The Scarlet Slipper Mystery (5 page)

Read The Scarlet Slipper Mystery Online

Authors: Carolyn Keene

Tags: #Art Thieves, #Jewel Thieves, #Women Detectives, #Detective and Mystery Stories, #Girls & Women, #Mystery & Detective, #Dance Schools, #Juvenile Fiction, #Adventure and Adventurers, #Mysteries & Detective Stories, #Fiction, #Adventures and Adventurers, #Mystery Fiction, #Women Sleuths, #Adventure Stories, #Mystery & Detective Stories, #Drew; Nancy (Fictitious Character), #General, #Smuggling, #Mystery and Detective Stories

BOOK: The Scarlet Slipper Mystery
13.75Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
“Nancy, you’re hurt!” Bess exclaimed.
“Mrs. Judson rushed outside and got into a taxi. I couldn’t find another one, so I had no way of following her. And I didn’t even get the license number of the cab.”
Nancy examined the thin piece of envelope George had saved. The letter had been post-marked in Paris, France, and sent by airmail. The notation
Par Avion
had been written by hand.
George suggested that she drive Nancy home and then return to help Bess. “I’ll take over the reception desk,” she promised her friend. “You don’t need a ballet dancer there!”
On the way home, the girls stopped at Dr. Milton’s office. He said that Nancy had suffered only a mild strain. He strapped the ankle and assured her that if she stayed off it as much as possible, it should be good as new in a day or two.
When Nancy reached home, Hannah Gruen was distraught. “That dancing school isn’t worth it!” she declared loudly.
At that, Henri and Helene rushed down the stairs. When they heard what had happened, Helene said, “Nancy, I had no idea that you would get into trouble. We cannot permit it to continue. Our enemies are more dangerous than I thought.”
Nancy had grown very fond of the dancing couple. Besides, she was determined not to give up so easily. Smiling, she insisted that her accident was of little consequence.
Before the Fontaines had a chance to comment further, Nancy asked them if they knew Mrs. Judson or had ever heard of her. They said no. Thinking the woman might be using an assumed name, Nancy described her carefully. The dancers said they knew no such person.
Nancy showed the couple the piece of envelope with the French stamp and asked if the Fontaines recognized the handwriting. They did not.
As Nancy ran her fingernail over the strange stamp, something on the envelope caught her eye. “Hannah,” she said to the housekeeper, “will you please steam the stamp off this envelope for me?”
The housekeeper went to the kitchen and returned quickly. Wide-eyed she exclaimed, “It beats me how Nancy figures things out!”
“I had a clue,” Nancy admitted. “I noticed a dot of ink extending beyond the edge of the stamp.”
“Well, it was a good idea,” said Hannah. “There was a number under the stamp.”
“What is it?” the three asked eagerly.
Dramatically, Hannah read, “10561-B-24!”
It was the same number that Nancy had found inside the bisque figurine!
Astonished, Nancy told them about the statuette and the impostor who had sold it to the local jeweler. “Does the number mean anything to either of you?” she asked Henri and Helene.
They shook their heads. “Could it be some sort of a code?” Henri asked.
“Perhaps,” Nancy admitted. “And it may be in French. Let’s see if we can figure it out. Have you ever tried solving a cryptogram?”
“A few times,” Helene answered.
“Good. Now, if Hannah will bring us a pad of paper and some pencils, we’ll all work on it. I’ll work in English and you two can experiment in French.”
They tried simple substitutions, using the series of numbers for letters of the alphabet, but nothing came of this. Next they tried transposition, numbering the alphabet with z for
1
and
a
for 26.
“I believe we’ve been following the wrong trail,” Nancy said finally, after several leads had failed to produce a message. “This may even be a serial number of some sort.”
Hannah Gruen, who had been listening, declared she thought enough decoding had been done that day. “Nancy, I suggest that you go to bed and let me serve supper to you in your room.”
Helene and Henri backed Hannah up, urging Nancy to rest her ankle. She finally consented.
The young detective went to sleep early that night. She woke the next morning eager to continue work.
When she hopped down to breakfast, being careful to put no pressure on her swollen ankle, Nancy found Helene and Henri looking very serious.
Helene confessed that they were embarrassed about staying at the Drew home without being permitted to reimburse the lawyer.
“Oh, please stop thinking of that,” said Nancy. “We just love having you here, and you can help me on the case as no one else could.”
