Mystery of the Strange Messages (15 page)

"I can't sell trays and gongs," said Fatty, giving the
tray a kick with his foot. "Now those crates out there—I could take some
of those. And newspapers—old newspapers if you've got any. I can sell those to
fishmongers and butchers But this brass stuff—no, I wouldn't get a penny for
it!"

"Go on!" said Mrs. Hicks, disbelievingly.

"Well, I'll give you sixpence for this ornament," said

Fatty, picking up a hideous little brass figure, "and
sixpence each for four of those crates—and a shilling a bundle for any old
newspapers you've got."

"What—a shilling for newspapers, and only sixpence for that
there lovely brass ornament!" said Mrs. Hicks. "You're crazy!"

"No, I'm not. I know what I can sell and what I can't,"
said Fatty, fingering the ornament with his dirty hands. He looked at Mrs.
Hicks from under his shaggy false eyebrows, and smiled, showing his awful
protruding teeth.

"Go on, Missus. You let me buy what I can sell—four of those
crates, and as many old newspapers as you've got—and one ornament."

"All right," said Mrs. Hicks. "You put four of
those crates on to your barrow, while I fetch the newspapers. There's plenty
stacked in the kitchen cupboard!"

Fatty grinned at her. showing his revolting false teeth again, and
took the little ornament and the crates to his hand-cart. He waited here for Mrs.
Hicks. Out she came with a vast number of newspapers, which she dumped in the
cart.

"There you are," she said. "How much are you giving
me for all that?"

"Five shillings," said Fatty. "And not a penny
more."

"That's robbery," said Mrs. Hicks.

"All right, take the things back," said Fatty, and
handed her a crate.

"No Give me the five bob," said Mrs. Hicks. "But
you're a robber, that's what you are." She took the five shillings, and
put it into her pocket. Just as she did so, a car drew up at the house, and two
men got out. the very two that Fatty had seen at Fairlin Hall! Fatty noted the
car at once—aha—Brown Riley, AJK 6660. So those two men were staying here—they
must be the two friends that Mrs. Hicks spoke of—one who had come from Burma,
and the other whom she said "never opened his mouth." Fatty took a
good look at them.

Things were beginning to fit together nicely! Rangoon. Mrs. Hicks
and the notes. The two men who were staying here—was it one of them who had
paid her to put the notes round and about Goon's house and yard? And now they
had been to Fairlin Hall!

"They wanted to get the Smiths out because
they
want
to take it—or to find something there," thought Fay, with a surge of
excitement. "And what do they want to find there? Could it be—could it
possibly
be—the diamonds that were never found after the robbery? Whew! Everything's
boiling up at once! My word!"

He wheeled his cart away slowly, gazing at the men as they walked
up to the front door of the house. He was longing to get out his notebook, and
write down their descriptions!

He set off down the road with his hand-cart, feeling quite in a
daze. He suddenly caught sight of the name of a house on the other side of the
road.

"Gosh! That's one of the houses that Mother asked me to
collect jumble from," he thought. "Well, as I'm so near, I'd better
collect it. Let's see—it was Mrs. Henry's, wasn't it."

Still in rather a daze, trying to sort out everything in his mind.
Fatty pushed his hand-cart up the drive of the house. He went to the front
door, quite forgetting that he was disguised as a dirty old rag-and-bone man.
He rang the bell.

Mrs. Henry came to the door and stared. "The back door is
round there," she said, pointing. "But we've nothing for you today. Nothing
at all."

"Er—well, my mother said you'd have some old clothes, Mrs.
Henry," said Fatty, politely. "For her Jumble Sale you know."

"Your
mother"
said Mrs. Henry, staring in
amazement at this awful, dirty old fellow, with his shaggy grey eyebrows and
filthy overcoat. "
I
don't know your mother. Who is she?"

"She's Mrs. Trotteville," said Fatty, and was most

astonished when the door was banged in his face. Then he suddenly
realized that he was in disguise, and rushed off down the drive with his cart.
Good gracious! How
could
he have forgotten he was a rag-and-bone
man—whatever must Mrs. Henry have thought?

