The storm came nearer. A puff of cool air came through the doorway and blew chaff in Freddy’s eyes. Between the thunder claps he could hear the thump of windows being put down in the house. And then with a sharp rattle, and then with a roar that was louder than the thunder, the rain came down upon the barn.
Jinx put his mouth close to Freddy’s ear. “They can’t hear us now,” he shouted. “Let’s get upstairs. I have an idea that if anything happens, it will be up there, because that’s where the big feed-box is. They’ll go after those oats, and then—Wham-o!” And the cat gave his friend a joyous whack on the back.
As they reached the top of the stairs, the rain stopped suddenly. There was a moment of silence, and through it the friends heard a queer rattling noise, as if someone was dragging empty tin cans across the floor. A distant flicker of lightning lit the loft dimly, and Freddy saw something that made queer prickles travel up his spine. A long low shape was moving slowly across from the hay-mow toward the feed-box.
If it was an animal, it was the strangest animal Freddy had ever seen. It was nearly four feet long, but not more than four or five inches high. It seemed to glide along like a snake, and as it moved it rattled and squeaked, as if its insides were full of machinery.
“I’m going,” said Freddy firmly, but as he backed toward the stairs, there came a sharper flash of lightning, and he saw what the strange animal was. It was the train of cars.
A train of toy cars that moves all by itself in an empty loft during a thunder-storm would make even a policeman a little uneasy. But though Freddy was scared, like all true detectives he was more curious than frightened, and he stood his ground. For a minute it was dark and they could hear nothing through the crashing thunder. Then came another flash, and as the train of cars was swallowed up again in the darkness, Jinx sprang.
Freddy waited. As the thunder died away again, he heard a rattling and banging in the middle of the floor, and then the loft seemed to be full of the squeaking laughter of rats. “He-he-he!” they giggled. “Smarty-cat Jinx! He can’t catch us now!” Lightning danced over the landscape outside, and for what seemed quite a long time Freddy watched a strange battle between the cat and the train. Jinx leaped upon it, bit it, pounded and slashed at it with his paws, tried to knock it over; and all the time it moved jerkily on toward the feed-box, accompanied by the shouts and jeers of rats. Then as darkness poured into the barn again, Jinx gave up and bounded back to Freddy’s side. “Back downstairs,” he panted. “It’s no use. We’ll have to try something else.”
Back in Hank’s stall again, Jinx stretched out on the floor to rest, and Freddy said: “I’d have tried to help you, Jinx, but I didn’t understand what it was all about or what you were trying to do. And, frankly, that train of cars, moving all by itself, had me scared.”
“It had me scared at first, too,” admitted Jinx. “But my eyes are pretty good in the dark, you know, and I saw what was inside the cars.”
“Inside them! You mean—” A light suddenly burst on Freddy. “The rats!” He saw it all. Those four cars had wheels, but there were no floors in them, and each was big enough to hold a good-sized rat. Easy enough for the rat to get in, and then he was as safe as a turtle inside his shell.
“Of course,” said Jinx. “And you see what it means. They can get from their holes to the feed-box and back, and I can’t stop ’em. Of course if Mr. Bean sweeps up all the grain that’s around on the floor, and stops up that hole in the side of the box, it will be harder for them. Then they’ll have to get out of their armored train. But I don’t want Mr. Bean to find out about it. He won’t know anything about the train, you see, and he’ll just think I’m no good at my job.”
“But what can we do?” asked Freddy.
“Well, you’re the detective, aren’t you?” asked Jinx irritably. “You’ve done a lot of big talk about how you were in charge of the case, and so on. Oh, I admit you did a good job finding out who stole the train—you mustn’t think I’m cross at you. I’m just sore about the whole business. But if you’re going in for being a detective, this is your chance to get a reputation. You’ve got as much at stake as I have.”
Freddy didn’t sleep much that night. He knew what Jinx had said was so. Sherlock Holmes would have rounded up those rats and had them behind the bars in a couple of days. But he couldn’t think of anything to do. He was up early the next morning, reading the stories in the Sherlock Holmes book, but the cases were all so different from his that he found nothing to help him. He went down to the barn.
