The Black Jacket Mystery

before the end of the week. That’s all.”
    He turned abruptly and started back to his horse. Trixie ran after him impulsively, ignoring the snow that fell on her bare head. She called, “Please wait a minute.” And when Regan, stony-faced, waited to hear what was on her mind, she asked quickly, “Did Dan tell you he was the one who found Honey’s watch and sold it?”
    Even in the semidarkness, his face looked stern. “No, Trixie. He hadn’t the grace to admit it. But I looked at those boot marks on the ground where she lost the watch, and he might as well have signed his name.”
    “Honey still thinks it might have been somebody else,” Trixie suggested. “Other boys wear boots like that.”
    But Regan shook his head. “In the city, maybe. Not out here.” He turned toward Jupiter, and Trixie heard him say, half under his breath, “I guess we were foolish to expect anything else.”
    Trixie went back into the little clubhouse, shaking off the snowflakes. She was shivering with cold.
    “I guess there’s no doubt about Dan.” Honey sighed. “But, somehow, I feel terribly disappointed. Poor Mr. Maypenny! How he must hate to send Dan away!”
    “How Dan must hate to be sent away! He’s been having a ball, swaggering around the other kids at school, telling them what a big shot he was in the city. I bet he’ll be simply furious at us! There’s no telling what he might do for revenge!” Trixie’s imagination was making her shiver even more than the wet snowflakes were.
    Honey laughed. “Now you’re taking his wild stories seriously! I still think he isn’t half as dangerous as he pretends to be! He just made up those yams.”
    But when they and the boys stopped by the clubhouse the next morning to pick up the finished posters and take them to Sleepyside on the bus, they changed their minds about Dan’s boasting and bragging about being tough. Perhaps he had been telling the truth, after all!
     

A Thief in the Sight • 13
    ITHAD STOPPED snowing sometime in the night, and there were only a few inches of snow carpeting the ground around the small clubhouse when they came up outside.
    “I’ll dash in and get the posters,” Mart offered and cut across the smooth expanse of snow toward the front door.
    The others waited for him to reappear, Brian glancing with a frown at his watch while they stood around. “Mart! What in the world is keeping you?” he called out.
    Trixie giggled. “Another black bear?” She grinned at Jim.
    “No bear of mine this time.” Jim laughed. But he stopped laughing abruptly as Mart appeared in the doorway and called out in an oddly strained voice, “Hey, come in here!”
    “We re late now. We’ll miss die bus!” Brian yelled back. “Come on, and cut the clowning.”
    “Better take a look,” Mart answered seriously. “We’ve had a visitor.”
    They exchanged worried glances as they hurried to see what he meant. And when they looked around inside the usually neat little cottage, they were dismayed at the wreckage someone had left.
    “Looks like one of us left the front door unlocked last night,” Jim said with a frown.
    “Not us!” Trixie defended herself and Honey at once. “We put the catch on the lock, and I closed the door tight after us. Then Honey tried the knob, and it was locked. We always do it that way, so that we share the responsibility.”
    “Somebody goofed this time,” Mart said grimly. “Wow! Posters spread around on the floor, paint pots tipped over, curtains torn. Looks as if our visitor had a grudge against us!”
    A light gust of wind blew in the curtain at the window through which Trixie had watched Regan ride up the night before. Trixie glanced at it, feeling the draft. “Hey, the window’s broken. That’s how they got in, whoever they were!”
    Brian hurried over and found one pane broken. “You’re right, Trixie. This pane has been smashed so they could reach in and unlock the window. And the snow’s been wiped off the sill, probably by somebody’s hand. I wish one of us knew something about taking fingerprints.”
    Trixie said, “Oh!” suddenly and darted behind the partition. They heard her rummaging around back there as if she were looking for something. Then she exclaimed, “I knew it!” and a moment later came rushing out with the small tin box that they called the Temper Box. Whenever one of them lost his or her temper, that one had to put a dime in the box as a penalty. There had been three dollars and