The Mysterious Visitor Page 3

  "No," Mart admitted. "To my certain knowledge, you’ve never cleaned the garage before in your life. And, I gather, since Dad laid down the law about our junk, it’s not what you’d call pristine right now."

  "Let’s stick to the subject," Brian said, giving his younger brother a light punch on the arm. "Go on, Trix. What happened at the luncheon?" "Well," Trixie began, "it was a very elaborate luncheon, complete with the butler and a maid. Just for us three—me and Di and her mother. The twins eat in their big nursery, which is in a separate wing of the house. The food was yummy, but, frankly, I felt so uncomfortable I didn’t enjoy it much. I guess Di knew how I felt, because she never invited me again."

  "Tactful you," Mart said in disgust.

  "I couldn’t help it," Trixie said forlornly. "I kept thinking how much more fun I would have had if I’d stayed home and eaten Moms’s sandwiches and cookies."

  "It’s getting dark," Brian said. "We had better remount now and start back." They trotted along in silence for a while, then he said, "It’s funny, Trix. The Wheelers have pretty elaborate meals, with Celia serving in her black taffeta uniform and white apron and cap. But you never seem to feel uncomfortable at their place."

  "I know," Trixie said. "I can’t quite explain the difference. The Wheelers are informally formal. You know that having a lot of servants doesn’t mean anything more to them than having a roof over their heads. But Mrs. Lynch—well, I got the impression that she was scared of the butler. Harrison is awfully prim and proper. Oh," she interrupted herself, "maybe it was Harrison Di was talking about when she said, ‘I hate him. I hate him!"’

  "I doubt that," Brian said. "She may not like the butler, but I doubt if she’d cry when she talked to him over the phone."

  "I’ve got an idea," Trixie said. "Why don’t you boys go to the movies after dinner? If Di’s alone with Honey and me she may tell us what’s bothering her."

  "That is an idea, Trixie," Mart said, and Brian nodded his agreement.

  When they reached the stable, they groomed the horses and hurried indoors to take showers. Miss Trask stopped Trixie in the downstairs hall.

  "Come into the study with me for a minute," she said. "I want to talk to you, Trixie."

  Oh, woe, Trixie thought, following Miss Trask. What have I done now?

  Miss Trask looked puzzled. "Diana’s suitcase," she began, "arrived while Regan was giving her a riding lesson on Lady in the corral. Celia was busy, so I took it upstairs to the guest room, across the hall from Honey’s room, and unpacked it. I’m afraid Mrs. Lynch must have got the impression that we were giving a party, for she had packed two frocks with long skirts. They’re both lovely, but, frankly, Trixie, I felt they were too sophisticated for a girl of thirteen." She frowned. "How long have you known Diana Lynch?"

  "Since kindergarten," Trixie said. "We were very good friends until the last year or so."

  Miss Trask nodded. "Judging from those frocks, I’m not sure I want Diana to become a close friend of Honey’s. You see, Mrs. Wheeler doesn’t want Honey to grow up too fast. We want her to be a tomboy like you, Trixie, for as long as possible."

  Trixie chuckled. "I’m glad somebody likes me the way I am. It seems to me that my own family has done nothing all day but lecture me on how sloppy I look."

  "Everybody likes you the way you are," Miss Trask said. "You know how grateful we all are for what you’ve done for Honey. She was a nervous, sickly child when you two met last summer. She owes Jim to you, too. Why, you’re like one big happy family. I certainly don’t want that to change at all."

  "But why should it change?" Trixie asked.

  "A newcomer to your group," Miss Trask said, "could make a difference. But perhaps I’m wrong about Diana. It’s unfair to judge her when I’ve really only had a glimpse of her."

  Then suddenly the French doors from the veranda burst open, and Di stood there, her face flaming.

  She was wearing a strapless gown with a long, full skirt, and she looked so grown-up that Trixie couldn’t help gasping.

  "I heard every word you said," she stormed, her violet eyes black with anger. "Don’t you worry, Miss Trask. I’m not going to stay in this house another minute. I’ll call a cab right now and leave at once."

  Miss Trask was at her side in a second. "Diana, dear, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know you were on the veranda. It was very wrong of me to discuss you with Trixie, but you see, she has known you for a long time, since kindergarten, really, and we—" "Don’t apologize." Di’s voice was taut with suppressed tears. "Everyone likes Trixie, and nobody likes me. I shouldn’t have come out here. I might have known this would happen." She raced out of the room and up the stairs. In a minute a door slammed.

