The Mystery at Maypenny's Read online

  For a moment, Trixie thought her friends must have missed the bus. Then she spotted Honey sitting toward the back of the bus, staring out the window. Dan was sitting next to her, looking at a book that was perched on his crossed leg. There was no sign of Jim.

  Trixie felt her stomach tighten. Something was obviously wrong. She paused, wondering what it could be. Then Brian, standing behind her, nudged her gently. “Let’s go, Trix,” he said. The concerned tone of his voice told her that he too had noticed something wrong.

  Trixie and Brian dropped into the seat in front of Honey and Dan, and Mart took one across the aisle. For the first time, Honey turned from the window, and Trixie saw that her eyes were swollen and red-rimmed.

  “What’s happened, Honey?” Trixie asked. The voice that came from her tightened throat was little more than a whisper.

  “Jim and Daddy had the most horrible fight this morning,” Honey said, her voice shaking.

  “Was it about your father’s wanting to sell part of the preserve?” Brian guessed.

  Honey nodded. “Mother and Daddy were out last night. They didn’t get home until late, so Jim didn’t get a chance to talk to them. This morning at breakfast, Jim brought the subject up. He said Mr. Maypenny had told us that International Pine wanted to expand and that Daddy was willing to go along with it. He said he wanted to know why.

  “Daddy got upset right away. He called Mr. Maypenny an old fool who couldn’t see past his nose. That made Jim angry, and he said he thought it was pretty shortsighted to destroy a natural wilderness that could be enjoyed by generations to come.”

  Trixie cringed. “Gleeps, Honey. Jim wasn’t holding anything back,” she said. “I bet it didn’t make your father any less angry.”

  Honey shook her head, her eyes brimming with tears once again. “Daddy got just furious when Jim said that. He said that Jim needed to be shown a thing or two.”

  “Shown what?” Brian asked.

  Honey shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know. After Daddy said that, he turned to me and said, ‘You’d better get to the bus stop. Jim won’t be going to school with you this morning.’ He looked so angry, I didn’t dare ask any questions. I—I just left.”

  Trixie looked from Mart to Brian, seeking an explanation for what had happened. They said nothing. They looked as bewildered as she felt.

  Surely Mr. Wheeler isn’t planning to send Jim away just because Jim talked back to him, she thought, a panicky feeling pushing at her chest. When Trixie and Honey had first met Jim, he was a homeless runaway hiding from his cruel stepfather. It had taken the girls a long time to get him to trust them, and even longer to convince him that there were some grown-ups he could trust, too. The result of that trust had been a real home with the Wheelers, and his first close friendships with the other Bob-Whites. If this disagreement with his adoptive father destroyed that trust, it could destroy the home and the friendships as well.

  Trixie felt tears springing into her own eyes as she imagined Jim running away again. Although she denied it to the others, and even to herself, Jim was more than a friend to Trixie. He was someone very, very special.

  Brian cleared his throat. “Let’s not get ourselves worked up over this thing until we find out what’s really going on,” he said. “Jim and Mr. Wheeler are both strong-willed and hot-tempered, but they’re also devoted to each other. I don’t think anything will stand between them for very long.”

  “Oh, Brian, you’re right, of course,” Trixie said gratefully. “We’re silly to be so upset.” She turned to her best friend. “Honey, you and I think it’s horrible that Jim and your father exchanged a few words, because we’re scared of yelling at someone—or of being yelled at. They aren’t like we are. They’ll get everything talked out, and they’ll wind up respecting one another even more because of it.”

  “I agree with what Trixie says,” Dan added.

  Dan had been so quiet that the others were startled now when he finally spoke up. “Sometimes being told off hurts a lot less than not being told at all.”

  Honey, always alert to other people’s feelings, caught the bitter edge in Dan’s voice. “You’re talking about yourself, aren’t you, Dan?” she asked softly.

