The Red Trailer Mystery (18 page)

Trixie looked up and groaned. “Jimmy Crow again! Bicycle handlebars indeed! After this long climb all we find is another one of his treasures. A small, battered chrome towel rack.” She turned around in disgust. “He can keep it for all I care. Let’s go home before Miss Trask gets cross and worried.”

The Autoville cafeteria that evening was humming with excitement. Everyone was talking about the capture of the trailer thieves, and the manager who had spent most of the day being questioned by the police, looked nervous.

“I never liked that Jeff,” he told Miss Trask when she invited him to sit at their table and have a cup of coffee. “But he came to me highly recommended by an old friend I haven’t seen in years. It never occurred to me to check either one of those men’s references. The forged signatures were very convincing.”

A man and woman were talking excitedly at the next table, and Trixie recognized them as the middle-aged couple Jeff had been listening to Sunday evening.

“I’m certainly glad you took my advice,” the woman said with smug satisfaction. “If we’d gone off in the trailer yesterday, we might have been hijacked too.”

The man nodded. “I had a feeling that waiter was listening to our plans when we were marking our route on the map at dinner Sunday.” He shrugged. “I thought
he was just one of those snoopy people who can’t resist eavesdropping.”

They left the dining-room then, and Trixie concentrated on what the manager was saying.

“I’d like to know who tipped the troopers off,” he told Miss Trask. “I’d give the man a fat reward. I can’t imagine why he had to be so mysterious about it all.”

“Do they know it was a man?” Honey asked cautiously, and Trixie kicked her sharply under the table.

“Oh, yes,” the manager said. “Those crooks made up a tall yarn about a redheaded boy who they claim was hiding in the Smiths’ barn. Insisted he loosened the valve core on the van’s tire and hid their jack. But the sergeant who received the telephone call said there could be no doubt that it was a man’s voice. Quite a deep one, although it was obvious, he said, that the man was very nervous. At first, you know, they decided it was a fake tip-off made by someone with a warped sense of humor. They run into a lot of false clues, I guess. They almost ignored that call, and I can’t say that I blame them. Why did the man hang up when they asked him for his name and address?”

“Did they trace the call?” Miss Trask asked.

The manager nodded. “Not until after they had
arrested Jeff and Al. It was made from a public phone booth in a gas station up the road a way. By the time the troopers checked it nobody could remember who had used the booth. Several cars had stopped there since noon, and neighboring farmers who haven’t phones of their own often use that public booth.”

Honey, ignoring Trixie’s warning kick, asked in an elaborately casual voice, “Are the troopers looking for a redheaded boy? Some boys do have deep voices, you know.”

Miss Trask, guessing that Honey hoped they would find some clue to Jim’s whereabouts, glanced at her sharply.

The manager laughed. “Oh, no, the gas station attendants would have noticed a boy with red hair if he had used the booth. That was obviously a tall tale Al cooked up for some reason.”

“Maybe Al himself made that call,” Trixie put in. “He’s the smart one of the two, isn’t he? He must have realized even before the van got a flat tire that they didn’t have a chance in the world of getting out of the state with the loot. He may have planned to frame Jeff but didn’t get away in time.”

The manager pushed back his chair and stood up. “One of the troopers seems to be thinking along those
lines,” he admitted. “But I can’t see it myself. No, somebody who doesn’t want his identity known notified the police. We probably never will find out who it was.” He smiled and strode across the cafeteria to his office in the back.

“Has Jim got a deep voice?” Miss Trask promptly demanded.

“It’s sort of husky,” Honey said. “But I don’t think it would sound like a grown man’s over the telephone.”

“I just thought,” Miss Trask went on, “it seems like rather a coincidence that those men would make up a story about a redheaded boy hiding in a barn at the same time and in the same neighborhood where we’re looking for Jim.”

And then the girls told her that they were pretty sure that they were on Jim’s trail at last. They even confessed that they had been hiding in the loft when the troopers arrested Al and Jeff. They carefully avoided mentioning that Al had threatened to kidnap Honey, but even then she was horrified.

