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ПРИЯТНОГО ЧТЕНИЯ!
Carolyn Keene
Nancy Drew Mystery Stories: Volume Forty-Nine
The Secret of Mirror Bay
Copyright © 1972 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Published by Grosset & Dunlap, Inc.
Aunt Eloise Drew invites Nancy and her friends to Mirror Bay Bide-A-Wee cabin near Cooperstown, New York, for a visit and a chance to solve the mystery of the woman who glides across the water.
Upon their arrival Nancy becomes mixed up in a vacation hoax because she resembles the young woman involved, and is nearly arrested for fraud.
On the wooded mountain near the cabin further exciting events await Nancy and the other girls. There, in the deep forest, a weird luminescent green sorcerer appears who threatens to cast an evil spell on anyone investigating his strange activities.
In a dangerous twist of circumstances Nancy finds that solving one mystery helps to solve another. What happens when the young detective and her friends uncover a cleverly concealed criminal operation makes thrilling reading.
CHAPTER I
Vacation Hoax
“It’s beautiful!”
“What is?”
“It’s spooky!”
“What’s spooky?”
“It’s fun but it’s dangerous!” Nancy Drew smiled at her two friends Bess and George who were listening intently.
George Fayne spoke up. She was a tall, slender athletic girl who loved her boyish name.
“You forgot to say it’s intriguing, but what is and where is it?”
“The spot we’re going to,” Nancy replied. “That is, you girls are invited to join me. I hope you can come.”
Nancy went on to say that Aunt Eloise Drew, her father’s sister who lived in New York City, had rented a cottage on a bay. “The name of the cabin is Mirror Bay Bide-A-Wee.”
Bess Marvin, blond, pretty, and always talking about going on a diet, looked at Nancy puzzled. “The place sounds wonderful. What did you mean by all those things you were saying about it?”
Nancy, slim and attractive-looking with reddish blond hair, said, “There’s a mystery, of course. Aunt Eloise heard that early on misty mornings a woman is seen gliding over the water.”
“In what?” George queried.
“Oh, she’s walking,” Nancy replied.
“How could she?” George asked skeptically.
“That’s one thing I want to find out,” Nancy answered. “The lake, of which the bay is a part, is a hundred and sixty-seven feet deep in the middle.”
“Wow!” Bess exclaimed. “Dangerous spot to fall overboard with heavy shoes on.”
Nancy said the water was shallow near shore and gradually became deeper. Bess and George, who were cousins, asked where the lake was.
“In New York State,” Nancy told them. “The Indians called the lake Otesaga and there’s a lovely hotel named after it. Later James Fenimore Cooper wrote stories about settlers and Indians in the area. He found the water so much like a mirror that he called it Glimmerglass. Now the official name is Otsego Lake.”
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Nancy explained that at the southern end of the lake was the famous village of Cooperstown.
George’s eyes lighted up. “That’s where the Baseball Hall of Fame is.”
“Right,” Nancy replied, “and there are also many interesting museums in and around Cooperstown.”
“Sounds great to me,” Bess remarked. “When would we go?”
“Tomorrow morning,” Nancy replied. “Aunt Eloise is taking a bus to Cooperstown from New York. We’re to meet her there and drive along the water to Hyde Bay, then walk down to Bide-A-Wee cabin.”
“Bide-A-Wee,” said Bess. “That’s Scottish for ‘stay awhile,’ isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Nancy agreed. “Well, how about you girls getting on the phone and finding out if you can go with me?”
It took less than ten minutes for the cousins to call their parents and get permission. They hurried home to pack and Nancy went out to the kitchen to talk to the Drews’ housekeeper, Hannah Gruen.
Mrs. Gruen had been with the family since the death of Mrs. Drew when Nancy was only three years old. The tender-hearted woman was like a mother to her and was very proud of Nancy’s accomplishments as a young amateur detective Nevertheless, she was always a little fearful when Nancy set off on one of her sleuthing expeditions.
“Do you know what I heard?” she asked. “That there are bears in the woods of the Cooperstown area. You’d better be mighty careful if you go up in the mountains.”
Nancy laughed. “Suppose I carry a few combs of honey with me,” she teased. “If a bear comes my way, I’ll toss one at him.”
