*adult themes

Chapter 12: Suspicious Minds

"If you would all just please listen instead of complaining about being here so early, I could explain!" Trixie resisted the urge to throw her notebook against the wall in emphasis, but if she had to watch Diana yawn and then Mart apologize for holding the meeting at such an early hour, as if it were his idea, she would, and cheerfully, too.

"Please do that," Jim said, from his usual seat at the opposite end of the table. "Dad's waiting for me to go into the city with him. I'm sitting in on some important meetings today."

Trixie clenched her jaw tight, chalking up yet another polite reminder that everyone else had better things to do than sit through another Bob-White meeting. Not only did Jim have plans with his father, but Brian was picking up an extra EMT shift, Di and Mart were going to White Plains for a dance lesson, Dan had to work and Anne… she was engrossed in some sort of repair to a laptop computer. "I'll try and be brief," Trixie managed to say. "Last night, I put together a Criminal Profile of the person who is framing Peter Belden for embezzlement."

Seated next to Jim that morning and dressed in his uniform, Brian frowned at her words. "You mean Dad? Trix, why are you calling him that like you don't know him?" Beside him, Honey looked wonderingly, too.

"To keep our objectivity," she explained. He was still frowning, but he seemed willing to go along with her on that point. "As I was saying, last night I put together a profile on this guy and-"

"What do you mean?" Diana asked. "What's a profile? You mean like a drawing?" Interested, she leaned forward.

"Sort of," Trixie replied. She felt slightly uncomfortable explaining detective terms as if she were some huge expert, but she also felt reasonably sure of her knowledge, so she explained to Diana, "It's more like a picture of the mind of the guy you're looking for. You look at what you know about the crime, what you know about people who have committed crimes like that in the past, what you know about people who think the way you'd need to think to commit a crime like the one you're investigating. You put that all together and then you have a profile. It's a place to start. A way to narrow down your suspects."

"Okay." Diana nodded, ready for Trixie to continue.

"You have a profile?" Honey asked, her voice a bit wistful.

"Uh, yeah," Trixie said. "I did it last night."

"You didn't call me about it."

A stab of guilt stuck into Trixie, but she had no easy reply. "I’m sorry, Honey. I guess I didn't think about calling you. Weren't you busy with fundraiser plans and stuff?" She smiled, hoping Honey would say she had been.

Honey shook her head. "No. Miss Trask and I finished up early. I spent the night watching TV."

"Oh. I see." Trixie ducked her head, feeling suddenly even more horrible she had inadvertently excluded her best friend from her work. Work they were supposed to be one day doing together. She ruthlessly shoved aside her feelings of regret and anguish, resolved to apologize to Honey and make it up to her as soon as she could, and barreled ahead with her report. "Anyway, this is what I came up with. This is who I think we should be looking for." She focused on the paper, knowing the others were probably growing impatient.

"Whom."

"Huh?" Trixie looked up from her papers, wondering for a moment who had spoken.

It was Anne, but she wasn't looking up. Instead, her face was barely two inches from the laptop, the back panel of which lay on the table, the guts of which glared in the morning light streaming in through the clubhouse windows. "'Whom'," she repeated, without inflection. "This is 'whom' I think we should be looking for. Actually, you should have said 'This is for whom I think we should be looking.'" Not once did Anne's eyes flicker or move away from the tip end of a tiny screwdriver, which even now she was using to tighten some impossibly tiny connector in the back of the machine.

"Anne?" Trixie asked slowly. "What are you doing?"

"I'm fixing this," she replied. "Go on. I’m listening." She set down the tool and gently tapped one of the internal components with her fingertip.

"Obviously." Trixie glanced at the others. Their attention seemed equally divided between herself and Anne's task, but since the common denominator in their regard was curiosity, whether for her profile or the computer, she continued. "This is for whom we should be looking," she began again. She did her best to ignore the small grin that touched Anne's mouth. "A white man, age 25 to 40, who works at the bank and has known Peter Belden for at least five years, probably more. He-"

"Whoa," Dan said. "White? What makes you so sure this guy's white?"

"Not to be un-PC," Trixie explained. "But it goes along with the rest of the criteria. You'll see." He shrugged, so she continued. "He's single, lives alone, no pets. He has a home computer and he's technically savvy. He's a resident of Sleepyside and has probably lived here most of his life."

Mart caught his sister's eyes. "My most esteemed female sibling," he began. "While I congratulate you on this, your first malefactor manifesto, I must interpellate your intellection."

Trixie was about to ask him to translate himself, but Anne's giggling laughter caused her to wait. "Tell the truth, Mart," the other girl said. "You've been saving that one up for a long time." His pink flush admitted the truth of her words.

Diana's next words, delivered in a bewildered tone, overcame the ensuing laughter. "Well, I just want to know how Trixie came up with all that stuff in her profile." Her violet eyes filled with uncertainty as the others laughed louder. Seeking to comfort her, Mart stretched across the table to put one of his hands on hers. Since he and Diana sat on either side of Trixie, they treated her to a front-row view of their subsequent soulful stare.

Trixie groaned almost silently. "Anyway," she tried again. "I figure that it has to be someone with tech experience -"

"Naturally," Anne agreed. "This is a tech crime."

"Right." Since the unqualified support was so suddenly and unexpectedly given, it took Trixie a moment to continue. "And, um, since most tech people are male -" Anne grunted. "-present company excluded, of course," Trixie smoothly added. "That makes it more likely it's a man doing this. Also, it has to be someone at the bank, because only someone at the bank would be able to pull this off without anyone in the bank knowing about it."

"What about accomplices?" Jim asked.

"Good question," she smiled. "But no. I doubt there is one. With a computer, you don't need someone helping you out. Intentionally, anyway. There's always the possibility that someone is helping the suspect without knowing it, but since the money is being put into an account under one name, probably only one guy is going to be able to walk into the Swiss bank and demand his money. This is also why I think the guy must be white, if he's hoping to pass for Peter Belden." Dan nodded. It did seem logical.

