038 The Final Scene (12 page)

“No one’s going to die, Joseph,” she said as gently as she could. “They’ve stopped the demolition.”

She looked over at the gaping hole in the
side wall. Through the space she could see Bart Anderson and his crew milling around outside.

Slowly Joseph lifted his head and looked around. He could see for himself that they had halted the destruction.

“How did you get them to stop?” he asked.

“We found out for sure that Bess is here in the theater, Joseph. And we know that you’re the one who took her.”

He looked at her in disbelief for a long moment. Then, suddenly his dazed look dissolved. He jumped to his feet, and before Nancy had a chance to grab him, he ran to the back door of the auditorium.

“Oh, no, you don’t!” she cried out as she ran after him. “You got away from me once today, and that’s enough.”

She burst through the doors that were still swinging from his escape. As she ran into the lobby, Nancy caught a glimpse of Joseph as he disappeared down the steps leading to the lower level.

Oh, no, Nancy thought. If he gets down there into that maze of practice rooms, I’ll never find him.

Instead, Joseph turned to the left and down the hall. Nancy chased him down the hallway.
It was a dead end with some dressing rooms and a costume room at one end.

I’ve got him now, she thought. She saw him jerk open the door to the wardrobe room and disappear inside.

But by the time she ran into the room, he was gone.

Nancy shook her head in disbelief. There were no other doors out of the room. The man came and went like a phantom in the old theater.

Then she caught a movement out of the corner of her eye. The costumes that were hanging on a rack to her right were swinging ever so slightly.

She ran to the rack and paused only a moment before sweeping the clothes aside with her hand. She expected to see Joseph standing there, huddled behind the costumes.

Nothing! He was gone again!

Nancy scanned the wall for a seam. Joseph couldn’t have disappeared into thin air. There had to be another secret door here, just like the one Bess had disappeared through.

There was. Part of the wood paneling was several shades lighter than the rest, and one board in particular stuck out from the wall.

Digging her fingernails into the crack between
the panels, Nancy pulled on the board. A thrill of triumph passed through her as the panel opened, but it faded quickly when she saw only darkness ahead of her. There was a musty, dank smell, like a basement that had been closed for a long, long time.

She reached into her purse and took out her penlight. Its golden beam pierced the darkness, and she saw a narrow staircase leading up into still more darkness.

Nancy carefully climbed the steep, rickety steps that twisted and turned, first to the right, then to the left.

There was no banister, only bare walls on either side. Nancy shuddered as a spider’s web brushed across her face and down her neck.

As she climbed, she kept her ears open for any sound from above. She had to find Joseph and make him tell her where Bess was. If he got away, they might never find her.

With her flashlight pointed at the steps, Nancy followed the set of footprints that Joseph had left in the thick dust. In the distance, far above, she heard the sound of his feet pounding as he ran.

Then the footsteps stopped. Was Joseph lying in wait for her?

Nancy slowed her pace and tried to see into the darkness above her. Quietly she made her
way to the top. Through the blackness, she saw a thin line of light streaming in. Another secret door!

Carefully she pushed the door open, bracing herself. Joseph could be right on the other side. But when Nancy opened the door, she saw that he had led her all the way to the hallway on the third floor. She was standing in the corridor outside the projection booth.

Joseph was at the end of the hall and heading for the stairs that led back down to the lobby.

Nancy’s heart sank. He was about to get away again!

“Joseph!” she cried out.

He turned to face her. Then, hardly believing her eyes, Nancy saw George and Nicholas appear on the stairs right behind Joseph.

“There he is!” George shouted.

“Get him!” Nancy yelled. They raced toward Joseph.

Nancy saw the panic in the old man’s face when he realized he was trapped. George and Nicholas were behind him, and Nancy was bearing down from the other side. Turning on his heel, Joseph darted into the projection room.

“We’ve got him!” Nancy cried. They all charged into the room after him.

They had him cornered. There was no way for him to escape now.

Joseph backed up against the wall, his eyes wide with fear.

“It’s okay, Joseph,” Nancy said. “We know why you did it. We understand, really.”

“How did you find out?” he asked.

She reached slowly into her pocket and took out Anderson’s cassette.

“We found the tape, the one that you recorded the movie introduction on.”

Joseph’s eyes darted from the tape in Nancy’s hand to the projector. Nancy caught the glance. His eyes told her where the real tape was.

In an instant she was taking the projector case apart and looking inside.

“Here it is!” she announced proudly as she pulled a cassette tape out.

George ran toward the projector. She leaned over Nancy and reached inside. “Hey, what’s this?” she asked. “There are some papers here, too.”

“The missing blueprints!” Nancy exclaimed. “So Joseph was the old man who took them from the archives.”

“Where is she, Joseph?” Nicholas asked.

Joseph looked more like a frightened child
than an old man as he stood there in the corner, trembling.

Nancy smoothed the wrinkled blueprints against her thigh and then held them out to Joseph. “Show us, Joseph. Please. Show us where you’ve hidden Bess.”

N
ANCY WATCHED
as a variety of emotions played across Joseph’s wrinkled face: fear, sadness, and finally, shame.

“I never meant to hurt young Bess,” he said in a shaky voice. “I was going to hold Brady, but she was there and—”

“I know you didn’t,” Nancy said soothingly.

“I showed you the earring,” he said, “and I told you that I heard her crying out. I wanted you to know for sure that she was here in the theater, but I couldn’t take you to her. As long
as I had her, there was some hope I might save the theater.”

“But why did you try to scare Nancy off at the same time?” George asked, confused.

“You mean the flowers, the light, and the movie screen?” Joseph asked. “I never meant to hurt you, Nancy. I just thought that if things kept happening at the theater, you’d know not to stop looking there. You’d realize that the kidnapper—and Bess—really were still inside.”

