The Happy Valley Mystery Read online

  Copyright © MCMLXII, MCMLXXVII by

  Western Publishing Company, Inc.

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  0-307-21577-6

  All names, characters, and events in this story are entirely fictitious.

  Straight to Adventure • 1

  TRIXIE BELDEN shook back her short sandy curls, unfastened her seat belt when the light up front flashed off, and settled back in the plane seat next to her friend Honey Wheeler.

  “I have to pinch myself,” she said, “to realize that in just an hour well be in Des Moines, Iowa. It all happened so quickly. Honey, I wonder if I even said good-bye to Moms.”

  “You did,” Honey assured her, “but I wouldn’t have been surprised if you hadn’t. We were in such a tizzy at Kennedy International Airport this morning—running around claiming our reservations, having our baggage weighed—”

  “Waving good-bye to Uncle Andrew,” Trixie interrupted. “I just don’t seem to remember a thing about the flight from New York to Chicago, where we changed planes. Isn’t it thrilling? All the Bob-Whites right here on this plane?”

  “Not all of them,” Honey reminded her. “I wish Dan could have come. It’s the one thing that keeps everything from being perfect.”

  “All the Bob-Whites” meant Trixie Belden, Honey Wheeler, and Diana Lynch, who were thirteen; Trixie’s brothers Brian, sixteen, and Mart, fourteen; Honey’s adopted brother Jim, who was fifteen; and Dan Mangan, the seventh member of their semisecret club, Bob-Whites of the Glen. Neighbors in Sleepyside, Westchester County, New York, they were students at the junior-senior high school. It was spring vacation, and all but Dan were on a plane bound for Trixie’s Uncle Andrew’s farm, near Des Moines, Iowa.

  “Isn’t it thrilling?” Trixie repeated as the plane leveled off and she looked at the ground below.

  “No mountains,” Honey said, disappointed, “no Hudson River—”

  “Maybe not,” Jim said. He and Brian sat ahead of the girls. “But, Sis, look at the millions of trees and all the fields marked off so exactly and all the different shades of green... dark for the woods...

  “Dark woods,” Trixie repeated thoughtfully. “I didn’t realize that there were so many acres and acres of dark woods. Do you suppose—”

  “Trixie Belden,” Jim said, “for heaven’s sake, let’s have one expedition where you don’t try to be a detective.”

  “Why shouldn’t I?” Trixie retorted. “If you’ll just think back, Jim, you have plenty of reason to be thankful for my ‘snooping,’ as you always call it.”

  “That’s right, Jim,” said Honey. “If it hadn’t been for Trixie, I wouldn’t have you for an adopted brother.”

  “I wasn’t criticizing you, Trix,” Jim assured her hastily. “Most of the cases you and Honey have tackled have finally turned out all to the good. I just hoped you’d have one carefree vacation.”

  “With Uncle Andrew worried about his sheep?” Trixie asked. “How could I forget about it? You know how he hated to go off to Scotland right now. He thought if he postponed his trip for even a little while, he could solve the mystery.”

  “He had to leave now,” Brian reminded Trixie. “He had to be in Scotland this week to complete the purchase of that new kind of sheep, Scotch Blackface.”

  “You sound like a sheep farmer yourself,” Mart called from across the aisle.

  “We should at least know the names of the different breeds,” Brian answered. “From the time Uncle Andrew arrived at our house, we heard nothing else.”

  “And ever since we knew we were going to Iowa, I’ve been studying them,” Trixie said. “Jim has, too. We found a wonderful article in the junior encyclopedia, and more in some old geographies that were library discards we had in the attic.”

  “Those geographies were so old,” Jim said to Brian, “that the girls began to gather up beads and trinkets to use for trade with the Indians they thought they’d find near the farm.”

  “Well, what if we did?” Trixie bristled. “There are Indians in Iowa. There’s a reservation near a town called Tama... Sacs and Foxes. Black Hawk was one of them. He died there. And, if you please, I know the names of all the different sheep there are. So there!”

  “Jeepers!” Honey exclaimed. “You really have been studying. I’m not sure I’d even know a sheep if I saw one.”

