Episode 1: The Thing Under the Floorboard
The rain had been falling over Kuala Lumpur since lunch.
Not the polite kind of rain that tapped softly against windows.
This was the “who forgot to close the sky?” kind.
Water rushed along the drains outside Eddy’s house. Motorbikes hissed through puddles. Somewhere down the lane, a loose metal sign kept going clank… clank… clank every time the wind pushed against it.
Eddy Teoh sat cross-legged on the living-room floor, surrounded by notebooks, pencils, a magnifying glass and three different maps of his neighbourhood.
His elder sister, Anna, stared at him from the sofa.
“You know,” she said, “normal people watch videos when it rains.”
Eddy did not look up.
“Normal people don’t find mysteries.”
Anna raised an eyebrow.
“Normal people also don’t spend forty minutes staring at a drain.”
“I wasn’t staring at the drain.”
“You were.”
“I was observing it.”
“Same thing lah.”
Eddy finally looked up.
“I found something.”
Anna sighed.
“Of course you did.”
Their parents had been clearing out the back storeroom that afternoon. The old room was packed with forgotten things—wooden boxes, cracked flowerpots, rusty tools, schoolbooks, bags of clothes and a battered cupboard nobody had opened in years.
Mum had asked Eddy and Anna to help.
Naturally, Eddy had treated it like an archaeological expedition.
He had discovered an old brass key.
A broken torch.
A stack of postcards.
Two coins.
A cricket bat nobody remembered owning.
And then, while moving an old wooden cabinet, Eddy had noticed something.
A floorboard was loose.
He crouched beside it.
“Anna.”
“What?”
“Come here.”
“I am comfortable.”
“Anna.”
She groaned and climbed down from the sofa.
Together they knelt beside the floorboard.
Eddy pushed his fingernail into a narrow gap.
The board lifted slightly.
Underneath was darkness.
Anna’s eyes widened.
“Okay,” she whispered. “That is actually interesting.”
Eddy grinned.
“Finally.”
He carefully lifted the board.
Beneath it was a shallow hollow in the concrete.
Inside lay a small bundle wrapped in faded cloth.
The cloth smelled of dust and old wood.
Eddy gently pulled it out.
Something hard was hidden inside.
He unwrapped the cloth.
A rolled-up piece of yellowed paper fell into his palm.
Anna leaned closer.
The paper was tied with thin brown string.
No name.
No date.
No explanation.
Just a tiny hand-drawn symbol on the outside.
A circle.
Inside the circle was a crooked little star.
Eddy’s detective instincts immediately switched on.
“Don’t touch it too much,” he said.
Anna laughed.
“Bro, it’s paper, not a dangerous animal.”
“It could be evidence.”
“Evidence of what?”
Eddy carefully loosened the string.
The paper unfurled with a soft crackle.
At first, they could barely read the writing.
The ink had faded to brown.
But slowly, the words became clear.
If the rain comes three times, follow the place where the old clock cannot see.
Anna stopped smiling.
“What does that mean?”
Eddy looked at the sentence.
Then at the strange symbol.
Then back at Anna.
“I don’t know.”
For perhaps five whole seconds, neither spoke.
Then Anna pointed at the paper.
“There’s more.”
At the bottom was a rough drawing of a map.
Three streets.
A small bridge.
A row of trees.
And a black X.
But someone had drawn a thick line across the X.
Almost as though they had wanted to hide it.
Eddy’s heart began beating faster.
“Anna…”
“What?”
“I think we just found a mystery.”
Anna looked at the rain hammering against the window.
“Yeah,” she said quietly.
“I think we did.”
Episode 2: The Three Rains
By evening, the rain had stopped.
The clouds remained dark over the city, but the streets glittered under the lamps.
Eddy spread the yellowed paper across the dining table.
Anna sat opposite him with a cup of warm Milo.
Their parents had gone upstairs.
“You’re not seriously planning to investigate tonight,” Anna said.
Eddy looked offended.
