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ПРИЯТНОГО ЧТЕНИЯ!
Carolyn Keene
Nancy Drew Mystery Stories: Volume Fifty-One
Mysteryof the Glowing Eye
Copyright © 1974 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Published by Grosset & Dunlap, Inc.
When Nancy Drew eagerly agrees to help her lawyer father solve the mystery of the glowing eye, she has no way of knowing that it will involve the kidnapping of her close friend Ned Nickerson.
A puzzling note in Ned’s handwriting sets Nancy and her friends Bess and George on a hazardous search for a bizarre criminal. From their base of operations, the Emerson College campus, the three girl detectives and Ned’s college pals follow a maze of clues to locate the kidnapper’s hideout and rescue Ned. Not only is Nancy greatly worried about Ned, but also she is alarmed by the high-handed methods of a woman lawyer who tries to take the case away from her.
Every reader will thrill to Nancy’s exciting adventures as she unravels this dangerous web of mystery.
CHAPTER I
Runaway Helicopter
THE hall telephone rang persistently. Nancy Drew, however, sat in the living room, lost in thought.
“What did Marty King mean by her remark?” the young detective mused.
Absentmindedly Nancy arose and went to the phone. It had stopped ringing and now no one was on the line.
“Oh dear! The call may have been important!” Nancy chided herself. Then, hoping the caller would try again, she sat down on the chair near the telephone table.
At once her mind reverted to Marty King. The twenty-four-year-old platinum blond was a recent graduate of nearby Bushwick Law School. She was working in Mr. Drew’s office as a researcher.
“And not as a detective!” Nancy fumed. “She can’t take the Anderson case away from me!”
The telephone rang again. Nancy’s close friend Bess Marvin was calling.
“Hi!” said Nancy. “Have you been trying to get me?”
“No. Why?”
Nancy replied, “How about you and George coming over? I’ll tell you why. I can’t leave the house because Dad is expecting a new letter file to be delivered for his den, and I’m alone here.”
The two girls arrived shortly. They were cousins and often assisted Nancy in her detective work. The three girls were a striking trio—Nancy, an attractive, slender, strawberry blond; Bess, a dimpled, blue-eyed blond, slightly overweight; and George Fayne, who enjoyed her boyish name and had short dark hair and a slim, straight figure.
“What’s worrying you, Nancy?” Bess asked. “On the phone you sounded as if something horrible had happened.”
“It’s not that bad,” Nancy replied, forcing a smile. “I guess it’s a case of just plain jealousy.”
“You jealous?” George scoffed. “That’s one trait you don’t have. Well, out with it!”
“It’s about a young woman named Marty King who has recently come to work for Dad. She’s a lawyer.”
“Uh-uh!” Bess said with a little giggle. “You think she has a romantic interest in your dad, and/or vice versa.”
Nancy was startled by the suggestion and hastened to assure her friends this was not the situation. “Marty King is trying to be an amateur detective—”
“And,” George finished, “take your place.” Nancy nodded. “Dad mentioned he has a case he thought I’d like to work on with you girls. It’s about a glowing eye.”
“Glowing eye!” George echoed. “Sounds intriguing.”
“Yes,” Nancy agreed. “But this morning Marty called me and said I wouldn’t need to help—that she already had partly solved the case.”
“The nerve of her!” George burst out. “What did your father say?”
“I haven’t told him,” Nancy replied. “And what’s more, I’m not going to. Maybe he asked Marty to take over and—”
“Don’t be silly,” Bess cut in. “I’m sure your dad would never do such a thing.”
Nancy wanted to believe this was true. But as Bess tried to console her friend, the young detective’s thoughts drifted off. Would her father ever again discuss with her the cases that troubled him? What would it be like without a mystery for her to solve?
Tears formed in Nancy’s eyes, but she smiled and said, “Thank you, Bess. Maybe I’m just making a mountain out of a molehill.”
George put an arm about Nancy’s shoulder. “Or maybe Miss King thinks she’s a queen!” With a broad grin, George added, “Which mystery does my lady wish to solve today? Or shall we slay the wicked dragon—?”
“Enough, enough,” Nancy interrupted, though she could not refrain from laughing at the pompous expression on George’s face.
Paying no attention to her friend’s remark, George bowed deeply. “Your Highness,” she said, brandishing an imaginary sword at her cousin.
“Your Low -ness,” Bess replied. “How low will you go?”
George bent over so far that she lost her balance and fell forward. “Is that low enough?” she said, resting on her elbows and looking up into Bess’s dimpled smile.
At that instant the three girls became aware of a loud whirring noise. It grew louder.
“That sounds like a copter!” Nancy exclaimed. “And it’s right overhead!”
She dashed out the front door with her friends and looked up. A small twin-motor helicopter was descending.
“Nancy, it’s going to land on your front lawn!” George cried out, and Bess ran back inside the house.
“Nancy, it’s going to land on your lawn!” George cried out.
Nancy and George watched in fascination. The rotors suddenly stopped and the helicopter plummeted the last fifty feet. It hit the grass with a thud and the door flew open.
“The pilot!” Nancy exclaimed. “He must have been injured!”
She and George hurried to the helicopter. They could not see the pilot, so the two girls climbed up and peered inside.
No one was there!
By this time Bess had run out and joined the others. “I called the police. Was anyone hurt?” When she heard that the craft was a pilotless helicopter, she stared in amazement. “Are you sure?” she asked.
“Not a soul here,” Nancy reported with a bewildered shrug.
The young detective, hoping to find a clue to the missing pilot, hopped aboard.
Nancy picked up an envelope which lay on the floor, face down. She turned it over. Her eyes opened wide in disbelief. The name on it was her own! There was no address.
“Did you find something?” George called up.
Nancy jumped down and showed her friends the sealed envelope. The handwriting, which they all recognized immediately, was that of her special friend Ned Nickerson. For a moment she could not speak.
But finally she said, “Perhaps Ned was in the copter and had to bail out!”
Bess and George were alarmed too. All of them were extremely fond of the good-looking Emerson College student. Arm in arm the three girls walked back into the house.
“Open the envelope,” Bess urged. “Maybe it contains a message for you.”
Nancy, who had been clutching the envelope tightly, slid her thumb under the flap. Inside was a small piece of paper. On it was a handwritten warning:
Beware of Cyclops.
Ned
CHAPTER II
A Suspected Forgery
NANCY sat dazed and bewildered. Bess, overcome by the thought of a tragedy, was wiping tears from her eyes.
