Mystery of the Strange Messages (2 page)

"Oh—hallo, Mr. Goon," said Larry, surprised. "What
a pleasant surprise!"

"So you're all here, are you?" said Mr. Goon, glaring
round. "Hatching mischief as usual, I suppose?"

"Well, not exactly," said Pip. "Fatty's mother is
having a jumble sale, and we're turning out the attic for her to see what we
can find. Have
you
got any jumble to spare, Mr. Goon—a couple of old
helmets that don't fit you, perhaps—they'd selJ like hot cakes."

Bets gave a sudden giggle, and then retreated hurriedly behind
Fatty as Goon looked sternly at her.

"Sit down, all of you," commanded Mr. Goon. "I've
come here about a serious matter. I thought I'd see what you've got to say
about it before I report it to Headquarters."

"This sounds very very interesting," said Fatty, sitting
on the couch. "Do sit down too, Mr. Goon. Let's all be comfortable and
listen to your bedtime story."

"It won't do you any good to be cheeky. Master Frederick, I
can tell you that," said Mr. Goon, seating himself majestically in the
biggest arm-chair in the room. "No, that it won't. First of all—why
weren't you upstairs in the attics with the others?"

Fatty looked astonished. "I brought some jumble downstairs to
stack in the garage," he said. "Then I heard old Buster barking and
came to see who the visitor was. Why?"

"Ho! Well, let me tell you that
I
know what you've
been doing this morning!" said Goon. "You've been putting on that
butcher-boy disguise of yours, haven't you? Oh yes, I know all about it! You
got out your striped butcher-boy apron, didn't you—and you put on that red
wig—and ..."

"I'm sorry to say that I didn't," said Fatty. "I
agree that it would have been much more exciting to parade round as a
butcher-boy, than to stagger downstairs with smelly old jumble—but I must be
truthful, Mr. Goon. You wouldn't like me to tell a lie, just to please you,
would you? I'm afraid I
haven't
been a butcher-boy this morning!"

"Ho! You haven't—so you
say!"
said Mr. Goon,
raising his voice. "And I suppose you didn't leave a note

in my peg-bag when you came to my house? And you didn't leave one
on my coal-shovel and..."

Fatty was too astonished for words. So were the others. They
looked at one another, wondering uneasily if Mr. Goon had gone mad. Peg-bags? Coal-shovels?
What next?

"And I suppose you thought it was
very
clever to stick
a note on my dustbin lid?" went on Mr. Goon, his voice growing louder
still. He stared round at the silent children, who were all gazing at him,
astounded.

"Where will you put the notes next?" he said
sarcastically. "Go on, tell me. Where? I'd like to know, then I could look
there."

"Well, let's see," said Fatty, frowning hard. "What
about inside a watering-can—if you've got one, have you Mr. Goon. Or in your
shopping-basket..."

"Or on his dressing-table," said Larry, joining in.
"He wouldn't have to go and look for a note there. It would be right under
his nose."

Mr. Goon had gone purple. He looked round threateningly, and Bets
half-thought she would make a dash out of the door. She didn't like Mr. Goon
when he looked like that!

"That's not funny," said Mr. Goon, angrily. "Not at
all funny. It only makes me more certain than ever that you've planned those
silly notes together."

"Mr. Goon, we haven't the least idea what you're talking
about," said Fatty, seeing that the policeman really had some serious
complaint to do with notes sent to him. "Suppose you tell us what you've
come about—and we'll tell you quite honestly whether we know anything about it
or not."

"Well, I
know
you're mixed up in it, Master
Frederick," said Goon. "It—it
smells
of you. Just the sort of
thing you'd do, to make a bit of fun for the others. But sending anonymous
notes isn't funny. It's wrong."

"What are
anonymous
notes?" asked Bets. "I
don't quite know."

"They're letters sent by someone who is afraid to put his
name at the end," explained Fatty. "Usually anonymous notes have no
address and no signature—and they're only sent by mean, cowardly people. Isn't
that so, Mr. Goon?"

"That is so," said the policeman. "And I tell you
straight, Master Frederick, that you've described yourself good and proper, if
you sent those notes!"