“Why not?”
“Because it is dark.”
“Exactly.”
“That’s not a good reason.”
“It makes mysteries more mysterious.”
Anna shook her head.
“You have been reading too many detective stories.”
Eddy ignored her.
He examined the map.
The drawing wasn’t detailed enough to identify every location, but one thing stood out.
A bridge.
Their neighbourhood had an old pedestrian bridge over a drainage canal about fifteen minutes away.
Beyond it stood a small public garden with several huge rain trees.
And near the entrance to that garden was an old clock tower.
The clock had stopped years ago.
Eddy had passed it hundreds of times.
Anna noticed where he was looking.
“The clock tower.”
“Maybe.”
“The paper says where the old clock cannot see.”
“Exactly.”
Anna took a sip.
“And the three rains?”
Eddy pointed toward the window.
“Maybe it means three rainy days.”
She stared at him.
“That’s convenient.”
“What?”
“We’ve had two days of heavy rain already.”
Eddy’s expression changed.
“Wait.”
He grabbed his notebook.
He had written down weather observations for the past week as part of one of his earlier investigations into why the neighbourhood drains kept overflowing.
“Monday. Rain.”
He flipped a page.
“Tuesday. Rain.”
Another page.
“Today. Rain.”
Anna slowly put down her cup.
“Three.”
They looked at each other.
For a moment, the room seemed strangely quiet.
Then the ceiling fan clicked overhead.
Tick.
Eddy froze.
Anna frowned.
“What?”
“Did you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
Eddy looked toward the hallway.
Nothing.
He stood.
“Come on.”
“Where?”
“To the storeroom.”
Anna groaned.
“Again?”
But she followed.
Inside the storeroom, Eddy lifted the loose floorboard again.
He examined the hollow.
Nothing.
Then he turned the yellowed paper over.
There, almost invisible beneath the map, was another sentence.
They had missed it.
The eye sees the road. The shadow sees the way.
Anna’s face became serious.
“The clock.”
Eddy nodded.
“The clock sees the road.”
“And the shadow sees the way.”
They didn’t say anything else.
They knew what they had to do.
Episode 3: The Clock That Never Moved
The next afternoon, Eddy and Anna walked toward the old clock tower.
The sky was bright after the storm.
Everything smelled freshly washed.
Puddles reflected shop signs and electric wires. A fruit seller was arranging baskets under an awning. Children raced past them with wet slippers making flip-flop, flip-flop sounds against the pavement.
Eddy carried the yellowed paper inside a plastic folder.
Anna carried an umbrella.
“You know,” she said, “if Mum asks, we’re going to the library.”
“We are.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
Eddy smiled.
The old clock tower stood at the edge of the public garden.
It was small and weathered, with pale walls stained by years of rain.
The clock face had stopped at 4:17.
Nobody knew why.
Eddy stood beneath it.
“Four seventeen.”
Anna looked up.
“So?”
“The paper says the old clock cannot see.”
She walked around the tower.
“Then let’s see what it can’t see.”
The front of the tower faced the main road.
The back faced the garden.
The clock’s shadow fell across the pavement.
Eddy studied it.
The afternoon sun was low enough to create a long dark shape.
He unfolded the map.
Three streets.
Bridge.
Trees.
X.
He compared the drawing with the real landscape.
“Anna.”
“What?”
“Look.”
The shadow stretched toward a narrow path behind the tower.
A path almost hidden by overgrown shrubs.
Anna pushed aside some leaves.
A line of old paving stones appeared.
“Okay,” she whispered.
Eddy followed the path.
It led behind the clock tower and disappeared between two enormous rain trees.
They walked slowly.
The city noise faded.
Birds called from the branches.
Leaves whispered overhead.
Then they reached a low concrete wall.
On the wall was the same crooked star symbol.
Eddy’s breath caught.
He touched it.
Underneath the symbol was a tiny arrow.
Pointing down.
Anna crouched.
There was a loose brick.
Eddy pulled it free.
