The Mystery of the Missing Heiress

with all the nurses, and the first thing all the other Candy Stripers ask us when we go to the hospital is ‘How’s Janie?’ ”
    “That’s what I mean,” Dan went on. There was a frown on his deep-tanned face. “So why hasn’t there been just one little inquiry from somewhere about a girl like her, who must have turned up missing?”
    “It’s a mystery, for sure,” Trixie said. “Don’t think it doesn’t worry Janie. We told you how marvelous she was on the plane coming home.”
    “Yeah, and all of it put on.” Mart sat down at the clubhouse table on the bench next to Trixie. “Why don’t you just work on Janie’s identity, instead of wasting time worrying over ‘mysterious’ calls about Jim’s aunt, and a mysterious’ man at the marsh, and a ‘mysterious’ guy who jimmied up our car in the Bronx and left a ‘mysterious’ pipe?”
    “If you’ll just give me time—” Trixie began.
    “If all of us do give you time, you’ll find out who Janie is. I know you will,” Honey said loyally. “You may make some mistakes, but you’ll find out eventually. I’m going to help you every way I can.”
    “Gosh, so are we,” Mart said quickly. “I just wish she’d concentrate on Janie.”
    “How do you know I’m not?” Trixie asked with spirit. “You’re not a detective, Mart, and you don’t know how to recognize clues when you see them or how to sense the way the wind blows.”
    “I know this much: It’s blowing up a storm for Janie just now, and not even the Belden-Wheeler Detective Agency is protecting her from it.” “We’re trying, Mart Belden,” Honey said. “Why don’t you come up with one of your marvellous ideas?”
    “Sarcasm ill becomes you,” Mart said loftily. “Anyway, if I don’t do anything, I don’t keep making mistakes.”
    “Heaven knows I don’t want to make any more mistakes,” Trixie said sadly. “When I saw that bewildered look come over Janie’s face when Mrs. Meredith didn’t recognize her, and when I realize how brave she’s been....”
    “That’s the worst thing about amnesia,” Brian, the future doctor, said. “I never knew anything about loss of memory till that day Trixie and Honey came home from the hospital and told us about Janie. Since then, I’ve been reading up on it. There doesn’t seem to be a lot anyone can do.”
    “You were saying, ‘That’s the worst thing about amnesia,’ ” Honey said. “What is, Brian?”
    “The fact that some contact with the person’s past is necessary to stimulate his memory. Then, in a flash, it all comes back. We just don’t seem to be able to dig up that trigger. I was so sure you’d bring back good news yesterday.”
    “I wouldn’t go through that experience again for anything,” Trixie said. “Next time I’ll be sure.”
    Jim broke in quietly, “If anyone asks me, and they haven’t, I think it would help Janie a lot, and us, too, if we’d think up some fun for her.”
    “Shake!” Mart said, extending his hand. “You sound more like a doctor than Brian. Now, what will we do, and when?”
    “Why not a barbecue tonight?” Dan suggested.
    “At our house!” Trixie cried. “A surprise one, for Janie.“
    “With a treasure hunt,” Honey said.
    “Maybe Janie’s too old for a treasure hunt,” Diana suggested, but she was hooted down by the others.
    “Janie may be past twenty, but she sure doesn’t look it. She likes everything we do, too,” Trixie insisted. Then her face fell. “What chance would we have for a surprise party with Bobby....”
    “He’s a darling,” Honey said, “but I know what you mean. Just try to keep a secret around him.”
    “Well,” Mart said, “how could we have a surprise for Janie, anyway, when she’s right there all the time?”
    “Miss Trask is the answer,” Jim said. “If Honey and I ask her, she'll figure out some sort of expedition today that will include Bobby and Janie. Let’s see—” He looked at his wristwatch. “It’s past twelve o’clock now. You beat it home for lunch, all of you, and about one fifteen, see if Miss Trask doesn’t show up at Crabapple Farm.”

    It was one fifteen on the dot when Miss Trask did, indeed, show up.
    Bobby was ecstatic, for, next to Old Brom, Miss Trask was his favorite best friend.”
    “We’re going to the zoo,” he cried. “They have a new baby elephant there.”
    Janie, invited, went along.
    Reddy, uninvited, went along, too, his tail a semaphore, his whole body wagging