Mystery of the Strange Bundle (4 page)

“Well, I hope he keeps out of here,” said Pip, beginning on a currant bun. “I say, these are good - new as anything.”

Bets let her eyes wander round the shop. Up on the mantelpiece was a model of a cow, standing about two feet high. It had a head that would nod up and down if any one set it going. She got up and went over to it.

“I like this cow,” she said. “I’ll set its head nid-nodding. Let’s see if it manages to nod it all the time we’re here.”

She set the head nodding and went back to her chair, watching the cow. Buster began to bark again, and the five swung their heads round to the door.

Mr. Goon was standing there, looking so plump that the buttons on his tunic were stretched to bursting-point. “Call this dog to you,” he commanded Fatty. “Put him on a lead. I won’t have him dancing round my ankles.”

“Why? Are you coming to have a drink of hot milk or something?” asked Fatty. He deftly put Buster on the lead, and made him sit down. Fatty was hoping against hope that Mr. Goon was indeed coming to sit in the shop and have a drink. Fatty had a bright iden, and wanted to carry it out!

Mr. Goon stalked in and sat down at the table next but one to the five children’s. He called for a cup of cocoa and a bun.

“Cold outside for you again, isn’t it, Mr. Goon, sir?” said the short plump woman, setting down a cup of cocoa and a bun in front of the red-faced policeman.

Mr. Goon took no notice of her. He glanced across at the children. “Ho - seems like I’ve had a nice quiet time these holidays,” he began. “No nosey-parkering, no Interfering with the Law. That says something for the ‘flu’, that does. You must have felt funny not being able to stick your noses in a mystery.”

Nobody answered. Fatty spoke a few words to Larry, and Larry said a few back. Nobody looked at Mr. Goon. He didn’t like being ignored. He raised his voice.

“Or have you got a mystery on hand?” he began again. “A nice juicy mystery to make a mess of?”

Fatty looked at him. “Now how did you hear that, Mr. Goon?” he said, in a surprised voice. “Larry, have you been saying anything about our latest mystery?”

Larry rose immediately to Fatty’s invitation to be absurd.

“Which case do you mean?” he said. “The mystery of the red-nosed reindeer, or the one about the flying saucers? We’ve solved them both, haven’t we?”

“Oh yes. I didn’t mean those,” said Fatty. “Mr. Goon probably knows all about those by now. They’re stale news, aren’t they, Mr. Goon. No, Larry - I meant the Mystery of the Strange Voices.”

“Gah!” said Mr. Goon, biting violently into his bun. “Strange voices - you don’t know what you’re talking about. Lot of silly make-up!”

The other four had pricked up their ears when they heard Fatty refer to Strange Voices. They all knew about his ventriloquial powers now, and he had practised a few of his tricks in front of them. Why had he mentioned Strange Voices to Mr. Goon?

“Lot of silly make-up,” said Mr. Goon again, and took a sip of hot cocoa. “Strange voices! Gah!”

“Oh yes - that mystery’s not solved yet, is it?” said Larry, speaking to Fatty in a voice loud enough for Mr. Goon to hear. “Curious case that - people hearing strange voices which aren’t really there. Somebody casting a spell on them, I suppose.”

“Baby-talk,” said Mr. Goon, drinking his cocoa rather loudly.

“You may be right,” said Fatty seriously. “But believe it or not, some people lately have been hearing ducks quack where there are no ducks, hens clucking, and people speaking - and yet there don’t seem to be any there.”

“You’ll tell me that cow on the mantelpiece will start to moo next,” said Mr. Goon, swallowing the last of the currant bun. Fatty scribbled something quickly on a piece of paper and pushed it across the table to the others.

“Cow will moo,” he had written. “But none of you is to hear it.”

Mr. Goon wiped his mouth. “Quacking ducks, clucking hens, mooing cows,” he observed sarcastically. “Silly make-up. Bosh and rubbish!”

“It’s a nice cow, isn’t it,” said Bets, looking across at it. “Its head is still going up and down.”

Mr. Goon looked across at it too.

“Moo-oo, moo-oo, moo-oo,” said the cow, mooing in exact time to the nodding of its head. The mooing was so realistic, and so exactly in time to the nodding, that even the children, with the exception of Fatty, thought for one moment that the mooing noise did actually come from it.

Mr. Goon stared at the cow, astounded. He glanced round at the children, Not one of them, of course, took any notice of the mooing, remembering Fatty’s hastily scribbled instructions. They lifted up their cups and drank, Bets hoping to goodness that she wouldn’t start to giggle.

