Carolyn Keene_Nancy Drew Mystery Stories_01

by The Secret of the Old Clock

  “The Tophams have a bungalow up here, haven’t they?” she questioned casually.

  “Yes, it’s across the lake,” Helen replied. “We’ll come to it soon.”

  “Is anyone staying there now?”

  “Oh, no, the cottage is closed. It’s being looked after by Jeff Tucker, the caretaker. He’s the tallest, skinniest man I’ve ever seen outside a circus.”

  “Is it hard to get to the place?”

  “Not if you go by launch. But it’s a long way if you take the road around the lake.” Helen looked at her friend. “I didn’t know you were particularly interested in the Tophams, Nancy.”

  “Oh, they’re not friends of mine, as you know,” Nancy returned hastily. “I was merely curious.”

  After a time, as the launch slowed down and chugged along close to shore, Helen pointed out a wide path through the woods. At the end of it stood a large, rambling white cottage.

  “That’s the Topham place,” she said.

  Trying not to appear too eager, Nancy looked intently at the bungalow. She made a quick mental note of its location.

  “Tomorrow I’ll visit that place and try to solve the mystery!” she told herself.

  CHAPTER XI

  An Unexpected Adventure

  NANCY awoke the next morning to the fragrant odor of pines. Eager to start out for the Topham bungalow, she dressed quickly.

  But in her plans she had reckoned without Helen Corning and her friends. From the moment breakfast was over, Nancy was swept into another whirlwind of activity by the campers of Avondale. The entire day passed without a chance for her to break away.

  “Oh, Helen!” Nancy groaned as she tumbled into bed that night. “Tennis matches, canoe races, swimming, water skiing—it’s been fun. But tomorrow I think I’ll stay out of the activities.”

  Helen laughed gaily. “You’ll change your mind after a sound sleep, Nancy. Wait and see.”

  For answer, Nancy murmured a sleepy good night. But even as she slipped into slumber, she vowed that in the morning she would not be deterred again from visiting the Tophams’ summer place!

  After breakfast the next day, Nancy stood firm in her resolve. When Helen urged her to accompany the girls on an all-day hike, Nancy shook her head.

  “Thanks a lot, but please excuse me today, Helen.”

  Normally Nancy would have loved going on such a hike. But she had to achieve her plan of sleuthing. Helen, though disappointed, heeded her friend’s plea and trudged off with the other campers into the woods.

  As soon as they were out of sight, Nancy leaped into action. After obtaining Aunt Martha’s permission to use the launch, she hurried down to the dock. Nancy had frequently handled motorboats and was confident she could manage this one.

  “Now. Full speed ahead for the Tophams’!”

  To her delight the motor started immediately, and Nancy steered out into the lake. As the launch cut through the water, a cool spray blew into her face. The young sleuth felt a thrill of excitement as she guided the craft toward her destination which might hold a solution to the mystery.

  “If only the Tophams’ caretaker will let me in when I get there!” she thought.

  Nancy’s heart beat somewhat faster as she neared her goal. But all of a sudden there was a sputter from the engine. The next instant, to Nancy’s utter dismay, the motor gave one long wheeze and died.

  “Oh!” she cried aloud.

  Nancy knew that the tank held plenty of fuel, for she had checked this before departing. A moment later she recalled Helen’s remark about the engine becoming balky at times.

  With a sigh of impatience at the unexpected delay, Nancy examined the motor. For over an hour she worked on it, trying every adjustment she could think of. But her efforts were useless. There was not a sound of response from the motor.

  “What miserable luck! she said aloud. ”Of all days for the motor to conk out! This means I won’t get to the Topham cottage after all!”

  For a moment Nancy was tempted to swim ashore. To be so close to the bungalow and not be able to reach it was tantalizing. But she resisted the impulse; she could not leave the boat stranded—it would drift off and she would be responsible.

  “I’ll just have to wait for a passing boat to rescue me,” Nancy decided.