  Dan nodded reluctantly. “You’re right, I guess. I am talking about myself—and Mr. May-penny. We live under the same roof and see each other every day, but he never told me about his nephew or about that visit from Mr. Wheeler that got him so upset. It hurts me that he didn’t want to tell me about it.”

  “I’m sure he was only trying to keep you from worrying, Dan,” Honey said.

  “But that preserve is my home, too,” Dan protested. “If someone is doing something to threaten it, I have a right to know about it.”

  “He turned Daddy down flat, after all,” Honey pointed out. “In his mind, he probably felt there was nothing left to say.”

  “Besides,” Brian added, “Mr. Maypenny lived alone for a long time before you came. He’s not used to having anyone to share his problems with. If he said nothing about Mr. Wheeler’s visit, I’m sure it was because of habit, not because of any lack of feeling for you.”

  Dan’s only response was a shrug, a sign that he understood the logic of his friends’ arguments but didn’t feel entirely comforted by them.

  Just then the bus pulled up in front of the school, and the Bob-Whites clambered off and walked into Sleepyside Junior-Senior High School. The friends parted inside the door to hurry to their lockers and then on to their first classes.

  First it was Mr. Maypenny and Mr. Wheeler. Then it was Mr. Maypenny and Jim. Now it's Jim and Mr. Wheeler, plus Dan and Mr. Maypenny. All oj them are having problems because of International Pine. Who'll be next? Trixie wondered to herself.

  She soon found out. That noon, the three Beldens, Honey, and Dan assembled at their usual table in the cafeteria. They were just beginning to eat when they heard a familiar voice say, “May I join you?”

  “Jim!” Trixie exclaimed, looking joyously at her redheaded friend.

  Honey looked as though she wanted to throw her arms around her brother, even though it would embarrass him no end.

  Brian, Mart, and Dan looked just as relieved as the girls did, and Jim started to laugh. “You’d think I’d dropped out of sight for a week instead of just missing one morning of school,” he said teasingly.

  “I told the others about your argument with Daddy this morning,” Honey confessed. “We didn’t know what might have happened after I left.”

  Jim’s face turned serious. “Dad said he was going to show me a thing or two, and that’s exactly what he did. I learned more this morning than I could in ten years of school.”

  “What did you learn about?” Trixie asked.

  “You could call it ‘applied economics,’ I guess,” Jim said, “with some political science and even a little philosophy thrown in.

  “Basically, Dad showed me how he’d come to his decision to consider the offer from International Pine. It wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment thing, believe me. He has reams of information about it.” Jim looked around the table. “Did you know that the population of Sleepyside has been declining at the rate of two percent per year for the past ten years?” he asked.

  The other Bob-Whites shook their heads.

  “Well, it has,” Jim said. “At the same time, the number of jobs has decreased five percent. That means the number of people on welfare is up.”

  “What does all this mean, Jim?” Honey asked.

  “It means a lot,” Trixie said. “We talked about this with our parents last night. Sleepyside needs the jobs that the International Pine expansion can provide.”

  “That’s it, in a nutshell,” Jim said.

  “So now you agree with your father about letting International Pine have the land. Is that the rest of it?” Dan asked.

  “It isn’t very much land—only about ten acres. Only three of those acres are Mr. Maypenny’s,” Jim pointed out. “Dad explained that to me, too. The ten acres they want
have the best stand of virgin timber anywhere around. They’d be getting valuable raw materials along with expansion area. That’s the only way they can afford to expand right now. The animals would still have hundreds of acres left, and Sleepyside would have hundreds of new jobs.”

  “That seems like a good solution for everyone,” Honey said hopefully, looking from Jim to Dan.

  Dan shook his head. “You can say that because you won’t be living right under the new factory’s smokestacks. Mr. Maypenny and I will. And what if the factory decides to expand again? Will another ten acres seem like a good solution someday? And then another ten, and another, until there’s no game preserve left?”