  "Well, that explains a lot of things," Trixie said. "But we can’t let her go home, Miss Trask. It isn’t her fault that she’s dressed all wrong. She didn’t want her mother to send those clothes. She begged her not to. But Mrs. Lynch probably knows that Mrs. Wheeler dresses up for dinner, and so she made Di do it."

  "Of course we can’t let her go home." Miss Trask was already starting up the stairs. "I’ll cope with this problem, Trixie."

  When Trixie entered Honey’s room a few minutes later, she found that Honey had just finished dressing. Trixie told her what had happened, while she took a shower. "I’m beginning to see why Di is so unhappy," she finished. "I hope she doesn’t go home."

  "Miss Trask won’t let her," Honey said as she handed Trixie clean underclothes. "Miss Trask is a very understanding person." She took a blue wool dress from one of her closets. "This ought to look nice on you, Trixie, and it won’t be much too long. Not that anybody cares. But what are you going to wear on your feet? I don’t think my shoes will fit you."

  "My battered mocs will have to do," Trixie said.. "Your feet are longer and narrower than mine, just like the rest of you is."

  Honey giggled. "That sounds awfully ungrammatical, but I can’t tell you why."

  Trixie surveyed herself in the mirror. "I look like a goon, but then I always do in a dress. At least my legs are still so tanned it looks as though I were wearing stockings. Don’t you think so, Honey?"

  "Except for the scratches," Honey said. "But I guess they could pass as clocks."

  "Clocks but no runs," Trixie said. "Come on. The suspense is killing me. If Di has gone home, what will we do, Honey?"

  But Di had not gone home. They met her in the hall. Miss Trask was with her. She was wearing a lavender wool dress that was very much like the ones Honey and Trixie were wearing.

  "How nice you look," Honey said, slipping her hand through Di’s arm.

  The boys came out of Jim’s room then, and they all trooped down to the dining room. Everyone joked and laughed a lot throughout the meal, except Di, who hardly said a word. When Celia, the pretty maid, brought in the dessert, Jim said to Miss Trask, "We menfolk plan to go to the movies, but since Brian isn’t allowed to drive after dark, may we ask Tom to drive us in and back?" Tom Delanoy was the Wheelers’ handsome young chauffeur.

  Celia blushed as she always did when Tom’s name was mentioned, although everyone knew that they planned to get married someday soon.

  "You’ll have to ask Tom about that," Miss Trask told Jim. "It’s his night off."

  "I can answer for him, ma’am," Celia said, blushing more furiously than ever. "He’ll be glad to do it. He can bring the boys home when he brings me back. Cook, too, if you like. But we’ll —he’ll need the station wagon."

  "Fine." Miss Trask nodded.

  When Celia went back into the kitchen, Jim said, grinning, "Tom is henpecked already. The top of Celia’s head just about reaches his chin, but she’s certainly going to be the boss of that family."

  "That’s what happens to he-men when they fall in love," Mart said, shaking his head with disapproval. "In the words of Kipling, ‘The female of the species is more deadly than the male.

  "Is that so?" Trixie demanded.

  "Yes, it is so," Mart informed her airily. "Take the black
widow spider—"

  "Let’s not and say we did," Honey interrupted with a shiver. "Which reminds me, it’s Halloween next Friday. Don’t you think we ought to have a party here, Miss Trask?"

  Miss Trask shook her head. "I’m sorry, dear. Have you forgotten? Your mother is giving a dinner party that night."

  "I know," Trixie said. "Moms and Dad are invited. So let’s have the party at our house. It’ll still be Indian summer, so it’ll be warm enough so we can roast franks on our outdoor grill. So—" "So, so, so-so," Mart interrupted. "How you love that word, Sis, when it isn’t spelled s-e-w." "Don’t," Di cried suddenly. "Please don’t." "What?" Trixie asked in amazement.

  "Don’t give a party at your house." Di’s cheeks were flaming, and her violet eyes were filmed with tears. "You just can’t give a party at your house. Mother would never forgive me."

  "But I don’t understand," Trixie said. "We planned to invite you, Di, if that’s what you mean."