"Why
did
I mention Mother's name?" thought Fatty, with a groan. "She's bound
to ring her up—and Mother won't be at all pleased. Well, I'll get home quickly.
I'm longing to have a look through these newspapers and see if there are any
from Rangoon. Mother didn't know how clever she was when she mentioned
Rangoon
to me!"

He was soon back at his house and pushed the handcart into the
garage. He took one of the crates, with
rangoon
stamped on it, and also the little brass ornament, and all the
newspapers, down to his shed, keeping a sharp look-out for the gardener as he
went.

The others had all gone. Not even Ern was there. "I bet
they're having macaroons at the dairy again," thought Fatty, feeling
suddenly hungry. "Now to have a look through these newspapers!"

He took them up one by one, and laid them down again,
disappointed.
"The Daily Telegraph—
heaps of those.
The Daily
Mail, Daily Express, Evening Standard—
wait now—what's this!"

He had come to a magazine, printed on cheap paper, He looked at
the title.
"The Rangoon Weekly".
He scrutinized the type
carefully—was it the same type as the letters and words in those notes? It
really did look like it!

"I'll get that anonymous note I have, in a minute,"
thought Fatty. "I'll just look through a few more papers. Ah—here's
another of those magazines—another
Rangoon Weekly,
but still in its
wrapper. And here's another—but wait a minute, wait a minute! This one's all
cut up! My word,
what
a bit of luck! I do believe this is one of the
papers that the sender of those notes cut the letters from, that he stuck on to
the note-paper!
it
is!"

Fatty stared at the magazine he was holding. Bits had been cut
from it. The "goon" had been cut from the

words
Rangoon Weekly
' Yes, not only on this page, but on
the next one too! Only the "Ran" was left in the word
"Rangoon"—the "goon" had been neatly snipped away!

Fatty found that his hands were trembling The jigsaw of the
mystery was fitting together now Fatty had quite a lot of the pieces Not many
were missing! He went swiftly through the rest of the papers he had bought

He found two more of the
Rangoon Weekly
magazines with
letters and words snipped from them He gazed at them in rapture What a
wonderful
piece of luck!

He stood up and put the three snipped magazines into an envelope,
opened a drawer and put them carefully inside Then he locked the drawer.

"Very valuable evidence!" said Fatty. "But evidence
of
what,
I don't quite know Funny mystery this—all made up of bits and
pieces—but I'll make a proper picture of them soon, and then we'll see what it
shows' Whew' I wish the others were here Oh my goodness, there's Mother calling!
and
she's coming down to the shed
Whatever will she say when she sees an old rag-and-bone man here!"

Fatty reports his doings.

Fatty hadn't time even to take out his horrible false teeth,
before his mother opened the shed-door. She looked inside "Frederick—are
you here? "

Fatty stood with his back to her, in the darkest corner of the
shed "Yes. Mother Did you want me? "

"Frederick, Mrs. Henry had just telephoned me," began
his mother "Do turn round, dear, I'm speaking to you ."

"Er—I'm in disguise. Mother," said Fatty, embarrassed.

"Turn
round"
said his mother, and Fatty
reluctantly faced her. She gave a horrified scream

"F
rederick!
Come
here! Into the light. How
can
you dress like that! Disguise indeed! Oh
Frederick—
don't
tell me that you were the horrible rag-and-bone man that
Mrs. Henry just rang me up about. Surely, surely, you didn't really go there
and say that your mother had sent you—that
I
had sent you "

"Well, Mother—it was a bit of a mistake," began Fatty,
his dirty face as red as a beetroot. "I forgot I was in disguise, you see,
and ..."

"Don't talk such rubbish," said his mother, really
angry. "How could you
possibly
forget you were in that horrible,
revolting get-up? I'm absolutely ashamed of you, Frederick. To go to Mrs.
Henry's like that! Please don't bother about collecting any more jumble for me.
If you're just going to make it a joke, and deceive my friends like that,
and..."