George was the first to speak. “We mustn’t think the worst. Maybe Ned wasn’t in the copter. The note might have been planted by someone else.”
Before the others could comment, the girls became aware that the police as well as neighbors had arrived. They were swarming over the large front lawn of the Drews’ colonial brick house. A photographer was snapping pictures and several officers were taking turns climbing into the helicopter to examine it.
As Nancy and Bess emerged from the house, there were shouts from the crowd. “What happened?” “Was anybody hurt?” “Nancy, is this a publicity stunt?”
Many times since she had solved her first case, The Secret of the Old Clock, until her most recent one, The Double Jinx Mystery, the young detective had been in the public eye. But she herself tried to avoid publicity.
A police officer began to question her about the helicopter. Nancy answered that she had no idea who the owner was. She did not mention the note she had found because she wanted to discuss it with her friend Chief McGinnis and also her father before revealing its contents.
Another officer came up and reported there was no clue to the owner in the helicopter. The only identification was the registration number under the tail rotor. He said he would have headquarters find out from the FAA the name of the person to whom the number had been assigned.
As he went off to use his car radio, George emerged from the house. She took Nancy aside and said, “I did some checking by phone at Emerson. Ned wasn’t at any of the usual places he goes, and an Omega Chi Epsilon brother at his fraternity house said there was a rumor that Ned had been kidnapped the day before!”
“Kidnapped!” Bess shrieked. At once all eyes turned on her.
“Sh!” Nancy cautioned. “What exactly did you find out, George?”
“I asked to speak to Burt.” Burt Eddleton was a special friend of George’s. “Ned told the boy on duty at the house he was taking a drive. When he didn’t return, Dave and Burt went looking for him.” Dave Evans was a boy Bess dated. “They found Ned’s car abandoned on a road near Emerson. Thinking that possibly something had gone wrong with the car and Ned had left to get help, the boys had looked it over. The car seemed to be in perfect condition.”
Nancy went into the house and sat down in the living room. She felt weak. Ned kidnapped! But why?
Suddenly a thought came to her and she pulled his note from her pocket. “This may be a forgery!”
Nancy examined the writing carefully. If it was forged, the writing was a clever imitation. The words had been hastily penciled. Another thought came to her. Had Ned written “Beware of Cyclops” of his own volition or had he been forced to do so?
Many fantastic ideas ran through Nancy’s mind. Was Ned warning her about a possible gang called Cyclops, or was someone trying to scare her?
“The message could have been telegraphed,” Nancy said to herself. “If Ned wanted to reach me in a hurry, a telegram or phone call would have been faster—unless he was confined in some way.
“It’s even possible,” Nancy thought, “that if Ned is being held somewhere, this is a clue to his whereabouts.”
Just then Mr. Drew walked in with Police Chief McGinnis. The tall, handsome lawyer and the rugged, ruddy-faced officer looked concerned.
“Nancy, what’s happened?” her father exclaimed.
Before answering, Nancy turned to Bess and George. “Will you girls keep everyone away from here while I talk to Dad and the chief?”
The cousins hurried outside. The police were already ordering curious men, women, and children from the front lawn of the house. There was a short confrontation with a photographer who insisted upon entering to take Nancy’s picture, but the girls were firm.
“No pictures, please,” George told him and finally the young man agreed. He turned and followed the crowd to the street.
Meanwhile, Nancy had started to tell the story of the helicopter, the strange note, and Ned’s disappearance to the chief and her father. She showed them the envelope and its contents, and said she was sure the handwriting was Ned’s.
“Chief McGinnis,” she asked, “have you ever heard of a person or an organization called Cyclops?”
The officer shook his head. “Never. But I’ll call headquarters and check on it.” He went to the phone and came back in a few minutes to report there was no such name on record.
“Nancy,” said her father, “what’s your theory about the whole thing?”
“Frankly, I have none yet,” she replied. “I’m too worried about Ned. Was he held up? Drugged? Or enticed away by a phony message?”
Chief McGinnis looked grave. “If no one gets word of him soon, I’ll report this to the FBI, unless the Emerson police have already done so. I’ll find out.”
Nancy spoke up. “May I keep the note?”
The officer smiled. “Since it is a personal message addressed to you and found on the premises of your home, which is private property, I guess the note belongs to you. But I’d like to have it for a while, at least.”
Mr. Drew put in, “Suppose I make a photostat in my office, then give you the original.”
“Oh, let me do it!” Nancy said quickly. She had a mental picture of Marty King seeing the note and asking Mr. Drew about it. If he told her of the strange events connected with it, she might try to involve herself in the case. Nancy’s father looked surprised, but she added hastily, “I want to keep this a secret, Dad.”
“All right. You drive down to the office and make the copy yourself.”
One of the policemen came in to say a message for the chief had been received over his car radio. “A report just came in that no parachutists have been found in the area.”
After he went outside, Chief McGinnis said, “What puzzles me is how the copter was flown here.”
Nancy made a guess. “Maybe it’s a robot copter. And someone deliberately sent it here to deliver the message. Of course that’s quite an elaborate way to do so.”
“And how is the owner going to get back his copter?” the chief asked. “We don’t know where it came from.”
“Wherever the place is, I’ll bet that’s where Ned is being held,” Nancy answered. She looked grim. “Let’s go out and see if we can get a soil clue from the tires.”
By this time the crowd in the street had dispersed and only the police were left. Nancy had brought her magnifying glass. An examination of the dried mud on the tires indicated that the take-off spot was probably near a swamp of black muck. She found tiny shreds of wood in it. “A lumber camp, or some other kind of forest area,” the young detective murmured to herself.
Without warning the engine burst into life and the rotors began to whir.
“The copter’s getting ready to leave!” Nancy cried out. “I must go with it. Maybe it will take me to Ned.” She began to climb aboard.
Mr. Drew jumped forward and made a grab for his daughter. “No!” he shouted. “It’s too dangerous! If the copter is controlled by an enemy, the operator could kidnap you and even kill you!”
Chief McGinnis agreed with Mr. Drew and added his caution. Before Nancy could step down, the rotors suddenly stopped whirring and the engine became silent.
“Something went wrong!” George exclaimed.
“Thank goodness,” said Bess. “Otherwise Nancy might be up in the air and off on a dangerous mission!”
Nancy nodded, but was more interested in the helicopter. “It must be remote-controlled,” she commented, “and can take off and land at any time.”
“But why did its engine stop?” Bess asked.
Nancy assumed that the operator had used a sensitized gadget which let him know whenever there was added weight in the helicopter, indicating that someone was aboard uninvited.
