‘Well, the post-office can wait a minute or two, I should think, said Pip, who felt that none of them had got very much information out of the telegraph- boy, and was hoping that perhaps Fatty might.
A small dog rounded the corner, and Bets gave a yell. ‘Buster! Come on, Buster! Where’s Fatty? Tell him to hurry.’
Everyone thought that Fatty would come round the corner too, but he didn’t. Buster trotted on towards them alone. He didn’t growl at the telegraph-boy. He gave him a lick and then sat down beside him on the kerb, turning adoring eyes up to him.
Bets was most astonished. She had never seen Buster adoring any one but Fatty in that way. She stared at the little black dog, surprised. What should make him like the telegraph-boy so much?
Then she gave a loud squeal and pounced on the telegraph-boy so suddenly that he jumped.
‘Fatty!’ she said. ‘Oh, Fatty! What idiots we are! FATTY!’
Pip’s mouth fell open. Daisy stared as if she couldn’t believe her eyes. Larry exploded and banged the telegraph-boy on the back.
‘You wretch! You absolute wretch! You took us all in properly - and you took old Clear-Orf in too. Fatty, you’re a marvel. How do you do it?’
Fatty grinned at them all. He removed his red eyebrows with a pull. He rubbed off his freckles with a wetted hanky. He shifted his red wig a little so that the others could see his sleek black hair beneath.
‘Fatty! It’s the most wonderful disguise!’ said Pip enviously. ‘But how do you manage to twist up your mouth to make it different and screw up your eyes to make them smaller and all that kind of thing?’
‘Oh, that’s just good acting,’ said Fatty, swelling a little with pride. ‘I’ve told you before, haven’t I, that I always take the chief part in our school plays, and this last term I...’
But the children didn’t want to hear about Fatty’s wonderful doings at school. They had heard about those too often. Larry interrupted him.
‘Golly! Now I know why the telegraph-boy praised you up so! Idiot! Calling yourself Mr. Trotteville and waiting for your own autograph! Honestly, Fatty, you’re the limit!’
They all went to Pip’s house and were soon settled in the playroom, examining Fatty’s cap and wig and everything.
‘It’s a new disguise I got,’ explained Fatty. ‘I wanted to try it out, of course. Fine wig, isn’t it? It cost an awful lot of money. I daren’t tell Mother. I could hardly wait to play that joke on you. I’m getting awfully good at disguises and acting.’
‘You are, Fatty,’ said Bets generously. ‘I would never have known it was you if I hadn’t noticed Buster sitting down looking up at you with that sort of adoring look he keeps for you, Fatty.’
‘So that’s how you guessed, you clever girl!’ said Fatty. ‘I call that pretty good, Bets. Honestly, I sometimes think you notice even more than the others!’
Bets glowed, but Pip did not look too pleased. He always thought of Bets as his baby sister, and thought she ought to be kept under, and not made conceited about herself.
‘She’ll get swelled head,’ he growled. ‘Any of us could have spotted Buster’s goofy look at you.’
‘Ah, but you didn’t,’ said Fatty. ‘I say - isn’t it great that old Clear-Orf thinks I’ve gone to Tippylooloo! That was a bit of luck, his happening to be with you when I cycled up this morning. Didn’t he jump when I let my bike fall on his shin!’
They all stared at Fatty in admiration. The things he did! The things he thought of! Bets giggled.
‘Won’t he be surprised when you turn up!’ she said. ‘He’ll think you’ve come back from Tippylooloo already!’
‘What a name!’ said Daisy. ‘How in the world did you think of it?’
‘Oh, things like that are easy,’ said Fatty, modestly. ‘Poor old Clear-Orf! He just swallowed that telegram whole!’
‘Are you going to use that disguise when we solve our next mystery?’ asked Bets, eagerly.
‘What’s our next mystery?’ said Pip. ‘We haven’t got one! It would be too much to expect one these hols.’
‘Well, you never know,’ said Fatty. ‘You simply never know! I bet a mystery will turn up again - and I jolly well hope we’ll be on to it before old Clear-Orf is. Do you remember how I locked him up in the coal-hole in our last mystery?’
Everyone laughed. They remembered how poor old Mr. Goon had staggered up out of the coal-hole, black with coal-dust, his helmet lost, and with a most terrible sneezing cold.
‘And we sent him some carbolic soap and found his helmet for him,’ remembered Daisy. ‘And he wasn’t a bit grateful, and never even thanked us. And Pip’s mother said it was rather an insult to send him soap and was cross with us.’
‘I’d like another mystery to solve,’ said Pip. ‘We’ll all keep our ears and eyes open. The hols have begun well, with you in your new disguise, Fatty - taking old Goon in as well as us!’
‘I must go,’ said Fatty, getting up. ‘I’ve got to slip back and change out of this telegraph-boy’s suit. I’ll just put on my wig and eyebrows again in case I meet Clear-Orf. Well - so long!’
OH, FOR A MYSTERY!
A whole week went by. The weather was rather dull and rainy, and the children got tired of it. It wasn’t much fun going for walks and getting soaked. On the other hand they couldn’t stay indoors all day.
The five of them and Buster met at Pip’s each day, because Pip had a fine big playroom. They made rather a noise sometimes, and then Mrs. Hilton would come in, looking cross.
‘There’s no need to behave as if you were a hurricane and an earthquake rolled into one!’ she said, one day. Then she looked in surprise at Pip. ‘Pip, what on earth are you doing?’
‘Nothing, Mother,’ said Pip, unwinding himself hurriedly from some weird purple garment. ‘Just being a Roman emperor, that’s all, and telling my slaves what I think of them.’
‘Where did you get that purple thing,’ asked his mother. ‘Oh, Pip - surely you haven’t taken Mrs. Moon’s bed-spread to act about in?’
‘Well, she’s out,’ said Pip. ‘I didn’t tlunk it would matter, Mother.’
Mrs. Moon was the cook-housekeeper, and had been with the Hiltons only a few months. The last cook was in hospital ill. Mrs. Moon was a really wonderful cook, but she had a very bad temper. Mrs. Hilton was tired of hearing her grumble about the children.
‘You just put that bed-spread back at once!’ she said. ‘Mrs. Moon will be most annoyed if she thinks you’ve been into her bedroom and taken her bed-covering. That was wrong of you, Pip. And will you all please remember to wipe your feet when you come in at the garden-door this wet weather? Mrs. Moon says she is always washing your muddy foot-marks away.’
‘She’s a spiteful old tell-tale,’ said Pip sulkily.
‘I won’t have you talking like that, Pip,’ said Mrs. Hilton. ‘She’s a very good cook and does her work extremely well. It’s no wonder she complains when you make her so much extra cleaning - and, by the way, she says things sometimes disappear from the larder and she feels sure it’s you children taking them. I hope that’s not so.’
Pip looked uncomfortable. ‘Well, Mother,’ he began, ‘it’s only that we’re most awfully hungry sometimes, and you see...’
‘No, I don’t see at all,’ said Mrs. Hilton. ‘Mrs. Moon is in charge of the larder, and you are not to take things without either my permission or hers. Now take back that bed-spread, for goodness sake, and spread it out neatly. Daisy, go with Pip and see that he puts it back properly.’
Daisy went off meekly with Pip. Mrs. Hilton could be very strict, and all five children were in awe of her, and of Mr. Hilton too. They would not stand any nonsense at all, either from their own children or from other people’s! Yet they all liked Mrs. Hilton very much, and Pip and Bets thought the world of her.