Danny’s feet seemed to have acquired a nasty habit of tumbling over each other. He wondered why. And then he gave a big yawn. How lovely it would be to be in bed—all warm and safe and cosy, and, best of all, to hear mother snoring in the next room! It was so lonely out here. He trudged sleepily on and round the corner towards Dutton. He was walking on the grass at the side of the road. A ditch ran along the hedge.
Suddenly, almost at his feet, he heard a long, muffled whistle. He started violently, and then, remembering the law of the wild, he “froze.” The next moment three whistle notes sounded, not quite so muffled, and coming, certainly, from the ditch. Then a strange, guttural voice, speaking in low tones. It was there, at his feet, in the ditch. What could it mean? Danny, the sleepy little boy, was trembling with fear, but Danny the Detective was on the scent again.
Creeping softly across the grass to the edge of the ditch he dropped on one knee and peered down. It was far too dark to see anything. So he strained his ears to try and catch this mysterious conversation. He soon found that, though he could hear every word distinctly, he could not understand it. It was in a foreign language! There seemed a lot of “ach,” and “gr-r-r” in it; very ugly it sounded. And the word “so” seemed to come in it rather often. “Nine” was mentioned still more often. Danny listened intently for any words he could recognise. Presently he heard “Sir Edward Grey” ... quite distinctly. It did not convey much to him, but at least the words were English, and he stored them up. “Downing Street” ... he caught, and, later on, “Asquith.”...
It was a funny conversation. It kept breaking off suddenly, and there would be a long silence. Then it would go on for a few words and stop. And, somehow, the whole thing reminded him of how it sounded when the postmaster telephoned from the village post-office.
Suddenly there was a movement in the ditch. “They’re coming out,” thought Danny. Like a rabbit he scuttled out of sight into a place where the bank in front of the ditch formed a kind of little, earthy grotto, half overgrown with bushes. He was hidden in the darkness, but he could see well himself.
As he peered out, straining his eyes in the gloom, he saw a black figure rear itself out of the ditch and stand up against the grey star-spangled sky. He could see its outline quite clearly. It was that of a slight, smallish man. In his hand he held something that looked like about three yards of rather thick rope. For a moment he stood still, brushing the mud from his suit. It was at this moment, when silence was so essential, that Danny felt a violent tickle in his nose.
He was going to sneeze!
“A—hi——A—hi—— A—tishu!” He tried to muffle it in his cap, but it was no use. The man started violently, then looked about him quickly. One step brought him close to Danny’s grotto. He had dropped his rope end, and against the grey sky Danny could see the outline of a revolver in his right hand.
Slowly the man bent towards him, peering through the darkness. Seeing nothing, he stretched out his hand to feel. Cold sweat broke out all over Danny. In a second the man would have touched him.
To keep still meant being caught for certain. To dash out and run would probably mean a bullet in his legs. The groping hand was very near his face. Suddenly an idea seized Danny. The man would not risk the danger of breaking the night stillness with a shot if he thought that the sound he had heard had merely been made by a fox; nor would he bother to follow it up or be in any way disturbed or set on his guard by its presence. With a sudden movement he fastened his sharp little teeth in the hand. The man gave a muffled cry of pain, started back, and Danny, with the bark of a young fox, dashed out past his legs in a doubled-up position, and was soon running down the road under cover of the darkness. Leaping across the ditch and through a well-known gap, he threw himself down on the grass, panting. There was no sound of following footsteps. His ruse had succeeded.