“That’s right,” he said. “And my wife adores this place. She isn’t very well and I’m afraid that if we had to move out and leave all this it would be very bad for her health.”
“Tell me some more about what has been happening to you,” Nancy requested.
“About a week ago,” Oscar replied, “a stink bomb was tossed through an open window. We had to get out of the house for one whole day.”
“How ghastly!” Bess put in.
“Yes, it was,” Oscar went on. “A few days ago I received an unsigned note in the mail. It said, ‘You’re holding up the chance for your neighbors to make a lot of money. Sell out or you will regret it!’”
“Where is the note?” Nancy asked.
“My wife found it and threw the note away.”
George frowned. “Do the police know about this?”
Oscar shook his head. “I had left everything to Mr. Drew.”
Bess smiled. “Nancy will never tell you, but she’s an amateur detective. Sometimes she works with her father and has solved lots of cases. She lets George and me help her and it’s pretty exciting. Recently we all worked on a really spooky one, The Secret of Mirror Bay.”
Oscar’s eyes opened wide. “I’m glad you told me. Nancy, I believe you and your friends have a real mystery to solve right here. Well, let’s start with my telling you something about the birds.”
He led the girls to a cage that contained many varieties of woodpeckers.
“There’s a joke about these birds,” he told them. “It’s said they live an upright life. You notice how each one stands erect on the trunk of a tree. These birds can do this because they have short legs and toes that are strong and tipped with sharp, curved nails. Two of the toes face forward, the others to the side. In this way they can cling to the bark.
“Besides, they have pointed tails with a stiff strong shaft which they use for propping themselves against the trunk. If you look closely, you will see that a woodpecker’s bill is straight, hard, and comes to a point. It certainly makes an ideal digging tool to get the insects from the bark. By the way, the constant pounding would probably make the birds ill if they didn’t have very strong skulls to take up the shock.”
The three girls listened intently, taking in all these details.
Oscar said, “I suppose you can’t see their tongues, but they’re long and the birds can stick them out to an astonishing length beyond their bills. Since the tongue has backward-pointing barbs at the tip”—Oscar smiled—“it’s bad news for an insect that gets caught in it.”
The naturalist farmer moved on to a smaller cage.
Immediately Bess cried out, “It’s a wryneck!”
Oscar looked at her in amazement. “Few people know about this type of woodpecker. How did you learn about it?”
Bess looked at Nancy, not knowing if she should tell the story of the stuffed wryneck left on the Drews’ lawn.
Nancy did not answer the question directly. She asked, “Where did you get this bird?”
“It belongs to a girl who is attending Harper University in town here,” Oscar replied. “She’s a Eurasian and brought this pet from Europe. She is staying with us.”
Nancy was startled. Could there be any connection between the girl and the person who had left the wryneck at the Drew house?
CHAPTER III
Kammy’s ESP
WHILE Nancy was wondering about the Eurasian girl’s connection with the mystery, Oscar said, “Our visitor’s name is Kamenka. We call her Kammy for short. She is a fine girl, but a bit mysterious at times. You must meet her.” He looked at his watch. “She will be home soon. Can you wait and see her?”
“Yes,” Nancy replied, eager to meet the owner of the wryneck. “Bess and George, you’re not in a hurry, are you?”
“No,” the cousins replied.
Oscar pointed out that the wryneck differed from other woodpeckers in the way it sat on a tree. “You will notice that Petra—that’s the bird’s name—perches on a branch like other breeds of birds and never clings upright to the trunk of a tree. This type of woodpecker does not peck or bore for food but picks it up mostly from the surface of the ground. He eats flying insects and will often make a short dash into the air to catch one.”
By the time Oscar and the girls reached the house, Mrs. Thurston was ready to receive the callers. Though she was in a wheelchair, the invalid managed to propel herself around rather quickly. She was thin and frail looking.
After greeting the girls, she said, “My husband doesn’t like me to sit in the wheelchair, but he doesn’t realize how weak I am from worry.”
