The Mystery Off Glen Road (9 page)

“They did,” Honey told her. “They’re in Canada now. We all got postcards from them yesterday. They’ll be back next weekend, thank goodness. When Mother called up from Florida on Wednesday she told Miss Trask to hire a temporary maid and a temporary chauffeur at any price, but Miss Trask said it wouldn’t be worth-while breaking them in for such a short time. She
has enough trouble breaking in cooks who are forever leaving.”

“I hope for Miss Trask’s sake,” Trixie said, “that Ben Riker doesn’t put any frogs in this cook’s bed.”

“That would be the straw that broke the camel’s back,” Honey agreed. “If the cook left while Celia and Tom are away I think Miss Trask would quit, too.”

“And that,” Trixie added, “would be the end. She’s just wonderful. Oh, Honey, let’s canter. I can’t wait to find out if Miss Trask and Regan will give us the gamekeeper’s job.”

“I can’t either,” Honey admitted. “If we can win Regan over to our side, I’m sure Miss Trask will agree. But Regan can be stubborn at times. We’ll have to be careful, and also we had better be very sure that we do a perfect job when we groom the horses.”

Half an hour later Honey began the conversation with: “Oh, Regan, about those ads you and Miss Trask put in the papers. Did anybody apply for the gamekeeper’s job?”

Trixie couldn’t help grinning. Honey was trying so hard to make her voice sound casual as she worked on Strawberry with a currycomb.

“No,” Regan replied from the doorway of the tack room. “And, in my opinion, nobody ever will. There
aren’t many people left who can afford game preserves, and they’ve got all the gamekeepers there are left working for them.”

“Oh,” Honey said as she led Strawberry back to his stall. “Do you have to be so very wonderful to be a gamekeeper? I didn’t think much of Fleagle. I mean, I thought he was sort of dumb, didn’t you?”

Trixie’s secret grin widened. There just wasn’t anybody in the world as tactful as Honey Wheeler.

“Fleagle,” Regan said in a wrathful tone of voice, “was as stupid as they come. Why, even you and Trixie know more about horses than he does.”

“That’s just what I thought,” Honey said innocently. “Trixie and I, working early in the morning, and after school, could be just as good a gamekeeper as Fleagle was, couldn’t we? I mean, what is there to do except ride along the trails and sort of patrol? Trixie and I were riding along the trails on the other side of the road only this morning and we didn’t get lost once.”

Regan placed his big freckled hands on his hips. “No kiddin’?” he demanded. “Now, that’s a record, isn’t it?” Grinning broadly, he added, “I suppose you two captured singlehanded a whole army of poachers, too.”

“Oh, don’t tease us, please, Regan,” Honey begged.
“We Bob-Whites have just got to get that job. On account of the clubhouse and Brian’s jalopy, you know. And you know perfectly well there aren’t any poachers, and if there were, the boys could capture them singlehanded and all.”

Regan guffawed. “The boys can singlehandedly go out and repair the feeding stations that were knocked down by the wind. One thing is sure.
I
certainly haven’t got the time to do it.”

“That’s just the point,” Trixie put in. “The boys are very good at repairs. They’ll do all that sort of thing. Honey and I, while we’re patrolling, can scatter grain around for the birds and whatever it is that deer like. After all, Regan, I’ve been feeding our chickens for years. There’s not much difference between a chicken and a pheasant when you get right down to it. Or a partridge either. They were all eggs once, you know.”

Regan howled with laughter. Then he sobered. “You girls have got something there. All five of you kids working together could certainly do as good a job as that Fleagle did, and cause me a lot less trouble.” He started for the stable door. “I’m going right in and talk to Miss Trask about it.”

When he had gone, Honey and Trixie collapsed on the floor of the tack room. “Keep your fingers crossed,”
Honey said. “Miss Trask is very understanding and all, but she just might not go for the idea.”

Trixie giggled. “I can’t keep my fingers crossed and clean my saddle and bridle.”

“Well, cross your toes then,” Honey retorted, handing her a sponge and a can of saddle soap. “This tack has got to be super-perfect today of all days.”

They worked in silence until they had cleaned and put away every bit of the leather, then they hurried outside and down to the clubhouse. The boys had finished rebuilding the wall and were now working on the roof.

Mart, sitting astride the ridgepole, called down to the girls, “Hi, you lazy squaws.”

