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standing in the middle of the road and sniffing the air with rapturous expression. “M-m-m! I smell violets! Let’s stop right here and pick some.”
    Trixie tilted her pert nose and sniffed. “Smells more like swamp to me,” she said flatly. Then, a moment later, her blue eyes sparkled. “Swamp! Wait a minute!” She ran to stand beside Honey. “Let’s see which way it’s coming from, and we’ll know which direction to go!”
    “Oh, Trixie, you’re a genius!” Honey exclaimed.
    They both stood still and sniffed inquiringly. It took Trixie only a moment to make up her mind. “Nothing from the east,” she announced, then sniffed inquiringly toward the west. “There! That’s it! West!”
    Honey wrinkled her pretty nose and pointed it west. “You’re right! Let’s go!” she laughed.
    A moment later, they were on their way.
    Honey called over to Trixie as they rode. “Can you remember any of the landmarks on the map?”
    “Golly, I don’t think so,” Trixie admitted mournfully. But a couple of minutes later, as they turned a corner, she gave a sudden exclamation and pointed ahead. “Look!
    A big oak split by lightning. Wasn’t there something about that on the map?”
    “Oak—lightning—why, of course! Now I remember!” Honey agreed excitedly. “Brian drew a tree with a big zigzag of lightning hitting it. There was a road beyond it just a little way, I think, where we turn off.”
    “Let’s take a look,” Trixie said eagerly and was on her way before she had finished speaking. Honey was not far behind her as they reached the big oak and went on to look for the turnoff road.
    The smell of the marsh was getting stronger every second, and the road was starting to get rougher and narrower.
    Suddenly Trixie let her bike veer across the dirt toward Honey, and they almost collided. Her eyes were fixed on something deep in among the trees at the side of the road. “Honey! Look! A huge old house!”
    They stopped and stared. At first sight, it had seemed like a whole house, one that a person could live in. But a closer look showed that it was only a shell. Three stories high, with part of its gambrel roof still covering the upper story, it stood in the midst of tall trees and a vast tangle of vegetation.
    “Reminds me of the Frayne house after Jim’s good-for-nothing stepfather accidentally set fire to it,” Trixie said. “Fire can really wreck a place, even when it’s brick and stone.”
    “It seems a shame, ” Honey sighed, “a waste of money. I suppose that’s the old Martin mansion where the partner of Captain Kidd lived.”
    “Dad said that people only suspected that he was Kidd’s partner.” Then Trixie added, “But I bet he was, all right. All sorts of things could have gone on in a spot that must have been at least a day’s journey from the city. And the Hudson is only a short distance away. There’s a swamp to hide in, besides.”
    Honey stole a quick look at Trixie as her friend was speaking. Trixie was getting the look that showed she was beginning to make plans. “Trixie Belden, you can just forget it,” she said, shaking a finger at her. “I know what you’re thinking.”
    “Huh?” Trixie looked surprised, and then she laughed. “We could just take a little bit of a look around in there. You know, I’ve heard about old places like that having secret passages underneath, especially when something unlawful was going on, like pirating. Suppose we just happened to find a trapdoor or a secret panel, and there was a tunnel, and—” Trixie’s vivid imagination had gone to work.
    Honey interrupted hastily. “And cobwebs and spiders and rats and maybe—” she gulped—“maybe skeletons. Ugh! You’re not going to talk me into exploring that house!”
    Trixie sighed. “Okay, scaredy-cat. But it would be fun to look around outside. Maybe we could even find some antique doorknobs or stuff like that and sell it to make some money for the B.W.G. treasury!”
    Honey looked at