Mystery of the Pantomime Cat (12 page)

"That's about it," said the manager, standing up to
polish the handle-bars. "And what's more, it must have been one of the
cast, because no one knows so much about things as they do—why, whoever the
thief was even knew that I didn't keep the safe-key on my key-ring—I always
keep it in a secret pocket of my wallet. And only the cast knew that for once
in a way I hadn't put Thursday's takings into the Bank, because they saw me
coming back in a temper with it, when I found the Bank was closed!"

The boys drank all this in. Some of it they already knew, but it
sounded much more exciting and real to hear it from the lips of the manager
himself. They didn't like him—he looked bad-tempered and mean. They could quite
well imagine that he would have a lot of enemies who would like to pay him back
for some spiteful thing he had said or done to them.

"I suppose the police are on the job all right," said
Pip, taking a duster and beginning to rub up the spokes of the wheels.

"Oh yes. That constable—what's his name—Goon—has been
practically
living
here this week-end—interviewing every one. He's got
poor Boysie so scared that I don't think he really knows what he's saying now.
He shouts at him till Boysie bursts into tears."

"Beast," muttered Pip, and the manager looked at him in
surprise.

"Oh, I don't know. If Boysie did it, he's got to get it out of
him somehow. Anyway, it doesn't hurt

him to be yelled at—only way to get things into his thick head
sometimes!"

The bicycle was finished now, and shone brightly. The manager ran
it into a shed. "Well, that's done," he said. "Sorry I can't
give you your tickets now. You'll get them easily enough this afternoon. There
are never many people on Mondays."

The boys went off, delighted at all they had learnt. To get the
whole story from the manager himself was simply marvellous. Now they knew as
much as Goon did! It was certainly very, very mysterious. The Pantomime Cat
had
taken the drugged cup of tea to the manager—and if he hadn't put the
sleeping-draught into it himself, he must have known who had done it—must even
have let them in. He might even have watched whilst the thief took down the
mirror and robbed the safe. Things looked very black for Boysie. Larry and Pip
could quite well imagine how Goon must have shouted and yelled at him to try
and make him tell the name of the robber.

"Come on—it's a quarter to twelve. Let's get back," said
Larry, who was bursting to tell his news. "I wonder how the girls have got
on. They had an easy job, really. And so had Fatty—just got to pump Pippin, and
that's all."

"I like this detecting business, don't you?" said Larry,
as they cycled up the road. "Of course it's more difficult for us than for
Goon or Pippin—all they've got to do is to go to any one they like and ask
questions, knowing that the people
must
answer the police—and they can
go into any house they like and snoop round—but we can't."

"No, we can't. But on the other hand, we can perhaps pick up
little bits of news that people might not tell Goon," said Pip. "Look
out—there's Goon!"

So it was—a frowning and majestic Goon, riding

his bicycle, and looking very important. He called out to them as
he came near.

"Where’s that fat boy? You tell him if I see him again this
morning I'll go and complain to his parents. Poking his Nose where he's not
wanted! Where is he?"

"I don't know," said Pip and Larry together, and
grinned. What could Fatty have been doing now?

"You don't know! Gah! I bet you know where he's hiding, ready
to pick Pippin's brains again. Does he think he's on this Case, too? Well, he's
not.
I'm
in charge of this. You tell him that!"

And with that Mr. Goon sailed off, leaving Larry and Pip full of
curiosity to know what in the world Fatty had been doing now!

More News-and a very Fat Face.

Fatty had had rather a hectic morning. He had biked down to the
road where Goon lived, and had looked into the front room of the police cottage
as he passed by. Only Pippin was there. Good.

Fatty leaned his bicycle against the little wall in front of the
house, leaving Buster on guard. He then went down the front path, and knocked
on the window of the room where Pippin was sitting, laboriously making out
reports on this and that.

Pippin looked up and grinned. He opened the door to Fatty and took
the boy into the front room.

"Any news?" said Fatty.

