Riddles!

Alright, since I am not anywhere good with jokes, I thought I might as well entertain the members using my own talents; mind-boggling mysteries.

I have always been the mystery buff since youth, and throughout my life, I have came across literally hundreds of quizzes and riddles with surprising twists, leaving me with my breath taken away.

So here’s how this thread works:
A poster would post a story with a question at the end regarding the story. The question would normally be something like “Who killed [insert name here]?” or “Who stole the [insert valuable object here]?” When another poster manages to get the answer correct, he/she will be allowed to post the next story-riddle, so on and so forth.

With that said, let me kick this off with my story first. For those of you who have already came across this story before, please keep it to yourself for now.

Sager Paten was a First Grade student, whose father was the landlord of a small apartment building containing three residents, and one of them had been acting suspiciously lately. Thus, Sager approached the detective club at his school for help. The club members were naturally more than delighted to assist their schoolmate, but they were asked by Sager to visit the following day as he had plans with his father.

The following day, however, the club members, laid their eyes on the horrific sight of a burned down structure... Through the address given by Sager, they arrived there; the destroyed building. They rechecked the address and confirmed it to be Sager's aforementioned apartment building.

The inspector in charge of the crime scene, James Aaron, upon being questioned by the more prominent member of the four, E. Doyle Kano, about the availability of death in the incident, told the club members that not only were there none, Sager was also fine with merely a few mild burns, though his father was very badly burned and was being attended to in the ICU (Intensive Care Unit) at that moment. Inspector Aaron further claimed that the three residents of the apartment building were happened to be out around the time of the fire - which happened around 2:30 AM - before their return in the morning.

After a moment of ponder, an officer involved in the investigation, Carmon Armstrong, informed Inspector Aaron in the discovery of the remains of a partially burned diary. In the entry written at the night before, it says:

[i]July 4th
The weather has been bad this morning. I'll have to get up early or I'll miss school, but I bet the red guy can sleep in late. When I got back from school, I fell down in the entryway. I'm glad the white guy was just coming out. Tonight the red guy and the white guy and the yellow guy are all going out. My dad and I are alone together. I want to play some more but the detective club is coming tomorrow, so I should go to bed early.

Who is it? Someone came home in the middle of the night. He's arguing with my father. It's the yellow guy. I wonder if my dad found out about the suspicious things he's doing. It's scary, so I'll cover my ears and go to bed. When I wake up I'll have to tell Kano about this.[/i]

After a brief moment of discussion, Inspector Aaron informed the club members about the identities of the three apartment residents.

The first resident, Ryan Banner, 25, was a carpenter with a dark tone and a tall, slender physique. He had a couple of plasters covering some parts of his body, including the one behind his left eye.

The second resident, Samuel Aster, 27, was an university graduate wearing a pair of glasses laying before his squelching eyes.

The third one with a more heavy build, Gant Mckane, 29, was a part-time worker with his drafty hair flowing towards his tea-green colored blouse.

When Officer Armstrong learned about the "yellow guy," he deducted that Sager must had represented the three colors to the three respective residents. Nevertheless, it was a difficult case, as none of the three had a color in their names nor were they wearing any yellow-colored garments. Their occupations were carpenter, university graduate and part-time worker, none of them were associated with the color of yellow.

Here are the conversations exchanged when the interrogations were held:
Ryan
Ryan: “Geez. How many times do I have to say the same thing? On the night of the fire, I was out drinking with my boss and my superiors from the carpentry trade.”

Inspector Aaron: “But earlier when we were confirming that, it seems you left sometime after 1 o’ clock in the morning.”

Ryan: “Yeah. I haven’t been drinking in a long time, so I got really drunk. (strokes the plaster on his face) To try to sober up, I went off by myself and laid down on a bench and fell asleep. And so, when I came to, it was already morning.”

Inspector Aaron: “Then at the time of the fire, around 2:30 AM in the morning, that means there was nobody there with you.”

Ryan: (looks away) “Ah, yeah.”

(Abruptly) Doyle: “Say, why do you have that? That plaster on your face. Did you get in a fight?”

Ryan: “What’s with this kid?”

Inspector Aaron: “It’s OK, just answer.”

Ryan: (strokes his plaster again) “I got hit by a board while I was working. I’m still a beginner, so I keep getting injured. (lifts up his right hand to show the four other plasters wrapped around his thumb, second, middle and pinkie finger) Look. These are all from work.”

Inspector Aaron: “By the way, what’s your favorite color?”

Ryan: “Color? The blue of the ocean. It’s cause I like to go surfing occasionally.”


[u]Samuel[/u]
Samuel: "No. I was driving by myself that night. I do that frequently whenever I start going crazy trying to prepare my thesis for my professor."

Inspector Aaron: "Whereabouts did you go driving?"

Samuel: "I drove down that tree-lined street by the Tannerson River. When I'm looking at the greenery, my heart feels at ease, so I end up alone there. I water the plants in the garden at this apartment building everyday, too. That's because the landlord doesn't seem very interested in maintaining the garden."

Inspector Aaron: "Oh, then your favorite color is green or something then?"

Samuel: (turns away) "No. (grabs chin with right hand) If you force me to pick one... it'd be black. It covers up the things inside of me that I don't want to know about. Well, for the same reason, black is the color I hate, too."

Gant
Gant: “Last night, I went to see a movie in New York City. It was an all-night showing from 10 PM at night until 5 AM in the morning. It was a triple-feature from the “Godzilla” series.”

Inspector Aaron: “Were you alone?”

Gant: “Yeah. My net friend was supposed to go with me, but he suddenly couldn’t come.”

Inspector Aaron: “What’s a “net friend?””

Gant: “Ah, as a side-line, I work as a day-trader. I have some friends who exchange information with me about that on the Internet.”

Inspector Aaron: “A day trader? So, you deal with stocks and such?”

Gant: “Well, it’s just sort of a hobby, so I only make a ridiculously small amount of profit from it.”

Inspector Aaron: “You’re only a part-time worker, but you earn enough to cover your living expenses from that?”

Gant: “Yeah, because I’m registered with a temp agency for daily work.”

(abruptly) Doyle: “Say, about that, (Gant looked down and found Doyle holding his (Gant) second and middle finger in his (Doyle) palm while examining them) do you do public construction work? See, there’s a lot of mud under your fingernails.”

Gant: “No, that’s…That’s mud from the time I played a survival game a while ago. It’s because I was running around in the mountains, but since they got covered in that bright color from paint gun shells, I ruined my clothes.”

Doyle: “Then, your favorite color is the color that camouflage clothing is usually made from, navy…” (pauses and look sharply at Gant)

Gant: (ponders for a while) “Yeah… It’s navy green.”

After the interrogations were finished, the club members were still unable to figure out who the "yellow guy" was. Heck, one of them, Mitch Tyson, tripped and fell while thinking about it... Fortunately, Ryan was available of many plasters due to his hazardous profession, and offered the young lad one. Nevertheless, that did not help in solving the case...

After a while even, Officer Armstrong felt that it was obstructive to the case if the Inspector was to continue in concentrating on the diary entry due to the probability that it might had been an imaginative concoction. The club members were naturally unhappy about the matter and went on in defending Sager's views about the matter, even the prominent one...

Doyle: "Exactly. Moreover, whenever you police, have a child who's done something bad, don't you start by asking the adults around him, if they know what kind of child he is? In that case, isn't the converse also? Even if he's a child, Paten has observed the residents closer, even so far as to give them nicknames..."

Samuel: ""The Adventure of the Copper Beeches," isn't it? (Doyle looks up to see Samuel behind) During the case of the Adventure of the Copper Beeches, it was one of the lines that Holmes said to Dr. Watson. [i]"My dear Watson, you as a medical man are continually gaining light as to the tendencies of a child by the study of the parents. Don't you see that the converse is equally valid?"[/i] Was that it?"

Doyle: "Yeah. You like Holmes, too?"

Samuel: "Yeah. I used to have all of it, but they've all been burned up now, eh?"

Inspector Aaron: "Well, speaking of Holmes, he wouldn't have ignored this diary."

After the long interactions exchanged between the Holmes fans, another officer, Johnathan Henson, ran out of the crime scene and reported another evidence near Paten's room; a large pile of mini-cars, easily more than 100 of them. Even with the new evidence, the detective club was still unable to figure out the identity of the arsonist, save one member...

Mitch: "Guess we'll have to confront Sager at another time to ask him more about this, huh?"

Doyle: "No, that won't be necessary. (confidently walks with a grin) Shall I play out the role of Holmes today... and make plain what's black and white right here? I'll tell you which one among them is... the yellow arsonist."

Could you figure out the identity of the 'yellow arsonist?' Hint: Mini-cars

its got to be Gant…the hobby (mini-cars) fits pretty well.

Aaron ;-p

Aaron???

Is that a joke?? :confused:

Ah, I forgot to mention something. Posters will have to describe the specific details; basically your average, everyday evidence. Assumptions won’t get you the culprit in real life. :wink:

oh…okay

Grant because

1-The investor probabely gets deals on odd mall items including mini-cars.
2-Grant could easiely get these investments for low money due to the deals that the investor got.

3-Grant’s net friend was the investor who sold him the cars.
4-Grant said he was a “internet trader”

Erm, first of all, it’s Gant. :stuck_out_tongue:

Secondly, those are still assumptions. You said, The investor probabely gets deals on odd mall items including mini-cars." You claimed that Gant earned ‘low money’ through the investments of those mini-cars, but never provided any evidence that he did that or even that his net friend was affiliated with the crime.

Also, so what if he’s an Internet trader? Just because a person is weapon-merchant, it does not mean he commits murder (illegal ones, anyway) unless otherwise proven.

Next! :stuck_out_tongue:

Anyone else wants to give this a shot? Or shall I reveal the answer as to the identity of the “Yellow Arsonist?” :sunglasses:

ahh… i couldn’t get anthing else about the riddle.
It was unelementary…lol

Let me run it down for you then. :wink:

Samuel: What does that mean? "The yellow arsonist?"

Gant: I thought I heard something like a diary or something.

Inspector: Ah, well, it's the diary belonging to Sager Paten, the son of the landlord of the apartment building that was caught on fire.

Mitch: It was written there right on the diary that the yellow guy suddenly came back home in the middle of the night and had a quarrel with Sager's father. The three of you said that you'd gone out on the night of the fire and returned home in the morning, didn't you?

Alane, the preadolescence female member of the club, added on to Mitch's deduction...

Alane: If that's so, then somebody must be lying!

as did Jack, a more chubby member of the club.

Jack: The one who's lying is the yellow guy, and he's the criminal who set fire to the apartment building.

Ryan: It's true that I know the landlord's son.

Samuel: Was that boy calling somebody things like "yellow guy?"

Gant: I don't know.

Inspector: Well now, it's just something a child said, so don't worry about it.

The three suspects looked gave each other an inquisitive stare, as if to implicate an accusation. The Inspector, who was beginning to feel the instability of the situation, crouched down towards the three members and whispered, "It's a bad idea to be talking about the 'yellow guy.'" to which the three members retorted at the same moment, "Huh? Why?"

Inspector: If they know that he's the arsonist, won't all three of them insist that they aren't the 'yellow guy?'

Mitch: Ah, I see.

Alane: That's right.

Doyle: No, it's OK.

Inspector/Mitch/Alane/Jack: Huh?

Doyle: Which of these three people is the yellow arsonist? I already know who.

Ryan: Wh-What did you say?!

Inspector: Hey, kid, is that true?

Doyle: Yeah. Alane, let me borrow the diary for a sec.

Alane: OK.

Doyle: Sager''s diary also mentions a "red guy" and a "white guy." I've figured who the 'red guy' and the 'white guy' are, so that's how I figured out who the 'yellow guy' is.

Ryan: There's a 'red guy' and a 'white guy,' too?!

Doyle: Yeah, this is what's written in the diary. "The weather has been bad this morning. I'll have to get up early or I'll miss school, but I bet the red guy can sleep in late." That must mean that the red guy does something every morning, but since it was raining that morning, it wasn't necessary to do that something. What do you think it could have been?

Mitch: Maybe taking out the laundry to dry?

Jack: PE would be canceled in the rain!

Alane: Adults don't have PE.

Mitch: Then, what about the 'white guy?'

Doyle: Remember, didn't you find a lot of mini-cars outside Sager's room? Sager definitely loves cars. If you think about "cars" and "white," what's the first thing that comes to your mind?

Jack: But there are a whole bunch of white cars.

Finally, Harley Ante, a fifth member and the second female of the club, finally spoke up.

Harley: An ambulance. The body of the vehicle is mostly white, so it would be perceived as a color of such by a child.

Jack/Mitch/Alane: That's it!

Mitch: But, what does that mean? The "ambulance?"

Doyle: What does an ambulance do for you?

Jack: It transports injured people.

Alane: They give your medical care inside the vehicle.

I will stop here, so as to give you more opportunities in identifying the suspect, especially with all these new clues given. :wink:

Wow that almost did nothing to my conclusion. I can’t seem to figure out their jobs…humph!!!

I think I know. Could it be Gant?

Ryan is injured often and would be asociated with the abulence therefore he is the white guy

Samuel often waters the gardens of the building, but since it was raining on the day of the entry he wouldn’t have to (and of course, most people water their plants in the morning, while the sunlight is weaker)

That leaves Gant. In addition, since his friend never showed up, he dosen’t have anyone to provide an aliby. He is the most likely to have caused the late night arguement (since he admitted his income is low he would be more likely to have conflicts over the rent and other such things) finally since his income is so low the money he would get from his property insurence would be a great help to him

Wow…now i get it…fantastic…

MiniChuchan is very close to the truth. But, due to the lack of popularity, I shall close this case for now with the truth to this mystery and let any willing individual take on hosting another mystery in continuing this little game of sleuth.

According to Sager Paten, a resident of his apartment building was behaving strangely night after night and he wanted it investigated. So, he commissioned the detective club of his school. However, the apartment building had been completely burned down in a fire.

In his diary, which escaped unburnt, Sager had assigned the nicknames “red guy,” “white guy” and “yellow guy” to the three residents. He wrote that the one behaving suspiciously was the yellow guy. And it seems like the one who set fire to the apartment building was also the yellow guy.

Doyle: Yeah, this is what’s written in the diary. “The weather has been bad this morning. I’ll have to get up early or I’ll miss school, but I bet the red guy can sleep in late.” That must mean that the red guy does something every morning, but since it was raining that morning, it wasn’t necessary to do that something. What do you think it could have been?

Mitch: Maybe taking out the laundry to dry?

Jack: PE would be canceled in the rain!

Alane: Adults don’t have PE.

Harley: Watering. Watering the flowers.

Alane: Ah, that’s right!

Doyle: Yeah. So, the “red guy” is the one who gives the plants at the apartment building water every day. Therefore, it’s Mr. Aster.

Inspector Aaron: But, kid, why is this young fellow called “red guy?”

Doyle: Remember, didn’t you find a lot of mini-cars outside Sager’s room? Sager definitely loves cars. If you think about cars and “red,” what’s the first thing that comes to your mind?

Jack/Alane/Mitch: Ah! A fire engine!

Inspector: I see, young Paten watched this young fellow sprinkling water from a hose, like a human fire engine. That’s why he gave him the nickname, “red guy.”

Mitch: If that’s the case, then “white guy” also refers to the color of a car, doesn’t it?

Jack: But there are a whole bunch of white cars.

Harley: An ambulance. The body of the vehicle is mostly white, so it would be perceived as a color of such by a child.

Jack/Mitch/Alane: That’s it!

Mitch: But, what does that mean? The “ambulance?”

Doyle: What does an ambulance do for you?

Jack: It transports injured people.

Alane: They give your medical care inside the vehicle.

Mitch: Ah, that’s it! Plasters! The white guy is the one who gets injured a lot and therefore always carries plasters. That must be Mr. Banner, right?

Inspector: Oh, yeah, the diary also says, “When I got back from school, I fell down in the entryway. I’m glad the white guy was just coming out.”

Ryan: Yeah, his knee was bleeding. I gave the boy one of the plasters I was carrying. That sort of thing has happened several times earlier, but… a dark-skinned guy like me is the “white guy,” eh?

Inspector: Then we’re left with the yellow guy.

Jack: Cabs are yellow.

Alane: But there are some white and green ones, too.

Inspector: What about construction vehicles…?

Doyle: Exactly. In short, it’s the person who has dirt under his fingernails. Mr Mckane, that means you are the yellow guy.

Gant: Wh-What are you saying? This dirt under my nails is from running around in the mountains playing a survival game.

Doyle: If I remember, you said that your clothes were ruined because they got stained by paint from a paint gun.

Gant: Uh, yeah.

Doyle: Where do you play those games normally?

Gant: Uh, well, since I don’t like to travel much, I would travel to the mountain near this building where a survival game station could be found located at.

Doyle: The Bloodhound Rifles?

Gant: Yeah…

Doyle: Don’tcha know? What they use for survival game are… air-soft guns that shoot BBs. Paint guns are used in a different game called “paint ball.”

Inspector: Ho.

Gant: shudders Th-Those are mostly the same thing, aren’t they?

Doyle: But paint guns use a water-soluble ink that comes out clean when you wash it.

Inspector: Ho, ho!

Gant: Ah, well…

Doyle: Moreover, Mr. Mckane, you said that your favorite color was the “navy green” used in camouflage clothing. But I think what’s usually used in camouflage clothes is a green called “olive drab.”

Inspector: Mr. Mckane, have you really played that whatever-it-was ball?

Gant: T-The thing is, I’m still just a beginner.

Doyle: Well, shouldn’t we just check around where the garden was in the apartment building?

Gant: shudders

Doyle: According to what Sager wrote, the yellow guy was doing something suspicious night after night. And if we add that Mr. Mckane is deceiving us by telling lies about the dirt in his fingernails… we might conclude that Mr. Mckane was digging in the garden at night to avoid being seen. He must have been burying something. Something important he didn’t want anyone else to see.

Gant: gasps

Doyle: And most likely that was… money you earned as a day trader, correct?

Gant: mutters

Inspector: What about it?!

Gant: sighs Two attache cases… With money I earned as a day trader, there’s roughly two million dollars.

Inspector: That much?! Why would you bury it in the garden?

Gant: So I wouldn’t have to pay the taxes. But last night, when I got back from the movies, the landlord questioned me insistently. I got irritated and pushed him away, but the landlord fell down the stairs. He wasn’t moving anymore, and I got real scared. And then, I figured, if I burned it all, just about everything would just be reset, and…

Inspector: grabs Gant by collar “Reset?!” Don’t you get it?! What you did was completely different from turning off the power because you lost a game! You turned the decades of memories created in this apartment into ash in a single night. You’re not allowed to just reset this! Your game of life isn’t over yet! You better be prepared to make up for this in full, including to young Sager and his father who you got mixed up in this.

Officer Armstrong: Inspector, I just got word from the hospital! They said the landlord’s operation was successful, and that Sager has regained consciousness.

Inspector: smiles Oh, is that so?

Jack/Alane/Mitch: Thank goodness! chuckles among each other

Inspector: Well, now you can rebuild this apartment building with the pile of cash you saved from that money game.

Gant: Yes…

And that’s it. The mystery is solved and this case is closed. Anyone else wanting to continue this game by hosting the next mystery, feel free to post here. :wink:

Wow that was seriously good.

Good to see Gant learned a lesson.

Can I post a riddle?

A man was found dead in his bedroom. He layed across the bed, front side up. The police found a gun in his hand. Instantly, the police assumed it was suicide. However, the detective comes in and finds a cassette player with a tape cassete inside. The detective pressed the play button on the cassete player. The last words of the dead man were recorded, “Life means nothing to me right now. Things would be better off if I were dead. . . BANG” At that moment, the detective concluded that the man was murdered.

How?

Heh, I’m better at posting mysteries than solving them… :stuck_out_tongue:

The way I see it, if the tape recorder was found on a table beside the bed, conclusion to the case being murder would be less likely, as it would seem normal in the case of a suicide.

However, if the voice inside the recorder was loud and explicitly clear, hinting that it was placed close to his mouth during the time of recording, furthermore, the victim was resting on the side of the bed that’s further away from the desk, it would not only be abnormal, as one who desires to record his voice would place himself near the recorder, but also, the voice should not had been that clear with the distance between him and the device.

If the recorder was placed in his other hand, then it shouldn’t had been suspicious, unless signs of adjustment to his limb had been found.

Then, there’s the obvious. The tape did not require a rewind to play his final words, since you claimed that the detective pushed the ‘play’ button without pressing the ‘rewind’ button first, meaning that someone had came in and rewound the tape before. The Police wouldn’t had touched such evidence, either, especially if they knew that a detective was coming to the crime scene, unless you are to claim that an Inspector had already examined the tape, which would eliminate the possibility I stated above.

Also, it seems like the man has a poor sense of grammar before his death as well. “…if I was dead” or “…if I am to be dead,” not “I were.” Then again, that could be just you, TSS. :stuck_out_tongue:

wiggles finger in Conan style Tsk, tsk, tsk, and that’s just the beginning of my deduction.

oh…boy…lost one here… :laughing:

Wboon has got it figured it out there. How can the man rewind and record his suicide if he was already dead? Someone must’ve rewound the tape to make it seem like a suicide.

^ Ha! I’ve heard that riddle before! It’s awesome!

Now for a riddle I heard from my Sunday School teacher. It took us AGES to figure it out.

A man was accused of murdering his wife, named Love. In the courtroom, he offered to claim he was guilty if the police could find out what he did with his wife. The only clue he gave was this strange riddle.

Love I sit, Love I stand
Love I hold fast in my hand.
I can see Love, but she can’t see me.
Answer this riddle, and hanged I will be.

In the end, the police could not figure out what happened to his wife, so he was set free.

Do you know what happened to his wife?

Haystack