"It isn't really very funny, but it seehis as if it is," said Daisy. "At school things seem like that sometimes too - we scream with laughter, and afterwards it doesn't really seem funny at all. But do let us tell you about Mr. Smellie, and the quarrel he had with Mr. Hiccup."
She told Larry and Fatty all that Mrs. Minns had said. Then Pip told about the old tramp who had been caught stealing eggs. And then Daisy described how Mr. Hick himself had come into the kitchen and rowed Mrs. Minns for letting her cat get under his feet. "They had a proper quarrel," said Daisy., "and Mrs. Minns actually called after Mr. Hick and said she felt like burning down his cottage if it hadn't already been done!"
"Golly!" said Larry, surprised. "It looks as if old Mrs. Minns might have done it herself then - if she felt like it today, she might quite easily have felt like it two days ago -and done it! She had plenty of chance."
"You know, we have already found four suspects," said Fatty solemnly. "I mean - we can quite properly suspect four persons of firing that cottage - the old tramp, Mr. Smellie, Mr. Peeks and Mrs. Minns! We are getting on."
"Getting on?" said Larry. "Well, I don't know about that. We seem to find more and more people to suspect, which makes it all more and more difficult. I can't think
how in the world we're going to discover which it is,8' "We must find out the movements of the four suspects.," said Fatty wisely. "For instance, if we find out that Mr. Smellie, whoever he is, spent the evening of the day before yesterday fifty miles away from here, we can rule him out. And if we find that Horace Peeks was at home with His mother all that evening,, we can rule him out. And so on."
"What we shall probably find is that all four people were messing about somewhere near the place/' said Pip. "And how in the world are we going to trace that old tramp? You know what tramps are - they wander about for miles., and nobody knows where they go or where they come from."
"Yes - the tramp's going to be difficult," said Daisy. "Very difficult. We can't rush all over the country looking for a tramp. And if we did find him, it's going to be difficult to ask him if he set fire to the cottage."
"We needn't do that, silly," said Larry. "Have you forgotten our clues?"
"What do you mean?" asked Dasiy.