The Mysterious Visitor: Trixie Belden

There''s a new face in Sleepyside, and Trixie Belden is sure this stranger is up to no good. Too bad no one else believes her. But if anyone get can to the truth of this visitor''s true motives, it''s Trixie! Discover Trixie Belden, the teenage detective who has been charming readers for generations.

Trixie Belden hasn''t talked to Diana Lynch in a long time. Not since her family got incredibly wealthy...and snobby. But when Trixie and her best friend Honey spot Di looking a little down, Trixie knows it is time to put old grievances in the past.

Except, the past is <exactly< the problem for Di. Her long-lost Uncle Monty has recently showed up, and he is ruining her social life. Trixie smells a rat. But can she prove that Monty is an imposter--or will Di be the one sent packing before it all over?

Peek into the adventurous world of Trixie Belden and unravel book three in the mystery series that has delighted decades of readers.

Auteur

In the 1940s, Julie Campbell was running her own literary agency when Western Publishing put out a call for talented authors to write mystery series for kids. Julie proposed the Trixie Belden series and wrote the first six titles herself, but books seven through thirty-nine were written by a variety of writers all under the pseudonym Kathryn Kenny.

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Chapter 1

An Unhappy Friend

Trixie and Honey linked arms as they left their home room. “Oh, woe,” Trixie moaned. “Homework on a Friday. It’s not fair. It’ll ruin the whole weekend.” She was a sturdy girl of thirteen with short sandy curls and round blue eyes. “Every Oc-tober since I learned to write, the English teacher has given us the same old as-signment.” Trixie frowned, looked down her nose, and said in a high-pitched voice: “‘Now, children, I want you to tell me in not less than two hundred words what you did this summer.’ Phooey! If I hand in a hundred words, I’ll be doing well. And they’re all sure to be spelled wrong and not punctuated properly.”

Honey Wheeler, who was Trixie’s best friend, laughed. She had earned her nick-name because of her golden-brown hair, and she had wide hazel eyes. Although they were the same age, Honey was taller than Trixie. “Trixie, you couldn’t possi-bly tell about everything we did this summer in a million words,” she said. “I thought we’d divide up our exciting experiences. Since he’s my adopted brother now, I’ll tell how we found Jim up at the old mansion and lost him, and then found him again when we solved the red trailer mystery. You could tell about the dia-mond we found in the gatehouse, and the thieves who stole it from us, and how you helped the police capture them.”

Trixie sniffed. “Telling about something is one thing; writing about it is another. I never could write about things and make them sound interesting--not even when I was very interested in them myself. My fingers ache at the very thought of holding a pencil long enough to explain all about the gatehouse and the diamond and the thieves and everything. And how the gatehouse is our secret clubhouse now. Of course, I’d never tell that part of the story, anyway.”

“I should hope not.” Although it was the last week of October, it was a very warm day. Honey pushed her bangs back from her forehead with her free hand. “You shouldn’t even talk about our club in the corridor when so many kids are milling around.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Suppose someone guessed that the initials B.W.G. stand for Bob-Whites of the Glen? Oh, Trixie, wasn’t it fun the first day of school when we wore our special red jackets and just about baffled every-one?”

Trixie nodded. “I don’t know how you ever made those jackets so quickly, Honey. And as for cross-stitching B.W.G. on the backs in white, well that baffled me. As far as I’m concerned, all sewing is cross-stitching because every time I look a needle in the eye I feel cross.”

Honey hugged Trixie’s arm. “As long as we’re neighbors, you don’t even have to think about sewing. I’ll always do your mending for you, Trix. I just love to sew, and mending is no trouble at all.”

The girls lived on Glen Road which was about two miles from the junior-senior high school in the village of Sleepyside-on-the-Hudson. They and Jim Frayne and Trixie’s older brothers, Brian and Mart, traveled to and from school by bus. The Manor House, which was the name of the Wheelers’ huge estate, included acres of rolling lawn and woodlands, a big lake, and a stable of horses. It formed the west-ern boundary of the Beldens’ Crabapple Farm, which nestled down in a hollow. Honey’s home was luxurious and very beautiful, but Trixie preferred the little white frame house where she lived with her three brothers and their parents.

“I hope we’ll always be neighbors,” she said to Honey. “I would have died of lone-liness last summer if your father hadn’t bought the Manor House. There was just no one around to talk to. Brian and Mart were away at camp and there was no-body left but Bobby. And you can’t do things with him. Just keep him out of trouble--if possible--and wash his face and comb his hair and bandage his scraped knees. That’s not a very exciting way to spend a summer, let me tell you.”

“I know someone who’s dying of loneliness right now,” Honey said. “And I feel aw-fully sorry for her.”

“Who?” Trixie asked curiously. With the exception of Honey, she had gone to grade school with all of the boys and girls who had entered junior high that Sep-tember. She couldn’t think of one of them who had any reason for being lonely. Most of them lived in the pretty residential section of the town which sprawled along the east bank of the Hudson River. Because they lived so near one another, they had grand times after school and during the holidays, whereas almost all of the bus children were separated from their friends by miles or at least acres. “Who?” Trixie asked again.

“Diana Lynch,” Honey said, whispering.

“Di--lonely?” Trixie was so surprised she almost shouted.

“Shh,” Honey cautioned. “She might be right behind us.”

“Why, she’s got everything,” Trixie continued in a slightly lower voice. “Next to you, Honey, she’s the prettiest girl in our class. She doesn’t get very good marks, but neither do I. She’s got two sets of twins for brothers and sisters, and her father made a million dollars a couple of years ago. They have a huge place that’s as gorgeous as yours, high up on a hill that’s even higher than your hill, with a mar-velous view of the river. I’ve only been out there once, but--”

“That’s the point,” Honey interrupted. “Why haven’t you been out there more than once? Why doesn’t she ever sit near you on the bus? I thought you and Di had known each other since kindergarten.”

“We have,” Trixie said. “And come to think of it, when the Lynches were poor and lived in a nice but rather crowded apartment on Main Street, she used to invite me home for lunch an awful lot. Her mother is a wonderful cook. I can still remember how yummy her pancakes and fried chicken tasted. Such a treat instead of sand-wiches and milk!”

“Her mother doesn’t cook at all anymore,” Honey said.

“Why should she?” Trixie demanded. “When Di asked me to lunch last spring--that’s when I saw their red trailer--the whole place was simply …