Читать книгу The Rare Stamp Mystery - Mary Adrian - Страница 2

CHAPTER ONE

The Package

“Here comes the mail truck!” cried Skeet. He was holding a conference with his friends, Chris and Gayle, by the side of the road. They were trying to decide what to do that summer morning—fish, swim, hunt for fossils, or comb the town’s dump for treasures. But now that the mail truck had turned into the driveway of Macdonald farm where Skeet lived, the meeting quickly broke up.

“It must be important mail to be delivered this early,” said Skeet, running after the truck with Chris and Gayle at his heels.

The driver, a ruddy-faced man with sandy hair, brought the truck to a stop in front of the Red Barn, a restaurant run by the Macdonald farm owners. It was also their home since the old hayloft had been changed into living quarters: a bedroom for Skeet, one for his parents, and an enormous living room with a fireplace. The lower part of the barn, where there had been stalls for cattle, was now the restaurant. And the old milk room had been converted into a kitchen where Skeet’s mother baked the famous Macdonald pies.

Now Skeet greeted the mailman with a warm smile. “Hi, Tom,” he said, and then looked curiously at the large package in the front of the truck.

“I suppose you think the package is from your girl friend in Japan,” said Tom, wiggling a toothpick in his mouth and grinning at Skeet.

Skeet often received mail from Japan, and the mailman liked to tease him about it. Skeet always laughed at the mailman’s comments, but now in front of Chris and Gayle it was a different matter.

“She’s not my girl friend, Tom,” he protested. “She’s my cousin.”

“Are you sure about that?” Tom picked up the package and stepped out of the truck, but he held the package in such a way that Skeet could not see the address on it.

The suspense was too much for Skeet. “Please let me see the package, Tom. Please.”

The mailman finally weakened. “It’s for your mom, Skeet, and it’s insured, so she’ll have to sign for it.”

Skeet’s face fell with disappointment, but his eyes brightened when he saw the stamps on the package. “Boy! Am I in luck! A special-delivery stamp, three ten-cent stamps, and wow—a one-dollar stamp!”

Skeet was an avid stamp collector and every piece of mail delivered to Macdonald farm was very carefully looked over by him for stamps. Never before had he made such a haul on one package.

Chris was impressed, too, for he also collected stamps. “You lucky bum, Skeet. I wish someone would send my mom a package with a dollar stamp on it.”

“Where is your mom, Skeet?” The mailman was getting impatient. “I have to get her signature.”

“I’ll tell her,” said Skeet. He hurried into the Red Barn and went by the tables in the dining room on his way to the kitchen. Chris and Gayle followed him.

The boys were the same age, ten years old, and looked more like brothers than just friends. They were dressed alike today: blue jeans turned up at the ankles and red polo shirts worn thin because they were the boys’ favorites.

Gayle was a year younger than her brother Chris. She had soft, shiny brown hair that bounced whenever she ran. Gayle liked to run as much as she enjoyed jumping over fences and curling her long legs around tree trunks. But best of all she liked to eat in the Red Barn and sit at the table by the big window. Then she could watch the ducks swim in the brook and turn upside down when they searched for water plants. And she could see the tractor moving in the fields where Skeet’s father grew wheat and potatoes.

Gayle stopped to look out the big window on her way to the kitchen with the boys. She was still standing there when the mailman came into the restaurant and asked Skeet’s mother to sign the slip for the package.

After the mailman had gone, the children gathered around Mrs. Macdonald and watched her open it. She soon pulled out of the box a pink dress that her sister had knitted for her.

“It’s beautiful, Mrs. Macdonald!” breathed Gayle.

The boys were not interested in looking at the dress.

“Come up to my room with me, Chris,” said Skeet. “I want to mount those new stamps in my album, especially the dollar stamp. You don’t see many of them nowadays. The big post offices use a postage meter, and only a small piece of paper with the amount of postage is pasted on the package.”

The boys raced each other up the narrow stairway to Skeet’s room in the old hayloft. Then Skeet went to the bathroom and partly filled a glass with lukewarm water. He came back to his room, set the glass on his desk, and under the watchful eyes of Chris carefully placed the stamps in the water.

“I’ll let them soak until they come loose from the wrapping paper,” he said. “Then I’ll peel them off with my stamp tongs and put them on clean paper to dry.”

“I do that, too, when I take stamps off a package or an envelope,” said Chris, “but I’ll have to buy a pair of stamp tongs because I’ve spoiled some stamps by touching them with my fingers.”

