"A nice thought, if I may say so," murmured the Inspector, watching Luke at his work, taking in the boy from head to foot. He turned to Pip.
"Just give him a call, tell him I'm a friend, and then leave us, please," he said.
"Hey, Luke!" yelled Pip. "I've brought a good friend of ours to see you. Come and talk to him."
Luke turned and saw the big Inspector in his blue uniform. He went white, and seemed as if he was rooted to the ground.
"I didn't steal no cat," he said at last, staring at me Inspector.
"Well, suppose you tell me all about it," said Inspector Jenks. "We'll go and sit in the summer-house."
He took Luke firmly by the arm and led him to the summer-house where the children had so often talked over the mystery of Dark Queen's disappearance. Luke was trembling. Pip gave him a comforting grin, and then ran back down the garden to the others.
The children all wondered how Luke was getting on with the Inspector. They seemed to be a very long time together. But at last footsteps were heard coming down the gravel path.
All the children looked to see if Luke was with the Inspector.
He was, and he looked quite cheerful too! The Inspector was smiling his usual twinkling smile. Bets ran to him.
"Is Luke going to come out of hiding? What is he going to do?"
"Well, I am pleased to say that Luke agrees with me that it would be better to go back to his job than to hide here any longer," said the Inspector.
"But what about his unkind stepfather?" said Daisy, who couldn't bear the thought of Luke being beaten any more.
"Ah!" said the Inspector, "I must arrange about that. I had meant to have a word with him myself but the time is getting on." He looked at his watch. "Hm, yes, I must be getting back. Goon, you must go down to Luke's stepfather at once, and inform him that the boy is not to be ill-treated. You must also go to Mr. Tupping, who, I understand, is the gardener next door, and inform him that Luke is to be taken back, with Lady Candling's permission, and is to be given a chance in the garden again."
Mr. Goon looked very
taken aback. After encouraging both the boy's stepfather and Mr. Tupping to treat the boy sternly and hardly, it was scarcely a pleasant job for him to do. Fatty looked sharply at the Inspector.
"I bet he's making Goon do that to punish him for frightening a young boy," thought Fatty. Inspector Jenks fastened his eyes on Mr. Goon.
"You have understood my orders, Goon?" he said in a voice that sounded quite pleasant and yet had a very hard note in it. Mr. Goon nodded hastily.
"Yes, sir, perfectly, sir," he said. "I'll go to the boy's stepfather now, sir. Name of Brown. And I'll make it my business to see Mr. Tupping too, sir."
"Naturally, if any complaints are made to me of ill-treatment, I shall hold you responsible, Goon," said Inspector Jenks. "But I imagine you will impress it carefully on these two men that the orders are mine, and that one of your duties is to see that my orders are carefully carried out. I am sure you agree with me in this, Goon?"
"Oh yes, sir, of course, sir," said Mr. Goon. "And er about the stolen cat, sir. About the case, I mean. Are we to drop the case, sir not make any more inquiries, I mean."
"Well, you might study those clues of yours and see if they shed any light on the case," said the Inspector gravely, with a wicked twinkle in his eye.
Mr. Goon did not answer. The Inspector turned to the children, and gravely shook hands with them all.
"It's been splendid to see the Five Find-Outers and Dog again," he said. "Good-bye and thanks for a wonderful tea the nicest I've had for weeks, if I may say so."
The Inspector got out his shiny black car. He roared down the drive, waving to the children. He was gone.
"I'm going to see Mr. Tupping," said Mr. Goon, with a scowl at the children and Luke. "But don't you think this case is all dosed and forgotten. It isn't I'm still working on it, even if the Inspector don't pay much attention to it. And I'll get the thief all right in the end you see if I don't!"
He gave Luke such a nasty look that the boy knew quite well he was still suspected. He watched Mr. Goon go down the drive on his way to see Tupping.
The children crowded round him. "Luke, did you like our Inspector? Luke, what did he say to you? Tell us everything!"
"He was mighty nice," said Luke. "Not a bit like that Mr. Goon all threats and shouts. But how did I ever come to promise I would go back to my job and go back to live with my stepfather, too? I wish I hadn't promised that. I'm frit."
This was a new word to the children. Bets stared at Luke.
"What's 'frit'?" she asked.
"He means he's frightened," said Fatty. "What a lovely word frit! I shall aways say that now. Frit!"
"I'm often frit," said Bets. "I was frit the other night when I had a bad dream. I was frit today when old Clear-Orf stopped to speak to us."
"And poor Luke is frit, too," said Daisy, looking at the big boy, with his untidy hair hanging over his brown forehead. "What are we to do about it?"