Hannah Gruen smiled. “You always know what to do,” she said.
Nancy’s father was out of town, but the next morning she said good-by to him on the telephone. Tall, handsome Carson Drew was a well-known attorney in River Heights. She picked up Bess and George in her convertible and they set off for Cooperstown.
The long drive in the fresh summer air was delightful. They stopped for lunch at a wayside snack bar. Soon after starting off again, they were confronted with a long detour.
“Oh dear!” said Nancy. “We’ll have to go miles out of our way and be late meeting Aunt Eloise. I just hate to think of her waiting on the sidewalk with her luggage.”
“Maybe she’ll go to the lovely hotel you mentioned,” Bess suggested.
Nancy shook her head. “Not if I know Aunt Eloise. She’ll be right at the bus stop.”
Nancy put on all the speed the law allowed and finally pulled into the main street of Cooperstown twenty minutes late.
“My goodness, what’s going on?” Bess asked.
Along one curb stood five large buses. People were milling about the street, arguing and making threats to no one in particular. There were suitcases and tote bags strewn on the sidewalk. Shop-keepers had come outside to learn what the trouble was.
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Nancy parked some distance from the commotion, locked the car, and the three girls hurried up the street. They saw Aunt Eloise standing in the doorway of a shop guarding her own luggage.
“Nancy!” exclaimed the tall charming woman, who taught school in New York.
The three girls kissed her, then asked what was going on.
“Right after my regularly scheduled bus arrived here,” she said, “this group of charter buses drove in. These people were aboard. As I understand the story, they had been sold tickets in New York City for a week’s stay at a very elegant place called The Homestead on the Mountain. The round trip and all hotel expenses were only a hundred dollars per person. But now it seems the hotel reservation was a hoax. There is no such place here as The Homestead on the Mountain.”
“How dreadful!” said Bess. “Who’s responsible for this?”
Miss Drew said she did not know. The bus drivers claimed to be entirely innocent. Their company had been paid for making the charter trip from New York City. The agitated passengers looked closely at their brochures of the trip and now they discovered that the tickets did not include a return trip, even though they had been promised one.
“It’s an outrage!” screamed a red-faced woman.
Just then one of the irate men spotted Nancy. In a couple of leaps he was at her side and grabbing her shoulder.
“Here she is!” he shouted. “The faker!”
Nancy removed the man’s hand and stared at him. “What are you talking about?” she asked.
By this time a crowd of people was running toward the girl. Someone exclaimed, “She’s the one all right!”
Aunt Eloise stepped forward. “I demand to know what you’re accusing my niece of.”
For answer the man pulled a brochure from his pocket. He pointed to a reproduction of a photograph. The pamphlet was printed on the kind of paper used for newspapers and the picture was not distinct. It showed a round-faced man and a girl who certainly did resemble Nancy.
“There’s your proof!” the irate passenger said to Aunt Eloise. “Get the police, somebody!”
There was no need to summon them. Two State Police officers were already on hand and pushing their way through the crowd.
“What’s going on here?” one of them demanded.
The man from New York answered. “This girl sold me a phony ticket and I want my money back.”
“This girl sold me a phony ticket!” the irate man shouted
Aunt Eloise, Bess, and George exclaimed in unison, “She did not! There is some mistake!”
One of the officers faced Nancy. “What do you have to say?”
Quickly Nancy explained that evidently some girl who resembled her, and a man partner, had cheated all these people out of a vacation. She ended by saying, “I had nothing to do with it. My friends and I just arrived in a car. This is my aunt. She has rented a cottage on the bay and we’re about to go there.”
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The adamant passenger pushed the brochure and his hotel reservation toward the policeman. “Don’t pay any attention to what they say. Here’s proof!”
The two officers stared at the photograph, then one said he thought that while the girl did resemble Nancy she was no doubt someone else. He asked to see Nancy’s driver’s license. Bess, George, and Aunt Eloise also showed theirs.
The angry man moved away. He seemed unconvinced and cried out, “What’s to become of us? We paid all this money and we have no place to stay and no ride back to New York.”
The officer said he would see what he could do to help the stranded travelers. He smiled at Aunt Eloise. “I’m sorry you people had such an unfortunate welcome to Cooperstown. I hope your stay here will be so enjoyable you will forget what happened.”
