Freddy nodded solemnly, and the detective gasped again.
“I got a case I’d like your help on,” continued the sheriff. “Come on over and sit under this tree while I tell you about it,” and he climbed out of the buggy. When Freddy had got over the fence, they sat down in the grass, while the amazed detective goggled at them for a few moments before himself getting out and joining them.
“You see, it’s this way,” said the sheriff. “There’s been a lot of robberies lately in this neighborhood. Robbers have been breaking in the back windows of banks and stores in nearly all the towns around here and taking all the money. We don’t know who they are. So far we haven’t got a clue, except that they nearly always wear rubbers, and that they travel in a car with one wobbly rear wheel. It’s got so that the people are afraid to leave their places of business now at night, for fear they’ll be robbed, and the bankers and business men are most of them sitting up all night with shot-guns and pistols to protect their money. Yes, sir, Freddy, it’s getting pretty bad. Because now, you see, the business men are so sleepy in the day-time that when you go in to do business with them, you find them sound asleep behind their counters. There’s hardly any business bein’ done in Centerboro, on account of the business men being so sleepy.
“That’s only one bad thing about it. There’s been a lot of accidents through fallin’ asleep at the wrong time. Just yesterday my brother fell asleep when he was looking for something to eat in the ice-box, and he lay there with his head on the ice for an hour till we found him, and froze both his ears. Right in the middle of summer—yes, sir! Froze ’em both solid. If you’d ’a’ tapped ’em, they’d ’a’ broke off like crackers. Course we was careful. We thawed ’em out slow, and they’re all right again.
“Then there was old Mr. Winch. He fell asleep driving up Main Street, and his car ran right up on the porch of the Holcomb House and knocked four rocking-chairs to splinters. That wouldn’t ’a’ been so bad, but Mis’ Holcomb was settin’ in one of ’em at the time. She was quite upset.
“But that ain’t neither here nor there. What I wanted to tell you was that we’re at our wits’ ends to know what to do. We can’t find hide nor hair of these robbers, even though we’ve got this special detective up from New York. —Oh, I forgot to introduce you to him. Mr. Boner, this is Freddy.”
Freddy bowed politely, but the detective frowned. “I ain’t going to shake hands with no pig,” he growled.
“Suit yourself,” said the sheriff, winking at Freddy. “Pig or not, he’s shook hands with the President in his time, and that’s more than you’ve done, I bet.”
“Oh, come on! Let’s get going!” exclaimed Mr. Boner.
“Time enough,” replied the sheriff. “Specially as we ain’t goin’ anywhere in particular.” He turned to Freddy. “I just thought,” he said, “that maybe, now you’ve started in as a detective, you’d be willing to give us a hand. I don’t know just how you’ll go at it, but we’re stumped. What do you say?”
“Can he talk?” demanded the astonished Mr. Boner.
“Course he can’t!” snapped the sheriff. “Who ever heard of a pig that could talk!”
“Well, according to you he can understand everything you’re saying,” said the detective, not unreasonably.
“That’s different,” said the sheriff.
While they were wrangling about this, Freddy got up, climbed the fence, and came back presently with the package of one-dollar bills that Cousin Augustus had brought from the trunk in the hermit’s house. As soon as they saw it, the two men became very much excited. They examined it carefully, and then the sheriff said to Freddy: “This is from Herbie’s Hardware Emporium, that was robbed last month. Gosh, I wish you could talk! Do you know where there’s any more of this money?”
Freddy nodded.
“Will you lead us to it?”
But this time Freddy shook his head. Lead them to it indeed, and let them get all the glory of the capture! No, he intended to capture the robbers himself. While they had been talking, he had thought of a plan. It was a good one, too, and he intended to try it out. If he failed, he could call in the sheriff later.
The sheriff was much put out at his refusal. “Oh come, Freddy,” he coaxed, “you want to help us, don’t you?”
Freddy nodded.
“But you won’t show us where the rest of the money is?”
Freddy shook his head again.
“You mean you’ve got some scheme of your own for getting it back?”
Freddy nodded his head emphatically.