“Lazy, indeed,” Trixie yelled back. “We just finished exercising all of the horses and cleaning about five million tons of leather.”

“Oh, don’t you and Mart start arguing,” Honey begged. “When you two get going you go on forever.” She tilted back her pretty face and called up to Jim who was hammering shingles into place. “Jim! Can’t you boys quit for a while so we can hold an emergency meeting? Something important’s happened. I mean, about to happen. At least I hope it’ll happen.”

Jim removed the nails from his mouth and stared down at her. “Gleeps, Honey! Can’t you ever make a simple
sentence without tacking on a lot of ‘I thinks’ and ‘I means’?”

“No, she can’t,” Brian answered the question as he started down the ladder. “She’s been exposed to Trixie too long. The habit is as catching as measles.”

“I’ve got news for you, Jim,” Mart added, as he followed Brian down the ladder. “Neither one of them ever makes sense. Lovely girls, and all that, at least Honey is, but—”

“Now who’s ‘at-leasting’?” Trixie demanded.

Jim slid down the roof and, grasping the gutter for a second, swung himself to the ground. Trixie couldn’t help giving him an admiring glance. All of the boys were strong and supple, but Jim was the most athletic one of them all. There really wasn’t anything worth doing that Jim couldn’t do—and do awfully well. Without realizing that she was thinking out loud she said to him:

“You’re just as good a gamekeeper as Fleagle was, if not better.”

Jim reached out and gave one of her sandy curls a gentle tug. “I’m going to have a great big scarlet ribbon made for you and on it, printed in gold, will be: ‘Miss Nonsense of America.’ ”

“Yes, yes,” Mart agreed. “I’ll be her press agent.
We’ll tour the country together, I in my limousine and she in her cage. Remind me to make a sign for that cage, Jim. Something to the effect that customers should not poke their fingers through the bars unless they wish to lose said fingers.”

Trixie bared her teeth at him. “I wish I were a lioness so I could bite your head off.”

“Oh, please,” Honey implored them. “Let’s go into what’s left of the clubhouse and hold a meeting.” She led the way and when they had gathered around the table, she said, “Trixie and I were just talking to Regan about maybe our getting the gamekeeper job, at least for a week, anyway. He’s talking to Miss Trask about it now.”

There was silence for a minute, then Mart emitted a loud, “WOW! If Miss Trask agrees, that’s a sure fifty bucks.” He turned to Brian. “Maybe you can get your jalopy after all.”

Brian shook his head. “That Ford’s at the secondhand car dealer’s place now. That is, if it hasn’t already been sold.”

“Well, let’s not worry about that now,” Trixie said hastily. “The important thing is for somebody to talk Miss Trask into agreeing with Regan that we should have the job.” She pointed her finger at Jim. “You’re that somebody.”

“That’s right,” Brian agreed. “And I now understand what Trixie was driving at when she said you’d make a good gamekeeper. If you didn’t have to go to school, Jim, you could hold down the job all by yourself.”

“Singlehanded is the word,” Honey said with a giggle. “It’s one of Regan’s favorites. He keeps on using it the way Trixie and I keep saying—”

“Never mind,” Jim interrupted. “If Regan’s on our side, we’ve practically won the battle. But I’ll go up to the house now and see what cooks.” He hurried off.

They sat there tensely waiting until he came back in less than ten minutes. There was a broad grin on his freckled face and he greeted them with a loud whoop:

“It’s all set. Except for a slight hitch.”

“Oh, no,” Honey moaned. “Don’t tell us.
We
know. Miss Trask doesn’t think Trixie and I can cope with poachers.”

He threw one arm around her slim shoulders and gave her a brotherly hug. “The chance of you and Trixie stumbling across a poacher is one in a million, little sister. So don’t you two let your vivid imaginations run away with you while you patrol.”

“Well, what
is
the hitch then?” Trixie demanded. She found it hard to be patient.

Jim pointed to the gaping hole in the ceiling. “That,”
he said succinctly. “We’ve got to stop working on the roof while we clear the paths and then repair the feeding stations.”

“Oh, nuts,” Mart cried. “That’ll probably take the entire week, and in the meantime—”

“Oh, let’s not be so pessimistic,” Brian broke in cheerfully. “The paths may not be blocked and how do we know? Maybe all of the feeding stations are still intact.”