Miss Drew thanked him and turned away from the crowd. The girls picked up her luggage and headed for the car.
Aunt Eloise pointed across the street. A man was just entering a restaurant.
“That’s my bus driver,” she said.
“Um! Handsome,” Bess murmured.
The others smiled. Miss Drew directed her niece to East Lake Road, which ran a few hundred feet above the lake.
On their left was the mirror-like water. Here and there a sailboat went by, wafted by a lazy breeze. Along the shore were several camps where children were swimming. Sounds of laughter came up the hillside.
To the right of the road was a steep wooded hillside, broken only now and then by a house or a garage. Some six miles from town they came to a small parking area on their left and climbed out of the car. They gathered their bags and trudged down the path leading to the waterfront. Soon an attractive cabin came into view. Though on the bay it was near the point where the inlet joined the lake proper.
“Welcome to Mirror Bay Bide-A-Wee,” said Aunt Eloise. “I hope you girls will have a glorious time and solve the mystery of the woman who can glide over the water.”
The cabin was rustic and had a large front porch with a view west across the lake and north across the bay. Besides a living room with a huge fireplace and a well-furnished kitchen, there were three good-sized bedrooms. Miss Drew assigned Nancy to one, the cousins to another, and the third to herself. As soon as the hot weary travelers had unpacked, they put on bathing suits and went for a swim.
“What gorgeous water!” George exclaimed, doing a quick overhand toward the middle of the sparkling lake.
“Come back!” cried Bess. “There’s enough water around here to swim in!”
George turned back. “Bet I could swim all the way to the west bank of the lake without stopping,” she said. “Oh, how I hate myself!” She grinned.
Refreshed and hungry, the girls insisted that Aunt Eloise sit on the porch and enjoy the brilliant sunset while they prepared supper.
“I wonder what happened to all those poor bus passengers,” said Bess.
“And I wonder,” Nancy added, “where that girl is who resembles me. I hope she doesn’t show up around this area.”
“Oh, she wouldn’t dare!” George insisted.
“Don’t be too sure!” Bess warned.
The group went to bed early and slept soundly. Nancy awoke early, raised up from her bed, and looked out the window toward the water. It was very misty.
“Maybe that woman who glides over the water is out there now,” she thought. “Anyway, it won’t hurt to look. It’s possible the story was made up just to amuse tourists.”
Quietly Nancy arose, put on her slippers, and walked to the porch. Suddenly she gave a start. Was her imagination playing tricks, or did she really see a ghostly figure gliding over the water?
CHAPTER II
News of a Sorcerer
THOUGH Nancy left the cabin quickly and hurried down the steps to the waterfront, she could see no one in the mist. Had the woman gone out too far from shore to be noticed?
Perplexed, the young detective kept on staring ahead. Very slowly the mist was beginning to rise. She could gaze through it more plainly now. She looked in every direction. The woman was not in sight at the moment.
“If I really saw someone, where could she have gone?” Nancy asked herself.
Then another thought came to Nancy. The ghostly figure may have seen her coming and swum away under water.
As her eyes searched the surface, the young detective spotted a piece of paper floating near shore. Wondering what it was, and if by any chance the spectral figure could have dropped it, Nancy waded into the water to retrieve it. The paper proved to be part of a letter.
Nancy carried it to the porch and dried the torn sheet the best she could with a tissue. Most of the letter was illegible but part of one sentence stood out clearly. It read:
With tears the poor child’s coach was lowered near—
“How strange!” Nancy thought. “I wonder what it means.”
As she sat on a rocker cogitating, Aunt Eloise came outside. “Oh, here you are!” she said. “I noticed your bed was empty and wondered where you’d gone.”
Nancy kissed her aunt good morning, then told of her adventure. “Make a guess as to what those strange words mean,” she teased.
Miss Drew laughed. “I wouldn’t have the faintest idea. But you’ll solve the mystery. You always do.”
She bent down and put an arm affectionately around her niece. Nancy hoped that what her aunt had just said would come true.
Solving mysteries was not new to Nancy. From the time her father had suggested she assist him in uncovering The Secret of the Old Clock, right through the intriguing case of The Crooked Banister. she had met with success.
