The Journal Thief {read desc}

Chapter 4 - Clues To Who?

"Old white?" wondered Brittany out loud.

"Miss Croner." replied Eleanor.

"How do you know?!"

"Long story." muttered Theodore.

All of a sudden, Simon's phone rang.

"It's Dave." said Simon, answering.

"Hey Simon, did Alvin and Theodore tell you that tonight we're gonna spend all evening together? They told me they would, you were at the library."

"It is?! They didn't tell me anything." Simon glared at his two brothers.

Theodore chuckled nervously.

"Well, did you have anything planned?"

"Nope. I'll be there. Thanks Dave,"

"Okay, see you!"

Dave cut the call.

Simon glanced at his watch. It was already 4:27pm?!

"So I guess we have to go to Miss Croner's basement tomorrow." Eleanor - who evidently was listening on the conversation - suggested.

"Yeah. Remember, don't over think, that's what the plaster said."

"Okay. Bye boys!" the Chipettes said simultaneously.

***

Eleanor sat on her bed texting someone.
"Hey guys, I'm gonna go play football with Joseph and his friends."

"Okay Ellie. I'm going to go to the clothes store. They're thinking of promoting my dresses!!" Brittany exclaimed happily.

***

Jeanette lay on the sofa with her phone. She felt a devil to admit it, but staying home by herself for a few hours without her sisters was quite blissful. Not implying that she didn't enjoy spending time with them.

There was just so much Eleanor and Brittany one person could take.

Jeanette decided to stalk the boys on Instant Gram.

She opened the app.

The boys had one main account with Dave, and each had their own individual accounts.

Lots of fans check our every account, resulting in over thousands of comments on every post.

It was the same for the chipettes, though they didn't have a parental figure on their joint account.

Miss Miller didn't know how to work Instant Gram.

She decided to stalk their joint account first.

There was one new photo.

The first one was a family photo.

They were in the Chipmunk's bedroom.

Dave was holding the camera in one hand, with a flyer for some.. Water park?

Theodore was in the background, holding 4 tickets to the same water park in the flyer.

Alvin had his arm around Simon's shoulder, and everyone was grinning wildly.

It was captioned: 'Going to the water park!!'

She smiled to herself.

She didn't bother checking Alvin's posts, as they were probably selfies if himself, or with classmates or his brothers.

Theodore didn't post much, so he had no recent posts.

Simon didn't post much either.

She went back to the family photo.

She stared at Simon. She loves his wonderful light blue ocean eyes, his roster cheeks, his beautiful chocolate brown hair..

Theodore's draw was slightly open, with a blue paintbrush sticking out.

.. The handle was green. The same colour as the one that appeared in Simon's safe. It looked like the same brand too.

Did this mean..

'No! That must be a cheap paint brush brand, lots of people have it.' she told herself. Theodore couldn't be doing all this.

She decided to lay down on her bed with a good mystery book to relax herself.

She went to the bedroom. Her draw was open?

Inside was her special pot of mystery ink. She picked it up. It felt lighter than usual; she never really used it.

All you needed to to was write with normal ink, and paint the special ink over the writing, and leave for 30 seconds or more.

She felt the inside of her draw. It was damp.

She opened the pot. It was only half full.

The same ink must have been used on the inside of Simon's safe.

Simon had given her the pot. He told her he had seen it in a window on the way to the antique shop and thought she would like it.

She did. She kept it safe.

Simon couldn't have done it! Theodore couldn't have done it!

But the person doing all this must have known about the ink pot.

Simon came back with the chipmunks when giving the ink pot; the chipmunks knew.

But their journals were stolen too. Maybe they were pretending so it didn't seem suspicious that it was them.

What if they were in on it together?!

She sighed. Was she over thinking?

Jeanette needed more clues. Which maybe could be found in Miss Croner's basement, which they were heading to tomorrow.