Nancy Clue Mysteries 2 - The Case of the Good-for-Nothing Girlfriend (36 page)

Soon, the best of River Depths' finest was quickly discouraged from entering the bar.

"Let's go close that jazz joint over on Third Avenue," an officer exclaimed as they jumped into the paddy wagon and drove away.

Jackie chuckled. "It's enough to make you wish you wore high heels, huh, Midge?" She rushed over to pluck Cherry out of the chorus line, but, to her dismay, found the perky nurse attached to a handsome girl attired in a man's black suit.

"Jackie, did you see me dance?" Cherry giggled as she stood in front of the Tin Tan Club, holding hands with the strange girl. "This is my new friend Micky," Cherry added. "You'll never guess who she is. Go on, guess."

"Are you a mechanic?" Jackie growled suspiciously.

"Cherry, have you seen anyone who might be the Chief?" Midge interrupted.

"Who?" Cherry replied. "No, Nancy's seen the Chief. Midge, don't you remember anything?" Cherry started to giggle again.

Midge groaned. Cherry was intoxicated!

"If you're looking for the Chief, I think he's around back," Cherry's chum said helpfully. She gestured toward a narrow side alleyway.

"Get in the car, Cherry," Midge ordered. "Let's go."

Cherry hopped in the car. So did Micky.

Midge turned on the ignition but kept her lights off as she steered the car down the narrow alley. "We've got to find him tonight," she muttered.

"Midge!" Velma cried. "Look!"

Velma had spied a shadowy figure at the far end of the alley. Midge snapped on the headlights. It was the Chief, and he was counting a pile of money. He looked up, saw the car, and went for his gun.

"Everybody down!" Jackie cried as she grabbed her pistol, kicked open the door, dropped to her knees behind it, and took aim. The man shot at Jackie and succeeded in knocking the gun from her hand. He then ran down the alley, passing the car on the left.

Midge opened her door to block his exit, but he shoved it so hard, Midge fell back into the seat. She felt something snap in her left shoulder. But the pain was nothing compared to the rage she felt.

"Duck, Jack! " she yelled as she put the car in reverse and hit the gas. Jackie jumped out of the way and, as the car careened backward down the narrow alley, Velma grabbed Midge's gun from her purse.

"Catch up to him, honey, and I'll shoot him," she ordered, one manicured finger on the trigger. She steadied herself on Midge's right shoulder and pointed the gun at the escaping man.

"Aim low!" Midge cried. "We need him alive at least long enough to tell us where he's hidden Nancy's letters."

But before Velma could get the Chief in her sights, he slipped on a patch of oil and fell right into the path of their oncoming, two-ton automobile!

"Oops!" Midge cried as she felt Chief Chumley slip under the wheels. Velma covered her ears when she heard the horrible crunch he made. Midge jammed on the brakes. She got out of the car and glanced underneath.

"Oh, no, he's dead!" she exclaimed. She gingerly stepped over the pool of blood seeping from under the car. "Ugh! What a mess!"

Cherry jumped out of the car and cradled Jackie in her arms. "I'm okay," Jackie said. "The bullet only nicked my hand."

"Oh, why don't I have my firstaid kit with me?" Cherry admonished herself. She gave Jackie a quick going-over and was relieved to find her friend was fine.

"Oh, no, we've killed the Chief," Jackie noticed.

"No big loss," Micky scowled.

"I won't argue with you there," Midge agreed. "It's just that he's got something we desperately need."

"Maybe he's got it on him," Velma suggested.

Jackie grimaced. "We'll have to search him then," she shuddered.

"First I have to move the car," Midge groaned. She gingerly rolled the car off the Chief's body.

"Oh dear," Velma said when she spied the flattened form of former Police Chief Chumley. Midge led her away. "Why don't you slip around front and search his car, honey?" she suggested gently. Velma nodded and raced off. Midge gulped. Jackie took a deep breath to steady her nerves. They searched his pockets, but to no avail.

"He doesn't have the letters on him," Midge declared. She shook her head. "Cripes! What are we going to do with him?"

