The Mystery of the Castaway Children

on his stomach and smoothed his hair.
    “How do you know when he’s had enough sun?” Honey asked, plopping down near him.
    “It’s like ironing,” replied Di. “You touch him with a damp finger. If he sizzles, he’s had enough.” Di kept a perfectly straight face except for her pansy-colored eyes, which sparkled with mischief.
    “Come on,” Honey begged. “Remember, I was an only child most of my life. Jim was fifteen years old when he joined the family!”
    Di turned serious. “We re watching the clock over there on the steps and keeping close track of his skin color.”
    Trixie touched the baby’s roughened, chapped skin. “Whoever had him last wasn’t so careful,” she said softly.
    “I’m a better sitter than that whoever,” Di declared.
    Di went home to dinner in the late afternoon, and soon it was time for Trixie and Honey to share the baby’s six o’clock feeding. The two girls arrived at the Belden dinner table radiant with renewed energy.
    “Are you just ego-tripping in general?” inquired Mart. “Or did the baby succumb to your indoctrination and tell you he wants to be a detective when he grows up?”
    Trixie glared at him, but Honey had to giggle. “Neither,” she told him. “There’s just—oh, you know, something special about a baby.”
    “Your point is well taken,” Mart agreed. “I’d recite a poem for you concerning youth’s incorruptibility, but, alas, I myself am too old to remember such innocence.”
    “Oh, Mart,” sighed his mother, “if you talk this way at fifteen, you’re going to be an unbearable old man.” Before Mart had a chance to defend himself, she turned to Mr. Belden. “Peter, I do wish you’d look at our washing machine. Something seems to have caught in the spinning basket.”
    Mr. Belden waggled dark brows at his family. “I’m sure someone else could handle it better.”
    “I’ll take care of it,” said Brian, who was used to tinkering with his jalopy.
    Jim arrived as the group was finishing dinner, and he rumpled Honey’s hair when he passed her chair. “Who’s the new boarder?” he queried. “She vaguely resembles a sister I used to have.” Honey wrinkled her nose. “Seems to me that when I last saw you, dear brother, you were in this very house, too.”
    “And here I plan to stay,” said Jim. “I volunteer for the ten o’clock feeding. But—” he paused dramatically—“I do not come empty-handed. Miss Trask sent a freezer of black walnut ice cream and a coconut cake as partial payment on our board bill.”
    Mart jumped up to offer Jim his chair. “Why didn’t you say so?” he whooped. Serving dishes had only just been emptied of baked ham, garden vegetables, and scalloped potatoes, but Mart was always ready to eat.
    “Hollow legs,” muttered his father.
    “Toes, too,” Bobby said.
    Minutes later, Dan Mangan rode Spartan down the bridle trail. Trixie came out to greet him, and even while she was saying hello, she was looking at Spartan’s great hooves. Almost covered by long, white feathering hairs, his feet were well cared for. No shoes were missing, and, a s Trixie had suspected, Spartan also wore a much larger shoe than the one she had found.
    “It’s time I saw that baby,” Dan demanded.
    “You’ll love him,” said Trixie as she led Dan to the clothes basket.
    Too listless to play, Moses still was able to turn his head and follow a source of sound with alert eyes. Dan stood beside him for several minutes before touching one tiny hand. Fingers moved, found Dan’s thumb, and clung. Dan was so thrilled that he refused to take his hand away until Moses went to sleep.
    While standing with Dan near Moses’ basket, Trixie noticed that the hooked rug by the guestroom beds seemed a little crooked. When she went to straighten it, she found a few clods of dried mud on the rug. Trixie frowned. Grandma Belden had made that rug when she was young. She had designed it, dyed the wool, and spent countless hours pulling yarn through canvas. Beldens were under strict orders to keep muddy feet off of it. Trixie collected the clods, then went to answer the doorbell.
    Di stood on the porch steps, and Trixie could see the Lynch Cadillac in the driveway.
    “Someone has to take me home, or else I’ll have to stay all night,” announced Di in her usual polite tones.
    “Stay,” Trixie invited. “You can share the two o’clock feeding.”
    At once, Di turned around and yelled, “See you in the morning,