Mystery of the Vanished Prince (15 page)

Goon cleared his throat and spoke pompously. “I have it here, Master Frederick. I stopped a tramp with it fifteen minutes ago. Very nasty fellow he was too. Most insolent. Didn’t want to give up the bike at all when I challenged him.”

“How did you get it, then?” asked Fatty in an awed voice.

“Well, I struggled with him,” said Goon, letting his imagination go. “It was a bit of a rough-house, you know - but I got it from him. He was so scared that he ran for his life. I brought the bike here. You can come round for it, if you like.”

“My word - you’ve done some pretty quick work, Mr. Goon!” said Fatty, admiringly. Mr. Goon stood up very straight. Aha! - it wasn’t often that fat boy said things like that to him.

“I don’t let the grass grow under my feet,” said Mr. Goon,with dignity. “Well - you’ll be along in a minute or two, Master Frederick, I suppose?”

“Give me ten minutes, and I’ll be there!” said Fatty, cheerfully, and rang off with a click.

Mr. Goon has a Bad Time

Fatty arrived in ten minutes, looking spruce and clean. He had just had time to get out of his disguise and clean himself up. He had given himself one minute to laugh very loudly indeed at Goon’s story of the tramp and the fight he had had.

Goon opened the door. He was still pompous. “There’s your bike,” he said, waving to where it stood in the hall. “Can’t beat the police, you know, Master Frederick.”

“Well, I must say it was pretty smart work, Mr. Goon,” said Fatty, so admiringly that Mr. Goon told the story of the tramp all over again, adding a few more trimmings.

“Mr. Goon, I’m much obliged to you,” said Fatty, earnestly. “And, in return, I must pass on a bit of news. We’ve discovered a bit more about the kidnapping - I know Ern told you about the Prince hiding in a pram under the babies, didn’t he? Well, we’ve found out now that that wasn’t the real prince. It was a gipsy boy. The real Prince is, we think, somewhere in Raylingham Marshes.”

Mr. Goon’s face slowly grew thunderous as Fatty reeled all this off. “Now look here,” he said, “why don’t you think up some better tale? How many more princes are you going to tell me about?”

“I’m not fooling you, Mr. Goon,” said Fatty. “I said I’d help you this time, and I’m trying to. But you make it very difficult.”

“So do you,” said Mr. Goon. “What with your dressing up as foreigners, and talking foreign, and then telling Ern to tell me about Princes in prams with babies, and now you say he was a gipsy, and you want me to go gallivanting off to Raylingham Marshes after another prince. Not me!”

“I don’t want you to do any gallivanting at all,” said Fatty. “All you’ve got to do is to ring up the Chief Inspector and tell him everything. He’ll tell you what to do.”

“Look here,” said Mr. Goon, beginning to turn his usual purple, “didn’t I ring up and tell the Chief all about Princess Bongawee, the Prince’s sister - and it was all a makeup on your part to make me look small? Oh, you needn’t shake your head, I know it was! Then you wanted me to tell him another idiotic story - and now this. Well, I shan’t!”

“You’d better,” said Fatty. “Or shall I? If I do, I’ll get all the credit again, you know.”

“Don’t you do any telephoning either,” snapped Mr. Goon. “Can’t you keep out of this? I’m in charge of this case, I tell you. Interfering with the Law! That’s what you do all the time. You’re a toad of a boy, a…”

“Shush-shush, Mr. Goon,” said Fatty, beginning to wheel his bicycle out of the hall. “Naughty-naughty! Mustn’t lose temper.”

He wheeled his bicycle to the front gate and mounted it. Then he called back. “Oh, I say - I forgot to ask you something, Mr. Goon. Did that tramp you fought with do up his shoe after all?”

And, without waiting for an answer, Fatty rode chuckling down the road. Mr. Goon stared after him in the darkness. He was puzzled. How did that boy know that the tramp had said he wanted to do up his shoe? Certainly Mr. Goon had mentioned no such thing. Then how did Fatty know it?

Light suddenly dawned on Mr. Goon. He staggered into his sitting-room and sat down heavily in his chair. He put his head in his hands and groaned. The tramp had been Fatty! He had taken his bike away - and patted himself on the back when Fatty had reported it gone - and given it back to him without so much as mentioning the missing front lamp!

Why, oh why had he made up such a wonderful story? How Fatty must have laughed up his sleeve! Mr. Goon spent quite half an hour thinking of all the horrid things he would like to do to Fatty - but alas, he knew he would never, never get the chance to do them. Fatty could look after himself too well!

