Freddy the Pied Piper (19 page)

Everything would have gone all right if Willy hadn't sneezed. But I guess you would have sneezed too if you had gone head first down a stovepipe into a firebox full of cold ashes. The first breath Willy took, the ashes went up his nose. It is really to his credit that he only sneezed once. But it was a good strong sneeze, even for a snake, and it blew one of the stove lids right off and sent it clattering to the floor.

Out on the porch Freddy and Jinx heard the racket. Mr. Bleech's gentle snoring stopped, there was a creak of bedsprings, and at once Freddy began pounding on the door.

As Freddy had hoped, the sound of the falling stove lid went right out of Mr. Bleech's mind when he heard the furious knocking. Convinced that whatever was wrong was at the front of the house, he grabbed his gun and started down the front stairs into the hall. “Shut up out there!” he shouted through the door. “Stop that racket!”

Freddy kept on pounding for a minute, to give Willy time to get out of the stove. Then he disguised his voice to a sort of whine and said: “Oh, excuse me, kind sir, but I am a little boy, and I am lost, and I want to find Yare's Corners. Would you please tell me which way to go?”

Now almost anybody would want to help a little boy who was lost in the middle of the night, but Mr. Bleech was a pretty mean man. Anyway, nobody in his senses would expect a kind action from a man who would steal from a rhinoceros. Mr. Bleech didn't open the door even a crack. “No, I won't!” he shouted. “And you get away from this house or I'll let you have a charge of birdshot. Now git!”

So Freddy pretended to burst into tears. He went down the front steps, and down the front walk, and as he went he cried and he howled and he bellowed so that you could have heard him a mile. I don't suppose any real boy could have made so much noise crying unless he was a giant or a concert singer. For a pig has piercing notes in his voice that very few boys can duplicate. But of course it was all to cover up any sounds that Willy might be making in the kitchen.

Mr. Bleech peered out through the keyhole, for the performance really astonished him, but all he could see in the darkness was a small figure going down the path and out the gate. And when the bellowing had died away, he went back upstairs and got into bed again. And Freddy crept back and joined Jinx on the porch, where a few minutes later they were joined by Leo.

Nothing happened for a little while. And then there were faint grating sounds in the front door lock, and very slowly the front door opened and two or three feet of Willy came out. “Psst, Freddy!” he hissed. And when the pig had crept over to him, he whispered: “The money isn't under his pillow. I just looked. What do we do now?”

So Freddy gave the snake his instructions, and then Willy made a U turn and went back into the house.

There was some more quiet for a few minutes, and then a sudden yell, and thumpings, from upstairs, and the animals rushed in and up into Mr. Bleech's bedroom. Mr. Bleech was in bed, and it didn't look as if he was going to get out of it again in a hurry either, for the upper half of Willy was sitting on Mr. Bleech's chest, and the lower half of him was wrapped three times around both Mr. Bleech and the bed.

“Hi, Freddy,” said the snake. “And what now?”

Freddy snapped on the electric light, and as he did so Mr. Bleech gave an exclamation of dismay. “You! Might have known it! Darned animals! You just wait! You'll be sorry for this to the last day of your lives.”

Willy brought his tail forward and gave Mr. Bleech a slap on the side of the head that made his teeth rattle and left a long streak of soot on his cheek. Snakes are pretty muscular, and Willy only hit him gently because he didn't want to knock him unconscious.

“Take it easy, Willy,” said Leo.

Freddy saw the shotgun standing in the corner by the bed. He got it and sat down in a chair. “Tell us where you've hidden the money,” he said.

“I don't know anything about your old money,” Mr. Bleech snarled.

“Give him a little squeeze, Willy,” said Leo. “Don't squash him, just scrunch him a little.”

So Willy scrunched him a little.

One scrunch was enough. When Mr. Bleech got his breath back he told them that the money was under a loose floor board in the closet. It was half a minute's work for Leo to claw up the board and bring the roll of bills out to Freddy.