“Will I be so lucky this time?” Nancy asked herself.
A few minutes later Bess and George came out to the porch and were shown the strange paper.
“Sounds gruesome,” Bess remarked. “Did that phantom woman on the water drop it?”
Nancy told the girls what little she knew. “In any case I’d like to find the owner of this paper and perhaps learn what it means.”
“How can you?” Bess asked. “You haven’t a single clue except a misty woman.”
Nancy smiled but did not reply. Aunt Eloise suggested that they all dress and get breakfast. “Maybe by that time an answer will come to Nancy. By the way, I’m going into town for food supplies. You girls won’t need the car, will you?”
“No,” Nancy answered. “What I’d like to do is go all around the neighborhood and question everybody about this paper. The owner may be nearby.”
After Aunt Eloise had left, the three girls tidied the cabin, locked it, and trudged up the hill to the road. They turned right toward Cooperstown and presently met a group of boy campers on a hike with a counselor.
Nancy asked the affable young man if he knew anyone who had lost part of a letter.
“No, I don’t,” he answered. “Did you find one?”
“Yes.” Nancy inquired if the counselor had heard the story of the woman who glided on the water.
He and the little boys began to laugh. “Yes, we’ve all heard it,” he said. “Of course no one believes the story but it’s a good one.”
He changed the subject abruptly, asking where the girls were staying. When Nancy told him, the young man remarked, “Don’t be surprised if some of us come to call on you. Mirror Bay Bide-A-Wee is known as a cola stop.”
Bess dimpled. “Oh, is that why there’s a coke refrigerator in the corner of the porch?”
The counselor and the boys nodded.
George grinned. “If you do stop by, be sure to bring a clue with you about the misty woman.”
The young man laughed and walked off with the boys.
Presently the girls reached a settlement of cabins which sprawled down the hillside from the road to the water. The threesome stopped at each cabin and inquired if anyone there had lost part of a torn letter. No one had, and most of the summer residents seemed amused by the idea.
“Let’s go back,” Bess begged. “We aren’t learning a thing.”
Nancy agreed, although she hated to give up the search. When they reached the cabin, George said she was going swimming.
“I want to try gliding over the water,” she said.
“I dare you ” Nancy said as they went into their rooms.
The three girls changed hurriedly, ran down to the water, and swam around a little while. Then Nancy stopped to examine the shoreline. She detected footprints but they did not seem to go anywhere.
Just then George called out, “Nancy, look! I’m gliding on the water!”
Nancy turned. Sure enough, her friend was actually skimming on the top of the bay! Before Nancy had a chance to figure this out, George suddenly dived in and Bess’s head and shoulders appeared.
Nancy burst into laughter. “Good trick!” she called. “You had me fooled for a moment. Nice work, Bess. You did well holding your breath that long and toting George across the water on your shoulders.”
“I couldn’t have held out another second,” Bess told her. “Next time we try that stunt, I’ll do the gliding and George can be under water.”
Her cousin groaned. “I may be strong, but I’d have to be Supergirl to hold your weight!” she remarked.
Bess quickly dunked George before she could swim away. Nancy laughed, then sobered. She suddenly had an idea. Could this be the way the phantom woman accomplished her unusual walk?
She mentioned this to the girls and added, “But what is the purpose of it?”
Bess gave a great sigh. “We haven’t been here twenty-four hours. I just feel too vacationy to figure out such a problem. Besides, I’m starving. Let’s start lunch.”
The girls had just finished preparing a delicious fruit-and-cottage cheese salad when Aunt Eloise appeared. She was laden down with bags of food.
“Hypers!” George cried. “There’s enough here for an army!”
Bess’s eyes were glistening. “Um!” she said, taking out jars of jam and jelly. “Peach preserves and pineapple—”
George gave her cousin a stern look. “You sound like someone in an eating contest. Take it easy.”
Aunt Eloise put a stop to the needling by saying she had two surprises to tell the girls. “First of all, I’ve rented a sailboat for you to use while you’re here.”
“How wonderful!” Nancy exclaimed. “Oh, you’re such a darling!” She gave her aunt a great hug.
Miss Drew went on to say that the sailboat, the Crestwood, was at the main Cooperstown dock.