The telephone bell rang and Mr. Goon jumped. He took up the receiver fiercely. If it was That Boy again he’d tell him what he thought of him!

But it wasn’t. It was a message from the Chief Inspector, delivered shortly by another constable.

“That P.C. Goon? Message from the Chief. A report has come through from one of our men to say it is now thought that the boy at the camp was not the real Prince - but some one masquerading as him. Photographs shown to boys on the field have not been recognized as the boy who was with them as the Prince. The Chief says, have you had any inkling of this - if so, please send in your report.”

Mr. Goon gaped. He didn’t know what to say. Why - it seemed as if the message Ern had delivered to him from Fatty might have been correct after all, then - not a fairytale. That story about the Prince getting away in the pram - and now Fatty’s tale about it being a gipsy boy after all! Was it all true?

“P.C. Goon? Are you still there?” said the voice at the other end, impatiently. “Did you hear me?”

“Yes - oh yes,” panted Goon, feeling suddenly as if hc had been running a long way. “Thanks. Interesting report. I’ll - er - think about it - and send in mine shortly.”

“Right. Good night,” said the voice, and the telephone clicked off.

For the second time that night Goon sank down into his chair and put his head in his hands, groaning. Why hadn’t he told the Chief all that Ern had told him? Now some one else had got the information, and got in before him. Goon began seriously to wonder if he owned as good brains as he thought himself to have.

“First I ring up and tell the Chief about that dressing-up and Princess Bongawee, which was nonsense,” he thought, “And then I don’t tell him about the Prince going off in the pram with those babies. That’s why those kids were over at the Fair, no doubt about that - trying to trace the babies and their mother.”

He sat and brooded for some time. Then he thought of the last thing Fatty had said to him - that he thought the real Prince was in Raylingham Marshes.

Was that true? Did he really think so? Dare he ring up and tell the Chief that - or would it turn out that there wasn’t such a place or something?

Mr. Goon began to get into a state. He paced up and down. He clutched his head. He groaned. He’d lose his job over this if he didn’t do something special now!

He got down a police map of the district. He looked up Raylingham Marshes. Yes - there was such a place. But was it just marshes and nothing else? Suppose there wasn’t even a house there?

“There’s only one thing to do,” said Mr. Goon, making up his mind. “I must go and see this place. Let’s see - what’s the time? There seems to be a station within a mile or two of the place. Is there a train I can catch?”

He looked up the time-table. There was a train, the very last train - in three-quarters of an hour. Mr. Goon began to do things in a great hurry.

He took off his uniform and put on ordinary clothes.

It wouldn’t do to go snooping round a hide-out in police uniform. He dragged on a pair of enormous, grey flannel trousers, added a grey jersey with a bright yellow border at neck and bottom and a cap. He put on a tweed coat, rather baggy, and then looked at himself in the glass.

“Nobody would guess I was a police officer!” he thought. “Talk about disguises! Well, I can do a bit of that too. I’m just a hiker now, that’s all. I’ll put a few things in a kit-bag to make meself seem real.”

He caught the train by the skin of his teeth. It arrived on time at the station near to Raylingham Marshes - Raylingham Station - a sleepy little place with one man who was porter, ticket-clerk and everything.

He seemed surprised to see Mr. Goon on the last train. “Did you want to get out here, mate?” he asked.

“I did,” said Mr. Goon. “Er - I’m a hiker, you see. I’m - er - seeing the countryside.”

“Well, don’t you go hiking over them marshes in the dark,” said the porter, puzzled.

“Are there any houses in the marshes?” asked Goon.

“Not many,” said the porter. “Two, that’s all. One’s a farm, on high ground, and the other’s a big house. Belongs to foreigners, so people says.”

“Aha!” thought Goon. “That’s the house I want. I’ll get there somehow, and snoop round. I might find the Prince. I might even rescue him.”

Wonderful pictures of himself carrying the Prince on his back across dangerous marshes came into Mr. Goon’s mind. Even more wonderful pictures came after that - photographs of himself and the Prince in the papers. Headlines - “Brave Constable Rescues Kidnapped Prince.”

Mr. Goon left the dimly-lighted station and stepped out into the darkness. There was a lane outside the exit. He would follow that - very very cautiously. It must lead somewhere!

The porter watched him go. “Funny chap,” he said to himself. “Mad as a hatter! Hiking over the marshes in the middle of the night. The police ought to be told about him - ought to keep an eye on him, they ought!