“Gracious,” she gasped, “you girls must be more careful. Promise me you won’t go inside any abandoned barns or houses from now on.”

“We won’t,” Honey assured her. “But the first thing tomorrow morning we want to explore the woods. If we start out early enough we might even find Jim in his camp.”

“Or Joeanne,” Miss Trask said. “I wish I had known her father had gone off and abandoned her. I would have reported it to the troopers at once. What kind of a man would do such a thing? I’ve a good mind to notify the police right now.”

“Oh, please don’t,” Honey begged. “He didn’t really abandon her, Miss Trask. She ran away, and he had to think of his wife and the other children. As soon as he found a home for them I’m sure he meant to go back and look for Joeanne.”

“Anyway,” Trixie added, “Joeanne knew where her family was going.” She clapped her hand over her mouth too late. She had not meant to let Miss Trask even guess that the stolen red trailer might be somewhere in the vicinity. If she knew that it had been parked in the Smith garage until the night before she would certainly feel that she should report it to the police.

Fortunately Miss Trask’s suspicions were not aroused, and Honey quickly changed the subject. “We’ll find Joeanne when we find Jim,” she said so positively that even Trixie was impressed. “I’m not worried about her at all now that Jim’s looking out for her.”

She slipped her arm through Trixie’s as they
followed the governess out of the cafeteria. Miss Trask stopped at the magazine stand, and the girls went down the steps to the park. “Listen,” Honey whispered, “she wants to go to the outdoor movies tonight, but we’ll say we’re too tired, which is the absolute truth. Only, after a short rest, let’s go back and see if we can find someone sleeping in that tent at Jim’s camp. If we find Joeanne we’ll make her tell us where Jim is.”

“Wonderful,” Trixie cried. “We can get there and be back long before the movie is over.”

Honey nodded. “I wouldn’t deceive Miss Trask for anything in the world, but you know perfectly well she would never give us permission to go into the woods at night. And it seems to me it’s the one sure way of finding somebody at Jim’s camp. After it’s all over and we’re back safely, she’ll understand why we had to do it without telling her.”

“I know,” Trixie agreed. “She’s an awfully good sport. I was terrified back at the table that she’d start the troopers looking for Joeanne.”

“Miss Trask knows we want to find her when we find Jim,” Honey went on. “But if we don’t find one or both of them by tomorrow she’ll
have
to notify Mr. Rainsford as well as the police.”

“We’ve got to find one of them this evening,” Trixie
said grimly. Then she chuckled. “You’re always calling yourself a fraidy-cat but I notice you don’t seem at all scared at the idea of going into the woods tonight.”

Honey’s hazel eyes widened in surprise. “Of course not! It’ll be as light as day with that big moon shining. It’s still almost as bright as it was last Wednesday when you and I and Jim went for a moonlight ride, remember?”

“I sure do,” Trixie said. “And I haven’t forgotten how Reddy kept delaying our start. Oh, golly,” she interrupted herself. “That reminds me. Where are those dogs now?”

Miss Trask joined them as they stopped by the swimming pool. “You girls look tired,” she said. “I’ll run along to the movie and let you topple into bed. You must go to sleep early if you want to look for Jim the first thing tomorrow morning.”

She smiled and hurried past them on her way to the parking lot.

“Those dogs,” Honey groaned. “I can’t remember now whether or not they were with us when we found Jimmy Crow’s towel rack. Can you?”

Trixie thought for a minute. “Reddy was. I was so disappointed and turned around to go home so suddenly I almost tripped over him.”

“That’s right,” Honey went on, “and I do remember
now. He was with us when we got back to the trailer. He barged by us when we opened the door and jumped up on the couch where Miss Trask was reading. She pushed him down and brushed off his muddy footprints. I just took it for granted that Bud was with us too.”

They hurried to the
Swan
and sure enough, Reddy was there, looking bored and hungry. But there was no sign of the little black cocker spaniel puppy.

