Mystery of the Missing Man (4 page)

But Fatty had too big a start and was now out of the front gate and racing for dear life down the road. Goon marvelled that an old man could run so fast.

By the time that Goon had got to the first corner, Fatty had entirely disappeared. He had run into the garden of the house there, gone right down to the bottom, leapt over the wall and made his way back once more to the little lane right at the bottom of his garden. He and Buster stood there, panting and listening. Buster licked Fatty’s hand, feeling very happy.

“They’ve come back - they’ve gone into the house, Buster,” said Fatty at last. “Now they’ll wake up Dad and Mother and tell them fairy-tales about an old thief of a tramp lying in my shed. Blow them -”

He slid into his shed, took his own clothes and slid out again, locking the shed behind him. He put the keys into his pocket. Then he crept up the garden to the kitchen door. He peered in at the window. Good - only Jane and Cookie were there, looking rather startled as they listened to something going on out in the hall.

“That’s Goon and Eunice there, I suppose,” thought Fatty, exasperated. “Well, I must change out of these things somehow - but where? I daren’t go in yet.”

He decided to change them under a tree - but first he peered in at the hall window to see what was going on. His father and mother and Mr. Tolling were all there, and Mr. Goon was trying in vain to get a word in - but Eunice was in full spate, describing at great length all that had happened.

“He was FIERCE, that tramp!” she cried. “As strong as ten men, Mr. Goon here said. Buster was very brave, he barked and bit - and the tramp kicked out at him like anything. Oh, if only Frederick had been there, this would never have happened. He would have turned that fellow out at once.”

“Here!” said Mr. Goon, indignantly, breaking in at last. “What do you mean? If I couldn’t get him, nobody could. I tell you…”

“A-a-a-a-ah!” suddenly screamed Eunice and pointed to the hall window, through which Fatty was peering, enjoying the whole scene. “There’s that tramp again. Quick, Mr. Goon!”

Everyone raced out of the front door as Fatty neatly slipped in at the side door. He shot upstairs at top speed, and into his bedroom, with an excited Buster.

“Not a word, Buster,” he said. “Not a bark, please. Just let me get changed!”

He stripped off the old clothes at top speed, and stuffed them into a cupboard. He cleaned his face, and removed whiskers, moustache and beard. Then he washed his hands and sank down into a chair with a sigh.

“Whew! What a joke, Buster! I wonder if they’re all still chasing that old tramp. Disgusting old fellow, wasn’t he? No wonder you barked at him!”

He sat and waited for a while but nobody came back, so he decided to go downstairs, and out into the road, and wait there. Then he would walk briskly up as if he had been out for a stroll, and pretend to be most surprised to see the others.

It all went off beautifully. Fatty strolled up with Buster just as a very disgruntled Goon came back with an equally disappointed Eunice, and a very annoyed trio of parents.

“What nonsense!” Mr. Trotteville was saying. “I don’t believe there was any tramp there - just this girl’s imagination! And you believed her, Goon! On a Sunday afternoon, too!”

Goon was red and angry, and Eunice was white-faced and furious, but had enough manners not to argue. They suddenly saw Fatty strolling along and shouted to him.

“Frederick! Where have you been?”

“You seen a nasty-looking tramp, Master Frederick?” asked Goon. “Whiskers and all? He was down in your shed - smoking his pipe too. Might have set the place alight!”

“A tramp - with whiskers?” said Fatty, sounding extremely surprised. “Where is he? Quick, I’ll set Buster on him!”

“That dog’s already been at him,” said Mr. Goon, exasperated. “Must have bit his trousers to pieces - barking and snarling. I wonder he’s got any ankles left!”

“Well, Mr. Goon, I think we’ll not bother any more,” said Mr. Trotteville, firmly. “The man’s gone - and we can’t do anything about it. Come in, Eunice - you can’t do anything either.”

“What a thing to happen - on a Sunday too!” said Mr. Tolling, looking rather white. “A good thing you happened to be about, Constable. Tramps hiding in garden sheds! Was anything stolen?”

“What a thing to happen - on a Sunday too!” said Mr. Trotteville, beginning to look exasperated. “Anyway, he only keeps a lot of rubbish there.”

Fatty said nothing to that. He was not at all anxious for his father to see what he really kept in bis shed! All kinds of disguises, sets of grease-paints for making up his face, dreadful false teeth to wear over his own, cheek-pads to alter the shape of his cheeks, false eyebrows, moustaches, beards - good gracious, Mr. Trotteville would certainly have been amazed to find so many peculiar things!