Henri brightened a little. “Nancy, I could do one thing that might help repay your kindness, but I’ll need your cooperation.”
He explained that he was a portrait painter as well as a dancer. His art was not well known, but he had done some acceptable work. He offered to paint Nancy’s portrait as a reward for her help.
“Why, that would be wonderful!” said Nancy. “Dad has been trying for a long time to get me to have my portrait painted. He’ll be thrilled.”
“Then it’s settled. As soon as we finish breakfast, we’ll pick the right spot and I’ll begin work.”
Half an hour later they set up a studio in Hannah’s second-floor sewing room. Nancy, wearing a dainty ice-blue blouse, sat quietly while Henri made several rough pencil sketches.
Finally he selected one that Helene declared looked exactly like Nancy.
“I like the expression, because it’s serious and yet Nancy has a little smile,” she said. “To me that is just the way she looks.”
After she had posed for two hours, Nancy was glad to stretch a bit. She telephoned the dancing school and found that things were running smoothly.
Soon afterward, George arrived. “Hypers, Nancy!” she exclaimed. “I thought you’d be in bed. Where did you learn to fall down a whole flight of stairs and come up with nothing worse than a few bruises and a twisted ankle?”
“It takes a lot of practice,” Nancy answered with a laugh.
“Anyway,” said George, “I just dropped in to see if I could be your chauffeur.”
“I certainly would like to go out and do some work on the case,” Nancy replied. “Suppose you have lunch here and we’ll start right afterward.”
At two o’clock Nancy and George were on their way. Their first stop was the Civic Center, where George ran in to tell Mrs. Parsons that Nancy would be unable to rehearse for a few days.
“Now I’d like to cruise around,” Nancy said, “on the off chance that I might see Mrs. Judson or that man who stopped me the other night.”
Though George drove around for half an hour, the girls did not spot either of the people they sought. Next Nancy wanted to check hotel lobbies and restaurants.
“But you can’t do that yourself,” George objected, “and I don’t know the man.”
Nancy had an idea. “You go in, and if you find anyone who seems to fit the description, I’ll take a look.”
George investigated hotels first, but saw no one who resembled either Mrs. Judson or the mysterious man. Next they tried a number of restaurants, where George looked over the clientele and asked cashiers and hat-check girls if anyone who ate there resembled the people they sought. All the replies were negative.
“Let’s try one more,” said Nancy late in the afternoon. George pulled up in front of a small dining place called the Regal Restaurant.
Both girls went inside. Nancy described the couple they wanted and told the cashier that the two would not necessarily have been together.
The woman thought for a few seconds, then said, “There was a couple in here last night that sounds like your description. The woman was an American. She was dressed in loud clothing and talked in a whiny voice. The man had a French accent.”
“Did you overhear their names?” Nancy asked.
“The woman called the man Rowl—or something like that.”
“Rowl?” Nancy repeated. “That might be Raoul. What were they talking about?”
The cashier thought for a moment. Then she said, “I didn’t hear much. Apparently they were finishing a conversation they’d started before they got here. But the woman said, ‘You’d better come across with a nice bit of jewelry for me or I’ll spill the beans!’ ”
“That sounds like her!” said Nancy. “Do you remember anything else?”
“Only that the woman handed the man a letter when they were eating dessert.”
At this point the cashier called to a waitress who had served the couple. The girl remembered them well.
“When the man read the letter,” she said, “he looked plenty mad. And he gave the woman an awful scolding for losing the stamp.”
“Have you any idea where they live?” Nancy asked.
The waitress said that she had heard them mention the big apartment house on Oakwood Avenue. “But I don’t know that they live there.”
Nancy thanked the cashier and the waitress, and the girls hurried off.
When they reached the apartment house, Nancy looked at every name on the letter boxes. Not one of them was Judson. She rang the superintendent’s bell. There was no reply, but the front door opened and a woman came out. Nancy asked her whether a couple named Judson lived in the building. The woman said she did not know.
“Mr. Judson’s a Frenchman,” said Nancy with a smile. “Would that mean anything?”
“There’s a Frenchman here. He lives in 1A.”
The two girls walked down a corridor and knocked. The door was opened by a thin, sallow-cheeked man with a waxed mustache.
“Ah,
charmant!”
the Frenchman said. “The so pretty American girls.”
