The Red Trailer Mystery

by Julie Campbell

  “Oh, I’m sure they’ll never do that,” Honey cried sympathetically. “They must love being here.”

  “It’s Mrs. Darnell who worries me,” Mrs. Smith went on. “She’s so frail-looking and yet she’s down there picking beans with her husband. He’s a grand worker, the best we ever had, and he and Nat will get the crop in all right without her help, although they did have to wait until the sun dried off the beans this morning on account of rust.”

  Trixie tried to gather her scattered thoughts. It must be the red trailer family, and if so, she should tell Mrs. Smith that Mr. Darnell had stolen the Robin. But somehow she couldn’t do that. The Smiths needed help, the Darnells needed a home, and Mrs. Smith obviously loved having them here. Anyway, she quieted her conscience, how can I be absolutely sure that Mr. Darnell is the same man we saw with the Robin?

  I have no business, she decided at last, causing a lot of people unhappiness until I actually see that trailer or someone in the Darnell family.

  Mrs. Smith was rambling on between enormous bites of cookies and gulps of lemonade. “Such sickly little mites,” she told Honey, who looked as though she were going to cry any minute. “I told Mrs. Darnell that I would take entire charge of them and fatten them up while she took a good long rest. But no. She insisted upon making the beds and washing the dishes and now she’s down there in this broiling sun picking beans. I tell you, it worries me.” Suddenly her broad face was wreathed in smiles. “One thing I did insist on, however, was cutting that poor man’s hair. With seven sons I’m as good as any barber in the state, and the pitiful creature would have drowned in his own sweat if I hadn’t taken shears and razor to him this morning.” She turned to Trixie. “Would you believe it? That man is so devoted to his family and so short of cash, he hasn’t spared the money for a haircut for two months!” She slapped the arms of the rocker resoundingly. “Said it would be like taking food out of his babies’ mouths to go to a barber. I never heard the like, did you?”

  Trixie, on the verge of tears herself now, nodded dumbly. I don’t care if he did steal that trailer, she told herself. Let the state troopers catch him. That’s their business.

  Honey broke the silence with, “Why couldn’t he get work in some other part of the state?”

  Mrs. Smith’s red face flamed with anger. “He had plenty of work until he hurt his eye in an accident and had to have an operation. Worked a successful farm down the river a way. But when he fell behind in his rent, the landlord threatened to evict him. Imagine it, with all those children!” Outraged, Mrs. Smith heaved herself to her feet. “And that reminds me, I must get those babies up for their juice and cod-liver oil.”

  “We must be starting home,” Honey said quickly. “We’ve outstayed our welcome.”

  “We’ve had a lovely time,” Trixie said. “And thanks for everything.”

  “Come again soon,” Mrs. Smith called to them and waved from the back door.

  The girls bridled their horses in a thoughtful silence and Honey held Prince’s head while Trixie returned the halters and rope to the nail over the steps. Then she swung up on Prince’s back and they trotted down the driveway to the main road.

  “We’re only about a mile from Autoville,” Honey said. “I found that out when I went after Prince. The Smith farm is north and west of where the big routes converge. It seems funny to me that the state troopers haven’t stopped there to ask about a stolen red trailer.”

  “It is funny,” Trixie agreed. “Oh, Honey, do you think Mr. Darnell is Joeanne’s father?”

  Honey’s hazel eyes widened. “Why, how could you think anything else, Trixie? He must be the same man with the crew cut who asked about her early this morning at Wilson Ranch.”

  Trixie sighed. “Well then, we’ve got to tell Mrs. Smith that Mr. Darnell stole that trailer, and we ought to notify the police too.”

  Honey squared her slim shoulders. “We won’t do anything of the kind, Trixie Belden. That family has had enough trouble without our adding to it. If you set the police on him, they’ll accuse him of all the other thefts. And I don’t think he stole the trailer. You know perfectly well Mrs. Smith said he only borrowed the Robin until he could find a home for his family.”

