The Mystery on Cobbett's Island (19 page)

“I used to when Eddie was home to help wait on customers, but when he went off to college, I had to get someone to help me. But I still do all the special cakes and such,” she said with a touch of pride.

“Is your son coming back here after college?” asked Mart. “I can't think of a pleasanter business, and, by the way, I'll take a dozen jelly doughnuts, please.”

“Mercy, no,” Mrs. Hall answered as she packed the doughnuts in a cardboard box. “It's never been anything but medicine for him. He dreamed of being a doctor
from the time he was just a little tyke, and now he has one more year to go. It's been a struggle, but he's made it this far.”

“That's what I'm aiming for, too. I've always wanted to be a doctor,” Brian said. “I can see how he feels, all right.”

“Well, it's a fine ambition, but be prepared for years of hard work and some disappointments, too.” Mrs. Hall's face clouded.

“What do you mean ‘disappointments'?” asked Trixie, sensing that Eddie's mother had something special in mind.

“Well, you take my boy. He has one more year, as I was saying, and a partial scholarship. I help out with what I can, but this year, his schedule is so heavy he won't be able to take odd jobs to earn his living expenses.” She paused, and finally continued, “He's just about decided to take a year off to earn the money and then go back.”

“Oh, that would be a shame, losing a whole year!” exclaimed Trixie. “Isn't there any other way?”

“He could borrow the money, but he won't go into debt, and I can't say I blame him. My husband always said we should keep clear of debt, and I've taught Eddie the same thing. Here's his picture,” she said proudly,
opening the little gold locket and removing it from the chain around her neck.

“He's really good-looking!” exclaimed Diana as she passed the locket around for the others to see.

“He's the image of his father when he was the same age,” Mrs. Hall continued. She reached behind her, and from a drawer under one of the cabinets, brought out a faded photograph and passed it over the counter for them to see.

“Yes, that's my Ed,” she added sadly. “He was lost at sea when Eddie was just a baby, so my boy never knew him, but they're a lot alike.”

The bell over the door rang again announcing another customer, so after deciding on an assortment of cookies and some brownies to eat on the way home, they bade Mrs. Hall good-by and started to leave.

“Do come back again,” she said, and then, calling to Brian, she added, “By the way, if you want to know more about medical school, drop in and talk to Eddie. He's coming home tomorrow for a few days between exams.”

“Thanks a lot, Mrs. Hall,” Brian replied. “I'd like nothing better.”

“And bring all your friends,” she added cordially.

Trixie could hardly wait to get into the car before her excitement broke forth. “That's Ed's wife all right, and she couldn't be nicer! We've just
got
to find the money, or I'll—”

“Or you'll what, Trix?” Diana asked with a smile.

“Oh, you know, Di,” Trixie answered, “I'd simply die!”

“In addition to being the means of saving Trixie's life, can you imagine what a thousand dollars would mean to Ethel and Eddie?” Mart commented.

“It couldn't come at a better time,” Peter added. “Let's hope we're lucky.”

“We'll need more than luck, I'm afraid,” Trixie sighed. “We'll need the brains of every B.W.G. member, and you, too, Peter. Tomorrow's our last chance!”

As they were leaving Easthampton, Peter pointed out an old, weathered, shingle salt-box house overlooking the village green and pond, saying “That's the boyhood home of John Payne who wrote ‘Home, Sweet Home,' and the house next to it was built by old Fishhook Mulford. They say that when he went to England to protest the tax on whale oil, he heard there were a lot of pickpockets in London. So what did he do but line his pockets with fishhooks! No one seems to know how he got his
own
money out, but it makes a good story, anyway!”

When they got to Sag Harbor, Trixie checked her wrist watch and found it was only four thirty, so there was time to stop at the Whaling Museum before going back to Cobbett's Island.

The large, square white building had been designed originally as a private home, and like so many residences built in the mid-1800's, it showed the influence of Greek architecture in the two-storied great Corinthian columns and the decorative moldings. The enormous jawbones of a whale had been set up to arch the main doorway when the building was converted to a museum. Once inside, the Bob-Whites scattered through the various rooms, the girls more interested in the collection of antique dolls, household utensils, and clothes than the boys who spent more time examining the harpoons, scrimshaw work, ship models, and pictures of the whaling trade. There was so much to see that they were all surprised when the custodian told them it was closing time.

“Jeepers!” Trixie exclaimed as they were heading home. “We've got enough material for sixty school papers, just from what we've seen today.”

“Maybe next year you can manage to improve your English marks without running to me for help, dear sister,” Mart quipped.

“Oh, I could
never
do without my walking encyclopedia,” Trixie chuckled. “Please don't desert me now!”

When Trixie awoke the next morning, it was quite dark in her room. She looked at the little clock on the bedside table and was surprised to see it was already eight thirty. Di was still sleeping soundly, so Trixie tiptoed to the window and quietly pulled back the curtains. Then she understood why the room had seemed so shadowy and dim. A thick fog hung over the harbor and enveloped the house. It was so dense she couldn't see the dock across the road or even the hedge in front of the house.

“Jeepers!” she said to herself. “This is fine weather for trying to follow a chart on land
or
sea.”

When she heard Honey stirring in the adjoining room, she went in to tell her the sad news about the weather. “And do you realize that tomorrow is the day we're supposed to leave for home?” Trixie reminded her. “So it's now or never, no matter what the weather. Come on, lazybones, get a move on!”

Honey sat up in bed and stretched her arms high above her head, muttering through a yawn, “Who
was it said this was going to be a quiet vacation?”

