The Happy Valley Mystery

suggestion set Honey laughing for some reason or other. That sounds good, Trixie thought.
    “Maybe playing a game sounds silly,” she said aloud. “But let’s do it, anyway. I’m thinking of something.”
    “Animal or mineral?” Jim asked, glad to get into the game to help take their minds off their predicament.
    “Animal.”
    “Manufactured?” Honey asked.
    “Yes.”
    “Does it belong to any one person?”
    “No.”
    “Is it alive?” Honey questioned.
    “Oh, Honey,” Jim teased, “how could it be manufactured and alive? Is it edible?”
    “Yes,” Trixie whispered. Even her whisper was hoarse now.
    “I know what it is,” Honey said, tears in her voice. “It’s Mrs. Schulz’s fried chicken, and I’m so hungry and cold, and I’m terrified! I don’t want to play any old game. I just want— Jiminy, do you see what I see? Over there toward what you said was Sand Hill?”
    Trixie, who had hardly taken her eyes from the spot since darkness came, said exultantly, “Yes, Honey—oh, yes, Honey—I see it—a light—and it’s coming this way. Hey!”
    She tried to call. Nothing came but a hoarse croak.
    Jim tried to call, too. But his voice had gone completely.
    Honey tried—in vain.
    Only the small dog’s half-whimper, half-yip cut the silence.
    “Nobody will pay any attention to the dog,” Honey whispered. “How can we let them know where we are?”
    Jim pulled a piece of iron loose from the cupola. When the putt-putt-putt of the outboard motor grew nearer, he beat hard against the hinges of the cupola windows. The noise was loud, but evidently no one in the boat heard. The frightened little dog inside the cupola cried more plaintively.
    The light of the boat came nearer. “It’s Mr. Gorman’s flash lantern,” Trixie said. “It’s a boat from Happy Valley! Oh, make him turn that flash lantern this way! What can we do?”
    In the pale light of the moon, they could see two figures in the boat.
    “One of them is Mr. Gorman,” Trixie said.
    “The other is Mart, I think,” Jim said. “If only they’d cut off that motor for a little bit, we just might be able to make them hear us somehow.”
    As though they had heard Jim’s mind, the motor was cut off, and the boat drifted. Someone took a megaphone and called, “Jim! Jim! Trixie! Trixie! Honey! Honey!”
    “It’s Mart!” Honey choked.
    Oh, heaven, let one of us be able to answer, Trixie prayed. Together they tried. The hoarse, frantic sounds almost burst their throats. But no one could possibly hear them.
    The boat drifted nearer and nearer, near enough that they could hear the voices of the people in it.
    The puppy yipped. The water in the river lapped quietly, menacingly, against the roof. Trixie tore off her jacket and waved it frantically. So did Honey. Jim beat on the iron hinge.
    In the boat, Mart held the megaphone to his mouth and called, “Jim! Jim! Trixie! Trixie! Honey! Honey! Are you out there somewhere? Answer! Jim! Trixie! Honey! Trixie-e-e!”
    Suddenly Trixie dropped the jacket she was waving, and, with an exultant hoarse cry, she put her two fingers to her lips and whistled shrilly: bob, bob-white! bob, bob-white!
    Out in the boat Mart threw his arms in the air for joy, and back came the answering whistle: bob, bob-white! bob, bob-white!
    Jim and Honey, overcome with joy, sat silent.
    Off in the high water, the motorboat came alive. Its motor turned over, started up, and, straight as an arrow, came to the edge of the old red barn.
    Mr. Gorman raised his gun and shot into the air.
    From the far edge of the water another gun answered.
    “They know you’re safe,” Mr. Gorman said. “Thank God!”
    When the boat grounded at the foot of Sand Hill, a crowd of about fifty people waited. There were men, women, boys, and girls, even a dozen or so from the Rivervale High crowd.
    Brian and Diana joyously threw their arms around the trio. Someone wrapped blankets about them. Someone else herded them into a waiting car.
    Up the hill they went, with all the cars following.
    In Trixie’s arms, the puppy went to sleep.
    Back at Happy Valley Farm, Mrs. Gorman waited. Immediately she took charge of the blanketed Bob-Whites. “It’s into warm baths for all of you,” she said. “Hank, you take Jim—”
    “Holy cow,” Jim said, “I can still bathe myself!”
    It broke the tension. Everyone laughed, even Mrs. Gorman. Jim’s big, lanky form towered above stocky Mr. Gorman.
    “Heavens, I didn’t mean that!” Mrs.