Skeet opened his desk drawer. “I have an extra pair. I’ll give them to you.”

“Gee, thanks, Skeet.”

By this time Gayle had come up to Skeet’s room. Seeing the stamp album on his desk, she pulled out a wallet from a pocket in her jeans. Then, much to the surprise of the boys, she waved three one-dollar bills in front of them.

“Wow! Where did you get all that money?” asked Skeet.

“I earned it,” answered Gayle proudly. “I’ve been walking Mrs. Brown’s dog and doing errands for her. Now I can buy a stamp album and start collecting stamps myself.”

“Swell!” cried Chris, delighted that his sister was going to take up stamp collecting.

Skeet was also pleased. “I’ll tell you what else to buy besides a stamp album.”

Gayle smiled. “Thank you, Skeet. I already know.” Gayle had not only been watching the boys work on their stamp collections, but she had read a library book on the subject. “I’ll need a magnifying glass to really study my stamps,” she said. “I saw one in a store for a dollar and a half. And I’ll need some stamp hinges. They don’t cost much. You see, I don’t want to paste stamps in my album because the stamps tear when you take them out to trade or sell them. I’m going to use stamp tongs, too, when I handle my stamps. Then I’ll keep them nice and clean.”

Skeet turned to Chris, amazed. “Boy, Gayle hasn’t missed a thing we’ve done on our collections.”

“No, she hasn’t,” replied Chris, thinking that his sister was quite smart. “Skeet just gave me a pair of stamp tongs, Gayle. I’ll let you use them.”

“Golly, I’ll save thirty cents! That’s what stamp tongs cost.” Gayle was getting very excited about starting her stamp collection. “Aunt Marie promised to look in her attic for some old letters for me,” she added. “Sometimes old envelopes have valuable stamps on them. I’ll give you a stamp, Chris, for letting me use the stamp tongs.”

Skeet appeared so hurt that Gayle quickly said, “And I’ll give you a stamp too, Skeet, because you gave the stamp tongs to Chris.”

“That would be great,” answered Skeet. “I’ll trade with you, too, Gayle. I have some Japanese stamps that you might like for your collection.”

“Not the bird stamp,” protested Chris. “You promised to trade that one with me for the airplane stamp. Remember?”

“Sure, I remember, but I have some duplicate stamps that my cousin sent me from Japan.”

The conversation was interrupted by a loud voice coming from the restaurant below. “Anybody home?”

Skeet knew immediately that it was Lefty, his grown-up friend who had been a famous baseball player.

Lefty was a big man, six feet three inches tall. Ever since he had moved to Springdale he had taken an interest in Skeet because the boy liked baseball and played on one of the town’s Little League Teams. Once, when he had practiced with Skeet, he let the boy use the professional baseball glove that he had used when he had played shortstop for the Blue Sox, a big-league team.

Lefty had also started Skeet collecting stamps and showed him how to go about it.

Skeet lost no time hurrying down the narrow stairway to see his friend. Chris and Gayle went too, for they liked Lefty.

“Hi, Lefty,” greeted Skeet. “Are you going fishing?” he asked, noticing the rod Lefty was carrying.

“Yes, I plan to go with Dad,” answered Lefty.

Lefty lived with his father who was eighty years old. They liked to go off together and fish, but lately Lefty’s father was acting forgetful. He seldom showed up when he promised to meet anyone.

“Dad said I should pick him up at the post office,” continued Lefty, “but he wasn’t there. He’s getting more forgetful every day. I thought maybe he’d dropped in here.”

“I haven’t seen him,” replied Skeet.

By this time Mrs. Macdonald had come out of the kitchen. “You’re just in time for coffee, Lefty,” she said. “And I have baked some doughnuts. They’re still warm.”

Before Lefty could answer, three hungry faces looked up at Mrs. Macdonald in such a pleading way that she could not refuse them. “All right. Doughnuts for all.”

Gayle went to the kitchen with Mrs. Macdonald to help bring out the food.

“We have another stamp collector in town, Skeet,” said Lefty, sitting down at a table. “He’s Mr. Doolittle who bought the old Smithfield house at Four Corners. He started collecting stamps when I did.”

“I’m starting to collect stamps, too, Lefty,” said Gayle, returning from the kitchen with Skeet’s mother.

“Glad to hear it, Gayle,” answered Lefty. “You’ll learn a lot about your country and other countries all over the world. You’ll have to go to Mr. Doolittle’s house with the boys to see his stamp collection. I was telling the boys about him. He collects all kinds of stamps, some with ships on them, others with airplanes.”

