Read Online The Marshland Mystery by Julie Campbell - Free Book Online

there was one thing that Mart disliked nearly as much as being called Trixie’s “twin,” it was being called “sonny.”
    “Why don’t you ask the law over there?” Mart snapped.
    Trent scowled at him. “You’re one of those smart-aleck Bob-Whites, aren’t you? From that crummy Sleepyside High?” He sneered and started to turn away.
    “Yeah, that ‘crummy’ school that walloped you thirty-eight to three last term!” Mart gave an insulting little snicker. “Boy, I’ll bet Central was glad when you graduated!”
    Trent’s sneer turned to a scowl, and his fists doubled as he towered over Mart. Trixie interrupted hurriedly. “It’s little Gaye. She’s run away somewhere.”
    “Gaye? Jeepers!” Trent forgot Mart at once and abruptly dashed off to talk to Sergeant Rooney.
    Mart glowered after him. “I should have smacked him! What did you have to speak up for?”
    “To keep you from getting a punch in the nose!” Trixie told him. “So thank me.” But Mart only scowled.
    Trent’s voice came through a sudden hush. “It looks like a kidnapping to me, Sergeant. They’ll probably get a ransom note any minute.”
    Mitzi, Gaye’s maid, shrieked, and Miss Crandall promptly toppled over in a faint and would have fallen if the sergeant hadn’t moved quickly to catch her. He led her to a chair and left her in the weeping Mitzi’s hands before he marched back to confront young Trent.
    “Where did you get that nonsense about kidnapping?” he demanded brusquely.
    Trent scowled and looked uneasy. An audible snicker from Mart did nothing to help. Trent flashed Mart an angry look and then asked Sergeant Rooney sullenly, “How do you know it’s nonsense? The kid makes a fortune with her fiddle. Why wouldn’t some crook get the idea of a kidnapping?”
    The sergeant said coldly, “There’s no evidence of such a thing. I don’t know where you got the idea,” he said, glancing toward Mart and Trixie and their fellow Bob-Whites before he continued, “but wherever it came from, forget it till we find something that points to it.” He frowned. “Clear?”
    The young reporter nodded and looked crestfallen as the sergeant and his assisting officer moved away, quietly discussing the case.
    Miss Crandall was moaning as she recovered from her faint, and Gaye’s governess and the maid were hovering over her, nervously getting into each other’s way as they ministered to her.
    Sergeant Rooney stopped by the solemn-faced little group of Bob-Whites. “I want all of you to try to think where the youngster may be hiding. You know, some old play spot of your own, a cave or an old building here on the estate.”
    “Regan and the chauffeur have looked just about everywhere imaginable and had no luck,” Jim explained gravely.
    The sergeant nodded. “I know. But one of you might know some special place.”
    “We’ll try to think,” Trixie promised.
    “Good.” Sergeant Rooney nodded. “The sooner we find her the better. Kids sometimes get themselves in a jam playing runaway.” He started after his assistant officer but stopped and looked back at them with a grim little smile. “But, for the love of pete, don’t start any wild rumors about kidnap plots. There’s nothing to point to any such thing.”
    “If that dumb reporter Trent says we gave him that goofy kidnap idea, he’s lying,” Mart told him quickly, with a scowl.
    “That’s right, Sergeant,” Trixie added quietly.
    Sergeant Rooney nodded. “Trent didn’t accuse you of it. It was just a little suspicion that came to me, and I’m glad it wasn’t so.”
    After the sergeant and his assistant had driven back to town to report, an uneasy silence settled down at the Wheelers’. Miss Crandall retired to her suite to check over the photographic proofs with a very subdued Paul Trent. He had, as Mart, grinning, confided to Brian and the girls, lost most of the wind out of his sails after the sergeant’s rebuke.
    The Bob-Whites stood in a group until