I could see the boat now, emerging from the shadow of the trees down the shore. It had come up the creek from the direction of the Sugar Creek bridge.
Now the boat was being steered toward the shore. I knew if it was anybody who knew the shoreline, he wouldn’t stop directly in front of the spring, ’cause the overflow drained into the creek there and it would be a muddy landing. Below it, or just above it, was a good place.
“There’s only one man in it,” Poetry said. Even in the shadowy moonlight, I could tell it was a red boat and one we’d never seen before.
Then I did get a startled surprise, and my whole mind began whirling with wondering what on earth in a gunny sack! No sooner had the prow of the boat touched the gravelled shore than whoever was in it was up and out and beaching the boat, wrapping the guy rope, which is called a “painter,” around the small maple that grew there. Then he stepped back into the boat, stooped, picked up something in both hands—something dark and long and——!
“Hey!” my mind’s voice was screaming, while my actual voice was keeping still. “It’s a gunny sack! It’s the old brown burlap bag we saw in the watermelon patch a half hour ago!”
In a minute the man was out of the boat and disappearing in the path in the shadow of the trees we knew about. A second later, he emerged at the opening in the board fence, worked his way through, and moved straight toward the spring, lugging the burlap bag with the melon in it.
“Let’s jump him!” I whispered to Poetry.
Poetry put his lips to my ear and whispered back, “Nothing doing. Detectives don’t capture a criminal before he commits a crime. They let him do it first, then they capture him!”
“He’s already done it,” I said, “at the melon patch!”
“If you’ll be patient,” Poetry whispered back, “we’ll find out what we want to know.”