  "That isn’t what I mean." Di’s voice was high-pitched. "You don’t understand, Trixie Belden, because your house isn’t all cluttered up with servants. When you give a party, you and your brothers do the planning, and you do all the cooking, too."

  "Natch," Mart said easily. "Who else?"

  For answer, Di jumped up and ran out of the dining room.

  "How do you like that?" Mart asked, bewildered. "What did I say to make her mad?"

  Jim coughed. "I think it’s about time we menfolk departed."

  "You’re all excused," Miss Trask said, pushing back her chair.

  Honey and Trixie raced upstairs to Di’s room. She was lying facedown on the bed, shaking with sobs and weeping into the pillows.

  "Please don’t cry," Trixie begged her. "Mart didn’t mean anything. What is wrong, Di?"

  Miss Trask came quietly into the room and sat on the foot of the bed. In a soothing voice, she said, "Sit up, Di, and tell the girls what you told me before dinner. Everything is going to be all right."

  Di tearfully obeyed. "Mother wants to give me a Halloween party," she began. "She told me to invite all of you and the boys and girls in our class on Monday. But I didn’t. I couldn’t. Because it won’t be any fun. Mother wants it to be a very elaborate affair, with Harrison hovering around like a grim ghost." She clenched her fists and

  rubbed her eyes with them. "I can’t seem to make her understand that we don’t want that kind of party. Oh, Honey, you’ve got to help me."

  "But how?" Honey’s wide hazel eyes were filled with sympathy.

  "Your mother," Di said, "is my mother’s very own ideal. If your mother would tell her that it would be much better to let me give the kind of party the Beldens give, why, then she would." "It’s really quite simple," Miss Trask put in. "I’m sure, Honey, that Mrs. Wheeler would like very much to invite Di’s parents to the dinner she’s giving next Friday night. When she telephones Mrs. Lynch tomorrow morning, she could suggest at the same time that Di’s friends would have much more fun if the party Di gives is simply an informal affair."

  Di nodded. "Do you think your mother would do that, Honey? I mean, explain that most of the kids will come in homemade costumes and won’t like it at all if they see Harrison hanging around in that prim way of his."

  "Of course," Honey cried enthusiastically. "Harrison can be given the night off, so you can run things the way you like, Di. Mother’s very good about explaining things like that. She knows how I feel about butlers. We haven’t had one since Miss Trask came to five with us. And I’m glad."

  "And Regan," Miss Trask reminded her. "Regan takes the place of a butler in this household, except that he doesn’t buttle."

  "I wish we had a Regan on our place," Di said enviously. "When he was giving me a riding lesson, I sort of poured my heart out to him, and he was so sympathetic." Suddenly she covered her pretty face with her hands. "Oh, I forgot. Uncle Monty! He’ll ruin everything."

  "Uncle Monty?" Trixie repeated. "I didn’t know you had an uncle, Di."

  "I didn’t," Di sobbed. "He suddenly turned up on Monday night. He’s Mother’s long-lost brother, who left home to make his fortune when she was just a baby. She has never heard from him until now."

  "How exciting," Honey cried. "What on earth makes you think he’ll ruin everything, Di?"

  Di stared dismally up at the ceiling. "Maybe he won’t. Let’s not talk about him. Let’s start making plans for Halloween. Maybe Uncle Monty will have gone back to Arizona by then."

  "If he hasn’t," Miss Trask put in, "Mrs. Wheeler will certainly invite your mother’s brother to the grown-up party here that evening."

  "Oh, no!" Di’s voice was so high-pitched it was almost a scream. "Please, Miss Trask, don’t let Mrs. Wheeler invite him out here."

  Honey tactfully changed the subject to plans for the Halloween party, but Trixie couldn’t help thinking: That afternoon Di Lynch had talked to someone on the phone. She had sobbed, "Oh, please don’t. Please don’t." Then she had hung up and said to herself, "I hate him. I hate him!" Could the person Di hated so violently be her newly found Uncle Monty?

  Trixie Is Suspicions • 4

  EXCEPT FOR special occasions, Trixie had to be home by nine o’clock, so she left right in the midst of exciting plans for the Halloween party. But her vivid imagination kept her awake and restless for a long time after she climbed into her bed.