“Boy, I can hardly wait to see them!” cried Skeet, “but are you sure Mr. Doolittle will show us his collection?”

“You tell him that you’re stamp collectors and that I sent you,” answered Lefty. “I’ve known Mr. Doolittle for some time. Don’t act surprised, though, when you see him. He has a beard like Santa Claus. Some people call him an eccentric old man—you know, a person who acts strange and stays by himself. But I’ve found Mr. Doolittle very friendly. I know you’ll like him.”

“I’m sure that man had dinner here last night,” said Mrs. Macdonald. “He told me he had bought a house in Springdale.”

“And he told me that he likes animals,” added Skeet. “I wanted to show him my pets, but he had to leave in a hurry.”

“That must have been Mr. Doolittle,” said Lefty. “He’s very fond of animals. At one time he had ten cats.”

“Did they all have kittens?” exclaimed Gayle.

Lefty laughed. “I don’t know. Dad and I moved to another town. By the way, there is a secret passageway in the old house Mr. Doolittle just bought. So ask him to show it to you when you call on him.”

“A secret passageway!” exclaimed Skeet. He pictured himself crawling down a dark passage like the one he had seen on TV.

“What is the secret passageway like, Lefty?” asked Gayle. “Is it spooky?”

Lefty tried to hide a smile. “There are no goblins in it, but there are plenty of spiderwebs, and the floor makes funny noises when you walk on it.”

Gayle swallowed hard. She hated spiders and scary places. She wasn’t sure that she wanted to go to Mr. Doolittle’s house.

“I meant to tell you, Skeet,” said Lefty, “that your pet rabbit was sitting in the driveway when I came in here.”

“She was!” exclaimed Skeet, looking amazed. “How did Pixie get out of her cage? I hope she hasn’t run away. Thanks for telling me, Lefty.”

Skeet hurried out of the restaurant.

Chris and Gayle went, too, for if Pixie had run away, they wanted to help look for her.

But the rabbit had not gone far. She was eating clover near the driveway.

Skeet picked her up and hugged her. Then he and his friends took turns carrying Pixie back to her cage in the other barn on the farm—the one set back from the road where the cows were milked.

When the children got there, they found Mr. Macdonald cleaning up the barn.

Skeet immediately went to help his dad, and Chris and Gayle did what they could. But all the while Skeet worked he kept trying to figure out how Pixie managed to get in the driveway. Finally he told his dad about it.

“Did you close the door to her cage after you fed her this morning?” asked Mr. Macdonald.

Skeet thought a moment. Last week he had forgotten to close the door of Pixie’s cage. Fortunately, Dad had spotted it just as the rabbit was about to jump out.

Now Skeet, feeling guilty, said in a low voice, “I’m to blame, Dad. I’ll have to be more careful the next time.” Then Skeet quickly added, “But Dad, how did Tiny get away last night? I’m sure I closed her door.”

Tiny was another one of Skeet’s pets. She was a pure white mouse.

Mr. Macdonald paused before answering. “I don’t know how your pet mouse got away, Skeet. I’ve been thinking about it, and it puzzles me.”

“It does me, too, Dad. I guess Tiny will never come back. I’ll miss her.”

Gayle did not care for mice, but since Skeet was fond of them, she supposed that someday she might like them. “I’ll ask everyone I know if they’ve seen a white mouse, Skeet.”

“That would help, Gayle.” Skeet then went to the cage where an opossum blinked at him from behind the wire. He was Skeet’s favorite pet, and he called him Possum White because he was an albino. Skeet had found the opossum on a country road when the little fellow’s mother was killed by a car.

Opening the door of the cage, Skeet reached inside and picked up the bundle of white fur. The fur was coarse, but Skeet did not mind. He snuggled his face right into it.

Gayle ran her fingers up and down the opossum’s back. “I’d sure love to have him for a pet.”

“I have my eye on a bullfrog,” said Chris. “There’s one down at Stony Creek. Boy, is he big!”

“You’ll never catch him,” said Skeet.

“I will, too,” answered Chris.

Skeet laughed. “That’s what you think. I tried to catch a bullfrog once. Have you ever put your hand down on one?”

“Well, er—” Chris did not want to tell Skeet that he had, and that the frog was so slippery he got away. So he said nothing more and watched Skeet put Possum White back in his cage.

After that Skeet inspected Pixie’s cage to make certain he had closed the door tight. Then he glanced at Tiny’s empty cage. “I sure wish I knew how Tiny got away last night,” he said. “It’s a mystery to me.”