The Crook Who Took the Book (5 page)

“Finally,” Nancy whispered as the last bell of the school day rang.

“Yeah,” Bess agreed, putting on her backpack. “Time for candy at the Bell. Let's go!”

The School Bell was an old-fashioned little store filled with everything kids loved. As the girls got near the store, they saw a bunch of third-graders, including Orson Wong, Katie Zaleski, and Andy Nixon.

“Oooh!” George said as they walked through the door. “New soccer balls.” She ran over to one of the shelves to have a closer look.

“Soccer!” Bess harrumphed. “Bo-ring. I'm heading for the candy.”

“Me, too,” Nancy said. She walked to the candy aisle. Lots of kids were already digging into after-school snacks. Josie Blanton, the biggest sweet tooth in the class, was in the chocolate section.

Nancy remembered what she'd read in
The Absent Award.
“The thief left some directions between the licorice and the jelly beans,” she whispered to herself.

Nancy headed straight for the jelly beans. Bags of them were hanging from a wire rack. Nancy lifted up each bag to look for a slip of paper. She found nothing.

Frowning, Nancy went to another shelf to look for the licorice. That was when she heard Josie Blanton's voice.

“Hey,” Josie said. “Look what I found on top of the Panda Crunch bars.”

Nancy ran over to Josie. Josie was gazing curiously at a piece of paper. “Can I see that?” Nancy asked breathlessly.

“Sure,” Josie said, handing the paper over. “It looks like a poem.”

Nancy peered at the words.

All fouled up?

Searching in vain?

Head downtown on School,

then Main.

Then a turn on Drake you'll take.

When you find a story—brake!

• • • 

“These are directions,” Nancy cried. “Someone knows where
Foul-up at the Floss Factory
is. That must be why it says, ‘All fouled up.'”

“Cool!” George said. “Let's follow the directions.”

“Yeah,” Nancy said. “We'd better call home for permission.”

She turned to the man behind the cash register. He was Mr. Pitt, the School Bell's owner.

“Mr. Pitt,” Nancy said. “May we use your phone to call home? It's urgent!”

“Sure, kids,” Mr. Pitt said. He handed Bess the cordless phone. As Bess dialed her mother, Orson and Josie walked up.

“What are you doing, Nancy?” Orson asked.

“Following this clue to find Mr. Sand-back's missing book,” Nancy said.

“Count me in!” Orson said. “Can I use the phone when you're done to get permission?”

A few minutes later all the kids had phoned home. Then Nancy led George, Bess, Josie, and Orson out the door and down School Street.

At the corner of School and Main, Nancy stopped to peer at the poem. “To reach Drake Street, we have to turn right on Main,” she said.

“That will take us by the park,” George said.

Nancy gasped. She'd had a chance to read more of
The Absent Award
at lunchtime. After the candy store, the wily detective had discovered another clue—a handkerchief—in the park. And after
that
, he'd found a compass in front of the city courthouse.

“We need to stop in the park,” she said. “I think we might find another clue there. A handkerchief!”

The kids ran to the park and began hunting for the clue. Josie searched near the swings. George clambered onto the monkey bars to scan the area from high up. Bess peered under the seesaws. Nancy stuffed
the slip of paper into her pocket and pawed through some shrubs.

“I don't see anything,” she heard Bess call.

“Me, neither,” Orson yelled from the sandbox.

Nancy sighed and pushed aside a few spiky branches. “Hmm,” she muttered. “Where
is
that hand—Oh!”

Nancy had found something.

Something white.

And soft.

It was a handkerchief! And it was stuck in the branches of the bush.

Holding her breath, Nancy plucked the fabric from the branch. When she examined it, she found three initials stitched in blue onto one corner.

“‘M. A. S.,'” Nancy read out loud.

She waved the handkerchief over her head and called to her friends, “Look what I found!”

The kids ran over and Nancy showed them the clue.

“M. A. S.,” Bess said. “I wonder whose initials those are.”

Suddenly Nancy realized something. She
reached into her book bag and pulled out
The Absent Award.
She turned to the last page and read out loud: “‘About the author: Morton Alvin Sandback.'”

“Mr. Sandback's middle name is Alvin,” Nancy said.

“Which means that's Mr. Sandback's handkerchief!” George said.

“Why would Mr. Sandback's handkerchief be a clue, though?” Bess asked.

“I'm not sure,” Nancy said. “But I think we need to keep searching. The courthouse is on the corner of Main and Drake. Let's go there. According to the book, we're supposed to find a compass there.”

The kids walked a block down Main Street until they reached the River Heights courthouse.

They began searching the big courtyard in front of the building. Nancy looked on the courthouse steps. Bess searched the lawn, but Orson Wong just yawned.

“This clue hunt is getting kind of boring,” he said. He walked over to the flagpole and began spinning around it. He spun faster and faster until he got dizzy.

“Ugh,” he yelled, grabbing the flag rope so he wouldn't fall down.

Nancy glanced at Orson and rolled her eyes. Then she looked again. Orson was peering at something attached to the end of the flag rope. Then he took the thing off and waved it in the air.

“The clue!” Orson yelled. “I think I found the clue!”

Nancy ran over to Orson. He showed her a pencil. Instead of an eraser on top, there was a little round dial.

