The Mystery off Glen Road

give the impression that you’re totally insane, and yet, in the end, you’re the only one who makes sense.” He danced around the kitchen with her until Trixie tapped him on the head with the vegetable grater.
    “Listen, muttonhead,” she said, gasping for breath, “it’s not as simple as you seem to think. There is a poacher in the preserve. We can’t collect our salary as gamekeepers on Saturday if we don’t do something about him first.”
    Mart immediately sobered and collapsed on the kitchen stool. “True,” he agreed. “But your cabin-in-the-clearing story is so fantastic, I can’t believe a word of it. But first things must come first. Right now I shall go upstairs and pour oil on the troubled waters of Bobby’s anguished sobs. While I am doing so, Moms will undoubtedly seize that opportunity to explain to you the meaning of the Shakespearean quotation: ‘Never a borrower nor a lender be.’ Then you must bathe and don suitable garments so that I can escort you up to the Manor House, where a festive repast awaits us. En route, we can discuss the poacher problem and what to do about it.”
    Trixie tapped him again on the head with the grater. “I supppose you don’t have to shower and change. And what about Brian? Is he going to dine 1 at the Wheelers’ in the same dirty clothes I last saw him in?”
    “Brian,” Mart informed her, “is showering at the home of our host and hostess and is wearing a handsome suit belonging to Jim.”
    “Oh, fine,” Trixie said sarcastically. “Somebody had better tell Brian the facts of life about what happens to borrowers. He and Jim are getting to be so chummy that it’s boring. Brian never comes home to change anymore. Why doesn’t he just move up there bag and baggage? Then Moms can rent his room and hire somebody to do his chores.”
    Mart gurgled. “Our elder sibling, commonly known as Brian Belden, has been doing his household chores at the crack of dawn every morning so that he can devote all of the daylight hours to work on the clubhouse. I have, too, as you would know if you did not stagger off to the stable every A.M. with both eyes tightly closed.”
    He darted out of the kitchen, and Trixie hastily began to collect china and silver so she could set the table for her parents and Bobby. Mrs. Belden joined her.
    “Trixie, honey,” she said, folding paper napkins, “you shouldn’t have borrowed Bobby’s compass. I know that you didn’t mean to lose it, but you realize, don’t you, that you’ll have to buy him another one as soon as you can?”
    Wordlessly, and very shamefacedly, Trixie nodded her head. “I’m sorry,” she gulped.
    “All right,” her mother said. “There’s no real rush about it, because it’s far too expensive a thing for him to treat as a toy, anyway. Now, run along and get ready for dinner at the Wheelers’. None of you can stay late. Tomorrow is going to be a very busy day. Although the ham and turkeys are already cooked, there are going to be a lot of last-minute things for you to do.” She frowned worriedly. “I don’t want to interfere with your job, but couldn’t Mart patrol the preserve tomorrow with Honey so you can help me?”
    “I’m sure he will,” Trixie said meekly. “I’ll ask him right away.” She fled upstairs.
    Mart agreed, and later, as they climbed the path to the Manor House, he said, “I fully planned to do some patrolling on my own tomorrow, anyway. If Honey goes with me, all the better, because she can show me how to get to that house in the clearing.”
    “Not a prayer,” Trixie said. “I keep trying to tell you, we have no idea where we were. It was sheer luck that we’re still not in the labyrinth.” They had reached the wooded section that lay between the path and the stable. The overhanging branches of the trees cut off the light from the crescent moon, and they turned on their flashlights. “But she can show you that rabbit snare. And we did hear two shots, Mart. We couldn’t both have imagined them. Besides, that’s what made the horses run away.”
    “Horses do not have vivid imaginations,” Mart agreed. “And they also probably blazed a trail to the big clearing. I’m not the woodsman Jim is, but I’ll bet I can follow the bruised and broken branches along that narrow path.”
    “I doubt it, ” Trixie said. “Don’t forget the storm broke and bruised a lot of branches, too.”
    “Maybe we ought to tell Jim,” Mart said. “The roof has reached the