CAN you imagine that! Big Bob Till, Big Jim’s worst enemy, and, except for Big Jim, the fiercest fighter in the whole country anywhere maybe! He was what people called a “juvenile delinquent,” which means he was a bad boy who didn’t like to behave himself and had done things that were against the law.

Maybe I’d better tell you right now, in case you don’t know it, that Mr. Foote, Little Jim’s daddy, had used his influence back at Sugar Creek to keep Bob from having to go to reform school, and Bob had been what is called “paroled” to him, and Little Jim himself had been glad ’cause he’d rather anybody would be good than to have him be bad and have to be punished for it. But Bob was still not behaving himself, on account of he hadn’t been trained at home like most of the rest of us. Even we were having a hard enough time to be even half as good as we thought we were, and we had had training all our boy lives.

When Tom said to me there in the moonlight in the middle of the dock, that he’d given his mom’s letter to his brother Bob, and I realized that Bob was up here in the North Woods—in fact had been standing right over there behind those bushes only a second ago—you could have knocked me over with a moonbeam, I was so surprised. Of course, he was gone now—somewhere or other—but where? I asked Tom a question that was trying to get out of my mind, and it was, “Where IS your daddy?” and he said, “I don’t know, but Bob does, and he’ll take Mother’s letter to him.”

It seemed like the rest of the gang ought to know Bob was up here, and yet for some reason it seemed like Poetry ought to know it first, so the very second I had a chance after I got into my tent a little later, and the lights were out, and Dragonfly had been quieted down from talking and laughing—in fact, his noisy nose sounded like he was asleep—I reached out my hand and touched Poetry and said, “You asleep?” and he whispered quietly, “Yes,” which meant he wasn’t. So I told him about Bob and he said, “That explains a lot of things.”

“What, for instance?” I asked, and he said, “It explains who opened the icehouse door and let John Till out.” Then Poetry and I decided to get up and go outside where we could talk without being heard.

I was surprised we were able to get up and out without being stopped by Dragonfly’s waking up and asking questions or insisting on going along, he not being able to let anybody have any secrets without wanting him to divide them up with him.

A good place to talk without being heard would be down at the dock, we decided, so away we went toward the lake where the waves were sighing and lapping against the shore and dock posts and making the boats rock a little—one of the boats making a little scraping noise against the dock. “Where was Bob standing?” Poetry asked, and when I pointed to the bushes he started straight toward them. As you maybe know he wanted to be a detective some day and was always looking for what detectives and the police and the FBI call “clues”; and also Poetry was always finding one, or something he thought was one.

As soon as we were both behind the bushes, where anybody at camp couldn’t see us, he turned on his flashlight and shined it all around where Bob and Tom had been standing.

“What’re we looking for?” I asked, and he answered like he always does, “A clue.”

“What kind of a clue?” I asked, and he replied, “I’ll tell you just as soon as I find it.”

Well, I certainly didn’t expect we’d find anything, but all of a sudden I heard a sound from up the shore like footsteps coming toward us, so I said in a husky whisper, “I think I heard a clue coming from somewhere”—and then I knew I had heard one for up the path not very far away I saw a flashlight flash on and off in a very fast fleeting flash like a firefly’s flash flashing on and off down at Sugar Creek.

We crouched low, hardly daring to breathe, knowing that somebody was coming for sure, and wondering who it was, and what did he want, and was it Bob Till or maybe Old hook-nosed John Till himself, or who?

Right that second, I saw something white lying where my feet had been a jiffy before. It looked like a folded white handkerchief or something, so I stooped down, reached out my hand to touch it, and it was an envelope of some kind.

“Little Tom’s mom’s letter,” I thought. “Bob dropped it, and is coming back to look for it.” Poetry and I kept even quieter than we had been, he not knowing of course, what I’d just found and had tucked into my pajama pocket—he and I not taking time to dress but were in our pajamas—I in my green and white striped ones and Poetry in his purple ones.