"Well, I didn't." said Fatty, beginning to lose
patience. "For goodness' sake, Mr. Goon, come to the point, and tell us
what's happened. We're completely in the dark."

"Oh no, you're not," said Goon, and took the four notes
from his pocket, each in their envelopes. He handed them to Fatty, who slid the
notes out of their envelopes, one by one, and read them out loud.

"Here's the first note. All it says is 'Ask Smith what his
real name is.' And here's the second. 'Turn him out of the Ivies.' And this one
says 'Call yourself a policeman? Go and see Smith!' And the last one says
'You'll be sorry if you don't go and see Smith!' Well—what queer notes! Look,
all of you—they're not even handwritten!"

He passed them round. "Whoever wrote them cut the words out
of newspapers—and then pasted them on the sheets of writing-paper," said
Larry. 'That's a common trick with people who don't want their writing
recognized."

"This is really rather peculiar," said Fatty, most interested.
"Who's Smith? And where is the house called •The Ivies'?"

"Don't know one," said Daisy. "But there's 'The
Poplars'—it's in our road."

"Gah!" said Mr. Goon, aggravated to hear "The
Poplars" suggested once more. Nobody took any notice of him.

"And there's "The Firs'," said Bets, "and The
Chestnuts'. But I can't think of any house called The Ivies'."

"And this Mr. Smith," said Fatty, staring at one of the
notes. "Why should he have to be turned out of the

Ivies, wherever it is? And why should Mr. Goon ask him what his
real
name is? It must be someone going under a false name for some purpose. Most
peculiar."

"It
really
sounds like a mystery!" said Pip,
hopefully, "We haven't had one this hols. This is exciting."

"And the notes were put into a peg-bag—and on a
coal-shovel—and stuck to the dustbin," said Fatty, frowning. "Isn't
that what you said, Mr. Goon? Where was the fourth one?"

"You
know
that as well as I do," growled the policeman. "It came through the
letter-box. My daily woman, Mrs. Hicks, found them all. And when she told me
that the butcher-boy arrived this morning at the same time as the last
note—well, I guessed who was at the bottom of all this."

"Well, as
I
wasn't that butcher-boy, why don't you go
and question the
real
butcher-boy," said Fatty. "Or shall I?
This is jolly interesting, Mr. Goon. I think there's something behind all
this!"

"So do I.
You
are, Master Frederick Trotteville!"
said Mr. Goon. "Now don't you keep telling me it wasn't you. I know you
well enough by now. You'll come to a bad end, you will—telling me fibs like
this!"

"I think we'll bring this meeting to an end," said
Fatty, "I never tell lies, Mr. Goon, never. You ought to know that by now.
I've had my jokes, yes—and played a good many tricks. But I—do—
not—
tell lies! Here—take the letters,
and get your bicycle."

Mr. Goon rose up majestically from his arm-chair. He took the
letters from Fatty and then threw them violently on the floor.

"You can have them back!" he said, "You sent them,
and you can keep them. But mind you—if
one
more
of those notes arrives at my police-station, I go straight to
Superintendent Jenks and report the whole lot."

"I really do think you'd better do that anyhow," said
Fatty. "There may be something
serious
behind all this, you know.
You've got a bee in your bonnet about me—

I don't know a thing about these anonymous letters. Now please
go."

"Why didn't you have the envelopes and the writing-paper
inside tested for finger-prints, Mr. Goon?" said Pip, suddenly. "Then
you'd have known if Fatty's were there, or not. You could have taken his too,
to prove it."

"As it is, we've-all handled the notes, and must have messed
up any finger-prints that were there already." said Fatty. "Blow!"

"Finger-prints! Bah!" said Goon. "You'd be clever
enough to wear
gloves
if you sent anonymous notes, Master Frederick
Trotteville. Well, I've said my say, and I'm going. But just you mind my words—
one more note,
and you'll get into such
trouble that you'll wish you'd never been born. And I should burn that
butcher-boy rig-out of yours, if I were you—if it hadn't been for you acting
the butcher-boy this morning I'd never have guessed it was you leaving those
notes."