"We'll have to dispose of the body somehow," Cherry murmured shakily as she stared at the corpse. "I'm a trained professional. I can handle anything. If I could only think clearly for a minute, I could come up with a plan. Goodness, there's a lot of blood, isn't there? Good thing I packed stain remover," she muttered before pitching forward in a dead faint. Jackie swooped Cherry up in her arms and laid her across the front seat.

"Let's hide the body in the trunk and then figure out what to do with it," Midge suggested. Jackie and Midge shoved the Chief into the trunk as best they could. Golly, Midge's shoulder hurt something awful!

"Darn Lauren and her rocks," Midge scowled as she watched Jackie struggle to close the trunk lid. "We barely have room for a body in here!"

"We can't leave him in there forever," Jackie commented.

"Yeah, he'll start to stink," Midge declared.

Velma returned from searching the Chief's car.

"There's nothing that looks like Nancy's personal property in his car," she reported. "But I did find a sack of unmarked bills." She showed them a pillowcase stuffed with hundreddollar bills. Velma blanched when she saw the pool of blood left on the ground. "Shouldn't we wash that away?" she wondered. "So no one gets suspicious?"

"No one will even notice," Micky assured them. "There's always blood back here."

"Let's get out of here then," Jackie commanded. She was keen to leave the scene before they were discovered. Her status as a big-city detective would be of little help if she were caught riding in a car with the body of a small-town police chief in the trunk!

They piled into the car, hurriedly backed out of the alley, and sped off. Midge was eager to put as many miles as possible between them and that blood-spattered site.

"I don't even know where I'm going," Midge admitted. She lit a cigarette to steady her nerves. She took a big gulp of the cool evening air. She had to clear her head. She had to think. Where could they dump the body?

Jackie puzzled over the same dilemma. "Maybe there's a quarry around here," she proposed. "We could bury him and hope by the time they dig him up we're long gone."

"Or we could weigh him down and throw him in the River Depths River and pray for rain," Micky suggested.

"We do have plenty of rocks," Midge grinned ruefully.

"If we could only get rid of him permanently, I could have my mother-the biggest gossip in town-spread the rumor that he's run off with money from last week's bank heist," Micky suggested.

"Her mother is Mrs. Milton Meeks, the matron who brought us that tuna salad," Cherry explained. She was awake, but her head was still in a fog. She continued to babble-a sure sign of trauma, Jackie thought. "She's head of the fundraising committee for Mr. Clue's commemorative statue," Cherry added. "They're erecting a bronze statue in his honor in the town square," she recalled. "She asked us for donations. Then she yelled at Nancy for not attending her father's funeral."

"That's my mother, all right," Micky laughed sourly.

"Repeat that, would you, Cherry?" Jackie asked.

"She brought us tuna salad," Cherry replied.

"No, I mean about the statue in the town square."

"It's going to be made of bronze, just like the statue of Abraham Lincoln we saw in Nebraska on the way to River Depths. In the glove box you'll find a fascinating brochure telling all about it." Golly, her head felt funny.

Midge laughed. "Let's bronze him," she joked.

"That will never work," Micky said. "But if we wanted to cover him with quick-dry concrete and then paint him bronze, I do believe we could pass him off as a park statue," she said in all seriousness. "I know where the Clue memorial is being made," she added. "No one will be there this time of night, and I can bust any lock in town."

"Let's!" Jackie and Midge chorused.

"Oh, Midge," Cherry giggled. "You always think of the silliest things!" It felt good to laugh again.

But Cherry wasn't laughing twenty minutes later when she found herself inside a sculptor's studio, watching Midge, Jackie, and Micky strip down to their undershirts and prepare the body for dipping. The trio worked quickly to position the Chief in a convincing posture before rigor mortis set in.

"Too bad we don't have a horse to sit him on," Midge joked as they tried different poses before settling on a simple yet stately stance.

"Who should he be?" Velma queried. She was making a plaque for the pedestal. "A general? A politician? A war hero?"

"We've already got one of each of those in the town square," Micky mused.

"How about a Founding Father?" Midge suggested. "Every town square's got one of those."

"Perfect," Velma said.