Mr. Goon looked at the nodding cow again. It had stopped mooing - principally because Fatty had been overcome with an urge to laugh. But, as Goon looked at it, it gave such a large and unexpected moo that the policeman jumped violently. Then the mooing quietened and went on in time with the nodding of the animal’s head.

Mr. Goon swallowed hard. “Moo-oo, moo-oo, moo-oo,” went the cow, nodding its head. Nobody would ever have believed that it was merely Fatty throwing the noise across to the mantelpiece!

Mr. Goon felt rather sick. He didn’t know what to make of it at all. He looked at the children again. They were taking absolutely no notice at all of the mooing cow. Neither was Buster, of course. Was it possible that they were not hearing what Mr. Goon was hearing?

The little plump woman came bustling into the shop with some more buns for the children. The cow stopped mooing. Mr. Goon cleared his throat and spoke to the shop-woman.

“Er - nice cow that of yours, my good woman - the one on the mantelpiece, I mean. Very life-like? You’d almost expect it to moo!”

“You will have your joke, sir,” said the little woman. “My, if I heard it moo I’d think there was something wrong with me. I’d think I was going crazy!”

“That’s just what we were saying,” said Fatty gravely. “Strange Voices are about - people are hearing them. What are they? A Warning? Brrrrrr! I’m glad I don’t hear them!”

“Well, we live in queer days, no doubt about it,” said the little shop-woman puzzled, and hurried off again. The cow began to moo once more, but so softly that Mr. Goon was not absolutely sure if he was hearing it or not. Could he be imagining it? He gazed so earnestly at the nodding cow that Bets felt an irresistible giggle rising up from the very middle of her tummy. She knew from experience that they were the worst kind of giggles - the ones that heaved up and broke out helplessly.

“Talk, do talk,” she besought the others in a low voice. “I’m going to laugh.”

All but Fatty talked in low voices, saying any nonsense that came into their heads. Fatty stopped making the cow moo. Mr. Goon sat back cautiously. Thank goodness the cow was behaving normally now. Maybe his ears had just played him a trick.

“Quark, quark, quark!” Mr. Goon jumped violently again, and looked all round. That was a duck quacking, not a doubt of it.

QUARK! Mr. Goon’s eyes caught sight of a wild duck, beautifully stuffed, placed in a glass case at the end of the shop. He gazed at it, holding his breath.

“Quark, quark, QUARK!” The duck appeared to be looking at him out of its glass eye, and its half-open beak seemed to be quacking. Mr. Goon leapt up, full of horror.

“That duck!” he said wildly. “Did you hear it!”

“What duck?” asked Larry. “Oh, Mr. Goon - surely - surely you are not suggesting that the duck in the glass case is quacking!”

“Mr. Goon - don’t say you are hearing the Strange Voices!” said Fatty, earnestly and solemnly.

“Quark!” The noise seemed to come from somewhere behind Mr. Goon. He gave a loud, hunted cry and ran from the shop, Buster almost tripping him up with his lead. And then the children collapsed over the table, crying tears of laughter into their empty cups. “Mr. Goon, Mr. Goon, you couldn’t have been funnier!”

Something Happens at Last

“Oh, Fatty - HOW do you do it?” said Daisy, mopping her eyes and feeling very weak. “The way you made that cow moo in time to its nodding was perfect. Honestly, I could have believed myself that the thing was mooing.”

“So would I,” said Bets. “Oh, dear - don’t do that sort of thing too often, Fatty - I simply shan’t be able to keep my giggles down if you do. Mr. Goon’s face! His eyes almost fell out of his head!”

“He must be feeling pretty puzzled,” said Larry. “I bet he’ll wake up at night and hear noises that aren’t there!”

They paid their second bill and went out. What a pity there wasn’t any first-class mystery to probe into! These were the first holidays in which nothing of any sort or kind had turned up. And there were only a few days left.

“Can’t we spoof old Goon a bit, just to get some kind of excitement into our last few days?” said Larry. “That laugh did me more good than a dozen days in bed!”

“Me too,” said Pip. “I was feeling rather low this morning, but now I’m feeling fine. That’s obviously what we all want - a jolly good laugh every now and again.”

“And Fatty’s the one to give it to us,” said Bets, squeezing his arm. “Fatty, do let’s see if we can’t spoof Mr. Goon a bit?”

