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the card on the mantelpiece. “She ought to be told what happened here.”
    While Brian wrote the note, Trixie stood thinking about her experiment with the cellar door. She would have liked to discuss it with the other Bob-Whites. Somehow, though, she had the feeling that Di wouldn’t like to hear that Harrison had not told the truth.
    In the end, she said nothing. I’ll talk it over with Honey later, she thought.
    At almost the same moment, Honey nudged her gently in the ribs. “I have something I want to tell you,” she whispered. “It’s the funniest thing.”
    “Funny ha-ha or funny peculiar?”
    Honey laughed. “You sound like Bobby. I meant that it’s funny peculiar. Remember when you were on the front porch calling the others?”
    “I remember.”
    “Well,” Honey whispered, “I could see old Harrison was really worried about something. When I asked him what was wrong, he said he’d let himself into the house with a spare front door key. Mrs. Crandall always keeps it under a flowerpot on the porch.”
    “We ought to put it back then,” Trixie said. “But that’s what I’m trying to tell you. Harrison wanted me to put it back for him. He was certain he’d left it on the kitchen table.”
    “But I didn’t see any key on the kitchen table when we arrived,” Trixie answered.
    “That’s just it,” Honey said. “It wasn’t there. Harrison had me search everywhere, but I never did find it. It had completely disappeared.”
    “Did you ask the others if they’d seen it?”
    “No,” Honey said slowly. “Harrison asked me not to. First, he said he was sure one of you would mention it if you found it. Then he said he probably hadn’t put it on the kitchen table at all. But I could tell he was positive he had.”
    Before she left with the others, Trixie, still carrying the derby hat, paused thoughtfully in the doorway of the little house.
    What had happened here last night? Why hadn’t Harrison told them the truth? Who was the person who had locked him in the cellar? And where was that door key? Had it really vanished?
    The more Trixie thought about it, the more puzzling it was.
    “It’s just like all the other mysteries,” Trixie said to herself. “It keeps on getting curiouser and curiouser.”

The Missing Vase ● 6

    THE BOB-WHITES were riding home once more when Trixie suddenly called, “Gleeps! I forgot something! I meant to take another look at those alphabet trees. I don’t suppose you guys would wait while I—”
    “You’re right; we wouldn’t!” Jim grinned at her from his seat on Jupiter’s back. “As it is, Regan will be wondering what’s kept us.”
    “Besides,” Mart drawled over his shoulder, “I, for one, want to hasten to weave our enticing enchantments around Miss Trask.”
    “Knowing you, my dear brother,” Trixie retorted, urging Susie on once more, “I’m sure it wouldn’t be long before you put your foot in your mouth. Maybe you’d better leave the talking to us.”
    Mart was still trying to think of something sufficiently scathing to say in reply when the horses trotted into the Wheelers’ stable yard.
    He slid from Strawberry’s back and said at last, “Introducing one’s foot into one’s oral cavity may be a reprehensible habit, O squaw! But it is not, methinks, as bad as having a pronounced predilection for unraveling murky mysteries.”
    “What murky mysteries have you been unraveling now?” asked a cool voice.
    Gray-haired Miss Trask, who managed the Wheeler estate for Honey’s millionaire father, emerged from the stable’s fragrant interior. She looked as trim as ever in a neat tweed suit.
    Patch, Jim’s black and white springer spaniel, followed close at her heels. Patch hurried to each of the dismounting Bob-Whites in turn and received an absentminded pat on the head from each of them.
    He didn’t seem to mind the lack of attention. He sat watching everyone, his head to one side, as all the Bob-Whites began talking at once.
    It