“Seven dollars short,” said the pig, when he had counted it. “Well, we won't grudge him that. I guess we've had seven dollars' worth of fun tonight. Come on, Willy.”

Mr. Bleech didn't get up to see them to the door. He just lay there in his bed saying a lot of things that I wouldn't care to repeat, as they trooped out and down the stairs.

It was nearly one in the morning when they got back to Mr. Boomschmidt's, and they all sneaked off quietly to bed. But before Freddy went into his tiger cage he gave Phil the rest of the cookies. “And you stay around here,” he said. “If everything works out right tomorrow morning, I'll write for that recipe, and as soon as it comes I'll get Mrs. Boomschmidt to bake you a double rule.”

“Brother,” said the delighted buzzard, “I ain't going to let you out of my sight.” At least that was what Freddy thought he said, for Phil talked as usual with his mouth full, and it was hard to understand him.

Jinx and Freddy were up early next morning, and before breakfast Jinx saw Jerry and told him what had happened at Mr. Bleech's. Jerry felt a lot better when he knew that the money had been recovered, but he said reproachfully that they might have taken him along.

“We had to be very quiet, Jerry,” said Jinx. “And—well, we were afraid maybe you'd get mad and bust up the house. If you'd have heard him yelling through the door at us, for instance—”

“I guess you're right, Freddy,” Jerry said. “I get so
awful
mad, and then I have to do something. But my, I'm glad you got that money back!”

Then Freddy had a long talk with Madame Delphine, the result of which was that after breakfast, when they were sitting on the porch, Madame Delphine said: “I have a strange feeling that something very wonderful is going to happen today. What can it be?” she said, looking around distractedly. “Dear me, if I could only get a clue!”

“Maybe you could find out from the coffee grounds,” Freddy suggested.

“Of course!” she said. “Let me see your cup.” She looked at it and handed it back. “Nothing special there. Let's see yours, Bill.”

She looked at several cups without finding anything significant, but when she came to Mr. Boomschmidt's she gave a loud dramatic cry. “Ah! This is it! This
must
be. See here—the dollar sign as plain as the nose on your face! And below it … what is this?” She closed her eyes. “Let me think; let me think!” she muttered.

“Hush everybody,” said Mr. Boomschmidt, leaning forward excitedly in his chair. “My gracious, stop rocking, mother! Willy, quit wiggling.”

For several minutes Madame Delphine sat with closed eyes and her head cocked as if listening to distant voices. Then she began speaking, in a low thrilling voice which—Leo whispered to Freddy—used to cost the customers fifty cents extra when she was telling fortunes in her tent at the circus.

“I see,” she said, “a dim room, a big room, with a sloping ceiling. I think it is an attic. I see a tall man. He wears a grey uniform and a grey slouch hat, and he has a sword at his side. In his hand he carries something. It might be a packet of letters. He takes it into a corner of the room; he kneels; he tucks the packet down into the corner where the roof meets the floor. Now I see him rise. He dusts off his hands. He—” She stopped suddenly, opened her eyes, and said in her natural voice: “Dear me, what are you all staring at? Did I tell you anything?”

“Come on!” shouted Mr. Boomschmidt, jumping to his feet. “Up to the attic. Let's see if we can find anything.”

Animals and people, they all, with the exception of Jerry and Mohammed, rushed for the attic stairs. Even old Mrs. Boomschmidt picked up her skirts and ran; and the ancient house shook and trembled as they galloped up the long steep flights.

There was nothing much in the attic but some big trunks of circus costumes, and they shoved these aside and made for the corners.

“This seems the most likely corner, boss,” said Leo, who had dropped back for a whispered word or two with Madame Delphine.

Mr. Boomschmidt knelt and fumbled around in the corner indicated, and sure enough, in a moment he rose with a shout of triumph, and in his hand a packet of twenty dollar bills. “We've found it!” he exclaimed. “Oh, glory me—look, boys and girls, here it is—Col. Yancey's money! O my gracious!” And he seized his mother about the waist and waltzed her around until the dust that her flying skirts raised from the attic floor set them all to sneezing.

