The Moonstone Castle Mystery (14 page)
Read The Moonstone Castle Mystery Online
Authors: Carolyn G. Keene
The girls stooped to examine them. Three of the tires had parallel grooves; the one on the right rear wheel was diamond-shaped.
“We’re on the trail of something all right,” Bess remarked. “But let’s not get ourselves captured!”
They hurried along the side of the road, ready to hide among the trees and bushes if a car should come along or any people appear. They neared the end of the driveway, where the trees on the far side ended, and a long green lawn extended for some distance.
“Girls!” Nancy whispered tensely. She pointed to their left. The tower of Moonstone Castle was in plain view! “Anyone standing here could have watched Jake Suggs signaling!”
“O-oh!” said Bess. “I’ve seen enough! Let’s go back!”
“No!” said Nancy. “We have a real clue this time.” She came from behind a tree, walked up to the front door, and boldly lifted the big brass knocker.
CHAPTER XVIII
Worried Plotters
WHEN there was no answer to Nancy’s knock, she tried again. Still no one came to open the door of Mrs. Wilson’s home.
Disappointed, Nancy was about to turn away, when Bess rushed up to her. She had been standing some distance back from the house and had been gazing at the windows. Now she exclaimed in an excited whisper:
“Somebody is home. I saw a middle-aged woman looking out one of the second-floor windows.”
“Middle-aged?” George repeated. “That couldn’t be old Mrs. Wilson.”
“That’s right,” Nancy agreed. “I wonder why the woman doesn’t come and answer my knock?”
“Maybe she’s deaf,” George suggested, and ran back from the doorway so she would be in plain sight if anyone looked out the window again.
Nancy, meanwhile, hammered the door knocker vigorously. No one came to answer it.
“Evidently they don’t want to see us,” said Bess.
The three girls discussed the question of whether it was just they who were not welcome, or whether no callers were allowed into the house. They did not come to any conclusion.
“Why don’t we pretend to leave?” said Nancy. “We’ll go down the driveway a short distance and double back, using the trees as a screen.”
She and the cousins followed this plan and remained in hiding for nearly ten minutes. They had a good view of the house, but no one appeared at any of the windows, or came to open the door.
“We may as well go,” said Bess.
“Not yet,” Nancy begged. “I see a way to get up to the house without being spotted. Normally I dislike eavesdropping, but in this case I think it is justified.”
The young sleuth managed to make her way behind trees and among bushes to an open, screened window not far from the front door. She had barely settled into a comfortable listening position when a car came up the driveway.
At once Bess was terrified. “Now we’ll be caught!” she told George.
“Sh!” her cousin warned and pulled Bess down to a stooping position. “Nancy’s well out of sight. I’m sure nobody will see her.”
As the car went past the place where the cousins were hiding, they could see the lone driver plainly. He was the man who had followed Nancy in River Heights and George in Deep River!
“He may have trailed us here,” Bess worried. “If so, he’ll hunt until he finds Nancy!”
George set her jaw. “If he does, you and I will run forward and help her!”
The man parked his car and went up to the front door. To the girls’ surprise, he took a key from his pocket and let himself into the house.
Nancy, who had seen all this clearly, and fortunately had not been noticed, wondered if the stranger lived here. Again the thought went through her mind, “I’ve seen that man some place.” As she tried hard to think where it had been, she heard voices in the room just above where she was crouched.
“Rudy Raspin!” exclaimed another man’s voice. “Why did you come here in the daytime? You know we agreed that all our meetings would be at night.”
“Listen, Oman,” said Raspin, “don’t give me orders. Things aren’t going well. We’d better scram!”
A woman’s voice said, “What happened?”
Before Raspin could answer, Oman broke in. But he had barely started to speak when the woman quickly ordered, “Be quiet, Ben! Listen to Rudy!”
“You’re a nagging wife, Clara!” Oman complained.