"True," Jim agreed, also nodding his head in agreement. "An accomplice isn't likely to be so trusting to believe that he or she would get paid when all was said and done."

"Right!" She grinned, happy her thoughts were proving to be provable. "I figure he has to be someone who knows Peter Belden, especially since it's probably an employee. That one's pretty much a 'duh'. The unmarried part comes in because I doubt any guy who's married would have this much time to spend thinking up this whole scheme. Not to mention time to monitor its progress and set up his victim so completely."

"Also," Dan agreed. "Wives and girlfriends, or boyfriends and husbands, would fall probably under the category of accomplice."

Trixie breathed another delighted, "Right!" This was almost too easy. "So then you guys agree with my profile?"

"Well," Dan hedged. "What if this is a black guy anyway?"

She grinned. "The only black guy at the bank is the branch Vice-President, Dad's boss. He's not going to risk his own career by making his employee out to be an embezzler. Mr. Bryson's the guy who hired Dad away from Citibank in the first place."

Dan nodded his understanding even as Brian said, "You mean 'Peter Belden', right?" He winked at his sister before continuing with, "Sure we agree with you. I mean, why not? It sounds reasonable enough. What are you going to do with it now? Share it with the FBI?"

"Not just yet," she admitted. "I'm not quite done."

"What more is there to discuss?" Jim asked. He checked his watch, then, as if he realized he'd been rude, he said, "I've got some time before Dad comes by in the car to pick me up."

"Well, there's 'who', of course," Trixie said. "But a quick look through the employees at the bank and we should be able to narrow that down."

Anne snapped the laptop case back together, turned the computer over and lifted the top. "Makes sense," she agreed. "What else are you thinking about?" She nodded her head with a satisfied smirk as the laptop turned on and booted up.

"What about 'how'?" Honey asked. "I mean, that's been bothering me. How do you take several million dollars out of a bank without anyone noticing?"

"That's easy," Trixie said. "Once you realize what I realized once."

"Which is…?" Honey waited for her to go on.

"It's simple," Anne replied instead. "Money isn't calculated to the hundredths, but the thousandths."

"You lost me," Diana stated flatly. She stifled a yawn.

"Our system of money," Anne tried again, "is based on hundreds. A hundred pennies make a dollar, et cetera. Right?"

"Okay," she said slowly. She glanced at Mart, but he seemed as interested in Anne's explanation as the others.

"Okay. That's all hard currency." Anne rubbed the fingers of her right hand together. "That's all money you can touch. In banks, they use thousandths to calculate money."

Diana turned in her seat to get a better view of Anne. "That's where you lose me. Why would they do it that way?"

She thought a moment, then said, "You ever look at a bank statement? Or notice the percentages sometimes on interest rates?"

"I think so."

"They're usually like 5.799 per cent or whatever. Right?"

Diana thought about it. "You mean like at the gas pump? How it goes through the tiny pennies?"

"Tiny pennies?" Anne repeated. It was her turn to be confused.

"She means the tenths of cents," Mart explained.

"Oh!" Anne smiled. "Those are actually used to calculate thousandths, since a tenth of a cent, which is already a hundredth, is a thousandth."

Diana was still lost. It took the better part of the next five minutes, a sheet of paper and a ball point pen before she felt reasonably sure of the concept. Finally, she said, "Tiny pennies are thousandths."

"Yes!" Anne almost shouted in triumph. "And that's what the criminal is stealing!"

Diana frowned. "But how? I didn't think people could actually use tiny pennies."

"They don't," she agreed. "But banks do. Especially in things like calculating stock prices, foreign exchanges and interest. They calculate past the penny, to the 'tiny penny', and round up or down to make it even up. Let's not get involved in the 'why' they do it that way, okay? I'm not entirely sure."

"Okay," Diana agreed. "But then how did it get stolen?"

"Someone wrote a computer program that would remove the extra pennies from a person's account as those pennies showed up," Trixie answered. "Those 'tiny pennies' get routed to another account and then transferred out of the bank. Since we're only talking about a penny here or there total per any one account, no one notices anything's wrong. People make mistakes with their checkbooks all the time and think nothing of it, especially when it's 'only' a penny."

"Right," Mart added. "They think they're the ones who made the mistake, that a bank computer could never have miscalculated. So they fix their checkbooks to reflect the new balance and never complain about the error at all. The plan's almost foolproof."

Just as Trixie opened her mouth, Anne snapped her fingers and said, "Mrs. Vanderpoel's twenty-seven cents!"

Startled by the seeming non sequiter, the others asked huh? but Trixie smiled in triumph. "That's right! She noticed the pennies missing in her account and complained. That's what got my dad curious about the situation and I'll bet that's what spooked the guy we're looking for into action."

"You think?" Honey asked. "Wow. I would've just thought Mrs. Vanderpoel made a mistake."

Anne laughed. "She doesn't make mistakes, Honey. But then, I thought it was some sort of Y2K error. Shows what I know!"

Jim gestured for Trixie's attention. "So what you're saying is this. Mrs. Vanderpoel notices some change missing from her account. She goes to your dad, he starts looking for it, mentions it to someone at the bank, that person either is or innocently tells the guy who's been stealing the money which prompts that guy to, what? Call the FBI on himself?"

"The FBI was acting on a tip," Trixie said. "They came in, searched the bank and found the planted evidence. This guy, whoever he is, has been waiting for this moment for a long time. I'm sure he had a plan of action for when someone figured out what he was up to. When he thought Peter Belden might be catching on, he put that plan into motion and here we are."

"Why him?" Brian asked. "What's he ever done to anyone?"

"I don't know," she replied. "I've wracked my brains for a clue, but came up with nothing."

Anne leaned across Dan's body to tap on Diana's arm. "Hey, Di," she said. "You got your cell phone on you?"

"Sure," she answered, reaching into her purse. "Who do you want to call?"

She handed the phone to Anne and watched as she plugged a thin black cord into the bottom of the receiver. The other end was plugged into the laptop. "I'm not sure yet, but I'll let you know."

