Sisters in Crime

by Carolyn Keene

  He threw a straight powerful shot at the target as Nancy asked, “Do you have a list of your members?” He picked up another dart, closed one eye, and aimed.

  “Nope. We’re not that organized,” he answered, picking up another dart, closing one eye and aiming. “Whoever comes is welcome, usually only about six of us show up. Darts isn’t a big sport on campus.” His last dart missed the target, hit the edge, and fell to the floor.

  “Well, you do your best,” he said good-naturedly. “Sometimes you get a hit and sometimes you get a miss.”

  Nancy smiled as she watched him throw his last shot. It hit the center of the target, directly in the bull’s-eye.

  “Nice!” she said appreciatively.

  “Thanks. Sure you don’t want to try?”

  “Not right now, thanks. Do you ever have any girls come?” Nancy asked.

  “A couple show up every once in a while,” he answered. Then he made note of his score on a piece of paper and called, “Jonathan, you’re on.”

  “Do you know their names?” Nancy asked.

  “I wasn’t here last week, but someone said a girl showed up then.”

  “Do you know who she was?” Nancy inquired.

  “Nope, and most of these guys wouldn’t know a pretty girl from a dog. They’re really into darts.”

  Turning to Nancy, he said, “Sorry I can’t be more helpful. I don’t have any idea if your friends ever come here. We’re pretty loose about that kind of thing.”

  “Sure,” Nancy answered, discouraged. “Thanks anyway.”

  Well, she thought to herself as she left Blake Hall. You do your best. Sometimes you get a hit, and sometimes you get a miss.

  This time, as Nancy walked across campus in the dark, she kept alert, watching for people, darts, or anything else.

  • • •

  After the meeting, when Susan came back to her room, she found Nancy lying on the bed thinking about the case.

  “Who got it?” Nancy asked curiously, putting her thoughts aside for the moment.

  Susan shrugged her shoulders as she reported, “Alice Clark is our new treasurer.”

  “Alice Clark?” Nancy asked. “That’s a surprise!”

  “To you and everyone else,” Susan said. “A lot of people really wanted that job. And, of course, Fran Kelly had her heart set on it. She even read a letter from our accountant, Linda Peterson, saying she’d be the best. It was sort of pathetic,” Susan added.

  “And Alice?”

  Sitting beside Nancy, Susan said, “Alice was silent, as always. She didn’t give a speech, like the others did, or say anything about how she was qualified for the position—only kind of a shy ‘thank you’ after she was elected.”

  Susan took her shoes off and crossed her legs under her. “Lori Westerly spoke for Alice, saying that Alice was the most brilliant person around, stuff like that. It was obvious that Lori wanted Alice to be treasurer, and that’s all you need around here, I guess.” Susan sighed. “Why do you look so discouraged?” she asked.

  “Every time I think I’m getting somewhere, I run into a dead end,” Nancy explained to her friend.

  “Kathy says that there’s no way Rina could have known about the exam stealing.” Nancy leaned her head back against the wall and thought out loud. “But if Kathy knows that Rina was murdered, and that her involvement in the cheating scheme was the cause of her death, then of course Kathy never would have told me that Rina was involved.”

  Looking back at Susan, Nancy continued, “So either Kathy is an excellent liar, or she was telling me the truth, and cheating has nothing to do with why Rina was killed.”

  “Which do you think?” Susan asked.

  “I think Kathy is telling the truth,” Nancy said, folding her arms across her chest. “And that I’ve set up a group of people to study a phony exam for Monday who have nothing to do with the murder.”

  Susan rested her elbows on her knees, and looked down.

  “Tomorrow, though, I can finally get into Peterson’s office—maybe there I’ll find the information we need,” Nancy said, trying to sound hopeful.

  “What about Fran Kelly and Jan Miller?” Susan asked. “They’ve been so cruel to you.”

  Nancy shook her head. “I’m starting to think that’s just Fran’s nature—she’s jealous—and somehow she convinced Jan not to like me.” Nancy crossed her outstretched legs at the ankles. “Maybe all these aggressive people are a smokescreen, keeping me from seeing someone not so obvious.”