Mrs. Thurston went on to talk about the Thurstons’ problem.
“Isn’t it dreadful?” she said. “Oscar and I have been here for many years and built up this place. Why does anyone have a right to make us sell it?”
“There, there, Martha,” Oscar said soothingly. “Please don’t get yourself so excited. Nancy Drew and her father are going to straighten everything out for us.”
“Oh I hope so,” his wife replied.
Suddenly she changed the subject and asked the girls if they had seen the owls and the ravens.
“Not yet,” Nancy replied.
“Oscar,” Mrs. Thurston said, “would you go and make some tea for us and serve cookies with it?”
Her husband left the room. Then Mrs. Thurston said, “You know, girls, that if an owl continually hoots in a tree near your home, it’s an omen of ill health for you. I keep telling Oscar he should get rid of our owls.”
Nancy said gently, “I’m sure there’s no truth in the superstition. Don’t let the owls bother you.”
Bess and George supported their friend’s comment but Mrs. Thurston paid no attention.
“Those ravens out in their cage bring trouble, too,” she went on. “With them around there’s always danger of a libel suit.”
Further attempts to dissuade Mrs. Thurston failed. Finally Nancy said, “Tell us about some of the good birds out in your cages.”
Martha Thurston relaxed. “Well, doves bring peace, and robins are messengers of good luck. My favorite birds are the darling little hummingbirds. They are most amazing creatures.”
“In what way?” George asked.
The woman warmed to her subject. “I like to think of them as miniature helicopters. They can hover motionless, and believe it or not, fly backwards.
“Those beautiful little iridescent birds—which by the way are only three and three-quarter inches long—have the most amazing energy. I understand that for their size, they can outperform any living warm-blooded animal. When a hummingbird is hovering he has an energy output per unit of weight ten times that of a man who is running nine miles an hour.”
The three girls were intensely interested to learn this and waited for Mrs. Thurston to go on.
“Do you know what the daily output of energy for a man is?”
When the girls shook their heads, she said, “It’s thirty-five hundred calories. But listen to this. The daily output of a hummingbird if calculated in the terms of a hundred-and-seventy-pound man is equivalent to a hundred and fifty-five thousand calories?”
“Wow!” George exclaimed. She grinned. “Hereafter I’ll have more admiration for hummingbirds.”
By this time Oscar had the tea service and a platter of cookies ready. He wheeled them in on a small cart which he set in front of his wife. She thanked him and then began to pour the tea.
Just as everyone had been served, Kamenka came in and was introduced. A combination of European and Asian features gave her an unusual beauty. Her complexion was olive. She had high cheekbones and straight black hair. Kammy did not look at the girls unpleasantly but did not smile either. The slightly dark shadows under her eyes gave the Eurasian young woman a rather mysterious, troubled expression.
“How did your class in ornithology go today?” Mrs. Thurston asked her.
“Very well, thank you. Sometimes I find it hard to understand the English. The s
cientific Latin terms are easier for me.”
Bess spoke up. “Ornithology is the study of birds, isn’t it?”
Kammy smiled and opened her big brown eyes wide. Nancy was startled by the change in the girl’s appearance. Now she looked happy !
Kammy laughed lightly. “I hardly expect to cover the whole subject,” she said. “If I knew half as much as Oscar does, I could get a master’s degree.”
The Eurasian girl now seemed quite charming. She took a cup of tea and a cookie and sat down with the others.
“I am hoping,” she said, “that I may remain in America, but I am afraid that the way my student visa reads, I’ll have to return to my native land.”
Oscar said he would miss Kammy very much. “She is a wonderful help to Mrs. Thurston and me. She knows how to take care of the birds and animals as well as Rausch and I do.”
Nancy asked her if she went to the university museum often.
“Oh yes,” Kammy replied. “I study the birds and animals in the glass cases. But I would rather watch the live ones. This is the very best place I could be.” She smiled at Oscar.