Trixie felt a bit irked that Anne was choosing to surf the Net while in the middle of a meeting. She was about to say something when she thought better of it. The last thing she wanted to do was come off like a disciplinarian when she preferred to be a 'lead by example' leader. So, she concentrated on answering Brian's question. "It could be for almost any reason. Maybe he made a joke about this guy's haircut one day, or maybe he stole this guy's girlfriend back in high school and he's never gotten over it. Maybe they've always been rivals but this guy's hidden it so well, no one else knows. Maybe-"

She was interrupted by Anne's sudden cackle of laughter. "Oh, Joan, you are too easy!" She gleefully punched a few keys on the tiny keyboard and laughed again.

"What are you doing?" Trixie finally asked, her patience ending.

"I hacked Joan's ISP."

After another flurry of questions, most of them by Diana, it was explained that an ISP (Internet Service Provider) enabled easy access to the Internet and the World Wide Web, that Joan Stinson used AOL as her ISP, that her AOL screen name was RoDoGRL, and that her password was MRSREGAN.

"But why do you have Joan's laptop?" Honey asked.

"It's broken," Anne replied. "Or, it was. Joan's been complaining about it not working right. She left it at the stables last night and said if I could get it working, she'd pay me. So I fixed it. She and Regan won't be back in town until this afternoon, so what I do with her PC between now and then is between me and her PC and no one else."

"What ended up being wrong with it?" Dan asked.

"She left it in a haystack or something and got hay seeds inside the keyboard," she explained. "I cleaned it out and now it works perfectly." She tapped a few more commands and then smiled. "Now. I've got the bank's website. They have an employee page." She clicked and waited.

Trixie felt a familiar shiver of excitement start to build. "You mean we could use the website to narrow down our suspects! One of those guys is going to be our guy!" She shared a significant look with Honey.

They all waited. And waited. "I suppose I could take the time to upgrade her modem," Anne finally said. "Anything's got to be faster than this. Wait- here it is." She turned the laptop to face Trixie. She tapped the screen, then the sensor pad on the machine. "There's your cursor and that's your mouse. Get to it, Sherlock."

Trixie took a deep breath and began to sift through the employee information. She resisted the urge to read each employee profile aloud. Some tech writer somewhere had taken the time to make each employee seem as friendly and approachable as possible, even going so far as to name each family member of each employee. She was relieved to notice she was billed as 'Trixie', and not 'Beatrix'.

After a good five minutes of diligent work, Trixie announced her findings. "I've narrowed it down to three suspects." Collectively, the Bob-Whites straightened in their chairs and looked expectantly toward her. "It's either Brandon Serlin, who's a systems engineer, Ken Kellerman, who's in charge of new accounts, or Ron Barger, who's in charge of mortgages. I remember meeting them a couple months ago on 'Take Our Children to Work Day'."

"Who's your father in relation to those guys?" Diana asked.

"Dad's their boss," Mart explained. "He's the bank manager."

She nodded as Honey asked, "And this other guy you talked about? Mr. Bryson?"

"He's the Vice President of this region," he continued smoothly. "He spends a lot time going to different branches in Westchester and in the city. His main office is near Rockefeller Center."

"How do we narrow the list down further?" Jim asked. "I mean, this Serlin guy sounds like a good choice, especially since he's a computer expert."

"And the other two," Trixie told them all, "were hired just before Dad was, but now he's their boss."

"That could explain their resentment of him," Honey said. "Especially if they wanted your dad's job."

"I wonder why the FBI hasn't been pursuing this line of thought," Jim said. "I mean, this seems logical to me."

Trixie pushed the laptop back toward Anne. "I don't know what the FBI is thinking, but I'm still not going to go to them with any of this unless and until I can figure out which of these three guys is doing this to my dad!"

They discussed possible motives including professional jealousy, imagined slight and 'just plain cussedness'. "I think this guy is feeling unloved and unlucky," Honey said at one point. "I don't think he really wants the money for its own sake. I think he just wants what he thinks money will bring him."

Trixie lifted Diana's wrist and looked at her watch. "Whoops, Jim, you don't have much time left."

"Yeah, I know," he said, checking his own watch. "Maybe five minutes, maybe more if Dad's running late."

Anne had remained silent during most of the previous discussion, content to tap away at the keyboard and let the others suggest motivations and suspects. Finally, she said, "Hey, guys. You want to know what the FBI's thinking?" She grinned at their puzzled responses. "I just found their case file."

"Excuse me?" Trixie blurted. "You just found their what?"

In short order, Anne explained that she had infiltrated the FBI main database, then found the file titled US Gov vs. Peter Belden. She pushed the laptop down the table toward Trixie. "Well, Madam President?" she offered. "It's all set. Just double-click and open the file."

"How did you get this?" Trixie asked warily. "And why?"

Anne shrugged. "Hacking into the FBI's easy once you know how," she said. "And as for why, well… Didn't you say you wanted to know what they were thinking? Well. There you go. There it is. Double-click and you'll know what they know."

"This is not a good idea, Trixie!" Jim said first. Brian and Mart quickly echoed their friend's reservations.

"Isn't hacking illegal?" Diana asked. She eyed her cell phone suspiciously.

Anne sighed. "Technically, yes. But we're only looking at the information. We're not changing it or anything. That's where hacking crosses the line and becomes reprehensible and dangerous." She turned to Trixie. "Come on," she urged her. "Think of it like this. The FBI came to your house with all their files and just happened to leave them sitting out on the table while they went into another room. Are you really going to just let the information sit there? Or are you going to peek? It's the same thing. If it were actually in front of you, I bet you'd be the first to look."

A wash of uncertainty poured over Trixie, but she had to agree with Anne's analogy. The question remained, however. Did she want to see everything in the FBI file? Did she want the others to see it, too? If not, how could she gracefully extricate herself from this suddenly sticky situation? Claim she wouldn't peek if it were right in front of her? Anyone who knew her would know she'd be the first one flipping through the pages. She looked at Honey, the only Bob-White who could possibly suspect the whole scope of the problem, but Honey's eyes, while hugely sympathetic, offered no solution. Trixie swallowed hard, then hit the key.