“Let’s go down this afternoon and get it,” George said enthusiastically. “It sounds great!”
“Aunt Eloise,” Nancy said, “while we’re eating, tell us about the second surprise.”
Miss Drew nodded. “This one is not in the line of fun. I’m afraid it could mean danger to you.”
“How?”
Her aunt said that just as she was leaving town, she had seen a girl hurrying along the shore road. “Later I realized she resembles you very much. I wonder if she could be the one who was part of that vacation swindle.”
Nancy frowned. Her aunt could be right. The police were looking for the girl. It could mean more problems for Nancy if she were mistaken again for this lawbreaker.
“I’ll certainly have to watch out,” she said aloud.
At two o’clock Aunt Eloise and the girls started for town in the convertible. Part way there, where the wooded mountain rose steeply from the road, the air suddenly reverberated with an anguished cry for help.
Nancy stopped the car and asked, “Where did that come from?”
The cry was repeated but the listeners could not be sure whether it was coming from the mountain or from the area between the road and the shoreline. Nancy pulled to the side of the road and parked. Everyone got out.
“Let’s divide for the search,” Nancy suggested. “Aunt Eloise, suppose you and Bess go down toward the shore. George and I will climb the mountain.”
The two search parties started off at once. Nancy and George had not gone verv far into the woods when they saw a girl racing pell-mell down the hill. She was about twenty years old and very pretty. But now she looked terrified and kept glancing back over her shoulder.
“What’s the matter?” Nancy called to her.
The girl was nearly breathless when she reached Nancy and George but she managed to gasp out, “The sorcerer! It’s true! He’s up there! Don’t go any farther!”
CHAPTER III
Yo
“YOU’RE safe now!” Nancy assured the distraught girl. The young detective put an arm around the stranger’s waist and George held her hand.
“Yes, you’re perfectly safe now,” George reiterated. “We have a car down below. Would you like to sit in it and rest awhile?”
The girl heaved a great sigh. “That won’t be necessary. I must return to camp.” She pointed in the distance toward the water. “I’m a counselor down there. Perhaps I shouldn’t have gone wandering so far by myself.”
“We’ll drive you back,” Nancy offered. “A few minutes ago you were warning us not to go up the mountain. Why?”
“Because there’s a real sorcerer up there—a horrible-looking creature. I suppose he’s a man—but awfully scary in appearance. He wears a green costume that makes him blend into the foliage. There’s a funny green light glowing about him. That’s not so bad, but his face—it has a weird greenish hue.”
“What about his hair?” Nancy asked. She was intrigued by the description of this creature.
“I don’t remember seeing any. I guess his costume had a hood.” The girl sighed. “To tell the truth, I was so frightened I nearly froze in my tracks.
“He didn’t come any closer but pointed a finger down the mountainside and said, ‘Go! Do not return or I will change your bones into stone so you will never walk again!’”
The girl had been trembling with fear, but suddenly she shook off the mood.
“What a ninny I am!” she chided herself. “Of course there are no such things as sorcerers. Don’t ever tell my little girl campers that I thought one frightened me! By the way, my name is Karen Jones. What are yours?”
Nancy and George introduced themselves and said they were glad Karen was over her scare. Nevertheless, they were sure that she had seen some man with a greenish face and wearing a green suit. No doubt he had turned a flashlight on himself.
“Did you see anything else on the mountain?” Nancy asked Karen.
“Nothing special. You mean like a hut or a tent or a lean-to? No, I didn’t see anything like that. But tell me, why do you suppose that man is pulling such a stunt?”
George smiled. “I’d say to keep people away from himself and whatever he’s doing in the forest.” The three girls started walking toward the car.
Karen’s eyes grew large. “Do you think something illegal is going on up in the mountain?”
“Could be,” George replied.
Karen sighed again. “At college I’m a botany major. I was up in the forest hunting for luminescent mushrooms on tree stumps. You know, the kind that glow.”
“I’ve heard of them,” Nancy told her, “but I’ve never seen any.”
“This coming semester I’m specializing in fungi,” Karen explained, “and I’m supposed to hunt for something luminescent this summer. But I wouldn’t go up that mountain again for a million dollars!”
“I don’t blame you,” George said. “But if you do, better take a crowd with you and not your young campers either.”
