Read Nancy's Mysterious Letter Online
Authors: Carolyn G. Keene
Nancy's Mysterious Letter (10 page)
At once an attractive young woman, walking just ahead of Nancy, turned around and stopped. She smiled at the girl.
“You’re Nancy Drew?”
When Nancy nodded, she went on, “For a moment I thought you might be another Nancy Drew whom I know. As a matter of fact, I thought I saw her here tonight but she left before I could speak to her.”
Nancy was excited about this news. “What is this other Nancy Drew’s full name?”
“Nancy Smith Drew.”
“Did she ever work for your family?” Nancy queried.
“Yes, she did. She was a governess for my brother and me for a few years. She left to become an actress.”
Nancy looked at the young woman. “Are you, by any chance, Miss Wilson?”
“Yes, I am.”
Nancy explained how she had telephoned to the Wilson home and left a message that if her mother ever heard from Nancy Smith Drew, she was to tell her that an inheritance awaited her in England.
“Oh, how marvelous!” Miss Wilson exclaimed. “I’ve been away at school and my parents didn’t pass along the message.”
“You said you thought Miss Drew was here tonight?” Nancy asked.
“Yes. I’m sure I saw her in the back of the auditorium when I happened to turn around, just before the show started. I left my seat and tried to find her but couldn’t. She went out of the building.”
People in the theater had started to crowd past the two girls and now a young man who had been with Miss Wilson came back. After introducing him to Nancy, she told him what they had been talking about.
Nancy said, “Possibly this Nancy Smith Drew is still around. She must have come back for some reason—possibly to see the play. Miss Wilson, could you take a few minutes to help me find her, since you know Miss Drew?”
“I’ll be glad to.” Miss Wilson turned to the young man, Frank Doolittle, whom Nancy had recognized as one of the star players on the Emerson football squad.
Nancy now introduced Ned, then told him, “We’ll be right back. Meet you in front of the theater.”
She and Miss Wilson dashed ahead of the others. Reaching the outside, Miss Wilson suddenly exclaimed, “There goes Miss Drew now!” She pointed to a side door of the gymnasium.
The two girls ran like mad, opened the door, and dashed inside. Only a dim light was burning and they could not see very far ahead but realized that the corridor turned abruptly.
“Miss Drew! Miss Drew!” Miss Wilson called. When no response came, Nancy tried her luck, but received no answer.
She and Miss Wilson dashed to the end of the corridor, then turned the comer. They saw no one.
“Wherever could she have been going?” Miss Wilson asked.
Nancy could only guess. “Maybe Miss Drew left some clothes in a locker in one of the rooms. And she wanted to get them, now that she apparently has severed her connection with the Dramatic Club.”
The two girls went through another door and this time found themselves at the foot of a fight of metal steps that spiraled both upward and downward. A single unshaded electric bulb illuminated the stairwell feebly.
“Up or down?” Marian Wilson asked.
“Let’s go down first,” Nancy answered. “Or, let’s save time. I’ll go down and you go up.”
When Nancy reached the floor below she found herself in the furnace room. Sure there would be no lockers here, she turned and scurried up the steps. Miss Wilson was just coming down.
“Nothing up there but a big, dark room and the stairs continue to the roof.”
“Miss Drew must have used another exit,” Nancy speculated. “Well, I guess all we can do is leave.”
At that moment the light went out.
“Oh dear!” her companion cried. “They’re turning out the lights and locking up!”
The two girls dashed along the corridor, feeling the walls until they came to the outer door. Nancy tried to lift the long bar which opened it, but this would not budge.
“We’re locked in!” she exclaimed, and began banging on the door with her fist and crying, “Let us out! We’re trapped!”
There was not a sound from outside.
“Whatever will we do?” Marian Wilson asked nervously.
“Frankly I don’t know, but let me think a minute.” A few moments later Nancy said, “That dark room you saw—were there any windows in it?”
“Yes, several.”