*     *     *

Minutes later, Trixie was awash in sick awe of the FBI. Not only was the file on her father complete to his dental records, but there were indications that similar files existed on her mother, her brothers, herself and their dog, Reddy. The Bob-Whites overcame their initial reluctance to take advantage of Anne's hack job and clustered around and behind Trixie as she navigated her way through the morass of information. Report upon report appeared on the small laptop screen, each of them further damning her father, his reputation and his integrity. Then she happened to pull up the file that impugned his marital fidelity. As soon as Trixie realized what the scanned-in hotel records, credit card receipts and affidavits meant, she moved the cursor to the X button, hoping to close the file.

"Hold on there, Trixie," Brian said softly from over her shoulder. "Not so fast. Let's see what this is all about, okay?"

She let her fingers curl away from the mouse sensor pad, then folded her arms. She felt her toes tighten in her sneakers. It was as if she were trying to literally shrink into herself. Her eyes closed. She wished the moment would end. She wished it had never happened at all.

She heard Mart curse. She waited for Brian's reprimand, or for someone to mention the Bob-White Cuss Fine, but no one said anything. The shock was too deep, too profound. An arm reached over her shoulder, startling her eyes open. She watched as someone paged down through the document. More evidence of Peter Belden's secret life scrolled past Trixie's eyes. Another moment later, she recognized the arm. It was Jim's.

Oh, God, Trixie moaned inwardly. This is all I need.

A sudden blast of a car horn startled them. Jim straightened. "Darn, he's here," he said. With an apologetic expression, he went to collect his things. "I've got to go now. One of you guys, call me at my dad's office, okay? Use the private line and leave a voice mail if I don't answer." He paused at the door, his hand on the latch. "Trixie, Brian, Mart," he said. "I'm sorry. I don't believe it for a minute. If you need anything, just ask me."

"Thanks, Jim," Brian said. Trixie looked up and managed a weak smile as the redhead nodded and then left the clubhouse. Her oldest brother nudged her shoulder. "Page down," he told her softly.

She did. Slowly, she paged through every screen and every image. Hotel registrations. Credit card receipts to florists, pizza delivery services and Nikki's Nighttime Niceties, whatever that was. Trixie could guess, and she was reasonably certain her guess was accurate, but she simply wasn't positive until she heard Dan say, "Nikki's? That sounds like a front for an escort service."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. Sorry, Trix," he said.

"And just how would you know that?" Anne asked.

"I'll tell you later," he replied.

Slowly, Mart sank back into his chair. He stared at his sister. "Somehow, you don't seem surprised about this, Beatrix."

Her eyes went wide with alarm. "What do you mean?"

"This," he said with a gesture toward the laptop. "You don't seem surprised at what you found."

"Yeah, Trixie," Brian agreed. "What's up with that? It's almost as if you knew already." He moved to take Jim's seat so that he could more easily face her. "Did you?" he asked outright.

What could she say? If she said 'yes', then they would all want to know how she had found out. What could she say to that? That her mother had taken her into strict confidence last week? But if she said 'no', would they even believe her? Then again, should she lie to her best friends? She looked to Honey for support and found it.

Honey sat in the chair beside Trixie and smiled encouragingly. "You should probably tell them what you told me the other day."

Trixie nodded and, as the others resumed their positions around the table, brought them all up to speed. Mart and Brian reacted predictably. Brian closed his mouth and Mart opened his. "I do not understand why our immediate maternal forebear chose to confide this information in you when she could have told either one of us."

"Hey!" Diana pushed at Mart's shoulder. "Sometimes a woman needs to tell another woman, got it?" She cast a glance at Dan which Trixie was unable to decipher. "Besides, she probably didn't want to burden either you or Brian with another problem. And I'm sure, too, that she didn't want you to think, even for an instant, that your father was cheating on her or the family."

Mollified, Mart calmed down. "I guess that makes sense," he said.

Brian rested his forehead in one hand. Almost to himself, he said, "But I told her to rely on me. I didn't want her to have to deal with this all on her own."

Honey moved quickly to Brian's side and laid a hand next to his on the table. Tenderly, she said, "Your mom didn't want you to have to deal with this all on your own, either. She wanted to keep this from you as long as possible, I’m sure."

"That's right," Trixie spoke up. "She didn't want you guys to worry any more than you already were."

"See?" Honey gently shook Brian. "Your mom wants to take care of you just as much as you want to take care of her. But she's the adult. She naturally wants to do more and take control of the situation."

Brian nodded, but did not reply. For a long moment, he and Mart exchanged a series of nonverbal communication. Trixie tried to read their expressions and thought she almost had it figured out when Brian said, "Then it's agreed. We don't let on to Moms that we know until she tells us. If she didn't want us to know, then officially, we still don't know. Okay?"

Mart agreed. "Okay. Trixie?"

"But I do know!" She frowned. "Or do you mean that I'm not supposed to let on that I know you guys know?"

"Right," Brian said. "It's business as usual."

She nodded. "I can do that."

Dan shifted in his chair. "That's all well and good, and I'll go along with not letting on to your mom that we know more than she wants us to know, but what are we going to do with this information now? I mean, this has to be a lie. Someone has to be framing your dad. This sex stuff… this is serious. This would ruin even a good marriage, you know? I'm glad your parents are so tight with each other." He grinned. "It restores my faith in the whole institution."

Trixie smiled, recognizing Dan's attempt to lighten the mood. "That's a good point. Anne? How about it? I'm guessing it would be simple for someone to impersonate someone else well enough to book hotel rooms and pay for, um, escorts, wouldn't it?"

Anne frowned in thought. "Well, I'm not the expert on escort services." She coughed loudly and said 'Dan' at the same time. A small ripple of laughter circled the table. "So I'd be only guessing, but I'd say chances are most guys who use such services don't use their real names anyway."