He went out of the room and banged the door so violently that
Buster barked in astonishment, and ran to the door, scratching at it eagerly.

"Be quiet. Buster," said Fatty, sitting down on the
couch again. "I say, you others—what do you think about these notes? A bit
queer, aren't they?"

Larry had picked them all up and put them on the table. The five
looked at them.

"Do we do a little detective work?" said Larry, eagerly.
"Goon's given it up, obviously—shall we take it on?"

"Rather!" said Fatty. "Our next mystery is now
beginning!"

Mr. Goon is worried.

Mr. Goon cycled home, very angry indeed. Fatty always seemed to
get the best of him somehow—and yet the policeman felt that he, Goon, had been
in the right all the time. That fat boy had given himself away properly by
disguising himself as the butcher-boy again. He'd done it once too often this
time! Ah well, he could tell Mrs. Hicks that he had solved the business of
those notes, and given someone a good ticking-off!

He flung his bicycle against the fence, and went into his house.
He found Mrs. Hicks scrubbing the kitchen floor, a soapy mess all round her.

"Oh, there you are, sir," she began, "Look, I'll
have to have a new scrubbing-brush, this here one's got no bristles left, and I
can't..."

"Mrs. Hicks—about those notes," interrupted Mr. Goon.
"There won't be any more, you'll be glad to know. I've been to talk to the
one who wrote them—frightened him almost to death, I did—he admitted
everything, but I've taken a kindly view of the whole matter, and let him off,
this time. So there won't be any more."

"Oh, but you're wrong, sir," said Mrs. Hicks, rising up
from her knees with difficulty, and standing before him with the dripping
scrubbing-brush still in her hand. "You're quite wrong. I found another
note, sir, as soon as you'd gone!"

"You couldn't have," said Mr. Goon, taken aback.

"Oh, but I did, sir," said Mrs. Hicks. "And a funny
place it was in too. I wouldn't have noticed it if the milkman hadn't pointed
it out."

"The milkman? Why, did
he
find it?" said Mr.
Goon, astonished. "Where was it?"

"Well, sir, it was tucked into the empty milk-bottle, stood
outside the back-door," said Mrs. Hicks, enjoying the policeman's
surprise. "The milkman picked up the bottle and of course he saw the note
at once—it was sticking out of the bottle-neck, sir."

Mr. Goon sat down heavily on a kitchen chair. "When was the
note put there?" he asked. "Could it have been slipped in some time
ago—say when the butcher-boy was here?"

"Oh no, sir. Why, I'd only put out the milk-bottle a few
minutes before the milkman came," said Mrs. Hicks. "I washed it out,
sir. I always do wash my milk-bottles out, I don't hand them dirty to the
milkman, like
some
folks—and I put it out nice and clean. And about
three minutes later along came Joe—that's the milkman, sir—and puts down your
quart, sir, and picks up the empty bottle."

"And was the note in it then?" asked Mr. Goon, hardly
able to believe it.

"Yes, sir. And the milkman, he says to me, 'Hey, what's this
note for? It's addressed to Mr. Goon!' and he gave it to me, sir, and it's on
your desk this very minute."

"Exactly when did the milkman hand you the note?" asked
poor Mr. Goon.

"About twenty minutes ago, sir," said Mrs. Hicks. Goon
groaned. Twenty minutes ago he had been with all five children—so it was plain
that not one of them could have been stuffing a note into his empty milk-bottle
then. Certainly not Fatty.

"You look upset, sir," said Mrs. Hicks. "Shall I
make you a nice hot cup of tea. The kettle's boiling."

"Yes. Yes, I think I could do with one," said Goon, and
walked off heavily to his little office. He sat down in his chair.

Now
what was
he to do? It couldn't have been Fatty after all. There was someone else
snooping about, hiding notes here and there when no one was around. And good

gracious—he had left all the notes with those five kids! What a
thing to do! Mr. Goon brooded for a few minutes and was glad to see Mrs. Hicks
coming in with an enormous cup of hot tea.