  She couldn’t help thinking about Di’s uncle who had suddenly turned up. In mystery stories long-lost relatives who suddenly turned up always turned out to be someone else impersonating the long-lost relative. What little Di had said about her uncle made Trixie feel sure that she didn’t like him.

  "Maybe he’s an impostor," Trixie kept thinking, until she fell asleep.

  As she did her chores the next morning, she let her imagination run away with her. It would be such fun to solve another mystery! If Di’s uncle wasn’t her mother’s brother, who was he? What was he doing at the Lynches’? What was his scheme?

  The practical side of Trixie’s nature answered these questions coldly: "Don’t be silly! Just because Di doesn’t like him doesn’t mean he’s an impostor. Besides, you don’t know for sure that Di doesn’t like him. And you haven’t even met him yet.

  By the time she had finished dusting the living room, Trixie was laughing at herself. She dismissed the mystery from her mind as she shook out the dustcloth and mop on the terrace. The sun was shining brightly, but a cool breeze was blowing. It was going to be a wonderful day. Indian summer was just about the nicest time of the year, except that it happened when school was in session.

  She groaned, remembering her English homework assignment. She would simply have to find time to write that theme this evening, just so she could forget about it. And she would make Brian help her. He was very good at both spelling and punctuation. Mart used a lot of big words and knew their definitions, too, but he was apt to spell words just the way they sounded, not as they were spelled in the dictionary.

  Then Trixie remembered Mart’s offer to help her write the theme—but, for a fee. "The nerve of him," Trixie said to herself as she went upstairs to make Bobby’s bed. "As if I’d pay Mart or anybody else a dollar to help me!"

  Bobby’s bed was its usual lumpy mess, which meant Trixie had to strip it. Although the little boy was only supposed to take his panda or teddy bear to bed with him, it always seemed to Trixie as though the entire contents of his toy box were there, way down at the foot. This morning she found a water pistol, a tiny train of cars, and a boat. To her horror when she impatiently yanked off the top sheet, a whole deck of cards leaped out and flew off to every corner of the room.

  "Fifty-two cards in a deck!" Trixie groaned as she stooped to get one from the floor.

  But at last this chore was done, and Trixie raced out of the house. When she arrived at the Wheelers’, she found the girls and Jim on the porch talking excitedly.

  "Everything is wonderful," Honey told Trixie. "Mother just got through talking to Mrs. Lynch on the telephone, and Di is go
ing to be allowed to give just the kind of a party she wants." "Swell," Trixie said, sinking into the glider beside Jim. "With that haircut of his, Mart can go as an escaped convict. All you need to do, Honey, is whip him up a costume out of some old striped mattress ticking. What are you going as, Jim?"

  "Dracula," Jim said promptly. "It’s a known fact that all vampires have red hair. I hear you’re going as a goon." He nodded approvingly. "The last goon I danced with in the moonlight looked just the way you look now."

  Trixie tossed her head. "Is that so? I’ve changed my mind. I’m going to wear the pirate’s costume Mart wore at the school masquerade last year. It should fit me perfectly. All I’ll need is a black wig, a red bandanna, and a big black moustache—and I’ll make a cardboard knife."

  "It sounds horrid," Honey said, laughing. "But a lot of fun. I think I’ll go as Captain John Silver, except that I don’t think I could cope with both a wooden leg and a parrot. But if Brian, our future doctor, is going as both Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, I guess I can manage. Di can’t decide whether to go as Queen Elizabeth or a character out of one of Jane Austen’s novels. Which do you think would look better, Trix?"

  Trixie groaned. "How literary can we get? I think it would be a lot simpler if we all went in our B.W.G. jackets over our jeans, with masks and wigs. Since Di is going to become a member this weekend, there would be six of us dressed exactly alike. If we all wear the same false faces and maybe black, curly wigs, we could confuse everybody and have a lot of fun."

  "It’s a wonderful idea," Di said thoughtfully. "Even if we don’t confuse anybody but Uncle Monty. We’ve just got to confuse him. Otherwise, I know he’ll try to run things and—" She stopped and looked at Honey appealingly. "Please, you explain to Trixie and Jim."

  Honey frowned. "It’s hard to explain, Di, but I’ll try. You see," she said to the others, "Di’s afraid that, even though her mother has promised to let her run the party, her uncle will interfere at the last minute and blow whistles and run around like he was a master of ceremonies on a radio or TV show."