Dan smirked at her joke. "What's more, O Sheltered One, is that most guys don't use credit cards. It leaves a trail. Like this one."

Trixie frowned. "Well, shouldn't that have tipped off the FBI? That he didn't pay in cash?" She shook her head. "Looks like a straightforward frame-up to me."

Brian stood. "I hate to break this up, especially when there's still so much to discuss, but I have to get going if I'm going to make my shift. Once more. We're not even telling the cousins, right?"

"Right," Trixie nodded. "Definitely not. Let them happily wallow in ignorance a little longer." She pulled the laptop toward her once more. "Anne, do you have a disk on you? We should probably make a copy of all this-"

But even as she said the words, the screen went black, the keyboard lights went dark and Diana's cell phone squealed horribly, then stopped suddenly. A thin plume of smoke escaped the keypad.

"Terrific," Anne said dryly. "Looks like the FBI caught on to us. Oops."

*     *     *

After a long moment of stunned silence, Diana repeated, "'Oops'? Just what does that mean, 'oops'? Why 'oops'?"

Anne laughed shakily. "Uhhh… maybe nothing." She took hold of the laptop and pulled it back across the table. She tapped on the keyboard, checked the modem connection, tried to dial out on the cell phone, but nothing worked. She sighed before announcing, "Nope. It's fried."

"Fried?" Diana repeated. "What do you mean, my cell phone's fried? The modem's fried? Joan's laptop? What? What's fried?"

Sensing she was starting to become hysterical, Trixie grabbed Diana's hands in a firm grip and said loudly, "Diana! Calm down. It's just a cell phone. You can get another one."

Her eyes huge and her cheeks pale, Diana met Trixie's gaze and took a slow, deep breath. "Right," she said, breathing out with a whoosh. She glanced at Mart and smiled at his look of concern. "I can get another one. Once I explain to my dad how and why this one bought it." She laughed shakily. "Um, Anne? You care to give me a decent explanation I can give my dad about my cell phone that doesn't involve anything illegal?"

"Give me a minute," Anne replied with a weak smile. "It'll come to me."

Diana let out a tiny eep! Trixie sat back in her chair. She looked at Honey, easily reading her friend's worried expression, then mused aloud, "Okay, so the FBI… what? They sent back a virus or something? Through the phone line?"

Anne nodded. "Sort of. Probably." She tapped at the laptop keyboard, shut the lid and opened it, then pushed the entire machine away from her. "At least it's really broken now. I can always tell Joan she broke it herself."

Dan fixed her with a stern look. "You'd do better telling her the truth."

"What? The truth?" Anne laughed. "That I used her AOL account to hack into government files?" She shook her head. "No way. That woman's better off thinking she fried this thing herself. I don't need to hear one more of her well-meaning lectures on how to survive teenager-hood."

Trixie pushed her fingers through her hair, fighting the distraught feeling that threatened to consume her. They were so close! Then she smiled. "What's so funny?" Mart asked her.

"This isn't such a disaster," she replied. "We have confirmation that we're on the right track. And I don't have to keep such huge secrets from my best friends any more."

Mart stood. "I suppose if she looks hard enough at any disaster, my sister will eventually find the argentiferous brattice. Come on, Di," he said. "We'll be late for our appointment."

"Oh, right," Diana said, jumping up.

"What appointment?" Dan asked. "Where are you guys going?"

Diana and Mart looked at each other and blushed. She grinned and said, "We took a chance and made an appointment for a dance lesson at that ballroom in White Plains. We're supposed to be there in fifteen minutes."

Dan stood and stuck out his hand for Mart to shake. When the other boy did, Dan told him, "Good luck. You'll need it to compete against Anne and me. We're working out a killer routine."

Mart drew himself up to his full height. "We may just surprise you, Danny-boy. There's almost two months before the contest, you know!"

Several minutes later, Diana and Mart drove off in her mother's car, borrowed for the day, to White Plains. Dan and Anne strode off up the hill toward Manor House and the stables. With Regan out of town for the day, the two of them were in charge of things there. Left by themselves, Honey and Trixie quickly straightened up the clubhouse before taking the short path to Crabapple Farm.

After locking and then double-checking the locked clubhouse door, Trixie took her opportunity to apologize to Honey. "I'm sorry I didn't call you last night," she began. "I don't know why I didn't, except that it seemed very important to me that I figure it out myself. I don't think I could have talked about it. It was like I had to write it all down and see it on paper to know just what I was thinking."

Honey nodded, remaining quiet. She glanced away from her friend, then grinned suddenly.

"What?" Trixie asked, both amused and puzzled by her friend's odd behavior. "What's so funny? Why are you blushing? Tell me!" She lightly pushed at Honey's shoulder, urging her to speech.

"It's nothing much, not really," Honey began. "It's just that… well… Brian kissed me yesterday."

Trixie stood dumfounded. "What!? Brian? Kissed? You? Yesterday?" She jaw hung open and she tried to shut it, but the utter shock she felt at Honey's words prevented her. "You're kidding! My brother Brian?"

"No, silly," Honey said smartly. "Brian the alien who landed in my back yard last night. We're getting married and soon I'll have five bald gray-skinned kids with huge eyes. Of course it was your brother Brian!"

Trixie stared. "I don't believe it! He kissed you?"

Honey sighed. "Yes, he kissed me. He kissed me twice, in fact. Why are you acting like this is some huge shock? Did you think no one would ever kiss me?" She started walking toward Crabapple Farm.

"Of course not!" Trixie hurried after her friend, catching up to her with quick steps. She tugged Honey's arm, drawing her to a stop. "I never thought no one would want to kiss you. What a strange thing to say! You're a great girl and lots of guys in school are always after you." She stopped for a moment, then said, "Why shouldn't Brian be?"

Honey smiled and flushed pink. "I suppose." Shyly, she confided, "It was really nice."

Trixie held up a hand. "Okay, TMI*. You want to discuss my brother's kissing technique, go talk to Diana. The two of you can compare notes on the Belden brothers. I don't want to know."