  “Bemember your Mother Goose book?” Mart leaned across the aisle. “ ‘Baa, Baa, Black Sheep’?”

  “I don’t think you know any more than that about sheep, either,” Honey said.

  “That remark is erroneous and irrelevant,” Mart said, “for, while I am not an authority, I am still cognizant of the fundamentals of sheep-raising.”

  “Isn’t he smart?” asked Diana, who sat beside Mart, widening her big violet eyes.

  “Maybe so,” Trixie answered reluctantly. Mart always exasperated her with his big words. “But what does it mean? I don’t think he knows, half the time, what he’s saying.”

  “Maligned, misunderstood, and mistrusted,” Mart sighed. “Hey, look at the time! We must be within ten minutes of the Des Moines airport.”

  Only a week before, Andrew Belden, on his way to Glasgow, had stopped for a brief visit with his brother Peter and his family at their home, Crabapple Farm, near Sleepyside.

  Uncle Andrew had never married and was devoted to his nieces and nephews, especially Trixie and the youngest Belden, Bobby, just six. He was the Belden children s very favorite uncle.

  When he found his niece and the two older boys at loose ends, it disturbed him. He didn’t know that they had spent part of the winter working hard on a successful antique show for the benefit of UNICEF and that they had just staged an equally successful ice carnival for the relief of earthquake victims in Central America. Now spring vacation was at hand, and they were restless; they didn’t know what to do with the free time.

  The evening after he arrived, Uncle Andrew went with Trixie, Brian, and Mart to a regular meeting of the Bob-Whites. He was amazed at the snug clubhouse, with its central meeting room and the big room where the club’s athletic equipment was kept.

  “It used to be the gatehouse for our home, Manor House,” Honey Wheeler explained to him. “It was falling to pieces when Daddy gave it to us. We’ve done all the remodeling ourselves.”

  Trixie had shown Uncle Andrew the big Manor House, just up the hill from Crabapple Farm, with its sloping lawns, stables, and small lake. Diana Lynch’s home, just beyond Honey’s, was just as impressive, for her father was a millionaire, too.

  “I like our home best, though,” Trixie confided to her uncle. “It may be smaller, and we all have to work hard to help out Moms with the garden and with the chickens, but I never want it to change.”

  At the clubhouse, as she watched her uncle, Trixie had thought, He likes Honey. I can tell that he does. And Di, too—and, as Jim and Dan showed him samples of the posters and handbills they had printed for the ice carnival—I guess he likes all the Bob-Whites.

  “Do you mean to tell me you did all the promotion work for the projects, too?” Uncle Andrew asked. “Printed all these things yourselves?”

  “Yes, we did,” Trixie said proudly. “It was lots of work, but it was lots of fun, too. I wish we had something exciting planned for spring vacation!”

  Uncle Andrew was impulsive. He sized people up quickly. “He never made a mistake doing it, either,” Trixie’s father often said.

  “Why don’t you all go out and stay at my home, Happy Vall
ey Farm, for the week?” he asked. “I’ll finance the expedition. You can fly out Sunday morning and be in Des Moines for a late lunch, then be back again the next Sunday and ready for school Monday morning.”

  “Jeepers!” Trixie exclaimed. “Well... well-I-I... jeepers!”

  ‘Wouldn’t we be an awful lot of trouble?” practical Brian inquired.

  “Not a bit. Just the opposite. My hired man has to be away for a couple of days next week, and there may be ways you can help Hank and Mary Gorman, my manager and his wife.”

  “Gosh, we’d like that,” Brian said.

  “There are plenty of bedrooms for the girls in the farmhouse,” Uncle Andrew continued, “and a lot of room for the boys where the hired man stays, upstairs in the barn. It’s snug and warm, with good beds: What do you say?”

  “I say let’s go I” Honey and Diana said together.

  “Me, too,” Jim said. “That is, if you really mean we can help.”

  “I’m stuck here,” Dan Mangan said regretfully. “I have to be tutored to stay in the same class with Jim and Brian, and I sure want to do that. It sounds pretty super, though.”

  “If Trixie doesn’t have some sleuthing to do, she’ll be sunk,” Mart said, roughing his sister’s sandy curls. “What do you mean?” Uncle Andrew asked.

