Age-old question
THE CLASS kept pestering the teacher to tell them her age. So she gave them a numerical exercise leading to it. She wrote two whole numbers on the board which, as she told the class, added together gave the square of her age.
Most of the class then correctly worked out her age, but one boy used his calculator and made a couple of errors. First, between entering the two numbers he forgot to press the 鈥渁dd鈥� button. Then, when taking the square root, he pushed that button twice instead of once. This too gave him a whole-number answer, but it turned out to be the age of the teacher鈥檚 husband, who was older than her.
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How old were the teacher and her husband?
A 拢10 book token will be awarded to the sender of the first correct answer opened on Thursday 4 January. The Editor鈥檚 decision is final. Please send entries to Enigma 851, 快猫短视频, King鈥檚 Reach Tower, Stamford Street, London SE99 0BB. The winner of Enigma 845 was R.F. Tindall of Great Shelford, Cambridge.
Answer to Enigma 845
Draw lots!
533.