They walked sedately down the garden and round the drive to the gates. They went to the dairy, which made real cream-ices that were most delicious, and sat down at the little table in the window to eat them.
Mr. Goon passed by on his bicycle as they sat there. He pedalled furiously, his face hot and red.
"Spot of hard work for Goon," said Fatty, letting a cold spoonful of ice-cream slide as slowly down his throat as possible. "Looks busy, doesn't he?"
Before they had finished their ices, Goon came pedalling back again, as furiously as before. The police-station was just opposite the dairy, and the children watched the policeman go smartly up the steps. Then they saw his head behind the frosted window-pane of one of the rooms in the police-station, talking to somebody else. Goon was talking the most and was nodding vigorously.
"Never seen Goon so busy before!" said Fatty, in astonishment. "Do you think he's really got a case to work on—a mystery to solve that we don't know anything about?"
"Golly, here he comes again!" said Pip, as Goon scuttled out of the police-station, buttoning a big sheaf of papers into his breast-pocket. "He's simply bursting with importance."
"He's feeling jolly pleased about something," said Fatty. "I should be mad if something had cropped up in Peterswood whilst I've been away, and we don't know anything about it!”
Goon jumped on to his bicycle and pedalled away again. It was maddening to sit there and watch him so busy and important and not know why. Fatty felt as if he was bursting with curiosity.
"He's on to something!" he said. "He really is. I know that look on his face. We must find out what it is!"
"Well, you find out then," said Larry. "And if he tells you, you'll be lucky! It's what Goon has dreamed of for months—a mystery all to himself, that the Five Find-Outers don't know anything about!”