Playing Detective

When I worked for Half Price Books on South Lamar, we noticed a car parked behind the store for several days. It was a rather new and good looking sedan. After about 4 days, I reported the car to the police, who had no interest in dealing with this car. This was during a time in Austin when a couple of bodies had been found stuffed in car trunks, and the news was filled with the story of a young woman who had been reported missing, so we employees had been sure an officer would be eager to check out this car. No luck.

We began to be quite concerned; and being of a literary bent, we began devising all types of plots surrounding the car's circumstances, thinking that any day we would begin detecting an unpleasant aroma arising from the trunk area. We decided to do some Agatha Christie sleuthing.

I began making phone calls to area rental car agencies, asking about missing cars. I discovered that the sedan had been stolen from an Advantage Car Rental outlet which used to be located down the road from Half Price Books, on the west side of South Lamar. The car had been missing for some time before finding its way to Half Price Books' parking lot.

The Advantage manager did not seem as pleased, as we had though she would be, to recover this car, which did not have a body in the truck, by the way. From Advantage's attitude, and reluctance to pick up the car, I presumed that they had already collected money for its loss from the insurance company, and the finding of the car meant reams of unwanted paperwork.

So much for good deeds. (And a dreadfully anti-climactic ending to my tale!)