“They’re up there,” said Hank. “Hard at it since before daylight.” And indeed from where he was, Freddy could hear the rattle of the train being drawn across the floor by its crew of rats. He climbed the stairs cautiously. There it was, moving away from the feed-box. He could see the rats’ feet moving as they pushed it along, and the tender was piled full of yellow oats.
“There’s one thing I can do,” said Freddy to himself, and he made a dash for the train, knocked over the tender, and spilled the grain out on the floor. But the rats only laughed. “Pooh, pooh for Freddy!” they shouted derisively. “We’ll get more than that the next trip. Do you want to know how we work it, silly pig? Four of us go over and eat all we can hold. The next trip, four others go and eat all they can hold. Then, the next trip, four others go and—”
But Freddy was tearing mad. To be mocked at by rats is more than any self-respecting pig can stand. He jumped at the train and tried to get his snout under it and fling it in the air, but it was too low. He did manage, however, to push two cars over on their sides, and while the rats lay there kicking, he tried to bite them. But he only succeeded in breaking one of his front teeth on a car wheel, and before he gave up, one of the rats had nipped him sharply in the ear. Then he went back downstairs, followed by more uncomplimentary remarks than he had ever heard before at one time in his life.
Freddy felt pretty low.
CHAPTER IV
THE MYSTERY OF EGBERT
Freddy’s failure bothered him a good deal. The rats soon spread the news of it far and wide, and Freddy couldn’t go outside the pig-pen without meeting animals who asked him how the case was getting on and whether he had got the train of cars back yet. “They’re all very kind and sympathetic,” he said to Jinx, “because nobody likes Simon and his family. But I won’t get any other cases if I don’t solve this one pretty quick. And from the way it looks now, it’s going to take some time.”
“Yes, and I’ll be out of a job if Mr. Bean finds out,” replied the cat. “We’ve got to do something, and do it now. I suppose you’ve heard the song the rats are singing about you?”
Freddy grunted angrily. Yes, he had heard it all right. Every time he went near the barn, the rats began shouting it out at the top of their lungs, and they used it as a sort of marching song when they trundled the train back and forth between their hole and the feed-box.
Freddy, the sleuth,
He busted a tooth,
He’s a silly old bonehead, and that is the truth.
Freddy the pig,
He talks very big,
But all that he’s good for’s to guzzle and swig.
Freddy the fat,
He’s never learned that
It takes forty-nine pigs to equal one rat.
And there were many more verses. It was not very good, just as a song, but it irritated Freddy frightfully, and that was what the rats wanted. It would irritate anyone to have a song like that yelled at him morning, noon, and night.
“Well,” said Jinx, “I’m counting on you. There’s nothing much I can do but hang round the barn and try to get a crack at Simon when he’s not inside that train. Haven’t you got any ideas at all?”
“Sure, I’ve got ideas,” Freddy replied. “I’m working on the thing all the time. But you know how detectives work. They wouldn’t be any good if they told everything they were doing. Everything is going satisfactorily, though a little slower than I had hoped. But I’m making as good progr
ess as could be expected.”
“Humph!” said the cat. “As good progress as I could expect from you—and that’s just none at all.” But he said it under his breath, for perhaps Freddy did have an idea—he was really a very clever pig—and it was no good offending him. Jinx needed his help too badly for that.
But Freddy really had no ideas at all. There was no good using force; he had tried that, and all he had got out of it was a broken tooth that sent his family into fits of laughter whenever he smiled. Anyway, detectives seldom used force; they used guile. He went back to his library and got comfortable and tried to think up some guile to use on the rats. And as usual when he lay perfectly still and concentrated for a short time, he fell asleep.
He was awakened by a timid but persistent tapping at the door. “Come in,” he said sleepily, and then as a white nose and two white ears appeared round the edge of the door, he jumped up. “Ah, Mrs. Winnick,” he said as the rest of an elderly rabbit followed the ears into the room; “long time since I have seen you. What can I do for you today?”
