Max Manly and the Case of the Muffin-Cupcake Dichotomy

A Story by Lincoln Bey

Max Manly owned his own private investigation agency. By any sane measure, he shouldn’t have. The simplest stakeouts left the man thoroughly befuddled, the art of disguise was completely foreign to him and he never could quite tell the difference between a muffin and a cupcake. Yet own it he did -- Manly & Asociates; The greatest insult to law enforcement and spelling yet to come out of the Pacific North-West. Plurals too; the “Asociates” were a single overworked man.

Yet, despite his numerous and severe failings, Manly had a successful business on his hands. While he often got tricky investigative concepts like “wire-tapping” and “assassination” confused, he at least made up for it by confusing financial concepts like “holiday” and “overtime without pay.”

Theodore-Lincoln McDonagh, his sole employee, did not share Manly’s talent for brilliant failures. He was, in fact, brilliant; but only on a more basic level. He solved terrible crimes and brought down criminal masterminds using amazing and esoteric methods, yet he never once managed to confuse a muffin for a cupcake. They made an excellent team, really. While McDonagh solved crimes based on nothing more than the condition of a suspect’s gear clutch, Manly solved them by getting into fights with seagulls. They really did work well together. Really…

---

Max Manly sat alone, in his office; staring at a cupcake and a muffin. He knew one was one and the other the other, yet he didn’t know which was which and which was not. He had been trying in vain, since dawn, to discover some tell-tale sign of muffinhood or cupcakicity -- yet he remained clueless. He was beginning to think that McDonagh had provided him with two muffins or two cupcakes as part of an elaborate scheme to send him mad. It was all too much for him, so he took a Panadol and decided to have a nap.

Before he could leave for his bed, the phone on his table started to ring. Manly didn’t have a keen sense of memory, yet, in some part of his lemur-like brain, he knew that this was the universally accepted sign used to indicate that a phone had an incoming call. He picked it up.
‘Manly & Asociates Investigation Agency’ he said.
‘Ah, Max Manly; it’s so good to finally speak to you.’
‘Mum?’
‘… No Max. I am not you’re mother.’
Max, a pathological smoker, lit a cigar before answering. ‘Ah, so Muffin Co. finally got my letters. Well, I wanted to ask: is there any difference betwee-‘
‘Max, I’m not with Muffin Co. either. Please, give me a minute, I-‘
‘Daddy?’
‘Shut up and let me talk! I’ve kidnapped your little sidekick McDonagh, and if you-‘
Max didn’t like yelling. He set the phone down and went to bed.

---

Meanwhile, in an abandoned warehouse, Max’s little sidekick McDonagh sat tied to a chair. Around him, three very angry people with guns stood talking loudly over one another.
‘The b*****d hung up on me! He doesn’t care about this little piece of-‘
‘He must already know where we are! I hear this guys a genius! We have to get out of here before-‘
‘I think a cupcake has to be made from flour while a muffin can-‘
‘Gentlemen, please, your attention for a moment!’ McDonagh grinned slyly at his captor before continuing. ‘Yes, my employer is a genius. He will be here any minute now, possibly with police support or, if he’s really angry bear cavalrymen riding ostriches. But you can all still make it out of this with your lives and a few thousand dollars for your effort.
‘Right, and you’re going to help us?’ one of the angry men answered.
‘That’s right. Bear cavalrymen, remember? What do you have to lose?’
The man raised a hand to hit McDonagh, but something about the kidnapee’s grin scared him. There was a terrible glint in his eyes, a few too many teeth and he seemed to have grown an inch or two since he arrived.
‘Here’s what you have to do.’ McDonagh continued.

---

Max Manly rose from his midday nap feeling refreshed and spry. He thought it was about time he put on some pants and leave the house (as he had been naked up until this point.) After dressing, he made his way out the front door and into the street.

Manly was a very driven man. Ever since he was young, he worked tirelessly to solve any mystery that caught his attention. His actual attempts were rarely successful, but sheer dumb luck tended to solve everything for him anyway. And so, he set out to solve the Case of the Muffin-Cupcake Dichotomy. He thought this could be best achieved at a hardware store. He was dead wrong.

---

‘Illrych! Pick up some glue. We’ll need lots and lots of glue. And Adeol! Anvils. We need anvils!’
Theodore-Lincoln McDonagh and his kidnappers made their way through Werehard Hardware, collecting equipment for McDonagh’s plan; his plan being to set a series of hilariously ineffectual cartoon-style booby traps around the warehouse while he thought of a better plan.
‘This better work, you American pig!’ Bentoli said. Bentoli was the angriest of the angry men with guns. He insisted on staying by McDonagh’s side the entire time, aiming his pistol at him through his coat. He at least agreed to move it to his side after the third woman maced him in disgust.
‘Don’t worry, Bentoli. The cops’ll never get past a floor covered in superglue!’
‘God, is that Manly over there?’ Bentoli said, pointing.
‘What? I don’t see anything.’
‘Over there. The guy with his shirt on backwards, talking to a paint can.’
‘… Oh… I suppose it is.’
‘HI MCDONAGH!’ Manly shouted as he made his way towards them.
‘Don’t get any closer! I have a gun! Move one step further and I’ll shoot him!’ Bentoli replied.
Manly, who had forgotten to tie his shoes earlier that day, tripped onto a nearby shelf, catapulting a plunger which stuck to Illrych’s face. Surprised, Bentoli turned his gun to Manly, fired, missed and knocked a pyramid of wood varnish onto Adeol.

Bentoli leapt back, away from the crime fighting pair and brought his pistol up -- aiming it towards them.
‘Back! Back or I fire’ he said.
‘Don’t do anything drastic. If you kill anyone, the police will be at your throat full force.’ McDonagh replied.
‘I don’t care! I’ll kill you both and damn the conse-‘ Bentoli collapsed in front of the pair. A huge bruise was forming on the back of his head. Behind him, a group of men, dressed in black suits, stood aiming pistols down on the unconscious criminal.
‘Oh, god! Thank you!’ McDonagh said as he placed a pair of handcuffs on Bentoli. ‘You with the FBI?
‘We’re with Muffin Co. That guy over there -- the one urinating in the cash register; he’s our best customer. He sent a letter asking what the difference between Muffins and Cupcakes are. We’re here to tell him we don’t know, but we’re forming a group to find out. The Free World’s best and brightest minds, all trying to solve it. We wanted you two to join.’

---

Though Max Manly and McDonagh searched their entire lives for an answer, they never did find out what the difference between a muffin and a cupcake is. As for Bentoli, Illrych and Adeol, they all got off on a technicality and moved back to their native Brazil. Rumour has it, they have plans to kidnap the President any day now.