The Happy Valley Mystery

old Tag has!”
    The collie lay on the floor in the comer of the big kitchen, pawing at his sore nose, which had doubled in size.
    “I’ll help you,” Trixie said, her laughter turned to pity at the poor dog’s plight. “Good old Tag! Are you making a poultice?” she asked Mrs. Gorman.
    “Here it is.” Mrs. Gorman handed Trixie a cloth soaked in warm water and soda. “You’ll have to keep it on his nose,” she said. “If you can keep it there for about ten minutes, it’ll take the sting away and the swelling will start to go down.”
    Tag moaned and licked Trixie’s hand but let her keep the poultice on his poor nose. Tip, restless, walked around and around Tag, seeming to sense something wrong.
    “There, now,” Mrs. Gorman said. “Thank goodness there was no more harm done than that. I’ve seen Hank and Ben pretty sick from beestings. Heavens, I’d better stir around and get something for you to eat. You’re probably starved.”
    Ned snapped his fingers. “Am la dumb bunny!” he said. “I forgot to say that Mom has a picnic lunch waiting for us over at our house. She told me to tell you that as soon as I came, Mrs. Gorman, and I forgot. Gee, I hope you haven’t gone and cooked a lot of things.”
    “I haven’t,” Mrs. Gorman assured him. “I’ve been so busy all morning. I had to sort of clean up the kitchen and put Midnight’s playpen away. Ben took him out to the barn and, well, with one thing and another....”
    “Good!” Ned said. “Mom has a lot of food waiting... even cherry pies.”
    “Say no more; I’m dying,” Mart said, holding his stomach.
    “I guess we’re all hungry,” Honey said. “It’s a grand idea, Ned.”
    “It sure is pouring down now I” Bob exclaimed.
    “We can crowd into my car,” Ned said. “It’ll hold all of you till we get across the road and down to our house, anyway. We’ll eat and then roll up the mg and dance. I’ve got some neat country western records.”
    “I sure can’t think of a better way to spend a rainy afternoon!” said Mart.
    “I can,” Trixie whispered to Jim.
    “So can I,” Honey, who heard her, whispered.
    “Have a heart!” Jim answered. “Look at the rain come down!”
    “And remember, this is Friday,” Trixie hissed. “You promised.”
    “All right, all right,” Jim murmured, resigned. “What are we going to tell Ned?”
    “Leave it to me,” Trixie answered.
    “We’ll just have to eat and rim, Jim and Honey and I,” she told Ned. “We have to go to the airport and pick up our reservations for Sunday.”
    “Jeepers!” Brian said. “I forgot. I’ll go with you, Jim, and let the girls stay in out of the rain. Better yet, why can’t we just call the airport?”
    “I’m not made of sugar,” Trixie said quickly, “and neither is Honey. Anyway, we have some shopping to do in the airport shop.”
    “Important enough to go out in a cloudburst for?” Brian asked.
    “Yes,” Trixie and Honey answered together. “Okay,” Brian said. “Don’t say I didn’t offer.”
    “Don’t say I did!” Mart chimed in. “Come on, gang, let’s get to Ned’s house. Better bring your jackets. It’s still raining. Boy, am I hungry!”
     

Dinner With the Schulzes • 14
     
    NED’S RED CAR, crowded almost beyond its capacity with nine young people, turned onto the winding road that led from Army Post Road to Seven Oaks, Ned Schulz’s home.
    The house was built of brick, a pre-Civil War home, remodeled and modernized. When the car stopped, Ned’s two German shepherd dogs, who looked almost as tall as the car itself, wagged their huge bodies to show how glad they were that their master and his friends had come.
    “They’re beauties,” Jim said, making friends immediately as Ned introduced the dogs to each one of them, laying his hand on each shoulder as he did.
    “If I didn’t do that,” Ned said, “they might try to protect me from you. I’ve had them six years. Once, when we lived in Evanston, they saved my life... in Lake Michigan.”
    Ned put his head down close to the big dogs’ heads and whispered to them, stroking their necks and tugging at their ears.
    “It makes me lonesome for Reddy,” Trixie said. “He’s my little brother Bobby’s red setter. I guess he really belongs to the whole family. Jim has a black-and-white springer called Patch. He sort of belongs to all of us, too.”
    Ned had stopped the car under an old-fashioned porte cochère. The rain still came down in buckets, but