The Case of the Waterproof Mascara

I was up to my elbows in dish water with a telephone hooked between my shoulder and my cheek when Andrew ran into the kitchen and threw both of his arms around my legs.  Oh great, another lousy case, I thought to myself, as I looked down into his distraught face.  I still hadn't been paid for the last one.  Suddenly, I noticed something wasn't quite right with his hair-- or his upper lip.  I wasn't going to be able to turn this one down. 

I hung up the phone, wiped the suds from my hands, and reached for my glass (I needed a drink real bad), but it was empty.  So, instead, I picked up the sobbing boy to inspect the mess.  On both sides of his head, a black substance was caked into his hair, making it stand straight out, and a tiny Hitler 'stache graced his upper lip.  Man, I hate Nazis.  This was a real puzzler, but whoever did this was gonna be behind the eight ball.

 

"Who did this to you dollface?" I asked.  Andrew was silent.  Typical.  Why won't the victims ever talk?  I checked his tongue, but it was still in his head.  That eliminated the obvious suspect, Jimmy the Squid.  I was gonna have to check out my other leads.

"Jacob, what's the skinny on Andrew's hair?"  He claimed that he was in his room reading.  He didn't know nothing.  A likely story.

"Benjy, whatcha heard around town about Andrew's hair?"  He didn't even look up from his toys, so I slipped him a fiver, but I still barely registered in his eyes.  Too much juice, I thought to myself.  I was gonna have to really start pounding the pavement for clues.

So, I holstered my bean shooter and headed out.  I sniffed out leads in every room of the house expecting to find some black stuff smeared into carpet or furniture, or at least some sign of the crime that had taken place.  I found nothing.  Another dead end.  I decided to go back to the beginning.

I sat the suspects down and questioned them one at a time.  Hopefully, someone would sing like a canary. Jacob held firm to his story that he had been in his room reading the whole time.  He had no idea what was in Andrew's hair or who had put it there.  Unfortunately, I believed him, this time.  Benjy, however, cracked under the pressure.

"Andrew had a yellow thing in your bathroom.  He put it in his own hair," Benjy mumbled.

I followed Benjy to my bathroom where he identified the black substance as waterproof mascara.  Amazingly enough, the yellow tube showed no signs of toddler tampering.  Clearly, this was not the work of a seventeen month old.  There had to be more to the story.

"Benjy, did you help Andrew with the mascara?"

"Nope.  He did it himself," he insisted.  The evidence, however, suggested otherwise.

I handed Andrew the tube of mascara once again, and watched, camera in hand, as the scene was reenacted.  

Andrew struggled with uncapping the mascara for a minute, and then passed it off to Benjy, who eagerly opened it and handed it back to him.  The clues were beginning to fall into place.

Andrew pulled out the wand and put it back in again several times, but not once did he try to put it in his hair-- not even when I suggested he do so.  

Benjy sat quietly by during the whole scene.  

So I turned to the little juicer and said, "Tell me everything you know, and we'll go easy on ya.  It could mean a little less time in the slammer.  Did you do it?"

"Yes," he finally admitted. "But, but, but... he wanted me to."

Case closed.

And that's a typical day at our house.  Just one fun game of Clue after another for this underpaid gumshoe. But, I still need a drink.