George peeked at the instrument. “It's a compass!” she said. “My dad and I used one on our last camping trip.”

“Look,” Nancy said. “It has a little mark on it.”

Nancy squinted at the compass. There was a tiny red X on the dial, right over the W.

“According to this compass, we're supposed to go west on Drake Street,” she said. “Maybe the next thing we'll find is Mr. Sandback's book!”

N
ancy and her friends headed west down Drake Street.

“I wonder where this clue will take us,” Bess said excitedly.

“I don't know,” Nancy said, fishing the slip of paper out of her pocket. “The directions say, ‘When you find a story—brake!' I wonder what that means?”

The group tromped down Drake Street for a half block.

Then another half block.

And then another whole block!

“I don't see anything,” George said.

“Neither do I,” Nancy answered.

A block farther Drake Street hit a dead end.

“Oh, no!” Nancy cried. “Where do we go now?”

She looked up.

And then she gasped.

“It's the Book Nook!” she said. “I didn't even realize it. ‘When you see a story—brake!' The Book Nook is
full
of stories. The compass and the directions were leading us right to it.”

“Let's go inside,” Josie said.

The kids ran up the stairs and into the bookstore. The first person they saw was Mr. Sandback. He was sitting behind the front desk. His long, skinny arms were folded across his chest. He was wearing his familiar big grin and his black vest with all the funny patches.

“Hello, children,” he said. He didn't seem very surprised to see them. “Have you found the missing book yet?”

“Well,” Nancy said, “we found a lot of clues, and they led us here, to the Book Nook.”

“I wonder why,” Mr. Sandback said.

Suddenly, clue after clue fell into place in Nancy's mind.

“I think I know why,” she burst out. “And I think I know who the thief is.”

“Really?” Mr. Sandback said. “Do tell!”

“But . . . it doesn't make sense at all,” Nancy said. Her forehead crinkled in a confused frown. “Because, Mr. Sandback, I think the thief is you.”

“What!” exclaimed all the other kids.

Mr. Sandback didn't look angry. In fact, he looked as if someone had just told him a wonderful joke.

“I'm the thief?” he asked. “Why do you say that, Detective Drew?”

“The clues all point to you,” Nancy said. She reached into her book bag and pulled out all the things she and her friends had found.

“I found this piece of red felt in the hinges of the box that the book was stolen from,” Nancy said. She pulled the bit of fabric from her clue notebook and showed it to Mr. Sandback. Then she pointed to a red typewriter on Mr. Sandback's vest. Part of the patch was ripped away.

“It looks like the felt came from that patch!” Nancy exclaimed.

Next she pointed to the half-moons propped on Mr. Sandback's nose. “You wear glasses,” she said.

She held out the case that Kyle had found on the bench in front of the school. “So, maybe this blue leather eyeglass case belongs to you.”

Mr. Sandback nodded. “Go on,” he said.

Feeling more confused than ever, Nancy showed Mr. Sandback the handkerchief she'd found in the bush.

“Your middle name is Alvin, which makes your initials M. A. S.,” she said. “And those are exactly the initials on this handkerchief.”

“Hey, what about the pencil, I found?” Orson said.

“Remember what Mr. Sandback said here on Sunday,” Nancy pointed out.

“I always write with a good old-fashioned
pencil,
” Mr. Sandback said. “Nancy, you've found me out.”

With that, Mr. Sandback reached beneath the front desk and pulled out a ragged copy of
Foul-up at the Floss Factory.

“The first edition!” George exclaimed. “You had it all the time!”

“But why would you steal your own book?” Nancy said.

Just then Nancy heard the click of a door opening behind her. She turned around to see Julia coming out of the office. She was wearing a grin much like her father's. Behind her was Anderson Quilling. He was smiling, too.

“I see you reached the bottom of the mystery,” she said. “You see, Nancy, this was another one of Dad's little pranks.”

“I thought it would be fun to bring one of my mysteries to life,” Mr. Sandback said. “So I re-created
The Absent Award
for my fans to solve. And you did a bang-up job, Nancy!”

“My friends helped with the clue hunt, too,” Nancy said.

“I warned you,” Julia said, placing a hand on Nancy's shoulder. “My father has lots of tricks up his sleeve.”

“Were you in on it, Julia?” Nancy asked.

“Yup!” Julia said. “And so was Anderson, here. And Mrs. Goldstein. We thought it would be a fun game for you all.”

“So,” Mr. Sandback said, turning to the small crowd of kids in front of the desk, “did you enjoy the mystery?”

“Yeah!” Nancy and her friends shouted.

“And most of all,” Nancy added, “I'm glad you have your rare book.”

“Well, actually,” Mr. Sandback said, patting the book cover fondly, “I thought I'd donate this book to the River Heights Public Library. They could put it on display for all readers to see—not just me.”

“That's so nice, Mr. Sandback!” Bess said.

“And it may not end there,” Mr. Sandback said. He gazed down at Nancy with another big grin. “I have a feeling Nancy Drew might see her name in my next mystery story,
The Crook Who Took the Book.
”

“Wow!” Nancy said. “Thanks, Mr. Sand-back!”

While her friends crowded around the famous author, Nancy picked up her clue notebook and pulled a pencil from her book bag. She sat in a chair and opened her notebook to the “Missing Mystery” page. Then she wrote: