Mystery Story

How about a mystery story today? Yesterday when my pickup was returned I discovered that the alarm, immobiliser,  and central locking was not working. Thinking that perhaps it was just a wiring connection that was forgotten I drove my pickup back to the panel beater.

While in the waiting room, waiting for the workshop manager as one does in a panel beater's waiting room, I saw a few woman magazines and this book titled "15 Mystery Short Stories". My first thought was, surely I hope I won't be that long to actually read a short story. Never in a thousand years did I think that I was about to enter an actual mystery.

It wasn't a too long of a wait, and the workshop manager arrived. I told him my story and he asked me to pull my pickup into the workshop while he went to fetch the auto-electrician who worked on my car. When the auto-electrician arrived, and I told him that my alarm does not work. He answered that there never was an alarm in the pickup when it arrived. WHAT!!!

In my hand was the pickup keys with the alarm remote. The auto electrician also thought it was odd as all the alarm wiring, siren, and anti-hijack system was in place BUT no alarm control box. He showed myself and the workshop foreman a bunch of wires that he explained that these wires go into the control box and look how they have been neatly bridged. He explained if it wasn't bridged and the alarm control box had been just yanked out it wouldn't start. The workshop foreman took some photos to cover themselves I suppose but where is my alarm?

The mystery deepens as I  phone my insurance company. Who stole my alarm? It is such an old pickup and the alarm system is old too. I don't think that they make that type any more. Anyways from what I recall. When my pickup caught on fire on Thursday 1 February it had an alarm system. My insurance company got a towing company to collect pickup and take it to their yard for the assessor to come inspect. But somehow they lost my pickup and it was only found a week later on the following Friday 9 February. I was told that when the towing company arrived to drop my pickup off, the yard was full and they took it to a yard next door. That is what I was told by my insurance broker when they finally found my pickup.

I got a call from an assessor not long after that asking me if my battery was flat. I answered no and that was the last I heard until I got an email from the insurance company that my claim was approved and that they are sending my pickup to the panel beater.

Over a month since the fire, I got my pickup back minus a alarm system. It is up to the insurance company to solve the mystery and rectify. I'll go back to reading some mystery novels.