“What are you talking about?” Jessie asked.
Winifred glared at them. “I left a bowl of apples here yesterday. I’d just bought them so I could paint a still life today. Now they’re gone!”
“You think we took your apples?” said Henry. “Why would we do that?”
“I don’t know,” said Winifred, holding up the empty bowl. “Things keep disappearing around here.”
“Well, we’re not doing it,” Benny said defensively. Then he added, “But we saw somebody on the beach last night. He was carrying a bucket—”
“—and the bucket looked heavy,” Violet broke in. “Like it could have had apples in it.”
“Did you see who this person was?” Winifred demanded.
Jessie shook her head. “No. We were wondering if you noticed anybody walking past your place. It was around nine o’clock.”
“I was watching the news then.” Winifred set the bowl down. “I’ll have to paint something else, I guess.”
Abruptly she went inside her house.
Jessie clucked her tongue. “That woman has the worst manners! She doesn’t even say good-bye, after she accused us of stealing her apples.”
“She’s not very polite,” Henry agreed. “But at least we found out one thing. She was in her house when we saw that person, so it couldn’t have been her.”
“That’s what she says,” Benny replied. He wasn’t sure he trusted the artist.
“I looked at her feet,” Violet reported. She held her hands apart. “They’re really big.”
Jessie giggled. “Yeah! Way bigger than the footprints we found.”
“Okay,” said Henry. “So it wasn’t Winifred who left those prints.”
The children wandered down to the beach again. They walked along the water’s edge and discussed the case.
“Who keeps taking Winifred’s stuff?” asked Jessie.
“My stuff, too,” Benny said. “Somebody swiped my peanut butter, banana, and mayonnaise sandwich, remember?”
Violet ticked off the missing items on one hand. “Winifred’s beach towel, Benny’s sandwich, and now the apples. Things taken from our house and her house.”
“But not Jeremy’s house,” Henry observed, glancing back at the brown house. “The college kids haven’t complained once about anything being stolen.”
Violet thought of something. “The person we saw last night was walking toward the college kids’ house—”
“And Jeremy likes to play jokes,” Henry reminded them. “He told us so himself. Suppose he took the towel and the apples to be funny. And remember how he ‘borrowed’ a goat to play a joke on his professor?”
“I suppose he could be a suspect,” Jessie admitted reluctantly. She thought Jeremy was nice.
Violet stooped to pick up a rosy shell. “Who else can we think of?”
“In which case?” asked Henry.
“What do you mean?” Violet said.
Henry tossed a pebble into a tide pool. “We’ve got two mysteries here. The missing items. And the missing horse.”
“Midnight is more important than a bunch of apples,” Benny declared. “What could have happened to him?”
“Well, we saw the picture Winifred painted of a black horse,” said Jessie. “I bet that horse is Midnight.”
“But she claimed she didn’t see any horses the day she drove to the sanctuary,” Violet said.
“Like Benny said, that’s what she told us,” said Henry. “Maybe she got Midnight away from the herd, took him somewhere, and painted his picture.”
“Or maybe she isn’t only an artist but also a horse thief,” said Violet. “Maybe she paints a horse and finds a buyer by showing the painting.”
“I don’t know,” said Henry. “She said she’d moved here without really knowing anything about the horses.”
“But maybe she told us that on purpose!” Jessie said.
Henry looked at his sisters with approval. “Those are interesting theories. You two got a lot out of that conversation we overheard.”
Jessie and Violet smiled at each other.
“What do you think Winifred meant when she said the horse was ‘the best’ and the others were ‘worthless’?” Violet wanted to know.
Jessie thought a moment. “Maybe when she saw the herd she figured Midnight was the prettiest and that’s why she painted him. The others aren’t as pretty.”
“I think they are,” Benny chimed in.
“I think so, too,” said Violet. “But Winifred is an artist. She sees things in a different way.”
“We can’t rule out Jeremy, either,” Henry said. “He keeps talking about the big stunts he pulled. If he took Midnight, that would be a really big stunt.”
“You’re right,” agreed Benny. “Jeremy could have horsenapped Midnight as easily as Winifred.”
“We’re forgetting a suspect,” said Violet. “Shad.”
Henry nodded. “Shad has the biggest reason of all for taking Midnight.”
“What’s that?” asked Benny. He liked the old fisherman.
“He hates the way the ponies are locked up,” Henry replied. “Shad wants them loose, like they used to be.”
