The Mystery of the Ghostly Galeon

back tomorrow,” Trixie said, watching him hurry away. “I only hope everyone’s right!”
    She glanced quickly around her, but she could see no one, not even the owner of the ghostly footprints. Who had made them?
    The Weasel, too, was nowhere in sight. Trixie found herself hoping that he’d gone to bed. She didn’t trust him at all. She had the feeling he was playing some strange game of his own.
    The dining room was dark and deserted, but the tables, or what she could see of them, had been neatly set for breakfast. The inn seemed to be functioning well, even in the absence of its owner.
    Trixie couldn’t help feeling a bit guilty as she moved toward the office door. She knew that Gaston had assumed that she and Honey were going straight upstairs.
    It had been kind of him to solve the mystery of the vanishing galleon. On the other hand, there were still many questions left unanswered. She was sure, however, that the next few minutes would answer at least one of them.
    “We’ll make a real quick search until we find the missing money,” she told Honey, “then we’ll go to bed, okay?”
    Honey was staring fearfully over her shoulder. “I keep on getting this funny feeling we’re being watched,” she said. “Oh, Trixie, suppose it’s the same person who sent you that warning note.” Trixie swung around to face the stairs. She was just in time to see two shadows slowly descending. Then she heard familiar voices muttering, “Six, seven, eight—”
    “Brian? Mart?” Trixie called, astonished. The shadows stopped.
    “Trix, is that you?” Mart’s voice said. In the next moment, he had run the rest of the way and was facing her. He was fully dressed in jeans, shirt, and Bob-White jacket, as was Brian, who quickly joined them. The four stood staring at each other.
    “What are you doing here?” Trixie demanded. “We were about to ask you the same thing,” Brian said. “We thought you’d gone to bed.”
    “We thought you did, too,” Honey said quickly. “But wait till you hear what’s happened. Trixie found out that we weren’t seeing things after all. We really did see a galleon.”
    The boys listened as she told them all about it. When she had finished, Brian said sternly, “I thought it was agreed that you wouldn’t go wandering off without us, Trix.”
    “No more clandestine adventures unless we were with you,” Mart added. “Though I must say, the spectral vessel does sound devastatingly tempting. If I didn’t have something far more important to do, I might be persuaded to sashay up the gangplanks right now.”
    “You can’t,” Trixie said. “It’s dangerous. No one’s allowed on board. Gaston said so.”
    “I still don’t understand why you two came down here in the first place,” Brian said, looking from one to the other of them. “You weren’t dumb enough to go looking for more secret passages, were you?”
    Trixie’s cheeks were crimson as she told her brothers how convinced she was that the missing money was in the office. Now that she was explaining her theory, she could tell how weak it sounded. It was based on nothing but a hunch.
    “Well, the money isn’t there,” Brian told her flatly. “Miss Trask searched for it, and later, so did Di and Dan. I’m beginning to think there isn’t any to be found.”
    Trixie’s face fell. “I was so sure—”
    “Why don’t you two go to bed,” Mart said. “We’ll talk about it in the morning.”
    Something in his voice made Trixie instantly suspicious. “You’ve been so busy asking us questions,” she retorted, “that you still haven’t told us how come you’re down here, too.”
    “Why, Trixie,” Honey exclaimed, watching their faces, “you’re right! They’re up to something, as sure as my name’s Honey Wheeler. Okay, you two—confess.”
    Reluctantly, Mart pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and unfolded it. “I found this tucked away in a secret drawer in the desk in our room,” he said. “I’ll bet it’s been there for years. Brian and I were just going to see what we could find, that’s all.”
    When Trixie took the yellowed paper from his hand, she could see that it was covered with spidery handwriting. The ink looked faded, as if it had been written long ago.
    Astonished, Trixie read aloud:

“Thirteen paces down the stair,
Then through the door—
Soon you’ll be there,
Where fortune waits upon the shore,
Inside a cave, upon the floor.
Beware of ghosts who guard the place
With