“Maybe we can get out that way,” Nancy suggested.
The girls groped their way along the corridor and up the spiral stairway. They opened the door to the dark room and made their way toward one of the windows. To their dismay, chicken wire was tacked over it and the window could not be opened. All the others had been protected the same way.
“I wonder which side of the theater this is on,” Nancy speculated. “If we could only attract someone’s attention!”
“But how?” Marian Wilson asked.
“I guess we’ll have to break the glass and yell.”
“But the chicken wire was put up there so the glass wouldn’t get broken,” Marian pointed out.
Nancy said she realized this, but hoped that a hard blow would break the wire as well as the glass. She began to feel around the floor with her feet, hoping to locate some heavy object. Presently she found what felt like a cannon ball. She assumed it was a ball used for shot-put contests.
There was enough light outside for the girls to see anyone going by. As Nancy picked up the metal ball, Marian Wilson exclaimed, “I just saw a car drive up! Nancy Smith Drew got into it!”
Nancy rushed forward, hoping to break the glass and attract the young woman’s attention. But in a second the car was gone. A feeling of exasperation came over her. Suppose no one else came past whose attention she could attract!
“Here come a couple of boys. Quick! Break the glass!” Marian cried out.
“Let us out! We’re trapped!” Nancy cried
Nancy heaved the heavy ball and it did the trick. The chicken wire bent and the glass shattered.
“They heard it!” Marian cried out, jumping up and down hopefully.
Together, the two girls screamed out, “Ned! Frankl”
The boys looked around.
“Up here!” Nancy called. “We’re locked in upstairs in the gym!”
Ned and Frank gazed upward in astonishment. “How’d you get there?” Frank asked.
“It’s a long story,” Marian replied. “Spooky in here. I don’t like it.”
“We’ll have you out in a minute,” Ned said.
The two boys raced off to find the grounds superintendent so he could open the door. Meanwhile, the girls groped their way down the stairs and were waiting at the door when it was finally opened.
“Thanks,” they said, locking arms with their dates.
“Boy! What were you trying to do?” Frank asked.
“Catch up with an actress,” said Nancy, chuckling. “You missed a chance for some excitement.”
An explanation was quickly given. Nancy ended the story with the rueful statement that Nancy Smith Drew had disappeared again.
“What! Then coach was
here.
That’s a funny one,” Frank remarked.
here.
That’s a funny one,” Frank remarked.
Ned said, “Pretty shabby way to treat the Emerson Drama Club.”
Nancy suddenly had an idea. “Ned,” she said, “let’s get my car and go to the place where Nancy Smith Drew lives. Maybe we can still stop her from getting married to Edgar Nixon!”
The two said good-by to the other couple and dashed off toward the fraternity house. They had almost reached it when a large rock came whizzing through the air. It was aimed directly at Nancy!
CHAPTER XIV
Elusive Niece
NED had caught a glimpse of the rock coming in Nancy’s direction. Instantly he pulled her down to the pavement and the stone sailed over the girl’s head. It crashed through one of the fraternity-house windows.
“Oh!” Nancy exclaimed, looking around quickly to see the person who had thrown the rock.
Both she and Ned saw a man running toward the parking lot. They dashed after him. Ned soon outdistanced Nancy and in a final sprint overtook the fellow, who was rather shabbily dressed.
Ned grabbed hold of the assailant’s collar and yanked him around. “What was the big idea?” he said angrily. “You might have harmed my friend badly.”
“But I didn’t, so let me go!” the stranger retorted.
“I’ll do nothing of the kind,” Ned snapped. “Suppose you give me an explanation. Then I’ll decide what to do.”
By this time Nancy had joined them. She, too, demanded to know why the man had acted the way he had and what his name was.
Their captive began to tremble with fright. “I—I really didn’t mean no harm, miss,” he said. “Please don’t make me tell my name. It’ll be bad for me.”
“Why?” Nancy said. “Would you rather tell the police?”
