The two clowns were practising a different routine from the one the boys had seen last night. The tall, sad clown had a tiny broom and a long-handled dustpan. He went round sweeping up rubbish, and every time he raised the dustpan the bottom fell open, dumping out everything he had swept up. The tall clown looked gloomily at the fallen rubbish, and the fat little clown did flips of joy and ridicule.
The fire eater worked with flaming wads on the end of his swords. As Pete watched with wide eyes, the fire eater calmly put the flaming wads into his mouth!
Khan the strong man lifted weights and tore thick books. Pete watched him particularly, but Khan did nothing suspicious.
The Great Ivan worked inside his show cage with Rajah, teaching the magnificent lion a new trick on the striped tubs the boys had painted. Two wire walkers practised their dazzling show of skill and balance on a wire stretched between two high poles.
Pete watched it all, trying to look like a boy just interested in the feats of the performers.
But nothing happened in the open field.
Meanwhile, Jupiter had been prowling among the booths and tents where the roughnecks and booth operators were repairing and setting up for the night’s opening. He missed no booth nor show tent and retraced his steps many times. But he, too, found nothing that seemed suspicious. He had stopped to watch the whirling carousel when Andy Carson joined him. Andy had finished his work at the shooting gallery.
“Don’t you test the Ferris wheel, Andy?” Jupiter asked. He pointed to the motionless wheel, its gondolas covered with canvas.
“It costs too much to run,” Andy explained. “We start it up just before the carnival opens and give it a trial run then.”
“You have a mechanic to maintain it?”
“Sure, my Dad does that himself, Jupiter.”
Jupiter was thoughtful. “It’s your most important single ride. Almost the symbol of the whole show. If — ”
“Jupiter!” Andy broke in, “here comes Bob! He looks excited!”
They watched as Bob pedalled up to Pete, and both boys came up to Jupiter and Andy. Bob began to talk before he was even off his bike.
“Jupe! Someone wants crooked cats!”
“Cats just like the one I lost!” Pete exclaimed.
“I don’t think Pete lost it at all,” Bob cried, digging into his pocket for the advertisement he had torn out of the newspaper. “I think it was stolen! Look at this, First!”
They all crowded round Jupiter as he read the small ad. The First Investigator’s eyes became bright.
“It certainly sounds like Pete’s crooked cat,” he agreed. “Andy, how many of those crooked cats did you have?”
“Five here in Rocky Beach, Jupe,” Andy said. “Pete’s was the last one I gave out”
Jupiter nodded. “The last one, and Pete lost it or, as Bob says, maybe it was stolen. If it was, that was the second time the same cat was stolen — remember that moustached old man who stole it but dropped it. Fellows, I think we’re beginning to see the pattern!”
“What pattern, First?” Bob wanted to know.
“Someone wants those crooked cats, Records,” Jupiter stated firmly. “Maybe all of them, or just one. It explains why Rajah was let loose!”
“It does, Jupe?” Pete said. “How?”
“Why was Rajah let loose, First?” Bob asked.
“To distract us, Records!” Jupiter declared. “When that old man failed to steal the crooked cat, he must have circled back and watched the shooting gallery. He saw Pete win the cat. While the rest of us were shooting, he went and got Rajah. When you two and Andy went back to the trailer, he released Rajah near you to distract Pete. Pete dropped the cat and forgot about it while we were all busy with Rajah. As soon as we were out of the way, the old man picked it up and left with it!”
“Wow, First,” Pete said, “he must have wanted that cat badly. It must be valuable and important.”
“Yes, it must be,” Jupiter agreed. “Andy, was there anything special about those crooked cats? Do you know why anyone would want one of them, or all of them?”
Andy shook his head. “I don’t know why, Jupe. There’s nothing special about them that I know of.” Jupiter pondered a moment while the others watched him. The stocky First Investigator chewed his lip.
“There are only three possibilities, fellows,” he pronounced at last. “First, that someone wants all those cats for himself, the way the ad seems to say. Some special reason for needing cats like that. Second, that the crooked cats, taken all together, mean something.”
“You mean like all the parrots in our
Bob was referring to a case the boys had handled in which a group of parrots had each been taught part of a message that helped solve a mystery.
“Precisely,” Jupiter declared. “And third, there could be something on one of the cats, or inside it, that is valuable, and that Andy didn’t know about.” He turned suddenly to the carnival boy. “Andy, did the carnival go to Mexico? Or anywhere near the border?”
“No, Jupe,” Andy shook his head. “Only California.”
“Why Mexico, First?” Bob asked.
“I was thinking of smugglers, Records,” Jupiter explained. “Smugglers often hide things inside articles like those crooked cats. Where did you get those cats, Andy?”
“From Chicago,” Andy said. “Dad bought them straight from the prize supplier there.”
Jupiter frowned. “Well, there is something important about those cats, and we have to find out what. One thing puzzles me, though. Why did that old man try to steal only the last crooked cat? Andy, this is only your third day in Rocky Beach?”
“That’s right. We’ve played only two shows. We came here overnight from San Mateo after our last show there.”
“And just when did you give out the cats?” asked Jupe.
“Four the first night here,” said Andy, “and the fifth to Pete last night.”
“Why did you give out four cats the first night? Isn’t that a lot of first prizes?”
“We always try to have a lot of winners the first night,” Andy explained. “We want people to go home and talk about winning. It’s good advertising. Actually, I let some borderline winners take crooked cats.”
“The cats were always first prize?” Jupiter asked.
“Oh, no. I’m always changing the first prizes. I lost some of my best prizes in the San Mateo fire, so I made the crooked cats a first prize the first night here.”
Jupiter pondered. “You keep your prizes in that trailer? How safe are they?”
“Well, the trailer is always locked. When the show isn’t open, it’s attached to our trucks, and it has a burglar alarm on it — we get a lot of attempts to pilfer our stuff — kids mostly. Someone’s nearly always round our truck, and when the gallery is open, I keep the trailer locked behind the booth where I can see it”
“Then it would be very difficult to steal one of the cats from the trailer without being seen?”
“It sure would,” Andy declared. “I mean, someone could break it open easy enough, but at night and most of the day the alarm would go off, and when the alarm’s off, a thief would be almost sure to be seen. I guess a thief could break it open and run, but we’d know about it.”
“Yes,” Jupiter said slowly, and the boys could almost see the wheels turning in the First Investigator’s brain. “So you left San Mateo with five crooked cats… You came straight here. It would have been difficult to steal the cats between San Mateo and here. It would have been difficult to steal the cats from your trailer at any time without the theft being quickly discovered. You opened up here right away, and you quickly gave away four cats as first prize. Then, last night, that old man with the moustache and dark glasses tried to grab the last cat. He failed, and Pete got it. Rajah got loose, and Pete lost that last cat. Now someone is advertising for cats just like your crooked ones.”
“That’s how it all happened, all right,” Andy agreed. “But what does it all mean, Jupiter?”
The First Investigator’s eyes took on the gleam so familiar to Bob and Pete — the gleam that told them that
