The Mystery of the Kidnapped Whale

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I was going to say this is Hector Sebastian speaking. But I’m not speaking. I’m writing this on my new word processor. That’s a computer with a typewriter keyboard and a memory to store what I write.

I’m a mystery writer by profession. I used to be a private detective. But that seems a long time ago now, and the case you’re going to read — at least I hope you’re going to read it — has nothing, or almost nothing, to do with me.

It’s a case that involved some young friends of mine, The Three Investigators, as they call themselves. So the best thing I can do is tell you about them first.

The Three Investigators are boys who live in Rocky Beach, a small city on the coast of southern California not far from Hollywood.

Jupiter Jones is the leader of the group. He is short and he probably thinks of himself as stocky. If you wanted to be unkind, you could say he was stout. You could even say he was fat. He has a keen deductive mind and a dogged determination to get to the bottom of anything that puzzles him. He also has a lot more self-confidence than I did at his age. Some people might even find him a little too sure of himself, but I’m fond of Jupe, as his friends call him, so I’ll just say that if he often believes he’s right about something — well, he often is.

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