The Pet Show Mystery

back to the telephone, this time to call Honey Wheeler.
    “Is everything straightened out?” Honey asked as soon as she picked up the phone.
    “Well, the show is un canceled. But we have to figure out who’s responsible for the sabotage, Honey. Otherwise—” Trixie let the unspoken threat hang in the air.
    “I don’t even know where to start,” Honey said hopelessly.
    “I do—with Paul Gale.”
    “You think he called the radio station and pretended to be you?” Honey asked, totally baffled.
    “I don’t think he did, but he could have asked his assistant to make the call.”
    “Have you told Brian and Mart about your suspicions?”
    “They’d just laugh at me. And this is no laughing matter.”
    “But what can we do? The boys won’t believe us without more proof, and nobody else will believe us if they don’t.”
    “We’ll have to get more proof, then.”
    “But how? Do you have a plan?”
    Just as Honey asked the question, an idea came to Trixie’s mind. It was far from foolproof, she realized; it was also far from comfortable, but— “There’s something we can try,” Trixie said. “It just might work. Bring extra-warm clothes to school tomorrow, and tell your parents you’ll be home late.”
    “But what—”
    “I can’t tell you more right now, because I don’t know any more. I’ll have it all figured out by tomorrow. See you then.” Trixie hung up before Honey could ask for more information.

    The next afternoon, the girls told their brothers they’d be taking the second bus home. “We have an errand to run in town,” Trixie said vaguely.
    Then they ducked into the washroom to pull on the extra sweatshirts and tights they’d brought along that morning.
    “I can hardly move ,” Honey said as she zipped up her jacket over four layers of clothes.
    “Well, you aren’t dressed for moving. You’re dressed for waiting.”
    “Waiting for what?”
    Trixie, enjoying the suspense but also concerned about her plan, only answered, “You’ll see.”
    The two girls left the school and retraced their steps to the World Anti-Hunger Foundation office. The alley next to the building was narrower than Trixie had remembered. It had a high fence at the back. “Get in there, out of sight,” she told Honey. She darted in behind her friend just long enough to open her book bag and get out a rolled-up poster announcing the pet show, a small package of thumbtacks, and a hammer.
    Honey watched, wide-eyed, but didn’t ask any more questions. Trixie didn’t offer any more information, either, until after she had darted out of the little alley, tacked the poster up on a telephone pole outside the foundation office, and ducked back into the alley again.
    “Now we wait for Paul Gale to see the poster,” Trixie said.
    “Then what?” Honey asked, already stomping her feet as the cold air began to nip at them.
    “We see how he reacts,” Trixie said. “Remember that time I’d suspected Nick Roberts of sabotaging one of our events because I saw him tear a flier off the wall at school? Well, I started thinking that if Paul Gale hates the pet show as much as we think he does, he’d probably react pretty violently if he saw a poster for it.”
    “So if Paul Gale comes along and rips down our poster, it means he’s the saboteur?” Honey said skeptically.
    “Of course not,” said Trixie. “It just means he’s worth keeping an eye on. Maybe we can even convince Jim and Brian and Mart of that fact.”
    Honey sniffed, but it was from the biting cold, not in response to Trixie’s statement. “We have no idea how long it might take Paul Gale to come along and see the poster, though, do we?”
    Trixie shook her head. “That’s why I said to wear warm clothes.”
    The girls’ conversation stopped for a while. They concentrated on watching the telephone pole, and on keeping warm. The second task proved impossible. Within minutes, Trixie’s feet had begun to ache from the cold. Stamping them to warm them only produced more pain. Then her nose began to tingle, and she covered it with a mittened hand. But the moisture from her breath soon made the mitten damp. She knew that wet cold could cause more trouble than dry cold, so she lowered her hand. The cold air slapped her in the face like a giant fist.
    She glanced over at her best friend. Although Honey was no longer as delicate as she once had been, her naturally slender frame gave her very little protection against the cold. Honey’s eyes