Read The Mystery at Lilac Inn Online

Authors: Carolyn Keene

Tags: #Jewel Thieves, #Women Detectives, #Detective and Mystery Stories, #Girls & Women, #Mystery & Detective, #Juvenile Fiction, #Adventure and Adventurers, #Mysteries & Detective Stories, #Fiction, #Thieves, #Mystery Fiction, #Women Sleuths, #Children's Stories, #Diamonds, #Drew; Nancy (Fictitious Character), #Electronics, #General, #Mystery and Detective Stories

The Mystery at Lilac Inn (14 page)

BOOK: The Mystery at Lilac Inn
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When he showed the pipe to Nancy, she could scarcely hide her excitement. The pipe looked exactly like Mr. Daly’s! But she asked Lillie in an offhand way if Gay had ever spoken of Lilac Inn,
“Why, yes,” the actress replied. “If you mean the old place in Benton that Gay said she visited as a child, when the inn was owned by a relative of hers—someone who’d lived in the West Indies.”
“He was a Spaniard, I believe,” Nancy put in, “named Ron Carioca.”
“That sounds right,” Lillie said.
Mr. Merriweather spoke up, “You might find Gay in Benton. Maybe she went back for old times’ sake.”
“A good idea. We’ll look there,” Helen said.
Nancy sighed. “I suppose she’s changed quite a bit since—her imprisonment.”
Lillie shook her head. “Surprisingly, no. I’ll show you.” The actress went to a table and picked up a scrapbook of clippings. She thumbed through the pages and pointed out a recent magazine picture of an attractive model with golden hair, “This is Gay. Looks just like her.”
The young sleuth studied the picture. It struck her there was something familiar about Gay’s eyes.
The two girls thanked the Merriweathers and left. They got into the car and headed for Benton. Elatedly, Nancy and Helen discussed everything they had learned—Gay’s last name, the fact that she had been in prison, and her childhood association with Lilac Inn.
“Do you think she
is
your double, Nancy?” asked Helen. “There’s a resemblance. Besides, being an actress, Gay knows how to use make-up skillfully.”
“Yes. Also, the color of her hair is similar to mine,” Nancy added.
“But,” said Helen, “I can’t understand why Gay decided to impersonate you in the first place.”
“I’m inclined to think it had nothing to do with the mystery of Lilac Inn in the beginning,” Nancy replied. “She wanted clothes and jewelry, so took my charge plate. But later she decided to use the disguise to keep John and me from our skin-diving trip.”
“You mean Gay was at the inn?”
“Yes. Under an assumed name, of course.”
Helen grinned at the young sleuth. “And next you’re going to tell me who she was. Well, one person she
couldn’t
have been was Mary Mason. You saw her in Dockville, and said she’s heavier and older than you.”
Nancy pursed her lips. “I never checked the description of
that
Mary Mason with Emily. She may not have been the Mary who worked at the inn, but was in league with her, and was asked to pose as Mary Mason, waitress.”
Helen was amazed. “Nancy, you’re a whiz. Gay and Mary probably are the same person.”
“That’s what I suspect, Helen. First, we’ll check with Emily.”
When the girls reached the inn, they questioned Emily. “Now that I think of it, Nancy,” Emily said, “Mary Mason
was
about your height and weight, and her coloring’s like yours.”
“That settles it,” said the young sleuth. “I’m going to talk to Chief McGinnis immediately.” With her friends covering the extension phones, Nancy told him of her suspicions.
“You’ve certainly made great progress, Nancy,” he praised her. “I’ll ask the Dockville police to get a line on the Mary Mason you talked to there.”
“Thank you,” said Nancy, then she called her father. Hannah said that Mr. Drew had gone out to dinner with a client, so Nancy asked the housekeeper to give him a message.
“Of course. Have you solved the mystery?” Hannah inquired hopefully.
Nancy said not yet, but to tell her father that she had an important clue to her impersonator. “Ask him to call me at the inn, please.”
Hannah promised to do so, and said that she hoped to hear the whole story soon. At supper-time John was not present at the table. Helen asked nonchalantly where he was.
“John said he had an errand to do,” Dick replied.
