Mystery of the Hidden House (4 page)

“What’s bated breath?” asked Bets. “Do we breathe fast, or something?”

“No - we just hold it, silly,” said Pip. “And don’t you go and give the game away, Bets. It would be just like you to do that!”

“It would not,” said Bets, indignantly. “Would it, Fatty?”

“No. You’re a very good little Find-Outer,” said Fatty, comfortingly. “I bet you’ll bate your breath best of any one. Hallo, what’s that?”

“The dinner-bell,” said Pip, gloomily. “It always goes when we’re in the middle of something.”

“Spitty,” said Fatty, and got up.

“What do you mean - spitty?” said Larry.

“He means ‘It’s a pity!’ ” said Bets with a giggle. “SwatIsaid,” said Fatty, and got up to go.

In Fatty’s Shed

The next day Ern got a message that filled him with excitement. It was a note from Fatty.

“Developments. Must talk to you. Bottom of my garden, twelve o’clock. FT.”

Mr. Goon saw Ern goggling over this note and became suspicious at once. “Who’s that from?”

“One of my friends,” said Ern haughtily, and put it into his pocket.

Mr. Goon went a purple-red. “You show it to me,” he said.

“Can’t,” said Ern. “It’s private.”

“What do you mean - private!” snorted Mr. Goon. “A kid like you don’t know what private means. You give me that note.”

“But, Uncle - it’s only from Fatty to say he wants to see me,” protested Ern.

“You show that note to me!” shouted Mr. Goon, and Ern, scared, passed it over. Mr. Goon snorted again as he read it.

“Gah! All a lot of tommy-rot! Developments indeed! What does he mean by that?”

Ern didn’t know, and he said so several times, but his uncle didn’t believe him. “If that there cheeky toad is up to his tricks again, I’ll skin him!” said Mr. Goon, “And you tell him that, see?”

“Oh, I will, Uncle,” said Ern, trying to edge out of the room. “I always tell them what you say. They like to hear. But it’s not right of Pip to say you’re a flat-footed bull-frog, I did tell him that.”

Before the purple Mr. Goon could find his tongue to say what he thought of this, Ern was out of the house and away. He mopped his forehead. Lovaduck - his uncle was a hot-tempered chap all right. Anyway, he hadn’t forbidden him to go; that was something!

He arrived at the bottom of Fatty’s garden and heard voices in the shed there. It was Fatty’s work-room and playroom. He had made it very comfortable indeed. On this cold winter’s day he had an oil-stove burning brightly and the inside of the shed was warm and cosy. A tiger-skin was on the floor, old and moth-eaten, but looking very grand, and a crocodile skin was stretched along one side of the shed-wall. The Five Find-Outers were trying to roast chestnuts on top of the oil-stove. They had a tin of condensed milk and were each having a dip in it with a spoon as they talked.

Ern looked in at the window. Ha! They were all there. Good! He knocked at the door.

“Come in!” called Fatty, and Ern went in. An icy draught at once came in with him.

“Shut the door,” said Daisy. “Oooh! What a draught. Hallo, Ern. Did you enjoy your egg for breakfast?”

Ern looked surprised. “Yes. But how did you know I had egg for breakfast?”

“Oh - we’re doing a bit of detecting for practice this morning,” said Daisy. The others tried not to laugh. Ern had spilt a good bit of his egg down the front of his jacket at breakfast, so it was not a difficult bit of detecting!

“Sorry you had to leave in such a hurry to come here,” said Fatty, solemnly.

Ern looked even more surprised. “Lovaduck! Is that another bit of detecting? How’d you know I left in a hurry?”

Ern had no hat and no coat, so that wasn’t a very difficult bit of detecting either. Nobody explained to Ern how they knew about his breakfast or his hurry, and he sat down feeling rather puzzled.

“Perhaps you’d like to tell me what I had for breakfast,” said Fatty to Ern. “Go on - do a bit of detecting too.”

Ern looked at Fatty’s solemn face, but no ideas about breakfast came into his mind. He shook his head. “No. I can see this sort of thing wants a lot of practice. Coo, I wasn’t half excited when I got your note this morning. My uncle saw me reading it.”

“Did he really?” said Fatty with interest. “Did he say anything?”

“Oh, he got into a rage, you know, but I soon settled that,” said Ern. “I just told him what I thought of him. ‘Uncle,’ I said, ‘this is a private note. It’s none of your business, so keep out of it.’ Just like that.”

Everyone looked at him admiringly but disbelievingly, “And what did he say to that?” asked Pip.

