Trixie Belden
#8 The Black Jacket Mystery by Kathryn Kenny, 1961.
Trixie and the other Bob-Whites are concerned about their pen pals in Mexico because an earthquake has damaged their town. To help them rebuild their school library, the Bob-Whites decide to hold a benefit carnival to collect books.
While they are planning the carnival, Trixie becomes worried about Regan, who is in charge of Mr. Wheeler’s stable. She overhears him speaking to her mother about a problem, asking her advice, but saying that he doesn’t want the kids to know. Although Trixie doesn’t want to pry to into Regan’s business, she can’t help but worry about him and wonder what he doesn’t want them to know.
Then, a boy called Dan Mangan comes to live with Mr. Maypenny. Dan wears a black jacket and looks like a member of some kind of street gang. At school, he brags about brushes with the law. The Bob-Whites try to be friendly with him, but something about Dan gets on Trixie’s nerves.
When someone sells Honey’s missing watch at Mr. Lytell’s store, people begin to suspect that Dan may be a thief. But, soon, Trixie and the others start to suspect that someone else may be hiding out in the woods.
The book is currently available online through Internet Archive.
In the attic, Trixie finds a key with a tag on it. The tag is covered with a bunch of little stick figures, which turns out to be a form of code (one that fans of Sherlock Holmes would be likely to recognize). The key opens a box hidden in the attic, which contains a treasure that will raise a considerable sum of money for their cause. However, there is more mystery to come.
Mystery of the Silent Friends by Robin Gottlieb, 1964.
For a time, it seems like there’s no risk of the automatons being sold because no one seems particularly interested in buying them. Then, suddenly, two different men come to the shop and ask to buy the dolls. Weirdly, each of them tells the same story to Nina’s father: that their name is George Ballantine the Third, that their family once owned the automatons, that the dolls are actually part of a set of three, that they own the third doll (a girl doll that plays the spinet), and that they want to purchase the other two in order to reunite the set. Nina’s father is bewildered by these two men with identical stories and identical names and refuses to sell the automatons because of his daughter’s attachment to them and because he doesn’t know which of the two men to believe and doesn’t trust either of them.
At first, they all expect that Red Ballantine won’t be able to show them the third doll and will give up trying to buy the other two, but to their astonishment, he takes them to the same apartment where Brown Ballantine said that he lived and shows them the exact same doll they saw before. Instead of clearing things up, the identities of the two men seem to get all the more confusing. However, Muffin notices something strange about the tune that the doll plays on the spinet that gives them a clue as to why the three dolls are so important. Later, someone breaks into the antique store and uncovers a hidden secret about Henri as well.
April Hall has come to live with her grandmother (the mother of her deceased father) because her actress mother is touring with a band as a singer. April’s mother isn’t a big star, although April likes to brag about her and their Hollywood life. Really, her mother is mostly a vocalist who occasionally gets parts as an extra, hoping for that big break. April is sure that when her mother gets back from her tour, she will send for her, and they will live together in Hollywood again. Although, from the way her grandmother behaves, it seems as though April may have to prepare herself for living with her for the long term. April resents her grandmother’s apparent belief that her mother has dumped her because she is unwilling or unable to take care of her.
The children are uneasy about this unexpected game player because frightening things are happening in their neighborhood. The kids wonder if the mysterious messages could be from the crazed killer who murdered the young girl. People have been looking suspiciously at the loner who owns the antique store, an older man who everyone calls the Professor. However, the kids have become too enmeshed in the Egypt game to give it up in spite of their fears.
It’s 1851, and Professor Carver of Boston is living in an apartment above a candle shop with his wife and two children, his son Jamie and daughter Lorna. One day, a man named Mr. Giddings comes to see Professor Carver to request his help. For years, he has wanted to buy a particular farm with a beautiful house called Windy Hill. However, when he finally succeeded in buying the house and he and his wife went to live there, his wife became very upset. She said that she felt strange in the house and that she had seen a ghost. Now, she is too upset to return to Windy Hill. Mr. Giddings has heard that Professor Carver once helped a friend get rid of a ghost haunting his house, and he asks the professor if he would be willing to do the same for him.
Jamie and Lorna are thrilled by the house, which is much bigger than their apartment in town. They can each have their own room, and there is an old tower in the house that was built by a former owner, who was always paranoid about Indian (Native American) attacks (something which had never actually happened). However, their new neighbors are kind of strange. Stover, the handyman, warns them that the house is haunted and also tells them about another neighbor, Miss Miggie. Miss Miggie is an old woman who wanders around, all dressed in white, and likes to spy on people. There is also a boy named Bruno, who apparently can’t walk and often begs at the side of the road with his pet goat, and his father, Tench, who is often drunk and doesn’t want people to make friends with Bruno.
Then, strange things do start happening in the house. The quilt that Lorna has been making disappears and reappears in another room in the middle of the night. At first, the family thinks maybe she was walking in her sleep because she had done it before, when she was younger. However, there is someone who has been entering the house without the Carvers’ knowledge, and Jamie and Lorna set a trap that catches the mysterious “ghost.”
A boy called Nicky and his mother are looking for a new place to live somewhere in New England. The mother wants to buy an old cottage with the idea of turning it into a tea room. At first, they have trouble finding a place, but finally they buy an old house that badly needs fixing up, not knowing that there is an old witch living there.
Basil and the Lost Colony by Eve Titus, 1964.
Mystery of the Secret Message by Elizabeth Honness, 1961.
Jestress's Forgotten Books and Stories 