The Mystery in Arizona

crossed,” Jim said and hurried back to the kitchen.
    “Fingers and toes,” Mart added. “Wow! Two weeks in the Sunshine City of Tucson. Cowboys, Indians, horses, deserts.” He patted Trixie’s hand paternally. “I pity you, poor little stay-at-home!” Trixie said nothing; she was too dose to tears to speak a word.
    And then Di came hurrying back, her lovely face glowing with pleasure. “It’s all settled,” she fairly shouted. “Uncle Monty just telephoned. We leave early Monday morning on a nonstop flight!”

The Big Question • 2

    MART HOWLED. “Monday morning? That means none of us can go. The holidays don’t start until next Friday, a whole week from today!”
    Do we have to leave on Monday?” Honey asked. “Why so early?”
    “I don’t understand it myself,” Di said. “But it has something to do with an ancient Mexican Christmas rite called La Posada , which takes place on Tuesday evening. Uncle Monty wants us to be out there a day ahead of time, so that means leaving Monday morning.” She stared down at her plate. “Mother said I could go, and she was so sure your parents would let you all go on Monday, too, that she’s telephoning Dad right now to have him make the plane reservations.”
    Mr. Lynch, like Mr. Wheeler, commuted daily to his office in New York City, but Mr. Belden worked in the Sleepyside bank. “We’d better call your father up right away,” Trixie said to Di, “and tell him not to buy a ticket for me. If you were going to leave on Friday, I might do enough homework between now and then to convince Moms and Dad that I will pass the midyears. But next Monday! I haven’t a prayer.”
    “Oh, dear,” Di moaned. “Why did you have to neglect your studies at a time like this, Trix?”
    “That’s Trixie for you,” said Mart, shaking his head gravely. “She always does the right things at the wrong times and the wrong things at the right times for making them wronger, if you follow me.”
    “We don’t,” Trixie retorted sourly. “And what, may I ask, makes you so sure that you will be allowed to leave on Monday? Your own math marks can’t be so good that Moms and Dad will be thrilled at the idea of your skipping five days of school.” Mart waved his hands airily. “If you had kept awake evenings during the past few weeks you would have learned that Brian, our brainy brother, has been tutoring me in algebra, with the result that I now have attained the giddy heights of an eighty average.”
    Trixie flushed. Why hadn’t she stayed awake and studied nights? Why hadn’t she thought of asking Brian for help?
    Brian, whose ambition was to become a doctor, really was a brain, and he was so good-natured that no matter how busy he might be he would never refuse to help his younger brother and sister with their homework.
    Jim was very good in all subjects, and Trixie knew that he would have helped her, too. He liked to teach so much that when he had inherited half a million dollars after his miserly uncle died, he immediately decided to invest it in a boys’ school, which he would both own and operate after he finished his own education.
    Trixie sighed, thinking, “There is just no excuse for my low marks. I deserve to be left behind on Monday.”
    As though she had been reading her mind, Honey said, Tm not sure Mother and Daddy will want Jim and me to skip five days of school, either, Di. I’m afraid we’ll just have to miss that ceremony and go on Friday.”
    Di shook her head. “The whole point is that Dad is flying to the Coast on Monday, which means he can be with us as far as Tucson. Mother won’t let me go without him.”
    Honey frowned. “We could fly out in care of the stewardess, you know.”
    “You could, but not me,” Di returned. “My mother is not as sophisticated as yours. She’s scared to death of planes, and she won’t even talk about the possibility of my flying unless Dad goes along.”
    “Things are getting more complicated by the minute,” said Mart. “Maybe you'd better call your father, Di, and tell him not to make any reservations until we’ve talked to our parents.”
    “Oh, I can’t do that,” Di wailed. “If he doesn’t make the reservations today, it will be too late. Tomorrow is Saturday and—”
    The bell rang then, and they hurried off to their homerooms. Several times during the afternoon Trixie tried to get a chance to tell Di that she must phone her father and tell him not to reserve a ticket for her, but the