The first thing we did when we got home was to hunt up Plunk and Tallow to find out if anything had been heard of Rock, but he was still just as missing as ever—and even more so.

“Well,” says Mark, “we got to f-find him, and find him quick. We need him in our business and he needs us in hisn.”

“You hain’t goin’ to give him up to Jethro like you said—honest, are you?”

“You b-b-bet I am,” says Mark, and there was an end to that.

“To-morrow mornin’,” says he, “you f-f-fellows be at my house at five o’clock, and we’ll git after him. I got an idee,” says he.

“Five o’clock,” says I. “What’s the use of goin’ to bed at all?”

Mark he sort of grinned and says: “This Rock business is a sort of s-s-side issue with us. What we’re doin’ for a livin’ is run a newspaper—and we got to give consid’able time to it.”

That was Mark Tidd all over. Business was first. He could tend to business more and harder than any kid I ever heard of.

Next morning we were on hand when Mark said, and off we started toward the place where we lost track of Rock. Mark was as sure as ever he was some place close around. “Bet I can p-prove it pretty quick,” says he, “and after I’ve proved it I bet I can go straight to where he’s asleep this minute.”

“Shucks!” says I.

“Will you eat a r-rotten apple if I can’t?” says Mark.

Well, I knew him pretty well, and when he talked like that he was pretty sure he knew what he was talking about, so I sort of backed down as easy as I could. He didn’t say anything, but just grinned aggravating.

There was just one farm out that way, and Mark headed us in the yard and around to the barn, where Mr. Soggs was milking.

“’Mornin’, Mr. Soggs,” says he.

“Up kinder early, hain’t ye?” says Mr. Soggs.

“Ketchin’ worms,” says Mark. “Say, Mr. Soggs, been missin’ anythin’ around here l-l-lately?”

“How’d you know?” says Soggs. “You boys hain’t campin’ out around here, be ye? ’Cause if ye be, and it’s you that’s been a-pesterin’ my wife, stealin’ pies off n the winder-sill and sich, I’ll have the law on ye.”

“Not guilty,” says Mark. “What was stolen?”

“A hull apple pie ’n’ a hunk of ham ’n’ half a loaf of bread.”

“Too bad,” says Mark, but I could see a twinkle in those little eyes of his. “Hope it didn’t spoil your meal, Mr. Soggs.”

“I managed,” says Soggs, “I managed.”

“To be sure,” says Mark. “Well, we’ll be movin’ on. G’by, Mr. Soggs.”

“G’by to ye,” says he, and off we went.

“There,” says Mark when we were out of hearing. “Now what you got to say?”

“Same’s ever,” says I. “What’s a missin’ pie got to do with Rock?”

“Rock et that pie,” says Mark.

“Fiddle-de-dee,” says I, but I wasn’t so sure about it. Mark he acted so certain.

“Now,” says he, “we’ll go and g-get him.”

He started off like he knew exactly where he was going, and we followed. He led us along the bluff above the river for a spell, and then started down. In a minute I saw where we were. We were just across from Butternut Island, and right above our old cave—the cave where Mark and Tallow hid Mr. Tidd’s turbine a long while back, and where Sammy, the half-breed Injun, used to live.

“Bet he hain’t there,” says I. “He couldn’t ever find it.”

“He must ’a’ found it,” says Mark, “because he’s in it right now.”

“How d’you know?” says I.

“Because,” says he, with another aggravating grin, “there hain’t no other place for him to be.”

Well, down we went, quiet-like, and peeked in the cave. It was pretty dark there, but all the same we could see something. It looked like somebody asleep, and Mark he grinned at me again.

“You sneaked up here and found him,” says I.

“Didn’t,” says he; “jest figgered it out—and there he is.”

He was that proud of himself just then that you couldn’t touch him with a giraffe’s neck.

“Rock,” he called, soft-like, “Rock.”

Rock jumped up so sudden he was like to have busted his head against the cave roof, and looked around scared.

“It’s Mark Tidd and the f-f-fellers,” says Mark. “Come on out.”

“How’d you find me?” says Rock, after he’d got over being scared and surprised.

“Well,” says Mark, “I knew you must be somewheres around, because you couldn’t of got away. You’d be seen or somethin’. We followed you to the river and then lost your tracks, so I knew you were perty clost to here, hidin’. This is the only good hidin’-place for a long ways, so I f-figgered you had to be here—and here you are.”

“Glad Jethro hasn’t as much brains as you have, Mark.”

“Why?”

“Because he’d have found me, instead of you.”

“But,” says Mark, “we’re a-goin’ to take you back to him.”

Rock just looked at him.