When the meal was over, Nancy encountered Jean Holmes in the center hall. “If anyone should phone me, will you please call me,” she requested. “I’m going outside for a walk.”
“I’ll be glad to, Miss Drew,” said the waitress.
Actually Nancy wanted to find Carl Bard and ask the guard if he had seen anything suspicious or obtained any clue to her double. She met him coming toward the inn to supper.
“No, I haven’t,” he replied to her questions. “It’s been very quiet here.”
Nancy thanked him and walked off. She strolled through the grounds, thinking over the day’s events. Who had used her car? Had John any idea as to the driver’s identity? Was it the person responsible for the flipper tracks John had examined several days ago in the orchard?
Nancy continued toward the water reflectively, but did look back, wondering if by chance anyone might be following her. Suddenly she saw Jean Holmes emerge from the kitchen door of the inn. No one else was in sight.
“She’s probably looking for me,” Nancy thought. “Chief McGinnis or Dad must have phoned.”
Nancy expected Jean to call out her name, but she did not do so. The young sleuth was about to hail the girl when she noticed that Jean was carrying a small suitcase. She glanced furtively from left to right, then headed for the river. Some instinct caused Nancy to duck behind a large oak. Jean reached the water and turned right. Nancy stealthily followed the waitress.
The other girl walked on quickly until she reached the lilac grove. Then she slipped through an opening in the bushes.
Curious, Nancy decided to keep shadowing the waitress. The trail led Nancy upstream along the river for about half a mile. Presently Jean approached a dilapidated building. She entered the partially open, sagging front door.
As Nancy crept forward, she looked about her constantly. Suddenly she stifled a scream. A grotesque shape was emerging from the river!
The apparition had stubby back fins and a bulging glassed-in prow. It was about fifteen feet long and painted a somber blue.
Then recognition struck Nancy full force. “That’s the ‘shark’ I saw underwater—a miniature submarine!”
Fascinated, she watched the craft glide into a cove adjacent to the shed. A moment later a man’s hand lifted back the glassed-in section and a figure in skin-diving gear stepped to the ground.
Before Nancy could decide what to do, she was grabbed from behind and a rough hand was clapped over her mouth!
CHAPTER XVIII
A Submarine Prisoner
NANCY struggled but could not free herself or see her captor as she was pushed toward the shack. A cloth had been tied over her mouth. Once inside the dilapidated building, she blinked in astonished disbelief.
Jean Holmes stood peering into what looked like a cellar! Gil Gary, the gardener, was holding open a trap door to the opening!
Jean and Gil stared at Nancy and her captor. “Well, Nancy Drew, the detective!” Jean’s voice was no longer shy, but strident. “Where did you find her, Frank?”
“Spying, was she?” Gil added.
“She sure was,” said the man called Frank. The young detective observed that he was about fifty years old, and of medium build. His hair was cropped close. Suddenly Nancy realized that he must be the boatman with a crew cut whom Helen had seen and also the fisherman on the river she herself had questioned. She recognized his nasal voice.
“Nancy Drew won’t get a chance to reveal
our scheme!”
But Jean! Nancy was astounded. What was this trio up to? Obviously something underhanded. Was Gay, alias Mary Mason, in league with them? And how did the miniature submarine fit into their scheme?
Frank maintained a tight grip on Nancy’s arm. “Guess you won’t go skin diving for a while.” He gave a harsh laugh.
“You bet,” Jean spoke up, her eyes gleaming coldly. Nancy noticed the girl no longer wore glasses. “We’ll see to that. Nancy Drew won’t ever get a chance to reveal our scheme!”
Gil nodded. “We’ve got to clear out pronto and take her with us. The shipment’s aboard the boat. Everything’s cleaned out of here.”
The three accomplices held a whispered consultation. Before Nancy had time for further analysis, Gil looked at his watch.
“We’ve got to step on it. Simon will be worried.”
“See you there,” Jean said to Nancy slyly. “Try to figure this one out, Miss Private Eye!”
At these words, Frank gave Nancy a shove and dragged her to the river. The man in skin-diving gear was waiting. Nancy struggled to get away, but to no avail.