Jim shrugged. “In either case, we’ve got to get going at once. Let’s just hope this bright sunny weather lasts until we boys are through. The girls, of course, will have to do all of the patrolling. Until school closes next Wednesday for the Thanksgiving holidays, that means, Trixie and Honey, that you kids will have to get up at dawn. Can you do it?”

“Of course we can,” Trixie retorted. “Tomorrow’s Sunday, so we don’t have to patrol early in the morning before school except on Monday and Tuesday. Two days aren’t going to kill us.”

“Says you,” Mart put in. “You die a thousand deaths every morning when the alarm clock goes off at seven. Thus, according to my mental slide rule, you’ll die two and a half thousand deaths when you have to get up at five-thirty.”

“Oh, don’t be so silly, Mart,” Honey cried impatiently. “In the first place, your mental slide rule is all off. In the second place, Trixie and I
like
to ride early in the morning. After all, we’ve been doing it ever since the storm because the horses simply have to be exercised and you boys have been much too busy working on the roof of the clubhouse even to go near the stable.”

“All right, all right,” Jim said, grinning. “Then it’s all settled. Except for one thing. When you girls patrol, for Pete’s sake, stick to the old bridle trails. Don’t wander off on any of the paths. While we boys work we’ll cope with that part of the patrolling.”

“Oh, heavens, yes,” Mart cried. “By all means stick to the trails, squaws. Otherwise, we’ll have to hire bloodhounds if we ever want to see you again.” In a loud aside to Brian he added, “Not that we ever want to. Trixie, I mean. After all, Honey is handy with a needle, so it would be tragic if we lost
her.”

Jim chuckled. “But Trixie sort of grows on you. Now that I’m used to her form of insanity, I’d hate to lose her. She’s sort of a human slide rule. Anybody who isn’t as crazy as she is, must be sane by comparison. If you see what I mean.”

“We do, we do,” Trixie said wearily. “Pardon me for moving around, but there’s a shortage of strait jackets.
As soon as I can get into one, I’ll curl up for a long winter’s nap, while you heroes do all of my chores. Complete with Bobby and dawn patrol.”

“Oh, no,” Mart yelled. “Dawn patrol I could endure for the sake of the club. But Bobby, no. Why, if I had to do your Bobby-sitting for you, I’d be as crazy as you are in no time at all.” He clenched his fist and tapped her lightly on the chin. “So
don’t
go and get lost!”

Sunday turned out to be another crisp, cool, sunshiny day. Trixie and Honey met at the stable right after breakfast. As they saddled and bridled their horses, Honey said:

“The boys sure did a lot of work yesterday afternoon. They cleared all of the paths, and Jim said this morning that he’s not very worried about the feeding stations. All of the ones they inspected yesterday were all right.”

“That’s good,” Trixie said as she swung up on the back of the lovely young mare, Susie. This horse theoretically belonged to Miss Trask, but because Miss Trask seldom had time to ride, Trixie felt that Susie really belonged to her.

Honey mounted Starlight and said, “This good weather can’t last long, Trixie. And if the boys can’t repair the clubhouse roof before we get sleet and snow and all, well, we might just as well forget that we ever had a clubhouse.” They trotted along the path that led up to the section of the game preserve that lay behind
the
Robin
. As they passed the red trailer, Honey said, “I’m
so
glad the honeymoon cottage escaped the storm. Celia and Tom would be brokenhearted if they came back and found the
Robin
the mess our clubhouse is. Oh, Trixie,” she finished in a wail of despair. “I know I’m silly to get so upset, but all of my life while I was going to boarding schools and camps I kept dreaming about someday belonging to a boys’ and girls’ club—and—and now our clubhouse is ruined.”

Trixie said nothing for a while. She knew that Honey, who had been a poor little rich girl until the Wheelers bought the Manor House and adopted Jim, would suffer more than any of the others if the clubhouse couldn’t be rebuilt. And the funny part of it was that if Honey wanted a brand-new wonderful clubhouse all she had to do was tell her father and he would have one built for her right away. But none of the Bob-Whites, Honey least of all, would have liked that. So there was nothing to do but hope that the boys would have time to do the necessary work on the clubhouse roof before winter set in. The sky now, thank heavens, was a solid blue arch without a cloud in it. But you never could count on November weather. They might wake up on Thanksgiving morning to find themselves in the midst of a blizzard.