“We’ll prevent it from flying away,” said the chief. “Tomorrow the police will take it. Girls, would you find some heavy pieces for my men to pile inside? I want to keep the copter here if possible until we can check on its ownership and move it.”
While the husky police chief and a few of his officers clung to the craft, Nancy and her father hurried into the garage and brought out a heavy tire rim, an iron bucket left by a painter, and part of an unused steel fence as ballast.
“That should help,” the chief said.
George had a suggestion. “Why don’t we tie the copter down? I saw a lot of strong, thick rope in the garage.”
The others agreed and the craft was securely anchored to a tall, sturdy-looking tree. Bess and George said they must leave but would be back in the morning to help Nancy on the case. Chief McGinnis ordered one man to stay on duty. He and the rest drove off.
As Nancy and her father started for the front door, their housekeeper, Mrs. Hannah Gruen, arrived in a taxi. She alighted and stared in astonishment at the helicopter, then at the Drews. Mrs. Gruen, middle-aged, and adored by Nancy, had lived with the Drews since the death of Nancy’s mother when the girl was only three years old.
Mr. Drew smiled. “We had a robot visitor,” he told the housekeeper. “Nancy will tell you the whole story. I must run back to the office, but I’ll be home by ten tonight. Please call Miss King and tell her I’m returning.”
Nancy made no comment. The last thing in the world she wanted to do was talk to Marty King. She turned to Hannah. “Will you do it, please?”
Unaware of Nancy’s reason for the request, the housekeeper made the call, then went to the kitchen to start dinner preparations.
Nancy followed. “Don’t cook much for me. I’m not hungry.”
“Why, what’s the matter, dear?” Hannah asked.
“Lots of things. But worst of all, we think Ned has been kidnapped.”
“What!”
Nancy explained and ended by saying, “I want to find Ned, but I don’t know which direction to go.”
“That’s not like you,” the housekeeper said kindly. “You’ve had a bad shock, dear. I suggest you eat a simple dinner and go right to bed. In the morning you’ll be refreshed and ready to start on the case.”
“But which case?” Nancy asked. “Ned, the robot copter, Cyclops, the glowing eye—”
“Stop!” Mrs. Gruen exclaimed. “That’s three too many. Nancy, do be sensible. Why not concentrate on Ned? Call Burt or Dave and see if there’s any news.”
Nancy took Hannah’s advice and went to the phone. Burt answered quickly, hoping the police were calling to report a clue to Ned’s whereabouts. He told Nancy there was no news from or about Ned.
“Have Mr. and Mrs. Nickerson been notified?” Nancy asked.
“Yes, and they haven’t heard anything. Apparently you’re the only one who received a message.”
During dinner Nancy and Hannah discussed the strange happenings of the day, but the young detective refrained from mentioning Marty King and her part in trying to solve the glowing eye mystery.
Later Nancy called the Nickersons, expressed her concern, and told them about the note signed by their son. “Do you know anything about Cyclops?”
“Cyclops? No,” Mr. Nickerson replied, and his wife on an extension phone said, “We never heard Ned mention it, so I’m sure it must be some new contact. Oh, Nancy, use your best detective instincts and find him,” Ned’s mother pleaded.
“I’ll do my best,” Nancy promised.
By nine-thirty Nancy felt so exhausted she decided not to wait for her father’s return, but to go to bed. She soon drifted off into a sound sleep. Several hours later she was awakened by a tremendous racket on the front lawn and jumped out of bed.
Nancy rushed to a window just in time to see the robot helicopter rising from the lawn!
CHAPTER III
A Glowing Eye
By the time Nancy had put on robe and slippers and had run into the hall, her father and Hannah Gruen were already there. Without a word all three rushed down the front stairway and out the door. Mr. Drew switched on a light that flooded the lawn.
The guy ropes which had held the helicopter down now lay on the ground. The craft itself was out of sight, but the moving lights in the sky indicated the copter had taken a northeasterly direction.
“That’s toward Emerson,” Nancy said. Then her thoughts turned to the officer who had been left by the police to watch the helicopter. “Where’s the guard?”
He was not in sight and Hannah suggested, “Maybe he was kidnapped too!”
“And possibly taken away in the copter,” Mr. Drew added.
Nancy had a different idea. “He may have been knocked out and left behind. Let’s look around.”
They did not have to search far. The guard was lying unconscious in the Drews’ garage. The officer did not respond to their first-aid treatment, so Nancy’s father phoned headquarters to report the incident and request medical help.
An ambulance with a police surgeon and a patrol car with two other officers reached the house within minutes. Dr. Tompkin quickly examined the injured guard.
“Dooley got a severe blow on his head. We’ll take him to the hospital at once. Probably have to operate.”
“That’s dreadful!” Mrs. Gruen spoke up.
“Indeed it is, ma’am,” said one of the remaining men, who introduced himself as Erman. “And so is all crime. Suppose we go into the house and you tell me what happened here.”
Hannah quickly made hot chocolate. As the group sipped it and ate some cookies, Nancy, her father, and the housekeeper told what they knew about the case.
“This sure is a strange one,” Erman said. “Of course the thing to do is track down the take-off point of the copter. I’ll check with the chief to see if he’s put anyone on that angle. Otherwise we’ll start right on it.” The two men arose, thanked Mrs. Gruen for the hot chocolate, and said good night.
After Mr. Drew had closed the front door, he smiled fondly at Nancy. “That plan to track the copter was your idea too, wasn’t it?”
Nancy nodded. Then, on a hunch, she changed the subject. “Dad, you never finished telling me about the glowing eye.”
“No, but I will. It’s too late now. We must all get to bed.”
Nancy went to her room, but she kept thinking, “Did Dad mean it was too late because Marty is working on the case?”
The young detective found it impossible to sleep. Finally at six o’clock she dressed and drove to Mr. Drew’s office to which she had a key. Quickly she made a photostat of Ned’s note and put it in her purse. Then she left the original at police headquarters for Chief McGinnis and went home.
No one was up yet. Using the telephone extension in the kitchen, she called George, then Bess.
“Will you drive up to Emerson with me today?” she asked. “I want to try getting a lead on Ned. Could you be ready in an hour?”
Both girls promised to hurry. Nancy ate a cold breakfast, left a note for her father, then hurried from the house to pick up George and Bess.
As they headed toward the highway in Nancy’s convertible, Bess asked, “What’s the big rush? Did you pick up a clue?”
