Chapter 5

That night at the get-together, after the older folks had commented on what an attractive young lady Trixie had become and they had met Honey, all of the young people retired to the Smiths' huge old porch to become acquainted. The Smiths had set up an old phonograph, with some classic 45 r.p.m. records to dance to.

It didn't escape Trixie's notice that Bradley, (the guy who was Bryan's age) who had been twelve the last time she'd seen him, had grown into a handsome young man. He was tall and athletic looking with black hair and deep green eyes. Ryan and Eric whom Trixie and Honey had seen at the lake earlier, were also there and Trixie noticed that Megan who had grown into a very attractive sixteen year old, seem to have eyes for Ryan, while her blonde younger sister Colleen, who was as prissy as ever, seemed to have staked her claim to Eric. She grabbed him by the arm and extended a sidelong glance toward Honey and Trixie that said "He's mine."

"Would you dance with me?" Bradley asked Trixie, as someone put a record on the phonograph.

The old Elvis classic "I can't help falling in love with you." began to play and Trixie felt as if she were back in time.

"Certainly." She replied, stepping into the small area which had been cleared for dancing.

"Do you think you might consider dancing with me?" Eric asked extending his elbow to Honey.

"Why sure." She answered smiling, taking him by the arm while trying to ignore the glare Colleen gave her. Megan and Ryan joined them then. Colleen, who was very beautiful, but spoiled, just looked jealously toward Honey.

"So, how are things back in Sleepyside?" Bradley asked Trixie, holding her close as the two swayed to the music.

"Oh great," she replied, smiling up at him.

"I've seen in the papers where you've solved a few mysteries," he told her admiringly.

"Yeah, Honey and I plan to be detectives when we finish college."

"Well, what have we here?" an unfamiliar male voice said, disturbing Trixie, who had closed her eyes as she slow danced with Bradley.

The song had ended and she and Bradley stepped away from one another. Trixie looked up and recognized Sean O'Rourke, Bradley, Megan and Colleen's older brother, as he swaggered onto the porch. With him was Aurora Alexander.

They both must be in their early twenties now, Trixie thought, studying them. And probably in college.

"Bradley, come on." Said Aurora, grabbing him by the arm and and trying to pull him into the house, while rudely ignoring the others. "Let's make an appearance so we can get out of here."

"I think I might like to dance," he said, throwing an arm around Trixie and pulling her close.

Trixie noticed that he was even more handsome than she remembered from the summer she was ten. He looked very much like his younger brother Bradley, even though he was even more muscular with longish black hair, where as Bradley was more clean cut. Trixie wrinkled her nose as the familiar smell of alcohol came to her nostrils.

"Hey, man," said Bradley, stepping forward and pulling Trixie out of his arms. "You better not let Mom and Dad see you like this."

Red-haired, freckle-faced Aurora stepped between Bradley and Trixie.  "Come on, Brad," she coaxed, while glaring at Trixie as if Bradley's attention to her was her fault.

Now, I guess Aurora hates me, Trixie thought. 

After much coaxing, Aurora finally persuaded Sean to leave with her, while Trixie and the others breathed a sigh of relief, but Trixie noticed that Brad and Megan looked worriedly after their brother as he left.

As the teens switched partners and danced to the music of the Beach Boys and other classics, Trixie found herself really having fun. But all good things must come to an end.

"Trixie," she heard her mother's voice.

"Yeah, Moms," she said, breathless from dancing. She saw Moms standing in the doorway. Trixie had just been whirled around the dance floor by Ryan to the tune of "She Loves You" by the Beatles.

"I have to take Bobby back to the cabin now. He's exhausted," Moms told her.

Disappointed, Trixie and Honey prepared to leave.

"Uh, if they could stay a while longer, I'll walk them to their door," volunteered Bradley O'Rourke, looking admiringly at Trixie.

"Yeah, I will, too," agreed Eric Singleton.

"Well, the adults are putting things away now, so you probably only have about thirty more minutes," Moms said, looking at her watch. "They can stay till ten-thirty, but then I want them back at our cabin."

After Moms left, the young people mostly just talked. Except for Colleen; she pouted and glared at Eric, who seemed to only have eyes for Honey. All too soon, it was time to go.

