The Mysterious Visitor

most friendly and the most pleasant people in the world.
    "After that awful Olyfant," Trixie reflected with a grin, "even a tribe of cannibals would look nice to me."
    A cab was parked on the comer of Main Street, and she gratefully climbed inside. Weak with relief because at last she was really safe, she sank back against the cushions and stared at her shaking hands. Gradually they stopped shaking as Trixie’s spirits rose. Getting the proof she needed had been worth the terrifying minutes she had spent in front of Olyfant’s hotel. There was no doubt in her mind now that it was Uncle Monty whom Tom had seen at the station that Saturday afternoon.
    The cab stopped at the Belden’s back terrace, and Mart, looking very cross, came down the terrace steps and paid the taxi driver.
    "Listen, lame-brain," he began and then, as she sank down on the low stone wall of the terrace, "Gleeps! You look as though you’d seen a ton of ghosts. What happened? Are you going to flunk math this term?"
    Trixie opened her mouth to tell him about her frightening experience, then changed her mind. Mart could be very sympathetic at times, but she sensed that this wasn’t one of those times. "Is Moms mad at me because I had to stay after school to talk to Miss Golden?" Trixie asked in a quavering voice.
    "She doesn’t even know it," Mart said disgustedly. "How could you have forgotten, you dope? She and her prize mums are at the Garden Club show. Which means that you owe me a buck. Seventy-five cents for the taxi, and a quarter for taking care of Bobby."
    Oh, oh, Trixie thought, how could I have forgotten the flower show? Suppose Brian and Mart hadn’t come straight home from school. Bobby would have been all alone this whole past hour! She shuddered. Bobby, when left to his own resources for even a short time, usually managed to get himself into some sort of scrape. Very often these scrapes amounted to narrow escapes.
    "I’m sorry, Mart," Trixie said contritely. "I’ll pay you back as soon as I get my allowance on Saturday. And thanks for taking over for me."
    "I’ve a good mind to charge you double for baby-sitting," Mart said. "Or should I say fiendsitting? Wait till you hear—"
    The phone rang then, and Trixie hurried inside to answer it.
    It was Honey. "Can you come up right away? I have something very important to tell you."
    "I can’t," Trixie said. "I was supposed to come straight home from school to take care of Bobby while Moms is at the Garden Club show. I forgot, and Mart has been stuck with him, and he’s furious. Can’t you come down here to tell me, Honey?"
    "In a sec," Honey said and hung up.
    Trixie hurried up to her room and changed her skirt for jeans. Bobby was playing in his room across the hall, and he yelled at her:
    "Hey! Where you been?"
    "Oh, around," Trixie said vaguely. "Did Mart give you your orange juice to drink?"
    Bobby came into her room, dragging a very worn giant panda behind him. "Nope. Mart didn’t gived it to me. I gived it to my own self."
    "How smart of you!" Trixie gave him a hug. "You’re getting very grown up since you started school."
    "I squoozed it my own self, too," he said, proudly holding out his hands. On every finger was a bandage. "I cutted myself with that great big kitchen knife but I didn’t cry at all. I didn’t yell, either."
    Mart appeared then. "In the two minutes that elapsed between the arrival of his bus and our bus, he managed to create a shambles. I don’t know how he does it."
    "Bobby," Trixie cried, holding him close to her. "You know you’re not supposed to touch knives." Guiltily she thought, If he’d cut himself badly it would have been all my fault. I’ve got to stop going around in a daze, or something awful will happen.
    Honey called to her from the terrace, and Trixie yelled out the window, "Come up to my room." She guided Bobby back across the hall. "Play with your toys like a good boy for just a little while, then I’ll give you a long ride on my bike." Mart greeted Honey at the top of the stairs. "You girls are certainly acting suspiciously. First Trix arrives from the village looking as though she’d seen a ghost. Then Honey arrives gasping for breath. What gives, girls?"
    He waited a minute and, when neither of them replied, galloped downstairs.
    Once the girls were alone in Trixie’s room, Honey exploded. "Oh, Trixie, you were absolutely right about Di’s uncle. He’s a terrible man. I called her up after I got home from school to find