‘Pull yourself together at once,’ said Mrs. Hilton sharply. ‘You’re getting hysterical and I won’t have it! When did the letter come?’
‘Just this minute as ever was!’ wailed Mrs. Moon. ‘Somebody pushed it in at the kitchen door, and I picked it up and opened it - and there was that nasty spiteful message - oh, to think somebody could write to me like that, me that hasn’t an enemy in the world.’
‘Somebody pushed it in just now?’ said Mrs. Hilton thoughtfully. ‘Well now - I saw the butcher-boy coming by my window a minute ago.’
‘He never came to my back door!’ declared Mrs. Moon. ‘Never left any meat or nothing.’
‘Strange,’ said Mrs. Hilton. ‘Could it possibly have been that boy who delivered the note - for somebody else? Well, we can easily make inquiries at the butcher’s.’
Fatty wished heartily that he hadn’t put on his butcher-boy disguise. He must hide it well away when he went upstairs.
‘I’ll go and telephone to Mr. Goon now,’ said Mrs. Hilton. ‘Make yourself a cup of tea, Mrs. Moon, and try and be sensible.’
Fatty shot upstairs as Mrs. Hilton came out into the hall to telephone. The others clutched him.
‘What’s the row about?’ they asked. ‘Quick, tell us!’
‘What do you think!’ said Fatty. ‘Mrs. Moon’s had one of those letters - delivered by hand a few minutes ago. We might any of us have seen who it was that left it here - but we didn’t. But your mother spotted me in my butcher-boy disguise, Pip, and that’s a pity, because she thinks I’m the one that delivered the letter!’