THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER
The Cubs’ bare knees were splashed with mud as they pounded along the
lane, looking out keenly for the little scraps of white paper that
formed the “scent” of the hares.
“Phew!” panted one of the hounds, “I’m hot.”
“Stick--to--it!” panted back his pal.
“Are we downhearted?” called Jim Tate, the Sixer, as he had heard
Tommies call out at the end of a long route march.
“No--o--o!” came the answer right down the road, for some Cubs were
getting left behind.
But Danny, having lived all his life in London, had not done much in
the way of long runs. He had got a bad stitch in his side almost at
once, but remembering the second Cub Law--“A Cub does not give in to
himself”--he had set his teeth, and determined to bear the pain, and
not to give in. Then his legs began to ache as if they were ready to
break. But he stuck out manfully. Finally his wind gave out.
“I’m done,” he gasped.
“No, you aren’t,” called his Sixer. “Here--hang on!” and he held out a
hand to his recruit. “We shall get them, I bet. We’ve kept it up hot so
far.”
Just then the white paper showed up a bank, and over the fence, into
a field. With a howl the Cubs scrambled up the grassy bank, clinging
to weeds and sticks and stones, and were soon in full cry across the
grass. On they went, and through a hedge on to the road beyond. But
there was no “scent” on the road; no paper showed on the brown mud.
“False trail!” groaned the hounds.
“Bad luck,” called Jim, the Sixer, “we must go back. We may get them
yet.” And the hounds dashed off again across the field to get back to
the old “scent.” But it was too much for Danny. He sank down, tired out.
“They _can_ run!” he said. And he thought, a little sadly, that they
would think him a rotter to have fallen out. “I stuck it as long as I
could,” he said. “I did my best--I couldn’t do more.”
He was just going to start back to Headquarters when something happened
which was the first step in the curious adventures that befell him from
that day onwards.
“Swish-sh-sh!” sounded the tires of a bicycle on the muddy road, as it
flew past him like a streak. The rider was bareheaded and seemed in
an awful hurry. Then something happened that made Danny jump up and
start running down the road for all he was worth, quite forgetful of
his weary legs. A dog had jumped out from the hedge, and, in trying to
avoid running over it, the cyclist had skidded badly, and now lay quite
still on the road.
Danny panted down the muddy lane, hoping the man was not dead, but,
before he reached the place where the accident had happened, the
stranger had got up and was sitting on the bank, his head in his hands.
“Can I help you, sir?” said Danny eager to do a good turn.
The young man started and looked up at the boy with wild eyes; then
peered about him and looked up and down the road, as if he were afraid
of being followed. Blood was streaming down his face from a nasty gash
in his forehead.
“Can I help you, sir?” repeated Danny. “Let me tie up your head--it’s
bleeding badly.”
“Thank you,” said the young man in a shaky voice.
Danny was glad to find he had put a large, clean handkerchief in his
pocket before starting. He knew enough about first aid to realise the
danger of putting on an open wound anything that is at all dirty. So
he opened out the handkerchief and laid the part that had been folded
up inside, on the wound. What could he use as a bandage? There was
nothing handy.
So, with a sigh of regret, he realised he must sacrifice his beautiful
new brown neckerchief. He took it off and folded it neatly into a
“narrow bandage.” This he tied firmly around the young man’s head,
securing it with a reef knot.
“You’re a bit shaky, sir, aren’t you?” he said. “My home is in the next
village. Won’t you come back and rest? Mother will give you some tea,
and I’ll run for a doctor. I think your head will want stitching.”
“No, thank you,” said the young man quickly, looking down the road
again. “I assure you I am quite all right now. I was just a little
stunned. I thank you for your assistance, my little friend.”
There was something curious about the way the man spoke. Danny wondered
what it was. “Foreigner,” he said to himself, as he picked up the
bicycle and held it for the stranger.
“Could you tell me the way to Thornhurst?” asked the man.
Danny thought a moment, and told him as well as he could.
“Thank you,” said the stranger. He was about to mount his bicycle when
a thought seemed to strike him. Turning to the Cub, “Little boy,” he
said, “should any person ask you if you have seen me on this road, tell
them you have seen _no one_--no one at all.”
Danny grinned.
