THE MYSTERY SOLVED
Farmer Slown arose early, milked the goat with nervous speed,
breakfasted on one less egg than usual and started for the village in
his flat-bottomed boat. His principal errand there was the buying of two
huge steel traps guaranteed to hold anything up to a grizzly bear in
size. These two traps having long been on exhibit in a hardware store
window as curiosities to draw a crowd and to help advertise the store's
wares, their purchase by the Farmer very naturally aroused the curiosity
of the shopkeeper and of several village loungers who happened to be
witnesses of the sale.
Questions soon drew from the Farmer enough details of the strange doings
on Goose Creek to make a very good story. He was buying the huge traps
to catch some uncanny creature which visited his farm at night and
carried off whole clothes lines. That was enough for the village
gossips. They enlarged the story at each telling until it became a
regular fairy tale, with the villain a creature nearly as high as the
trees, marching about in the woods terrorizing the inhabitants.
So sure did the gossips become of the truth of the story, that they even
made Farmer Slown wonder whether it might not be true. He stayed all day
in the village repeating his version of it to all the newcomers and so
thoroughly enjoying being a hero that he let his own imagination work a
little to make the story better. He even described the dreadful creature
as he thought it ought to look. Needless to say it did not resemble a
little wood pussy.
One of those who took great interest in the affair was the Editor of the
little local paper. He saw a great opportunity and made the most of it
in a special afternoon edition with the story under black headlines and
illustrated with sketches of a creature as large as a house and
resembling a cross between a camel and an elephant.
The little paper circulated far and wide and was quoted by papers
elsewhere until the story in its exaggerated form, was being discussed
in the biggest cities. The general conclusion seemed to be that someone
had gone loony or else that a prehistoric mammal had been hiding in the
Pine Barrens all these years and had now suddenly been discovered.
In a week Goose Creek was a famous place. Newspapers sent photographers
there who poled up and down the stream taking pictures of places wild
enough to be the den of the monster and of any holes in the mud which
might be taken for its foot prints. And Farmer Slown was still the great
hero whom everyone had to visit and listen to and sympathize with.
[Illustration: He approached with caution]
Meanwhile the wood pussies, cause of all the excitement, could not
understand what had happened to make the place so noisy and unsafe for
them. There were strange people and strange dogs in the woods, there
were shouts and gunshots and new odors. The mother, always nervous,
hunted for a new den and finally moved the family to a deserted
woodchuck burrow under a holly tree in the middle of the burned section
of the wood, not very far from where the brush pile had once stood.
But Striped Coat did not like the change. The other young ones were
quarrelsome and the new quarters were crowded. Also he missed his white
crow. So after one day in the burrow he made a trip all by himself back
to the barn, looking more than ever like a fur ball as, all fluffed up
with excitement, he marched along the field.
Nor had his white crow disappointed him. He approached with caution and
in her nest found a fine egg, with a shell thin enough for him to crack.
Its luscious contents were both food and drink. Afterwards he wandered
under the barn and remodelled the bed to suit his own needs. The remains
of the blue night shirt he draped around the top, the socks he stuffed
underneath. By morning he was curled up in the middle of the comfortable
mass, fast asleep.
That day a city cousin of the Farmer, a Mrs. Simpkins, arrived by boat
to get first hand details of the strange affairs which had so suddenly
made the family famous. She brought as companion her son, an overgrown
boy named Oswald who, having read a good many books, thought himself
pretty smart, and perhaps he was. At any rate, while his mother was
talking to the Farmer in the parlor, Oswald nosed about the farm.
He managed to escape disaster, except for one bee sting and a good
butting from the goat, until by mere chance he wandered back of the barn
and caught sight of the hole leading underneath it. Here was mystery! In
true detective fashion he examined the opening and found two large
hairs, one black the other white.
"A cat!" said the bright Oswald. "Maybe it has kittens under here. I'll
have a look." Getting down on his stomach he wormed his way under the
barn until, his eyes becoming used to the darkness, he could see all
about. Everything was bare except in one corner. Oswald elbowed his way
in that direction. Yes, he had certainly found the kittens, for here was
a bed for them, all nicely made with rags!
"Pussy, pussy," called Oswald. He did not want to surprise an angry cat.
"Pussy, pussy." And then to his joy there stood up in the middle of the
nest not a big mother cat but a fluffy black kitten with white stripes
on its head and neck.
Oswald's heart gave a thump of delight. Here was just the pet for him.
He would catch it and take it home. Of course his cousin the Farmer
wouldn't mind, since it was he who had found it. But he must not let it
get away! Craftily advancing an arm under cover of many "pussy,
pussies," he felt the right moment had come. Around went his hand in a
sudden wild grab.
"Yow-w-w-w-w!" howled Oswald as the little "kitten" gave him a musk bath
precisely where it would do the most good--"Yow-w-w-w-w!"
He could not see and he could not breathe, so he made up for it in yells
which even reached his mother in the Farmer's parlor. She had just been
telling her cousin what a wonderful boy her Oswald was.
"Yes," she went on, "he isn't like other boys at all. He is never idle,
he is always finding out things for himself or doing something splendid!
Ah! What's that! I think I hear him calling. He always does that when
he's found something wonderful!"
So Mrs. Simpkins and the Farmer went out of the house to see what Oswald
had found. They heard him all right, but they could not find him.
"Yow-w-w-w-w!" howled Oswald more wild with fury because his fond Mamma
had not at once come to his rescue. "Yow-w-w-w-w!!!"
"Sounds as if he were under the barn!" exclaimed the Farmer at last. He
walked around to the back and there found a foot sticking out of the
hole. Dodging a kick, he seized the foot and began to pull, Mrs.
Simpkins, now much alarmed, pulling also until between them they nearly
pulled Oswald in two.
"We've got him!" gurgled Mrs. Simpkins as more body appeared and the
sound of the yells grew louder. "Oh, what an awful smell!"
"I say so, too!" agreed the Farmer heartily. "Let's poke him back."
But just then the whole of Oswald came out and his mother clasped him to
her in utter disregard of consequences.
"My son," cried Mrs. Simpkins tragically, "what has happened!"
"A kitty!" cried Oswald, "a little black kitty with a white striped
coat." Then, seeing the Farmer's convulsed face, his tears drowned all
else.
"Well, well, it's all right," crooned his mother, "but what's that
you've got in your hand?" The Farmer looked too and all at once his face
grew very red. Tightly clutched in Oswald's hand was all that was left
of the blue night shirt.
A few hours later Mrs. Simpkins, waiting with her son for a train at the
village station, was being interviewed by an appreciative reporter.
"Yes," she was saying. "It was all my Oswald. He isn't like other boys.
He is always finding out things for himself. He went under the barn all
alone and discovered the lost clothes. Isn't he wonderful?"
The reporter's eye swept appraisingly over the blushing Oswald.
"Well, yes," he admitted reluctantly, "he certainly is; but, doesn't he
smell awful!"