  Susan looked at Nancy’s determined face as Nancy continued, “Someone who could be in the background. Someone,” Nancy said, “like Alice Clark.”

  “Where are you going now?” Susan asked as Nancy got up from the bed and pulled a bright purple sweatshirt over her short-sleeved shirt.

  “Down to the study hall,” Nancy replied with a smile.

  • • •

  Alice Clark was sitting—just as Nancy thought she would be—in her regular seat at one of the long tables.

  “Congratulations,” Nancy said out loud, since they were the only two people there.

  Alice looked up from the large book in front of her, which Nancy noticed had diagrams of the human skeleton. “Thanks,” she said, putting the top on her yellow pen.

  “Anatomy?” Nancy asked, standing next to Alice.

  “Physiology,” Alice said.

  Alice’s answers were always only one word. Nancy wondered if it was going to be possible to get into a more extended conversation with this very private person.

  “Do you mostly study science?” Nancy asked.

  “I’m premed.” Alice nodded.

  “That must be time-consuming,” Nancy said, sitting down across from Alice.

  “I like it,” Alice said. Leafing through her physiology book, she found a page that showed a large drawing of the musculature system. “See these points?” she asked Nancy, pointing to two spots in the neck. “If you press exactly there, you can make a person pass out cold.”

  “Did you learn that in physiology?” Nancy asked innocently as Alice slowly closed the book. Nancy knew very well about the pressure points in the neck.

  “In judo,” Alice answered, looking directly at Nancy.

  “I study karate,” Nancy said, meeting Alice’s gaze.

  “I wondered,” Alice said as two freshman walked into the study hall laughing. Seeing Nancy and Alice, they lowered their voices and put their books down on the back table.

  Alice took the top off her highlighting pen and once again began reading the text in front of her.

  “See you later,” Nancy said, standing up.

  As she headed back up the stairs, Nancy tried to sort out what she had just learned. Alice was telling her something, she knew, something important about those pressure points.

  Was she describing to Nancy how Rina Charles was killed? Was Rina unconscious before she was thrown into the ocean? And if that was the case, how did Alice know it?

  Was this a warning of some sort? Nancy wondered. Was the quiet, unassuming Alice Clark a murderer?

  Chapter

  Thirteen

  IN HONOR OF Valentine’s Day, Nancy put a red belt on over her denim dress and folded a white lace hanky into her breast pocket when she dressed on Friday morning.

  She had not sent Ned a card, and the two-hour time difference made it too late to call him. He’d be in class already. But tonight, Nancy thought, smiling at the picture of Ned she had taken from her wallet, I will call my number-one valentine.

  Putting the photograph away and looking in the mirror, Nancy brushed her hair and then picked up the car keys Susan had left for her. It was only eight-thirty in the morning and Susan was still sleeping.

  Nancy avoided the dining hall and hurried outside to head to the accounting offices at 4846 Thirty-fifth Street.

  Counting on the likelihood that nobody had let the accountant know yet about the election of Alice Clark, Nancy told the receptionist that she was the interim treasurer o
f Delta Phi and had come to see the sorority’s records.

  “Ah yes,” said the older woman at the desk. “Ms. Peterson told me you’d be here. Come right this way. I’m Mrs. Haft, and I’ll be glad to help you.”

  “Thank you so much,” Nancy said. She followed the receptionist around to a file cabinet, and as she looked through folders, Mrs. Haft asked Nancy, “Did you bring this month’s bookkeeping, dear?”

  “No, I’m sorry,” Nancy answered. “We’re just getting things organized again, since the tragedy.”

  “Wasn’t that terrible?” the kind woman said. “To have that happen to a fine, bright girl like Rina.” Shaking her head, Mrs. Haft said, “I always warn my kids about the ocean. You just can’t trust it.” She gave several folders to Nancy as she added, “Not that they listen.” Then she made a beeline to the front desk to catch a ringing phone.

  After about thirty minutes of studying the sorority’s financial situation, Nancy was about to quit. Nothing looked the least bit suspicious. Rina, and the treasurers before her, had been well organized and meticulous. And Nancy had no doubt that Alice Clark would be the same.