It was a queer feeling we had, right that second. For some reason we decided to get ourselves out of there, which we did, sneaking back maybe fifteen feet before we decided to stop and wait to see who it was and what he was looking for and why, if we could.

In only a few excited jiffies, whoever it was was right where we ourselves had been, and was flashing his flashlight on and off, all around, right where a little while before I’d picked up the envelope. I could see he wasn’t very tall—not as tall as Big John Till, so I decided it might be Bob again. Poetry had hold of my arm so tight it actually hurt, which showed, even though he was usually calm in a time of excitement, while I was the one that always got all nervous inside, this time he was pretty tense himself.

I certainly didn’t know what to do, and would have been afraid to do it even if I had. Besides I wouldn’t have had time to do much of anything, for right that jiffy whoever it was, stopped looking for whatever he was looking for, which was maybe the envelope I had in my striped pajama pocket, and I heard his footsteps going on past, and in the direction of Santa’s dock, which was several hundred yards farther on.

For a worried jiffy, I remembered the envelope in my pocket and thought that it wasn’t mine, which it wasn’t, and thought I ought to call out to whoever it was, and say, “Hey, there, mister, whatever you’re looking for, I’ve got it, whatever it is!” but I didn’t. A little later, Poetry and I were alone with ourselves, and the only sound there was, was the friendly lapping of the waves against the dock posts and the washing of other waves against the sandy shore. Away out on the lake there was a great big shimmering silver spot of moonlight which was very pretty. Still farther was the shadow of the trees on the little island on the other side of which we had caught our walleye that afternoon and where Wally had lost his life, and right that minute was maybe half digested in the stomach of a great big ugly-snouted northern pike.

I could feel my heart beating with excitement, but there was something else I was feeling too, and it was the envelope I had in my pocket, which I quick took out, and whispered for Poetry to turn on his light, which he did, and this is what we saw on the envelope written in pencil, that was kinda smeared like pencil marks on a letter are when a boy has carried it around in his pocket or in his hands awhile. We saw written in a big awkward scrawl, the name Bob Till, but there wasn’t anything else, not even an address—and no postage stamp.

Quick as anything, not stopping to think that that letter was private property and he had no right to open it, Poetry had the inside out of the outside and was unfolding it, and I was holding his trembling flashlight on it to see what it said, and—would you believe it?—it was a sheet of white typewriter paper and there wasn’t a thing on it, not even a pencil mark. “’Tsanother invisible-ink map,” Poetry said to me, and I remembered quick the other one we’d found which I told you about in another story, and which when we’d warmed it up had turned out to be a map of the territory up here, showing where the little kidnapped girl had been found, and which way the broken twig trails led and we had followed them and finally found the ransom money in the old icehouse.

“And here’s a note,” Poetry whispered, as a little folded piece of paper with writing on it tumbled out.

That note, which was printed in pencil, said,

“Dear Bob:

Santa’s away tonight. Get my boat which is tied to his dock and pick me up at the Indian cemetery at 10 o’clock and we’ll get the rest of the ransom money.... If I’m not there, wait till I come.

Your Dad.”

Well, when I saw what Poetry’s trembling flashlight showed us was written on that unfolded piece of paper, you could have knocked me over with a question mark, I was so surprised. Our mystery had come to life again and we were going to have another exciting adventure before our vacation was over.... Hurrah!... Boy oh boy!

Poetry spoke first, saying excitedly, “I’ll bet Bob’s going down to get the boat right now! We’ve got to stop him!”

“Why?” I said, and he said, “Stop him and make him tell us where his dad is. Then we or the police can capture him.”

“Bob wouldn’t tell us,” I said, being sure he wouldn’t.

“Well, for goodness’ sake, let’s do something!” Poetry exclaimed to me, and when I said “What?” he said, “Get the gang and beat Bob to the cemetery!” which made as good sense as anything I could have thought of, especially since right that minute I heard an outboard motor somewhere and guessed that Bob had already started the powerful black-shrouded motor that was on the boat John Till had had, and which the police had left at Santa’s dock.

