The Mystery of the Memorial Day Fire

schoolgirl shamus was in the thick of things, as usual,” Sergeant Molinson said. “Suppose you tell me what happened.”
    “They’ve been through enough for one night,” Miss Trask said. She looked ready to tackle the whole Sleepyside police department, not just Sergeant Molinson. “Why don’t you leave them alone until tomorrow morning?”
    “I really don’t mind talking,” Jane Dix-Strauss said. “In fact, it’s probably a good idea. If I have a concussion, I should do whatever I can to stay awake.”
    “I don’t mind talking, either,” Trixie said. “I couldn’t possibly calm down for a while — talking might help.”
    “All right,” Miss Trask said reluctantly. “But you’ll let them talk, Sergeant — not interrogate them.”
    “Yes, ma’am,” Sergeant Molinson said sheepishly. He looked relieved when the doorbell rang and Miss Trask left the room to answer it. “Now,” he said, trying to regain his dignity. “Who wants to start?”
    “I suppose I’d better,” Jane Dix-Strauss said. “I’d suspected —”
    Her story was interrupted by shouts in the hall. “Trixie? Where are you? Are you all right?” Brian and Mart burst through the door, stopping suddenly when they saw the sergeant and the reporter.
    “We heard the sirens,” Brian said, making his way more cautiously into the room. “We tried to call and couldn’t reach anyone, so Moms and Dad sent us over here to make sure everyone was all right.”
    “We’re fine,” Trixie assured him, “except that there’s a fire in the stable.”
    “Not any more,” Brian told her. “The fire fighters were packing up their hoses as we came in.”
    “Well, then, everything is terrific,” Trixie said. “Sit down. Jane Dix-Strauss is just about to tell us how she figured out that Mr. Slettom was the arsonist.”
    “Mr. Slettom?” Brian asked, sounding as amazed as Honey had earlier.
    “Jane Dix-Strauss?” For Mart, the presence of the once-loathed news reporter was the biggest mystery.
    “Listen and learn,” Jim said, gesturing toward empty chairs.
    “Meanwhile,” said Miss Trask dryly, “I’ll call Mr. and Mrs. Belden and tell them that Trixie says everything is terrific.”
    Trixie’s brothers settled down and looked expectantly at Jane Dix-Strauss. The young woman cleared her throat and began again.
    “I’d suspected Slettom almost from the first. The Memorial Day arson reminded me immediately of another fire I’d heard about when I was researching for a magazine article. You see, Mr. Slettom started the fire in the basement of the trophy shop so that Mr. Roberts would be suspected. But the real purpose of the arson was to burn down the building next door, which was used as a warehouse by Mr. Slettom.
    “I suspect, Sergeant, that if you can find any records that weren’t destroyed during the second fire, you’ll see that Mr. Slettom claimed to have a huge inventory of new appliances stored in that warehouse. They’ll be valued at thousands of dollars and insured for that amount.’’
    “But they weren’t new appliances?” Sergeant Molinson guessed.
    “No,” Jane Dix-Strauss said. “They were old ones, nearly worthless.”
    “So the idea was to burn down the warehouse and collect the insurance on the inventory shown on paper,” Jim said.
    Jane Dix-Strauss nodded. “The warehouse was to burn so completely that the appliances would be heaps of molten metal. No one would be able to tell whether they were new or used, working or useless. But the plan didn’t work because Slettom bungled the arson. The building blew up instead of burning down. The old appliances in the warehouse were still identifiable. That led to the second fire.”
    “You mean Mr. Slettom tried to burn more appliances so he could create another falsified insurance claim?” Mart asked.
    “No. The point of the second fire wasn’t to burn appliances. It was to burn records,” Jane said.
    “Of course!” Brian sat forward in his chair. “Mr. Slettom would have created some pretty fancy paperwork for the fake inventory in the warehouse - something convincing enough to collect insurance on. He’d have already destroyed the records of the old appliances, because he wouldn’t want an insurance investigator to stumble across them. But when the warehouse blew up instead of burning down, it was the fake ones that were dangerous. They showed new appliances, but the contents of the warehouse could be recognized as old