Nancy Clue Mysteries 3 - A Ghost in the Closet (14 page)

Cherry thought a moment and then stammered, "She's got shiny black hair fashioned in a flattering closecrop hairdo that shows off her strong features to their best advantage."

"Excellent," Joe said. "Now, can you describe her eye and complexion color?"

"Deep black eyes with just a hint of brown that makes them warm and inviting. I've seen them sparkle with intelligence and good humor, then flash with anger," Cherry sighed. Golly, this game was easier than she had imagined. Maybe she could be a detective! It was a queer sensation, wearing a blindfold. Why, it made her feel as if she and Jackie were alone in the room.

"And skin?" Joe prodded.

"Warm brown skin, the color of strong coffee with just a hint of cream."

Joe nodded. "Now for build and notable physical characteristics."

Cherry blushed deeply and threw off her lightweight cardigan sweater. Was it her imagination, or had the summer night suddenly turned much warmer? "Well, she's tall and has wide, strong shoulders just made for someone to cry on," she gulped.

A sharp knock at the front door brought the little game to an abrupt end. "Thank goodness," Frank and Nancy sighed with relief.

Midge grabbed Velma by the hand and pulled her into the garden. Frank went to answer the door.

"Why, it's Uncle Nelly and his chum Willy," Frank exclaimed. "And none too soon," he thought with relief. "Where have you fellows been?" he said under his breath as he let the men in. "You're here just in the nick of time!"

CHAPTER 19

The Telltale Slippers

"Look who's here!" Joe cried. "It's our Uncle Nelly and his chum Willy! My, you two look rather excited! Uncle, has something happened?"

Uncle Nelly stumbled inside. "Boys, something awful has happened-the queerest thingooh! " He dropped into a nearby comfortable upholstered wing back chair, took the peach-colored silk kerchief from around his neck and began fanning his face, which was bright pink from excitement. Why, it looked as if he had been weeping!

Joe grinned. Trust Uncle Nelly to put on a show!

"Take a deep breath, Nelson," Willy said, clutching his friend's hand. "Frank, Joe, your uncle has something very grievous to tell you," he said in a grave tone. Frank noticed that even the unflappable Willy seemed shaken. He and Joe exchanged a delighted grin. This was going to be good!

"I almost can't say it," Uncle Nelly gasped. Joe brought him a glass of cool lemonade to steady his nerves. "No-" Uncle Nelly waved the glass away. "Not at a time like this!" Uncle Nelly moaned as he wrung his neck kerchief between his soft pale hands. "Oh, boys," he cried dramatically, "you won't believe the terrible turn of events!"

Frank was mighty impressed by his uncle's flawless performance. "Why, if we didn't know this was a set-up, I'd swear Uncle Nelly was really worried about something," he thought to himself.

"Uncle, are you trying to say that you've witnessed something that you think could be related to the recent Dog Show incident, and you're here to beg Nancy to take the case?" Joe urged him on.

Cherry gasped. My, Joe was good!

Jackie rolled her eyes. She smelled a rat!

Uncle Nelly appeared too overcome to speak. He buried his head in his hands and started to weep. Willy stepped in, and what he said made the partygoers gasp in horror.

"Boys, your parents, well-known detective Fennel P. Hardly and his attractive wife Mrs. Hardly, have been kidnapped!"

"Kidnapped!" Frank and Joe chorused. Golly, the fellows had gone and changed the mystery on them! Joe looked at Nancy and shrugged. Nancy looked momentarily puzzled, but the cool-headed sleuth quickly regained her composure.

Jackie ran to the closet for her detective's notebook and pencil stowed in her jacket pocket, but Nancy was ready. She hid a little smile as she reached for the notebook she had stowed earlier in the front patch pocket of her flared skirt. And she just happened to have a little pencil tucked behind one ear!

Nancy speedily quizzed Uncle Nelly.

"Did you see the kidnapping? Who do you think snatched them? Are you aware of anyone who bears a grudge against Mr. and Mrs. Hardly? What happened in the minutes leading up to this shocking incident?"

While Cherry thrilled to the sight of the comely girl taking charge of an important investigation, Jackie crossed her muscular arms over her strong chest and smoldered in the corner. "I'll get my firstaid kit, just in case someone needs a nurse," Cherry told Nancy.

Joe grinned. "Golly, Mother and Father have joined in on our little scheme," he whispered to his brother.

"For a minute there, I thought something really had happened to them," Frank admitted. "Why, Uncle Nelly ought to win an Oscar for his performance."

Joe agreed. "What really impresses me is that Uncle Nelly came all the way over here in his old carpet slippers. It certainly lends credence to his performance as the distraught relative."

Frank looked at his brother queerly. "Why, Uncle Nelly would never leave the house without the right shoes-"

"-unless something as terrible as a kidnapping had occurred!" Joe finished his thought, all wide-eyed.

"Something terrible has happened to Mother and Father!" the boys chorused in horror.

"That's what we've been trying to tell you," Uncle Nelly cried. "Frank-Joe-someone has stolen into your home and made off with your parents! " A long horrible moment of silence followed. Frank clenched his fists. His pleasant face grew stormy with rage.

"These perpetrators shall be brought to justice," the boy vowed, "or my name isn't Francis P. Hardly!"

CHAPTER 20

"Hold It Right There!"

"-and I was just about to hang up the telephone when suddenly I heard a loud, brutishsounding man call out, `Hold it right there, Fennel. You're coming with me! You too, Mrs. Hardly!' Then what sounded like a scuffle ensued. Why, I could hear the unmistakable sound of good furniture breaking," Uncle Nelly cried.

"Not the beautiful Federal writing table you gave them for their last anniversary?" Joe cried in alarm.