Behind it was a small metal box.
Not new.
Not ancient either.
Its surface was spotted with rust.
Anna stared.
“No way.”
Eddy carefully opened it.
Inside was another piece of paper.
This one was folded into a square.
He unfolded it.
Only six words were written inside.
Find the house with blue steps.
Anna blinked.
“That sounds easy.”
“It shouldn’t.”
“Why?”
“Because there are about twenty houses with blue steps around here.”
Anna sighed.
“Of course there are.”
Eddy smiled.
“Then our real investigation begins.”
Episode 4: Blue Steps
The first blue-stepped house belonged to an elderly tailor named Uncle Rahman.
The second belonged to a family with three noisy dogs.
The third was painted blue from roof to gate.
The fourth had blue steps but a green front door.
The fifth had steps that were mostly blue because somebody had painted them years ago and forgotten to finish.
By sunset, Eddy had written down eleven possibilities.
Anna sat on a bench, fanning herself with the notebook.
“This is officially the least exciting detective case ever.”
“You said that before.”
“And I was right.”
Eddy looked at his list.
Something bothered him.
The note hadn’t said a house with blue steps.
It had said:
the house with blue steps.
One particular house.
He studied the old map again.
The three streets.
The bridge.
The trees.
Then he noticed something.
The map didn’t show the clock tower.
Instead, it showed a tiny square.
“Anna.”
“What now?”
“The map is older than the clock tower.”
She frowned.
“How do you know?”
“Look at the roads.”
He pointed.
“One road bends differently today. This map was drawn before the road was widened.”
“So?”
“So whoever made this map wasn’t marking modern places.”
Anna sat upright.
“They were marking old landmarks.”
“Exactly.”
They walked back toward the older part of the neighbourhood.
There was a row of wooden terrace houses there, squeezed between newer buildings.
One stood apart from the rest.
It had faded blue steps.
The paint was peeling.
A small brass number hung beside the door.
17.
Eddy looked at the paper.
Then at the house.
His heart began to race.
“Four seventeen.”
Anna whispered it.
“The clock stopped at 4:17.”
“And the house is number seventeen.”
They looked at each other.
Eddy knocked.
An elderly woman opened the door.
She had silver hair tied neatly behind her head and sharp, curious eyes.
“Yes?”
Eddy smiled politely.
“Sorry to disturb you, Auntie. We found something.”
He showed her the yellowed paper.
The woman’s expression changed.
Not much.
Just enough.
Her fingers tightened around the door.
“Where did you get that?”
Eddy noticed.
Detectives noticed things like that.
“Under a floorboard in our storeroom.”
The woman stared at the paper for several seconds.
Then she opened the door wider.
“Come in.”
Episode 5: The Story of Four-Seventeen
Her name was Auntie Mei Lin.
Her house smelled of old books, ginger tea and polished wood.
On one wall hung dozens of photographs.
Families.
Children.
Neighbours.
Festivals.
School groups.
People standing proudly beside old buildings that no longer existed.
Auntie Mei Lin took the yellowed paper.
She didn’t unfold it.
Instead, she looked at the symbol.
“I haven’t seen this in a very long time,” she said.
Eddy leaned forward.
“What is it?”
“A club.”
“A secret club?”
She smiled.
“When you’re young, every club feels secret.”
Anna grinned.
“Fair.”
Auntie Mei Lin walked to a cabinet.
From the bottom drawer she removed a small wooden box.
She opened it.
Inside were old letters tied with string.
“The children who lived here many years ago started a little neighbourhood group. They called themselves the Four-Seventeen Club.”
Eddy stared.
“Because of the clock?”
“Yes.”
“Why four seventeen?”
“Because the clock stopped at that time during a terrible storm.”
Anna looked at Eddy.
“So the clock really did stop at 4:17.”
Auntie Mei Lin nodded.
“The children believed the clock had stopped to point them toward something.”
“What?”
She smiled.
“That was the game.”
Eddy’s eyes widened.