“We’re perfectly awful, Honey,” Trixie said as she opened a can of dog food. “We don’t deserve to have pets if we can’t take better care of them. The water in their pan hasn’t been emptied and refilled for ages I’ll bet.”

“I did it this morning,” Honey said quickly. “That’s what I was doing when Miss Trask burned herself. Oh, dear, Trixie, where do you suppose Bud is?”

Trixie grinned suddenly. “At least, we have a good excuse now to go back to the woods across the road. He must be around there. Maybe his sense of direction is no better than ours. He’s nothing but a puppy, so when he got tired of looking for us, he may have collapsed under a tree and gone to sleep.”

“I hope so,” Honey said as she followed Trixie out of the
Swan
, carefully shutting Reddy inside. “The first thing I’m going to do when we get back home is to teach that little wretch to heel.”

Trixie laughed. “You’d better first train him to come when called. He’s as bad as Reddy who only comes when he hasn’t anything better to do.”

“It seems to me,” Honey complained as they hurried down the Autoville driveway, “that we never have less than three things to look for at the same time. Wouldn’t it be heavenly if Bud met Jim in the woods and we found them both at the camp?”

“Bud doesn’t know Jim,” Trixie objected. “Reddy does, but you always shut Bud inside the house when we went up to the mansion.”

“Bud knows Joeanne,” Honey pointed out. “He spent a whole morning in the red trailer. Maybe he’s asleep in the tent with her right now.”

“It’s too hot and too early for anyone to be asleep,” Trixie said. “The movies started at eight so it’s only a little after that now.”

They walked along in silence until they came to the Pine Hollow road. As they rounded the bend they saw that Mr. Currier’s automobile was no longer there, then they cut through the woods.

With the aid of their flashlight and the bright moonlight, they easily followed the path, and in a short while they arrived at the little camp in the clearing. There was no sign of life and Bud did not appear
in answer to their shouts and whistles.

“The ashes are cold,” Trixie said, patting the remnants of the fire between the two forked sticks. “Nobody has been cooking here today.”

Honey lifted the mosquito-net flap to the tent. “Everything is exactly as we left it,” she sighed. “Even that wrinkle in the blanket I forgot to smooth out after Bud yanked it off the bed.”

“Well, I’m going to leave a note for Jim,” Trixie said, refusing to become depressed. “Sooner or later, he’s bound to come back after his mug and Bible.”

“But we haven’t any paper or pencil,” Honey said, looking as though she were going to cry.

“I’ll tear a label off one of the cans,” Trixie told her, “and write on the back of it with a hunk of charred wood from the dead fire.”

“You’re wonderful,” Honey cried, cheering up as she slipped out of the tent and hurried back with a piece of charcoal. “What are you going to say?”

Trixie thought for a minute and then she wrote.

Jim: Honey and I are at the Autoville trailer camp. It is perfectly safe now for you to come to see us. Trixie
.

“There isn’t room for another word,” she said, “but he trusts us so he’ll come. I’ll stick the note inside his christening mug so he can’t possibly miss seeing it.”

“Now what’ll we do about Bud?” Honey demanded as they replaced the corner of the blanket over the foot of the bed and scrambled out of the tent.

“We could climb up to the top of that shrubby hill,” Trixie suggested, “but I doubt if we could catch a glimpse of him from there, not in the moonlight.”

“Oh dear,” Honey moaned. “I can’t bear to think of the poor little thing spending a night alone in the woods.”

“It won’t hurt him at all,” Trixie declared emphatically. “It’s very warm and there’s plenty of water for him to drink. He may even have caught a small field mouse for his supper.”

“I suppose the sensible thing for us to do is go home and look for Bud again early in the morning,” Honey said after they had called and called in vain.

“That’s right,” Trixie agreed. “I’m so tired I don’t think I could climb that hill and that’s probably where he is. Both dogs were with us when the trees thinned out and began to be shrubs. That’s the last time I remember seeing Bud. He raced ahead of us but Reddy stayed close by for a wonder.” She yawned wearily.