“He began to go purple,” said Ern, “and I said ‘Now calm yourself, Uncle, or you’ll go pop. And don’t go poking your nose into what I do with my friends. It’s private.’ And then I walked out and came here.”

“Most admirable!” said Fatty. “Sit down on the tiger-skin rug, Ern. Don’t be afraid of the head and the teeth. He’s not as fierce now as he was when I shot him in the Tippylooloo Plain.”

Ern’s eyes nearly fell out of his head. “Lovaduck! You been tiger-shooting? What about that thing up on the wall? Did you shoot that too?”

“That’s a crocodile skin,” said Bets, enjoying herself. “Let me see, Fatty - was that the third or fourth crocodile you shot?”

Ern’s repect for Fatty went up a hundredfold. He gazed at him with the greatest awe. He looked at the fierce head of the tiger-rug, and felt a bit scared of it, even though it was no longer alive. He moved a little way from the snarling teeth.

“You said in your note there were developments,” said Ern, eagerly. “Are you going to tell us anything today?”

“Yes. The time has come for us to ask you to do something,” said Fatty, in a solemn voice that sent a thrill down Ern’s spine. “I am uncovering a very mysterious mystery.”

“Coo,” said Ern, in a hushed voice. “Do the others know?”

“Not yet,” said Fatty. “Now listen all of you. There are strange lights flashing at night over on Christmas Hill!”

“Oooh,” said Ern. “Have you seen them?”

“There are rival gangs there,” said Fatty, in a grave voice. “One is a kidnapping gang. One is a gang of robbers. Soon they will get busy.”

Ern’s mouth fell open. The others, although they knew it was all Fatty’s make-up, couldn’t help feeling a bit thrilled too. Ern swallowed once or twice. Talk about a mystery! This was a whacker!

“Now the thing is - can we get going, and find out who they are and their plans, before they start their robbing and kidnapping?” said Fatty.

“We can’t,” said Bets, in a dismal voice. “We’ve been forbidden to get mixed up in any mystery these hols.”

“So have we,” said Larry and Daisy together.

“Yes, it’s bad luck,” said Fatty. “I’m the only one who can do anything - but I can’t do it alone. That’s why I’ve got you here this morning, Ern. You must help me.”

Ern took in all this rather slowly, but with the utmost excitement and delight. He swelled out his chest proudly.

“You can count on me,” he said, and made his voice deep and solemn. “Ern’s with you! Coo! I feel all funny-like. I bet I’d write a good pome with this sort of feeling inside me!”

“Yes. It could begin like this,” said Fatty, who could reel off silly verse by the mile.

“There’s a mystery a-moving

Away on Christmas Hill,

Where kidnappers and robbers

Are waiting for the kill.

But when kidnappers are napping

And robbers are asleep,

We’ll pounce on them together

And knock them in a heap!”

Everyone laughed. No one could reel off verse like Fatty. Ern gaped and couldn’t find a word to say. Why, that was wonderful portry! To think Fatty could say it all off like that!

He found his voice at last. “Lovaduck! Did you make all that up out of your head just this minute? It takes me hours to think of a pome - and even when I do, it won’t rhyme for ages. You must be one of them queer things - a genius.”

“Well - you never know,” said Fatty, trying to look modest. “I remember having to write a poem - er, I mean pome - for class one day, and forgetting all about it till the master pounced on me and asked for mine. I looked in my desk, but of course it wasn’t there because I had forgotten to write one. So I just said ‘Sorry, sir, it seems to be mislaid - but I’ll recite it if you like.’ And I stood up and recited six verses straight off out of my head. What’s more, I got top marks for it.”

“I don’t believe you,” said Pip.

“Well, I’ll recite it for you now if you like,” said Fatty, indignantly, but the others wouldn’t let him.

“Stop boasting,” said Larry. “Let’s get down to work. How did we get on to this poem-business anyway? You’ll have Ern wanting to recite next!”

Ern would have been only too willing to oblige, but most unfortunately in his hurried departure from his uncle’s house he had left his portry notebook behind. However, he produced another notebook - a very grand one, with black covers, and elastic band, and a pencil down the back.

“Mr. Goon’s got one like that,” said Bets. “Did he give you that?”

Mr. Goon would not even have dreamed of giving his nephew one of his precious notebooks, provided for him by the Inspector. Ern licked the end of the pencil and looked round triumphantly. “Give it me! I should think not! I pinched it out of his drawer.”

There was a horrified silence. “Then you’ll jolly well give it back,” said Fatty. “Or you’ll be pinched one day. You’re disgusting, Ern.”

Ern looked hurt and astonished. “Well, he’s my uncle, isn’t he? It won’t hurt him to let me have one of his notebooks - and I’m going detecting, aren’t I? You’re very high-and-mighty all of a sudden.”

