Read The Clue in the Old Stagecoach Online
Authors: Carolyn G. Keene
The Clue in the Old Stagecoach (14 page)
“Perhaps you should go to the hospital, Mrs. Strook,” Bess spoke up. “At least until the mess here is straightened out.”
The woman shook her head. “I don’t feel bad enough to go to the hospital,” she insisted. “A little rest will fix me up, I’m sure. Anyway, I want to be here to answer any questions the police may have.”
Nancy had felt Bess’s suggestion a good one but could not go against the woman’s wishes. Now she said, “Perhaps you have some friend or neighbor who will be able to stay with you for a few days?”
Mrs. Strook said she would like this. She gave Nancy a list of names to call. The third one on it, a Mrs. Grover, said she would be happy to help.
Nancy now phoned police headquarters and told her story to Sergeant Hurley. He promised to send a man to Mrs. Strook’s as soon as possible. At present most of the force was investigating the explosion.
It was fully an hour before two officers arrived. They were the sergeant himself and Detective Takman.
Mrs. Strook repeated her story, then Nancy told of her suspicion as to who the two thugs might have been.
“This is amazing,” Sergeant Hurley remarked. “Those hijackers have eluded the police so far.” The officer smiled at Nancy. “You wouldn’t have any idea where they are right now, would you, Miss Drew?”
“I wish I did,” she answered. “I’d like to ask them a few questions myself!”
During most of this conversation, only Nancy and the officers had been in the room with Mrs. Strook. Bess and George had joined the boys outdoors. They found that Ned had traced the intruders’ footprints around the house and through a hedge to the next property. Burt had gone into the kitchen for some string and had “roped” off the footprints.
“Aren’t you boys clever!” Bess praised them. “Any more clues?”
“Yes,” Dave spoke up. “I’ll show you one.”
At that moment Nancy came from the house with the police officers. When the roped-off area was pointed out to them, Sergeant Hurley said, “Are all of you detectives?”
“The only real detective among us is Nancy Drew, but we all go to her training school,” Burt Eddleton spoke up with a grin.
“Well, I can see that she teaches good courses,” the officer said. “Did you find out anything else, young man?”
Dave led them to a spot near the hedge. A man’s dark-brown glove lay on the ground. “Mrs. Strook said the thugs wore gloves. Perhaps this is one of them.”
From his pocket Detective Takman took a paper bag and a pair of tweezers. Carefully he lifted the glove up and dropped it inside the bag. “We’ll have it tested for fingerprints at headquarters,” he said.
Nancy heard the telephone ring and went to answer it. To her amazement the call was for her. It was from Mrs. Pauling, who asked if Nancy and her friends could come over to Bridgeford right away.
“You’re needed here,” she said. “It’s a good thing you told John O’Brien where you were going and I could catch you.”
“What’s up?” Nancy asked.
“They’re getting ready for a historical pageant to be held in connection with the formal opening soon,” Mrs. Pauling told her. “I’m the chairman. I’ve just learned that the principals have been held up some place and can’t get here in time for special pictures to be taken for a big magazine. The cameramen are waiting. How about you and your friends coming over and posing?”
“Why, certainly,” said Nancy. “We’ll be there as soon as possible.”
She went to check with Mrs. Strook to be sure the elderly woman was all right. Mrs. Grover had arrived and said she would take good care of her friend.
When Nancy made her announcement to Bess, George, and the boys, they showed mingled feelings. Bess thought how romantic it would be. George objected to wearing “a flubby-dubby costume.” The boys declared they would feel very silly. But all said that so long as Nancy had promised to do it, they would go.
Upon reaching Bridgeford, Nancy introduced the boys, then Mrs. Pauling took the group into a small white house where a governor of the state had once lived. The young people were given rooms in which to dress. As the six reappeared in their costumes, a few minutes later, all burst out laughing.
“I never knew I had such skinny legs until I put on these tight-fitting trousers,” said Burt.
“And I should have curls hanging down under this bonnet,” George remarked. “I must look like a lady convict of 1850 with my hair so short.”
The merriment continued as the group went outside and walked over to the old stagecoach and horses, where two cameramen waited with John O’Brien. Introductions were made by Mrs. Pauling.
Ned, costumed as the driver, opened the door of the stagecoach for the girls to climb in. Nancy and Bess eagerly stepped up. Burt refused to follow and declared he was going to ride on top.
“I think I’ll try that too,” said George.
The others roared with laughter as the tom-boyish girl tried to negotiate the climb in her long skirt. Finally, with the boys’ help, she made it. Dave, who was to be messenger, pulled himself up to the front seat beside Ned.
“All ready?” the photographer called out.
“Let ’er roll!” Ned replied.
Cameras clicked for several pictures. Then the photographer called out, “Now I want to take some movies. O’Brien will pull the horses and stagecoach. Ned, act as if you were really driving, will you?”
The tow chain was attached and John O’Brien took his place at the wheel of the truck. A moment later the outfit began to move, but unfortunately the truck had started with a jerk. The stagecoach gave a sudden lurch, jostling George and Burt.
George lost her balance and toppled over the side!
Burt made a dive for her. He managed to seize George in time to keep her from falling to the ground. George, for her part, made a wild grab for the railing at the top of the coach and helped pull herself up.
The commotion had reached John O’Brien’s ear and he had stopped short. George, shamefaced and a little disheveled, apologized. Suddenly she realized that the movie camera was still whirring. Turning to the photographer, she cried out:
“You didn’t take my picture!”
“Of course. It looked very realistic,” he replied, grinning.
“Well, don’t you dare show it to anybody!” George snapped, but she knew from the big tantalizing smile he gave her that he would not accede to her request.
