Mystery of the Strange Messages (6 page)

"Was it ever called The Ivies', asked Fatty, hopefully. Mr.
Smith shook his head.

"No. It was just called The Cottage", he said.
"Sorry I can't help you."

"I'm very sorry to have bothered you," said Fatty, and
he raised his cap politely, pleased to have met with such a nice old couple. He
went back to Bets and told her what had happened.

"I felt rather mean, bothering such nice people," he
said, putting Buster down. "Well—although their name is Smith and they
live in an ivy-covered house, they can't be anything to do with the Smith in
those notes. That little place used to be called The Cottage' not The Ivies'.
Come along—on with the search. Bets. I wonder how the others are getting
on!"

Bets and Fatty were astonished to discover that there were no more
houses with ivy in the roads they rode along. "Ivy must have gone out of
fashion," said Bets. "There are plenty of houses with roses on the
wall, and clematis and wisteria, and creeper—but no ivy! Well—I must say ivy is
a dark, rather ugly thing to cover a

house with, when you can get so much prettier things to grow up
the walls. What's the time. Fatty?"

"Time to meet the others," said Fatty, looking at his
watch. "Come on—let's see how they've got on. Better than we have, I hope.
Certainly we found an ivy-covered house, and people called smith—but not the
ones we want!"

They cycled off to the corner where they were to meet the others.
Larry and Daisy were there already, waiting patiently. Ern and Pip arrived soon
after, Ern grinning all over his face as usual.

"Any luck?" asked Fatty.

"We're not quite sure," said Pip. "Let's got to
your shed. Fatty. We can't talk here. We'll all compare notes, and see if we've
got anything useful!"

Pip and Ern have some News.

Soon all six, with Buster running round busily, were sitting once
more in Fatty's shed. He produced some chocolate biscuits, and Buster sat up
and begged at once.

'No, Buster. Think of your figure," said Fatty, solemnly.
Buster barked loudly.

"He says—'You jolly well think of
yours.
Fatty!' said
Bets, with a chuckle. "I'll only have one, thank you. It's getting near
dinner-time, and we're having steak and kidney pudding—I don't want not to be
hungry for that!"

"Well—any news?" asked Fatty, producing his notebook.

"You tell yours first," said Pip.

"There's not much," said Fatty. "Bets and I found
one big ivy-covered house called Barton Grange, in Hollins Road. Ivy almost up
to the roof. We'll have to find

out if it was ever called 'The Ivies'. And we found a nice little
cottage, with no name in Jordans Road, No. 29—
and
the people who live there are called Smith."

Everyone sat up in surprise. "Goodness—you don't mean to say
you've hit on the right house and people straightaway!" said Larry,
astonished.

"No. Apparently the house once belonged to the gardener of
the big place next to it, and was called The
Cottage'—
not 'The
Ivies'," said Fatty. "And the Smiths weren't the right Smiths cither.
Most disappointing! We'll have to rule it out. I'm afraid. Well, what about
you, Larry and Daisy?"

"Absolutely nothing to report," said Larry. "We did
see one old ivy-covered house—ivy right up to the roof, so it must have been
quite an old house."

"But its name was Fairlin Hall," said Daisy. "And
it was empty. We rode in at the drive, because we couldn't see the house
properly from the front gates. We guessed it would be empty because there was a
big board up outside To be Sold'."

"It looked a dreadful old place," said Larry. "Old-fashioned,
with great pillars at the front door, and heavy balconies jutting out
everywhere. I wonder if people ever sat out on those stone balconies in the old
days."

"It looked so lonely and dismal," said Daisy. "It
really gave me the shivers. It reminded me of the line in that poem, Fatty—'All
my windows stare*. They did seem to stare at us, as if they were hoping we
might be coming to live there, and put up curtains and light fires."

"But we ruled it out because it was called Fairlin Hall, and
was
empty"
said Larry. "No Smith there!"

"Quite
right," said Fatty. "What about you and Ern, Pip?"

"We found
two
ivy-covered houses," said Pip.
"And one really might be worth while looking into, Fatty. Ern and I agreed
that it
might
be the one!"