  Honey was emphatically expressing Trixie’s own innermost thoughts on the subject, so she did not argue. But she could not stop the pricking of her conscience. Kindhearted Mrs. Smith at least ought to be told that she was entertaining a thief in her home.

  Unhappily Trixie walked her horse along the macadam road beside Honey. Deep down inside her she knew that she would have to return to the Smith farm the first thing in the morning.

  Chapter 9

  An Early Morning Call

  As the girls turned into the entrance to the trailer camp, a uniformed attendant at the gate handed Honey a letter.

  “Air mail from Canada,” he said, “and horses aren’t allowed here. Should I return ’em for you?”

  Honey slipped off Peanuts’s back. “Oh, that would be wonderful,” she said gratefully. “We’re terribly tired and I’m dying to open this envelope. It’s from my mother.”

  The attendant grinned and led the horses away. “Hurry up and read it, Honey,” Trixie begged even before she got out of the saddle, and said again as they strolled toward the Swan, “Hurry! I can’t wait to hear what she says about Jim.”

  Honey read the letter.

  Dear Honey,

  Your father asked me to write you that he is seriously considering the matter of adopting Winthrop Frayne’s son, Jim. I am not at all sure that it would be a good idea, but I thought you would like to know that we received your letter.

  Miss Trask writes that you are very well and are having a good time.

  Much love from us both, Mother.

  Honey crumpled the letter into a tight ball. Tears welled up in her eyes. “That’s that,” she gulped. “I knew Mother would be against it.”

  Trixie patted her chum’s shoulder. “Don’t feel too disappointed, Honey,” she begged. “We haven’t even found Jim yet, and when we do and introduce him to your mother, maybe she’ll feel differently about it.”

  Honey was crying in earnest now. “I don’t think we are going to find him or Joeanne, and the next thing you know the police will arrest Mr. Darnell before he can return the Robin to that man who left it all hitched up and ready to go.” She stopped and buried her face in the crook of her arm. “Oh, I wish we had never come on this trip. I never knew there were so many unhappy people in the world.”

  Trixie tried to comfort her but she felt so miserable herself she could hardly keep back her own tears.

  All that evening after she had gone to bed, she tossed and turned, trying to make up her mind. I can’t turn that starving Darnell family over to the police, she finally decided. Anyway, not until I’ve made sure that their trailer is the Robin.

  It was still quite dark when she awoke in the morning after a troubled sleep. The sun was just beginning to paint the patches between the trees a reddish gold. Trixie dressed quietly and slipped out of the Swan without even disturbing the dogs.

  “Honey is too unhappy already,” she told herself aloud as she trudged along the road. “If I find out the Darnells’ trailer is the Robin, I won’t tell anybody but Mrs. Smith. I’ll let her notify the police.”

  Birds were chirping in the trees and every now and then a truck whizzed past, but the rest of the world seemed to be sound asleep. Trixie knew that farmers arose with the chickens so she guessed that the Smith household would be at breakfast when she arrived.

  She had walked hardly half a mile north of where the Autoville road came out on the main highway when she slowly realized that there was something familiar about the woods on her right. And then it dawned on her that she was standing only a few yards from where she had discovered the mysterious van’s hiding place.

  “Those bridle trails certainly do run around in circles.” She chuckled as she gazed into the clearing. “Honey and I had no idea we were so near hom
e when we found that net.”

  There was no sign of the net now and the heap of evergreen branches had been torn down. “Honey and I didn’t notice the clearing yesterday,” Trixie muttered, “because on our way back from the Smiths’ we were riding on the other side of the road. And Sunday afternoon we were so busy looking for bicycle tracks we didn’t realize that the road to Pine Hollow is only a stone’s throw north of the road to Autoville. Our only other excuse for being so dumb is that, after all, we were asleep when Miss Trask arrived at the trailer camp the night before, so neither of us had seen the entrance from the main road until yesterday.”

  She laughed to herself as she hurried on toward the Smith farm. “No wonder we kept getting lost. We never look where we’re going.”