Uncle Nelly nodded solemnly. He and Willy had raced to the Hardly house only to behold a terrible sight. "I'm afraid so, son."

The Hardly boys grew silent at the grim news. They were riding in Nancy's snappy convertible, with their uncle and his chum Willy in the back seat, trying to get the story straight while Nancy steered her large automobile swiftly, yet cautiously, through heavy evening traffic, anxious to get to the scene of the crime.

Frank could scarcely believe what was happening. Just minutes ago, he had been part of a gay scheme involving a simple dognapping and a love life gone awry; now he was leading an investigation in which his own parents were the victims!

Cherry sat in the front seat next to Nancy, her heart pounding in excitement and her cap sitting a little askew. "Golly, I've never been a Kidnap Nurse before," Cherry thought with a mixture of excitement and worry. Good thing she always made it a point to carry plenty of rope-burn salve wherever she went!

"Perhaps one of the many scalawags he's put behind bars has finally made good on his threat to pay him back," Joe offered.

"Does your father have many enemies?" Cherry asked innocently. Who wouldn't like a swell guy like Fennel P. Hardly-crackerjack detective, loving father and doting husband to Mrs. Hardly?

Frank fixed a level gaze on Cherry. "I don't mean to alarm you, Nurse, but my father's work brings him in contact with many a nefarious character. Who knows where the kidnapper's trail will lead us."

Cherry clutched her firstaid kit to her bosom. "It's my job to go wherever I'm needed, and if the search for patients leads me to dangerous or scary places, well, I agreed to that the day I swore to nurse the sick and comfort the disturbed while keeping my uniform clean and starched."

Frank nodded solemnly. "I thought as much. Why, when I saw you on the patio wearing that attractive summer frock and your nurse's cap, I thought, 'There is one committed girl.' "

Cherry blushed with pride.

Joe tried to ready himself by taking inventory of the Hardly Boys Official Detective Kit. He ticked off the contents.

"Magnifying glass, portable microscope, calipers for measuring lengths of things, rubber gloves for messy inspections, one magnet, a pocket-size Geiger counter, chalk for outlining objects, collapsible telescope, walkie-talkies, file and bobby pins for picking locks, handcuffs, a handy rope, a can of grease for getting out of tight jams, and some dried prunes and graham crackers in case we have to hole up somewhere."

"No one touch anything when we get there," Frank warned Cherry, Uncle Nelly and Willy.

"Unless we find your parents bleeding from a gash in the head," Cherry corrected him.

"Right," Frank said. "Other than that, no one's to touch a thing until we dust for fingerprints. And don't walk on the grass. You might destroy valuable evidence, like suspicious shoe prints or tire marks."

"Oh, dear," Uncle Nelly confessed. "Boys, we may have accidentally touched a few things when we were there earlier, and I'm pretty sure I remember running haphazardly across your lawn."

"That's okay, Uncle," Joe told him. "We'll fingerprint you and Willy and use the results to eliminate your prints, plus your carpet slipper prints and those from Willy's boots should be easy to spot."

He explained to Cherry the value of shoe prints when tracking criminals. "Often a criminal can be tracked down with just a shoe or tire print. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, or the FBI as we call it, has on hand photographs of thousands of different kinds of shoe plates. After we make a plaster cast of the shoe print using The Hardly Boys Mold Making Kit, I'll photograph it, make a quick print in the fully-equipped photographic lab in our basement and send it over our teletype to Bureau headquarters in Washington, DC. By morning, we'll know what size shoe the kidnapper was wearing, its make and model, and perhaps the very store where he made his purchase."

"Goodness," Cherry cried. "And I thought nursing was scientific!"

"Although our methods have improved vastly in the last fifteen years, it's still often the simplest thing that helps us get our man," Frank was forced to admit. "While crime detection has always been shrouded in deeps veils of mystery, the truth is that many an escaped criminal is brought to justice on as slim a clue as a single fingerprint."

"Jeepers!" Cherry cried. "But what if the kidnappers wore gloves? What then?"

"Yes, Nancy, what then?" Frank asked. Nancy shot him a thankful grin in the rearview mirror.

"Often even the most hardened criminal will slip up and take off a glove for a second, which is just enough time for him to leave his calling card," she explained, remembering how, in The Case of the Pilfered Pocketbook, the purse snatcher had left just one pinkie print on the patent leather handle-but it was enough!

"You see, Cherry, each of us has one thing that is ours alone, and that's our fingerprints. Although many attempts have been made to alter the telltale marks, they always grow back the exact same way," she explained.

"John Dillinger tried to change his fingerprint patterns by burning them with acid," Joe added. "But it didn't work!"

"How dreadful," Cherry shuddered.

"Since so many people were fingerprinted during the war as a national precaution to protect against invasion from within, a large number of people are on file at the FBI Identification Division," Frank interjected. "Over seventy million in fact. Just one fingerprint would be enough to identify the kidnappers and point us in their direction."

Cherry shivered. She was a little nervous about what they would find once they reached the Hardly residence. She glanced at the car behind them. Jackie was at the wheel of the Hardly jalopy. Cherry gave her a little wave, and was rewarded with a big grin from Jackie, who was keeping her eyes glued on the car ahead, and especially the attractive nurse in the front seat!

Somehow Cherry always felt better when Jackie was near. Was it her big, strong biceps or her quiet, confident manner that made Cherry go a little weak at the knees? Cherry blushed to the roots of her unruly curls. "Get ahold of yourself, Nurse Aimless," she scolded herself. "You're on a case-perhaps the most dangerous of your career. Now is not the time to swoon over some girl-not even one as handsome, good-hearted, sweet-natured and downright sensible as Police Detective Jackie Jones!"