“They made a treasure hunt?”
“Something like that.”
Auntie Mei Lin opened the wooden box.
Inside were photographs, handwritten riddles and small drawings.
“They created clues for one another. But the last clue was never solved.”
“Why?”
Auntie Mei Lin looked toward the window.
“Because the person who made it disappeared from the neighbourhood.”
Eddy’s excitement faded.
“Disappeared?”
“Not in a frightening way,” she quickly added. “Her family moved away suddenly. Nobody knew where they went.”
She handed Eddy a photograph.
It showed six children standing beside the clock tower.
One boy held a cardboard sign.
A girl in the middle wore a bright yellow ribbon in her hair.
On the back, someone had written:
Four-Seventeen Club — The Last Hunt.
Eddy turned the photograph over.
There was another clue.
A tiny drawing of a bridge.
Underneath:
Where water passes beneath, look where footsteps do not.
Anna immediately understood.
“The old bridge.”
Auntie Mei Lin smiled.
“You two really are detectives, aren’t you?”
Eddy nodded seriously.
“Very much.”
Anna laughed.
“Don’t encourage him.”
Episode 6: Beneath the Bridge
The old pedestrian bridge was almost empty by the time they reached it.
The evening sky had turned orange.
Water moved beneath the concrete structure.
Not quickly.
Not loudly.
Just steadily.
Eddy checked the clue again.
Where water passes beneath, look where footsteps do not.
They searched the bridge.
Nothing.
Underneath.
Nothing.
Beside the canal.
Nothing.
Anna finally sat down.
“Maybe we’re wrong.”
Eddy shook his head.
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Because the clue says footsteps do not.”
He looked around.
People walked across the bridge.
Nobody walked underneath.
He climbed down the grassy slope.
Anna followed.
At the bottom, they found a narrow ledge beside the canal.
There were old concrete pillars.
One had a shallow hollow.
Inside sat a glass jar.
Eddy pulled it out.
A folded piece of paper was inside.
Anna laughed.
“This is becoming ridiculous.”
Eddy opened it.
The handwriting was different from the yellowed paper.
Older.
Neater.
The message read:
When the city grows loud, find the place that remembers quietly.
Below the words was a drawing.
A house.
A tree.
And a small square window.
Eddy looked toward the neighbourhood.
“What place remembers quietly?”
Anna thought.
“Library?”
“Maybe.”
“Old house?”
“Maybe.”
“Your room?”
Eddy gave her a look.
“Very funny.”
Then he remembered Auntie Mei Lin’s photographs.
The old photographs.
The walls.
The wooden cabinet.
“The community hall.”
Anna’s eyes lit up.
“The old community hall has an archive room.”
They ran.
Episode 7: The Room Nobody Used
The old community hall stood behind a row of shops.
It was no longer used for large gatherings, but the caretaker allowed them inside after Eddy explained that they were looking for historical records.
The archive room was dusty.
Very dusty.
Anna sneezed.
“Ah-choo!”
Eddy whispered, “Quiet.”
She glared at him.
“You’re telling me to be quiet in a room where nobody has entered for ten years?”
Eddy ignored her.
They searched shelves of old newsletters, maps, photographs and notebooks.
Then Anna called out.
“Eddy!”
He hurried over.
She was holding a faded ledger.
A page near the back contained the same crooked star.
Below it were six names.
And beside one name was a yellow mark.
Lina.
Eddy remembered the girl in the photograph.
The yellow ribbon.
“That’s her.”
Anna turned the page.
A final message had been written beneath the names.
The treasure is not something you can keep.
It belongs to everyone who comes after us.
Eddy frowned.
“That sounds like the ending.”
“But we haven’t found the treasure.”
“Maybe the treasure isn’t money.”
Anna thought for a moment.
“What belongs to everyone?”
Eddy looked around.
The old photographs.
The maps.
The stories.
“The neighbourhood.”
Then he noticed the yellow mark beside Lina’s name.