  If Miss Trask insisted upon driving home the next morning, Wednesday, Trixie knew that this was the last day in which they could look for Jim. She and Honey had planned to ride to Rushkill Farms after breakfast, so she must get back from the Smith place as soon as possible.

  The sun had risen above the tall trees by now and although Trixie walked along the highway as fast as she could, she kept looking for bicycle tracks in the soft dirt in the shallow ditch between the road and the woods.

  “I just know he’s hiding around here somewhere,” she kept encouraging herself. And then the sunlight gleamed on something that was shiny and metal on a rise of ground above the bushes on the other side of the road.

  “Bicycle handlebars!” Trixie gasped and began to run in that direction. The underbrush hampered her every step, and brambles slapped her arms, but she kept on until the very denseness of the thicket forced her to stop. It was all too obvious that nobody could have dragged a bicycle through that part of the woods.

  “I’ll come back this afternoon with Honey,” Trixie decided, “and see if we can find a path that leads to that shrub-covered mound.”

  Of course she couldn’t be at all sure that the thing she had seen gleaming in the early morning sunlight had been part of a bicycle, but somehow she felt positive that it had something to do with Jim.

  The air was hot and sultry now, and although the sun in the east was splashing the sky with rosy gold streaks, a heavy fog hung over the treetops of the western woods.

  “It looks and feels like rain,” Trixie told herself, depressed again. “Oh, I hope the sun burns off that fog. If we can’t look for Jim today, I’ll die!”

  And almost as depressing was the thought that they might never find Joeanne or discover the hiding place of the mysterious van. And, as Honey had said, Mr. Darnell might be arrested any minute for the theft of the red trailer. Then what would happen to his poor, half-starved family?

  Hoping against hope that the Darnell trailer would not turn out to be the Robin, she trudged on, feeling like the worst tattletale in the world. It was awful to be torn between sympathy for the Darnells and her sense of duty. The only comforting thought was that kindhearted Mrs. Smith might not notify the police, but would advise her new hired hand to turn himself in; then at least his punishment would be less severe. But in that case he might well be accused of the other trailer thefts, and how could he prove his innocence?

  “Oh, golly,” Trixie groaned aloud, “if only I had time to get proof that would lead to the arrest of Jeff and his bushy-haired friend!”

  When she turned in the Smith driveway, Laddie came rushing out to meet her, barking so loudly that Trixie knew she could not now investigate the barn without being seen by somebody when she passed the house. Indeed, when she came nearer, she saw that Mrs. Smith herself was standing out on the back stoop with Jimmy Crow perched on one fat shoulder.

  With a jolt of surprise, Trixie realized that Mrs. Smith had been crying. Her plump red cheeks were streaked with tears, and her black eyes were almost hidden in little puffy rolls of flesh. It would never have occurred to Trixie that anyone as cheerful as the farmer’s wife would give way to weeping.

  “Oh, you lamb,” Mrs. Smith called, her voice choked with gasping sobs, “I’m so glad you came. Come right in and have some waffles and sausages and hot chocolate. I said to Nat only a few minutes ago, nothing will ever cheer me up but a young person around the place again.”

  Trixie tried to protest, but Mrs. Smith hustled her into a chair and poured batter into the double waffle iron, talking all the while.

  “My precious babies’ pictures, all of them gone! I wouldn’t mind the locket so much, although Nat must have paid a pretty penny for it. Solid gold it was, studded with real pearls and turquoises. Of all the things they could have stolen in this big house, why did they have to take that?”

  Trixie, completely baffled, rubbed her forehead. “I’m awfully sorry, Mrs. Smith,” she got out. “What happened?”

  Mrs. Smith heaped sausages on a plate the size of a serving platter and pushed the butter crock and maple-sirup pitcher closer to Trixie. It was not until then that Trixie realized how hungry she was, and although she was dying to know what her hostess was talking about, she ate steadily throughout the conversation.

  “It’s my own fault, Nat says,” Mrs. Smith went on between shuddering sighs of grief. “Although he’s as bad as I am. Neither one of us can ever think evil of anyone. And that nice little Mrs. Darnell! Who in the world could have thought she was a thief?”