Mrs. Winnick was a widow who lived down by the edge of the woods. In her day she had been as pretty a young rabbit as you could wish to see, but since the loss of her husband the cares of providing for a large family had taken every bit of her time and energy. She took no part in the gay social life of the other animals in the neighborhood, and they seldom saw her, though they were good to her, and one or other of them was always taking a fresh head of lettuce or a couple of carrots down to her, for they suspected that she and the children did not always get enough food.
“Oh, Mr. Freddy,” she burst out, “it’s about Egbert. He’s disappeared, and whatever I shall do I don’t know. He was always such a good boy, too—kind and helpful, and willing to look after the baby. With the other children it’s play, play, play all day long, but Egbert—” And she began to cry.
Freddy was not greatly disturbed by her tears. Most animals don’t like to cry because it makes their eyes red, but white rabbits have red eyes anyway, so crying doesn’t make them look any different. And as they are very sentimental and tender-hearted little animals, and easily upset, they cry a good deal.
“Come, come,” said Freddy briskly. “Just tell me all about it, and we’ll see what can be done. I’m sure it’s not as bad as you think. Now, do you want me to help you find Egbert?” And as she nodded tearful assent, “Well,” he continued, “let’s get at the facts. Let’s see—Egbert. He’s your eighth oldest, isn’t he? Or ninth?”
“Twelfth,” she replied, “and always such a good—”
“Yes,” said Freddy quickly. “And when did you last see him?”
After asking a good many questions Freddy got Mrs. Winnick’s story. The night before Egbert had taken several of the children up through the woods to Jones’s Creek to get some watercress. At nine o’clock the children had come home without him. They had not found any good watercress, and Egbert had said that he would go farther down the creek to a place he knew where there was sure to be some, but that they must go home, as it was their bedtime, and their mother would worry. Mrs. Winnick had put the children to bed and had presently gone to bed herself. But this morning Egbert’s bed was empty. He had not come home, and nothing had been seen or heard of him since.
Freddy consoled the weeping widow as best he could. “I’ll get to work on it right away,” he said, “and meanwhile don’t worry. I’ll soon have Egbert back for you. By the way, who sent you to me?”
“It was the children,” said the rabbit. “They’d heard about your setting up to be a detective, and they wanted me to come and see you. Not that I have any faith in it—excuse me, sir. But you haven’t been at it very long, have you?”
“No,” Freddy admitted, “but there always has to be a first time, doesn’t there? Even Sherlock Holmes made a start once, didn’t he? Don’t you worry, ma’am. I’ve made a deep study of the subject, and there isn’t an animal in the country that knows more about detecting than I do. Why, I’ve read a whole book about it.”
Mrs. Winnick seemed satisfied with this and went off home, stopping after every three or four hops to cry a little and blow her nose. Freddy wasted no time, but set out at once for the creek. He found the watercress bed which Egbert had visited with his little brothers and sisters, then went slowly on downstream, keeping a sharp look-out for any signs of the missing rabbit. Once he saw where some wintergreen leaves had been nibbled, and once, in a sandy place, he saw the plain imprint of a rabbit’s foot, so he knew he was on the right track. And then where the stream widened out, just before it took a bend round to the right to join the river, he found another big bed of cress, and in the swampy shore a large number of rabbit’s footprints.
Freddy had been very happy when he started out. Although he had failed to get back Everett’s train of cars, Mrs. Winnick’s visit had cheered him up a lot. Here was a new problem. He would solve it and prove to his friends that he was a real detective after all. But now this problem was just as bad as the other one. What was he going to do? These were Egbert’s footprints all right, but what good did they do him? There ought to be some clue that he could follow up. There always was in the Sherlock Holmes stories. “You can’t solve a case without clues,” he muttered unhappily. “These might be clues to Sherlock Holmes, but to me they’re just a lot of footprints.” And he sat down on the bank to think.
