“I don’t know. Annie could have called anyone else in the group.” Russ looked up at the clock, then added, “I’ve got to get going. You two staying for the show?”
“Sure,” Nancy said.
“Are you going to be in it?” asked George.
“Oh, yeah,” Russ said with a wide grin. “I’ll be the one without the fins.”
When the girls left Russ’s office, they found that the amphitheater was nearly filled with excited, chattering people. They circled the huge pool, then climbed into the bleachers to find seats.
“Russ seems sincere,” George said, taking a seat beside two girls wearing Whale Watch T- shirts.
Nancy agreed. “He’s a sweetheart. I wish there was a way to prove that Russ wasn’t home the night that Annie was killed.”
A sudden hush fell over the crowd as a drum roll sounded. Suddenly the pool erupted, and a gray whale leapt out of the water, arching through the air before it splashed back down into the water.
“Welcome to Voices from the Sea,” Doug said, speaking into a portable microphone. Doug and Megan climbed onto the platform that circled the pool. A second whale leapt out of the water, and the crowd applauded. “You’ve just met two of our beluga whales. Their names are Kia and Anore, and today they’re going to show you that the underwater world is not the quiet place you imagine.”
Dressed in wet suits, Doug and Megan went to the platform that jutted into the center of the pool, and the two whales joined them there.
“Beluga whales are often called sea canaries,” explained Doug, “because of their constant chirping and squealing underwater.” On cue, the two whales “spoke,” letting out high-pitched noises.
“Anore is our largest whale, weighing in at eleven hundred pounds. She’s going to demonstrate the power of the beluga whale’s tail fin.” Doug signaled Anore, and the whale rose out of the water as if she were standing on her tail. Moving her tail back and forth, Anore managed to walk backward in the water. “How’s that for a moon walk?” asked Doug.
The audience roared with approval. Next Kia swam around the glass wall of the tank, pushing gallons of water out of the pool with her huge tail fin. Everyone laughed and squealed as the water splashed into the first few rows of the audience.
Looking down at the crowd, Nancy noticed a familiar face in the second row. “There’s Detective DePaulo,” she whispered to George.
“And he doesn’t look too happy to have saltwater on his suit,” George commented.
Considering the way this case was heating up, Nancy wasn’t surprised to see the detective at the aquarium. Realizing that she had to tell him about finding Stuart, Nancy stood up and started down the aisle. “I’ll be right back,” she told George.
As the whales displayed their ability to find objects by sound waves, Nancy told Detective DePaulo that Stuart was hiding out on the Friendly Fin. “Stuart Feinstein is the prime suspect in a murder case,” he said sternly. “He might have tried to hurt both you and your friend George!”
He calmed down when Nancy explained why she believed Stuart was innocent. By the end of the conversation, Nancy had convinced him to post a guard by the Friendly Fin and to hold off on arresting Stuart, just until Friday night.
As Nancy returned to her seat beside George, the whales leapt through the air for a final round of applause. Then Megan moved them to the adjoining tank, and Russ appeared, ushering in two dolphins.
“Meet Schooner and Nalu, two of our bottle- nose dolphins,” said Doug. As Nancy watched, the dolphins leapt through the air. They were nearly as long as the whales, but their bodies were more streamlined, and their mouths and noses came to a point.
“For this part of the presentation,” Doug explained, “our marine mammalogist, Russ Farmer, is going to join the dolphins underwater.”
At that, Russ took a running start and dove into the huge pool. Through the glass side of the tank, the crowd could see what was going on underwater. With strong strokes, Russ swam down toward the deep floor of the pool.
“Look,” said George, “the dolphins are following Russ.”
The audience gasped as the dolphins pressed their noses behind Russ’s feet. They began pushing him through the water. They continued to push him along the glass wall, then nudged him up onto a platform before he ran out of breath.
“Now, if you watch closely,” Doug teased, “you’ll see the dolphins give Russ a little lift.”
