The Mystery at Maypenny's

concern. “Do you think he’s all right?” Trixie asked softly. “I hope the letter wasn’t bad news.”
    As she spoke, Mr. Maypenny returned to the room as abruptly as he had left it. He was wiping his eyes with a handkerchief, but there was a broad grin on his face. “It isn’t bad news at all, Trixie,” he said. “In fact, it’s about the best news I’ve had in ages.”
    “Who’s the letter from, Mr. Maypenny?” Trixie asked curiously.
    “It’s from my nephew, David Maypenny,” the gamekeeper said, sitting back down at the table. He unfolded the letter again and stared down at it as if he couldn’t quite believe it was real.
    “You never told me you had a nephew,” Dan Mangan said.
    “I’d almost forgotten I did have one,” the old man said. “I’ve never even met the boy. Actually, he’s not a boy anymore. He must be almost thirty by now.” Mr. Maypenny’s face clouded over, and his eyes glistened. “I quarreled with the boy’s father, my late brother, several years before David was born. My brother moved to the city and I never saw him again. I later heard that he’d married and had a son. Then I heard he’d died. I—I wrote to the boy’s mother then, asking if I could do anything, send a bit of money from time to time to help out.” He sighed. “I never got an answer to my letter. I figured my brother had turned her against me—turned the boy against me, too, probably. I never wrote again.”
    “And now your nephew has written to you,” Trixie said softly. “But why, after all these years?”
    Mr. Maypenny shrugged. “I don’t know, exactly. He just says he thinks it’s time we buried the hatchet and got to know one another. He has some vacation time coming, and he wants to come up here for a visit.”
    “That’s wonderful!” Honey said. Her own unhappiness was completely forgotten in the face of Mr. Maypenny’s good news. “When is he going to come?”
    “He says he’d like to drive up the end of next week. He says he won’t come unless he hears from me, though,” Mr. Maypenny said. “I think I’ll write to him tonight.”
    Brian rose from the table and stretched. “I think that sounds like a good idea, Mr. Maypenny. And I think it would be a good idea if we went home and let you get started with your letter. It’s getting late.”
    “A perspicuous observation,” Mart said, rising to his feet. “I have an arduous assignment in geometry still ahead of me this evening, and I seem to recall that dear Beatrix also transported a textbook or two from the halls of academe.” Trixie wrinkled her nose at the sound of her hated full name, which Mart used only when he wanted to tease her. Then she too stood up. “I do have some homework to do yet tonight. Thanks for the great stew, Mr. Maypenny. And we’ll look forward to meeting your nephew.”
    Honey was also ready to leave. “Thank you for the dinner, Mr. Maypenny,” she said.
    “Thank you for your help,” Mr. Maypenny said. “Tell Jim I said thanks, too. And—and tell him I’m sorry for getting him all upset tonight. I hope he won’t stay mad at me.”
    “He won’t,” Honey replied. “Jim’s anger is pretty powerful, but it usually doesn’t last very long.”
    Calling out final good-nights, the Bob-Whites walked out into the deepening twilight. The Beldens walked Honey down the path to the Manor House until they could see the front door. They waited until their friend was safely inside before they turned and walked back to their own house.
    Trixie pulled her red Bob-White jacket close to her body to ward off the evening chill. “It’s beginning to feel like fall,” she said. “I just hope this cool air wakes me up before we get home. It’s been a long day, and I still have to read ten pages in my history book before I go to bed.”
    “It really isn’t that late,” Brian said. “It’s only a little after seven o’clock. So much has happened, it feels as if it should be midnight.”
    Trixie nodded. “We haven’t even been home since we left for school this morning. Oh, that reminds me! There was a car pulling into our driveway this morning just as we left on the bus. I was going to ask Moms about it this afternoon, but I never did, of course. I’ll have to do that as soon as we get home.”
    But when Trixie and her brothers walked through the kitchen door, the sound of Bobby’s screams drove all other thoughts from their minds.
    “I won't go to bed,” they heard him wail. “I