WNP: Beginning

WNP- "While standing in line, I was tapped on the shoulder..."

The start of my detective career and the beginning of my first case (the Search for the Missing Bracelet Charm) began in a very a simple manner.  I was perhaps eight or nine at the time and had been waiting in line at the history museum with my class (We were on a field trip to watch  the Life and Times of Clementine During the Gold Rush of Forty-Nine.), when I was tapped on the shoulder very precisely three times. Behind me in line was a pale girl with large gray eyes and a trembling lip. "Have you seen a small silver charm in the shape of an umbrella?" she asked. And that was the start. I remember all of this very clearly, because I had just finished reading my first Nancy Drew book the night before and had carefully started a notebook titled "Sleuth Notes" into which I carefully entered all the relevant details of my first cases. Such as what movie we were going to see, and what my first client looked like and said.

Elizabeth Harden
Age 12
Excerpted from an essay application to "Kids are Sleuths Too" Training Camp