Читать книгу A Night on Thunder Rock and other Adventure Stories - Enid blyton - Страница 4

Table of Contents

“Your Uncle Thomas is coming to stay for a day or two,” Mrs. Hollins said to John. “He’s an Inspector, you know, in the police force, and a very clever man.”

“Goodness!” said John. “Will he tell me stories of how he catches burglars and thieves?”

“I daresay he will, if you ask him,” said his mother. “And you mind you behave yourself when he comes! He thinks that young boys ought to be taught how to behave when they’re small—then, he says, they wouldn’t get into trouble when they’re older, and appear in the courts.”

John grinned at his mother. He wasn’t a bad boy, and he knew his mother was proud of him. “Well, I’ll try not to burgle anybody’s house or steal anybody’s chickens, Mother!” he said, “at any rate while Uncle Thomas is here!”

Uncle Thomas arrived. He was not in uniform because he was on holiday and John felt rather disappointed. He had hoped to see a very grand-looking policeman in Inspector’s uniform. But Uncle Thomas was in a tweed suit and except that he was very big and had a very clever face with a pair of sharp eyes, he looked quite ordinary.

He liked John at once. “Now there’s a smart boy for you,” he said to John’s mother, when the boy was out of the room. “Asks me sensible questions, listens quietly to my answers, and takes it all in. And when I took him out for a walk this morning he noticed quite as much as I did.”

“I’m glad,” said Mrs. Hollins. “He’s a good boy too, honest and straight. I’m lucky!”

John heard a lot of his uncle’s tales. How this thief was caught, and that one—how a burglar was traced and the stolen goods found—how bad boys are dealt with and punished.

“We learn to use our eyes, our ears, yes, and even our noses, in the police force!” said his uncle. “You would be surprised if you knew how many times a very small thing has led to the capture of rogues.”

John made up his mind to use his ears, eyes, and even his nose too in future, just in case he might happen on something interesting. But although he kept a sharp look-out as he went about, he couldn’t really seem to find anything suspicious or queer that needed looking into.

“John dear, take this bundle of old clothes along to Mrs. Browning, will you,” said his mother, two days later. “She’s a poor old thing and lives all alone in Melling Cottage. You know where that is.”

“Yes, I know,” said John, and put down his book. “I’ll go now.” He took the bundle of clothes and set off to Melling Cottage. He knew where it was, at the end of a little lane.

On the way he met old Mrs. Browning herself. She was a little bent woman, with a pale worried face. She had a basket in one hand, and her purse in the other. She was so thin that John felt sure she didn’t eat enough.

“Oh, Mrs. Browning, good morning,” said John. “I was just going to your cottage with these clothes from my mother. Will there be anyone there?”

“No, no, there won’t,” said Mrs. Browning. “It is empty, and I’ve locked the door. I’ll take the clothes with me now, thank you, Master John, and carry them back home when I’ve done the shopping.”

“Oh no, they’re heavy,” said John. “Haven’t you got a shed or anything I can just pop the bundle into, till you come back? I could run along to your cottage, put the clothes in the shed, and you’d find them there when you got back.”

Mrs. Browning hesitated. “Well, yes, there is an old shed,” she said. “It’s halfway down the garden. You could slip down there, open the door and put in the bundle, Master John. Thank you very much.”

John said goodbye and went off with the bundle. He came to the deserted lane where Melling Cottage stood. He went down it and saw the little cottage, a tiny wreath of smoke coming from its chimney.

He pushed open the rickety gate and went along the side of the house into the garden. Yes, there was the shed, halfway down. He went to it, opened the wooden door and looked inside. It seemed to be full of rubbish, a broken chair or two, a few pots, a spade, and some firewood. John put the bundle of old clothes down on a broken chair and then made his way up the garden again, towards the cottage.

Growing beside the wall was a very tall foxglove. A bumble-bee crawled into one, and John stood still to watch it. And then, as he was standing there, he heard a sudden noise from inside the cottage.

It was the sound of people talking! It started up quite suddenly and made him jump. Who was in the cottage? Mrs. Browning had distinctly said that it was empty and locked up. Then who was there?

The voices went on. Then suddenly they stopped and a band began to play, loudly at first, and then softly.

