Mystery #02 — The Mystery of the Disappearing Cat

"She wouldn't steal her own cat, silly," said Daisy.

"She might," said Larry. "It might be insured against theft, you know. She would get a lot of money. You've got to think of all these things." He wrote down Lady Candling's name.

"Tupping?" said Bets.

Larry shook his head very regretfully. "No, Bets. I'd love to put his name down; but if he was with old Clear-Orf all the afternoon it's just no good suspecting him. What about Miss Harmer? Could she possibly have come back quietly and secretly from her day out and taken the cat? She knew how valuable Dark Queen was."

This was quite a new idea. Everyone thought of the plump, smiling Miss Harmer. She didn't seem at all the sort of person who would steal a valuable cat from her employer. Still — her name went down on the list of Suspects.

"We'll have to try and find out where Miss Harmer was between four and five o'clock today," said Pip.

"Who else is there?" said Daisy. "We've got Miss Tremble, Lady Candling, and Miss Harmer down. What about the cook and house-parlourmaid next door? They would have had a chance of going down to the cat-house and taking Dark Queen, wouldn't they?"

"I've never seen the cook or parlourmaid," said Pip. "None of us have. We'll have to find out about them too. Goodness, we've got quite a lot of suspected people after all! We'll have a lot of work to do!"

"The one person who is horrid enough to have done it is Tupping — and he's just the very one we can't even suspect," said Bets sadly. "Well, there aren't any more Suspects, are there?"

"We'll have to put old Luke down," said Larry. "I know we don't suspect him — but Tupping has accused him of the crime, so we'd better put him down. We can cross him out as soon as we like."

So Luke's name went down too. Poor old Luke! He always seemed to be in trouble.

"Let's go and whistle to him," said Larry. "He hasn't gone home yet, or he'd have whistled to us and told us everything."

So they went to the wall and whistled the special notes that they and Luke used for signalling to one another. But although they whistled and whistled, nobody came. Whatever could Luke be doing?

 

Luke gets into Trouble.

 

The five children sat on top of the wall, with Buster scratching at the bricks below. They wondered what to do. Pip looked at his watch.

"Just gone quarter to six," he said. "Can Luke have gone home? No; he surely would have spoken to us first"

"Perhaps old Clear-Orf is questioning him," said Fatty. This seemed very likely. Tie children wished they could find out.

Fatty had a good idea. "Look here, Pip," he said, "you could find out what's happening if you liked."

"How?" asked Pip.

"Well, your mother has just been to tea next door, hasn't she," said Fatty. "You could hop over the wall, and go and see what's happening; and if anyone sees you and wants to know what you are doing there, you could say your mother has just been to tea, and has she by any chance dropped her hanky in the garden?"

"But she hasn't," said Pip. "Didn't you see her take it out of her bag when she was talking to us? It had a most lovely smell."

"Of course I did, idiot," said Fatty impatiently. "It's only just an excuse. You don't need to say she did drop her hanky, because we know she didn't — but you could easily say, Had she?' couldn't you?"

"It's a good idea of Fatty's," said Larry. "It's about the only way any of us could get into the garden without being sent out at once by Clear-Orf or Tupping. Go on, Pip. Jump down and see whether you can find out what's happening. Hurry up. It's realty a great bit of luck that your mother has just been there to tea."

Pip was anxious to go — and yet very much afraid of meeting Tupping or Clear-Orf. He jumped down, waved to the others, and set off through the bushes.

There was no sign of Luke at all. Pip passed by the cat-house, but there was no one there either. He peeped into the cage where Dark Queen should have been with the others. The cats looked at him and mewed. Pip went on down the path, round by the greenhouses, and then stood hidden in the bushes. He could hear voices nearby.

He peeped through the bushes. There was a little group of people on the lawn. Pip knew most of them.

"There's Lady Candling," he thought. "And that's Miss Tremble — doesn't she look upset! And there's Tupping, looking very pleased and important — and that's old Clear-Orf the bobby! And oh, there's poor old Luke!"

Poor Luke was there, in the centre, looking quite bewildered and terribly scared. The policeman was standing opposite to him, big black notebook in hand, and Luke was stammering and stuttering out replies to questions that Mr. Goon was barking out at him.

At the back were two maids, plainly the cook and the parlourmaid, both looking excited. They were whispering together, nudging one another.

Pip crept nearer. He could hear the questions now that were fired at poor frightened Luke.

"What were you doing all the afternoon?"

"I was — I was — digging up the old peas — in the Long Bed," stammered Luke.