CHAPTER IVONE A.M.
Nighthad fallen, soft and dark and still, when Danny climbed out of his little latticed window on to the roof of the porch. He could smell the honeysuckle though he could not see it. And somewhere a nightingale was singing. He had gone up to bed at 9 o’clock. His mother had come in and tucked him up, and, shutting the door, had gone downstairs.
Now Danny scrambled down the trellis-work of the porch and was soon trotting softly along the road. As he got beyond the village his courage began to fail just a wee bit. The road was very dark and lonely. Great black fir trees stretched out weird arms towards him. An owl hooted. A rabbit scampered across his path with a whisk of white tail.Once he jumped as a cow poked her head through a gap at him, and heaved a great sigh. Between the weird black branches of the pines he could see the little, white, sparkling stars winking at him. They reminded him of God, and that after all he was not quite alone. God must be pleased with him, because he was “doing his best.” The lonely darkness ceased to be full of horror. He went on with a brave heart.
At last he reached the pond. All was quite still. After listening intently for a few minutes, he flashed his electric torch on the water. The scraps of paper were still floating about. He walked round the bank, casting a ring of golden light on to the dusty ground. But there were no wet footmarks to show that someone had come up out of the water.
“I’ll keep watch,” said Danny, and he curled up in the shadow of the wall.
It was a warm July night, but Danny’s teeth were chattering as he squatted alone beneath the ruined wall. He gazed fascinatedat the black waters of the pond. Any moment a face, with a red, straggly beard, might come up, all wet and dripping and look at him. He half-wished he had not come. But he had vowed to do all he could to solve the problem, and surely he was on the scent at last.
The moments crept by and nothing happened. Everything was very still, save for the occasional hoot of an owl. The world seemed fast asleep. Presently Danny began to nod.
It must have been three hours later when he awoke, stiff and uncomfortable. Where was he? Oh yes! He jumped up quickly, rubbing his eyes. He had slept on guard. He blushed in the darkness. Just think—if he had been a soldier and his officer had come round—the shame of it! And suddenly he found he was simply longing for home and mother and bed.
“My duty,” he said between his chattering teeth. Switching on his electric torch, he went softly round the pond. But there wereno wet marks on the parched, dusty bank; so no one had come up out of the water.
From away across the valley stole the faint sound of a church clock. The four quarters rang out; Danny listened for the hour.One... chimed like a sad voice across the dim countryside. “One o’clock,” whispered Danny. He could not resist the longing for home, and softly he made his way back on to the road.
“Rh-rrru-um!” A great, grey car swung round the corner and hummed past Danny.
“A.R. 1692,” he said to himself as he watched the red tail-light grow smaller and smaller in the distance. Almost from force of habit he fixed the number in his mind.
Danny’s feet seemed to have acquired a nasty habit of tumbling over each other. He wondered why. And then he gave a big yawn. How lovely it would be to be in bed—all warm and safe and cosy, and, best of all, to hear mother snoring in the next room! It was so lonely out here. He trudged sleepilyon and round the corner towards Dutton. He was walking on the grass at the side of the road. A ditch ran along the hedge.
Suddenly, almost at his feet, he heard a long, muffled whistle. He started violently, and then, remembering the law of the wild, he “froze.” The next moment three whistle notes sounded, not quite so muffled, and coming, certainly, from the ditch. Then a strange, guttural voice, speaking in low tones. It was there, at his feet, in the ditch. What could it mean? Danny, the sleepy little boy, was trembling with fear, but Danny the Detective was on the scent again.
Creeping softly across the grass to the edge of the ditch he dropped on one knee and peered down. It was far too dark to see anything. So he strained his ears to try and catch this mysterious conversation. He soon found that, though he could hear every word distinctly, he could not understand it. It was in a foreign language! There seemed a lot of “ach,” and “gr-r-r” in it; very ugly itsounded. And the word “so” seemed to come in it rather often. “Nine” was mentioned still more often. Danny listened intently for any words he could recognise. Presently he heard “Sir Edward Grey” ... quite distinctly. It did not convey much to him, but at least the words were English, and he stored them up. “Downing Street” ... he caught, and, later on, “Asquith.”...
It was a funny conversation. It kept breaking off suddenly, and there would be a long silence. Then it would go on for a few words and stop. And, somehow, the whole thing reminded him of how it sounded when the postmastertelephonedfrom the village post-office.