  “Dad won’t let that happen,” Jim said firmly. “How can you be so sure?” Dan asked. “Yesterday you were shocked when you heard he wanted to sell that first ten acres; today you’re behind him all the way. Maybe he’ll give you the same snow job next time.”

  “Dan—” Honey’s voice was pleading, and she put a restraining hand on the boy’s arm.

  “I’m sorry,” Dan said. “I just—” He broke off in mid sentence, the look in his eyes begging his friends to understand.

  “I can see your point of view,” Jim said quietly. “But I can see my father’s—Sleepyside’s—too. I have to back him in selling the land.”

  “And I have to back Mr. Maypenny in trying to stop him,” Dan replied.

  The two boys looked at each other steadily for a long moment. Then Dan abruptly gathered up his things and walked away.

  Trixie watched him leave. Now the factory expansion is dividing the Bob-Whites, she thought. She looked around at her circle of friends and found them all looking uneasily at one another. She knew that they were all echoing her own troubled thoughts: Who’s next?

  Dan’s Surprise ● 4

  DURING THE FOLLOWING week, the news about International Pine’s offer spread throughout Sleepyside. And wherever the news spread, it touched off the same arguments that had already begun among the Bob-Whites.

  To many of Sleepyside’s worried businessmen, who had seen their sales fall off because of rising unemployment, the possibility that International Pine might expand, creating new jobs and bringing new money into the community, seemed like a dream come true.

  But to many of the older people in town, who had grown up in a Sleepyside that was quiet and rural, the expansion was more like a nightmare. They worried not only about the increase in pollution that the expansion might cause, but also about the change in their community. If their sons and grandsons left .farming and shopkeeping behind to work in a factory, would they leave the old customs and traditions behind, too?

  To Trixie, it began to seem as though talking about International Pine was as much a part of everyday life as eating and sleeping. Interviews with the company president and with environmental experts filled the front page of the Sleepy-side Sun. The paper received so many letters to the editor on the expansion issue that it had to devote a full page, instead of the usual half page, to them each day.

  Many of the store owners in town hung signs in their windows, either in support of or against the factory expansion.

  Even in school, as she walked down the hallways, Trixie could hear her classmates arguing about the issue. In class, too, the expansion was worked into history, social studies, and science classes.

  It seemed to Trixie that the only place in town where the International Pine controversy was not discussed was at the Bob-Whites’ lunch table at school and in their section of the school bus.

  After the argument between Jim and Dan, the Bob-Whites had agreed not to discuss International Pine, the proposed expansion, Mr. Wheeler’s decision to sell, or Mr. Maypenny’s decision not to. In the end, they had realized, their own opinions would have very little effect on what happened. It would be better to keep those opinions to themselves so that, whatever the outcome, the Bob-Whites would still be friends when the controversy was over.

  Trixie did talk things over with her brothers when they were away from the other Bob-Whites, but she found that they continued to be as confused about the issue as she was. Because of the things their father had told them, they realized that more jobs were necessary; on the other hand, they all loved the preserve. They loved Mr. Maypenny, too. It was impossible for any of them to take a firm stand one way or the other.

  On Thursday, Brian announced at the dinner table that his social studies class was going to have a debate the following week.

  “The subject is International Pine, of course,” he said. “I’m on the affirmative team. Dad, would you help me put together some facts and figures?”

  “I will,” Peter Belden said.

  “What made you finally decide you’re for the expansion?” Trixie asked.

  “I haven’t decided that at all, Trix,” Brian said. “I’m as much on the fence as ever.”

  “But you’re arguing for it in the debate,” Trixie reminded him. “Does that mean you’re for it but you’re not for it? I don’t understand.”

  Brian shrugged. “It’s really not that confusing, Trix. I think this debate is important. It’s the first time that the arguments for and against the expansion will really be laid out, side by side, so that people can listen to them clearly if they care to. When my social studies teacher asked for volunteers for the debate, the first two people who spoke up asked to take the negative side, opposing the expansion. They’re both smart kids, and I know they’ll do a good job.