We didn’t have time to decide anything right then, though, ’cause almost as quick as a lightning bug can flash his flash on and off, we heard somebody running toward us from the direction of Santa’s cottage and, a second later, two forms came puffing out into the moonlight and into our camp—and it was Big Jim and Circus, who, as you already know, were staying all night in Santa’s cabin, just to sort of look after things for him.

I thought of Tom Till, and hated to have him know what was going on, which he would if there was a lot of boy noise and the whole camp should wake up and come scrambling over each other down to the dock in crazy-looking pajamas, talking and wondering “What on earth?”

So Poetry and I shushed Big Jim and Circus and the four of us started to tell each other what we knew.

“Somebody took John Till’s boat!” Circus puffed. “Hear him?—there he goes now!”

About two hundred yards from shore I saw a shadow of a boat out in the moonlight and heard the roar of a powerful motor, and knew we’d have to hurry if we got to the Indian cemetery first.

“Let’s step on the gas and get going,” Circus said as soon as we’d told them about the note we had found, and Poetry said, “What kind of gas—outboard motor, or station wagon?” Big Jim, knowing that most of the Sugar Creek Gang had more bravery than good sense and that we sometimes did things that were dangerous, without thinking first, said, “This is another job for the police,” but Poetry spoke up and said, “Let’s be policemen ourselves. By the time we could phone them and they could get there, it’d be too late,” which it would be, I thought, so we decided we ought to try to get to the cemetery first by driving there as fast as we could in the station wagon.

What to do about Tom, was our first problem, but we wouldn’t have much time to try to solve it—some of us simply had to get going to the cemetery to be there before Bob could get to the Narrows, zip through it, and into that other lake where the cemetery was. It was half past nine right that second, and Bob was supposed to meet his dad there at ten. If only we could get there before either one of them did, and hide somewhere in the bushes. Then maybe we could sneak up on them, and get both of them at once—’cause it looked like Bob was in on the business of being a helper to the kidnapper too.

Barry and Little Jim and Tom Till were the only ones left in Barry’s tent. Barry must have heard our excited talk, ’cause in a jiffy his tent flap plopped open and out he came and wanted to know what on earth all the excitement was all about. We told him and showed him the note and he also heard Bob’s motor on the lake at the same time. We didn’t stop to try to figure out why John Till had written to Bob instead of just telling him where to meet him, or came tumbling out of Barry’s tent and in our direction, and anything. Right that minute almost, Little Jim and Tom Dragonfly came out of the other tent, and there we all were—too many—and some of us too little—to go on a kidnapper hunt.

I guess I never was so disappointed in my life as I was right that minute, though, ’cause Barry took charge of things quick, and said, “You boys all stay right here, and look after camp. I’ve a phone call to make—and I want to see the firewarden a minute.”

“Is there a fire somewhere?” Tom Till asked quick, sniffing to see if anything smelled like smoke, and Dragonfly did the same thing, and sneezed just like he had actually smelled something he was allergic to, which he is to nearly everything in the world anyway.

A jiffy later, Barry in the station wagon was riding down the lane toward Santa’s boathouse and I knew that in a few jiffies more he’d be pulling in low up a steep hill, swishing along a sandy trail at the top, and driving like mad down a winding road through the forest to the firewarden’s house, which you know about if you’ve read “The Sugar Creek Gang Goes North.” There he’d make a terribly fast phone call to the police—or else let the firewarden’s wife do it while he and the firewarden would beat it on to the Indian cemetery. They’d probably stop before they got there though, and sneak carefully up along the lake shore to where Bob’s boat would be coming in, and, if they could, they’d capture both Bob and John. I felt terribly disappointed inside, like I’d just blown up a very pretty great big colored balloon, and somebody had stuck a pin into it and it had burst—not knowing there was going to be more excitement where we were than where Barry and the firewarden would be.