"Dedicated to the memory of fathers everywhere," Velma inscribed on the plaque.

"Although I prefer his final expression of surprise and fear, I guess a benevolent smile will do," Midge remarked as she finished posing the body.

"Ready to dip?" Jackie cried.

"Ready!" her chums replied.

"Golly," Cherry exclaimed as she watched them carefully pick up the Chief and dip him, bit by bit, into a vat of concrete; then, using a trowel, they smoothed the quick-drying mixture over his form. In minutes they had created a nifty statue, ready for painting. When they were finished coating him in bronze-colored paint, they stepped back to admire their handiwork.

"This is just like the pair of bronzed baby shoes Mother has on her bedroom bureau, only bigger! " Cherry cried. "Mother says they make an excellent paperweight! "

They carefully loaded the stiff figure into car, covered it with a tarp they had found in the studio, and made their way to the town square. Lucky for them, the place was deserted, and the installation went off without a hitch.

"What's next?" Cherry yawned. It had been a pretty busy night, and she was desperate to get home and out of her fourinch heels.

"Now we've got to find that evidence," Jackie declared. They piled into the car and headed for the police station to search the Chief's office.

Using Velma as a diversion, the girls were able to lure the night officer away from his post long enough for Midge and Jackie to slip inside and give the place a good going-over. They came up empty-handed, except for stacks of crisp, neatlywrapped hundreddollar bills and a box of official-looking documents they had discovered in the Chief's top drawer.

When they rejoined Velma outside, she told them, "I've learned from that helpful Deputy Drone that Hannah's jury has been selected. The trial starts tomorrow! "

The girls, now growing ever more anxious to find the evidence, decided to pay a call to the Chief's suburban ranch house.

"But first I need some coffee," Midge admitted. She pulled into an all-night hamburger joint, and Velma hopped out and ran inside.

A sporty convertible pulled into the spot beside them, and a man called out, "Yoo hoo, girls!"

"Hello there," Cherry called back.

"Ignore him, Cherry," Midge groaned. "Great. Now some strange man's coming over here," she grumbled when she heard a car door slam. But to her great delight, it wasn't a stranger at all.

It was Mr. Donald-attractively attired in a cream-colored silk shirt, snug white trousers, and soft kid loafers-and his little dogs, too!

"Girls, what's wrong?" he cried. "Did something happen to Nancy?" he fretted. "Oh, dear, perhaps I did the wrong thing, teaching her to disguise herself as Hannah."

"Nancy is in trouble, Mr. Donald," Velma admitted as she returned to the car with cups of coffee for all. She saw that Mr. Donald was genuinely concerned about their sleuthing friend and added, "But it happened long before she came to you for help."

"We haven't time to explain now," Midge said. "We've got some evidence to track down."

"Oh, take me with you," Mr. Donald squealed. "This town is nowhere tonight. In fact, I'm so bored, I was just going home to wash my hair."

"Hop in!" the girls invited.

Mr. Donald, Mitzi, Bitzi, and Fritzi squeezed into the back seat next to Jackie, Cherry, and Micky.

"We may be heading into dangerous territory," Midge warned him as she started the engine. "Are you up to it?"

"Drive on, mister!" Mr. Donald cried in delight. "Danger's my middle name!"

On the way to the Chief's house, Midge filled in Mr. Donald on their mission-to find the letters that belonged to Nancy, but had fallen into the Chief's hands. "The letters will clear up any mystery about Mr. Clue's death," Midge added mysteriously. "And if we find them at the Chief's house, well, it won't bode well for him, either."

Mr. Donald seemed to accept this explanation. Then he fell into a conversation with Micky and was thrilled when he realized she was the daughter of leading socialite Mrs. Milton Meeks.

The girls gave him a blow-by-blow account of Mrs. Meeks's visit to the Clue house.

"It's a terrible thing when matrons go bad," Mr. Donald said sadly. Then Micky got them all laughing with a perfect imitation of her mother, complete with fluttering hands and heaving bosom, culminating in a convincing swoon. Soon Mr. Donald, who was an excellent mimic, picked up Mrs. Meeks's grating mannerisms.