Fatty went to scout about and find out where Miss Harmer was. She was, as he had guessed, in one of the greenhouses tying up peach-tree branches. Fatty looked about for her coat.
It was hung on a nail inside the greenhouse where she was working. Blow! No one could possibly look for a key in the pockets without being seen by Miss Harmer! Fatty went back to the others and told them.
"We must get Miss Harmer out of the greenhouse for a minute, somehow," said Pip. They all thought hard, and some very complicated plans were talked of. It was Daisy who thought of a very simple one that could be done without anyone being seen at all.
"I know!" she said. "I'll slip along to the end of the greenhouse farthest from the coat — there are doors each end, aren't there? I'll hide in a thick bush in one of the beds, and then I'll call loudly, 'Miss Harmer! Miss Harmer! ' And I bet Miss Harmer will walk out of the door of the greenhouse to see who's calling her, and that will just give one of you time to slip in at the other door and get the key!"
"We'd get into an awful row if anyone saw us taking the key," said Larry. "But after all, we are the Find-Outers, and we've got to take a few risks in our work, haven't we? Who's going to get the key?"
"I will," said Pip. "Let me do it. I'm very nippy."
"Yes, you are," said Fatty. "All right, you do it, Pip. Are you and Larry and Bets going to wait for me by the cat-house?"
"Yes," said Fatty. "Come on, let's get going, or Miss Harmer will put on her coat again!"
Daisy and Pip left the others and crept through the bushes to the greenhouses. Miss Harmer was still at work near the other end. Daisy settled herself in a thick bush near the farther end. She waited until she saw that Pip was safely in another bush near the door inside which Miss Harmer's coat was hanging.
Then the whole plan worked as if it had been oiled! "Miss Harmer! MISS HARMER!" called Daisy.