"Well," said Pippin, "there's a report on the safe
and the mirror—about fingerprints. Not a single one to be found!"

"Then whoever did the job was wily." said Fatty.
"Looks as if that rules out the Pantomime Cat!"

Pippin was about to speak again, when he heard Buster barking.
They both looked out of the window. Goon was just dismounting from his bicycle,
looking as black as thunder. Buster parked himself in the middle of the
gateway, and barked deliriously, as if to say, "Yah! Can't come in I Woof,
woof! Can't come in! Yah!"

"You'd better go," said Pippin, hurriedly. "I've a
bit more news for you but you must go now."

As Buster now showed every sign of being about to attack Goon,
Fatty hurriedly left the house and ran up to the front gate. He picked Buster
up and put him in his bicycle basket.

"What you doing here?" blustered Goon. "I've warned
Pippin against you, Mr. Nosey Parker. You won't get anything out of
him!
He's
not on this case. He doesn't know a thing—and he wouldn't tell you if he did.
Clear orf! I'm tired of that fat face of yours."

"Don't be rude, Mr. Goon," said Fatty, with dignity. He
hated his face to be called fat.

"Rude! I'm not rude—just truthful," said Mr. Goon,
wheeling his bicycle in at the gate. "I tell you, I don't want to see that
fat face of yours any more today! I'm a busy man, with important things to do.
I won't have you noseying around."

He went in, pleased to think that Pippin had heard him treat that
fat boy in the way he ought to be treated. Aha! He, Mr. Goon, was well on the
way to solving a Very Difficult Case. Got it all Pat, he had—and for once in a
way Master Frederick Algernon Trotteville was going to have his nose put out of
joint. Him and his fat face!

With these pleasant thoughts to keep him company, Mr. Goon went in
to fire off a few sharp remarks to Pippin. Fatty, anxious to have a few more
words with Pippin, rode up the road a Little way, and then leaned his bicycle
against a tree, putting himself the other side of the trunk so that he might
watch unseen for Goon to come out and ride off again. The policeman had left
his bicycle against the wall of his cottage, as if he meant to come out again
in a little while.

Fatty stood and brooded over Goon's rude remarks about the fatness
of his face. Goon thought he had a fat face, did he? All right—he'd show him
one! Fatty slipped his hand into his pocket and brought out two nice new plump
cheek-pads. He slipped one into each cheek, between his teeth and the fleshy
part of the cheek. At once he took on a most swollen, blown-out look.

Goon came out of his house in a few minutes and mounted his
bicycle. He rode slowly up the road. Fatty came out from behind his tree to
show himself to Goon.

"You here again?" began Goon, wobbling in rage.
"You ..."

And then he caught sight of Fatty's enormously blown-out cheeks.
He blinked and looked again. Fatty grinned, and his cheeks almost burst.

Mr. Goon got off his bicycle, unable to believe his eyes, but
Fatty jumped on his and sailed away. He waited in a side-road, riding up and
down, till he thought Goon must have gone, and then cycled back to Pippin.

"It's all right," said Pippin, from the window.
"He's gone to send a telegram off, and after that he's going to the
Theatre car-park to snoop round again, and then he's got to go to Loo Farm about
a dog. He won't be back for some time."

Fatty had now taken out his cheek-pads and looked

quite normal again.

"I won't keep you more than a few minutes," he told
Pippin. "I know you're busy. What other news have you?"

"Well, there way a sleeping-draught in that cup all
right," said Pippin. "A harmless one, but strong. Traces of it were
found in the cup. So that's proved all right."

"Anything else?" enquired Fatty. "Has the money
been traced?"

"No. And it won't be either," said Pippin. "It was
all in ten-shilling or pound notes, and silver."

"Any idea yet who did the job?" asked Fatty.