"Eric, are you going to walk me home?" Colleen said, grabbing his hand and looking up at him, with a dainty pout on her lips.

"No, I'm going to walk with Honey." he told her, while pulling his arm away. "Ryan can walk with you and Megan." Angrily, she turned and stamped away.

Eric and Honey walked ahead of Trixie and Bradley on the wooded trail that led toward the Belden cottage.

"I'd like to apologize for my brother Sean and the way he acted tonight," Bradley told Trixie, taking her by the hand. "He's really an alright guy. He just has problems."

"Oh, that's okay, he didn't bother me at all," Trixie told him. "But, what's wrong with Sean?"

"He never got over Mrs. Alexander's death that summer. It's almost like he feels responsible somehow," Bradley told her. "He was never the same afterward. And it really hurt him when it was rumored that he might've done it. And there's Aurora. She used to follow Sean around after that happened. She wouldn't leave him alone. The summer after her mother was killed, our parents had to change our phone number, because she called him all the time. She would run away from home and come to our house demanding to see Sean. She even concocted a story that she was pregnant and he had to marry her, which turned out to be false. This went on until two years later, when he went away to college. Our parents wouldn't even let her know where he had gone. But, this summer, he wanted to come back down here; this is the first time for him since Mrs. Alexander was killed. We didn't expect Aurora to be here, like you and your family, she and her father didn't come back after her mother's death. But, as coincidence would have it, they're here, too. She seems to have renewed her obsession for Sean again. "

"I'm sorry to hear that Sean's been through so much," Trixie said solemnly, while wondering if maybe Sean or Aurora might've had something to do with Mrs. Alexander’s' death.

"I know," said Bradley. "If he'd tell her to get lost, I think he'd be better off. But, for his own sake, I wish he hadn't of came here. Anyway, let's move on to happier thoughts." He stopped for a moment and looked into her eyes. "Like, how glad I am to see you back in Blueberry Cove. I never knew Brian and Mart's little sister would grow up to be so beautiful."

"Thanks," said Trixie shyly.

They walked hand in hand the remainder of the way to the cottage.

 

Chapter 6

Bradley lightly kissed Trixie on the lips and waited politely as Eric kissed Honey goodbye on the porch steps. "See you tomorrow," said Bradley as he and Eric left for their own families' cottages.

"I love this place," Honey said dreamily as she and Trixie stood on the porch watching the guys walk away. "And you thought we'd be bored!" 

"I must admit that it's nothing like I thought it would be," Trixie said, smiling.

"Trixie, let's sleep out here on the porch just like you and your brothers used to do."

"Yeah, let's," Trixie agreed. "It's probably hot upstairs and out here, it's nice." She felt the cool breeze from off the lake. "Maybe we still have the camp cots.  Hopefully, Uncle Andrew didn't have them thrown out during remodeling."

The girls tiptoed up the stairs; Moms had already gone to bed and they didn't want to wake her.

After looking in several places, Trixie found the cots in an upstairs closet.   They carried two of them down stairs. They retrieved sheets, pillows, and blankets and quickly changed into pajamas.

After they had set up the cots and put bed linens on them, Honey glanced toward the lake. "Oh, it's so beautiful here," she said as she looked at the moonlight casting a path across the lake. "It looks like you could walk out on the dock and touch the moon."

The girls laid down on their cots and begin to giggle and talk; neither one was able to sleep.

"I don't think Aurora likes you very much," Honey teased Trixie. "Especially when her boyfriend put his arm around you."

"I don't think Colleen was too thrilled with you and Eric, either," Trixie teased back. "If it were the summer I was ten, I would be mad at you, too.  I had a mad crush on Eric."

"Oh, tell me about it," Honey laughed, sitting up on her cot. "I have to hear this."

"I decided I was in love with him the summer before, when all of us kids we were roasting hot dogs over an open fire on the lake and it was discovered that he could eat more hot dogs than I could." Honey burst out laughing at that point. Smiling, Trixie continued. "Well, I thought he liked me, too. The next summer, even though I was only ten, I thought I might do a little flirting. Moms had made me this prissy little dress, it was pink with tiny white flowers, it had a little ruffled skirt and it was trimmed in white lace. Well, I put it on, and I even put these two little white plastic hair barrettes in my hair and slipped on a pair of dainty white sandals that Moms had bought for me to wear with it.