“Master Frederick - perhaps we’d better go down to your shed and have a look round to see if that tramp took anything,” suggested Goon, who thought this might be a very good opportunity of seeing exactly what Fatty did keep in his shed. Goon had a shrewd idea of the contents, and it would have been a real feather in bis cap if he could have poked round into every corner. Ha! He’d find a few of that boy’s secrets then!

“Oh, I can easily look myself,” said Fatty. “And I wouldn’t dream of bothering you any further, Goon. You go home and finish your Sunday nap.”

Goon went red. “I’m on duty,” he said, “and a good thing for you I was too! If I hadn’t come by when I did, that there tramp might have stolen half your things and set your shed on fire!”

“I bet he wasn’t smoking,” said Fatty, who knew quite well that he, Fatty, had only had an unlighted pipe in his mouth.

“You don’t know anything about it!” said Eunice. “I saw him, not you - and he was smoking like a chimney - wasn’t he, Constable?”

“That’s right, Miss,” said Goon, thinking that Eunice was someone after his own heart, willing to exaggerate to make a story more exciting! “A very nasty-looking piece of work, he looked - no wonder the dog went for him.”

“Good old Buster,” said Fatty, bending down to pat the little Scottie, and to hide a grin. Well, well - what a couple of exaggerators Goon and Eunice were! It was really a pity he couldn’t tell them that he was the dirty old tramp!

The others had all gone indoors now, and Fatty decided that he had had enough of Goon and would go in too. He debated whether to bicycle up to Pip’s and tell him about the tramp episode, but decided that he’d better not. Eunice might follow him there!

“Come on indoors,” he said to Eunice. “It must be teatime by now.”

Eunice followed him in, and to Fatty’s disgust she insisted on telling him again and again how she had peered through the window and keyhole of his shed, and had spotted the tramp, and how she and Goon had gone for him when he came out.

“I don’t know why you wanted to go and spy into my shed,” said Fatty at last, so tired of Eunice that he decided to be rude. Perhaps she would go off in a huff then. That would be fine.

“I was not spying!” she said, angrily, and, to Fatty’s delight, took herself off at once. She marched out of the door and stamped up the stairs to her room. Fatty immediately shot out to the kitchen with Buster, collected some cakes and scones and biscuits from the tea-tray, and raced off again.

“Eunice won’t come spying into my shed again today,” he thought. “I can take these down there and eat and read in peace. I only hope Goon doesn’t come snooping round. What a life - Eunice always about, and Goon popping up whenever he’s not wanted.”

He let himself into his shed, locked the door behind him, and sat down. He found his book and began to munch. It was only when he had eaten two-thirds of what he had brought that he remembered he was slimming.

“Blow!” he said, and looked at the faithful Buster, waiting patiently for a titbit. “Why didn’t you remind me not to eat all these? Have you forgotten I’m slimming, Buster? Couldn’t you paw me hard, when you see I’m tucking in?”

Buster obligingly pawed him, and whined, hoping to get one of his favourite chocolate biscuits. “You can have a cake and a biscuit,” said Fatty. “But only to stop me from eating them! And I warn you - you’ll have to go for a cross-country run with me tonight, to work off all this extra food!”

And so, when Eunice, who seemed to have forgotten that she had been offended, suggested after supper that they should have a game of chess, Fatty mournfully shook his head.

“Nothing I’d like better than to beat you at chess, Eunice,” he said, “but…”

“Beat me! You couldn’t!” said Eunice. “I’m champion chess-player of my school!”

“How strange - so am I,” said Fatty, quite truthfully. “But I fear I’ve eaten too much today, Eunice, and I’m now going for an hour’s run down by the river and back.”

“What - in the dark?” said his mother. “Really, I think you are overdoing this running business, Frederick!”

Fatty thought so too - but the idea of a solemn evening playing chess with a fiercely-brooding Eunice was too much for him. Sorrowfully he went off with Buster to change into running-shorts, and was soon loping along by the quiet river, with Buster at his heels. What a life!

Chief-Inspector Jenks has Something to Say

On Easter Monday morning, just as Mr. Goon was finishing a large breakfast of fried bacon and three eggs, a long shiny black car drew up outside his house. Mr. Goon caught sight of it as he was about to attack his third egg, and his mouth fell open even wider.

“The Inspector! Now what does he want with me this morning!” thought Goon, and hurriedly did up his tunic and ran to brush his hair. He called to the daily woman in the kitchen in his most urgent voice.