"Well, I've seen Goon's notes, and if you want a
motive
for
the robbery—some one with a spite against the manager—any of the company would
do for the thief!" said Pippin. "Mr. Goon wasn't going to tell me
anything, as you know, but he's so proud of himself for finding out so much,
that he gave me his notes to read. Said it would do me good to see how an
expert got to work on a case like this!"

Fatty grinned. "Yes—sort of thing he
would
say. But
what do you mean—all the company had a spite against the manager?"

"Mr. Goon interviewed the manager, and got quite a lot out of
him," said Pippin. "Now—take Miss Zoe Markham—she had a row with him
that morning and got the sack. And now Lucy White—asked him to lend her some
money because her mother was ill, and he raged at her and refused. And here's
Peter Watting and William Orr—they want to do a series of decent straight plays
here instead of this comic stuff, and the manager laughed at them—told them
they were only fit for third-rate comedy stuff. Said that third-rate people
would have to be content with third-rate shows."

"I bet they were angry," said Fatty.

"Yes. They were furious, apparently," said Pippin.
"Almost came to blows. Threatened to knock him down if he called them
third-rate again. As a matter of fact they are quite good, especially William
Orr."

"Go on," said Fatty. "This is interesting. Who else
has a grudge against him?"

"John James wanted a rise in his salary," said Pippin.
"Apparently the manager had promised him this after a six months' run. So
he asked for it and was refused. The manager says he never promised him
anything of the sort."

"Nice amiable chap, this manager," said Fatty with a
grin. "Always ready to help! My word, what a way to run a company! They
must all hate him."

"They do!" said Pippin. "Even poor Boysie, the
Pantomime Cat, detests him. Now let me see—is that the lot? No—here's Alec
Grant. He wanted permission to go and act in another show on the days he's not
on here—and the manager wouldn't let him. There was an awful row about that,
apparently—so, you see, there are plenty of people who would very much like to
pay the manager out for his spiteful treatment of them!"

"What about their alibis?" asked Fatty, after a pause to
digest all this.

"All checked," said Pippin. "And all correct,
except that there's a query about Zoe Markham, because she went out of her
sister's house that evening, and nobody saw her come back; she says she went
straight up to her room. So, what with that fact and the Z on the handkerchief
found on the verandah, Goon's got her and Boysie down as Chief Suspects
now!"

This wasn't very pleasant. Pippin bent over his papers.
"Well," he said, "that's all I can tell you for the present—and
don't you let on I've told you, either! You'd better go now—and don't forget to
let

me know if
you've
got anything interesting up your
sleeve."

"I haven't at the moment," said Fatty, soberly.
"Except that I hope Mr. Goon was tired after his afternoon walk
yesterday!"

Pippin looked up at once. "What—trailing that red-headed
foreigner! You don't mean to say he was

"Well—I thought Mr. Goon might as well meet
somebody
off
the three-thirty train!" said Fatty. "You'd have thought he would have
been a bit suspicious of red-heads by now, wouldn't you, Pippin?"

And with that Fatty went off whistling on his bicycle, thinking
hard. A thought struck him. He put his cheek-pads in, and rode off to the post
office. Goon might still be there.

He was. Fatty sidled into the near-by telephone kiosk as Goon came
out of the post office. The policeman saw some one grinning at him from the
kiosk, and stopped. He gazed in horror at Fatty, whose cheeks were now as
enormous as when Goon had seen him a short time before.

Fatty nodded and grinned amiably. Goon walked off, puzzled. That
boy! His face seemed fatter than ever. He couldn't be blowing it out with his
breath, because he was grinning. He must have some disease!

Fatty shot off on his bicycle, taking a short cut to the car-park
behind the theatre. He took his bike to the shed, and bent over it. In a moment
or two Goon came sailing in on
his
bicycle, and dismounted to put it
into the shed. He saw a boy there, but took no notice—till Fatty turned round
and presented him with yet another wonderful view of his great fat face.

Goon got a shock. He peered closely at Fatty. "You

got toothache?" he enquired. "Talk about a fat
face!"