"I knew Eric was fishing by himself down at the dock, and my brothers and the others weren't around. So, I went down to the dock, and prepared to strike up a conversation with him and hoped he'd notice me in my prissy little dress, which I wore just for him. Well, he took one look at me and ran behind a tree and threw pebbles at me.   Needless to say, my crush ended as I was pelted with those rocks."

"Oh, you poor thing," Honey said, falling over on the cot laughing. "It sounds like Ben Riker all over again."

"Oh, did you have to bring that up?" Trixie asked, laughing.

While they were giggling, someone stepped up suddenly to the screen door. Both girls jumped up and yelled with fright and started to run inside.

"Calm down. It's just me," a familiar male voice said.

They both realized it was Sean O'Rourke.

 

Chapter 7

"Sean, what are you doing here?" Trixie asked, looking worriedly toward the front door. She knew if Moms heard him out here, she would probably not allow her and Honey to sleep on the porch again.

"I want you and your friend to come out to the lake. I want to show you something," he told her.

"Sean, we can't go outside with you. If Moms caught us, she'd freak," Trixie told him, still looking worriedly toward the door.

"Oh, I guess I thought you'd grown up," he said, almost falling off the steps, as he was still a little drunk. "You still have to do what Mommy says?" His voice was tinged with sarcasm.

"Well, the idea of being grounded until I become old enough to go to college is a great motivator." Trixie replied.

She and Honey stared at each other, silently trying to figure out what to do to get Sean to leave.

"Sean," said a male voice as another guy who looked about Sean's age came walking up; Aurora was close behind him. "Sean, come on, man."

Trixie recognized him as Cody, a guy that had hung out with Sean and Aurora the last couple of summers she was down here. His parents were one of the wealthier families from the other side of the lake.

"Sorry, guys. He's had a little too much to drink," Cody politely told Honey and Trixie. "Are you the little tom-boy Belden kid? Wow, you've grown up." He grinned. "And who's your beautiful friend?"

"Honey Wheeler," Honey said, smiling as she stuck out her hand.

Cody shook hands with her and said, "I'm going to have to come over to this side of the lake more often," glancing admiringly at Trixie and Honey, who felt somewhat embarrassed.

Trixie thought, At least it's dark and our pajamas resemble shorts and a T-shirt.

A few more pleasantries were exchanged, excluding Aurora who just stood back and acted like Trixie and Honey didn't exist, which Trixie was sure she probably wished they really didn't. Finally, Sean and Cody said their goodbyes and left.

Trixie then told Honey about the conversation she had had earlier when walking home with Bradley O'Rourke about how Sean seemed to feel somewhat responsible for Anastasia's death.

"I wonder what makes him feel responsible?" Trixie said as she watched them walk down the moonlit path.

Even in the moonlight, Honey could see that gleam in Trixie's eyes. "Oh Trixie," she said. "Don't even think about it. I swear, I believe if you went to the very center of the North Pole, you could find a mystery." Honey sounded exasperated.

"But, someone killed Mrs. Alexander and they haven't been caught, yet," Trixie said.

"They're not going to get caught tonight. I think I'm going to go to sleep before daylight comes." Honey lay down and pulled the covers up to her chin.

 

Chapter 8

Trixie and Honey yawned their way through a delicious blueberry pancake breakfast.

"Did you girls sit up all night?" Moms asked, smiling as they yawned.

"Well, we were talking, and we just lost track of how late it was getting," Honey replied politely.

Trixie and Honey both knew Moms would not be happy if she knew Sean was outside last night.

"Moms, what all do we need to do here?" asked Trixie, feeling guilty that she hadn't helped with Bobby or any housework yesterday.

"Oh, maybe sometime today or tomorrow, pick me some more blueberries," Moms replied, sitting down at the table with the girls; Bobby was still in bed. "The Smiths' great-grandchildren are coming today and they're around Bobby's age. So, hopefully, that'll keep him busy. I want him to get to go to the lake some. All the Belden kids learned to swim here when they were younger than he is; I don't want to break the tradition."

"Maybe we can help teach Bobby," Honey offered.

"That would be great, Honey. I don't know when we're going to actually get around to doing it."

"Moms," Trixie asked looking into her mother's eyes. "Have you been alright here? I mean, really alright?"