  “She’s Trixie, the girl detective,” Mart explained, “and Honey’s her faithful gumshoe companion.” Mart then told Uncle Andrew of some of Trixie’s escapades.

  “That’s hard to believe,” Uncle Andrew said when Mart had finished. “She’s such a pretty little girl... so feminine and sort of helpless....”

  Mart snorted. “She’s about as helpless as a heavyweight champion,” he said. “Do you have any projects she can hope to complete in a week? Any bank robberies? Even any murders?”

  “You just keep still, Mart Belden,” Trixie said. “You think because you’re eleven months older than I am that you can always make fun of me. You can just stop it! That’s final. Why, Uncle Andrew, what’s the matter?” Andrew Belden’s face had sobered as Mart talked. New lines appeared across his forehead, and worry lines showed plainly around his eyes.

  “It’s nothing,” he said, straightening himself. “But you’ll be good for the Gormans just now. They’ve been worried. So have I.”

  “Anything serious?” Trixie asked.

  “It could be,” Uncle Andrew said. “You see, for some time my sheep have been disappearing... one, two, three—sometimes more—at a time. We always expect to lose a few of them to stray dogs, disease, falls into culverts, or any of the several hazards of sheep-raising.”

  “And now?” Trixie inquired, her own face taking on some of her beloved uncle’s worry.

  “Well, it’s downright mysterious,” her uncle said. “Not a sign of any of the sheep to be found—not a carcass, not a bone or a hair. Missing, gone, disappeared.” He spread his hands wide. “Just like that. Not a thing left.”

  “Not any clues?” Trixie asked.

  “Not a clue,” her uncle answered. “Oh, well, I’ll figure it out when I get back. The sheriff’s investigating. You young folks forget about it and have a good time. Happy Valley is a place to have a good time. Lots to do, and much of it will be strange to you. Hank Gorman or Ben will go fishing with you. You can ride the horses, help herd sheep, keep the dogs in order, and eat—eat your heads off. How Mary Gorman can cook! You kids just forget about my worries. Have a good time!”

  But the “kids,” as he called them, didn’t forget about the disappearing sheep. Especially not Trixie. She was just like a bird dog scenting quail.

  “I’ll simply die dead if Moms and Daddy don’t let us go,” she said, “or if Honey and Di and Jim aren’t allowed to go, too. Dan can’t, with all that schoolwork.” She soon found that her own parents thought the expedition to Happy Valley Farm an excellent idea, especially if the visitors could help with the work while the hired man was away.

  Trixie needn’t have worried about the rest of the Bob-Whites. Honey and Jim showed up early the next morning to say they could go. Diana was close on their heels with her parents’ permission.

  Bobby was disconsolate. He was just too young to go. Mrs. Belden wouldn’t even consider it. “I’ll just never be big,” he wailed.

  “Never mind,” his mother said. “You and Daddy and I will have a wonderful time here.”

  “Don’t want a wonnerful time,” Bobby said.

  “Circus in White Plains?” his mother suggested. “Well,… maybe...Bobby’s face brightened.

  Such scurrying about the Bob-Whites did for the next two days!

  “Take just as little gear with you as you possibly can,” Uncle Andrew suggested. “No fancy clothes. Boots, sweaters, even galoshes. It’s been known to snow way into May. Take one pretty dress apiece, girls, for there just might be a dance at Rivervale High School.”

  So there they were. One day talking to Uncle Andrew in their clubhouse, and a few days later taking off from Kennedy International in New York. Now here they were, fastening their safety belts, ready to land in Des Moines, Iowa.

  Slowly the plane lost height, drifted past the busy city, touched down lightly, and taxied up the runway to the airport terminal.

  As they entered the building, a short, smiling man with graying hair hurried forward to grasp the girls’ hands. He was Hank Gorman, Uncle Andrew’s farm manager.

  “Say,” he said, “I’d have known you anywhere, Trixie.” He took her flight bag and turned to greet Diana and the boys. “No mistaking this gang,” he said. “We sure are the lucky ones, my wife and I, to have a ready-made family like this for a visit. Our children are scattered to all comers of the continent... even got one at the Arctic Circle.”

