The Mystery of the Phantom Grashopper

When her stomach was even with the edge of the opening, Trixie pitched forward and toppled into the belfry. For a moment, she lay limp with exhaustion on the dirty floor, gasping and panting.
    There was a large metal ring set in one end of the trapdoor in the floor of the belfry. Trixie stood and brushed herself off, then squatted in front of the ring and pulled with all her might. The heavy door creaked open, exposing the ladder that went down inside Town Hall.
    Trixie took a deep breath and started down the ladder.

Danger! • 19

    IN THE ROOM below the belfry, Trixie waited for her eyes to become accustomed to the darkness. She could make out the door off to one side, and, hands outstretched like a sleepwalker’s, she headed for it. At the door, she groped along the wall beside the doorframe until she found the light switch. Her eyes burned from the sudden glare of the single bare bulb hanging from the ceiling.
    In the opposite comer of the room, the canvas-wrapped bundle was still leaning against the wall. Trixie walked to it and lifted a comer of the canvas, exposing the large copper head of the grasshopper weather vane. Gently, Trixie patted the head. “Hello, Hoppy,” she said quietly.
    She lifted more of the canvas and discovered a small leather bag close to the weather vane. Dropping to her knees, Trixie picked up the bag. It jingled with the sound of coins! With trembling fingers, Trixie pulled the bag open and looked inside. She recognized the coins immediately.
    “Mr. Quinn’s coin collection—it’s all right here!” she exclaimed. At the same moment, she heard footsteps in the hallway outside!
    “Somebody’s coming this way,” she gasped.
    Dropping the bag of coins beside the weather vane, Trixie dashed across the room and turned off the light. Finding her way back to the steel ladder, she climbed quickly, but couldn’t make it all the way up before the door opened.
    Miss Lawler and Sammy came into the room.
    Sammy carried a flashlight in one hand and a gun gripped tightly in the other. The gun was pointed at Miss Lawler!
    “Aw, stop your bawling,” Sammy said roughly. “By the time anybody notices that broken window downstairs, we’ll be long gone.”
    “Sammy,” Miss Lawler said in a pleading tone, “you’ve been doing so well since you left the halfway house. Everyone was proud of you. You’ve got a job now, and you can go to college next year... you’ve got a good life ahead of you.”
    Sammy’s laugh was harsh and scornful. “Who needs college?” he said. ’Td rather make my money the easy way. And this time I wont get caught, either.”
    “Sammy,” Miss Lawler said, “you’ve got your thousand dollars now. Just let it go at that—quit while you’re ahead.”
    “Oh, yeah,” Sammy snapped. “After I finally talk old man Perkins into giving me the reward money, I should just forget about the coin collection? Sure thing. Listen: This dumb town can keep their old weather vane—my partner and I would have had a hard time unloading it anyway. But those coins are something else! There are plenty of collectors who’ll be willing to take those coins off my hands with no questions asked.” As Sammy spoke, he kept his gun pointed unwaveringly at Miss Lawler.
    “But, Sammy, those coins were my responsibility. I-”
    “That’s the whole point, Cis,” Sammy said with a sneer. “When you disappear, everybody’s going to assume that you ran off with the coin collection. And the cops will waste all their time looking for you, while me and my sidekick take it easy. I may even stick around Sleepyside for a while and enjoy being a hero.”
    “Sammy,” Miss Lawler said weakly, “you don’t mean—”
    “What I mean,” Sammy interrupted, “is that we re going to take the coins and go for a nice long ride in your big station wagon. And I’m going to come back alone.”
    “Sammy, please...” Miss Lawler pleaded.
    “Nobody’ll be surprised,” Sammy went on. “They know you’re an expert on coins. And when they find out about how you flipped out after killing your brother—”
    Trixie, hanging on to the top rung of the ladder, covered her mouth with a hand to smother her gasp.
    “I didn’t! I didn’t!” Miss Lawler cried. “It was an accident. You know that.”
    “Sure, Cis, I know,” Sammy crooned. “It was an accident. You lost control of your car and smashed into a tree. And your poor brother was killed. You flipped out and had to spend some time at a