“You see,” said the sheriff to Mr. Boner, “he’ll help us; but he’s going to do it in his own way. And I don’t know that I blame him.”
“Nonsense!” exclaimed the detective angrily. “Let me talk to him.” He moved toward the pig, but Freddy was too quick for him and scrambled over the fence. Mr. Boner would have climbed over after him, but the sheriff caught his arm.
“You won’t get anywhere that way,” he said. “Let him alone. He said he’d help us, and he will. I know these animals.”
“You know ’em all right,” growled Mr. Boner. “You ought to be livin’ in the pen along with ’em. I wash my hands of you. When you’re ready to go along, let me know.” And he climbed into the buggy and lit a cigar.
“Well, Freddy,” said the sheriff, “I guess you’ll have to do it your own way. I’ll be back along this way day after tomorrow about this time, and if you’ve got anything for me, you be here. If you want me before that, you know where to find me. And do the best you can. If you can help me catch these rascals, I’ll be grateful, you bet; and you know there’s five thousand dollars reward offered for their capture. You’ll get that, and I’ll see that your name is played up big in the newspapers. So long. I’m countin’ on you.”
As soon as the men had gone, Freddy made his preparations. He got a pencil and paper and drew a plan which you will hear more about later. But to visit the hermit’s house he needed a disguise, for he remembered how anxious they had been to catch him when he had been there before. Detectives did much of their work in disguise—workmen’s clothes and false whiskers and so on—and Freddy had got together quite a large wardrobe for use in disguising himself, though he had never yet used any of it. Today he picked out a false mustache, a pipe, a cap like Sherlock Holmes’s, with a vizor in front and behind and ear-flaps that tied at the top with a tape, and an old suit of Mr. Bean’s which was a trifle long in the leg, but otherwise fitted very well.
Walking on his hind legs, with the pipe in his mouth and the cap pulled well down over his eyes, Freddy might have passed for a very small tramp with a very long nose. As there was no looking-glass in his office, he decided to go first up to the house and see what he looked like in Mrs. Bean’s mirror. At the same time he would try the effect of his disguise on some of his friends.
To his surprise, he found no animals in the usually busy barnyard. He walked across to the house and rapped on the back door. Mrs. Bean answered. “Good morning,” she said politely. “What can I do for you?”
Freddy touched his cap awkwardly and then brushed past her, walked across the kitchen, and started up the back stairs, while Mrs. Bean watched him with amazement and alarm. “See here, young man!” she began—but at that moment Freddy came to grief. By long practice he had learned how to walk on his hind legs, but going upstairs was a different matter. At the fourth step he lost his balance and came tumbling down.
Mrs. Bean stared for a moment, then burst out laughing. “My goodness, Freddy, it’s you! For a minute I thought you were a tramp. I suppose you’re up to some of your detective tricks again. What won’t you animals be doing next!” She picked up his pipe and handed it to him. “Land alive! In that suit you look enough like Mr. Bean to be his brother, except that your legs aren’t long enough, and you haven’t any beard.”
She patted him on the back and went back to her knitting, and Freddy went upstairs on all four legs this time and was soon admiring his get-up in t
he big mirror in the front bedroom. As he turned and twisted before the glass, trying the hat and the pipe at different angles, and nodding and bowing to himself with little grunts of satisfaction, he heard a curious sound. He turned quickly. Someone, he thought, had chuckled. But there was no one there, so he went back to the always pleasant task of admiring himself.
And again came the noise—an unmistakable giggle this time.
He stooped and looked under the bed, and there, not an inch from his nose, was the grinning face of Jinx, who had been watching him all the time.
It is always embarrassing to find that someone has been watching you when you think you are alone, even if you haven’t been doing anything silly; and Freddy knew that he must have looked very silly in front of the glass. So he said angrily: “What are you doing here? Why aren’t you watching for the rats instead of sneaking round and spying on sensible folks?”
To his surprise Jinx, instead of bursting into his usual loud teasing laugh, came out from under the bed and said meekly: “Excuse me, Freddy; you did look funny, you know. But I wasn’t spying on you. I was hiding. They’re after me.”