“L-look here,” says Mark, “you got to trust us if we’re goin’ to do you any good. And I’ll tell you this, that with you gone there hain’t the least chance of ever findin’ out about you. You got to be there.... I shouldn’t wonder if the Man With the Black Gloves would be t-tickled to death, when he got to thinkin’ it over, if you was to run away and he never heard of you again. You’re a-goin’ back there because that’s where you can do yourself the most good and those f-fellers the most harm. See it?”

“I see your idea,” says Rock, “but it don’t look very pleasant.”

“Neither does l-livin’ in a cave and eat’n’ stolen pie look very good,” says Mark.

“But—” says Rock.

“Either you go back with us or we quit the whole b-b-business,” says Mark. “We’re goin’ to let on to Jethro that we captured you, and he’ll pay us money. And he’ll think you hate us, if you act right, and he’ll trust us so’s we’ll get a chance to nose around a little. I’m mighty curious,” says he, “about that cat that Mr. Wigglesworth wrote about, and where it’s lookin’, and why; and I’d like a chance to l-l-look for it.”

“Maybe you’re right,” says Rock.

“Course I am,” says Mark.

“All right,” says Rock, “but it isn’t very pleasant being shut up and watched and treated like they’ve treated me.”

“It won’t l-l-last long,” says Mark. “Come on.”

We started back, with Rock looking pretty dubious over his prospects. If he had known Mark Tidd as well as we did he wouldn’t have felt so much that way, though I’ll admit I wouldn’t have been tickled to death if I’d been in his place.

It didn’t take us a great while to get back to the farm with Rock, and there was Jethro walking up and down and growling and acting pretty anxious. When he saw us turn in the yard with Rock he just rushed at us and grabbed a-holt of Rock, rough-like.

“Hey, there!” says Mark. “G-go easy.”

Jethro looked at him a second and let right go, and then began to grin. “I guess,” says he, “that you kids have earned your money,” and he passed it over.

“Now,” says he to Rock, “what you mean by runnin’ off, eh? Had a perty time of it, hain’t you? Well, you let me ketch you tryin’ it again, and you’ll wisht you’d been shut up in a cage like a monkey in a circus. You bet you will.”

“G-got anythin’ to eat around this p-place?” says Mark.

Jethro looked Mark over and laughed right out. Not the kind of laugh a fellow likes, but a noisy, bossy kind of a laugh. “You look like you gen’ally got plenty,” says he.

“I do,” says Mark, short as could be, because he don’t like to have folks talking about his weight. Then he winked at Jethro and got him off to one side.

“Say,” he says, “that kid’s goin’ to slip away s-s-sure,” says he, “if he hain’t watched. You can’t do it right, but us fellers can. What you say to givin’ us a job guardin’ him? We’ll see he’s kept here till it’s time for him to go somewheres else.”

Jethro scratched his chin and thought it over.

“How much?” says he.

“Fifty c-cents a day,” says Mark. “One of us’ll be here all the t-time.”

“Good,” says Jethro. “I’ll jest take you up on that. Keep your eye on him clost. Don’t let him git out of this yard.”

“Don’t worry,” says Mark. “Now how about s-s-somethin’ to eat?”

Jethro went in and brought us out some pie and a fried-cake apiece—the bakery kind. They weren’t very good, but we managed to get away with them, and then Jethro went about his business, having been fooled good by Mark, and depending on him to keep his eye on Rock.

When he was gone Mark says to Rock, “Now you s-s-see why we wanted to f-fetch you back? We got the job w-watchin’ you, and we can be with you all we want, and we can s-s-snoop around this place as much as we want to. And I can tell you I’ve got a heap of snoopin’ to do. And we can see to it that nothin’ happens to you, for one of us will be here all the time.”

“Mark Tidd,” says Rock, “you’re all right. You’ve got more brains in your little finger than I have in my head.”

Mark sort of threw up his head and pushed out his chest, and his little eyes just shone, he was so tickled. There’s nothing that pleases him like getting praised when he knows it’s coming to him.

“You kids go off and p-p-play somethin’,” says he. “I want to nose around this p-place to see if I can make any thin’ out of that writin’ Mr. Wigglesworth left. Seems to me l-like it must have meant this p-place. Don’t it to you?”

“Why?” says I.

“Because,” says he, “there don’t seem to be anythin’ about the writin’ to indicate any other p-place. This was the p-place he was always at. This was where Rock was, and the w-writin’ concerns Rock, you can bet on that. What I got to do is f-find a cat that’s always lookin’ in one d-direction, and then f-figger on from there.”

“Sure,” says I, “you just find me a cat that don’t never turn her head, and I’ll dig up a bag of gold right under her feet. The cats I know hain’t used to actin’ jest like that. Sometimes they move; anyways, they wiggle their ears. And the cat ’u’d starve,” says I. “How could a cat live that didn’t move around any?”