The balance of the photographing took place without incident. Mrs. Pauling thanked Nancy and her friends for all their trouble, then the young people said good-by and headed for Camp Merriweather.
The evening was spent catching up on home news, but by ten o’clock all declared they were weary from their day’s experiences and said good night.
When Nancy reached her room, she sat down in a chair and gazed out the window, lost in thought. Her father had once told her that reviewing the various details of a case just before going to bed might bring a ready answer in the morning. Nancy often found herself instinctively doing this.
George lost her balance
and toppled
over the side!
and toppled
over the side!
Suddenly she jumped up and began to walk around the room as an idea came to her. She snapped her fingers and smiled.
“I wonder if I could possibly be right!” she thought excitedly.
CHAPTER XIX
A Midnight Attack
AT THAT moment the door between her room and the one George and Bess occupied suddenly opened. “Nancy, aren’t you ever going to bed?” Bess demanded solicitously.
George followed. “Why, you’re not even undressed!”
“Don’t scold!” Nancy pleaded. “I just had an idea that I think may solve the mystery!”
As her friends watched, she dashed across the room to a bureau drawer where she had left the notes written by Great-uncle Abner Langstreet. Bringing them to the desk and turning on a bright light, she stared at the sides on which the signatures appeared.
“Some of these notes have penciled markings, you notice,” she remarked.
“I see them,” said George. “Just doodlings.”
“Maybe not,” Nancy murmured.
She creased one paper and laid it on top of another, so that the two drawings came together to form a horizontal staff and an arrow-shaped crosspiece at the center and to the right. Then she fitted a pointed section to the top. Finally, after creasing three papers into tiny squares, Nancy slid three circles over the center section.
“You’re a genius!” Bess exclaimed. “That’s a railroad semaphore!”
“It sure is,” George agreed. “But what does it mean?”
Nancy smiled excitedly. “It’s my guess that Mr. Langstreet buried his stagecoach along the railroad tracks near a semaphore.”
“It’s a marvelous deduction,” said George. “But the question is, which semaphore. We might find ourselves digging in hundreds of places.”
Before Nancy answered, she went back to the bureau drawer and this time pulled out the map Mrs. Strook had given her. After studying it carefully, she said:
“I’m convinced that Great-uncle Abner buried the old stagecoach on family property which runs along the railroad. Here’s a strip and it isn’t too many feet long. Even if we don’t find the semaphore, we wouldn’t have a great deal of digging to do at this spot.”
Bess’s eyes were wide open in astonishment. All sleepiness had gone out of them. “I think this is simply super, Nancy,” she said in praise. “Right after breakfast tomorrow we’ll all start out and go to this place.”
“Oh, I can’t wait that long,” said the young sleuth. “It really isn’t late. If we can get the boys to go, aren’t you game to start digging tonight?”
“I’m game,” said George, but reminded Nancy that she really had no right to dig on private property.
“That is a problem,” the girl detective conceded. “I know what I’ll do. I’ll call up Art Warner and see what he says.”
She hurried to the private phone booth on the first floor and called the lawyer. His wife, who answered, said he was working late at the town hall. “He’s at a special meeting, but I know he’d be glad to talk to you,” Mrs. Warner assured the girl.
Nancy put in a call and a few minutes later was talking to Art Warner. When she told him what she had in mind, he said he might be able to help her very easily.
“Please tell me exactly where that piece of property is,” he requested.
After Nancy had described the location, the young lawyer asked her to hold the phone a few minutes. Returning, he said:
“I have good news for you. That property belongs to the town of Francisville. Taxes on it were not paid for a long time and the owner lost the piece. You have the permission of the councilmen to dig on it all you please.”
“Terrific!” said Nancy excitedly. “I’ll let you know the result. Any news for me about Mr. Langstreet?”
“I’m afraid not. But regarding any marriage of his, I think no news is good news.”
Nancy said she must go now, and Art Warner wished her luck. She stepped from the booth and went to a house phone at the end of the registry desk. Calling Ned’s room she asked him if he and the other boys would be willing to go out right away to do some sleuthing.
“Of course. But what’s up?” he asked.
“I can’t tell you now, but I’m sure I have a good clue this time.”
Ned, who said he had not been asleep, would rouse Burt and Dave and they would all meet at Nancy’s convertible in a few minutes. Nancy put down the phone, then went to speak to the night clerk. Smiling, she said, “I wonder if the lodge could do me a big favor? I’d like to borrow several garden digging tools—say six.”
The clerk grinned at her. “More sleuthing, Miss Drew?” he asked.
“Now what makes you think such a thing instead of guessing that I might just want to transplant some flowers?” Nancy replied with a chuckle.
“When do you want the tools?” the clerk asked.
“Right away, if possible.”
“I’ll see that you get them. Where do you want the boy to take them?”
“To my car.”
Nancy gave the license number, then said she was going to run back to her room but would return soon. When she and the other girls and the three boys met in the parking lot, the digging tools were standing up against the trunk compartment.
“You think of everything,” Ned praised Nancy. “Where in the world did you get these?”
Nancy tossed her head. “From my friend the night clerk. And we’d better put them to good use because he’ll certainly be asking what I accomplished.”
Ned drove while Nancy, who was now very familiar with the general area, directed him to the special piece of property along the old railroad right of way. Picsently she pointed out an overgrown, rutted lane where she thought he should turn down.
The narrow piece of property stretched a good distance from the road to where the tracks had once been. The railioad embankment was still there.
The group flashed their lights around and even beamed the headlights of the car on the surrounding area. If there had ever been a semaphore at the spot, it was gone now. The boys scuffed their feet along the ground and after a while Ned found part of a rusted iron pipe which stuck up alongside a stone.
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