  But as Nancy was about to give up, something caught her attention. Under the page marked “Alumnae Donations,” Nancy had scanned down to the name Marsha Charles. There beside Rina’s mother’s name was listed the amount of one hundred and fifty dollars. Nancy’s heart began to race as though she had just finished the fifty-yard dash. Nancy was certain that Mrs. Charles had told her that she had donated six hundred dollars this year.

  “Finally,” she said under her breath.

  “What’s that?” Mrs. Haft asked, walking by Nancy at that moment.

  “Oh, nothing.” Nancy smiled, trying to hide her excitement. “I’ll just need to reproduce some of this, please.”

  “Right over here, dear,” Mrs. Haft said.

  As Nancy carefully ran the papers through the copy machine, she tried to be cautious about her discovery. It’s possible that this is only a bookkeeping error, she warned herself.

  But her heart wouldn’t stop racing, because Nancy knew that it was also possible she had finally found a major clue.

  • • •

  When Nancy arrived back at the sorority house, Susan had already left for her classes.

  Locking the door behind her, Nancy sat down at Rina’s old desk, took out the list of alumnae donations from the accountant’s office, and found the information she had copied from the secret file box. Quickly scanning her notes, she looked for the evidence she needed.

  There it was! Nancy let out a deep sigh, unaware that she had been holding her breath. Next to Marsha Charles’s name was listed the amount she had actually donated—six hundred dollars.

  Here was a lead. A concrete lead. The embezzlement of money—maybe a lot of money—and a reason for murder.

  A knock on the door startled Nancy, and she quickly put away her paperwork as she called out, “One minute.” But before she could stand up, she heard a key in the door and Susan walked in.

  Nancy jumped up, quickly closed the door behind Susan, relocked it, and said in an excited whisper, “We’ve got a missing piece to this puzzle!”

  “Oh, Nancy, finally! Tell me,” Susan pleaded.

  “I’ll show you,” Nancy said, pulling the papers out of the top desk drawer.

  “See this?” Nancy asked, pointing to the sheet she had copied. “This is a listing of all your alumnae donations. It totals ten thousand dollars this year.”

  “Pretty generous,” Susan said, looking at the sheet. “Why is it the missing puzzle piece, though?”

  “Because this,” Nancy explained, pointing to the handwritten list she had copied from the file box, “is the true amount that was given. I haven’t added it up yet, but look at all these discrepancies.” Her pencil tip ran back and forth. “This person gave one hundred fifty dollars, and the amount submitted to the accountant was twenty-five. And here—”

  “And the difference?” Susan said, interrupting Nancy and speaking rapidly. “Who has the money? Did Rina—”

  “We don’t know. Maybe Rina was in on it, but more likely, she just discovered it and was about to blow the whistle.”

  As Nancy reached over to Susan’s desk and picked up a calculator, Susan asked, “I wonder why they kept this list of the real contributions.”

  “So they could write the contributors thank-you letters for the actual amounts. Only the amount they reported in the official records was a whole lot less. Let’s figure out how much less,” Nancy said.

  As Nancy called off the differences to Susan, Susan added up the totals.

  In only a few minutes Susan had the total. “Fifteen thousand dollars less!” She gasped. “This must be it, Nan, this must be what Rina knew.”

  “Yes.” Nancy sighed. “Maybe nobody would commit murder for a better grade, but I’m afraid someone would to keep from being exposed as a thief.”

  “Lori?” Susan asked.

  “She surely knows about the embezzlement,” Nancy said.

  “And maybe this is the reason that Fran Kelly was so desperate to be treasurer,” Susan continued. “And maybe Alice Clark knows now, and—”

  “Just because we have this one puzzle piece doesn’t mean we know who did it,” Nancy explained. “We’re no closer to the murderer. We just have a reason.”

  Susan nodded and jumped as someone knocked at the door just then.

  “One minute,” Susan called out, and quickly glanced at Nancy.

  Nancy put away all the paperwork and took out an SDU catalog before she went to the door.