By this time the three had reached the car. Bess and Aunt Eloise were just returning from the waterfront and reported that the cry for help had not come from there.
“It was on the mountain,” Nancy explained, then introduced Karen to the others.
George gave a quick résumé of the counselor’s story.
“Oh, how horrible!” Bess exclaimed.
They all got into the car and headed for Karen’s camp.
On the way she said, “One day I met a boy—he’s really a young man—in Cooperstown who told me there was a sorcerer on the mountain. He works at the main boat dock and people around there laugh at him and say he’s full of tall tales and that this was just another one of them. But now I believe him.”
Nancy asked who the boy was.
“His name is Johann Bradley, but everybody calls him Yo,” Karen explained. “I got the impression that he’s older than he looks and is kind of a town character.”
By this time they had reached Karen’s camp and she got out of the car. “I can’t thank you girls enough. If you ever learn the mystery of the green man, let me know.”
“I will,” Nancy replied as she locked the door and drove off.
During the rest of the ride to town, the conversation centered around the strange person in the woods. Who was he? Why was he there? Was he a danger to the community?
Bess spoke up. “I thought Mirror Bay Bide-A-Wee was going to be as calm as the water here and in less than two days we’ve bumped into two mysteries.”
Aunt Eloise laughed. “Which I’m sure pleases Nancy very much.”
Nancy grinned. “I’ll be happier after I solve them. I’m going to start by interviewing the boy Yo.”
She drove immediately to the Cooperstown main boat dock. Before taking the sailboat, she asked the man at the booth if Yo were around. He pointed to the end of a dock where a round-faced, pudgy young man sat twirling a toothpick in his fingers. As Nancy came closer, she could hear low singing. His voice was melodious and dreamy.
When Nancy approached, Yo looked up but did not arise.
“Are you Yo?” she asked.
“That’s me,” the young man replied. “Something I can do for you?”
Nancy sat down beside him.
“Yo,” she began, “a girl at a camp along the lake told me you’ve seen a man with a strange green face and wearing a green suit up on the mountain. He had a light around him.”
“That’s right. But he didn’t scare me,” Yo bragged, grinning.
“Do you know who the man is or anything about him?”
“Nothing except he’s a sorcerer,” Yo answered. “As you get near him he’ll tell you awful things. Like what he said to me. ‘Jump in the lake, boy, and don’t come up!’ ”
“Nice person,” Nancy commented. “Can you tell me anything else about him? Does he live on the mountain?”
“Search me. I know these mountains pretty well and I’ve never seen a shack around that area where he rushed at me. Maybe he comes from a distance.”
“But why would he always appear in that particular spot?” Nancy asked.
“I don’t know.” Abruptly Yo changed the subject. “You and your friends are newcomers here, aren’t you? I saw you at the bus stop yesterday. Did you get taken, too, by those phony people?”
“No,” Nancy told him. “That was a crime! By the way, the girl involved is supposed to resemble me. Have you seen her around?”
“Yup. Lots of times.”
Nancy was surprised to hear this. “Do you mean she lives here?”
Yo said he did not know, but he had often seen her walk up East Lake Road and take off through the forest.
Nancy wondered if there might be some connection between her and the green man. Was he the girl’s partner in the vacation racket? Perhaps a gang of them was hiding on the mountain! She said nothing of this to Yo and after a few minutes more conversation she finally stood up.
“What’s your name?” Yo asked. “And where are you staying?”
Nancy told him, thinking if she did not, he would find out anyway through the rental record of the sailboat. She also mentioned her aunt and the other girls who were with her.
“Yo, the police are looking for that girl who resembles me. If you see her around again, you had better tell them.”
“Okay, I will,” he promised. “Now you got me interested. I wonder who she is.”
Yo got up and accompanied Nancy back to the booth where Aunt Eloise was making arrangements about the sailboat.
Hearing this, Yo asked Nancy, “Do you know how to sail?”
“Oh yes,” she replied.
The pudgy young man smiled to himself. Nancy wondered what he was thinking about, but he gave no explanation.
Instead, he said, “I got a dandy little boat with an outboard motor. I’ll stop by your place sometime and show it to you.”
He was introduced to Miss Drew, Bess, and George. Then, smiling, Yo walked off.