“Who are after you?” demanded the pig.
“Haven’t you heard?” asked Jinx. “The policemen are after me—Robert and Jock. I tell you, Freddy, I don’t know what to do. I wouldn’t mind going to jail at any other time. From all I hear, they have a better time inside than we do out. But I can’t go now—”
“What on earth are you talking about?” interrupted the pig.
“You haven’t heard, then,” said Jinx. “Well, let me tell you about it—or at least what little I know—for I need your help. You know that for the past few weeks, ever since we got Everett’s train back from the rats, I have been spending nearly all my time up in the barn loft, guarding the grain-box. The rats have been trying every way they can to get into it, because, although they say they have got enough grain hidden in their holes under the barn to last all winter, I don’t believe they’ve got very much, and when their supply gives out, they’ll have to leave the barn and go back to the woods.”
“That’ll make old Simon pretty sick,” said Freddy.
“Yes, and that’s just what I’m working for. He’s got to be shown who’s boss round here. But if I go to jail, he and his family can just help themselves to all the grain they want. I can’t go to jail, Freddy!”
“Well, why should you?” asked the puzzled pig. “You haven’t done anything, have you—?”
“Of course I haven’t. But just listen to this. This noon I left the barn and went to the house to get my lunch. When I got back, over in the corner of the loft where I usually sit, I saw something that hadn’t been there when I left. I went over to look at it, and what do you think was there? Somebody had eaten a crow there and left nothing but his claws and feathers.”
“My goodness!” said Freddy.
“Just what I said,” went on the cat. “And I was standing there looking at them and trying to figure out how they could have got there, when in stalks Charles, very haughty—you know he’s never forgiven me for throwing those tomatoes at him the night he was elected—and he clears his throat a few times and then says: ‘Ha, it was true, then, was it?’ he says. ‘This is a serious matter, Jinx,’ he says. ‘This will take some explaining.’
“‘Well,’ I said, ‘if you can explain it, Charles, I wish you would. It’s beyond me.’
“‘Oh, is it, indeed?’ says Charles, very sarcastic. ‘Well, it looks plain enough, Jinx. Yes, it certainly looks plain enough.’
“‘Oh, cut out the big talk, Charles,’ I said; ‘I come back here and find that someone has eaten this crow—’
“‘Someone!’ he interrupted. Then he laughed kind of nastily. ‘Someone! Ha ha, that’s good.’
“He made me so mad that I pretty near slapped him one. But I kept my temper. ‘Look here, Charles,’ I said, ‘you don’t think I had anything to do with this, do you? Gosh, you ought to know that even an alley cat won’t eat a crow.’
“‘They’ve been known to eat chickens,’ he said meaningly. ‘But I’m not afraid of you, Jinx. I warn you, it won’t be wise for you to try any violence. Jock and Robert are within call. If you dare to so much as lift a paw against me, I have only to call, and they’ll be here in a few seconds.’
“Well, Freddy, that kind of pompous talk from Charles, who has always been a good friend of mine, made me pretty wild. If I hadn’t seen that there was something serious behind it all, I’d have given him the scare of his life. But I tried to be reasonable. ‘Look here, Charles,’ I said, ‘that kind of talk is just silly. I never even chased a bird of any kind, to say nothing of eating one, and you know it. I found this crow here when I came back from lunch. Now be sensible and tell me what it is all about.’
“Well, then I got it out of him, though he wasn’t very friendly about it. It seems that about the time I was having lunch, one of the young rats slipped out of the barn, ran down to the hen-house, and told Charles to come right away and bring the policemen. He said I had caught this crow in the barn and was eating it. Of course Charles came, and there I was with the crow. Charles must know perfectly well that I wouldn’t do such a thing, but he’s made up his mind to get even with me about the tomatoes, and so he wants to send me to jail. So I didn’t wait for Jock and Robert to get there. They were waiting by the door. I ran down the stairs and got through the window in Hank’s stall, and I’ve been hiding here ever since until I could get a word with you. You’ve got to get to the bottom of this for me, Freddy.”
