text: C Kelemen The Winter Mill Murder Winter's Death To the girls who have been into mystery. 
   
   
   Rights To The Picture 
   I'm writing this in the book too because I am trying to make a point the artwork on the cover and all future artwork for this series is not mine and the rightful artist deserves the credit for it. 
   !--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--I will respectfully take any picture down if the artist asks so. !--[endif]-- 
   
   
    The Tortoise  !--[if gte mso 9]<xml>
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  ![endif]-- !--StartFragment--The snow was falling. The winter in West Virginia was still getting colder. The tortoise crawled by the mill back to its home in the farmhouse. When the tortoise dives into the frosted pond near the house the smudge of blood on his shell went mostly off leaving just a nick from a weapon with someone’s blood stuck in it. Leaving the now red pond, he searches for some food. I pick him up. I call Jim and Garry over; we have just found our first clue or piece of evidence to little Katie’s death.!--EndFragment-- 
   
   
   Parents  
   The hardest part of the death of a child is the interrogation with the parents. It was different with Katie’s parents when they heard of her death they cried for about a minute and then asked for the body to be buried. They answered all the questions without hesitation and couldn’t wait to leave. Finally right before I let them go I asked,” What types of animals live on this farm and mill?" The answer they gave me was three horses, four pigs, two cows, eight chickens, two pet fishes, and a dog. No tortoises lived there yet we found one, how peculiar. 
     
   
   
   
   After Dark  
   My partners went back to the office but I stayed to see what I could dig up. I went in the mill to see what it looked like and if it was the murder scene. Unfortunately I ended up getting locked in the mill. The machines started to come to life, doing their jobs. That is when I saw a smear of blood on the floor. I saw a pile of straw untouched by anything. As I took a closer look I noticed the baby tortoise eggs. That was when, no, wait, stop, boom… 
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   Text: Kelemen Images: Photo: Bookrix All rights reserved. Publication Date: April 13th 2013 https://www.bookrix.com/-r16ckelemen