  “That’s when I decided to take the affirmative side. I figured that with the information I can get from Dad, I can present some pretty convincing arguments. It will be an even debate. That’s all I’m concerned about.”

  “Methinks it will take perseverance to persuade Dan Mangan of the perspicuity of the positive position,” Mart said.

  “Dan’s in my social studies class,” Brian reminded his brother. “He looked pretty tense when I volunteered. But I caught up with him after class and explained it to him. I think he understands that it’s a sense of fair play that got me into this, not my personal opinion about the expansion. He can respect that, just as he can respect Jim’s need to stand by his father.” Brian paused and sighed. Then he added, “Still, I don’t think his respect for our positions makes him feel any less lonely right now, or any less worried about whether he’s going to have a place to live when the controversy is over.”

  “I think this whole thing has been harder on Dan than anybody else,” Trixie agreed. “He’s spent so much of his life trying to find a place where he feels that he belongs. He even got involved with that bad bunch in New York City—when he’s not a bad person at all—just because they seemed to take an interest in him.”

  Brian nodded. “When Regan finally brought him to Sleepyside, Dan found a great place to live with Mr. Maypenny. He also found a group of friends, the Bob-Whites, who like him for what he is without trying to force him to be rowdy or get into trouble.”

  “And now his abode is in jeopardy and his companions seem alienated,” Mart concluded.

  “Poor Dan,” Trixie said. “I think we should be extra careful to let him know he’s our friend, until this whole thing is over.”

  “I don’t think we ought to do that, Trix,” Brian said. “Dan is pretty good at noticing things. Being extra nice, for whatever reason, still boils down to treating Dan differently than we have in the past. It might make him even more nervous than he already is.”

  Trixie wrinkled her nose, annoyed at her own stupidity. “You’re right, Brian. We Bob-Whites are always teasing one another and pretending to fight. If all of a sudden we start being nice as pie to Dan, he’ll probably feel like an outsider again. I guess all we can do is try to keep things as much as possible the way they’ve always been. But it’s hard.”

  “Indubitably,” Mart agreed gloomily.

  Trixie helped her mother clear the table and wash the dishes, too busy thinking about Dan and Mr. Maypenny and Brian and Jim to do her usual chattering as she worked.


  When she was finished, she laid the dish towel on the counter absentmindedly and wandered out of the kitchen. From the living room, she could hear the murmur of voices, first her father’s and then Brian’s, as they talked about the debate. Occasionally Mart’s voice would come in briefly, too. Trixie smiled to herself. Nobody loved to argue as much as Mart did. She could imagine him pouncing on anything his father and brother said that sounded weak, tearing it apart the way the opposition would at the debate. This was one time when Brian would be grateful for Mart’s feisty nature.

  Trixie considered joining the others in the living room, but she decided against it. She would hear Brian’s debate at school, since the principal had invited the whole school to attend. Right now, she wanted to get away from International Pine for a while.

  She wandered up to her room and stood in front of her bookshelf. She looked over the rows of books and pulled out Huckleberry Finn. It was an old favorite, one she’d read over and over and had never tired of. She flopped down on the bed, opened the book, and started to read. Soon she was lost in the story. Sleepyside and International Pine were far away. What was real was the Mississippi River, the raft, and Huck and Jim.

  She was laughing at Huck, dressed up in a girl’s clothes complete with bonnet, when a soft knock on her door brought her back to the real world.

  Come in,” she said, a little impatient at having her fun interrupted.

  The door opened, and Bobby wandered into the room. For a moment, Trixie felt startled by the fact that Bobby had knocked. Ordinarily he barged in wherever he wanted to go, with a six-year-old’s confidence that he’d be welcome.

  “I’d like to have a talk, Trixie,” he announced.

  Trixie bit the inside of her cheek to stifle a smile. Now she realized why Bobby had knocked. He wanted to have a “grown-up” talk, so he was doing everything in the most grown-up way he knew how.