Once again, Russ dove down to the bottom of the pool. The dolphins joined him, placing their noses against the bottom of his feet. This time, they picked up speed until Russ arched toward the surface. A moment later, he was flying out of the water, propelled by the dolphins at his feet.
Awed by the spectacle of the grand finale, the crowd burst into applause.
“What a terrific show!” George exclaimed as she and Nancy filed out of the amphitheater. They headed back to the hotel to change for dinner. They had agreed to meet Chris and Jackson at a restaurant in the waterfront village of Fells Point.
As the girls passed the hotel desk, the clerk called out, “Miss Drew! There’s a package here for you. It just arrived this afternoon.” The clerk pointed to a long white box tied with a red satin ribbon.
“Roses?” George suggested, giving her friend a teasing grin.
It looked like roses. Smiling, Nancy was sure they were from the best boyfriend in the world, Ned Nickerson.
But as soon as she pulled the box across the counter, Nancy’s nose wrinkled up in distaste. She had never received flowers that smelled so bad.
Nancy flipped open the lid of the box and gagged. Instead of fragrant roses, the tissue-lined carton was filled with dead fish!
Chapter
Thirteen
THAT’S DISGUSTING,” George said, wrinkling her nose. “Who would do that?”
“There’s a card.” Nancy reached behind one silvery fishhead to remove the tiny white envelope. The message said: Back off or you’ll be swimming with the fish.
Nancy glanced up at the clerk. “Do you remember who delivered these?”
“Sure,” the young man said. “I signed for the box. It was brought by a messenger from one of the services used by lots of Baltimore businesses.”
“That doesn’t help us.” Nancy tossed the card back into the carton, and the clerk promised to dispose of the offensive package.
“Someone really wants you off this case,” George said as they rode the elevator up to their floor.
“I’ll say. But I’m not backing off until I find out who killed Annie.” Nancy’s eyes flashed with determination. “This whole case is beginning to smell fishy!”
• • •
“Watch your step,” Jackson said as Nancy and George negotiated a cobblestone lane of Fells Point. After a hearty meal at an old-fashioned colonial inn, the group had decided to take a walk along the waterfront.
Despite the wind off the harbor, the night was mild, and the seaport area was alive with the laughter and conversation of people on their way to restaurants and dance clubs.
Nancy was charmed by Fells Point, which resembled a seaport town from the turn of the century. Under the glow of quaint gas lamps, the group passed blocks of restored two-story brick buildings until they reached the docks, where two tugboats were moored.
Twinkling lights on the far side of the harbor caught Nancy’s attention. “The bay is beautiful at night,” she said.
“Very romantic, isn’t it?” Chris agreed. “Unfortunately, the reality is harsh. Those yellow lights come from a sugar refinery. The green and white lights are a brewery, and the bright white lights mark the Paperworks plant.”
“Wow,” George muttered. “It’s not so charming when you put it that way.”
As the foursome looked out at the water, various groups of people passed by. Turning away from the wind, Nancy glanced down the walkway just in time to see Megan walk by with an older woman.
“Hey! There’s a familiar face,” Chris said cheerfully.
“Wait up!” Chris called jovially. “Aren’t you going to introduce us to your lovely friend?”
At last the ladies paused. The older woman laughed and reached up to smooth back her red hair. “I’m not a friend, I’m her mother.”
Nancy realized that the woman did look like an older version of Megan.
“It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. O’Connor,” said Jackson. “We work at the aquarium with Megan.”
“Oh, my name isn’t O’Connor. That was Megan’s married name,” the woman explained. “I’m Peggy Cribbins.”
As Chris introduced Megan’s mother to everyone in the group, Nancy gazed curiously at the older woman. She was sure that she had never met Megan’s mother before, but both Megan and her mother reminded Nancy of someone else. She was still lost in thought when the women moved on and disappeared down the street.
“Megan looks a lot like her mother,” George commented.