Trixie laughingly threw a pillow at her and went to wake Diana and the boys.

“Well, as the plot thickens, so does the fog,” Mart chuckled as they met for breakfast. “Do you intend to pursue your will-o'-the-wisp in this weather, dear leader?” he asked his sister.

“It's not the least bit will-o'-the-wispish, Mart Belden,” snapped Trixie angrily, “and if you don't want to help, you don't have to. You can drop out right now!”

“Oh, you know he won't quit,” said Diana, quickly coming to Mart's defense. “You ought to be used to his teasing by now, Trix.”

“Oh, I'm used to it all right, and you know—” she paused, thought a minute, and then continued, “the reason I get mad is probably because sometimes his remarks have a grain of truth in them which I've refused to face up to.”

As she said this, she smiled fondly at her brother. Mart was so surprised at this unaccustomed response that he dropped his fork and was glad of an excuse to dive under the table to retrieve it.

“You don't mean you think we're foolish to keep looking, do you, Trix?” Jim asked apprehensively.

“No, of course not. It's just that—well, we mustn't let ourselves expect too much or we'll be awfully disappointed if we don't find the money. You know today is our last day,” Trixie pointed out.

“Well, then let's get on with it and hope our efforts pay off,” suggested Brian.

After breakfast, as Honey was phoning Peter that they were on their way, Trixie called out, “Tell him to bring a compass, if he has one. We may need it.”

“We'd better take a flashlight so we won't get run down, if anyone is foolish enough to drive in this pea soup,” added Jim.

“Well, I can see my hand in front of my face, but that's about all,” said Honey as they went outside.

“Just follow along the hedge, and we'll soon come to Pete's gate,” said Jim, taking the lead.

“Right-o, old chap,” Mart said in his best imitation of an English accent. “This is just like jolly old England. Chin up. Pip, pip!”

Peter was waiting for them near the entrance to the garden, and together they slowly made their way to the gazebo. “This fog will probably burn off in a couple of hours,” he said hopefully. “It's a good thing we haven't got a race scheduled today.”

“It doesn't help us any either, but it certainly lends
a ghostly atmosphere,” Honey said with a shiver. “Where do we go from here?”

“The next mark after the spire is the rock, and it's southwest from here,” Trixie noted, “but it doesn't say how far.”

“Maybe it's one of the stones in the slave cemetery,” Diana suggested. “What direction would that be?”

“I'm afraid that's too far north,” said Peter, “because they are over near the gate back of us.”

“Let's follow the compass southwest, and we may bump into something,” suggested Trixie, impatient to get started.

They had gone only a short distance when Brian, who was in the lead, almost fell over the same stone on which they had broken the bottle a few days before. “Oh, no! How stupid can we get?” cried Trixie. “Why didn't someone
think
of this? It's so
obvious!
”

“That's probably why,” Mart said. “We were all looking for something more elusive.”

“You can be sure the black buoy will be more elusive,” chuckled Peter, “because I'm dead sure there aren't any black buoys to stumble over anywhere around here.” He consulted the chart which Trixie was carrying and then started out due south.

“Jeepers! This is taking us right back into the
jungle,” Trixie said as they slowly worked their way through the tangle of vines. “Is there anything back in there, Pete?”

“Nothing but an old smokehouse where they used to cure hams and bacon,” Peter answered. “I found it when we first came here, but I haven't been near it since. It's pretty ramshackle.”

“A smokehouse, smoke, soot, black,
black buoy
,” Trixie muttered to herself. Then suddenly she cried, “I'll bet you anything the smokehouse is our next mark. Keep going!”

“It's lucky we wore our foul-weather gear, or we'd never get through these brambles,” Brian said as he pushed aside the clinging canes from some old raspberry bushes.

They had penetrated the thicket for about two hundred feet when they came to the little shanty which was in line with the compass marking,
South
.

“How long did you say it's been since you were here, Pete?” asked Trixie, her brows furrowing, as she started to look around.

“About two years, I'd say. Why?” he answered.

“Well, someone's been here not more than two
days
ago,” Trixie rejoined. “Look at the vines around the door. They've all been pulled down, and recently, too. See
where these new shoots have been pulled off the main stem?”

“And look here, Trix,” Honey cried. “There's a fresh semicircle on the ground where the door was pulled open.”

“But they couldn't have come the way we did or we would have seen their trail, wouldn't we?” Diana queried.

“Maybe they came in from another direction,” volunteered Mart, going around to the other side of the smokehouse. “See, here where the vines are tramped down,” he called out as he pointed to an opening in the underbrush.

“I think you're right, Mart, but why do you say ‘they'?” Trixie inquired as she went back and poked her head inside the door. She had taken the flashlight from Jim and was shining it on the floor. “It was only
one
person, or I miss my guess. Look at these footprints!”

“Golly, you're right, Trix,” said Jim, looking over her shoulder. “Only one pair shows up in the dust, and they look as though they were made by worn-out sneakers.”

In a corner, Trixie caught sight of a black jacket which had obviously been thrown down very recently. “Now I'm positive that our mysterious guest in the tool
shed is the same one we saw from the attic. He probably helped himself to Peter's chart and has beat us to this mark. If we don't hurry,” she said, “this is one race we may not win!”

By now, the sun was beginning to break through the fog, making their progress somewhat easier. After they came out into the open, they headed southeast across an open field, on the far side of which was the lily pool. Honey, wiping her damp forehead, suggested they stop there for a breather before going on.