Suddenly there was a movement in the ditch. “They’re coming out,” thought Danny. Like a rabbit he scuttled out of sight into a place where the bank in front of the ditch formed a kind of little, earthy grotto, half overgrown with bushes. He was hidden in the darkness, but he could see well himself.
As he peered out, straining his eyes in the gloom, he saw a black figure rear itself out of the ditch and stand up against the grey star-spangled sky. He could see its outline quite clearly. It was that of a slight, smallish man. In his hand he held something that looked like about three yards of rather thick rope. For a moment he stood still, brushing the mud from his suit. It was at this moment, when silence was so essential, that Danny felt a violent tickle in his nose.
He was going to sneeze!
“A—hi——A—hi—— A—tishu!” He tried to muffle it in his cap, but it was no use. The man started violently, then looked about him quickly. One step brought him close to Danny’s grotto. He had dropped his rope end, and against the grey sky Danny could see the outline of a revolver in his right hand.
Slowly the man bent towards him, peering through the darkness. Seeing nothing, he stretched out his hand to feel. Cold sweatbroke out all over Danny. In a second the man would have touched him.
To keep still meant being caught for certain. To dash out and run would probably mean a bullet in his legs. The groping hand was very near his face. Suddenly an idea seized Danny. The man would not risk the danger of breaking the night stillness with a shot if he thought that the sound he had heard had merely been made by afox; nor would he bother to follow it up or be in any way disturbed or set on his guard by its presence. With a sudden movement he fastened his sharp little teeth in the hand. The man gave a muffled cry of pain, started back, and Danny, with the bark of a young fox, dashed out past his legs in a doubled-up position, and was soon running down the road under cover of the darkness. Leaping across the ditch and through a well-known gap, he threw himself down on the grass, panting. There was no sound of following footsteps. His ruse had succeeded.
Cautiously Danny rose to his feet andbegan walking down the side of the hedge on the field side. He was making for home. Strangers with revolvers were not to be followed in the dark, even by detectives, when the latter were unarmed. But before long he had stopped short and was peering through the hedge. A little red light had caught his eye. Yes, it was the tail-light of a motor—A.R. 1692! It was the same car that had passed him—he remembered the number! The head-lights had been turned off. The great body of the car loomed like some huge monster in the darkness. Danny could just make out the form of a man sitting quite still in the driver’s seat. He seemed to be waiting for something.
Perhaps the man who had been talking in the ditch was going to rejoin him. Danny, managing to overcome his fear of the revolver, decided to wait and watch. Before long there was a slight sound and the man he had seen before stepped on to the road from the grassy border that had muffled his approaching steps.The men exchanged a few words in the same guttural language Danny had heard coming from the ditch. Then the driver got down from the car and lit up the head-lights. A bright shaft shot along the road.
Bending down, the man allowed his face to be caught in it for a moment, and Danny looked with all his eyes, so that he might remember every feature.
He was a thick-set man with a square, black beard and thick-lensed, round glasses. An exclamation of annoyance from him brought his friend round to help adjust one of the lamps, and Danny had a glimpse of the second man’s face. He knew him in a moment! It was the mysterious stranger of the bicycle incident, on whose track he had been for so long!
The head-lights being successfully fixed up, the driver of the car went round to the back, and Danny watched, fascinated, while he removed the number board and substituted for it one showing “L. 323.” Then togetherthe men raised the hood of the car, though it was a cloudless night. After moving about some time they both got into the car. But the automatic starter would not work, and the driver, grumbling to himself, climbed out again and went round to turn the handle.
This brought his face once more within the light of the great lamps. Danny’s eyes opened wide at what he saw. The motorist was no longer a black-bearded, spectacled, man. He had now a bristling red moustache and his bright little blue eyes showed out from beneath rather bushy eyebrows! A moment later the car had hummed off down the road.
The man allowed his face to be caught in the bright lightBending down, the man allowed his face to be caught in the bright light, and Danny looked with all his eyes, so that he might remember every feature.
Bending down, the man allowed his face to be caught in the bright light, and Danny looked with all his eyes, so that he might remember every feature.
Bending down, the man allowed his face to be caught in the bright light, and Danny looked with all his eyes, so that he might remember every feature.