“What an idiot I am!” said John to himself. “It’s not people. It’s only the wireless.”

He was about to go on, when a sudden thought struck him. Surely the wireless had started up quite suddenly—it hadn’t been on when he first stopped to look at the bumble-bee in the foxglove. And then the programme had been switched to another one—well, then there must be someone in the house playing about with it!

It was very puzzling. John wondered what to do. He decided to go and knock at the door and see if anyone came. So he went round to the little front door and knocked hard. He waited, but nobody came. There was not a sound from the cottage except the wireless, which was still playing music.

John left the cottage, still feeling very puzzled. He met little Mrs. Browning hurrying home from her shopping. She stopped and spoke to him.

“Did you find the shed all right? Thank you, Master John, you’re kind.”

“Oh, Mrs. Browning, I hope there isn’t anyone in your cottage,” said John, anxiously, “because when I was coming back from the shed, I suddenly heard the wireless being started up.”

Mrs. Browning looked startled. Then she smiled. “Oh, I left it on when I went out for my bit of shopping. I’m that careless! No wonder it gave you a start, Master John. I’m always doing that.”

“Oh,” said John, thinking that he must have been mistaken. “Well, that explains it, then!”

He walked back home. But on the way he remembered that he had distinctly heard two programmes, one after the other, as if the wireless had first been on one, and then had been switched to another.

He thought about it. “Perhaps though, it was just one programme,” he said to himself. “I might have heard the end of one talky-talky bit, and then the beginning of the next which was music. It could easily have been one programme. And anyway, Mrs. Browning seemed quite certain she had left it going.”

All the same there was a little nagging doubt going on at the back of his mind. It did seem as if the wireless had suddenly been put on—else why hadn’t he heard it when he first went down the garden? He decided to look at the Radio Times, and see what programmes were on at that particular time.

“It was about ten past eleven when I was there,” thought John, looking at his watch. He looked up the programmes. On one there was a talk, lasting from eleven o’clock to a quarter to twelve. On another there was a musical half-hour of dance-band playing.

“Well, then, I did hear a bit of two programmes,” said John to himself. “It’s jolly queer. I wonder if I ought to find out a little more? I wouldn’t like Mrs. Browning to find a burglar waiting for her in her cottage!”

So that afternoon John went along to Melling Cottage again. The smoke was still coming from the chimney. The wireless was silent now. There seemed to be no one about at all.

Feeling a little bit uncomfortable John knocked at the door. He heard a sudden scraping noise from inside, and then silence. Somebody was there, no doubt about it. He knocked again. He heard another little noise, this time from upstairs. Then he heard footsteps coming to the door. He held his breath, wondering who was going to open it.

And, after all, it was little Mrs. Browning, looking quite scared! “Oh, Master John, it’s you!” she said, relieved. “Not many people come along here, and I couldn’t think who it was. You must excuse my being so long in answering, but I was in the middle of my cooking.”

“That’s all right,” said John. “I—er—I just came to see if you’d found the clothes all right in the shed.”

“Oh yes, thank you,” said Mrs. Browning. “Won’t you come in?”

“Well, I don’t think I will,” said John, feeling rather foolish. “Goodbye, Mrs. Browning.”

He went away, still feeling foolish. All the same, he was feeling puzzled too. Why had he heard a noise downstairs when he had first knocked, and a noise upstairs when he had knocked a second time?

“I’m making a to-do about nothing!” he thought at last. “Absolutely nothing. I’ll forget about it.”

But that night, in bed, he began to worry about it again. He felt sure something was not quite right at Melling Cottage. Mrs. Browning did look very white and worried and frightened. She had gone very thin, too. Was there anything the matter?

All at once John threw off the bedclothes, dressed himself quickly, put on his gym shoes and slipped quietly downstairs and out of the back door. He was soon making his way to Melling Cottage. It was about eleven o’clock, and dark, for there was no moon at all.

Down the little lane went John, and came to Melling Cottage. It stood there, a small dark mass by the side of the lane. There was no light in it at all, and no sound from it.

“I’m an idiot,” thought John to himself. “What did I expect to find? I don’t know! There isn’t a thing to be seen or heard. I expect old Mrs. Browning is in bed and fast asleep. Well, I’ll just creep quietly round the cottage once and then go back to bed. I’m really being very silly.”