Jackson added, “She has a brother with the same coloring—those freckles and red hair.”
“A brother?” Nancy said aloud. Her pulse began to race as the connection became clearer. Cribbins . . . Daniel Cribbins! That was the name of the man she had run into at Paperworks. “That’s right! Megan told me she had a brother!”
Confusion on their faces, the others stared at her.
“Nan,” George asked, “what’s going on?”
“Is her brother a big, stout guy named Daniel Cribbins?” Nancy asked Jackson.
He nodded. “Yeah, that’s him.”
“And he’s employed by Paperworks?” she pressed.
Dumbfounded, Jackson and Chris exchanged a look. “I don’t know about that,” Chris said dubiously.
“Of course!” Nancy clapped her hands together excitedly. “I ran into him at the Paperworks factory. But I also saw him at the aquarium—in Megan’s office. No wonder she didn’t introduce him. Megan is Paperworks’s inside link at the aquarium. She’s got to be!”
“Do you think she’s the one who put the ring on my air tank?” asked Chris.
Nancy nodded. “I’ll bet she’s the culprit behind most of the incidents at the aquarium.”
“Although she couldn’t have pushed you into the pool,” George pointed out. “You said she was out in the office area with Russ.”
“That’s true,” Nancy said, pausing to think back on that afternoon. “But that was the day I saw Daniel in her office. He could have pushed me into the pool, then dashed out of the area before anyone saw him.”
Jackson still seemed shocked. “Do you really think that Megan had the heart to kill those animals—the birds, and the porcupine fish?”
“I’m afraid so.” Nancy frowned. “But she couldn’t bear to kill one of the seals, whom she works with and is probably attached to. So instead, she stole Asia. It makes sense.”
“My dad will want to hear about this,” said Jackson.
“We’ll give him a full update, first thing tomorrow morning,” said Nancy.
“Then the case is solved?” asked Chris.
“Not yet,” Nancy replied. “I need to collect the hard evidence.” She looked at George. “That means we’ll be paying Paperworks another visit. Tomorrow, right after our meeting with Dr. Winston, George and I will drive over to that plant across the water.” She gestured at the white lights flickering across the bay. “But this time we’re going in through the back door.”
• • •
The next morning, when Nancy and George breezed into the private entrance of the aquarium, the security guard at the desk stopped them. “Excuse me, ladies, but I need to see your badges.”
Nancy turned to show him her badge, and he waved her on. “Sorry, Miss Drew. You were in such a hurry, I didn’t recognize you.”
“Do you want us to sign in?” asked Nancy.
He waved her away. “No, the log book is only for after hours.”
The girls were on their way up the stairs to Dr. Winston’s office when a thought hit Nancy. “The log book! How could I have forgotten to check it! I can’t believe it—I was so upset that I didn’t remember to sign out, and the guard was so worried about my being caught in the net that he must have forgotten to remind me. I don’t believe this—it was so obvious!”
“What? What are you talking about?” Confused, George followed as Nancy raced back down the stairs to the guard.
“I signed into the book the other night, when I came into the aquarium after hours,” Nancy told him. “What about employees? Do they have to sign in and out?”
The guard nodded. “After hours, this is the only entrance that stays open, and everyone has to log in and out. The lobby doors, the emergency exits, the loading docks—they’re all locked up.”
“This was right before my eyes, and I missed it!” Nancy leaned against the counter. “Do you mind if I take a look at the log book?”
“No problem.” The guard placed the book on the counter.
Nancy bit her lip as she leafed through the book, turning to the entries for Wednesday night. “Look, George. Chris isn’t the only one who signed in the night that I was in the rain forest. Megan was here from seven until ten. She could have been the one who set the trap in the rain forest!”
Then Nancy turned back to Monday night—the night Annie was murdered. “Russ was working here the night Annie was killed, just as he said,” Nancy confirmed, pointing to his signature in the book.