To her horror, the skin diver forced her into the back seat of the miniature submarine and tied her securely. She had a glimpse of Frank, Gil, and Jean boarding a motorboat hidden in a nearby cove. Then the skin diver shut the transparent hatch and the sub began to descend.
“How am I ever going to escape?” A wave of terror swept over the young sleuth. As the submarine plunged downward, Nancy told herself sternly, “I must keep cool!”
She noticed that the skin diver remained in front with another man, who was piloting the craft. “They’re two more members of the gang,” Nancy thought. “I wonder who Simon is? And what kind of shipment is on the boat Gil mentioned? Are we heading there now?”
The navigator was steering forward, using a simple control stick and automatic pedals. He and the frogman kept their backs turned to Nancy. Were these men enemy agents, or smugglers? Perhaps Emily’s diamonds were part of the mysterious shipment!
Nancy thought about the rocky overhang under which the shark-nosed sub had been hidden. “I suppose Frank was the lookout,” she conjectured. “And Gil probably went to meet him in a canoe from the inn.”
She concluded that the skin diver had probably thrown the spear at her. “Either to get rid of me for good, or scare me away. And it was probably this sub that caused Helen and me to capsize in the canoe.”
It occurred to Nancy that even if she learned the answers to all her questions, it might do her no good. Escape seemed impossible. She realized that none of her friends, her father, or the police would have the slightest idea where she was.
Then a faint hope came to her. Carl Bard had seen her leave the inn! “If only they think to search the river,” Nancy thought worriedly.
Trying to forget her fears, the young sleuth concentrated on the two scheming waitresses: Mary, doubtless a disguise of Gay Moreau, and Jean Holmes who—
“It’s fantastic—but—if Gay can impersonate me, and pose as Mary, why couldn’t she be Jean Holmes?”
Nancy was sure the actress could easily play any role—plus being Gay herself! Gay, beautiful but avaricious; easygoing, flighty Mary, and shy, plain Jean.
Gay, familiar with the inn, had disguised herself as Mary. She could have been the “ghost,” sometimes as a titian blonde, at others wearing a dark wig. As part of the scare operation, she had left, using the excuse of the place being haunted. Then she had come back in another disguise—as Jean Holmes.
Gay, as Mary, could easily have overheard Mrs. Willoughby describing Emily’s twenty diamonds, and also telling Maud the planned date of presentation. Then Mary bought the substitutes. She had slipped into the hidden closet without being seen and committed the theft.
The speculation brought Nancy back to the present. Had Frank and the men on the sub helped with the diamond robbery? Was the cellar in the river shack being used to hide stolen goods to be taken away later in the sub? Would the answer to these questions explain the other mysterious events, including the time bomb and the vibrations at the inn, all done to scare people away from the place?
It seemed to the young sleuth that ages had gone by since her capture. But now the sub slowly ascended to the surface. Nancy heard the navigator say that something was wrong with the mechanism. As he steered toward a small cabin cruiser a few hundred feet away, Nancy saw that they were on an isolated section of the Muskoka River.
The sub stopped alongside the cruiser and the pilot opened the hatch. He untied Nancy from the seat and helped her mount a small ladder to the deck of the cruiser.
Awaiting them were Jean Holmes, Gil Gary, and Frank! Jean laughed triumphantly. “Well, have a nice trip?” she taunted Nancy.
Unable to speak, and guarded closely by Gil and Frank, holding flashlights, Nancy gave her a disgusted look. She scanned the river for other nearby craft. There were none. If only a River Police Patrol boat would come by! But none did,
Meanwhile, the skin diver and pilot had hitched the miniature submarine to the stern of the cruiser. As the diver took off his face mask, Nancy saw that he was dark, wiry, and had an impassive expression. Jean gestured toward the pilot, a stocky man of about thirty.
“This is my brother-in-law Bud,” she smirked, as Gil tied Nancy’s arms behind her back, then bound her legs together with a stout rope. “I couldn’t introduce you when you visited my sister in Dockville. She did a good job of being Mary Mason, eh, Nancy?”
Nancy’s theory about two Mary Masons was correct! Also, it was now apparent that Gay Moreau had assumed her brother-in-law’s last name for her first Lilac Inn disguise.
BOOK: The Mystery at Lilac Inn
5.38Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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