  But fate was against her. The hours dragged by and not another craft appeared in sight. Nancy became increasingly uncomfortable as the hot sun beat down on her. Also, she was growing weak from hunger.

  “And worst of all,” Nancy thought gloomily, “another whole day is being wasted. I want to get to the bottom of this mystery!”

  To occupy her mind, Nancy concentrated once more on the motor. Determinedly she bent over the engine. It was not until the sun sank low in the sky that she sat up and drew a long breath.

  “There!” she declared. “I’ve done everything. If it doesn’t start now, it never will.”

  To her relief and astonishment, it responded with a steady roar as if nothing had ever gone wrong!

  Nancy lost no time in heading back toward camp. She dared not attempt to visit the bungalow, since it would be dark very soon.

  When finally she eased up to the dock, Nancy saw Helen and her friends awaiting her. They greeted her with delight.

  “We were just going to send out a search party for you!” Helen exclaimed. She stopped abruptly and stared at her friend. “You’re sunburned and covered with grease! What happened?”

  Nancy laughed. “I had an extended sun bath.” Then she gave a lighthearted account of her mishap as the campers trooped back to their cabins. When Helen learned that Nancy had had nothing to eat since breakfast, she went to the kitchen and brought back some food.

  The following morning the young sleuth decided on her next move. Directly after breakfast she began packing.

  When Helen entered the cabin she exclaimed in amazement, “Why, Nancy Drew! You’re not leaving camp already!”

  “I’m afraid I’ll have to, Helen. Right after lunch. I may be back but I’m not sure, so I’d better take my bag with me.”

  “Don’t you like it here?”

  “Of course!” Nancy assured her. “I’ve had a wonderful time. It’s just that there’s something very important I must attend to at once.”

  Helen looked at her friend searchingly, then grinned. “Nancy Drew, you’re working on some mystery with your father!”

  “Well, sort of,” Nancy admitted. “But I’ll try to get back. Okay?”

  “Oh, please do,” Helen begged.

  Nancy went to the office to pay Aunt Martha and explain her hasty departure. After lunch she set off in her car to a chorus of farewells from the campers, who sadly watched her depart.

  She headed the car toward the end of the lake, then took the dirt road leading to the Topham cottage. Soon she came to a fork in the woods.

  “Now, which way shall I turn for the bungalow?” she wondered. After a moment’s hesitation, Nancy calculated that she should turn left toward the water and did so.

  The going was rather rough due to ruts in the road. Two of them, deeper than the others, apparently had been made by a heavy truck.

  “The tracks appear fresh,” Nancy mused.

  As she drove along, the young sleuth noticed a number of summer cottages. Most of them were still boarded up, since it was early in the season. As she gazed at one of them, the steering wheel was nearly wrenched from her hand by a crooked rut. As Nancy turned the steering wheel, to bring the car back to the center of the narrow road, one hand accidentally touched the horn. It blared loudly in the still woods.

  “That must have scared all the birds and animals.” Nancy chuckled.

  Around a bend in the road, she caught sight of a white bungalow ahead on the right side of the road.

  There was no sign at the entrance to the driveway to indicate who the owner was, but a wooded path leading down to the lake looked like the one she had seen from the water.

  “I think I’ll walk down to the shore and look a
t the cottage from there,” Nancy determined. “Then I’ll know for sure if this is the place Helen pointed out.”

  Nancy parked at the edge of the road and got out. To her surprise, she observed that the truck’s tire marks turned into the driveway. A second set of tracks indicated that the vehicle had backed out and gone on down the road.

  “Delivering supplies for the summer, no doubt,” Nancy told herself.

  She went down the path to the water, then turned around to look at the cottage.

  “It’s the Tophams’ all right,” Nancy decided.

  Instead of coming back by way of the path, she decided to take a short cut through the woods. With mounting anticipation of solving the Crowley mystery, she reached the road and hurried up the driveway.

  “I hope the caretaker is here,” she thought.

  Nancy suddenly stopped short with a gasp of astonishment. “Why, the Tophams must be mov ing out!”