“Oh no! Not the police!” the man pleaded. “As I said, I didn’t hurt you when I threw the stone, so you got no right to hold me. Let me go!”
Nancy and Ned looked at each other. Legally the man was right. He could insist that he had not intended to hit Nancy or the window with the stone.
“You should pay for repairing the window,” Nancy said.
“I ain’t got no money.”
“In that case, I guess the police will have to decide what to do,” Ned told him.
“Please, mister, don’t do that. I’ll tell you my name. It’s Otto Busch. I’m just a no-good guy in this town. I’ll tell you the whole story. A smoothlookin’ guy came up to me down in the village and asked me if I’d like to earn some money.”
“Yes?” Nancy prodded the man as he paused.
“Well, he gave me a few dollars to do a job. He showed me a picture of you, miss, and said when you come home tonight, here at this house, I was to throw a big-sized rock at you and scare you.”
“Scare me about what?” Nancy queried, staring hard at Otto Busch.
The man shrugged. “I dunno. The guy didn’t say. I s’posed he had something on you.” Busch stopped speaking.
“Is that all?” Ned asked.
“Yeah. Now can I go?”
Nancy asked for a description of the man and was sure he was Edgar Nixon. He must be getting desperate to try such a villainous method to keep her from trying to solve the mystery about him. Perhaps he had found out she had taken the letters for his Lonely Hearts Club to the postal inspector in River Heights.
Ned let go his hold on Otto Busch. “I advise you not to be doing errands for people you don’t know. How much did the man pay you for this job?”
“Twenty-five dollars.”
“That’s pretty high pay for throwing one stone,” Ned remarked. “Suppose you turn over some of it to me to have a new window put in our fraternity house.”
Otto was reluctant to do this, but seeing the determined look in the husky football player’s eyes, he changed his mind and handed over five dollars. Then, quick as a ferret, he dashed off among the cars.
“We may as well let him go,” said Nancy.
“What a night!” Ned remarked. “Nancy, you must be dead tired. Why don’t you go to bed and let me pick you up early in the morning to go to the house where Miss Nancy Smith Drew has been living?”
When Nancy demurred, he added, “I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll drive past the place myself. If there’s a light in the house, I’ll ring the bell. If the elusive heiress is home, I’ll have her telephone you.”
“I guess,” Nancy mused, “that the man who left the money to his niece had no idea she would be so hard to find.”
Nancy suddenly realized she was extremely weary and consented to the arrangement. She waited up for half an hour but no phone call came and finally she went to bed.
True to his word, Ned was ready by eight-thirty the next morning to take her to Mrs. Roderick’s guesthouse on Linden Road. The owner was a pleasant, middle-aged woman and her house looked immaculate.
“Miss Drew?” she said when asked about her guest. “She slept here last night, but she has already gone out.” The woman smiled. “She is busy buying a trousseau.”
Nancy asked quickly, “Is she wearing a wedding ring?”
Mrs. Roderick laughed. “No, but after that little trip she just made, Miss Drew returned with a beautiful engagement ring.”
“When will she be back?” Nancy inquired, trying not to show her mounting excitement.
“She didn’t say. Miss Drew was carrying a suitcase, and I expect she planned to do a lot of shopping and fill it up.”
Nancy and Ned exchanged glances. Was it possible the actress would not return?
At once Mrs. Roderick asked, “Is something the matter?”
“I don’t know,” Nancy replied. “I have been trying hard to find Miss Drew because I have a very important message for her. I can’t reveal everything, but when your Miss Drew returns, tell her another Nancy Drew was here and must speak to her at once. Above all, she mustn’t get married until I talk with her.”
Mrs. Roderick started in surprise. “You mean there is something the matter with the man she’s going to marry?”
Nancy said she preferred not to say anything more. “But, Mrs. Roderick, please be sure to have Miss Drew get in touch with me at the Omega Chi Epsilon House.”
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