“You can think us high-and-mighty if you like, said Fatty, getting up. “But we think you’re very low-down to take something out of your uncle’s drawer without asking him.”

“I’ll put it back,” said Ern, in a small voice. “I wouldn’t have taken it for my portry - but for detecting, well, somehow I thought that was different. I kind of thought I ought to have it.”

“Well, you think again,” said Fatty. “And put it back before you get into trouble. Look - here’s a notebook of mine you can have. It’s an old one. We’ll tell you what to write in it. But mind - you put that black one back as soon as ever you get home!”

“Yes, I will, Fatty,” said Ern, humbly. He took the old notebook Fatty held out to him, and felt about in his pocket for a pencil, for he did not feel he dared to use the one in the black notebook now. Fatty might get all high-and-mighty again.

“Now,” said Fatty, “keep this page for clues. Write the word down - Clues.”

“Clues,” said Ern, solemnly, and wrote it down. The word “Suspects” came next. “Coo,” said Ern, “do we have Suspects too? What are they?”

“People who might be mixed up in the mystery,” said Fatty. “You make a whole list of them, inquire into their goings-on, and then cross them off one by one when you find they’re all right.”

Ern felt very important as he put down the things Fatty told him. He licked his stump of a pencil, and wrote most laboriously, with his tongue sticking out of the corner of his mouth all the time.

Buster suddenly growled and cocked up his ears. Fatty put his hand on him. “Quiet, Buster,” he said. He winked at the others. “I bet it’s Old Clear-Orf snooping round,” he said. Ern looked alarmed.

“I wonder he dares to come snooping after Ern, considering the way he got ticked off by Ern himself this morning,” said Fatty, innocently. “If it is your uncle, Ern, you’d better send him off at once. Bit of cheek, tracking you down like this!”

Ern felt even more alarmed. A shadow fell across the cosy room, and the Find-Outers and Ern saw Mr. Goon’s head peering in at the window. He saw Ern with a notebook. Ern looked up with a scared face.

“You come on out, Ern,” boomed Mr. Goon. “I got a job for you to do!”

Ern got up and went to the door. He opened it and out shot Buster in delight. He flew for Mr. Goon’s ankles at once, barking madly.

“Clear-orf!” yelled Mr. Goon, kicking out at Buster. “Here you, call off your dog! Ern, hold him! He’ll take a bit out of my ankle soon! Clear-orf, you pestering dog!”

But it was Mr. Goon who had to clear-orf, with Buster barking at him all the way, and Ern following in delight. “Go on, Buster” he muttered under his breath. “Keep it up! Good dog then, good dog!”

Ern Gets into Trouble

The Five Find-Outers were very pleased with their little bit of work that morning. “We’ll keep Ern busy,” said Fatty. “And as I’m pretty sure he’ll let everything out to Goon - or Goon will probably dip into Ern’s notebook - we shall keep him busy too!”

“It’s a pity Mr. Goon came and interrupted our talk this morning,” said Bets, getting up to go. “We were just getting on nicely. Fatty, what’s the first clue to be?”

“Well, I told Ern that this morning,” said Fatty. “Mysterious lights flash on Christmas Hill at night! Ern will have to go and find out what they are.”

“Will you go with him?” asked Bets.

“No. I’ll be flashing the lights,” said Fatty with a grin. The others looked at him enviously.

“Wish we could come too,” said Larry. “It’s maddening to be forbidden to do anything these hols.”

“Well, you’re not forbidden to play a trick on somebody,” said Fatty, considering the matter. “You’re forbidden to get mixed up in any mystery or to go and look for one. You’re not looking for a mystery, and there certainly isn’t one, so I don’t see why you and Pip can’t come.”

The other’s faces brightened. But Bets and Daisy were soon disappointed. “The girls can’t come out these cold nights,” went on Fatty. “We’ll have to find something else for them to do. Look here - I’ll do a bit of disguising the first night Ern goes mystery-hunting - and you two boys can do the light-flashing. I’ll let Ern discover me crouching in a ditch or something, so that he really will think he’s happened on some robber or other.”

“Yes - that would be fine!” said Larry. “When shall we do it?”

“Can’t do it tonight,” said Fatty. “We may not be able to get in touch with Ern in time. Tomorrow night, say.”

“Wasn’t Ern funny when you spouted all that verse, said Larry, with a grin. “I don’t know how you do it, Fatty, really I don’t. Ern thinks you’re the world’s wonder. I wonder if Sid and Perce are just as easy to take in as Ern. Are we going to meet again today?”