  The front and side doors of the cottage stood wide open. Some of the furniture on the porch was overturned and various small household items were strewn along the driveway.

  Nancy bent to examine some marks in the soft earth. She noted that several were boot prints, while others were long lines probably caused by dragging cartons and furniture across the lawn.

  “That must have been a moving van’s tracks I saw,” Nancy told herself. “But the Tophams didn’t say anything about moving.” She frowned in puzzlement.

  Her feeling persisted and grew strong as she walked up the steps of the cottage porch. Nancy knocked loudly on the opened door. No response. Nancy rapped again. Silence.

  Where was Jeff Tucker, the caretaker? Why wasn’t he on hand to keep an eye on the moving activities? An air of complete desertion hung over the place.

  “There’s something very strange about this,” she thought.

  Curious and puzzled, Nancy entered the living room. Again her eyes met a scene of disorder. Except for a few small pieces, the room was bare of furniture. Even the draperies had been pulled from their rods and all floor coverings were gone.

  “Hm! Most of the furnishings have been taken out,” Nancy thought. “I suppose the movers will be back for the other odds and ends.”

  She made a careful tour of the first floor. All but one room had been virtually emptied. This was a small study. As Nancy entered it, she noticed that the rug lay rolled up and tied, and some of the furniture had evidently been shifted in readiness for moving.

  “Funny I didn’t hear anything about the Tophams deciding to give up their cottage,” she murmured. “And I must say those moving men were awfully careless—”

  A vague suspicion that had been forming in the back of Nancy’s mind now came into startling focus. “Those men may not be movers!” she burst out. “They may be thieves!”

  At once Nancy thought of the dark-gray van which had stopped at the Turners. “Those men may be the same ones who robbed them!”

  That would explain, Nancy thought fearfully, the evidences of the truck’s hasty departure. “Probably the thieves were scared away when I sounded my horn!”

  Nancy glanced about uneasily. What if the men were still nearby, watching for a chance to return and pick up the remaining valuables? The realization that she was alone, some distance from the nearest house, swept over her. A tingling sensation crept up Nancy’s spine.

  But resolutely she shook off her nervousness. “At least I must see if the Crowley clock is still here,” Nancy reminded herself, and then went through the bungalow again.

  She found no trace of the timepiece, however. “I guess the thieves took that too,” Nancy concluded. “I’d better report this robbery to the police right now.” She looked about for a phone but there was none. “I’ll have to drive to the nearest State Police headquarters.”

  Nancy started toward the front door. Passing a window, she glanced out, then paused in sheer fright. A man, wearing a cap pulled low over his eyes, was stalking up the driveway toward the cottage. He was not tall and slender like the caretaker. This stranger was rather short and heavy-set.

  “This man fits the Turners’ description! He must be one of the thieves who stole the silver heirlooms!” Nancy thought wildly.

  CHAPTER XII

  A Desperate Situation

  FOR A moment Nancy stood frozen to the spot, positive that the man who was coming to the Topham cottage was one of the thieves.

  But she hesitated only an instant. Then she turned and ran back into the study. Too late she realized that she had trapped herself, for this room had no other door.

  Nancy started back toward the living room. But before she had taken half a dozen steps she knew that escape had been cut off from that direction. The man had reached the porch steps.

  “It won’t do a bit of good to talk to him,” she reasoned. “I’ll hide, and when he leaves, I’ll follow him in my car and report him to the police!”

  Frantically the young sleuth glanced about for a hiding place. A closet offered the only possible refuge. She scurried inside and closed the door.

  Nancy was not a second too soon. She had scarcely shut the door when she heard the tread of the man’s heavy shoes on the floor just outside. Peeping cautiously through a tiny crack in the door, she saw the heavy-set man come into the study. His face wore a cruel expression.

  As he turned toward the closet where she huddled, Nancy hardly dared to breathe, lest her presence be detected. Apparently the man noticed nothing amiss, because his eyes rested only casually on the door.