George looked at the entries over Nancy’s shoulder. “But there’s no entry for Megan that night.”
“So Megan could have been the task force member Annie called after she and Stuart spotted the polluters.” Nancy passed the book back to the security guard. “Hold on to this,” she told him. “It’s hard evidence.”
“No problem,” he said.
Upstairs, Jonathan Winston was encouraged by the progress the girls had made on the case. As he went off to meet with the party’s caterer, he thanked Nancy for her hard work.
“We’ve got the puzzle solved,” Nancy explained. “We just need to collect a few more of the pieces.”
• • •
“At times like this, detective work should be called paper work,” George said, closing the bottom file drawer and opening the drawer above it.
“Shh!” Nancy flipped through a hefty computer printout, then shoved it back into a file. “It’s only four-thirty. The building is probably still filled with employees.”
Working in the dim light of Paperworks’s file room, the girls were methodically sifting through the company’s records.
It hadn’t been hard to sneak into the building. Nancy had pulled their rental car around to the rear of the factory, and she and George had slipped in through the loading dock when the workers weren’t looking. The girls had even managed to elude the other plant workers. The problem was finding the documents they needed. They had been searching all day without success.
“I think we’ve been through almost every file in this place,” George complained, standing up and stretching her back.
“I know,” Nancy said, “but there’s got to be something that proves Megan O’Connor is involved with Paperworks.” She pulled out another printout and skimmed through it. “Something like—like a computer sheet with Megan’s name printed across the top!” she gasped.
George rushed over to Nancy’s side and read over her shoulder: “O’Connor, Megan—Miscellaneous Fees.”
Nancy held up the printout, and three sheets unfolded with numerous columns of recorded payments. “According to this, Megan’s been getting thousands of dollars from Paperworks. This is exactly what we needed to prove—”
Hearing a strange sound from behind a nearby door, Nancy paused.
“What was that?” George whispered.
This time they heard a scuffling noise from behind the door. “Look out!” Nancy gasped, pushing George out of the aisle. “Someone’s coming!”
Chapter
Fourteen
HER HEART POUNDING, Nancy ducked behind a tall file cabinet in the center of the file room with George right behind her. Breathlessly, they waited for the intruder to enter.
A moment passed, and then they heard a barking sound, along with a dull thump on the door.
When nothing happened, Nancy’s curiosity grew. She stood and edged toward the door. Cautiously she turned the knob. The door opened into a small dark room filled with boxes and a rack of blue uniforms. “It’s a storage closet,” she told George. Then, looking down, she saw two button eyes staring up at her. With a grunt, a seal pup wiggled out past Nancy’s feet.
“Asia!” Nancy squatted down and stroked the seal between the eyes. “She seems to be okay. Now we can tie the mishaps at the aquarium directly to Paperworks.” She patted Asia’s head. “When I think of how Megan shed those tears over Asia’s disappearance, it really burns me up. She and her brother must have planned the whole thing!”
“She had all of us fooled,” George admitted. “How are we going to sneak Asia out of here? We can’t exactly hide an eighty-pound seal pup under our coats.”
“Good point.” Nancy peered into the dark closet where Asia had been held captive. On the floor she found two tins of water and a few scraps of raw fish. Along the wall, she spotted a row of blue coveralls on wire hangers. “Put this on,” she said to George as she took a pair of coveralls off the rack.
Ten minutes later, Nancy and George were rolling Asia through the corridors, retracing their steps back toward Paperworks’s loading docks. The girls had slipped on the coveralls, hoping to pass as plant employees. Asia was riding in a mail cart Nancy had commandeered from an empty office. Lured by a piece of raw fish, the seal pup had willingly climbed into a canvas mail sack.
To Nancy’s relief, no one bothered them as they wheeled their precious cargo through the building. After riding the freight elevator to the ground floor, they maneuvered around giant parcels in the cavernous loading bay, and finally made it out one of the huge garage doors.
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