The Mysterious Code

said.
    Trixie sighed in
relief. “I guess it's up to you to call Daddy," she said to Brian. “He
knows by now that something has delayed us.”
    “I’ll tell him we’ll
get up early in the morning and shovel the snow,” Brian said “Here goes!” Honey
and Diana went inside the school, too, to use the public telephone in the
vestibule.
    “Another problem
arises,” Mart said when they were together again. “A question of finances. We
must eat” He turned his pocket inside out “I have exactly nothing.”
    “I have fifty
cents,” Trixie said, hunting in the pocket of her coat “Think no more about
it,” Jim assured them. “We have a charge account at Wimpy’s. Dad set it up for
Honey and me in case of an emergency. We can fill up on hamburgers, French
fried potatoes, and malts, at least. Let’s go.”
    “Saved!” Mart said.
    Forgetting for a
little while the dark cloud that filled their sky, the B.W.G.'s crowded into
the narrow replica of a dining car.
    Only one person was
at the counter—Spider Webster.
    “Well, if it isn’t
the prize member of the FBI and her squad,” Spider said as they sat down
nearby.
    Trixie wrinkled her
nose at him.
    “Have you rounded up
any crooks lately?” Spider asked.
    “No, but I wish I
could. There are some crooks just spoiling to be caught.” Trixie was serious.
    The man behind the
counter waited.
    “Two hamburgers all
around,” Jim said. “Is that all right, gang?”
    They nodded.
    “With everything,”
Mart added, “onions, catsup, tomatoes, relish—”
    “And French fried
potatoes,” Jim added. “Heaps of them. I’m starved.”
    “We didn’t eat a
thing at noon,” Honey explained. Their faces fell, remembering. “Chocolate
malts, Mike,” she told the counterman. “And hurry!”
    “Now, what’s this
about the crooks who need attention?” Spider wanted to know, moving the catsup
bottle over to Trixie, who sat next to him.
    “Haven’t you heard
about all the things that have happened at Junior-Senior High?” Honey asked.
    Spider’s face
sobered. “Why, yes, yes I have. We’re working on it.”
    “The teachers seem
to think it may be an inside job,” Mart said.
    Spider spoke
nervously. “They do?” he asked. “The police haven’t any clues so far as I know.
I don’t think they’ve ever thought it was any of the students that did it,
though.”
    Spider’s brother
Tad, fourteen, was a freshman at Sleepyside High. Their father and mother were
dead, and Spider had tried to take their place with him. The B.W.G. s had some
idea of how much Tad worried his brother, and it made them provoked. They
didn’t think Tad was really bad, but they did wish he would act his age.
    Mart went on
talking. “The teachers think it must be kids,” he said. “You see, they do crazy
things like some kids do.”
    “Like what?” Spider
asked.
    “Such things as
upsetting desks, spilling wastebaskets, even breaking some of the windows...
“No looting?” Spider asked.
    “Last night, yes,”
Mart answered. “Isn’t that what you told us, Trixie?”
    “Last night,” Trixie
said soberly, “someone stole some money from Mr. Stratton’s desk, and a number
of the lockers were broken open.”
    The look on Spider’s
face alarmed her when she said this. Suddenly she remembered a conversation she
had overheard in the hall. Tad was telling another member of the Hawks that he
had asked his brother Spider for ten dollars for some equipment they needed.
Tad said his brother told him he didn’t have the money. Could it be that Spider
wondered if Tad might have found another way to get his hands on some money?
    Spider’s voice broke
in on Trixie’s puzzlement. “I suppose you kids think you can find the vandals,
and that’s why you’re in town on a school night,” he said sarcastically. “If
so, you’d better go on home. That’s a job for the police.”
    “That isn’t the
reason,” Trixie said, and she told Spider about the threat to their club. She
told him, too, of the plan they had to try to save the club.
    Tad came in while
they were talking and heard Trixie telling about the proposed antique show.
“Huh!” he sneered. “Who’d ever go to an old antique show? Why don’t you have a
boxing match?”
    “Who’d do the
boxing?” Spider asked.
    “I would,” Tad said.
“I’d take on both Brian and Jim any day.”
    “What a long tail
our cat has!” Mart jeered. “Yes, and I’d take you on, too, squirt,” said Tad,
doubling up his