corey Egbert (https://coreyegbert.com/) recently did a “Do this in your style” (DTIYS) challenge on Instagram. I wanted to take the character on a test drive (who the character is and what their story might be about) so I made this short story. Then I posted PART 1 on my social media and asked my readers to come up with who the culprit was. Based on everyone’s feedback I finalized PART 2 and posted it online. Hope everyone enjoys it!

Sally is the best private detective in the large riverfront town she lives. One day a baffling case landed on her desk, which had her intrigued.

A week after the start of the Great Depression, Granny’s bakery vault was broken into and an ingredient worth $65k was stolen. Clues left behind indicate 6 suspects.

Sue (cat) - Cranky security guard who works for Henry. During the crime, she claimed to have been guarding a shipment for Henry at the docks, which took longer than expected to load. Sue is known for being a notorious pick-pocket.

Phil (bear) - Over-confident popular baseball star. During the crime, he claimed to have been celebrating his team’s win at a soda pub after doing an errand at Anthony’s pawn shop. Phil is known for not controlling his temper and holding a grudge.

Brutus (alligator) - Silky-tongued bodyguard and assistant to Granny. During the crime, he claimed to have been on an errand to buy eggs for Granny when he saw a house on fire and went to help. Brutus is known for lying and exaggerating.

Anthony (bulldog) - Nervous pawn shop owner. During the crime, he claimed to have been closing shop when Phil showed up to sell a rare watch that supposedly belonged to his father. Anthony is known for selling stolen goods.

Henry (crow) - Eccentric owner of the glue factory. During the crime, he claimed to have been with playing cards his buddies, when he rushed off to oversee a late shipment at the docks. Henry is known for his risky gambling and extravagant life.

Granny (human) - Desperate 3rd generation owner of a bakery. During the crime, she claimed to have been working on a secret recipe to revive her business, when she found her vault broken in and rare ingredient missing. Granny is known for bribing city officials to overlook her factory conditions.

Sally had a strong hunch who the criminal was, but one thing kept troubling her. What was the late shipment at the docks? She headed down to the riverside to look for clues.

Sue (cat) was lounging nearby and let it slip that Henry (crow) had been shipping something for Granny (human) the night of the crime. Anthony (bulldog) had almost bungled everything by showing up so late.

So Sally decided to pay Anthony a visit.

Anthony quickly admitted that all the suspects had been at Granny’s the night before the crime. Brutus (alligator) won a rare watch from Phil (bear) while playing cards. Brutus offered Anthony the watch if he helped him with something the next evening. On the next day, when it came time for Anthony to close shop, Phil showed up and angrily demanded his watch back. Anthony didn’t have it yet and eventually managed to get away. After helping load some crates onto a barge, he got the watch and went home.

Sally still wanted to know what was in the crates, so she visited Brutus and laid all the facts on the table. He had some part to do with the crime and she could prove it. Brutus laughed and said that if Sally wanted the truth so badly, she would need to sneak a peek in Granny’s window after factory hours. He wasn’t going to take a fall for this nonsense.

Slipping past the factory walls, Sally watched in horror as Granny threw batch after batch of already-baked cookies into a raging inferno. Then using a shovel, she filled up wooden crates with ashes and stacked them with others already on a pallet. Confronting her, Granny admitted that there had been no secret ingredient. The $65k had been the cost of supplies she had accidentally wasted when she mixed up salt with sugar on her new secret recipe as it went into full production. Granny had enough salty cookies for everyone in the city to have one.

Sally concluded that Granny had broken into her own safe and claimed a thief had done it so she could get insurance money. To hide the evidence she had Brutus and Anthony load the first large batch of crates full of ashes, where Henry could dispose of them downriver. Granny was the main criminal. Case closed. Thanks for reading!