“Sorry, sir,” he said. “Can’t tell a lie.”
The man swore under his breath. “Little fool,” he muttered.
Then he held out a bright half-crown. “That will keep you quiet,” he
said.
Danny flushed, and then laughed scornfully. “Not much--it won’t,” he
cried.
“Well,” said the man angrily, “tell them I’ve gone to Thornhurst, and
am taking a train to London. I shall be in Dover to-morrow. You won’t
forget--London and Dover.”
Danny nodded, and the man jumped on his bicycle and rode away.
“He’s a queer chap,” said Danny, “and I bet there’s something on
somewhere. Wish I knew what it was.” The detective spirit was roused
in him. Suddenly he forgot all about Cubs and paper-chases. He was a
private detective again, as in the old London days. Kneeling on the
ground, he examined the man’s footprints in the mud, and made a sketch
of them and of the bicycle tracks in his notebook. Then, feeling very
important, he wrote a short report of the adventure in his pocket-book,
added the date (July 1, 1914), and started off across the fields to get
back to the Pack Headquarters.
About half a mile on, his path lay across the yard of an old deserted
mill. As he clambered over the wall, something made him glance at the
mill pool a hundred yards away. By it, in the shadow of the mill, stood
the mysterious stranger, who had bicycled away half an hour ago towards
Thornhurst! His head was still bound up with Danny’s scarf.
Remembering the law of the jungle, Danny “froze.” Squatting perfectly
still on the top of the wall he watched, breathlessly. What could the
stranger be doing there? Thornhurst was in the opposite direction. He
had said he was going there, and on to London.
Looking about him warily the stranger picked up his bicycle and flung
it into the dark waters of the pool. Danny heard the splash, and all
was still.
Then the man looked about him again, turning his head from side to
side, as if to make sure he was not perceived. What was he going to do?
Then, alas, he saw Danny! For one moment he stood quite still, gazing
up at him, as if in dismay. Then, like a shadow, he vanished behind the
crumbling walls of the deserted mill.
For a moment, Danny stood quite still, his eyes and mouth wide open
with utter surprise.
[Illustration: Looking about him warily the stranger picked up his
bicycle and flung it into the dark waters of the pool.]
Then the detective instinct in him realised that there must be
something very “fishy” about a person who threw a good bike into a
pond! He also realised that if he was to find out anything about this
fishy person there was not a moment to be lost, so he scrambled down
off the rickety old wall that he had been scaling, when he got his
glimpse of the man, and set off across the yard.
The man had caught sight of Danny, he felt sure, just after flinging
the bicycle into the pond. This was why he had vanished so quickly. The
pond was hidden from Danny’s view when he got down from the wall. Would
this give the stranger a chance to escape?
A moment later Danny was hurrying down the steep bank towards the
marshy ground where the pond lay.
When he reached the pool there was no sign of the man. He peered about
in the old barns, the rickety sheds, and the broken pig-sty--the man
was nowhere. He went up into the mill. He climbed up ladders to the
topmost floor. He peered between the great millstones. He leant far
out of the windows and looked up and down the road and across the
fields. There was no sign of the stranger.
“He must be a jolly good scout to have hidden so quickly,” said Danny
to himself. “I wasn’t more than two minutes getting to the pond, but he
managed to bunk.”
The only thing to do was to track the man down. Yes, there were the
footmarks and a bicycle track in the soft mud of the little path that
led down from the road to the marshy ground by the pond. Danny examined
them carefully; they were quite fresh. He compared them with the
drawing he had made in his pocket-book half an hour before, and they
tallied exactly. So this _was_ the same man; there could be no mistake.
With his heart thumping hard, Danny followed up the tracks. They led
to the pond in a roundabout way, showing that the man had taken cover
behind a hedge, the old barn, and a broken wall. By the side of the
pond the wheel tracks stopped. Danny could see the firm, deep marks
where the man had stood while picking up the machine and throwing it
into the water.
Then the footmarks went off at right angles; four long strides--and
they stopped behind the broken wall, where the man seemed to have stood
still. Danny searched all round, but the footmarks did not go any
further. And yet there was no cover here!
