ArchiveAugust 12, 2026Rookie
Case File · Detective · No. 048
Daily Casefile · Detective
The Missing Songbird of Quill & Whistle
≈ 4 min
The Delacroix estate is being valued today at Quill & Whistle, and its centrepiece is a Victorian mechanical singing-bird box — a gilt cage whose enamel songbird flutters and warbles when wound. At 2:40 PM, mid-valuation, shop owner Harriet Quill lifted the velvet cloth and found the box gone from its stand. Nobody left the shop; the bird is somewhere on the premises, hidden by someone in the room.
Subject
The Delacroix Singing-Bird Box
A gilt-cage automaton with a jewelled enamel warbler, estimated at £14,000 and the star lot of the estate valuation.
The suspects
- Harriet Quill — Shop owner and host of the valuation
- Edmund Voss — Estate appraiser sent by the auction house
- Nadia Delacroix — Heir to the estate
- Tom Peel — Delivery porter moving crates for the valuation
Play today’s Detective.
This case first aired on August 12, 2026. A fresh detective runs every morning — same rules, five minutes, one solution.