The yellowed paper.
The yellow ribbon.
The yellow paint on one old wooden cabinet.
Everything was pointing to one thing.
“The treasure is a memory.”
Anna stared at him.
“That sounds cheesy.”
“Maybe.”
“But…”
She smiled.
“Maybe you’re right.”
Then the lights went out.
Both froze.
Darkness filled the archive room.
Anna grabbed Eddy’s arm.
“Don’t move.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
A sound came from somewhere behind them.
Scrrrrch.
Something moved.
Eddy switched on his torch.
The beam swept across the shelves.
Nothing.
Then they heard it again.
Scrrrrch.
Eddy turned.
A loose wooden panel near the wall was moving.
He stepped closer.
Behind it was a narrow compartment.
Inside sat a small metal tin.
On its lid was the crooked star.
Eddy opened it.
Inside was a final rolled piece of paper.
This one was bright yellow.
Not yellowed.
Bright.
The writing was fresh.
Eddy’s stomach dropped.
“Anna.”
“What?”
“This isn’t old.”
Episode 8: Someone Else Was Looking
They took the paper to the caretaker.
He examined it carefully.
“I didn’t put this here.”
Eddy looked at Anna.
Someone had been inside the archive room.
Someone knew about the Four-Seventeen Club.
Someone had continued the hunt.
The message inside the paper said:
A mystery survives only when someone chooses to remember.
Take what we found back to where the first clue began.
Eddy thought of the floorboard.
The clock.
The blue steps.
The bridge.
The archive.
They had followed a trail that had been waiting for decades.
But why had someone added the new paper?
Anna noticed something.
“Eddy.”
“What?”
She pointed to the edge of the paper.
There was a faint pencil mark.
A tiny drawing.
A rain tree.
And beneath it, three dots.
Eddy understood.
“The clock tower.”
They hurried back.
Night had fallen.
The clock tower stood beneath the moonlight.
Its hands remained frozen at 4:17.
But now Eddy noticed something he had missed before.
The base of the tower had three small holes.
Three dots.
He pressed the stone beneath them.
Nothing.
Anna tried the second.
Nothing.
Eddy pressed the third.
Click.
A small panel opened.
Inside was a wooden box.
Eddy carefully removed it.
The box contained old photographs.
Letters.
A hand-drawn map.
And a notebook.
On the first page was written:
For whoever solves the last hunt.
Eddy opened it.
The first page explained everything.
The Four-Seventeen Club had never intended to hide gold or money.
Their treasure was a collection of stories about their neighbourhood.
They had gathered memories from shopkeepers, families, gardeners and children.
But before they could finish, one member—Lina—had moved away.
She had taken the final notebook with her.
Years passed.
The club disappeared.
The neighbourhood changed.
Buildings were rebuilt.
Roads widened.
Children grew up.
But someone had recently found the old papers and decided to finish the hunt.
Eddy turned the page.
There was one final sentence.
If you have found this, add your own story. Then hide the collection somewhere safe for the next curious child.
Anna smiled.
“So that’s it.”
Eddy shook his head.
“No.”
“What?”
“This is the beginning.”
Episode 9: The Last Clue
The next morning, Eddy and Anna returned home.
They showed their parents everything.
Mum read the notebook carefully.
Dad studied the old photographs.
Their parents were surprised, then amused, then completely fascinated.
“This neighbourhood has changed so much,” Dad said.
Mum smiled at one photograph.
“I remember that old shop.”
“You do?” Eddy asked.
“Of course. Before you were born.”
That gave Eddy an idea.
Over the next few days, the mystery became a family project.
They visited neighbours.
They listened to stories.
Uncle Rahman remembered when the street flooded during a huge storm.
Auntie Mei Lin told them about childhood games.
The fruit seller described how the market once looked.
An old carpenter explained where a missing wooden footbridge had stood.
Eddy wrote everything down.
Anna took photographs.
Soon, they had filled two notebooks.
They called the collection:
The Four-Seventeen Memory Book.
