The Mystery of the Ghostly Galeon

hand on the banister rail and listened. Someone—or was it something ?—was moving about in the darkness below!
I could see my reflection in the mirror that hung on the wall beside me. A tall, slim girl, about eighteen years of age, with dark red hair and wide green eyes, stared back at me. Her complexion was flawless. Her long, golden dress hung gracefully from her white shoulders.
“Easy now, Lucy,” I whispered to her. “The fate of your country depends on your next move.”

    Trixie sighed contentedly and settled herself into a more comfortable position against her pillow. “So much for Mart!” she muttered under her breath. “Lucy doesn’t either have zits!”
    She read on:

All at once, as I peered through the gloom, I heard a door open softly. A man’s caped figure appeared suddenly before me. And the secret plans that I had been sent to Germany to defend with my life were tucked firmly under his arm.

    Trixie gasped and sat up, almost bumping her head on the ceiling.
    Lucy was not the only one to have seen a dim figure emerging from a doorway. Trixie, too, had seen the same thing earlier that evening. Why had she forgotten about it until now? Trixie and Honey had been coming down the stairs into darkness, just as Lucy Radcliffe had.
    Trixie hadn’t seen a caped figure, however. She had seen a pirate. He had been hurrying out of a room that Trixie now knew was Mr. Trask’s office. Who was he, and what had he been doing there?
    She kicked off the covers and hung way over the edge of the top bunk. “Honey!” she cried. “You’ve got to wake up! I’ve just thought of something else. Suppose Mr. Trask did have the money, after all. And suppose he had it hidden somewhere in his office. Someone could be trying to find it!”
    Honey grunted and gazed bleary-eyed at the upside-down face dangling in front of hers. “Go to sleep, Trix,” she mumbled. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow.”
    “But I want you to wake up,” Trixie insisted stubbornly. “This could be important. Earlier this evening, we saw someone sneaking out of Mr. Trask’s office, remember? Who was it?” Honey tried to blink the sleep out of her eyes. “I don’t know,” she said at last. “I didn’t get a good look.”
    Trixie jumped to the floor and reached for her clothes. “If I’m right,” she said excitedly, pulling on her jeans and warm turtleneck sweater, “then whoever it was could be trying to cause trouble for the Trasks. I think the would-be thief could have been the one who set the fire, too.”
    Honey leaned up on one elbow. “But where are you going, and what’re you going to do?”
    Trixie picked up her Bob-White jacket from the chair and threw it around her shoulders. “There may be a clue right now in that office. Besides, if the money is there, we ought to find it before someone else does. Anyway, I’m going to look.”
    “Now?” Honey wailed. “You’re going to look now ?”
    “Oh, Honey,” Trixie answered, “don’t you see? Tomorrow may be too late.”

    It didn’t take Honey long to dress, but she was still arguing as she and Trixie began tiptoeing silently down the stairs.
    “I don’t know why I let you talk me into this,” she whispered. “We’ve already looked everywhere in that room once tonight, and we didn’t find anything. Oh, please, let’s go back to bed.”
    “Lucy Radcliffe wouldn’t go back to bed,” Trixie replied obstinately. “She would just toss her gorgeous red hair back from her face, set her jaw firmly, and stick at it until the case was solved. Jeepers, Honey! How I wish I were a spy. Lucy leads such an exciting life.”
    Honey tried to smother a yawn. “Then Lucy can have it,” she declared. “Everyone else is asleep, and I wish I were, too.”
    They had almost reached the bottom of the stairs when they stopped to listen. Around them, the inn was quiet and still. The polished brass ship’s lanterns, which hung at intervals along the walls, cast soft light and shadows on the stair treads beneath their feet.
    Now that they were close to the mysterious dining room, Trixie thought she could smell the familiar fragrances of fresh-baked fruit pies and newly risen bread dough.
    “If I close my eyes,” she whispered, “I can almost believe I’m back in our kitchen at Crabapple Farm.”
    “If I close my eyes,” Honey retorted, “I can almost believe I’m back in the bottom bunk in our room at Pirate’s Inn—where I belong!”
    Trixie grinned and paused