"Fine," Honey folded her arms. "But what happens when I want to discuss my boyfriend with my best friend? Should I just move on to the next best person to talk about my problems with? Forget about discussing my problems with the person who understands me best?"

Trixie sighed. "Okay, okay. I get it." She tucked her arm in Honey's and they began walking toward the farmhouse. "I can be adult about this. Just try and bear with me for some of this, okay? It's kind of creepy thinking of my brother… you know… puckering up." She made a fish-face in demonstration.

Honey's peal of laughter rang through the summer morning, startling several birds from the tall maples and oaks. The girls continued on their path toward the farmhouse, their tension and hesitancy forgotten and excused by the strength of their friendship.

*     *     *

They arrived at the house, entered through the kitchen and found everything in confusion. The phone was off the hook, the receiver shoved safely in a drawer. Groceries had been half unpacked, half put away. Honey looked uneasily at Trixie, who called out, "Moms? Cap? Knut? Hallie? What's going on?"

Bobby pushed through the kitchen door, still dressed in his pajamas, his hair a tangled, blond mess. "Hey, Trixie," he said dully. "Morning, Honey."

"Good morning, Bobby," Honey replied. "What's going on? Where is everyone?"

Bobby lifted a small shoulder to shrug a reply. "They're all in there," he said, pointing to indicate some interior room. "They brought home the paper."

"The paper?" Trixie frowned.

"Who?" Honey asked at the same time.

"Our cousins went for groceries and stuff this morning," Trixie replied, pushing past Bobby to go find out what had happened. Honey followed after.

They found Cap, Knut and Hallie in the living room. Hallie sat curled up in the wing chair, braiding and unbraiding her long black hair. Knut sat on the sofa, the newspaper spread out in front of him. Cap stood in the center of the room, his arms folded, his expression grim. Trixie looked at each of them before asking, "Where's Moms?"

Cap replied, "Aunt Helen went into town to see the editor of the Sleepyside Sun. After that, she said she was going to see the lawyer and Uncle Peter, not necessarily in that order."

"Why?" Honey asked.

Trixie heard a noise from the laundry room and knew Bobby had not followed them. "What's in the newspaper?" She braced herself. "Something more about Dad?"

"Show her," Hallie said softly. "She'll see it soon enough, anyway."

"Show me what?" Trixie moved toward Knut, who refolded the paper to reveal the front page and its screaming headline:

FBI REVEALS BANKER'S SECRET LIFE

And below it:

IRS AUDITS KIDS CLUB

~ A PAUL TRENT EXCLUSIVE REPORT

Honey gasped. Trixie felt her knees go weak. So much for keeping things secret.

*     *     *

By the time Trixie had finished putting away the groceries, she learned that 'everyone in town' was talking about the Sun's report, or so Hallie claimed. To hear her tell it, Peter Belden's infidelity was an accepted fact. While Trixie concentrated on putting things in their proper places, she ruthlessly squashed the unwelcome knowledge that the family pantry now contained two full, unopened jars of peach marmalade, her father's favorite. Meanwhile, Honey read the article out loud.

According to Paul Trent, the FBI was convinced that Peter Belden had been having sexual relations with prostitutes on a regular basis for the past three years. The evidence, which included the hotel receipts, credit card statements and personal affidavits from convicted sex workers, overwhelmingly supported the theory that Peter Belden had been routinely ordering 'services' from known escort agencies, particularly when he was away from town on business. He had two credit cards he used solely for these 'purchases'. He was a slow payer, often running 30-60 days late on his bills.

Trixie's hands shook as Honey read aloud a passage from one of the affidavits. It was exactly, word for word, what she had read earlier on the laptop in the clubhouse.

"So Moms went to talk to the editor? Why?" Trixie asked when Honey was done.

"Aunt Helen said she knew the editor," Hallie replied. "She also said something about the editor being Paul Trent's mother."

"Really?" Honey said. "I didn't know that."

"Sure explains why the slime got his job," Trixie groused.

They heard the front door slam. Trixie and Hallie, closer to the kitchen door, got up to look outside. They saw Bobby walking slowly across the lawn. He had changed into play clothes, but he still had not combed his hair. "Someday, he'll learn that woods don't like curly hair," Trixie remarked. "And then he'll learn to keep it neat."

Hallie glanced at Trixie's unruly locks. "As neat as you do? That's hard to believe," she said dryly. Waving off her cousin's gasp of mock outrage, she opened the door. "I think I'll take a walk outside, too. It's a beautiful day and I want to enjoy the quiet if I can."

"Before you go," Trixie said. "Why's the phone off the hook?"

Hallie grinned, leaned down to pick up a pair of hiking shoes from the porch, and said, "According to your mom, about five minutes after all of us left this morning, the phone started ringing. You know. Reporters from all over wanting a comment on today's headlines. See ya later." She smiled, shoved on the boots and then headed off towards the woods.

Trixie groaned and let the door shut. She turned to Honey. "Well, partner? We need to move fast. What say you and me go into town and do some digging?"

Honey smiled apologetically. "I'd like to," she began, "but I've got an appointment today myself. Miss Trask and I are meeting one of the decorators at the gym around eleven. I can't cancel."

Trixie grit her teeth in frustration. She wanted to tell Honey to forget her plans, but how could she? She knew her friend well enough to know she was taking her duties seriously. For her, the fundraiser was coming first.

"All right then," she said. "I suppose I can put it off until you can come with me."

"Don't do that!" Honey nearly shrieked. "Go now! Strike while the iron is hot! You can't wait a moment longer. Not when Paul Trent is busy raking muck." She pulled Trixie to the door with her. "Go investigate this without me."

Trixie resisted. "You can't be serious. You want me to go alone?"

"Not hardly," Honey replied. "I'd never ask you to go by yourself! No. I want you to go find someone to go with you." She pushed open the swinging kitchen door and led Trixie out after her.

