The Mystery of the Vanishing Victim

where we’d gone to—”
    Honey Wheeler cleared her throat. “We’d love to tell you the entire story sometime. Maybe you could come to the rummage sale and chat with us there. Right now, though, we have to get going. If you’ll just set a time, my brother will come around with our station wagon to collect these books.”
    “Of course, of course. I mustn’t keep you. I plan to go to the rummage sale, so I can talk more with you then,” the woman said. “Tell your brother he can drop by for the books anytime tonight.”
    The girls said their thank-you’s and left. On the front step, Honey turned to Trixie with a stern look on her face. “I thought you said no more long conversations,” she said accusingly.
    Trixie was crestfallen. “I got carried away. From now on I won’t say a word more than I have to.” She went a few steps down the walk, then froze in her tracks. “Yipes!” she yelled. “With all I’ve been saying that I didn’t have to, I haven’t been saying what I did have to!”
    Honey looked at her best friend in puzzlement. “We’ve explained we’re collecting for the rummage sale, and we’ve told the people Jim will come to pick up the donations later on today. What more is there that we have to say?”
    “Honey, you’re forgetting why we’re here. I mean, the other reason we’re here. I mean, the reason we’re right here. Oh, I mean the miser,” she finished in exasperation. “I was going to drop that word into the conversation at every house we went to, to see if anyone reacted to it.”
    “That’s right,” Honey said. “Oh, why can’t I keep more than one thing in my mind at a time? When I was worried about the stranger, I forgot about the rummage sale. Now I’m worried about getting the most donations for the rummage sale, so I forgot all about the stranger.”
    “I did the same thing,” Trixie said sadly. Then she brightened. “Well, I certainly don’t think either of the two women we’ve talked to so far had anything to hide. They certainly didn’t act like it. But I’ll ride along with Jim tonight when he comes back, just in case. I can work the word miser in then. For now, we’ll just remind ourselves to remember at the other houses we go to.”
    At the next house, the door was opened by a pretty, blond-haired woman. “Wonderful!” she exclaimed when the girls told her about the rummage sale.
    “My husband and I have been married just a few months, but we both had our own apartments for several years before that. That means we have two of everything, from toasters to vacuum cleaners. Actually, we have three of some things, because of the wedding gifts we received. This rummage sale will give us a chance to contribute something to our new hometown and weed out our belongings.”
    “Well, if you’ve accumulated all those things, I guess you must not be misers ,” Trixie said, accenting the last word clumsily.
    The woman looked at her curiously. “No, I guess we must not be,” she said, obviously bewildered at the turn the conversation had taken.
    “Would tomorrow evening be a convenient time for us to pick up your donation?” Honey said hastily.
    “Yes, that would be fine,” the woman said. The confused look was still on her face when she closed the door.
    “Really, Trixie,” Honey said as they walked to the next house, “I think you’ll have to be more subtle than that if you’re going to work in the word miser. People will think we’re crazy and refuse to give us anything.”
    “Well, you mention the miser next time, then,” Trixie retorted.
    A little girl of about Bobby’s age opened the door of the next house.
    “Hi,” Trixie said cheerfully. “Is your mom home?” The little girl nodded solemnly. “We’re all home,” she said. “We don’t get to go out and play or anything.”
    Trixie frowned. “Have you been sick?” she asked. The little girl shook her head, still unsmiling. “We’re okay. We just don’t get to go out, that’s all. My mother—”
    The little girl was interrupted by a haggard-looking young woman. “Can I help you?” she asked sharply.
    Trixie looked at Honey, who began the now-familiar introduction. While Honey spoke, the little girl ducked through the doorway and plopped on the lawn, where she began hunting, Trixie supposed, for a four-leaf clover.
    “I’m sorry,” the woman said more politely than before. “We just moved to Sleepyside. We weeded out our belongings quite thoroughly before we