The Mystery of the Midnight Marauder

driving a truck if you were out riding your bike at the same time?”
    All at once, Grandpa Crimper grinned at her mischievously. “I fooled ’em back at the house,” he replied. “When they weren’t looking, I took the truck—and I threw Sonny’s bike into the back of it, too.”
    Honey stared at him, fascinated. “Sonny?“
    “That’s young Mr. Crimper,” Trixie whispered in her ear. “He’s the one who’s running the department store now. We saw him yesterday, remember?”
    “Yes,” Grandpa said, “Sonny didn’t want me to ride his bike. He didn’t want me to drive his truck, either. He says I’m not to be trusted with anything on wheels. Another lot of nonsense! I was driving before that boy was born! Well, come on! Let’s not hang about all day!” He turned and began walking away.
    “But I still don’t understand,” Trixie called after him. “Why were you riding the bike?”
    “I wanted to see if I could still do it,” Grandpa barked as he walked away. “And, of course, I could! Mind you, the stupid machine got damaged a little....”
    “Damaged a little” didn’t even begin to describe the bicycle in question. When the two girls followed the old man across the road, they found the Crimper bike almost completely demolished.
    It was a tangle of twisted metal.
    “It hit a tree,” the old man said in explanation, rubbing his long nose thoughtfully. “Good thing I wasn’t on it, though. I had the good sense to jump off. Wait here, you two. I’ll get the truck. Now, where did I park the dratted thing?”
    Still muttering to himself, he hurried away and was soon lost to view around the bend in the road.
    Honey frowned as she stared after him. “Are you sure you feel like going to his house, Trix? And are you really okay?”
    Trixie rolled up one leg of her blue jeans. “I’ve got a couple of bruises,” she confessed, “but other than that I’m fine.” She stared ruefully at her bike, which was now propped drunkenly against a bush close to the scene of the accident. “I don’t know what I’m going to do with those crooked wheels, though. I don’t think they’ll ever be the same. I wonder if they can be fixed.”
    “I expect Tom can do it, once he gets back tomorrow,” Honey replied absently, still staring thoughtfully along the road. “You know, Trix, I’ve heard you talk about old Mr. Crimper before, but he isn’t at all the way I’d pictured him.”
    Trixie chuckled. “Did you expect him to be an old-fashioned sort of person?”
    Honey swung around to face her. “That’s exactly it,” she said. “I thought he’d look—Victorian, I suppose—sort of like his department store. Very turn-of-the-century, if you know what I mean.” Trixie smiled. “I asked Dad about it once, because I remember thinking the same thing. Dad says that old Mr. Crimper is a very shrewd businessman—at least, he was. Many people in Sleepy-side like doing business at Crimper’s because it looks—”
    “Respectable?” Honey said.
    Trixie nodded. “And safe, and conservative, and unchanging. Even young Mr. Crimper sees the sense in that. He hasn’t altered anything ever since he took over the running of the place. I wonder if he ever will.”
    From somewhere far down the road, they heard the sound of a truck’s engine-start up.
    “Are you going to ask Mr. Crimper if we can stop and look for that scrap of material?” Honey asked.
    “I don’t have to look for it,” Trixie answered. “I’ve already found it.”
    Honey’s hazel eyes opened wide as she watched her friend reach into her Bob-White jacket. A second later, Trixie was opening her hand. Lying in the palm of it was a small square of red flannel.
    Honey gasped. “It’s the clue we were looking for. But where did you find it?”
    “I was about to tell you that we’d reached the right place,” Trixie said, “when Grandpa Crimper shot out in front of me. This clue was the easiest one we’ve ever found. I fell on it, Honey!”
    Her friend was about to laugh, when she saw the expression on Trixie’s face. “Is there something else that’s worrying you?” she asked.
    Trixie nodded. “Didn’t you notice? Grandpa Crimper is wearing a torn red shirt. He’s also driving a truck.”
    Honey caught her breath. “But you don’t think—you couldn’t think—”
    “That he’s the Midnight Marauder?” Trixie frowned. “I don’t know. I can’t be sure. Oh, I’m so confused. None of it makes any sense,