Nancy briefed the cousins on the night’s happenings. They were thunderstruck and George asked, “Do you think the copter took off by remote control, or did whoever attacked the police guard fly it?”
“I don’t know,” Nancy replied. “Probably the police will come this morning and investigate.”
The girls were silent for nearly two miles as they enjoyed the early morning with its twittering birds and hide-and-seek sunshine.
Finally Bess spoke up. “What is Cyclops, anyway? I remember something from school about it being a one-eyed monster.”
“I looked it up to make sure,” Nancy replied. “The story comes from Greek mythology. There was a race of giant shepherds. Each man had only one eye. It was in the center of his forehead. The Cyclops made weapons and armor for the gods, and also thunderbolts. One of these thunderbolts killed Aesculapius, so his father Apollo had all the shepherds put to death.”
“What a gruesome story!” Bess commented. “But what in the world did Ned mean by Cyclops?”
George had no answer, but presently Nancy said, “I have a hunch that maybe the glowing eye is a present-day Cyclops.”
Bess’s eyes opened wide. “You mean there’s a one-eyed monster man loose somewhere? And he kidnaps people?”
“Yes,” George replied. “And his main diet is plump young ladies who like to eat sweets.”
Bess made a face at her cousin, then said, “Nancy, are you suggesting that Ned is being held by some monster man?”
“With one eye?” George added.
“Seriously,” Nancy answered, “Ned may have stumbled upon a clue in the glowing eye mystery. I did mention it to him. Oh, I wish I knew what his note means!”
By eleven o’clock Bess began to complain of being starved. “Let’s stop for a bite in Martin City,” she suggested.
Though Nancy would have liked to push on and had not thought of food, she suddenly realized she was hungry. “Okay, Bess.”
When they reached the turnoff, Nancy took the downhill road that led to the industrial city on the Wimpole River. “What do they manufacture here?” she asked.
George said, “Fresh-water fishing equipment and small boats. My dad has bought a lot of things made by these people. By the way, this is a historic place. Maybe we could look around a little.”
“After we eat,” Bess said firmly.
At an intersection in town Nancy inquired of a traffic policeman where there was a good restaurant. He recommended The Clearview. In a few minutes the girls reached the attractive, ivy-covered brick homestead. Inside, it was filled with beautiful old furniture and paintings.
“How charming!” Bess exclaimed as the girls went to the powder room.
A few minutes later a headwaitress led them toward a table by the window. Nancy, who was ahead of the others, stopped suddenly. At a booth for two in a secluded corner sat her father and Marty King!
“What’s the matter?” asked George, who had bumped into Nancy. The young detective did not answer. Instead she called to the headwaitress. “We’d like to sit back here.” She herself chose a table out of sight of her father and his assistant.
After the headwaitress had handed the girls menus and gone off, Nancy told the cousins what had startled her. “I thought it best not to be seen by Dad and Marty,” she added.
George guessed what was going through her friend’s mind. “You’re afraid Marty will think you followed them because she was going to work on the glowing eye mystery.”
“Yes,” Nancy replied. “And I don’t want Marty to bring it up to me. They must have flown here. Let’s eat quickly and leave.”
The young detective’s hopes of not being seen were in vain. A short time later Marty came directly toward the girls on her way to the telephone booth in the hall. She looked surprised, but said cheerily, “Hello, Nancy. How’s everything? Have you caught up with the kidnappers yet?”
Nancy introduced Bess and George. Marty smiled, then said, “Oh, you’re the girls who help Nancy solve mysteries. What fun you must have! Well, I’ll run now and make a call to the office.”
She walked away without saying a word about Mr. Drew. On impulse Nancy got up, said to Bess and George, “Order me some soup and a ham on rye,” and hurried across the room to speak to her father.
He was surprised but invited her to sit down. “Marty’s with me,” he said. “We flew up here in connection with a boat-company case. You decided rather suddenly to go to Emerson, didn’t you?”
“Yes. It may be a wild-goose chase, but I’m trying to follow the course that copter took. By the way, I think there may be a connection between Cyclops that Ned mentioned and your mystery of the glowing eye. Dad, you haven’t yet told me details about that mystery, which you first called the Anderson case.”
“You could be right about a connection between the two cases,” the lawyer agreed. “I’ll tell you the whole story when I have time.” Out of the corner of her eye, Nancy saw Marty coming back. “I’ll give you this hint. Investigate the Anderson Museum in Hager. It’s about six miles from here.”
Nancy returned to her table in a far better mood than she had left it. Her father was not sidestepping her detective work in favor of Marty’s after all! Bess and George noticed the difference in their friend. But before they had a chance to ask her about it, Nancy said they were going to Hager to pick up a clue.
“What is it?” George asked.
“Something to do with Cyclops or the glowing eye.”
Twenty minutes later the three girls were on their way. Mr. Drew and Marty remained at the restaurant. The six miles were quickly covered.
Hager proved to be another historic town with brownstone mansions dating back to the “elegant eighties” and still in fine condition. Tall trees and well-kept lawns lent the area a picturesque, though severe atmosphere.
Bess remarked, “I wouldn’t be happy living in these surroundings. You’d never dare disturb anything, and you’d be afraid to laugh.”
Nancy smiled at Bess’s pretended fears. “Cheer up. The people here are no doubt very friendly.”
After riding around a while the girls came to a large estate with a high hedge around it. Over the entrance drive was a stone archway with a large silver nameplate at the top. Engraved in script was Anderson Museum.
Nancy parked and the girls started up the long walk to the museum. There were no flowers, no bright-colored shrubs, just green grass and evergreen trees on either side.
When the visitors reached the building, the huge front door was opened by a slender, elderly woman whose plain black dress and severe hair-style fitted the rigid surroundings. “Good afternoon,” she said, but her face was expressionless.
“I’m Nancy Drew.” The young detective smiled. “My father is Carson Drew, a lawyer in River Heights. He suggested I visit your museum.” She then introduced Bess and George.
Nancy’s smile was not returned. “I’m Miss Wilkin. I don’t know your father and we have no lawsuits pending. The only person from River Heights who has been here lately is a Miss King. What in particular do you wish to see?”
Nancy’s mind whirled. On a hunch she said quickly, “Just what Miss King saw.”
Bess and George could have shouted with excitement but they kept still and followed the straight-backed woman with the uptilted head. She led the girls through a section filled with figures of knights in armor and deadly swords.
“Ugh! I don’t like this room,” Bess whispered. “It’s too scary.”
“That is too bad,” said Miss Wilkin. “Brave men fighting for their countries used these weapons.”