  “I just wanted to make sure you were coming to the party this afternoon,” Lori said as Nancy opened the door. “There’s a friend of Mike’s coming that I think you’ll like. And I’m sure he’ll like you; I told him about you already.”

  Nancy stood at the door talking to Lori as Susan busied herself cleaning up a pile of clothes on her bed. “I don’t know,” Nancy confessed, “I really miss my boyfriend today. I was just going to call him and tell him I’ll be back home soon.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. You really are welcome to stay longer, you know,” Lori said. It was hard for Nancy to believe that this warm person knew all about the embezzling.

  “Thank you,” Nancy said, still standing in the doorway.

  “My friend’s name is Peter,” Lori said, backing up, “He’s very cute!”

  “Thanks.” Nancy smiled. “See you down there later.”

  “What is it?” Susan asked Nancy when she saw her leaning against the closed door, the color drained from her face.

  “Lori’s jacket,” Nancy answered when she was certain that Lori’s footsteps were far away.

  “What about it?” Susan asked.

  “It’s the one that Kathy was wearing the night I got hit with the dart.”

  Chapter

  Fourteen

  SO WHAT IF she’s wearing Kathy’s jacket?” Susan asked curiously. “Everyone borrows clothes around here.”

  Nancy shook her head and tiptoed away from the door to speak. “I don’t think it’s Kathy’s,” she said. “I think it’s Lori’s.”

  Susan was even more confused. “I don’t get it, Nan.”

  “It’s a lot of guesses,” Nancy admitted, speaking quickly and quietly. “But I think I’m on to something. Listen.” Nancy sat back down on the desk chair to explain to Susan. “I think that when Kathy went upstairs to get something warm to put on Tuesday night she ran into Lori, who had perhaps just come in. Kathy told her she was going for a walk with me and asked if she could borrow her jacket.”

  “So Lori knew you were going on the walk?” Susan asked. “And she followed you, and threw a green- and red-striped dart into your shoulder?”

  Nancy nodded. “It’s a possibility,” she said.

  “You think Kathy is innocent?” Susan asked.

  “I do. She was so shocked by it all. And I just don’t think she’d be able to act that well.” Nancy shrugged. “Bu
t I’ve been wrong before, so I’ll just keep watching.”

  Opening the desk drawer where Nancy had put the embezzlement information, she and Susan looked over the figures they had just computed. “Fifteen thousand dollars,” Nancy said again.

  • • •

  When Nancy and Susan went downstairs in the early evening, the sorority house had been transformed. The tables in the dining room had been removed to make a dance floor, red-and-white paper hearts were hanging from the ceiling, and a band was setting up its sound system.

  Beneath the vases of red roses in the hall someone had placed a sign: HELP YOURSELF. GIVE ONE TO YOUR SWEETHEART!

  “I invited Ira to stop by later,” Susan told Nancy, looking at the roses.

  Nancy smiled at her friend. “Good for you.”

  Almost everyone in the sorority was downstairs, clustered around the refreshment table, laughing.

  “What’s the joke?” Susan asked, peering over to the table.

  “Harriet made heart-shaped pizzas, with heart-shaped pepperoni,” answered a girl as she walked by. “She got carried away!”

  Only a few guys were in the room so far, and Nancy saw most of them hanging around out front on the large porch and on the lawn. It must be muscles that get you into Zeta Psi, Nancy observed, recognizing a few of them as members of SDU’s swim team.

  “There you are,” Lori called out to Nancy, and waved to her. She told her to come meet the person standing with her in the hall. Lori was dressed in a softer style than usual. She was wearing a pastel flowered print dress with a lace collar. She looked quite beautiful.

  “Peter Ryan—Nancy Drew,” Lori said proudly. “You two are going to click, I just know it,” she said with flushed cheeks. Just then Mike Jamison appeared with one red rose for Lori.

  Peter was a handsome guy with shining dark brown eyes, dark curly hair, and a deep tan. Nancy said “hi,” and Peter said “click.” Nancy smiled at his joke.

  “And this is Mike,” Lori added. Turning to her boyfriend, Lori explained, “Nancy is checking out the school to see about coming here.”

  “I enjoyed watching you dive on Wednesday,” Nancy said to Mike.