Nancy sighed. It was so illogical. But all of Joseph’s thinking seemed confused and twisted. Obviously, his love for the theater outweighed all his reason.

“I think I understand, Joseph.” She held out the blueprints to him. “But, please. Show us where Bess is. They’ve stopped the demolition. You can tell us where she is now.”

Joseph blinked several times, holding back his tears. Then Nancy watched as he slowly reached out his hand. His finger trembled. Nancy held her breath. Finally, after a long pause, Joseph pointed to the spot where he had hidden their friend.

• • •

“An ice depository?” Nancy asked as she and George followed Nicholas up a steep,
narrow flight of stairs toward the attic. “What’s an ice depository?”

“It was the air-conditioning system in the old days,” Nicholas said, panting from exertion. “There’s this narrow space between the attic and the ceiling of the auditorium. They used to put big chunks of ice there in the summer to keep the audiences cool.”

“Did it work?” George asked.

“I don’t know. I wasn’t around back then. I just remember hearing about it.”

“So, where is it?” Nancy asked when they reached the attic.

Nicholas referred to the paper in his hand. “Somewhere about here.” He dropped the blueprints and began examining the wide boards in the floor. “The opening where the ice was put in has been boarded over. But if Joseph has been in here, there should be some loose planks.”

Suddenly a board came up at his prying. The girls caught their breath.

“Bess?” George cried.

They paused a moment to see if they could hear anything.

They did. A faint movement from the dark recesses that Nicholas had just uncovered.

“Bess, is that you?” Nancy called.

“She’s in there,” George said firmly. “I just know it.”

Nancy knelt beside the hole and shined her flashlight into the darkness. That was when she saw the most welcome sight of her life—a patch of teal blue and the sparkle of sequins. And it was moving.

“It’s her!” she cried. “And she’s alive!”

“Here, let me get her out,” Nicholas said, gently easing Nancy aside. “It would be my honor, really.”

Nicholas slipped easily into the narrow space and disappeared for a while. In less than a minute he reappeared with a dirty, disheveled, but happy Bess in his arms.

He lifted her out of the hole and handed her to George and Nancy, who instantly smothered her with hugs and kisses.

“Oh, Bess, we were so worried!” George said while laughing and crying at the same time. “We didn’t know where you were, or if he’d hurt you, or even who had you. It was awful.”

Nancy grinned in relief. “Hold on, George. Before you have your reunion, let’s untie her and take the gag off her mouth.”

George quickly untied the towel from Bess’s mouth, while Nicholas and Nancy unbound her hands and feet.

When Bess opened her mouth to talk her voice was hoarse and shaky. “What took you guys so long?” she asked.

With that one question, Nancy was reduced to tears. At last, they had found their friend.

• • •

“Just look at the two of you,” George said, “lying there like ladies of leisure.” She stood at the foot of Bess’s hospital bed. In the bed next to Bess lay Nancy. Both of them looked more bored than ill.

“Hey, I’ll trade places with you any time you’re ready,” Nancy said. “The only reason my doctor is making me spend the night is to get even with me for running out this morning.”

“And what are you in for?” George asked her cousin.

“Five years to life,” Bess complained. “Actually, just overnight like Nancy. They just want to keep an eye on me to make sure that I don’t croak or something.”

“Hey, is this slumber party for girls only, or are fathers allowed?” Carson Drew stuck his head through the door. Then he showed them a box of Hannah’s chocolate-chip cookies. “I bear sweets and good news.”

“Cookies!” Bess looked ecstatic. “Wow! I
feel like I haven’t had a chocolate-chip cookie since my previous lifetime.”

“Didn’t Joseph feed you?” Mr. Drew asked, handing her the tin.

“Just pizza,” she said, munching on one of the cookies. “He didn’t want to leave the theater to get groceries, so he just kept ordering out for pizza. I’ll never look at another mushroom and pepperoni in my life.”

Nancy and George giggled.

“Sure—” Nancy said.

“You know, I still can’t believe it was Joseph. I thought I recognized his voice at one point, but he kept me blindfolded the whole time. He must really love that old theater.”

“He meant to grab Brady, you know. He never planned on taking you,” George added.

“Yes, he told me that. Said he meant to get a boy because boys were sturdier and less afraid than girls. So, of course, I had to be a good sport and hang tough to show him how wrong he was.”

“And you did,” Nancy said with a grin.

“I’m just glad he didn’t hurt you,!’ she added.

“My wrists and ankles are a little sore from the ropes, but that’s about it.” She took another cookie from the tin.

“What’s going to happen to Joseph?” she asked.

“After we put you in the ambulance, we handed him over to the police,” Nancy said. “They arrested him on the spot. I suppose he’ll be charged with kidnapping and extortion.”

“That’s too bad,” Bess said. “Even though he put me through one of the worst experiences of my life, I feel sorry for him. Maybe my testimony will help him in court.”

“I’m sure it will,” Mr. Drew assured her. “And now for my good news.”

“Oh, yes, he brought good news with his cookies,” Nancy exclaimed. “Let’s have it.”

“Thanks to the efforts of Nicholas Falcone, his grandfather, and the Landmarks Committee, the demolition of the theater has been canceled—permanently,” he announced proudly. “And the city has declared it a historical landmark.”

“Bart Anderson must be livid!” George said, not bothering to hide her glee.

Mr. Drew cleared his throat. “Actually, Bart Anderson has other things on his mind. He was arrested, too, along with Joseph.”

“He was?” the girls asked in unison.

“For what?” Nancy asked.

“Kidnapping. Remember, he had Nicholas
taken from his home and physically restrained him. He’s in deep trouble with the law.”

“Hey, this looks like a party! Can we join in?” Deirdre asked as she peeked into the room.