  Trixie gulped guiltily and choked so hard on a bit of waffle Mrs. Smith had to pat her on the back. Oh, dear, she thought, I should have warned Mrs. Smith yesterday. Now it’s too late!

  “I took the locket out of its case to show Mrs. Darnell how my boys looked when they were her baby’s age,” Mrs. Smith continued when Trixie had stopped coughing. “It’s an album locket, you see, and Nat had it especially made for me so I could have all seven of my lambs’ pictures together; with Nat himself as a baby in the extra space. And now they’re all gone.” Mrs. Smith burst into tears and covered her face with her voluminous apron. She sobbed loudly for several minutes, her great shoulders heaving, while Trixie tried to guess what had happened.

  “What makes you think Mrs. Darnell took the locket?” she asked when Mrs. Smith’s sobs had subsided. “Have you accused her?”

  “Accuse her?” Mrs. Smith demanded. “How can I accuse her when they sneaked out in the night and were gone without a trace when we woke up this morning?”

  “Oh,” Trixie gasped. “That’s terrible. Whatever made them run away?”

  “I don’t know, I don’t know,” Mrs. Smith moaned. “And if they just stopped here to steal from us, why didn’t they take the silver too and my teapot that’s filled to the brim with my egg money?” She reached up on a shelf above the table and brought down a large pewter teapot that was literally crammed with bills and small change. “They both knew about this,” she explained, “for they saw me put five dollars in it when Lalla Stern came over to pay her bill. The chickens are mine, you see. Nat gave them to me as a present and I pay for the feed and everything out of my egg money. I like to have a bit of cash that’s my very own, and I told Mrs. Darnell that. And now, will you tell me why she took that locket and left all this loose cash?”

  Trixie shook her head. “Maybe she didn’t take it. Maybe you misplaced it.”

  Mrs. Smith placed her hands on her broad hips. “Do you think I look like the kind of woman who would misplace her babies’ pictures? No, after I showed the locket to Mrs. Darnell I put it right back on top of the highboy in the parlor where I always keep it because that’s where it catches the morning sun and looks so pretty gleaming against the shiny mahogany.”

  Trixie thought for a minute. Now was the time to tell Mrs. Smith what she should have told her yesterday—that the Darnell family had stolen their trailer. But was it necessary? “Have you notified the police?” she asked.

  “I can’t,” Mrs. Smith wailed. “In spite of what they did to me, I can’t bear to cause that poor family any more trouble. The frail little woman fainted yesterday after picking all those beans. And I think that’s why they left. She felt she was too sickly to earn he
r bed and board, although I’m sure I didn’t want her to do a thing but rest and get her strength back. I was fixing her a nice cup of hot tea when the little girl, Sally, came running in, chattering the way she always does.

  “ ‘Oh, Mommy,’ she said, ‘Guess what! When I was taking my nap I looked out of the window and I saw those girls riding away from here. You know, the ones that live in the big silver trailer with my black puppy.’ And that,” Mrs. Smith finished, “was when Mrs. Darnell fainted. She turned as white as my apron and pitched forward into my arms.” Mrs. Smith glanced sharply at Trixie. “You never told me you knew the Darnells, but Sally insists that Honey has her puppy.”

  Trixie flushed. “We didn’t know it was the same family,” she explained. “We thought it might be the one we parked beside at a trailer camp farther down the river. That’s why we asked you if their trailer was red, remember?”

  Mrs. Smith rocked back and forth, pursing her lips thoughtfully. “I do remember now. And what’s the story of the black puppy? Every time Sally mentions it her parents get very upset.”

  Trixie laughed. “Sally thinks all black puppies are hers because she had one once that died. She took Honey’s dog with her when they left the camp and we didn’t get him back until we caught up with them at a picnic ground.” Trixie suddenly sobered. “Do you know what I think? I think Sally took your locket. She may have thought the babies’ faces in it were her brother and sister. Baby pictures do look pretty much alike, you know.”