The Wolf Patrol Part 21

His eyes were still shut, when he heard voices. He opened them, and saw d.i.c.k's father, the head of the firm, walking into the room, followed by the warehouse manager.

'This is a most extraordinary thing, White,' Mr. Elliott was saying.

'There's certainly a thief about the place, or someone is breaking in at night.'

'It's a most mysterious affair, sir,' replied White. 'The place was locked up as usual, and I unlocked everything myself. Every padlock and fastening was in order, and no window had been tampered with.'

'Yet there's a lot of valuable stuff gone,' said Mr. Elliott. White shook his head. He seemed utterly bewildered and unable to explain what had happened.

'I shall go to the police at once,' said Mr. Elliott.

'Yes, sir; there's nothing else for it,' agreed the manager; and the two, who had been talking as they went through the great storeroom where Chippy was waiting, pa.s.sed out at a farther door, and disappeared.

Chippy left his practice, and fell into thought. Things had been stolen from the warehouse. That was plain enough. The Elliotts were being robbed. Chippy was on fire in a moment. His friends and benefactors were being robbed. It was clear that Mr. Elliott meant to set the police to watch the place. Chippy promised himself that a certain boy scout would also take a hand in the game. Skinner's Hole was close by, and his home was not four hundred yards from the warehouse. That would be convenient for keeping watch.

That evening Chippy ate his supper so slowly and thoughtfully that his mother asked him what was on his mind.

'It's all right about yer place, ain't it?' she asked anxiously.

'Rather,' replied Chippy, waking up and giving her a cheerful nod.

'This ain't a job like old Blades's. Do yer work, and yer all right at Elliott Brothers'.'

'Yer seemed a-moonin' like,' said Mrs. Slynn.

'Thinkin',' returned Chippy briefly. 'I got a bit o' scoutin' to do to-night as 'ull keep me out pretty late, so don't get a-worryin', mother, an' sendin' people to see if I've dropped into the "Old Cut."'

The Old Cut was a dangerous, unprotected creek, where more than one resident of Skinner's Hole had been drowned in darkness and fog, and its name was proverbial on local lips.

'Tek care o' yerself, my boy,' said Mrs. Slynn. 'I don't know what I should do without yer.'

Chippy waved his hand with an air of lofty protection, and went on with his supper.

Towards ten o'clock he left the house, and went down a quiet byway to Quay Flat, and as soon as he got well on the Flat and away from the gas-lamps, he could see little or nothing. But Chippy had haunted the Flat all his life, and could find his way across it blindfold. He headed steadily forward, and a few minutes brought him to the spot where the huge bulk of the warehouse buildings stood at the river's edge, black against the sky.

He now commenced a stealthy patrol of the walks, every sense on the alert, and creeping along as softly as possible. The warehouse occupied an isolated position on the quay. The river front was now washed by only a few feet of water, for the tide was nearly out; but this side was only approachable by boat. A rude pavement of flag-stones ran round the other three sides, and along this pavement the Raven meant to hold his patrol march.

The march came to an end almost as soon as it had begun. Chippy turned an angle of the walls, and pulled up dead. He could hear footsteps a short distance away. He flitted off to the shelter of a pile of rusty anchors and iron cables which he knew lay within twenty yards of where he stood. He found his cover, and crouched behind it. He had barely gained it when a flood of light swept the pavement he had just left, and heavy boots tramped forward.

'Huh!' grunted Chippy to himself, 'they've got a bobby on the job. No call for a boy scout here. I might as well be off home an' go to bed.'

The policeman came forward, stood at the corner, and yawned; then he slowly paced forward on his beat once more. Chippy waited twenty minutes, but the constable persistently haunted the warehouse walls; it was clear that they were the special object of his care to-night.

'It's old Martin,' thought Chippy, who had recognised the constable; 'he's gooin' to potter round all night. I'll get 'ome again.'

Martin disappeared round the farther angle of the walls, and Chippy stood up to move softly away. But he did not move. He stood still listening intently. At the moment he straightened himself he felt certain that he heard a low chuckle somewhere behind him in the darkness.

Yes, there was someone there. Now he caught the voices of men who conversed together in tones little above a whisper. Chippy judged they were some twenty yards from him. Next he heard stealthy sounds as they moved away.

Who were these people who had crept up so silently that the scout had heard nothing? Chippy meant to find out, if possible, and already he had bent down, and his fingers were going like the wind as he whipped the laces out of the eyelets of his boots. Off came the latter; off came his stockings. The stockings went into his pockets; the boots were tied together by their laces and slung round his neck, and away slipped Chippy in search of the men who had laughed and whispered together.

He had lost a few seconds in taking off his boots, and the sounds of their stealthy movements had died away. Chippy dropped flat, and laid his ear to the ground. This gave him their direction at once, and, to his surprise, the sounds told him that they were going towards the river. That was odd. The quay edge was a very dangerous place on so dark a night as this, but these men were going down to it, and not across towards the town, as Chippy had expected.

The scout followed with the utmost caution--a caution which he redoubled as he drew near to the riverside. He would have thought little of going over the quay wall when the water was up, for that would only mean a ducking, and he could swim like a fish. But in some places patches of deep mud were laid bare at low tide, spots in which the finest swimmer would flounder, sink, and perish. Chippy sought for a mooring-post, and was full of delight when his hands came against a huge oaken bole, scored with rope-marks and polished with long service.

