The Mystery off Glen Road

head. “Don’t bother. Just, please, get out of our way.”
    “I wish they’d get off the face of the earth,” Trixie said grimly. “Such morons should not be allowed in the same interplanetary system with us.” She deliberately stepped on Mart’s toe as she strode past him.
    He punched her lightly on the arm. “Pardon me for living, but the graveyard’s full.” He followed her into the tack room. “Come on, sis, ’fess up. You’re in some sort of a scrape, and you know it.” Honey came quickly to the rescue. “Oh, my goodness,” she cried exasperatedly. “Can’t you leave her alone? Don’t you know that her heart is broken and all because Ben is so crazy about Di?”
    “So that's it.” Jim abruptly left the stable. Brian, with a puzzled expression on his handsome face, followed him out into the darkness.
    Mart simply leaned against the edge of the worktable and began to whistle, saying after a while, “Don’t you girls try to give me any of that. You almost had me fooled for a while, Trix. But when you disappeared so mysteriously yesterday afternoon, instead of lurking around and waving your diamond ring in Ben’s face, I knew that you had simply been using him for an excuse.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Why did you ask Dad for the ring , and where is it now ?”
    “None of your business,” Trixie retorted.
    “Did you pawn it?” Mart persisted. “Or lose it?” It was Honey who replied. “Neither, Mart Belden, and it is none of your business. If you knew the real reason why Trixie asked her father for the ring, you’d die of shame.”
    “So?” His sandy eyebrows shot up. “The plot thickens. Mr. Lytell, among others, is very, very suspicious. He saw Trixie emerge from the woods yesterday after dark. He asked me to give him some explanation of why she was there at that time of the evening.” Mart waved his hands. “I passed it off by explaining that you girls were gamekeepers and Trix must have been working overtime. He thought it odd, as I did, that she should patrol on foot at such a weird hour of the day.”
    “Oh, all right, Mart,” Trixie suddenly exploded. “I’ll tell you the truth, but you’ve got to promise not to tell Jim and Brian.”
    He raised his right hand. “Wild horses couldn’t drag it out of me.”
    Trixie replaced the top on the saddle-soap can and squeezed the sponge dry. Then she went over to the window to make sure that Brian and Jim had gone into the big house. “It’s this way, Mart,” she confided. “I found a dead deer in the preserve yesterday, so I know there’s a poacher lurking around. I want to catch him, but Honey thinks that maybe he was just a hunter who trespassed by accident and probably won’t ever come back.”
    Mart slid off the table and began to pace up and down in the tack room. “I’m inclined to agree with Honey,” he said at last. “But the adventurous part of my personality agrees with you, Trix. To capture a poacher would be a feather in our caps. So let’s not leave a stone or a leaf unturned.”
    Honey sighed. “Don’t be silly, Mart. The important thing right now is to get the roof of the clubhouse fixed. That’ll never be done if you’re going to go galloping around looking for clues.”
    “True,” he said, “but I have no intention of galloping or Sherlocking. I will simply provide Trixie with a few facts about snares and traps and such. Thus, if she doesn’t fall into them, she will be able to recognize same. The point is this: A poacher worth catching is one who makes a business of it. That kind of a poacher rarely uses a gun. He shoots deer with a longbow, in or out of season. He sets snares for partridge and pheasant, in or out of season. Instead of using a rod and reel, he catches fish in a net. Those guys,” he finished, “are a menace, and they ought to be exterminated.”
    “All right,” Trixie said. “Honey and I will track him down to his lair; then you can exterminate him.”
    “Not so fast,” Mart cautioned her. “All you girls should do is search for signs. If you discover evidence that a professional poacher is systematically depleting the preserve of game, report to me. I will take over from then on.”
    “Oh, great,” Trixie said sarcastically. “Just great. Then you can wear the feather we earned in your cap. That will be the day.”

A Snare ● 15

    SCHOOL CLOSED at noon on Wednesday, and Di came home on the bus with the other Bob-Whites. Instead of going home,