Nationwide Search Recovers Keys

While at dinner with fellow quilter friends before our meeting, the suspect received a frantic call from authorities saying Frank's keys were missing.  The search coordinator believed the keys were taken by a family member, the wife, in retaliation for some unknown injustice.

When initially questioned, the wife responded with, Huh? Why would I have taken his keys?  You need to ask him the results of previous searches.

At the urging of the suspect, questioning of the victim revealed that at least twice a week, similar search efforts are repeated for various items such as keys and wallets.  None of these searches have proven the accusations that the current suspect has actually hidden or stolen any item.

After several hours when no obvious ransom demands were received, the suspect received another call from the victim's daughter, pleading for information about the keys.  She inquired if there was going to be a ransom demand.  The suspect denied culpability and refused to confirm ransom demands would be forthcoming.

In due process of law, the suspect or person of interest, returned to the scene of the crime.  According to the victim, the suspect made dramatic overtures relating to the search by raising the sofa and looking under it, scouring the back yard with a flashlight in 32 degree weather with a slight drizzle and inspecting dog beds to see if it had been pilfered by a recalcitrant basset.

The keys were not found in any location.

The suspect, in an overwhelming gesture of platitude, requested that the victim be hypnotized to recount movements from the time he drove into the driveway and had last seen the keys.  Initially, the victim refused, believing the suspect would compromise him in an absurdly amorous way as to confound his thinking.  But seeing no other resort, he reluctantly agreed to be led through a psychic journey with the stipulation that the TV remain on so he would not fall into a deep trance.  (The suspect knew this was what normally put him into a deep trance, so the condition was accepted.)

The attempt at finding the keys through hypnosis was unsuccessful because full cooperation by the victim was not accorded.

The suspect, having searched the entire premises upside and down, ventured into the sewing room. This was against the protests of the victim saying he had never entered the suspect's lair.

Whereupon the suspect found the keys sitting atop the ironing board between the Mystery Quilt and the Reflections quilt.  It seems the victim entered the sewing room to pull the blinds down, thus preventing the above named basset from viewing the landscape.  Thusly the keys were left upon said ironing board and left forgotten.

The suspect was released and became the heroine and was accorded the honor of a fresh eclair and a coffee made by the victim in return for his forgiveness for such accusations of non-merit.