The secret of the Mansion

there all alone! I’ve worried about him so often, but he would never let anyone come near him. He’s probably been sick for days."
    "That’s right," Mr. Belden said. "He’s suffering from pneumonia complicated by malnutrition. The doctors said there was very little chance that he would pull through."
    "Serves him right," Trixie said, wiping her grimy hands on her rolled-up blue jeans. "The mean old miser. You should have left him lying in the driveway, Dad."
    Mr. Belden frowned. "Why, Trixie! I don’t like you to talk that way, and you know you don’t mean it. Although Mr. Frayne may not have always been a very pleasant neighbor, he is still a neighbor."
    "I’m sorry, Dad." Trixie squinted up at the big rambling mansion half-hidden by the trees on top of the hill. "He never seemed like a neighbor to me," she added under her breath.
    As her father drove away, she turned to her mother. "Why, old man Frayne said he’d call the police if he ever caught any of us trespassing. Remember that time he yelled at Mart and—"
    "Now, Trixie," Mrs. Belden interrupted. "You’re old enough to understand Mr. Frayne’s attitude. He and your father had a disagreement about the boundary line between the two properties. Of course, Dad didn’t want to take the matter to court because nobody really cares who owns that little patch of the woods, but Mr. Frayne insisted. Naturally, when the decision went against him he resented it."
    Trixie pulled up a piece of grass and chewed it thoughtfully. "Well, his game chickens come down on our property whenever they please, and you don t complain. And just last week, Moms, Reddy chased Queenie, the black hen, onto Mr. Frayne s property. I tore after him because I didn’t want him to hurt Queenie, even though she does belong to the old miser. But I needn’t have worried, because I guess those game hens can take care of themselves. Just as I caught up to them, she suddenly turned and flew right into Reddy’s face, flapping her wings and squawking and scratching like anything." Trixie laughed. "Reddy was the most surprised Irish setter you ever saw. He tucked his tail between his legs and dashed off into the woods, and just then Mr. Frayne burst out of his house, waving a shotgun and shouting at me. Golly, I was awfully scared for a minute, Moms. He said he’d shoot Reddy if he ever crossed the boundary line again."
    "I’m sorry that happened, dear," Mrs. Belden said as they strolled back to the garden. "But I honestly don’t think Mr. Frayne would really shoot Reddy."
    "I do." Trixie kicked a pebble across the path. "He’s such a wrinkled little old man with such a cross face. I bet he doesn’t weigh much more than Bobby does, and in those funny patched clothes, he looks like a scarecrow. And his land’s in a terrible state. It’s all choked with weeds and vines except for a clearing right around the house which isn’t a lawn anymore, because the chickens have scratched it
    bare. The whole place needs repair."
    "He wasn’t always a wrinkled old man, Trixie," Mrs. Belden said quietly. "And Ten Acres was once as much of a showplace as the Manor House on the other hill is now. Grief sometimes changes people, you know. Before Mrs. Frayne died, he was a charming old gentleman, and he and his wife were very kind to your father and me when we moved up here from the city." She carefully slipped a cardboard collar around one of the tomato plants. "I’ll never forget the night Mrs. Frayne died. It was a terrible shock to all of us."
    "What happened, Moms?" Trixie knelt in the next row and began thinning the feathery little carrots. "All I know is that she was bitten by a copperhead snake. But you don’t have to die from that kind of bite. Dad told us all long ago what to do in case any of us were bitten. First, you put on a tourniquet; then you cut into the fang marks with a knife or a razor blade, and then you suck out the blood to keep the poison from spreading. Didn’t Mr. Frayne know what to do, Moms?"
    Mrs. Belden pressed the last tomato plant into place with her fingers and stood up.
    "I don’t know, Trixie, but he must have been terribly upset. He absolutely adored his wife. She was a beautiful little old lady, and everyone loved her." She slipped off her gloves and wiped her face with her handkerchief. "It happened one evening when they were sitting out in their summerhouse. The snake must have been curled under Mrs. Frayne s chair, and she probably kicked it accidentally.