These stood in line along the quay some ten yards apart, and Chippy worked from one to the other, and followed his men, who were still ahead, but moving very slowly. It was quite certain that the two in front knew the quay well, or they would not be here at this time.

Suddenly a match spurted, and a pipe was lighted. The men had come a good way now from the warehouse, and were quite out of sight of the constable. The light of the match showed the scout that there were two of them, and they had halted in lee of a fish-curing shed, now locked up for the night. The shed stood in a very lonely part of the quay, where no one ever went after nightfall. The men began to talk together, and Chippy crept closer and closer until he could catch their words.

'Laugh!' said one, as if in answer to a remark the scout had not caught--'who could help laughin'? To see old Martin postin' up an'

down, round an' round, just on the sides we want him to. If he started to swim up an' down t'other side, now, it might be a bit awkward for us.'

'Ah,' replied his companion, 'it'll be a long time before they tumble to the idea of anybody workin' 'em from the river-front. How did ye get round to the trap this mornin'?'

'Easy as winking,' said the first speaker. 'I made a little errand there, and slipped the bolts, and there it all was, as right as rain.'

'It's a clippin' dodge,' murmured the second man. 'We'll have another good go to-night, then leave it for two or three months till all's quiet again.'

'We will,' agreed the other. 'The boat's ready, I suppose?'

'Yes; I've seen to all that,' was the answer. 'She's lyin' at Ferryman's Slip, just swingin' by her painter. It'll be slack water pretty soon. We can start in about half an hour or so.'

CHAPTER XXII

CHIPPY GOES IN CHASE

Chippy's heart beat high with excitement. It thumped against his ribs till he felt sure that the talkers a few yards away would hear it; and he turned and crept away, and circled round to the back of the fish-shed, where he pulled up to think over what he had heard. He felt sure that he had hit upon the thieves. What should he do? Run to Martin and tell him what he had found out? Chippy considered that, then shook his head. He knew Martin, and Martin knew Chippy. 'He'd ne'er believe me,' thought Chippy. 'He'd think I was a-tryin' to kid 'im.'

Martin was a good, zealous officer, but rather a dull one, and Chippy knew that he would be very slow to give any credit to a story brought him by a wharf-rat. And then, they were not the best of friends.

Chippy now entertained the most respectful regard for police-constables, for it was part of his duty; but it had not always been so. In his days of sin, before he became a boy scout, he had guyed and chaffed Martin many a time and oft, and had exercised a diabolical ingenuity in tricks for his discomfiture. Therefore a sudden appearance, springing out of the darkness as a supporter of law and order, might not be taken as it was meant, and Chippy was quite shrewd enough to see that.

And Chippy was puzzled--he was tremendously puzzled. For the life of him, he could not see how two men in a boat were going to successfully attack the river-front of Elliotts' warehouse, and he burned to discover their plan of a.s.sault. He shut his eyes, and saw clearly a mental picture of the building. Chippy knew the riverside look of every building as well as he knew the back of his hand; he had spent scores and scores of summer days floating about in anything he could seize upon in the shape of a boat.

Well, he saw a broad, high wall, perfectly flat, turning a gable end to the wide stream, and in that wall he saw a number of windows and one large doorway, above which an arm carrying pulleys was thrust out.

Under this doorway barges came when the tide was up, and sank to the mud when it went down. Boxes, bags, bales, were swung up to the doorway by pulley and chain, and so taken into the warehouse. But there was no landing-place of any kind; the wall ran sheer down to the mud.

Now, how were these men going to break in? And at low water, too!

Fifteen feet at least of oozy, slimy wall would stand up between the boat and the foot of the doorway; twenty feet to the nearest row of windows. Chippy could not form any idea of their tactics, but he meant to discover them before long.

'Well, I got to move a bit,' said the scout to himself. 'I'll 'ook it down to Ferryman's, and get ready for 'em.'

Still on his bare feet, he slid like a shadow through the darkness, counted the mooring-posts as he went, in order to get his bearings, found the head of the steps running down to the spot he sought, and at the next instant his feet were treading the rough stones of Ferryman's Slip.

Here close beside the water it was not quite so dark; the heavy clouds had broken in the west, and the stars were coming out. In their faint gleam Chippy caught the s.h.i.+ne of the oily swells as the water lapped gently against the wharf.

There was always water beside Ferryman's Slip at every state of the tide, and Chippy knew that a bunch of boats would certainly be moored off the boat-builder's yard at the top end of the slip. He went up there, and saw their dark forms on the water. He could step into the nearest, and in a moment he was climbing from one to the other with all the sureness of a born waterman, searching for what he wanted. Luck favoured him: he found it on the outside of a bunch, where he had only to slip the knot of a cord to set it free. It was a little broad boat, blunt in the bows, wide in the stern, the sort of boat you can sit on the side of without oversetting, and very suitable for Chippy's purpose this night.

Now Chippy scratched his jaw thoughtfully. There was the boat, but oars and rowlocks were safely locked up in the builder's shed. This would have stumped some people, but not Chippy. Often and often he had been able to get hold of a boat, but nothing else. He was quite familiar with the task of rigging up something to take the place of an oar. He hopped across the boats, gained the sh.o.r.e, and sought the boat-builder's shed. Around such a place lie piles of planks, broken thwarts, broken oars, odds and ends of every kind relating to boats, new or old. Chippy knew the shed, and sought the back.