But Eddy still wondered about the fresh yellow paper.
Who had placed it in the archive?
One afternoon, while they were returning the old materials to Auntie Mei Lin, she smiled.
“You finally solved it.”
Eddy stopped.
“You did it?”
She laughed.
“No.”
She looked toward the road.
“Someone else did.”
A teenage girl stood outside the gate.
She looked nervous.
Eddy recognized her.
She was the caretaker’s daughter.
Her name was Sarah.
She held a yellow notebook.
“I found the old archive papers last month,” Sarah admitted. “I wanted to see if the Four-Seventeen Club was real. When I saw you searching, I left clues.”
Eddy stared.
“So you were following us?”
“Not exactly.”
Anna folded her arms.
“That’s exactly what following means.”
Sarah laughed.
“I wanted to know if you’d finish the hunt.”
Eddy smiled.
“Why?”
Sarah looked at the old photographs.
“Because I thought nobody cared anymore.”
Silence settled over them.
Then Eddy opened his notebook.
“We care.”
Anna nodded.
“And now more people know.”
Sarah smiled.
“Then I think the mystery worked.”
Episode 10: What the Paper Was Really For
A month later, the community hall hosted a small exhibition.
Nothing fancy.
Just photographs, drawings, handwritten stories and old maps.
People came.
They pointed at pictures.
They laughed.
They remembered.
Some stories were funny.
Some were ordinary.
But that was what made them special.
One little boy spent nearly an hour staring at the old clock tower.
“Why does the clock say 4:17?” he asked.
Eddy crouched beside him.
“Because someone wanted people to remember.”
“Remember what?”
Eddy looked around.
The hall was full of neighbours.
People talking.
Children running.
Older people smiling at photographs of themselves when they were young.
“Everything,” Eddy said.
The boy frowned.
“Everything?”
Eddy nodded.
“Not everything in the whole world. Just the little things.”
“The little things?”
“Like which tree you climbed when you were young. Which road flooded first. Which house had the blue steps. Which friend made you laugh when you were having a bad day.”
The boy smiled.
“That’s not treasure.”
Eddy grinned.
“Maybe not the kind you bury.”
Anna walked past and heard him.
“You’re getting very philosophical.”
“I have matured.”
“You’re still eleven.”
“Exactly. Very mature eleven.”
She laughed.
Later that evening, Eddy stood beneath the old clock tower.
The city hummed around him.
Cars moved along the road.
Lights blinked in apartment windows.
The rain trees swayed gently.
Anna stood beside him.
“So,” she said, “detective.”
“Yes?”
“Do you think there are more mysteries?”
Eddy looked at the clock.
4:17.
He smiled.
“Definitely.”
Anna sighed.
“I knew you were going to say that.”
A breeze passed through the trees.
Something fluttered near Eddy’s shoe.
He looked down.
A tiny piece of yellow paper.
His eyes widened.
He picked it up.
There was only one sentence.
Every mystery ends where another story begins.
Eddy looked at Anna.
Anna looked at him.
Neither spoke.
Then Anna smiled.
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Whatever you’re thinking.”
Eddy tucked the paper carefully into his notebook.
“I wasn’t thinking anything.”
“You’re smiling.”
“Am I?”
“Yes.”
“That proves nothing.”
Anna shook her head.
“Come on, Sherlock.”
They started walking home.
Behind them, the old clock remained frozen at 4:17.
But somehow, it no longer looked broken.
It looked like a sign.
A reminder that even in a city filled with tall buildings, busy roads, bright lights and endless noise, there were still quiet corners waiting for someone curious enough to notice them.
And somewhere, beneath an old floorboard, inside a rusty box or behind a forgotten wall, another rolled-up piece of yellowed paper might already be waiting.
Waiting for the next pair of sharp eyes.
Waiting for the next question.
Waiting for the next story.
Because the best mysteries are not really about finding something lost.
They are about discovering what was worth remembering all along.
The End…
