The Knights of the White Shield Part 16

"Hem, hem; sorry."

"We think we know who did it."

"You know certainly."

"No, but we think we do, and the feller is just bad enough to do it."

"It's pretty hard to have people think you are bad; and then, if you are thought to have done something you were never guilty of, that is worse still. I don't think it fair to charge a wrong thing on any body unless we know pretty certainly. It is not just."

Charlie had not thought of it _that_ way before.

"I guess you are right, teacher."

Bidding her good-bye, he was moving off, when she said: "Stop one moment.

Whoever that boy is, I wish you'd get him out to Sunday-school."

"What an idea!" thought Charlie. "Tim Tyler's going to Sunday-school!"

In the meantime Wort had been prosecuting his bold investigations. He strolled down the lane, pa.s.sing several cottages, and then a fish-house, where several men were splitting and salting fish. All these were on the left side of the lane. On the right was a long dock, and in it were several boats.

"There is Tim Tyler," exclaimed Wort, "and there is his boat. There is young Tim, the thief!"

It was an old boat that Wort looked into as he stood upon the stairs leading down into the dock. It was a boat badly battered, like its owner.

"If the red paint could be got off Tim's nose and put on his boat, it would be better for both," thought Wort.

Old Tim was fixing a net in the stem of his boat. Young Tim was in another part of the dock, hunting amid the muddy flats for relics.

"There she is!" said Wort to himself. He had detected a dipper in the bottom of the boat. "Now is my chance," thought Wort. He reached down to the coveted dipper. It was a venerable piece of tinware.

"That's too old to be ours," reflected the daring Wort. "Let me turn it over and see if there is a mark on the bottom. Bah, an old worm! That is not our dipper."

"Here, you thief! what are you meddlin' with that property for?" roared a voice.

It was Old Tim. His face was red as a boiled lobster, and as he crooked his bare arms and rested them on his hips, they looked like the claws of a mammoth lobster ready to crawl out and seize any offender.

"Guess I'll go," thought Wort, and off he hurried to tell the club his ill-success, and that their detective in search of a thief had been called one.

A few minutes later Juggie exclaimed to the disconsolate circle, "Dar's de organ-grinder."

It was indeed he hurrying along the lane and turning a troubled face toward the barn, for no monkey came with him. Had he lost his friend from the far South?

"He gone!" said the grinder, as he reached the boys. "You sheen him?"

"Seen your monkey?" asked Sid.

"Yes, yes! You sheen my leetle mun-kee?"

"Why, no."

"You--you--you," and the grinder swept the circle to find out if any one had seen the lost favorite. No one had seen him.

"O, O dear!" lamented the grinder excitedly.

Poor organ-grinder! his face was wrinkled as badly as that of his missing a.s.sistant when attempting to pick a very bad nut.

"You go--find--my--mun-kee?"

"O, yes," said the president, "we will hunt. Come on."

They scattered, tumbling over fences, climbing shed roofs, diving into corners, shouting, yelling, and stirring up the neighborhood thoroughly.

It did no good. "My munkee" refused to be found.

The boys went to school and returned, meeting in the barn chamber once more.

"There's some business to be done, Mr. President," said the "securtary,"

in a very formal way. But where was the president? He was no more to be found than the monkey. A little later, Wort Wentworth was looking out of the window.

"Here comes Sid," he shouted.

Sid was running through the yard, when, seeing the boys at the window, he stopped, and shouted excitedly:

"O, fellers, I have made a discovery! It's all out now. Come!"

What was out he did not say, but turned and speedily was out himself in the lane.

"Come on, boys," called the governor, and down the stairs they went, rus.h.i.+ng, shoving, tumbling, just in time to see the last of Sid's legs disappearing round the corner of the house. They hurried after him, down the lane, then up a little pa.s.sage-way between two buildings on the left.

Then they turned aside to the rear of a barn, and there the panting, confused group halted.

"There!" said Sid, solemnly, pointing as he spoke. "The mystery is over.

Poor feller!"

Dangling from the roof by a cord that was twisted round his neck, swung the dead monkey! In the grasp of his rigid paw was the missing dipper.

"I see the s.h.i.+eld!" sang out Wort. Yes, there was the mark identifying the stolen property. Poor little child of the tropics, swinging in his leafy, native haunts from bough to bough, gripping the branches with paw and tail, he little antic.i.p.ated that his last swing would be by the neck, like that of a murderer from the black, unsightly gallows! He had strayed away, carrying with him the cord binding him to his master's wrist. In his peregrinations over various roofs, he had examined the cupola, and reaching a paw through an opening where a slat chanced to have been removed, he had abstracted the property of the club. Whatever money was in the dipper had been spilled hopelessly as marbles in the sea. Attempting to come down by a spout from the last barn-roof visited, he was entangled in the cord that had caught about a nail in the roof. Finally, the cord was twisted about his neck and twisted the life out of him. The thief was holding out the dipper as if asking for more, and showing that the ruling pa.s.sion was strong in death. There were many sighs from the tender-hearted, sympathetic boys. All were ready to pity and forgive, but pity and forgiveness could not bring the little creature back to life.

"Let's bury him!" said a tearful voice. It was Tony, who said little generally, but he was now moved to speak in his secret sympathy for this wandering child of the sun. The organ-grinder was notified, and then a grave was dug for his dead property under the leafiest apple-tree. Charlie furnished a box, and Wort brought fresh straw from his stable. The box with its occupant was laid in the grave, and the pitiful face of the monkey was then covered up forever.

CHAPTER X.

AUNT STANSHY'S BOARDER.

Aunt Stanshy had often said she would never have boarders, and she would "go to the almshouse first," yes, she "would." One day, though, there came to the house a frank, lively, irrepressible young man of nineteen.