"Ah—this is better news," said Fatty. "Out with it,
Pip."

"Well. Ern found the first one," said Pip, seeing that
Ern had taken out his notebook, and was looking hopefully at him, eager to
enter into the debate.

"It was called 'Dean Lodge', and was in Bolton Road,"
said Ern, in a very business-like voice, flicking over the pages of his
notebook, as he had seen his uncle do. "Ivy-covered to the roof—well,
almost to the roof. And it wasn't empty, like the one Pip talked about. It had
people in it."

"Called Smith?" said Bets.

"No. Afraid not," said Ern, looking hard at his notebook
if he needed to refer to a list of names. "Me and Pip decided it might be
a likely place, as the people who lived in it first
might
have called it
'The Ivies'. So we decided to ask if anyone called Smith lived there now."

"And was there?" asked Fatty.

"No. The milkman came up just as we were looking at it, and I
asked him," said Ern. "I said, 'Anyone called Smith live here, mate?'
And he said no, it was the Willoughby-Jenkins, or some such name, and they'd
been there sixteen years, and he'd brought them their milk every single morning
on those sixteen years, except the two days he got married."

Everyone laughed at Ern's way of telling his little tale. "Now
you. Pip," he said, shutting his notebook.

"Well, the house I spotted was in Haylings Lane," said
Pip, referring to
his
notebook. "Not a very big one, and not very
old. Actually it isn't really a house now, it's been made into half-shop,
half-house, and over the front gate is a notice. It said 'Smith and Harris,
Nursery-Men. Plants and shrubs for sale. Apply at house'."

"Smith
and
Harris!" said Fatty, interested at once. "And you say the house is
ivy-covered?"

"Well—not exactly
covered,"
said Pip. "It
had a kind of variegated ivy growing half-way up the whitewashed walls, the
leaves were half-yellow and half-green—rather unusual, really. We thought
perhaps as Smith and Harris grew shrubs and things, they probably planted one

of their own ivies there, to cover the house. But the place wasn't
called The Ivies'. It was just called 'Hay-lings Nursery'—after the lane, I
suppose. I told you it was in Haylings Lane."

"Yes," said Fatty, thoughtfully, "I can't help
thinking that your house is the most likely one. Pip. Ivy up the walls—owned by
Smith
and Harris—and it
might
have been called 'The Ivies' before
they took it over."

"Well—what shall we do next?" said Ern, eagerly.
"Loveaduck—whatever would my uncle say if he knew all we'd been doing this
morning!"

"Let's quickly run over the ivy-covered houses we've all
discovered," said Fatty, "and make up our minds which are definitely
no good, and which are worth enquiring into. I'll take Bets and mine
first."

He ran over them quickly. "Barton Grange, Hollins Road. Ivy-covered.
Well, I suppose we'd better find out if people called Smith lived there, and if
it was ever named 'The Ivies'. Then there was the house we found in Jordans
Road, but we've ruled that out already, because it never
was
called The
Ivies. Then there's the house called Fairlin Hall, that Larry and Daisy
found—but it's empty, so that's no good."

"So that only leaves Haylings Nursery, owned by Smith and
Harris," said Pip. "I vote we enquire into that! If that's no good,
we'll find out a bit more about Barton Grange in Hollins Road, the one you and
Bets found. Fatty."

"I wonder if my mother knows who lives in Barton
Grange," said Fatty. "She's lived in Peterswood so long, she knows
practically everybody. I'll ask her. Gosh, look at the time! And there's our
dinner-bell! Buck up, all of you, you'll get into a row!"

"Oh my goodness!" said Ern, in a panic. "What will
Uncle say if I'm late! And he's supposed to pay me my first half-crown at
dinner-time. Good-bye, all!"

He raced off to get his bicycle, and Larry and the others rode
away at top speed too.

"I'll telephone you later!" Fatty shouted after them,
and ran indoors to his own lunch. How the time flew when there was detective
work to be done! He washed his hands, slicked back his hair and went into the
dining-room, to find his mother just about to sit down herself.