He walked in a circle round the spot at about five yards’ distance, but
no tracks were to be seen. Danny the Detective was sorely puzzled. But,
returning to the place by the wall where the man had stood, he suddenly
saw what he had missed before. The footprints did leave the spot, but
they went straight back to the pond-side, treading almost where the
first footprints showed!
He followed them up. But at the water’s edge he was as puzzled as he
had been at the wall. The footprints did not lead away!
Danny was stumped. There was nothing more to be done. It seemed a
mystery with no solution--a riddle with no answer. He determined to put
the matter into the hands of wiser people than he.
Squatting on the old wall he wrote in his notebook an account of what
had passed. Then he set off homewards. At the Pack Headquarters, he
found Fred Codding, his Sixer, ramping on the step.
“You little rotter!” he cried, as soon as he saw Danny. “What did you
want to fall out for, and then play about and not come back? All the
other chaps have gone back to tea. But when we found that you were not
at your house I was told to wait here and report to Mr. Fox if you were
not back by 6.30.”
“Awfully sorry, Fred,” said Danny, “but I wasn’t playing about. I was
having a wonderful adventure. I----”
“Oh, shut up!” said Fred, impatiently. “We know all about your
‘adventures.’”
“But this is _truth_,” said Danny, in despair. “A most extraordinary
thing happened----”
“Dry up!” said Fred.
But Danny was determined to make him listen.
“Look here,” he said, “it’s all very well for you to say, ‘Dry up,’ but
what would you say if you saw a chap chuck a good bike into a pond and
then make off?”
“I’d say the chap who told me such a yarn was a liar,” said Fred. “I
must go and report that you’ve got back,” he added. “You cut along home
and stop telling everyone detective stories. Remember you’re a Wolf
Cub, and not a kid any more. A Cub is truthful.”
Danny flushed to the roots of his hair. But he had the sense not to
answer back, for he knew that if he did he would not be able to resist
punching his Sixer’s head--and that would not be loyalty. So he turned
and went sadly home.
But the strange thing he had seen was not to be put out of his mind so
easily. Something must be done. He decided to go to the Scouts about it
that night.
After tea he set out for the Scouts’ Headquarters. There was a meeting
on. He banged at the door.
“What d’you want?” said the Second who opened it.
“I want to speak to Patrol-Leader Church,” said Danny. He felt sure his
friend would give him a fair hearing.
“He’s away,” said the Scout, “gone to see his uncle at Thornhurst.”
“I’ve got something very important to report,” said Danny.
“Sorry,” said the Scout kindly, “there’s a Court of Honour sitting just
now. Come another time.”
But here the Chairman’s voice broke in.
“Bring the kid in,” he called. “Let’s hear the ‘important’ matter!”
Danny entered the brightly lighted room shyly. The eight Leaders and
Seconds stared at him. Then one of them, Fred Codding’s big brother,
burst into a shout of laughter.
“Hullo!” he cried, “it’s ‘Danny the Detective!’ I hear from my young
brother that he’s got a wonderful yarn about a mysterious stranger and
a bike and a pond!”
Danny flushed. Then he looked straight at Patrol-Leader Codding.
“Your brother wouldn’t believe me,” he said, “but I’m a Wolf Cub, and I
wouldn’t tell a lie for anything. It’s the truth, and that’s what I’ve
come about.”
The Patrol-Leaders smiled.
“All right, youngster,” said the Chairman, “sit down. And when we’ve
done the job we’re on now, you can make your report.”
Danny sat down, wishing himself a hundred miles away. Presently the
Chairman called him up.
“Please give the Court your report about this stranger,” he said
solemnly.
Danny forgot his shyness. It seemed to him that he was a chief witness,
giving evidence at a court of law. Very clearly he told his story.
The Court deliberated for a few minutes.
“It’s a good yarn, anyway!” said the Chairman, “though I can’t see the
chap’s idea in throwing his bike in the pond. Look here, youngster,
we’ll take the matter in hand. Kangaroo Patrol shall go with you
to-morrow and drag the pond. If they find the bike we will take further
steps.”
This was duly recorded in the minutes by the Secretary.
Danny was delighted.
“Thank you very much indeed!” he said, and, saluting, withdrew.
“Smart little chap!” said the Leaders, as they turned once more to the
business on hand.