Jessie threw up her hands. “As usual, we have a lot of questions and no answers! Let’s check where I put the food out last night. Maybe we’ll find a clue we overlooked.”
Near the dune, they located a ring-shaped mark in the sand where the bucket had stood.
Benny noticed a glint of silver tangled in the sea grass. He pulled out a fine silver chain with a dark gray object dangling from it.
“What is this?” he asked, holding up the chain.
Jessie knew instantly. “It’s a shark’s tooth. Violet and I saw necklaces just like that in the jewelry store yesterday.”
“A real shark’s tooth?” Benny was fascinated.
“Whoever took your food probably lost this necklace at the same time,” Henry said to Jessie. “Probably when he—or she—bent over.”
“Can I have it?” Benny asked. The necklace was the coolest thing he’d ever seen.
“We might find the owner,” Jessie told him. “So I’d better hang on to it for safekeeping. But the next time we go to those little shops, Violet and I will buy you a shark’s tooth.”
As he watched his sister stow the necklace in her shorts pocket, Benny had a niggling thought. The necklace looked sort of familiar.
Where had he seen a necklace like that before?
Shad was fishing at the end of the dock, sitting on an old camp stool. The brown pelican eyed Shad’s bait in a plastic fish-market bucket.
Jessie realized the bucket was just like the one their clams had come in. Was it the same bucket? Was it Shad who took the plate of food she’d put out last night?
“Mornin’,” he greeted them.
“Hi,” said Henry. “Catch anything yet?”
“A few minnows,” Shad replied. “Threw ’em back. What are y’all doing up so early?”
“We were walking on the beach,” said Violet.
Jessie pulled the necklace out of her pocket. “We found this. We wondered if it might be yours.” If the necklace belonged to Shad, then she’d know he had taken the food plate.
Shad shook his head. “Not mine. Nobody I know wears one of those. You know, it’s bad luck to wear them.”
“Really?” Benny’s eyes grew round.
“Well … that’s what I’ve heard.” Suddenly Shad became very interested in checking his line.
Jessie was certain he was making that up, about shark’s teeth being bad luck. But why?
The older man rose. “I just remembered. I have to go home.” Reeling in his line, he picked up his rod and bucket and clumped down the dock.
“That was weird,” said Violet. “He didn’t want to talk to us this time.”
“He’s certainly acting suspicious,” said Henry. “I wonder if he catches all his food. He’s always fishing, either on this dock or on the beach.”
“He must get sick of fish,” said Benny, who didn’t much like fish himself.
Jessie agreed. “He’s kind of thin. I wonder if he’s hungry.” Then she thought, Was Shad so hungry he had to steal food?
At that moment, the kids heard a piercing whistle.
“What’s that?” asked Violet.
“It’s coming from the road,” said Benny. “Let’s check it out.”
They ran down the dock and across the short, cropped grass by the road.
Thomas Hyde was standing in the middle of the two-lane road. He was halting traffic by blowing a whistle and holding up his hands.
When the cars had stopped, several ponies poked their heads through the bayberry bushes.
“Look!” cried Benny. “They’re coming over to our side!”
The horses daintily stepped onto the road and crossed single file. Tourists in their cars clapped at the sight. A few snapped pictures. Violet wished she had brought her own camera.
When the horses were safely on the other side, Officer Hyde dropped his hands and gave a short all-clear blast on his whistle. Traffic moved once more.
The kids watched as the horses nibbled grass on the bank. Officer Hyde joined them.
“Good morning,” he said. “You guys are really lucky. Tourists wait all summer to see the horses away from the sanctuary. Most people never do see them.”
“We’ve seen them three times,” Benny said. “Twice at the sanctuary and now here. Will they be all right?”
“I’ll stay with them,” Officer Hyde said. “Eventually I’ll get them back to the pen. They like to roam. It’s only natural. At one time, the whole island was theirs. Now they have to stay in one little corner of it.”
“Did you find Midnight?” Henry asked.
Officer Hyde shook his head. “But I’ll tell you what I did find. A break in the dune fence on the Sound side. Black hair was snagged on a broken slat.”
“Is Midnight hurt?” asked Violet, concerned.
“He could be,” Officer Hyde replied. “That was obviously where Midnight escaped—or was forced—from the sanctuary. If he’s hurt, he probably needs medical attention.”
The Aldens looked at one another.
Midnight must be found … and fast!
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