Bess stood up and set down her teacup and saucer. She turned to Kammy. “In your country do some people use wrynecks to cast spells on other persons?”
Suddenly Kammy’s happy expression became sullen. She too arose and put down her teacup.
Without answering Bess’s question, she said, “Will you all please excuse me? I’d like to go to my room.” She picked up her handbag and the books she had brought with her, and left the room.
“Oh dear!” said Bess. “I’m afraid I hurt Kammy’s feelings but I didn’t mean to.”
Mrs. Thurston spoke up. “Don’t worry about it. Kammy is moody. By the way, she’s also very psychic—knows a lot about astrology.”
Oscar laughed. “At least my wife thinks she does. She insists that Kammy can tell from the stars exactly what’s going to happen to you.”
Nancy smiled and said to him, “Has Kammy predicted the outcome of the land deal?”
“Oh yes,” Mrs. Thurston answered, “but she won’t tell us, so I’m afraid it’s bad.”
Nancy stood up and said the girls must leave. “I’d like to walk over the fields before driving home.” She thanked the Thurstons for their hospitality and assured them that she would help her father as much as possible to solve the mystery.
Bess and George followed the young detective over the hundred-acre property, looking for evidence that the proposed builders had driven stakes to indicate a road or a building. Nancy concentrated on trees and large stones for any paint marks. They found nothing.
Finally Nancy said, “Evidently the High Rise people haven’t done any surveying yet. I’m glad. Well, let’s go!”
On the drive home the three girls talked about their unusual visit. They could not dismiss their mixed feelings about Mrs. Thurston and Kammy. There was no question in their minds but that Oscar was a fine man.
“He’s not superstitious,” said Bess. “But his wife certainly is. I’ll bet that’s what keeps her from getting better.”
“You’re probably right,” George added. “And Kammy certainly is hypersensitive.”
Nancy dropped George and Bess at their homes, then started for her own. She suddenly recalled having promised Hannah Gruen she would stop at the supermarket to buy some groceries and meat.
She parked and entered the huge market. Nancy took one of the carts and started on her errands. She had it almost filled when suddenly there was a rumble behind her. Turning, she was just in time to see a fast-oncoming cart. It whacked her ankle.
“Oh!” she cried out in pain.
Nancy looked up to see who was responsible but no one was in sight. She was sure that someone had deliberately tried to injure her!
Nancy glanced down and was dismayed to see blood on her leg. Quickly she tied a couple of clean tissues around her ankle and decided to go directly home.
She rolled the cart to the checkout counter, paid for the groceries, and hobbled to the parking lot. Nancy put the packages inside the car, then climbed in. Worried that she might be harmed again, Nancy locked the doors and started off. She detected nobody watching her, and no car followed her out of the parking lot.
Hannah was not at home. Nancy put her packages on the kitchen table and went at once to the second floor. She removed her makeshift bandage and her shoe, then bathed the wound with an antiseptic.
Nancy finished the first-aid treatment just as the telephone rang. She was surprised to find that the caller was Mrs. Thurston.
“Nancy, did you have an accident on the way home?” the woman asked.
“Why yes, I did—a little one,” she replied, and told what had happened to her.
“Kammy knew it. Her ESP was workingl She came rushing to me a little while ago and said, ‘I just had a strange vibration that Nancy Drew has been hurt!’”
The young detective was amazed. Maybe Kammy did have some kind of exceptional sensitivity.
Nancy merely said, “Kammy is psychic all right but please tell her I’ll be okay.”
Mrs. Thurston suggested that Nancy tell Kammy herself. When the Eurasian girl came to the phone, she said she was glad to hear Nancy had not been seriously injured.
“I want to apologize for my behavior this afternoon. Perhaps someday I can tell you more about myself, but Bess’s remark upset me a bit. Please give her a message: that I hold no resentment and I would like very much to be friends with you three girls.”