"Oh, yes, Trixie. It feels a little funny without Anastasia here, because I've never been here without her before. She was here the very first time your father ever brought me here. It was our honeymoon."

"Oh wow, Mrs. Belden. You spent your honeymoon here?" asked Honey.

"We sure did. Anastasia and her husband had just gotten married, also. They had bought the little cabin back in the woods behind us, that's when we met. Anastasia loved Blueberry Cove. When you met her, you would've thought she wouldn't like a place like this, but she did."

"What kind of relationship did she have with her husband, Moms?" Trixie asked curiously, as she wiped syrup off her mouth with a sunny peach-colored napkin.

"They were very much in love," Moms said, a hint of tears in her eyes. "He was quite a bit older than she was and not very friendly to the folks down here.   He never participated in get-togethers and such down here at the lake, but she did. He never seemed to mind her doing so. And, he didn't seem to be jealous or possessive. He knew Anastasia liked men and men liked her. Of course, that's probably why she wasn't close friends with the other women down here. Because she was so beautiful, they were all afraid she was after their husbands. But, harmless flirting was all Anastasia ever did."

"So, there was no truth to the rumors that he killed her?" Trixie asked.

"All the rumors were preposterous," Moms replied. "Her husband would never have killed her. Sean O'Rourke wouldn't have done anything like that, either. I mean, he was a party boy and all that, but I don't think that makes him capable of murder. And Aurora wouldn't have done that. She loved her mother, even though they didn't have a close relationship. My own opinion is that a drifter was passing through here and went in her house and shot her."

"Was she robbed?" Trixie asked, trying to keep her curiosity at bay, at least in front of Moms.

"No, that's the strange thing. She was wearing gold jewelry and there was a jewel box with some expensive antique jewelry in it on the table beside the bed where she was killed, but it wasn't touched. And, no weapon was ever found."

The girls and Moms changed the subject to the upcoming Fourth of July bash and what kind of food would be there.

"I'm getting hungry just talking about it," Honey said.

They quickly cleaned the kitchen for Moms as she went upstairs to take care of Bobby.

"It's already warming up," Trixie said, wiping sweat off her brow. "Let's go swimming."

The two girls quickly ran upstairs and put on swimsuits and with a yelled, "Moms, we're going swimming!" they were out the door and headed to the lake. Sean, Eric and Ryan were already down there waiting when the two girls got there.

"Well, it's about time someone rolled out of bed. We've been down here for hours," said Eric jokingly as he came up behind Honey on the dock and put his arms around her shoulders.

"Hi, Bradley," Trixie said, all of a sudden feeling shy.

"Hi, yourself," he said, smiling, just before Ryan shoved them both into the lake.

Trixie came up sputtering and embarrassed; she noticed Colleen and Megan walking up. Colleen looked gorgeous in a skimpy neon pink bikini and Trixie suspected that Colleen was very much aware that she did.

"Let's get in the boats and row over to Poplar Island," Bradley suggested, after he had climbed up on the dock and extended a hand to Trixie.

"Yeah. It's been awhile since we been there," replied Eric.

They all piled into the two boats. Bradley, Trixie, Megan and Ryan climbed into one, while Honey, Eric and Colleen got in the other one.

"We shouldn't go to the island today, we need to bring a lunch for that," suggested Megan.

"You're right," said Eric. "Since we're all in the boats, let's play pirates."

"I call our side to be the pirates!" yelled Ryan.

"How do we play?" Honey asked.

"We go over and throw all of them off that boat," Bradley told her.

"I don't want to get my hair wet!" exclaimed Colleen as Bradley and Ryan invaded the boat and threw her and Honey overboard.  Eric put up a fight, but eventually he had to surrender and was thrown over, too.

They spent most of the morning in the water, laughing and splashing and having fun. Everyone except Colleen, that is. After a hateful glance toward Honey and Eric, she stomped off down the trail that led to her own cabin.

Honey and Trixie soon headed to their cabin for lunch and the group planned to get together later that day.

Trixie walked along silently. She really enjoyed Bradley's company, but she wished she could get him alone, because she wanted to ask him more questions about his brother and the relationship with Aurora. She felt like this was a key to solving the mystery of who murdered Mrs. Alexander.

To Be Continued

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