Presently they came to the most unusual exhibit the girls had ever seen. Enlarged glass eyes hung on all the walls. In display cases beneath them were pictures of fish, animals, and humans, with descriptions of their types of eyes.
“Look!” said George. “This caption says a housefly has a compound eye with four thousand lenses.”
“No wonder he’s hard to catch,” Nancy remarked.
Just then all the lights went out. The room was in complete darkness, but in a moment a reddish light began to appear high on the rear wall.
Seconds later it became a fiery, glowing eye!
CHAPTER IV
Fiery Red Hair
FOR several seconds Nancy, Bess, and George stood transfixed by the awesome sight of the glowing eye. At times it blinked and seemed to grow redder.
Bess grabbed Nancy’s hand. “What is it?” she whispered tensely.
“I don’t know.”
“Let’s get out of here,” Bess pleaded. “This place gives me the creeps.”
“Not yet,” Nancy answered. “I want to see what happens.”
The words were barely said when the glowing eye disappeared. There was pitch blackness for several seconds, then the ceiling lights came on. Nancy turned to ask Miss Wilkin for an explanation.
She had vanished!
“Where did she go and why?” George asked. “She’s a strange person.”
Bess and George started for the entrance, but Nancy paused to look closely at the spot where the glowing eye had appeared. Though the wall was of wood and paneled in large squares, there was no visible opening or sliding section near the glowing eye. Nancy found a high stool and set it under the panel where the glowing eye had shone. She stood on the stool but was unable to move the panel. And the wood was not hot!
Nancy was sure no image of the eye had been projected onto the wall.
“There must be a cold light behind this panel,” she said to herself. “A very bright heat-less light.”
Her friends had come back. “Learn anything?” George asked.
“No,” Nancy replied. “It’s a puzzle.”
The girls found Miss Wilkin at her desk in the entrance hall. She still had the same expressionless look and offered no explanation of what had happened. Nancy asked her for one.
The woman answered stiffly, “I left to see why the lights went out.”
“And the glowing eye?” Nancy prodded.
“That,” Miss Wilkin replied, “is used by the engineering students at Emerson who come here to attend lectures given by our member scientists.”
“And are the students supposed to give an explanation of the glowing eye?” Nancy asked.
“Yes, but so far none of them has.”
The woman stood up and escorted the visitors to the front door. She seemed eager to have them leave.
Nancy smiled and said, “May we come again sometime and see more of the exhibits?”
“If you wish,” Miss Wilkin replied, but there was no cordiality in her voice.
The girls drove off, discussing the strange adventure.
“Do you suppose,” George asked, “that Ned is connected with this glowing eye bit?”
“Perhaps,” Nancy replied. “He’s in the engineering school. But I’m surprised that he didn’t mention it when I told him about the glowing eye.”
“I’m not.” George smiled. “Maybe he thought he could find a solution on his own,” she teased.
Nancy said, “Ned may have figured out the secret of the glowing eye and been kidnapped because of his discovery.”
“That could connect the kidnappers with the Anderson Museum,” George commented.
“Maybe in a roundabout way,” Nancy replied. To herself she was saying, “I wonder how much Marty King knows about this.”
Bess, silent until now, said, “I didn’t like that Miss Wilkin and I wouldn’t trust her the length of this car. She’s spooky and I’ll bet she knows a lot more than she’s telling.”
“I’m inclined to agree,” said Nancy. “Let’s stop at the library and see what we can find out about the Anderson Museum.”
The girl at the reference desk there told them she had never been to the museum but understood it was a spooky place. “But look in the newspaper file. I think there’s an article in one of the papers.”
Nancy’s search was not particularly rewarding. She learned that a large fund had been left to the museum as an endowment to take care of it for educational purposes. There was no mention of a glowing eye.
“Perhaps Burt and Dave will know something about it,” George suggested.
Nancy drove directly to the Omega Chi Epsilon fraternity house. Burt and Dave had just come in and greeted the girls warmly. Burt was a rather stocky, athletic blond boy; Dave was slender and blond. They played on the college football team with Ned.
“Any news of Ned?” Nancy asked immediately.
“Not a word,” Burt replied. “But Dave and I tracked down a bit of information that might link a certain man with Ned’s disappearance.”
“Tell me about him,” Nancy begged.
Burt said that in one of Ned’s engineering courses there was a graduate student with fiery red hair who worked next to Ned in the lab. “He disappeared at the same time Ned did.”
“We also learned,” Dave added, “that this Zapp Crosson had his pilot’s license.”
Nancy was intrigued by this information. “So he could have flown the mysterious copter and known how to program the craft to fly itself.”
The boys nodded and Burt said, “Nancy, we thought you’d probably know what to do next.”
“Any clues about where the copter went?” she asked.
Dave said no one in the vicinity of Emerson knew anything about a helicopter which had the same registration number as the pilotless craft. The local police had made inquiries at a small airfield on the outskirts of Emerson, and also talked with members of a balloon club nearby. No one had a lead.
“It’s still early enough to do some exploring before dinner,” Dave said. “While you girls are in Emerson you can stay here in our first-floor guest room.”
Bess giggled. “I didn’t know you had one.”
Dave grinned. “Oh, old Omega Chi Epsilon aims to keep up to date,” he said.
The girls were led to a charming room with three beds in it and an adjoining bath.
“I’ll take your car, Nancy, and fill it with gas,” Burt offered. “Meet you all in front in ten minutes.”
While the girls were washing their hands and combing their hair, George asked Nancy, “What are your thoughts about Zapp Crosson?”
Nancy replied, “I’ve been wondering if there was any connection between Zapp’s project and an experiment on which Ned might have been working. Ned may have been keeping his own a secret until he had completed the experiment.”
Just then the boys returned. They knew where the nearby airfields were located, so the five young people climbed into the car. Bess and George told them the story of the glowing eye.
Nancy felt lonesome without Ned, and started worrying even more about him than she had before. Sensing this, Dave said lightly, “Speaking of glowing eyes, I learned in bio class today that a crayfish’s eye has four thousand parts. Each one is a separate eye.”
George grinned. “I didn’t know the bottom of the sea had enough to see to require that many eyes.”
“Oh, George,” said her cousin Bess, “that’s a horrible pun.”
The others laughed. Burt, who was at the wheel, asked, “Where to?”
Nancy smiled. “Directly northeast from my home in River Heights.”
“Emerson is slightly northeast,” Burt replied, “so suppose we go due east.”
Everyone agreed. Within ten minutes they came to a private flying field. A helicopter was just coming in. Burt turned into the driveway and went directly toward the whirlybird’s landing spot.