"So sorry I'm a bit late, Mother," said Fatty, sliding
into his seat.

"It will be a nice surprise for me when you decide to be
punctual, Frederick," said his mother. "What have you been doing this
morning?"

"Oh—just messing about with the others," said Fatty,
truthfully. "We did a bit of cycling. Mother, can you tell me something? Who
lives at Barton Grange—the big house in Hollins Road?"

"Barton Grange—let me think now," said his mother.
"First the Fords lived there—then the old man died and his widow went to
live with her daughter. Then the Jenkins came there—but they lost all their
money and left. Then the Georges came—now what happened to them? I know they
left very hurriedly indeed—there was some trouble..."

"And then did the Smiths come?" asked Fatty, hopefully.

"The Smiths? What Smiths?" said his mother, in surprise.

"Oh—I don't really know," said Fatty. "Anyway—who's
there now? It wouldn't
be
people called Smith, would it?"

"No. Nothing
like
Smith," said his mother,
decidedly. "Yes—I remember now—it's old Lady Hammerlit. I don't know her
at all—she's bedridden, poor old thing. But why are you so interested in Barton
Grange, Frederick?"

"Well, I was—but I'm not now," said Fatty, disappointed
to find that no Smiths lived there. "Mother, I suppose you don't know any
place that was once called 'The Ivies', do you?"

"Frederick, what
is
all this?" asked his mother,
sus
piciously. "You're
not getting mixed up in anything peculiar again, are you? I don't want that
unpleasant Mr. Goon here again, complaining about you."

"Mother, he's got
nothing
to complain about,"
said Fatty, impatiently. "And you haven't answered my question. Was there
ever any house called 'The Ivies' in Peterswood—its name will have been changed
by now. We've heard of one—but nobody seems to know of it now."

"The Ivies?" said Mrs. Trotteville. "No—I don't think
I've ever heard of it. I've lived in Peterswood for nineteen years, and as far
as I remember there never
has
been any place called 'The Ivies'. Why do
you want to know?"

Fatty didn't like the way his mother was questioning him. He
wasn't going to tell any fibs, and yet he couldn't give away the reason for his
questions, or his mother would at once complain that he was "getting mixed
up in something peculiar again".

He reached out for the salt—and upset his glass of water. "Oh
Frederick!”
said his mother, vexed. "You really are careless. Dab
it with your table-napkin, quick."

Fatty heaved a sigh of relief. The subject was certainly changed
now! "Sorry, Mother," he said. "I say—what was that story you
used to tell about the man who sat next to you at a big dinner-party one
night—and told you what a big fish he had caught, and ..."

"Oh yes," said his mother, and laughed. "He
stretched out his arms to show me how big it was, and said, 'You should have
seen
the fish—' and knocked a whole dish of fish out of the waiter's hand aJI
over himself. He certainly saw a lot of fish then!"

Clever old Fatty! No more awkward questions were asked about The
Ivies' after that. His mother happily related a few more amusing stories, to
which Fatty listened with great enjoyment. In the middle of them, the telephone
bell rang.

"You answer it," said his mother. "It's probably
your father to say he'll be late tonight."

But it wasn't. It was Ern, and he sounded very upset indeed.

"That you. Fatty? I say, my uncle's in an awful temper with
me, because I wouldn't tell him all we did this morning. He won't pay me my
wages. And he says I'm not to go home, I've got to stay here. What shall I do?
Shall I scoot off home? I don't want to, because it's so nice to be in the
middle of a mystery with all of you."

"I'll come up and see Mr. Goon," said Fatty, sorry for
poor old Ern. "You stay put. I'll be up in half an hour's time!"

Fatty pays a call on Mr. Goon.

Fatty kept his promise to Ern. As soon as he had finished his
lunch, he put Buster in his bedroom and told him to stay there.

"I'm going to see your enemy, old Goon," he told Buster,
"and much as you would like to go with me and snap at his ankles, I don't
feel that it would be wise this afternoon. Buster. I've got to get poor old Ern
his wages!"