  The warmth of his greeting made the Bob-Whites feel immediately at home. He went with them to claim their luggage, grasped two of the bags sturdily, and motioned to the boys to bring the rest. Then they all piled into the big, bright yellow station wagon with HAPPY VAULEY FARM lettered on its side.

  Talking all the while, Mr. Gorman guided the car around the circle, out of the airport grounds, onto the highway, and then along Army Post Road, which led to the farm.

  Neat clapboard and brick farmhouses, fenced with newly painted white pickets, lined the road. Huge barns flanked the small homes. Long, low chicken houses extended far to the rear. Trees enclosed the shrubbery-circled lawns, and white chickens swarmed everywhere around the trim farmyards.

  “It’s almost like being at home,” Brian said.

  “Except for mountains,” Trixie agreed. “Whoops I That hill was just like a roller coaster, up and down in a hurry! The trees are beautiful, and here’s a river! Jim, isn’t it almost like home?”

  “It’s super!” Jim answered.

  For a while they had skirted a heavily wooded area as dense as the game preserve around the Manor House. “Walnut Woods,” Mr. Gorman explained. “A good place for you to stay out of. Many a person has been lost there. The other boundary of the woods is the Raccoon River,” he went on, “a little high right now and liable to go a lot higher. Then we’ll have to watch the sheep... not that we don’t have to watch them pretty close right now.” His face was strained.

  “Uncle Andrew told us about the disappearing sheep,” Trixie said. “Don’t you have any idea at all about what could be happening to them?”

  “Not a one. It sure gets me down,” Mr. Gorman said. “But don’t let it bother you young ones. What’s that on the back of your jackets?” He looked at the B.W.G. embroidered on each. “I’ve heard of New York gangs.” He nudged Mart. “You don’t belong to any of those, do you?”

  The Bob-Whites howled with laughter. Then, sobering, Trixie explained that their red jackets identified them as members of their club. She told him of how they tried to do worthwhile things for other people. “I hope we can help with your work now that the hired man is away,” she said.

  “I reckon my wife will find plenty for you girls to do in any spare time you have,” Mr. Gorman sa
id. “Right down there is Happy Valley Farm. We turn in at the next road.”

  With a sweep of his hand, Mr. Gorman framed a panorama of beauty. An old orchard ambled down a slope behind the white rail fence that lined the road. In the valley, Happy Valley, Uncle Andrew’s pleasant ranch home nestled, a long, low, white-shingled house with green shutters. It extended comfortably across a large yard sprinkled with white chickens and busy geese.

  Two brown and white collies ran out, barking a welcome, followed by a huge black cat with fur nervously ruffled.

  When the station wagon stopped, Mrs. Gorman came through the back door, quickly drying her hands on a large checked apron, a cordial smile on her tanned, motherly face.

  “There you are, all of you,” she said, “safe and sound and back on solid ground.” She took the girls into her welcoming arms and patted the boys on their backs. “I’ve been in a tizzy,” she said, her eyes twinkling, “till you really got here. I can’t get used to airplanes. I want to feel the earth under me, instead of a mile of air. Welcome, all of you, every one, to Happy Valley Farm. I’ve a bite of lunch waiting.”

  “It’ll be more than a bite, I’ll wager, Mary,” Mr. Gorman said, “judging from the dust of flour on your face. You’ve been baking.”

  “And glad I am to have young ones to bake for once again,” Mrs. Gorman said, brushing the flour from her cheek. “Come right in and make the farm your very own home!”

  Black Beard • 2

  IT’S A WONDER we could even move after a lunch like that,” Trixie said as she came down the stairs. “Banana cream pie. Imagine! Mrs. Gorman, our rooms are dreamy! I have exactly the same flowered pattern in the curtains in my bedroom at home. I love Happy Valley Farm. See, were all in jeans and ready to work.”

  “Indeed, you’ll not work the minute you’ve arrived. There’s a lot more to a farm than work. Wouldn’t you all like to go out and get acquainted with the horses? Your Uncle Andrew is always talking about the way his niece and nephews ride.”