“But how?” said Fatty. “I mean - we can’t follow him around with all kinds of noises. He’d soon begin to associate them with us. If every time he hears a cow moo or a duck quack, or hears mysterious voices going on, and sees us somewhere near, well, even he’s wide-awake enough to put two and two together - us and the noises.”

“I suppose you’re right,” said Bets, with a sigh, putting away her visions of pursuing Mr. Goon with strange and wonderful sounds. “Well - perhaps something will happen to give us a bit of excitement.”

It was queer that she said that - because that very night something did happen, though nothing very startling. They didn’t know about it till the next morning.

The milkman told Larry. “Heard about the breakin at the Cedars last night?” he said. “It’s next door but one from you. It’s a small house, and a man called Mr. Fellows has rented it since a week or two. Lived there all alone.”

“What happened?” said Larry.

“Well, apparently somebody broke in, and rifled the house from top to bottom,” said the milkman. “We don’t know if Mr. Fellows was there or not - anyway, he’s gone this morning. Hasn’t come back yet either.”

“Who discovered this?” asked Larry, quite excited to think that all this had taken place so near to his own home. Why, he might have heard something in the night - a shout, the breaking of a window, or something. Alas, he had been too sound asleep.

“I found the house-door open, and a window broken at the back, when I took the milk early this morning,” said the milkman. “I peeped in at the hall-door and my, what a mess the place was in! I stepped in and telephoned for the police at once.”

“Oh - did Mr. Goon come?” asked Larry, disappointed. He had hoped for one moment that the Find-Outers might get in first! It was still early, only just after breakfast-time.

“Yes. He’s there now - taking notes and looking for finger-prints and the rest of it,” said the milkman. “He’s feeling important this morning. Told me to keep my big mouth shut and not tell anyone what I found - after I’d told every single one of my customers! What does he think I am - a clam?”

“Did you notice anything at all out of the way?” asked Larry.

“Nothing,” said the milkman. “I didn’t stop to look round, anyway, I telephoned the police at once. Mustn’t disturb anything, you know, in cases like this.”

Larry got on his bicycle and went to tell Fatty. It might be nothing, or it might be something interesting, you never knew. Fatty would soon get the old brains to work and decide if the Find-Outers were to do anything or not!

Fatty was most interested. “This cheers me up immensely,” he said. “It may be a potty little robbery, but we’d better go and find out. If the house really was rifled from top to bottom, it looks as though some one was trying very hard to find something of great importance to him. What was it - and who was it?”

They collected Pip and Bets, fetched Daisy, and all five of them, with Buster, went up to the house that stood two doors from Larry’s. It didn’t look as if anyone was there. Mr. Goon must have come and gone. Good.

“Now then,” said Fatty. “Examine all the paths and beds round the house. Look for the usual things - footmarks, cigarette ends, hand-prints on window-ledges,
etc.
Make notes of what you find, and we’ll compare later.”

“Aren’t you coming with us?” asked Bets, seeing Fatty turn away.

“No. I’m going to look in at the windows and see if there’s anything interesting inside,” said Fatty.

But the curtains were drawn across and he couldn’t see anything. He went steadily round the little house, but not one window could he see into. The front door was closed and fastened now, and the back door was locked too.

Fatty came to the broken window at the back. It was the kitchen window. Obviously the robber or whatever he was, had got in here. Fatty stuck his hand inside and moved the curtain. The kitchen was upside down! Drawers had been pulled from the dresser and from the table. Cupboards were open and their contents dragged out on to the floor! What could the intruder have been looking for?

Fatty suddenly heard a sound inside the kitchen. He listened. What was it? He heard it again, and then peeping in at the window once more, he made out two gleaming eyes looking at him from a cupboard.

“Miaow! Miaow!” said the owner of the eyes piteously.

“Gosh - it’s a kitten,” said Fatty. “Scared to death, I expect, and nobody to feed it or care for it, poor little thing!”

The others came round the corner of the house, notebooks in their hands. “Here!” said Fatty, beckoning. “There’s a kitten left in the house! What shall we do?”

“Get it,” said Daisy promptly.

“How?” asked Pip. “All the doors and windows are shut tight. We’ve checked that.”

“This one’s broken,” said Fatty. “If I wrap my hand in a handkerchief I think I could put it through the broken pane and do what the thief did - undo the clasp and open the window. Then I could get in and rescue the kitten.”

“Well, go on then,” said Larry, looking all round. “There’s no one about. Goon won’t come back yet.”