"Like who?" she asked, not resisting now. "Brian's working, Jim's in the city, Mart and Di are in White Plains, Hallie's gone off who knows where, Dan and Anne are at the stables." Her voice trailed off in confusion.

Honey just smiled. "One of them will be able to go with you," she said confidently. "The two of them don't need to be there all day."

*     *     *

As it turned out, the two of them weren't needed at the stables all day. Relieved that meant she could put into motion her plan to question her suspects, Trixie asked which one wanted to accompany her on her errand. Since Regan had left instructions that either Dan or Anne go into town to pick up supplies, they played a quick round of Rock, Paper, Scissors to determine that Anne would drive Trixie in the Manor House truck. As she drove into the village, she asked her passenger, "Tell me again what we're really going to do?"

Trixie replied, "You. You are going to do some investigating. I'm barred from entering the bank, so you're going to go in and ask the questions I can't ask and you're going to do it without raising any suspicion. You're going to get one of our three suspects to give you more info than he thinks he is."

"I am?" Somehow, Anne wasn't at all sure she could do that. Despite recent evidence to the contrary, the one thing she knew how to do without question was find out information on a computer without it ever knowing she was there. She'd never had to try the same thing in person, to a person. A person who might resist her inquiries. A person who might react differently than expected. Chalking her sudden nerves to a rise in blood sugar, she pulled the truck into municipal parking and turned off the engine. "While I’m in there then," she said to Trixie, "you'll get the stuff for Regan?"

"You got it." Trixie grinned. "It'll be cake. Now do it just like I told you, ask everything I told you to ask, and you'll be fine. Trust me. Bad guys love to brag."

Anne took a deep breath. "You realize I've never done this before in person. All my hacking has been remote."

"You'll be fine! Now stop worrying about it and let's get going!" She opened the car door and stepped out into the midday sunshine. Slamming the door, she waved once at Anne and then hurried quickly and casually across the street to the farm supply store. In case anyone from the bank were watching, she took pains to appear natural and unsuspicious.

After a moment of fervent prayer followed by a quick Sign of the Cross, Anne exited the truck and did her best to walk calmly toward the First National Bank of Sleepyside.

*     *     *

Trixie checked the truck's clock. She'd been sitting still for a full fifteen minutes. What could possibly be taking Anne so long? Get in, ask the questions, get out. That was all she'd told her to do. Trixie fully expected the other girl to be waiting in the truck by the time she returned with the box of supplies Regan had ordered for the stables. She had been hoping for a hand in carrying the fifty-pound box, but found to her surprise that she could manage well enough on her own. Still, it was tough to lift it high enough to clear the tailgate, but she managed that as well. Now she sat alone in the truck, windows down, sun beating the asphalt parking lot gray, smelling her deodorant, and wondering what was keeping Anne.

From her vantage point, Trixie could see partly into the bank across the street. She had a clear view of the front doors, anyway. To either side of the doors were large windows revealing the lobby. At her angle, she couldn't see the row of tellers or her father's office, both places she had suggested Anne do her reconnaissance. Instead, she had a fairly good view of a single glassed-in office.

Growing bored with the wait, she shifted on the bench seat and idly examined the foot traffic on the street. She saw Molinson, in full uniform, in the distance. Her thoughts began to drift. Suddenly, as if she had flipped a switch, her brain kicked into gear. The glassed-in office she had the fairly good view of belonged to Ron Barger, and wasn't that him standing on the sidewalk, smoking a cigarette?

It was. It was! Then why wasn't Anne outside, too? Chatting him up? Questioning him? Anything? He was a suspect, after all, and a sitting duck if he was out on his smoke break. Frustrated, Trixie began to chew a fingernail. What should she do? She was practically banned from the bank, but not the sidewalk, so she could run out and chat the man up herself, but Molinson was getting closer.

Trixie squirmed onto her knees on the bench seat and leaned out the open truck window. "Hi, Mr. Barger!" she shouted, waving her arms. She plastered a huge grin on her face when he hesitantly returned her wave. "How are you?" she called again, still grinning.

Barger waved once more before dropping his cigarette onto the sidewalk and squashing it with his shoe. He turned and entered the bank.

Disappointed the man didn't come over to talk to her, Trixie slumped back into the seat. "Terrific, Beatrix," she scolded herself. "Real smooth. What a professional." She stared at the digital clock on the truck's dashboard and groaned in frustration.

Sixteen minutes had gone by.

When the seventeenth minute became the eighteenth and Trixie's eyes almost closed from lack of interesting visual stimulation, her attention was drawn by a sudden and loud angry protest. Instantly, Trixie looked to see what was going on. It was Anne. She had been found out.

Two men were busy dragging the slender, white-haired teenager out the bank's front door. Trixie concentrated on tuning her hearing in to what the trio was saying.

"I have every right to be there," Anne kept shouting. "You're just a bunch of-of jackbooted thugs is what you are! Fascists!"

One of the men was an armed bank security guard. The other wore a dark gray suit. As they reached the edge of the street, the men stopped and stood straight. Trixie caught a glimpse of a shoulder holster hidden underneath the suited man's coat. Feeling uneasy, she opened the truck door and hurried to cross the street and join them.

"What's going on?" she asked, hearing her own nervousness in her voice. "Hey, Anne," she smiled. "Did you get my dad's coffee mug?" She stared meaningfully at the other girl, hoping against hope that she hadn't blown their cover story.

"What mug?" Anne asked.

She had blown their story. Still smiling, Trixie repeated, "My dad's mug? His favorite?" To the security officer and the probable FBI agent, she explained. "My mother wanted the mug back so she could wash it. She doesn't like thinking of it sitting in the break room all this time, you know."

The guard just looked at the suited man. "You got this okay? I should get back inside."

The other man nodded. "Go ahead. I can handle this here." The guard nodded and left them somewhat alone on the fairly unpopulated sidewalk. To Trixie, he said, "I'm Agent Bailey of the FBI."

