The Mystery at Saratoga

go out on the town for dinner. That’ll give them a chance to freshen up a little.”
    “Thanks, Mrs. Wheeler,” Trixie said gratefully. “I’ll see you at the hotel. Thank you, too, for showing us around, Mr. Worthington.”
    Honey, looking vaguely worried at her best friend’s strangely quiet mood, thanked Mr. Worthington and followed Trixie out of the stands.
    The two girls walked slowly through the rapidly thinning crowd to the front gate of the racetrack, where a row of taxis was waiting to pick up passengers returning to their homes and hotels.
    Suddenly Trixie broke into a run, weaving through the crowd and shouting, “Excuse me, please!” as she pushed her way past startled adults. Honey followed, trying to keep Trixie in sight without knocking anyone out of the way.
    When they were almost at the front gate, Trixie stopped running as abruptly as she had begun. “Wh-What is going on, Trixie?” Honey asked breathlessly as she came up beside her friend.
    “Oh, Honey,” Trixie wailed, “I saw a redheaded man in the crowd. I tried to catch up to him, but he just disappeared!”

Supersleuth Honey ● 11

    HONEY STARED at her friend open-mouthed for a moment, then closed her mouth and swallowed hard. “Oh, Trixie,” she said, her voice cracking, “do you think it was Regan?”
    Trixie’s mouth turned down at the corners and she shrugged. “I don’t know, Honey. I never got close enough to him to tell for sure. The man I saw was about the right size, and he had red hair. That’s all I know.”
    “Oh!” Honey exclaimed in disgust, stamping her foot. “This whole day has been one frustration after another. I’ve felt as though I were about to explode, having to keep all my feelings to myself because you and I were never alone to talk things over.”
    “That’s exactly how I’ve felt, Honey,” Trixie said. “That’s why I passed up the chance to go to the winners’ circle, much as I’d like to any other time. Now we have a couple of hours to talk things over before your parents get to the hotel, starting as soon as we can catch a cab.”
    Unfortunately, the girls’ chance to talk was postponed by their cabdriver, an outgoing, chatty man who began a one-sided conversation almost as soon as the girls got into the cab.
    “It sure is nice to have a couple of fresh-faced young ladies in the cab for a change,” he said. “The customers who usually climb into this hack at the track are a different-looking bunch. High rollers and down-and-outers, but all of ’em people who’ve been around the track too long. Yessir, you ladies are a nice change of pace. Boy, you should have seen the last guy I drove back to town. Now that was a tough customer if ever I saw one, and I’ve seen my share. This guy was big and mean-looking. Nasty scar running all down one side of his face, like he’d got on the wrong end of a knife fight sometime in his life.”
    “I saw that man, too, when we were at the concession stand at the track,” Trixie said.
    “Then you know what I’m talking about,” the driver said, barely stopping his flow of chatter long enough to absorb Trixie’s observation. “Yessir, I’ve seen ’em all. I’ve driven guys to the track who were laughin’ and jokin’ with me all the way out, and picked those same guys up a couple of hours later lookin’ like they were about to bust out cryin’. And I’ve seen guys lookin’ like the cat that ate the canary after a good day’s bettin’, and I’ve seen guys who looked like they’d never lose at the track ’cause they’d do whatever they had to to see that their horses won.
    “Some of the ladies are somethin’ else, too. I get little old ladies that look like they should be home sittin’ in a rockin’ chair on the front porch and tendin’ to their knittin’, unless you look close enough to see the gleam in their eye that means they’re all set to wager a bundle on the ponies. And I get ladies who are all dolled up like they’re goin’ to meet the queen of England, with so much perfume on it makes my eyes water. The saddest, though, are the gamblers’ wives. They come along with their husbands to the track because they think maybe they can stop them from losing their shirts, but they know in their hearts that they can’t. So they just sit in the backseat all quiet and tense, chewin’ their lips and lookin’ half scared to death.” The cabbie shook his head. “They’re the ones 1 feel sorry for. I try to laugh