Holly and Trixie meet a strange new dog in Wagtail that leads them right into murder. . . . Holly Miller is looking forward to finally taking a few days to relax. Enjoying an early morning on her terrace, she spots an unfamiliar reddish-gold pooch across the lake. She's intrigued, but never expects to find the very same dog smiling at her in bed when she wakes up the next morning! Trixie and Twinkletoes appear to accept this cute stranger, but Holly doesn't know to whom he belongs.
Oma thinks the dog looks familiar, and it turns out the wayward pooch belongs to Holly's cousin Josh. Holly knew her cousin well as a child, but she hasn't seen him in over a decade. He's camping with his girlfriend across the lake. Holly returns the cute dog to Josh's campsite twice, but the second time, Josh and his girlfriend are nowhere to be found. Instead, a guest of the Sugar Maple Inn is dead in their tent. Now it's up to Holly and Trixie to suss out a sneaky killer.