Just great, Trixie thought. Now what? Behind Bailey's shoulder, she could see Molinson only ten feet away. He'd stopped and was obviously paying attention to the impromptu drama. "Nice to meet you," Trixie said. "I'm -"

"I know who you are," Bailey said. "And this young lady and I have already been introduced. Miss Belden, you do know that it's not a good idea for you to be hanging around here, right? We know all about your little 'hobby'. The Bureau takes a dim view of amateurs."

"Amateurs, hm?" Trixie replied disinterestedly. "So?"

Bailey stiffened his neck with clear disapproval for her own condescending reply.

*     *     *

He was only on his way to pick up his girlfriend for lunch. Why did that have to be complicated? Because of Trixie Belden, that's why. He saw the FBI agent and the guard pulling the Maypenny girl from the bank, but what trouble that tiny thing could accomplish, and why it would require two grown men to handle, he had no idea. Then he saw Trixie sprint through traffic to the site of the public disturbance and the pieces began to fit.

He stood and watched the proceedings from a short distance. He heard every word the agent blustered. Typical government jerk, he thought. Oh, well. At least now I understand why the Boss always hangs around when I have to lecture Belden. It's funny as heck to see a grown man try and try to intimidate the spunky teenager and fail. About time it happens to someone else!

The agent ran out of steam after what Molinson took to be forty-five seconds, but he had ranted enough for the police officer to understand what had happened, and guess at how the whole thing started. Trixie, he figured, had put Anne up to 'innocently' hit up the bank employees for inside information. Knowing that Trixie's appearance would immediately set off an alert, the girl had sent in a decoy. Usually, however, that decoy was Honey Wheeler. What was Anne doing here?

The agent had stopped talking, so Trixie began to reply. That was when Molinson made his move. He walked up beside the agent and told the girls as sternly as he could, "You two had better go on home now and stop playing at being a detective, okay?"

"I'm handling this just fine without your help, Officer," Bailey almost sneered.

Molinson merely turned on his blandest smile. "I could see and hear that," he replied evenly. "But these girls didn't do anything wrong or illegal. They just used bad judgement and, last time I checked, there wasn't anything on the books about that." The agent fumed, but before he could utter a single word, Molinson continued with, "You should just go on back to your babysitting job inside the bank. Go on now and maybe you'll catch the last fifteen minutes of whatever dream you were working on. Okay?" He smiled cheerfully, daring the agent to make a single word of complaint.

He didn't. He turned on his heels and went back inside the bank.

Molinson dropped the smile. He focused his sternest glare on both girls and asked Trixie, "Why don't you tell me what you hoped you'd be accomplishing today?"

That was when Trixie's face went red and she began to sputter. "I-! I-! I-!" She had been successfully intimidated and it didn't take a fancy shield nor a government position to do it. He hoped the agent was watching!

As it turned out, Molinson was correct. Trixie had sent Anne on a fishing trip. "Did you even find anything out, or was this all a wasted effort?" he asked the girl with the strangely colored hair.

Anne shrugged. "Wasted effort, I guess. I'm sorry, Trix! I guess I'm not real good at this sort of thing."

"I don’t understand, Anne!" Trixie replied. "You do this all the - I mean, you used to do this kind of thing a lot, before you moved here." She glanced carefully at Molinson, but he refused to give a sign that he found that tidbit of information interesting.

"But that was all on the computer!" Anne exclaimed, her voice rising insistently. "Never face to face. Always anonymously. I mean, they didn't follow their end of the script!"

"Couldn't improvise, eh?" Molinson fought his grin. "Don't worry about it and don't try this again, okay?" Intently, he stared at Trixie, willing her to obey him even just this once. "Go home and concentrate on helping your mother. She's a nice lady and doesn't deserve what's been going on."

"No, she doesn't," Trixie agreed solemnly. "Thanks for not making this worse on us."

Surprised at the gratitude, he could only say, "You're welcome." By the time the girls were halfway across the street, he recovered from the shock long enough to say, "But don't try me again!" Trixie turned with a grin and waved. Molinson waved back, then went inside the bank to pick up Lisa for lunch. Catching the agent's envious grin as the pretty blonde kissed him hello, he took full advantage of the situation and kissed her harder in reply. Lisa blushed all the way to Wimpy's.

Once there and once they had ordered, Molinson's mind replayed the little scene in the bank lobby. Bailey had been staring at Lisa's figure. Molinson knew where the agent's mind had been wandering. As the couple exited the bank, though, he had noticed someone else staring jealously and even as if he were angry at the sight of the two of them. That someone else was one of Lisa's coworkers, and didn't that guy have anything better to do than watch the two of them go to and from lunch every day? He'd have to think about that some more later on.

Hearing the song on the juke box come to an end, he leaned across the table. "Lisa, honey," he said. "You want to play something nice?" He gestured toward the 50's era box and handed her some change from his pocket. "Go on," he said. "Anything but oldies."

Lisa made a face. "All right, Dell." She took the money, but as she slid to the end of the seat, someone else had already made the next selection. She shrugged and they waited to learn what song was chosen. "Oops," she said with a giggle. "I'm too late. It's an oldie."

"I'll live," Molinson replied, smiling into her eyes. His mind automatically drifted back over the events of the past week and the past half hour in particular. Why was that squirrelly mortgage broker staring at him and Lisa? Who had Lisa had that appointment with last week? What was Trixie's aim in sending Anne? That was a bad decision, considering that he'd always felt Honey Wheeler was born for undercover work. And why was his mind persistently tying it all together? What was his subconscious trying to tell him? It killed him that Trixie probably had a better grip on this case than he did. Wasn't he supposed to be the professional here?

But Lisa was smiling at him, the waitress was asking if he wanted his usual, and Elvis Presley kept on singing:

We can't go on together… with suspicious minds (suspicious minds!) and we can't build our dre-e-eams… on suspicious mi-inds… So when an old friend I know… stops and says hello… will I still see suspicion in your eyes? Why can't you see… what you're doing to me? When you don't believe a word I say…

*     *     *

To Be Continued

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