"But,
Mother—
I tell you I
forgot
for just a
minute or two," said poor Fatty. "I'm most terribly sorry I'll go and
apologize to Mrs. Henry. You see, I'd just discovered a few amazing things, and
I was a bit dazed, thinking them out, but when
you
hear what's been
happening, you'll be just as astonished, and you'll..."

"Stop all this rigmarole," said Mrs. Trotteville,
angrier than Fatty had ever seen her. "I don't wonder that Mr. Goon gets annoyed
with you if you wander about like that. Has
he
seen you in that get-up
too? He has? Well, I suppose he'll soon be along here then, complaining as
usual. I only hope your father doesn't hear about this."

And away she went up the garden path, her skirts whisking angrily
over the edges of the border Fatty stared after her, quite shocked.
Now
he
was in a fix I His mother would continue to be very upset with him—and yet he
couldn't very well explain to her what had been happening. Life was going to be
very uncomfortable indeed.

Fatty groaned heavily, and began to remove his makeup and various
pieces of disguise. Out came the awful teeth, and off came the shaggy grey
eyebrows He stripped off the smelly overcoat and hung it up, and bit by bit
became himself again.

He looked at himself in the glass. Yes, his face was clean now Should
he take the hand-cart out and go and collect the jumble his mother had asked
him to!' Should he go and apologize first of all to Mrs. Henry and get her
jumble?

No, Fatty thought
no!
Let it all blow over for a day. He
would sit down now and write out a report of the morning's happenings Nothing
like writing everything down, to get it straight in his mind! Fatty found his
pen, and took out his notebook. He wrote rapidly

About half-past twelve he heard the sound of voices. It was the
others coming to see if he were back again Fatty shut his notebook and went to
the shed-door.

"Oh, you're back. Fatty!" said Bets, pleased "Any
luck this morning'"

"Plenty," said Fatty, grinning "Some good and some
bad"

"Oh—what was the bad?" asked Daisy, anxiously.

"Well, in a fit of absent-mindedness, I went to Mrs. Henry's
front door to collect her jumble while I was in my rag-and-bone man
get-up," said Fatty. "And, also absent-mindedly, I told her that my
mother had sent me to her'"

There was laughter at this and horrified exclamations "I say—you
surely didn't say that your mother was
Mrs. Trotteville.
did you?"
said Pip. "Well,
Fatty—
I never thought you could be such a prize
ass! She'll telephone to your mother, and you'll get into an awful row."

"She did, and I have," said Fatty, soberly. "My
mother is not on speaking terms with me now."

"Loveaduck!" said Ern. "The things you do. Fatty.
What was the  luck?"

"Well, I've just written a sort of report on what hap
pened," said Fatty. "To get
things straight in my mind, really. I'll read it to you."

He opened his notebook and read from it "Dressed up as
rag-and-bone man. Went to watch Fairlin Hall. Saw car there. Brown Riley, AJK
6660. Guessed it had brought the two men who had got the keys of the place from
the Agent's. Went to back door and saw men in kitchen, peering into cupboards,
taking up carpets, etc. They saw me, and told me to clear out. Then Goon
arrived…"

"Oh
no!"
said
Bets. "Oh dear!"

"Goon arrived and the men told him to send me off. He asked
my name, and..."

"Oh, you didn't give it!" cried Daisy.

"No. I said it was F-f-f-f-f." said Fatty, stammering.
"T-t-t-t-t... well, he just couldn't be bothered with stutterers, he said,
so that was all right!"

The others laughed. Fatty turned to his notebook, and went on.
"I then left Fairlin Hall and went out. shouting like a rag-and-bone man.
Saw Mrs. Hicks coming along in a hurry and decided to follow her. I thought she
might be going to the sender of the notes, to be paid. So I followed and she
went into a house called Kuntan. I went to the back door, thinking I'd ask if
they'd any rubbish."

"Oh Fatty—how exciting!" said Bets. "Is this the
good luck part?"