The girls were amused by his exaggerated mannerisms. George asked, “Is there another Frenchman in this building who might be using the name of Judson?”
“I see you are not interested in poor Guion,” said the man. “But yes, we have a Mr. and Mrs. Judson here for some weeks.”
Nancy asked for a description of the couple. It sounded as though the woman was Mrs. Judson, and her husband might well be the man who had stopped her on the deserted road!
“Where are they living?” she asked.
Mr. Guion pointed down the corridor. “They have sublet down here, while the tenant is away in Canada. However,” he said, shrugging, “I do not know where they are now. This morning they most quickly moved out.”
CHAPTER VI
A Strange Mix-up
“To think we came so close to finding the Judsons and then missed them!” George fumed when she and Nancy were back in the convertible, heading for the Drew home.
Nancy, too, was discouraged, although it was interesting to know that she had been correct in suspecting that the man and woman who evidently had a major role in the Fontaine case had been living in River Heights.
“We could call the apartment superintendent to learn whether they left a forwarding address,” the girl said. “But since they’ve been receiving mail at the General Post Office, that doesn’t seem likely.”
When George dropped Nancy at her home, Hannah Gruen greeted the young detective with a smile. “You have company!” she announced.
Nancy hobbled into the living room to find Ned Nickerson seated on the sofa.
“Hello!” he said. “Say, what’s this I hear about a busted ankle?”
Nancy told him it was only a mild strain. “Then if you’re okay,” he said, “how about a double date tonight with the Fontaines?”
“All right. But we’ll have to stay here,” said Nancy. “It would be dangerous for them to leave the house. Won’t you have dinner with us? I can promise apple pie.”
“It’s a deal.”
The drapes were drawn throughout the first floor and the Fontaines came downstairs. Ned liked them at once, and they conversed freely.
During dinner Nancy told the group what she had learned at the Oakwood Avenue apartment house. Afterward, Mr. Drew excused himself and went to his study. The four young people sat in the living room and talked.
Suddenly the doorbell rang several times. The Fontaines looked worried and Nancy advised them to hide in the kitchen. As Helene and Henri hurried off, Hannah went to answer the bell.
Nancy and Ned watched from the living room while the housekeeper opened the door. They were amazed to see a man of medium build, his face concealed by a handkerchief he held in his hand, force his way in. He pushed past Hannah and shut the door behind him!
Ned ran into the hall, intending to tackle the intruder. The man stood still and whisked the handkerchief away from his face.
“What’s the idea of forcing your way in here?” Ned demanded.
Nancy had hobbled to the hall and stood staring at the man in blank amazement. He was the one she had met on the plane—the person they suspected of having sent the warning note to the Fontaines!
He was thunderstruck when he recognized Nancy. “You live here?” he asked.
Before she could reply, there was a frantic pounding on the front door.
“Don’t let anybody in!” the stranger cried. “I was followed!”
“Open the door!” cried a girl’s voice, which Nancy recognized at once as George’s.
Nancy opened the door and her friend rushed in. “Oh, I tried to warn you!” she exclaimed. “But this man—he got here ahead of me!”
“Warn them about what?” the stranger asked.
“About you,” George said bluntly. “Nancy, get the police!”
“Police?” the man asked. “I don’t know what this is all about. I didn’t come here to cause any trouble.”
“Then why are you here?” George demanded.
“I’ve come to see Mr. Carson Drew,” the man answered. “I understand that he is an attorney. I have a case for him.”
Mr. Drew had stepped out of his study when the commotion began. He now came forward. “I’m Carson Drew,” he said. “And your name?”
“Johann Koff.”
“Millie Koff’s father?” Nancy exclaimed.
“Yes.”
“I understood from Mrs. Parsons that you and Millie had left town and no one knew where you had gone,” said Nancy.
Mr. Drew added, “You will forgive us if your mysterious disappearance seems suspicious to us?”
“I will explain everything,” Mr. Koff said.
“You mean I’ve been shadowing you for nothing?” George exclaimed, sagging weakly against the door frame.
Mr. Koff laughed. For the first time he recognized George as the young woman who had demanded an interview of him the night before last.

Other books

The Dead Dog Day by Jackie Kabler
Hell Come Sundown by Nancy A. Collins
Hell's Heart by John Jackson Miller
An Unsuitable Match by Sasha Cottman
Sebastian by Anne Bishop
Viper's Run by Jamie Begley
The Name of the Game by Jennifer Dawson