Nancy told her that Bess felt bad about hurting Kammy’s feelings and certainly would not do it again.
The two talked a little longer, then said goodby. A few minutes later Mr. Drew, tall, handsome and distinguished looking, arrived home. He and Nancy sat down in the living room to talk. She gave him a full report on her trip to the Thurston farm. “We couldn’t find anything suspicious.”
“What happened to your ankle?” he asked.
“Oh it’s nothing,” Nancy insisted, and told how the accident had occurred.
The lawyer frowned. “You remember I’ve been threatened. Now my enemy may have become yours also. Please, dear, watch carefully wherever you go.”
Nancy promised to be cautious. Then her father leaned forward and said, “Nancy, I have something startling to tell you.”
CHAPTER IV
Suspicious Digging
SITTING forward on her chair, Nancy waited eagerly for her father’s startling news.
He smiled. “I did a little investigating myself today, and found out the wryneck was stolen. Can you guess from where?”
“Some museum, I suppose,” Nancy replied. “But that would not be startling.”
“The bird was taken from the Harper University Museum!”
“Near the Thurstons’ farm?”
Mr. Drew nodded. The lawyer’s eyes twinkled. “Nancy, you’re not the only one who gets hunches. I had one and called several museums until I located the right one. The curator was surprised when I told him the bird had been left here. Nancy, didn’t you say that the Eurasian girl who is living with the Thurstons is studying ornithology at Harper University?”
Nancy knew at once what her father was thinking. “Surely Kammy didn’t steal it from the museum!” she exclaimed. “Why, she’d be the last one in the world to do that. She’s a dedicated student.”
Mr. Drew shrugged. “What you say is logical, Nancy, but don’t forget that sometimes a person lets superstition and custom take precedence over his good sense. Other people must be tolerant about this.”
Nancy thought about this comment for several seconds and had to admit that this was an example of her father’s wise counseling which had made him one of the leading attorneys in the state.
He changed the subject. “Nancy,” he said, “will you please take the wryneck back to the university museum? I talked with Professor Saunders there and told him I would see that the bird was returned soon.”
“I’ll go first thing tomorrow morning,” Nan
cy replied. “Perhaps Kammy will be there and I’ll have a chance to talk to her.”
Unfortunately the Eurasian girl was not at the university the next morning. To Nancy’s disappointment she learned from the registrar that Kammy had no classes all day.
“Oh well.” Nancy sighed and decided to seek out Professor Saunders. He proved to be a very pleasant man and thanked Nancy profusely for returning the stolen wryneck.
“I can’t understand it,” he said. “The only person who has a key to the glass cases besides myself is our maintenance man. He has been here many years and is entirely trustworthy.”
Nancy suggested that someone might have used a skeleton key. “Have you any idea who?”
He shook his head in bewilderment. “If a person really wanted to get money for the collection, he would have had to steal many birds. Why he only picked out the wryneck is a mystery to me.”
“I think it was to jinx us Drews,” Nancy replied. “Fortunately, we don’t believe in such things. Nevertheless, we’d like to find out who did it. There was no note or any clue to the person who brought it.”
“That must make you feel a bit uncomfortable,” Saunders commented.
Nancy asked the professor if he or the maintenance man ever lent their keys to anyone to borrow birds for study or exhibition purposes.
“Sometimes I do when I’m too busy to leave my office,” he answered. “But only to graduate students—and on occasion, other professional ornithologists. I jot down their names and requests. That way I don’t have to depend on my memory.”
“Has anyone asked you in the past week or so for the keys to the cases?” Nancy queried.
Professor Saunders thought for a minute, then said, “Yes, three graduate students have asked for the keys recently but all returned them as soon as possible and brought back the birds to me personally.”
Nancy was puzzled. Someone had apparently removed the mounted wryneck from the case without breaking either the lock or the glass. Who was it and how did he do it?
“Would you mind telling me the names of the students and which birds they borrowed?” she asked.
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