Free The Clue of the Screeching Owl by Franklin W. Dixon Page A

table in front of the mute boy. Simon looked up questioningly, but without suspicion now.
    â€œSimon,” said Frank slowly and distinctly, “tell us—why did you run away with the dog?” At the same time he pointed to the beagle.
    The boy’s eyes looked puzzled for a minute. Then he seized the pencil and began to sketch.
    Swiftly the picture of a tall, broad-shouldered man took shape. Simon darkened in heavy eyebrows and a mustache.
    â€œIt’s Donner!” cried Joe in amazement.
    â€œWait!” Frank warned. “Simon hasn’t finished.”
    As Frank, Joe, and Chet crowded around, Simon rapidly drew the tall man’s arm and hand in the act of grasping a little dog with Mystery’s markings!
    â€œHe’s telling us that Donner stole Mystery!” Joe cried out.

CHAPTER XI
    The Tailor’s Clue
    â€œTHERE’S no doubt!” Joe exclaimed. “Simon’s sketch tells us that Donner is the one who took Mystery!”
    â€œWait!” Frank commanded. “He’s drawing something else!”
    With a series of swift, sure strokes, the mute boy surrounded his drawing of Donner and the beagle with sketches of various dogs—a cocker spaniel, a German shepherd, and two hounds.
    â€œWhat’s this little one he’s shading in with the pencil?” Joe asked. “A gray dog?”
    â€œGray or brown,” Frank returned. “See, he’s left one ear white.”
    â€œBrown with a white ear—that’s Bobby Thompson’s Skippy!” exclaimed Chet. “So Donner stole Skippy, too!”
    Upon hearing the man’s name, Simon raised his head once with an angry scowl, then finished his picture by drawing a line from each dog to Donner.
    Then the mute boy stood up quickly from the table. His eager eyes showed that he had something more to communicate. He pointed to Donner’s picture, then to Mystery. Suddenly Simon crouched down behind a chair and peered out.
    â€œHe’s trying to tell us that he was hiding—behind a tree, perhaps,” Frank interpreted.
    Simon’s one arm was tensed, with the fingers spread as though holding something heavy. “As if he’s holding a rock or club,” Frank deduced.
    Abruptly Simon leaped out from behind the chair. He struggled with an imaginary antagonist, swinging the hand that held the “rock.” Next, he seemed to clutch something else, in both arms and to be running away with it.
    â€œThat’s Mystery he’s holding now!” Chet said excitedly. “He means he waited in ambush for Donner tonight, then hit him with a rock and ran off with Mystery himself!”
    â€œOh, great!” thought the bewildered Joe. “Simon and Donner are blaming the dog stealing on each other now. Who is guilty?”
    While Frank and Chet, too, looked puzzled, Joe said aloud, “Well, there’s one thing I want to know.” He turned to Simon. “Why did you throw stones at us this afternoon?”
    Going to the table once more, Simon quickly produced sketches of three very lifelike rattlesnakes. Frowning, he looked at Frank and Joe, and made as though to push them away with his hands.
    â€œI get it! He was trying to warn us about those deadly snakes, not hurt us,” Frank said.
    â€œWell, he sure picked a forceful way to do it!” Joe rubbed his forehead ruefully. “That would mean he didn’t think we were in cahoots with Donner.”
    Frank nodded. “Simon’s given us something to work with. It seems pretty clear the self-styled hermit has been stealing dogs, and for my money, that ties him in with Captain Maguire’s disappearance, too.”
    â€œYou think the captain went after the dognaper himself and ran into trouble?” Joe queried.
    â€œWell, apparently the captain had a dog,” his brother reasoned. “Now suppose Donner stole the animal and Captain Maguire traced him to the hollow. Then suppose when he