Ginger Pye

Jerry Pye saves up a hard earned dollar to buy a puppy from a neighbor, Mrs. Speedy, naming him Ginger, and the dog quickly becomes the smartest, most devoted animal in town, capable of climbing a fire escape and slipping through a second story window into Jerry's own classroom just to be near him. Not long after Ginger arrives, Jerry and his sister Rachel notice a mysterious stranger in a yellow hat following them around, an unsettling presence that recurs through the fall without explanation. On Labor Day the hat blows into a reservoir, and Jerry's friend Dick marks it with red crayon before it is fished out, a clue the children hold onto without yet understanding its importance. On Thanksgiving, Ginger vanishes from the yard entirely, and Jerry and Rachel spend months investigating, following leads through the neighborhood until they finally spot a boy named Wally Bullwinkle boarding a train and recognize, unmistakably, the same crayon marked yellow hat he is wearing, confirming that Wally has been the culprit all along. Ginger himself turns up separately: Gramma and Uncle Bennie encounter a stray dog on their own outing and Uncle Bennie recognizes him instantly as Ginger, bringing him home before the family even learns the full truth about Wally, who it turns out had spotted Ginger on a passing trolley but was never able to catch him.

It is a warm, funny neighborhood mystery told from a child's own unhurried point of view, with Estes's close, affectionate attention to sibling squabbles and small town routine doing as much work as the plot itself.