He walked quietly along the side of the cottage, and then round to the back. There was still nothing to be seen or heard in the black night. John walked softly over the grass at the back of the cottage.

And then he stopped suddenly. He hadn’t seen anything, or heard anything—but what was this he smelt?

He stood and sniffed quietly. Somebody quite nearby—sitting at the cottage window perhaps—was smoking a very strong pipe-tobacco. John knew it well, because old Taffy the gardener smoked the same, and John had smelt it time and time again when he had sat with Taffy in the shed during the old man’s dinner-hour.

And now he could smell that same tobacco being smoked again! It was quite certain it could not be Mrs. Browning. It was some man, sitting there quietly in the dark, smoking by himself.

It was all very queer and puzzling. Did Mrs. Browning know there was a man in her house? She had said she was all alone, a little bent old woman living by herself. Perhaps she didn’t know there was a stranger there?

John sniffed the tobacco smoke once more and then turned to go home very quietly. He let himself in at his back door and wondered what to do. Should he go to Uncle Thomas and wake him and tell him? Or would Uncle think he was silly?

“I’d better wake him,” said John. “Better to be thought silly than to leave an old woman in danger. That man might rob her!”

So he woke up his uncle. The Inspector roused himself at once, and sat up, alert and wide-awake. He listened to John’s queer little tale.

“You did quite right to come and tell me, John,” he said. “We’ll investigate in the morning. There’s something queer in Melling Cottage, no doubt about that. Sharp work, John!”

“But oughtn’t we to do something to-night?” asked John. “Suppose that man should rob Mrs. Browning or hurt her?”

“I don’t somehow think we need worry about that,” said Uncle Thomas. “Get back to bed. We’ll tackle it in the morning.”

The next day Uncle Thomas went along to see the local police and make a few enquiries. Then he called back for John. “Come along with us,” he said. “Then you’ll see what the mystery was.”

Two policemen were with him. Awed and a little scared John went along to Melling Cottage with them and his uncle. They knocked loudly at the door. Mrs. Browning opened it. She gave a scream when she saw the policemen.

“Oh! What do you want?”

“Madam, I’m sorry—but we have reason to believe that you are hiding your son, who is a deserter from the army,” said one of the policemen, “I have a search warrant here. I must search your house.”

They went in. John stayed outside with his uncle, looking scared. Presently the two policemen came out again—and this time they had a great lout with them, sullen and brutal-looking. Behind came Mrs. Browning, weeping bitterly.

“He had got a hiding-place under the boards of the bedroom floor, sir,” said one of the policemen to Uncle Thomas. “He’s frightened his poor old mother terribly—made her hide him—and as far as I can make out she’s been giving him all her food and half-starving herself.”

“I told him to go back,” wept Mrs. Browning. “I begged him to give himself up. But he’s never done as I told him, never. I was too scared to say anything. I knew he’d be found sooner or later. I wanted him to go back and give himself up.”

“Oh, shut up, Ma,” said the sullen youth. He was led off between the two policemen. The Inspector stayed to comfort the poor old woman a little, and John looked at her miserably. How awful to have a son like that!

Mrs. Browning saw him. She patted his arm. “You be a good son to your mother,” she said. “Don’t you turn out like my boy. He’s been cruel and unkind to me ever since he was so high. I spoilt him, and this is my reward! Oh, Inspector, sir, I didn’t mean to do wrong, hiding him like that but I was right down scared of him and what he might do to me.”

“Now, now, don’t you worry any more,” said the Inspector. “You did what you could. You get somebody to come and stay with you for a few days, and you’ll soon feel better.”

He and John walked home. Uncle Thomas was pleased with his nephew. “How old are you, John—just gone twelve? Well, I’m proud of you. Good smart work, that. The police have been looking for that young man for some time and have even searched the cottage once before. But he must have heard they were coming and hid in the woods till the coast was clear again.”

“Uncle, I did what you said,” said John. “I tried to use my eyes, ears and nose!”

“You did very well, Detective John!” said Uncle Thomas. “I shall expect to hear of more cases you have solved in the future!”