With fingerprint in hand the little girl paraded down the hall to her bedroom. It was her 8th birthday and she had asked for a detective kit as a gift.  The fingerprint had been lifted off a glass she found sitting on the table and now the fun began.

She put the fingerprint on the table where her kit was set up.  Marching to the living room with ink pad in hand she went from family member to family member printing each of them, determined to figure out whose glass it was.

When the last family member had been printed she marched back to her bedroom and compared each print with the one that had been lifted from the glass. Under the microscope she looked to the swirls and loops that made each fingerprint different. Only there was one special thing about this print, it had a blank spot right by the edge.

With one last burst of determination she looked carefully and found the culprit that hadn’t put the glass where it belonged. It was her mom.  Happy with her discovery she fell asleep that night dreaming of what it would be like to do this for a job.

Catherine Hobson, [Hill City, MN], takes care of her beautiful little girl when she is not coming up with ideas for writing.

© 2008 Catherine Hobson. Original for CCF  (Hobson grants CCF  first electronic rights for one month; CCF may archive the material indefinitely and include it in an eBook anthology).