But nobody kept an eye on the brave and valiant Mr. Goon. He was quite, quite alone.

Disappearance of Mr. Goon

Fatty had done nothing that night except to look up the map to find Raylingham Marshes, if there was such a place. There was, as Goon had already found. Fatty examined the map closely.

“I believe I could get into the marshes from this bit of high ground here,” he thought. “There’s a path or something marked there. Two buildings marked as well - one at one end of the marsh, one in the middle. There’s a station too. Well, I certainly shan’t go by train - much too conspicuous.”

He decided to go to bed and sleep on the whole idea. He would tell the others about it in the morning. He was much too tired to do any more “gallivanting” about that night - and anyway he wasn’t going to lose himself in unknown marshes in pitch darkness!

The telephone rang while he was eating his breakfast next morning. The house parlourmaid answered it and came into the room.

“Master Frederick, it’s for you, sir,” she said. “Chief Inspector Jenks on the telephone.”

Fatty jumped. His father looked at him at once. “You haven’t been getting into any trouble, Frederick, I hope,” he said.

“I don’t think so, sir,” said Fatty and disappeared hurriedly into the hall, wondering what in the world the Chief wanted at this time of the morning.

“Frederick? Is that you?” came the Chief’s crisp voice. “Listen - Goon’s disappeared. Do you know anything about it?”

“Gosh!” said Fatty, startled. “No, I don’t sir. I saw him late last night - he - er - found my bicycle for me after I had - er - reported it gone. He certainly didn’t make me think he was going to disappear.”

“Well, he has,” said the Chief Inspector, sounding annoyed. “He didn’t answer his telephone this morning, and when I sent a man over, he reported that Goon was Gone - not in his uniform either.”

“Don’t say he’s disappeared in his pyjamas too - like the Prince!” said Fatty, still more startled.

“I don’t know,” said the Chief. “Nobody would kidnap Goon, I should imagine - not out of his own house. It’s most extraordinary. You are sure you don’t know anything about it, Frederick? You usually seem to know a good deal more than most people.”

“No, sir. Honestly I didn’t know he had gone - or was meaning to go anywhere,” said Fatty, very puzzled. “I can’t make it out.”

“Well, I can’t stop for more now,” said the Chief. “Ring me up if you have any ideas. Goodbye.”

And before Fatty could ask him or tell him anything more, the telephone went dead. Fatty stared down at it. He was most surprised at this news.

“Goon disappeared! He must have gone after I left him. It was dark then, and he was in his uniform. He must have undressed. Gosh, don’t say he’s gone in his pyjamas too - this is all very peculiar!” Fatty quite forgot that he hadn’t finished his breakfast, and went out to get his bicycle to ride round to Larry’s.

Larry was surprised to see him so early. “No time to talk much now,” said Fatty. “Come round to Pip’s, you and Daisy. There’s a lot of news.”

There certainly was! The others drank in all Fatty had to say about the boy in the caravan the night before, and what he had told Fatty.

“So you see Sid was quite right when he told us about the boy who was hiding in the pram,” said Fatty. “And now we know why he hid - and why he pretended to be the Prince, and everything.”

“But we don’t know where he’s been hidden - the real Prince, I mean,” said Pip.

“Well, I may even know that,” said Fatty, and he told them what the boy had said. “He said his uncle, Old Man Tallery, was in Raylingham Marshes,” he went on, “and as he was mixed up in the kidnapping, and produced his nephew, Rollo, to impersonate the real Prince, it’s very likely that the Prince is there too. There’s probably a good hide-out there, in those marshes.”

“You did awfully well last night,” said Pip. “What time did you get back?”

“Latish, in the dark,” said Fatty. “And I hadn’t a lamp on my bike - and what do you think! I was caught by Goon!”

“Gracious!” said Bets, alarmed. “Did he go round and complain to your people?”

“Of course not. He didn’t know it was me. You forget I was disguised as a tramp,” grinned Fatty, and then told them how Goon had taken his bicycle, and how he, Fatty, had got it back again. The others roared with laughter.

“No one will ever get the better of you, Fatty,” said Daisy, with the utmost conviction. “Any more news? What a lot you’ve got.”

“Yes. I’ve kept the spiciest bit till the last,” said Fatty. “Goon has disappeared! Nowhere to be found this morning, so the Chief Inspector says - and he’s left his uniform behind. Where, oh where can he be?”