A pleasant-looking young pilot leaped down. “Hi!” he said. “Want a ride?”
Nancy jumped from the car. “Do you take people sightseeing?” she asked as an idea flashed into her mind.
“Sure thing. Any place within a radius of a hundred and fifty miles. My rates are low.”
Nancy thought so too when she heard what they were.
“How many passengers can you take?”
“Three.”
“We’ll go,” Nancy said. “Are you ready?”
“In a few minutes. I’ll fill ’er up with fuel, and take you up for an hour.”
While the pilot was doing this, Nancy quickly explained to her friends that she thought it was a marvelous opportunity to view the countryside near Emerson. “Which two of you want to go?”
Bess and Dave offered to stay on the ground. “I’d like to look around and see the planes here,” Dave said.
Quarter of an hour later the three passengers climbed aboard and the helicopter rose.
“I’m Glenn Munson,” the pilot said. “Anything in particular you’d like to see?”
Nancy introduced herself and her friends. “Yes. As many airfields public and private that you have time to show us.”
Glenn raised his eyebrows. “For any special reason?”
Nancy told of the mysterious helicopter landing on the Drews’ lawn. “Have you ever seen or heard of a robot copter around this area?” she asked.
“Sure. A friend of mine who’s a computer expert has one. Want to meet him?”
Nancy was so excited she could hardly keep her voice calm. But she managed to say, “We’d love to.”
Munson steered his craft in a half circle, flew a few miles, then descended. “There’s Jerry now,” he said, “just tuning up his robot copter to take off.” Jerry’s helicopter was much smaller than the one which had landed on the Drews’ front lawn, and Nancy assumed this was the reason the police had not mentioned it.
She and the others jumped down from their craft and were introduced to Jerry Faber, a tall, lanky young man with twinkling eyes.
“Nancy’s looking for a certain robot copter,” Glenn said.
“One that’s larger than yours,” she told Faber.
Jerry grinned. “Sorry I can’t help you. But come, I’ll show you my real beauty of a copter.”
He led the group to a barn at one edge of the field and opened the door. Before them stood a big, shiny new helicopter.
“There’s Emmy,” Jerry said proudly. “She’s not a robot but I can take ten passengers in her. And she has a long range—three hundred and fifty miles.”
Nancy was disappointed that neither helicopter was the one she had hoped to find, but said, “This big one certainly is beautiful. Do you use it just for pleasure?”
“No, I fly executives of nearby companies on short business trips, and sometimes other people. I had a mysterious passenger a week ago. He didn’t even give me his full name. He just said, ‘Call me Crossy.’ ”
“Crossy?” Burt burst out. “What did he look like?”
“Had bright red hair.”
“He’s the one!” Burt exclaimed. “We think—” A warning look from Nancy kept him from saying, “We think he’s a kidnapper.”
“Do you know him?” Glenn asked in surprise.
Burt replied that the man in question might be a graduate student at Emerson who had disappeared.
“Where did you fly him?” Nancy inquired.
Jerry thought a moment. “Oh, I remember now. It was over River Heights.”
The visitors exchanged glances. Nancy asked why Jerry thought Crossy was mysterious. She was told that the man took binoculars from his pocket when they reached River Heights and trained them on every house in town.
“I finally laughed and asked him, ‘You got a girl friend down there?’ He said, ‘Sort of. She’s a smart one. Knows the law like a lawyer’!”
Nancy started. Could the girl be Marty King? If so, what did she know about Crosson? Was she playing up to him to get information concerning the mystery of the glowing eye?
“Did Crossy tell you anything else?” Nancy asked.
“No. He talked very little, but he did ask me a lot of questions about complicated computer programming.”
Burt said the graduate student from Emerson was a whiz in this subject. “If you ever hear from Crossy, or see him, please let us know.”
“I sure will,” Jerry replied, “and now I must go to keep an appointment. Look around all you like.”
The group thanked the pilot and said good-by. Jerry hurried back to his small helicopter and got in. He spun the rotors and took off. The others watched intently.
Suddenly George cried out, “Oh my goodness! Jerry’s in trouble!”
Everyone gazed in horror at his whirlybird which was spiraling toward the ground!
CHAPTER V
A Strange Prison
As the group watched Jerry’s helicopter, which apparently was out of control, Glenn suddenly began to laugh. The others looked at him in amazement.
“Jerry had me fooled too for a few minutes. He’s not in trouble. Jerry’s doing some acrobatics for you. Pretty intricate flying maneuvers for a copter. He’s really good.”
“I’ll say he is,” Burt spoke up.
Jerry leveled his craft and flew off. Those on the ground could visualize him grinning over his trick. Then they turned and walked back to look again at the helicopter in the hangar. Nancy climbed up to look inside.
“What a battery of gadgets!” she exclaimed. “There must be a hundred push buttons and levers and lights on this instrument panel!”
As her eyes wandered over the intricate setup, Nancy noticed a penny on the floor.
“I wonder if Jerry dropped this,” she thought, “or some passenger—perhaps Crosson!”
Nancy picked up the penny and examined it. The coin bore the date 1923 S. “Mm, that’s old and valuable,” she said to herself. “It’s like one Dad has. Shall I leave it here?”
She decided to ask Glenn to return it to Jerry. Nancy stepped down and handed the penny to their pilot. She made her request, then added, “If Jerry knows who dropped it, please call me.” She wrote down the telephone number of the fraternity house.
Glenn promised that he would and said they had better leave. “I have another job in half an hour,” he explained.
The pilot took his passengers back to the airfield, then hurried off. Nancy’s car was not in sight.
“Bess and Dave must have taken it,” Nancy remarked.
The couple had driven off in the convertible soon after their friends had left.
“Let’s do some sleuthing in this area,” Dave suggested as they headed for the road.
“Where do we start?” Bess asked. “This is farming country. I’m getting one of Nancy’s hunches that Zapp Crosson or whoever kidnapped Ned would pick a secluded section like this one to hide out.”
“Right.”
After traveling a few miles they came to an old, dilapidated two-story farmhouse. Bess went up on the porch of rotting floorboards. The windows had no curtains and she could see there were only a few pieces of half-broken furniture inside the house.
“I guess no one lives here,” she called out to Dave.
He hopped from the car and came to take a look. “I wonder if the house is locked.” Dave tried the front door. It opened without a key.
“Let’s explore,” he urged.
“No thanks,” said Bess. “Deserted houses with unlocked doors aren’t my idea of safe places to investigate.”
