erally, came back to the group below the companion. He had been
given a general idea of Chippy's work in the discovery of the stolen
goods, and now he wished to question the scout.

'First thing,' he said, 'did you know either of the men?'

'No,' said Chippy; 'I never saw their faces, and the only way I could
spot one of 'em 'ud be becos he'd lost a finger.'

'Lost a finger!' cried Mr. Jim Elliott. 'Why, Luke Raper's a finger
short!'

'Ah, ha!' said Inspector Bird; 'this begins to look like narrowing it
down, gentlemen. It seems to me the sooner we have a talk to Mr. Luke
Raper, the better.'

'We'll go back to the warehouse,' said the senior partner, 'and see
whether your man has Drought Raper up to the mark.'

So back to the warehouse they went, leaving one of the watermen to
guard the goods on the _Three Spires_ until they could be removed. But
there was no Luke Raper at the warehouse, nor was he ever seen there
again. The police found that he had vanished from his lodgings,
leaving no clue whither he had gone, and he was never traced. Chippy
always felt certain that he was the timorous partner of the pair of
thieves, and had fled because he feared implication in the murder which
he believed had been committed.

Almost at the same time a wild, drunken longshoreman, known as Spitfire
Bill--a name which his savage temper had earned for him--disappeared
from the wharves of Bardon River, and very possibly he was Raper's
accomplice. No one could say, for neither man was ever brought to
book; but Raper's guilt was certain, for every other man about the
place could account for himself clearly, and none other than Raper had
a deformed hand.

Mr. Elliott wished to give Chippy a handsome reward, but the Raven
steadily refused to take it. 'Can't be done,' was his reply. 'Yer
see, theer's Law 2 an' the back end o' Law 5; they'm dead agin it.'

However, Mr. Elliott did something which filled Chippy and his
followers with immense delight. He rigged out the Raven Patrol, from
their leader down to No. 8, in full khaki scout's rig, so that when
they went out in friendly competition or on a scouting-run with their
friends the Wolves it was hard to say which patrol was the more smartly
turned out.

CHAPTER XXVII

DICK'S GREAT PLAN

No one was more delighted to hear of Chippy's clever work in connection
with the robbery than his fellow patrol-leader, Dick Elliott. Part of
Dick's delight, if the truth must