“Mrs. Boggs! Ask whoever it is into the office, quick!” Just as he spoke there came a peremptory knock at the front door, and Mrs. Boggs flew to open it.

Outside stood a tall Inspector of Police - Chief Inspector Jenks, with keen sharp eyes and an impatient look about him. Mrs. Boggs showed him into the office. “Mr. Goon will be along at once, sir,” she said, and almost dropped a curtsy as she backed from the room.

Goon came in at once, looking much tidier. “Good morning, sir,” he said. “Er - this is an unexpected visit.”

“Goon,” said the Inspector, abruptly. “There’s a dangerous man somewhere in this district. An escaped prisoner, violent and up to every trick there is. Known to be clever at disguises. Now - there’s a Fair at Peterswood, a likely place for a fellow like this to make for. I want you to keep your eyes open and report to me at once if there’s anyone you’re in the least suspicious about. I’ll send men over immediately to watch whoever you report on.”

Goon swelled up at once with importance. “Yes, sir,” he said. “Er - would it be a good idea to go to the Fair out of uniform, sir? You know I took a Special Course at the Police school, sir - disguises and all that.”

“Well,” said the Chief, looking at Goon doubtfully, “you can try it, I suppose. Pity you’re so fat - you can’t hide that, and it makes you very noticeable.”

Goon felt hurt. He looked down at himself. “I could try a spot of slimming, sir,” he said, hopefully. “But…”

“Hm - it would take you months to get down to a reasonable size,” said the Chief. “Now, here are a few details of this fellow we want.” He laid some notes down on the desk and Goon looked at them with interest.

“Medium height, sharp-eyed, scar over rather thin mouth, which a moustache, real or false, could hide, may wear false whiskers…” Goon stopped, as an astonishing idea came to him. He stared in excitement at the Inspector.

“I saw this man yesterday!” he said, excitedly, and actually poked the Chief in the chest. “Yes, I did - whiskers and all!”

“Where?” asked the Chief, sharply.

“And he was violent, too - very violent!” went on Goon. “Kicked and flailed his arms about, and strong as I am, I couldn’t hold him.”

“WHERE was this man?” demanded the Inspector again, but Goon couldn’t be stopped.

“And sharp-eyed too - eyes like gimlets, he had. And a moustache as well and now I come to think of it he might have had a scar under it. Bless me, if he wasn’t the man!”

“GOON,” said the Chief, in a dangerous voice. “Kindly stop gabbling and listen to me. WHERE was this fellow?”

“Er - well, sir - funny thing, sir, but he was in that Frederick Trotteville’s garden, down in his shed,” said Goon. “I was called in by a young lady staying there, sir. Buster, that Scottie, he went for the old tramp fiercely, and must have bitten his ankles to the bone. Real savage he was, sir.”

“Was Frederick Trotteville there, too?” asked the Chief. “Couldn’t he catch the man? He’s usually pretty nippy at that kind of thing.”

“Well, if that fellow could have been caught, I’d have caught him,” said Goon, huffily. “Actually Master Frederick didn’t come along till too late. I’d done the dirty work before he turned up.”

“I see,” said the Inspector, thoughtfully. “I think I’ll go along and see what Frederick thought of this fellow.”

“He didn’t see him, sir,” said Goon. “I told you, he came along too late.”

“Yes, I heard you,” said the Chief, curtly. “All right. Study those notes, Goon, and keep your eyes skinned. That fellow has been seen here - and we know he’s got friends nearby who might fix him up with some disguise. He’s not a fellow who’ll hide away. He’d take a delight in mixing with people somewhere and watching the police trying to find him.”

“Ho - then I’ll certainly disguise myself,” said Goon. “Supposing I put on my…”

But the Inspector was already striding out to his car, and Goon was left muttering to himself. “To the Trottevilles’ house,” ordered the Inspector, and the big car slid smoothly away. It turned in at Fatty’s drive and stopped beside the front door. The Inspector got out and rang the bell.

“Is Master Frederick in?” he asked, when Jane came to the door.

“Oh, good morning, sir,” said Jane. “Yes, I think so. He was just going out. Come in, sir, and I’ll call him.”

The Chief Inspector stepped in and was shown into Mrs. Trotteville’s pretty drawing-room. Then came the sound of hurried footsteps down the stairs and Fatty appeared, dressed in running-shorts and white singlet. The Chief looked surprised.