He was thinking so hard that for some time he did not see a small rabbit who hopped down out of the woods to the cress bed, picked a few stalks, then hopped back up among the trees. The rabbit had made several trips before Freddy suddenly caught sight of him.
The rabbit hadn’t seen Freddy either, and when the pig started up suddenly, he dodged quickly behind a bush.
“So you’re the one who made all those footprints in the mud here, are you?” said Freddy.
“Yes, sir,” came a small anxious voice from behind the bush. “Isn’t it all right, sir?”
“Sure it’s all right,” said the pig. “Come out; I won’t hurt you. I’m looking for a rabbit about your size. Haven’t seen one around, have you?”
The rabbit hopped timidly out. “No, sir,” he said. “Who was he, sir?”
“Ah,” said Freddy mysteriously, “I’m the one to be asking the questions. I’m a detective. Just you answer up briskly, young fellow. Haven’t seen any other rabbits around, eh?”
“No, sir—”
“No other footprints in the mud when you came here?”
“I don’t think so, sir. You see, I—”
“How long have you been here?”
“Since last night, sir. You see, I came to get some watercress, and as I was—”
Freddy stopped him. “That’s enough,” he said severely. “Please just answer the questions I ask you, without adding anything of your own. Just answer yes or no. You heard no unusual noises?”
“Yes, sir—I mean no, sir,” said the rabbit, who was getting confused.
“What do you mean—‘yes, sir, no, sir’?” said Freddy. “Please give me a straight answer. Did you or did you not hear any unusual noises?”
“No, sir—I mean—” The rabbit gulped. “—no, sir.”
“Good,” said the pig. “That’s the stuff; a straight answer to a straight question. And—ha, h’m—let me see—” He hadn’t found out anything, and yet he couldn’t think of any more questions to ask. “Well, ah—what are you doing here anyway?”
But the rabbit didn’t answer. “Come, come,” said Freddy sharply. “Answer me! What are you—”
But the rabbit interrupted him by bursting into tears. “You told me to answer yes or no,” he sobbed, “and you can’t answer that question yes or no. I c-came here to get watercress, an’ I was just going home an’ I found a little bird with a hurt wing, and I thought I ought to stay with it, an’ I know my mother’ll worry, b-but I don’t like to leave the bird all alone, an’ now you come an’ ask me a lot of questions I don’t know the answers to, an’—” Here he broke down en
tirely and cried so hard that he got the hiccups.
Freddy was a kind-hearted animal, but he had been so absorbed in asking questions in a thoroughly detective-like manner that he hadn’t really noticed that he was frightening the rabbit so badly that the poor little creature couldn’t give him any information even if he had it to give. In this Freddy was more like a real detective than he realized. Some detectives will ask a simple question like “What is your name?” in so frightening a voice that the person he asks can’t even remember whether he has a name or not.
“There, there,” said Freddy, patting the rabbit on the back, “I’m sorry I scared you. It’s all right. Where is this bird?”
“Up in a hollow behind that tree,” hiccuped the little animal.
“All right,” said Freddy. “I’ll look after him for you. You run along home. I’ve got to find this other rabbit I was telling you about, but first I’ll see that the bird is taken care of. Run along and tell your mother not to worry any more.”
The rabbit wasted no time, but trotted off, still crying, and hiccuping occasionally through his tears, and Freddy went in search of the bird. He found it presently—a fledgling wood thrush, too young to talk yet. Beside it was a small heap of watercress which the rabbit had evidently been trying to feed it.
“Tut, tut,” said Freddy. “Feeding an infant like that watercress! He’ll be sick. And he’s hidden here so that his mother couldn’t possibly find him. That rabbit has a kind heart, but he certainly isn’t very bright.” He picked up the little thrush carefully in his mouth and carried it, fluttering feebly, out into an open space, then went back into the bushes and sat down. In five minutes there was a rush of wings and the mother thrush alighted beside the hungry fledgling and began consoling him with little chirps. Freddy slipped away without waiting to be thanked.
Freddy the Detective Page 3