Dave made no comment and walked in. “If I don’t return in thirty minutes, get the police,” he teased, tossing Bess the car keys.
“Oh, I’ll come,” she decided. Bess was fearful but did not want Dave to think her a coward.
There was a narrow center hall with a steep stairway. A room opened onto it from either side. The rear of the hallway led into the kitchen, which was stocked with canned food. A knife, fork, and spoon lay in the sink alongside an unwashed plate.
“Someone’s probably camping out here,” Dave remarked.
“And I’ll bet,” Bess replied, “it’s someone who has no business here. But I don’t want to be caught trespassing. Let’s go!”
“No,” said Dave. “I’d like to find out who the intruder is. I’m going upstairs. You stay here on guard.”
Bess felt uncomfortable being left alone but knew she would be more ill at ease on the floor above. She closed the front door and posted herself near it, but presently began to walk from window to window.
Suddenly she jumped in fright as something heavy fell overhead. Bess rushed to the stairway and called up.
“Dave! Are you all right?”
There was no answer. Putting her fears aside, Bess vaulted up the steps two at a time, all the while calling Dave’s name. He did not reply. She hurried through the scantily furnished bedrooms but found no sign of her friend. She could not figure out what had fallen. There was no stairway to a third floor.
“Oh, Dave, where are you?” Bess wailed.
She began opening one closet door after another, each time with a shudder as to what she might find. Finally Bess reached the last closet. As she opened the door she could hear muffled sounds. Nobody was inside. Bess stepped forward to put her ear to the wall.
“0-o-oh!” Bess exclaimed as the floor suddenly opened and she plummeted downward.
The startled girl landed in the pitch darkness on something soft. It moved under her. She heard a groan.
“Dave!” Bess murmured. “Oh, I must have hurt you!”
“You sure knocked the wind out of me. Good thing I’m used to tackle football!”
“Where are we?” Bess asked.
“At the bottom of a clothes chute,” Dave answered. “It was lucky there were some things in it to cushion my fall.”
Bess asked how they were going to escape. “Besides, I don’t want to get caught by that person who comes here. He might be dangerous.”
Dave admitted he had not yet found an opening, but was sure there was one.
The two captives felt every inch of the wall and floor of their prison. When they could find no doorknob nor a bolt, they began to push and press the wood.
“I’m sure of one thing,” said Dave. “We’re below the first floor in a cellar. There must be an opening in this wooden chute.”
“Sh!” Bess whispered as he finished. “Listen!”
She had heard the front door slam. Now there were footsteps overhead.
Bess clung to Dave’s arm. “We’ll be found!” she whispered tensely.
“In here? I doubt it,” he said, trying to reassure her with a little hug.
The two waited in silence. Floorboards creaked as the heavy stepping person trudged all through the house. Bess and Dave assumed he had spotted the car in front and had come to investigate. Evidently satisfied the place was vacant, the man slammed the front door again. In a few moments Bess and Dave heard an automobile drive off.
“Probably a policeman,” Dave suggested. “At first I thought he might be the person who’s using this place.”
Once more he and Bess began to push on the walls of the clothes chute. Finally Dave put his finger in a small knothole and was able to move a concealed door to one side. The couple stepped out into a cellar dimly lighted by the sun streaming through a small window. The place was empty except for two musty washtubs and a stack of dusty newspapers.
“How do we get out of this prison?” Bess asked Dave, after glancing around. No door or other exit was visible.
While she searched for a hidden exit in a wall, Dave’s eyes roved back and forth across the ceiling. It was thick with dirt and cobwebs, but he thought he could detect a movable section under the kitchen. He mentioned his discovery to Bess.
“Climb up to my shoulders and try to open this,” Dave said. “The people who lived here must have used a ladder.”
Dave leaned over. Bess pulled herself onto his shoulders and stood up. She quickly found that a section of the ceiling could be pushed upward. With a little effort Bess eased herself through.
“Try to open it,” Dave said.
“How are you going to get out?” she asked Dave.
“Don’t worry. The first thing I want to do is examine these clothes in the chute. There might be a clue for Nancy to work on.”
Bess quickly looked for a stepladder and found one in a closet.
Dave reported with a laugh, “All men’s clothes in the chute and nothing in them but a penny in a shirt pocket.”
Bess giggled. “Bring it up here. Might be a good-luck penny. Here’s a ladder. I’ll hand it to you.”
Dave took it and in a moment he was beside Bess. Then he reached down and pulled up the ladder.
“We’d better go,” Bess said. “Nancy and George and Burt may be back and wondering where we went.”
The two hurried outside without meeting any one and drove back to the airfield. Their friends were waiting.
“Where have you been?” George said petulantly. “We thought you’d been kidnapped too.”
Dave replied, “We were prisoners. It’s lucky we got back here. Bess, shall we tell them where we were being held?” There was a twinkle in his eye.
Bess smiled. “After they tell us where they went.”
Nancy knew there was no use coaxing, so she briefed the couple on the helicopter trip, and mentioned the 1923 S penny she had found in Jerry Faber’s big copter.
“I found a penny also,” said Dave. He took the coin out of a pocket in his jeans. After looking at the date on it, he exclaimed, “This is a 1923 S penny too!”
CHAPTER VI
Mysterious Burglary
FINALLY Nancy said, “I have a hunch that Zapp Crosson owns both pennies.” After hearing Bess and Dave’s story, she said, “He could have dropped the first one in the copter on his trip to look over River Heights, and left the other one at the farmhouse.”
George spoke up. “In other words, you think he put the second penny in the pocket of his shirt and then changed clothes.”
Nancy told her she thought Crosson had done more than this. “I believe the farmhouse is a hideout for him.”
Bess was sure the suspect was not carrying on any kind of experiments at the house. “Dave and I looked over the place thoroughly and didn’t find anything unusual until we fell down the clothes chute.”
George laughed. “I’ll bet he doesn’t go there just to wash his clothes.”
Burt said, “More likely he goes there to put on a disguise of some kind to fool the police. For one thing, he’d want to cover that fiery red hair of his.”
There was a great deal of discussion among the young people as Burt drove along. Nancy said she thought the farmhouse should be guarded. “But I don’t like to notify the police until we know for sure that Crosson is our man.”
Dave said he had a suggestion. “How about Burt and me staying at the house for the night? I saw plenty of canned food. If there’s no car around, Crosson won’t suspect anyone is there. When he comes in, we’ll give him a football rush before he can escape.”