“Binney,” says he, slow-like, “if you had as m-many brains in your head as you got words you’d be a wonder,” and off he went, holding all three of his chins up in the air, he was so disgusted.

“He’s a funny one, isn’t he?” says Rock, looking after him, “but I’ll bet he’s more fun than any kid I ever saw.”

“You bet he is,” says I.

“What d’you s’pose he’s tryin’ to find?” says Rock. “It’s sure he doesn’t expect to discover a cat that always sits still and looks right in one direction. He’s got too much sense for that.”

“Mostly,” says I, “you don’t get on to what Mark Tidd is up to until he’s done it.”

“And then,” says Tallow, “sometimes you wisht you hadn’t. He’d rather play a joke on somebody than do anything else in the world except think up some business scheme. I’ll bet he gets rich some day. Yes, sir, I’ll bet he gets richer than his pa.”

“Is his father rich?” says Rock.

“Got billions,” says Tallow, “and Mark got ’em for him, too. We helped some, but Mark did most of it. Mark’s father is a inventor, and some men stole his turbine, and we fellers got it back again.”

“Say,” says I, “let’s pester him a little to see what he’ll do—about that cat, I mean.”

“Better not,” says Tallow.

“Go on,” says Plunk. “Maybe we can get the best of him for once. Tell you what let’s do. Let’s make up a poem about a cat that don’t move, and recite it to him. It’ll tease him to beat the band, because he hates poetry.”

“Go ahead,” says I. “I hain’t no poet. It keeps me busy talkin’ ordinary grammar.”

“Keeps you more ’n busy,” says Plunk. “If I talked as bad grammar as you do I’d git special lessons off’n the teacher.”

“Huh!” says I. “I guess I make folks understand what I’m talkin’ about, anyhow. Git at that poem.”

They sat still, thinking about it, and pretty soon Tallow says, “How’d this do for a first line?

“There was a boy and he was fat.

He went and hunted for a cat.”

“Fine,” says I. “Go ahead.”

After a while Plunk scratched around in his head and dug up another line:

“It was a cat that didn’t stir,

And probably it didn’t purr.”

“Rotten,” says I, “but what can you expect of sich a crowd?”

“See what you can do, then,” says Plunk. “All right,” says I. “Listen to this:

“That was a funny kind of cat;

The boy was talking through his hat.”

“Good stuff,” says Tallow. “Best yet. Be careful, Binney, or you’ll git somethin’ printed if you don’t watch out.”

“Here he comes,” says Rock, and, sure enough, there was Mark coming toward us slow, waddling like a duck just before Thanksgiving. He came and sat down without saying a word, and anybody could see he was discouraged. Why, discouragement just oozed out of him. We snickered.

“Say, Mark,” says I, “we been improvin’ our time while you was gone. We made up a poem. Like to hear it?”

“Go ahead,” says he. “I guess I can s-s-stand ’most any thin’ to-day.”

“Here it is,” says I:

“There was a boy and he was fat.

He went and hunted for a cat.

It was a cat that didn’t stir,

And probably it didn’t purr.

That was a funny kind of cat;

The boy was talking through his hat.”

Mark didn’t say anything for a couple of minutes, and we knew we had him. At last we had stung him good, and he couldn’t think of anything to say. I was that tickled I reached over and poked Tallow in the ribs.

Mark looked at me sad-like, and then says: “I got a l-l-little to add to that poem. How’s this?

“He h-hunted for it all alone,

Because the f-f-fellers’ heads was bone,

And found a cat made out of s-stone!”

He almost yelled that last word, and looked so tickled and excited I knew in a second that he had the best of us again.

“What’s that?” says I.

“Come and see,” says he, and up we got and followed him. He led us down the yard a piece where we could see all those carved animals, and then he took us around a clump of bushes and pointed down. There was a cat! It was a stone cat.

“Guess she don’t move frequent, d-does she?” says he.

“For cat’s sake!” says Tallow.

Mark grinned. “You said it t-that time. ‘The boy was talkin’ through his hat,’” he quoted from our poem. “Maybe he was—and maybe not. I was lookin’ for somethin’ like this. Now, how about cats that don’t stir, eh? Guess this cat looks the same way all the time. Don’t it?”

“Mark,” says I, “how did you ever think of it?”

“It had to be this kind of a c-c-cat,” says he; “that was p-plain enough.”

“Where she looks she walks,” says Plunk. “Let’s walk.”

“Nix,” says Mark. “Jethro might be l-l-lookin’. We want to foiler out this thing on the quiet—and we’ll do it, you bet. We know where to start from, and that’s the hardest part of it.” He turned to Rock, “I guess we’re goin’ to haul you out of this scrape,” says he, “sooner or later.... Now we got to git for h-home. I got work to do.”