Chapter 16

They clattered down the stairs, shouting and laughing, but when they got back to the porch Mr. Boomschmidt called for quiet. “There's just one thing,” he said. “This money belonged to Col. Yancey. See?—it says on the paper: Property of Col. Jefferson Bird Yancey. Now Col. Yancey is dead, and I understand he left no living relatives. So who does this money really belong to? Does it really belong to us?”

“If the house belongs to you, the money you found in it belongs to you,” said Jinx, and the others agreed.

“Yes,” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “Yes, I suppose so. I just want to be sure.”

“Never look a gift horse in the mouth, chief,” said Leo.

“Horse?” Mr. Boomschmidt screwed up his face in puzzlement. “What are you getting at, Leo? There's no horse here. Lions, boas, pigs, cats—no horse. I'm afraid you're a little over excited, Leo; perhaps you'd better go in and lie down on the couch for a while.”

“You know what I mean,” said the lion. “I just mean, if you get a present, it isn't nice to ask many questions about it.”

“A present?” said Mr. Boomschmidt, looking questioningly at Leo. “A present from whom?”

“Well,” said Leo, looking embarrassed, “I guess it's a present from Col. Yancey, isn't it?”

“Oh,” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “Oh, Col. Yancey. Yes.” He began counting the money. “Fifteen hundred … sixteen hundred … seventeen hundred—Funny! It's almost exactly the same amount that—excuse me mentioning it, Freddy—but it's almost exactly what that man stole from you.”

“Why—is it?” said Freddy nervously. “Yes, of course it is. Odd, eh?”

“Just a coincidence, chief,” said Leo, trying to make up for his slip of a minute earlier.

“Life is full of coincidences like that,” said Freddy. “I remember one time—”

“Excuse me, Freddy,” said Mr. Boomschmidt, “but my gracious! we haven't time for reminiscences today. We've got to get organized. Got to get the tents and wagons out and look them over, got to get new crews together.… Bill, you have the addresses of most of the old employes, haven't you? Well, send 'em all telegrams: ‘Come at once; circus reopening immediately.' Leo, you and I will see how many of the animals we can round up. Gracious, that's a big job! Got any ideas about it, Freddy?”

Freddy told him how he had found where Leo was, by showing the birds a picture of a lion.

“Splendid!” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “Isn't that a splendid idea, Leo? I knew we could count on you, Freddy. And by the way, how about coming in as my partner? The offer still stands. We need you; eh, Leo?”

“Sure do, chief.”

Freddy shook his head. “A partner has to bring something to the partnership,” he said. “I was to bring the money, and you, the know-how and equipment, remember? But I lost the money—”

“You raised it, didn't you?” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “ 'Tisn't your fault you lost it. Now don't say no. You don't want to hurt my feelings, do you?”

Freddy said of course not.

“Well, my feelings hurt awful easy,” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “You just ask Leo if they don't.”

“That's right, Freddy,” said the lion. “The chief's awful sensitive. Why, I've known him to cry half the night, just when one of the snakes forgot to come in and say goodnight to him. Heard him myself in his bedroom, sobbin' and moanin' and—”

“There, there; that's enough, Leo,” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “No need to overdo it. Well, Freddy, what do you say?”

“I guess I ought to tell you,” said the pig. “I didn't really want to be a partner in the show. Oh, I know it would be fun, and I'd enjoy being with you and all the animals, and on the road and everything. But it would keep me away from the farm all summer. And I wouldn't like that.”

“I see,” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “Yes, yes; should have thought of that myself. Well, that settles it, then. But I tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to make you a sort of partner just the same. When Boomschmidt's Colossal and Umparalleled Circus goes on the road, it's going to be—not just Boomschmidt's, but Boomschmidt & Company's. And you're going to be the Company—or abbreviated: Co. Not that we'd want to abbreviate you, Freddy; on the contrary. Anyway, I wouldn't know how to abbreviate a pig, even if I wanted to.”