Burt turned the car and headed toward the farmhouse. When they had almost reached it, he said, “You girls go on back to Emerson and pick us up at the farm early in the morning.”
They agreed. Half a mile from the house the two boys got out and to keep from being seen approached the building from the rear.
Meanwhile, Nancy had taken the wheel and the girls had gone on. When they returned to the fraternity house, students crowded around and asked many questions.
“Any news of Ned?”
“What did you find out?”
The girls admitted that they had learned very little but suspected a certain place might offer a clue, so Burt and Dave were spending the night there to see what they could find out. This seemed to satisfy the boys, and the girls hurried off to the guest room.
“I certainly need a bath and a shampoo,” Bess spoke up. “Anybody mind if I use the shower first?”
“Go ahead,” said Nancy. She sat down in a chair and stared out a window, but her mind was not on the scenery. She was recalling the day’s adventures and trying to fit the pieces of the puzzle together. She asked herself, “If Crosson goes to the farmhouse, does he bring Ned with him?
“Probably not,” the young detective decided. “Oh, Ned, where are you?” she thought wistfully. “If you can’t send me another message, concentrate real hard on transmitting a clue into this brain of mine.”
A while later George tapped her on the shoulder. “Time’s up for daydreaming,” she said. “Bathroom’s free. Your turn for a shower.”
Almost absentmindedly Nancy got up and went to take a refreshing bath. After it, she felt less edgy and hurried to put on fresh clothes for dinner.
Ned’s fraternity brothers were very kind and solicitous and tried their best to entertain the three girls, Nancy in particular. When dinner was over, a tall blond boy with deep-blue eyes, named Tom Rankin, put some hit records on the stereo. Nancy enjoyed the music, but before one album had finished, she was called to the telephone.
“Hello! Who is this?” she asked.
“Never mind who I am. What I want to know is, where are Burt Eddleton and Dave Evans?”
Nancy was instantly alert. Instead of giving the information, she said, “I won’t answer your question until you identify yourself.”
She waited for an answer but none came. There were several seconds of silence, then the caller hung up.
As Nancy came back to join the group, she began to worry about Burt and Dave. She asked the boy who had originally taken the call if the speaker had asked for either Burt or Dave.
“Yes, he did. When I said they were not here, he wanted to speak to you. Is something wrong?”
“I don’t know, but the man wouldn’t give me his name,” Nancy replied.
Bess and George were upset when they heard what had happened. Bess, who was frantic with worry, said, “I’m sure the caller was Crosson. He isn’t satisfied with having kidnapped Ned. Now he’s going to get Dave and Burt!”
George did not share her cousin’s fears. “I’m sure Burt and Dave will know how to take care of themselves if he arrives.”
“But suppose,” said Bess, “that he brings along some pals and they overpower Dave and Burt?”
There was a discussion about whether or not the girls should notify the police, but they had confidence in their friends’ resourcefulness and strength to meet any emergency.
George said, “Let’s get some sleep and go out there early in the morning.”
The girls said good night to Ned’s fraternity brothers and went to bed. None of them slept well and were up at six o’clock.
The friendly blond boy Tom Rankin was also up. It was his turn to be on kitchen duty. Nancy, Bess, and George helped him and the four had breakfast together.
“Where are you off to?” he asked.
“To get Burt and Dave,” Nancy replied, but gave no other information.
When the girls reached the farmhouse, it appeared to be deserted. Nancy opened the front door and called out. There was no answer. Quickly the three made a search of the place and George even got the ladder from the closet and went to the cellar. She looked in the clothes chute. Burt and Dave were not on the premises.
Moments later Nancy, Bess, and George stood in the middle of the living room, staring at one another, the same thought going through their minds. Had Burt and Dave been kidnapped?
“Oh, I can’t stand it!” Bess wailed, tears welling up in her eyes. “Why did we ever let the boys stay here?”
“Shush!” George commanded. “Crying over the situation isn’t helping any. Put on your thinking cap, Bess, and help us figure out—”
Nancy interrupted to ask a pertinent question. “George, were there clothes in the chute?”
George admitted that she had not noticed. Once more she climbed down the ladder to the cellar, then slid back the door to the chute. There was nothing in it.
“Now I know Crosson was here!” she thought.
George was not the kind of girl to give in to tears, but it was difficult for her to come back up the ladder and tell the others of her suspicion.
“I’m going outside and look around,” she said.
Nancy and Bess began to hunt in the house for anything which might give them a clue to the boys’ whereabouts. They hoped that Burt and Dave might have managed to leave some kind of message. But their search revealed no leads.
George, who had just finished scrutinizing the ground in front of the farmhouse for clues, saw a State Police patrol car coming. She was about to hail it, when the car pulled in and stopped. The uniformed driver opened the door on the passenger side and shouted to George, “Is Nancy Drew here?”
“Yes, she is,” George replied, wondering whether the man was bringing bad news.
George rushed up to the front door and called to Nancy. She came downstairs with Bess at her heels.
“I’m Anthony Russo,” the policeman said.
The girls introduced themselves and Nancy said, “Do you have a message for me?”
The officer nodded and said that he had been there earlier and talked to Burt and Dave who had explained their reason for trespassing. The officer grinned. “I found out they hadn’t had a meal since lunchtime yesterday so I took them to Campbell’s Diner in town. You’re to meet them there.”
The three girls heaved sighs of relief and Nancy told the policeman how frightened they had been that possibly the boys had been kidnapped.
Russo laughed. “It would be pretty hard to subdue those two huskies,” he said.
Nancy asked the officer if he knew who lived at the farmhouse.
“Nobody.”
“Do you think a tramp might be using the place?” Nancy queried.
Russo said he doubted this, although he had noticed a dirty dish and silverware in the sink. “I come by here fairly often and I’ve never yet seen anybody around.”
Nancy thanked him for bringing the message and said the girls would pick up the boys at once.
When they arrived at the diner, Burt and Dave were standing in front. “Hi!” they said cheerily.
Bess did not smile in return. “Why didn’t you leave us a note?” she scolded. “We’ve been beside ourselves with worry that you had been kidnapped.”
“Kidnapped!” Burt said, and burst into laughter.
He told them that the boys had found nothing at the farmhouse to connect Crosson with the place and had not been disturbed during the night.
George was unwilling to accept this statement without an explanation. “When did the clothes vanish from the chute?” she asked.
Burt and Dave looked blank. They admitted they had failed to look in the chute and had no idea when the clothes might have been taken out.
“But I’m sure it wasn’t after we arrived,” Burt declared. “Someone must have removed