“Oh, we can get to the bottom of it all right,” said Freddy. “But it may take some time. It looks to me as if it was a plot the rats cooked up to get you sent to jail so they could have all the grain they wanted.”
“Exactly,” said the cat. “But what can I do? I ought to be in the barn, not hiding here under the bed.”
“You stay here a little longer,” said the pig, “and I’ll go down and see if I can pick up any clues.”
“But you do believe I didn’t do it, don’t you?” asked Jinx.
“Sure I believe you,” said Freddy. “But believing isn’t enough to keep you out of jail. We’ve got to prove it. But you wait; I’ll be right back.” And struggling out of his disguise, he hurried down the stairs.
In the loft he found a crowd of excited animals, in the middle of which was Charles, who hurried up to the pig as he came in. “Aha, here’s the detective!” he cried. “Now we’ll get something done. The criminal has escaped, Freddy. You’ll have to track him down for us. Spare no pains, in the interests of justice and the safety of this law-abiding barnyard—”
“Oh, shut up, Charles,” said the pig good-naturedly. “I know all about it. I don’t think for a minute Jinx killed this crow. Clear out, now, all of you. I want to take a look at things.”
The animals went reluctantly downstairs, and Freddy looked carefully around. The crow’s two claws were laid neatly side by side, and the feathers were in a tidy heap beside them. “Please note,” he said to Charles, who, since he was the judge, had been allowed to stay, “that there are no signs of a struggle. If Jinx caught this crow here, the crow would have struggled, and feathers would be strewn all over the place.”
“He may have caught it outside,” said Charles. “What difference does that make? All this detective work of yours can’t change the fact that he’s guilty.”
“Maybe they can. Maybe they can,” said Freddy musingly. He walked around the pile of feathers, stopping to examine them closely every few steps, then sniffed at them. “Ha!” he said. “Hum! Very curious! Very curious indeed!”
“Very silly, if you ask me,” said a harsh voice, as Simon stuck his nose out of a hole in the floor. “You’d be better occupied catching that cat and getting him locked up in jail, than poking round up here, Freddy. He’s a friend of yours and all that, but we’ve got him this time!”
“What do you mean, you’ve got him?” demanded Freddy sharply.
“Oh, noth
ing,” grinned the rat, “except that we all saw him catch the crow and eat him, right in front of our eyes. You can’t get round that, I guess.”
“No, it doesn’t look that way, does it?” said Freddy. He picked up a claw and a few feathers and carried them over to the light, where he studied them for a long time. Then he said: “Charles, we’ll just keep these things for a while. I’m not at all satisfied that this business is as plain as it looks—not at all satisfied. You can’t sentence Jinx to jail until he has had a regular trial. We’ll have to get a regular jury together, and all that. I’ll leave that to you. But I want to have a few days first to make some inquiries. Let’s say we’ll have the trial a week from today.”
Charles agreed, and the two friends left the loft, followed by Simon’s malevolent glare. They took the claws and the feathers along and left them with Robert, who promised to keep them in a safe place. Before he left Charles, Freddy got the rooster to promise that Jinx should be allowed to go free until the day of the trial. “If he’s found guilty,” the pig said, “you can give him a good long sentence. But until then let’s let him go on with his job. He won’t run away.”
“You talk as if you thought he wasn’t guilty,” said Charles; “yet the proof’s as plain as the nose on your face.”
“The nose on my face may be plain or it may not be plain,” replied Freddy. “Some think one way and some think different. It’s a matter of opinion, Charlie, old boy. And so is this matter of Jinx’s guilt. My opinion is, he isn’t guilty. But I’m not going to tell you why. You saw as much up there in the barn as I did. If you didn’t see what I saw, you’ll have to wait until the trial to find out what it was. Good-bye.”
Then Freddy went back in the house and upstairs to where Jinx was waiting and told him what had happened. “You just go back to the barn and keep an eye on the rats,” he said, “and leave the rest of it to me. I’ve got another job on my hands right now that will keep me busy for a day or two, but there’s plenty of time before your trial to get the evidence I need to prove you didn’t eat that crow. Don’t you worry.”
Freddy the Detective Page 8