  Nancy’s hiding place was anything but comfortable. It was dark and musty, and old clothing hung from nails on the walls. As dust assailed her nostrils, she held a handkerchief to her face.

  “If I sneeze he’ll surely find me,” she told herself.

  She felt around and once came close to ripping her hand on a sharp nail. Then she came upon something soft on a shelf and imagined it was a sleeping cat. She drew back, then touched it more cautiously.

  “Only an old fur cap,” she told herself in disgust. “O-oo, now I feel like sneezing more than ever!”

  She held one hand over her mouth hard and waited in agony. But presently the desire to sneeze passed and Nancy breathed more freely.

  When she dared to peep out through the crack a second time, she saw that two other rough-looking men had come into the room. One was short and stout, the other taller. Nancy was sure that neither of these two men was the caretaker, because Helen Corning had mentioned that the man was skinny.

  The heavy-set man who had come in first seemed to be the leader, for he proceeded to issue orders. “Get a move on!” he growled. “We haven’t got all day unless we want to be caught. That girl you saw, Jake, may be back any time from the shore. And she just might get snoopy.”

  The man addressed as Jake scowled. “What’s the matter with you, Sid? Going chicken? If that girl comes around, we’ll just give her a smooth story and send her on her way.”

  “Cut out the yaking,” said Sid. “Parky, you and Jake take that desk out of here.”

  There was no doubt now in Nancy’s mind. She was trapped by a clever gang of thieves! She could only continue to watch and listen helplessly from her hiding place.

  The two men lifted the heavy piece of furniture and started with it to the door. But they did not move swiftly enough to satisfy the leader, and he berated them savagely.

  Jake turned on him. “If you’re in such a hurry, why don’t you bring the van back to the driveway, instead of leaving it hidden on that road in the woods?”

  “And have someone driving past here see us!” sneered the leader. “Now get going!”

  Little by little the men stripped the room of everything valuable. Nancy was given no opportunity to escape. Sid remained in the room while the others made several trips to the van.

  “Well, I guess we have all the stuff that’s worth anything now,” Sid muttered at last.

  He turned to follow his companions, who already had left the room, but in the doorway he paus
ed for a final careful survey of the room.

  At that same moment Nancy felt an uncontrollable urge to sneeze. She tried to muffle the sound, but to no avail.

  The thief wheeled about. “Hey! What—”

  Walking directly to the closet, he flung open the door. Instantly he spotted Nancy and angrily jerked her out.

  “Spying on us, eh?” he snarled.

  Nancy faced the man defiantly. “I wasn’t spying on anyone.”

  “Then what were you doing in that closet?” the thief demanded, his eyes narrowing to slits.

  “I came to see the caretaker.”

  “Looking for him in a funny place, ain’t you?” the man sneered.

  Nancy realized that she was in a desperate situation. But she steeled herself not to show any of her inward fears.

  “I must keep calm,” she told herself firmly. Aloud, she explained coolly, “I heard someone coming and I just felt a bit nervous.”

  “Well, you’re going to be a lot more nervous,” the man said threateningly. “This will be the last time you’ll ever stick your nose in business that doesn’t concern you!”

  A fresh wave of fright swept over Nancy, but resolutely she held on to her courage. “You have no right to be here, helping yourself to the Tophams’ furniture!” she retorted. “You should be turned over to the police!”

  “Well, you’ll never get the chance to do it.” The ringleader laughed loudly. “You’ll wish you’d never come snoopin’ around here. I’ll give you the same treatment the caretaker got.”

  “The caretaker!” Nancy gasped in horror. “What have you done to him?”

  “You’ll find out in good time.”

  Nancy gave a sudden agile twist, darted past the man, and raced for the door. The thief gave a cry of rage, and in one long leap overtook her. He caught Nancy roughly by the arm.

  “Think you’re smart, eh?” he snarled. “Well, I’m smarter!”

  Nancy struggled to get away. She twisted and squirmed, kicked and clawed. But she was helpless in the viselike grip of the powerful man.