Nancy’s heart was thumping with excitement. Oman! The name on the postcard which had been found in Grandmother Horton’s home! Also, Nancy was sure from the sound of Ben Oman’s voice that he was Mr. Seaman! So the man was using an alias!
Raspin went on, “Jake Suggs is in jail, and he has talked!”
Even outdoors Nancy could hear the gasps of alarm from the Omans. They asked what had happened.
“That pesky Drew girl and her friends searched the castle and found Suggs. I always said he was too dumb to be trusted. Well, they took him to the police. Then, a few hours later, Suggs told the cops about Mr. Wheeler and they went out to the castle and rescued him.”
“And now Wheeler will start talking!” Oman exclaimed in a thoroughly alarmed tone of voice. “We are in a tight spot.”
His wife, who sounded doubtful about the story, asked, “Where did you get all this information, Rudy? You wouldn’t have dared go to the jail to see Jake!”
“I wouldn’t, eh?” Raspin asked in a sneering tone. “I’ll tell you how I managed it. I just happened to go to that tearoom you like so much, and the old busybody there told me the story about Suggs being captured and Wheeler being found. Then I went to the jail.”
Raspin laughed. “Pretty clever of me, too, the way I did it. I put on a disguise, and wrote a letter on stolen official state stationery I keep on hand along with other handy forms I pick up. The letter, addressed to Chief Burke, said I was a member of a state committee on jail inspection. I signed an assumed name.”
“So you did talk to Suggs?” said Oman.
“Right. And I found out something else from him. Nancy Drew has my moonstone!”
“How’d she get it?” Ben Oman cried out, and his wife asked, “When did you learn that, Rudy?”
“Suggs told me. That fool held the Drew girl prisoner a short time until he was discovered. Those girl friends of hers stood right outside the secret door on the castle cellar stairway. Suggs heard one of them say, ‘That moonstone somebody sent her certainly didn’t help Nancy.’ ”
Oman whistled, as Raspin, now in a loud and angry voice, said, “I don’t know who sent it to her, but I have an idea. If I’m right, I’ll—I’ll—well, never mind, that’s a personal matter. But I’m going to get the moonstone back! I’ve had bad luck ever since it disappeared!”
Nancy was amazed to hear that the moonstone she had received belonged to Rudy Raspin! Who had sent it to her? And why had it been taken from him?
After a few moments’ silence, Raspin spoke again. “I tell you, it’s getting too hot around here. The sooner we get out, the better!”
“Just a minute,” said Oman. “I’m not going to give up this job.”
“You and Clara will be caught!” Raspin argued.
“Listen,” said Ben Oman in a wheedling tone, “we have the old lady just where we want her. She’s too weak to resist.” The man laughed sardonically.
“That’s right,” spoke up Clara Oman. “She’s signing checks now without looking at them.”
Rudy Raspin, apparently as greedy as his pals, laughed. “I guess we can’t leave the loot behind,” he said. “Well, force all you can out of the old lady’s checkbook today. Tomorrow we get out of here!”
Nothing more was said and in a few moments Raspin left the house. As soon as he had driven off, Nancy cautiously returned to Bess and George and told the story. They stared in speechless amazement.
“We must get the police right away!” Nancy said. “Old Mrs. Wilson is in real danger!”
The girls ran to Nancy’s hidden car and hurried to town. As they neared the road leading up to the motel, she said, “I think it would be a good idea, before we go to the police, to see if there’s any word from Dad.”
When she reached the motel, the three girls dashed inside, all hoping for letters. There were none and no message from Mr. Drew, but Mrs. Thompson, who was behind the desk, said:
“Nancy, I found an envelope here this morning. The address looked so strange I thought I’d better keep the letter and hand it to you myself.” She gave it to Nancy, then went off.
Nancy’s name was spelled out in letters cut from newspaper words. Tied to the envelope was a small, dark-green box.
Remembering the package which contained the moonstone, Nancy quickly tore open the envelope and pulled out a note. It also was made from newspaper words. The message read:
PLEASE RETURN MOONSTONE. NOW I AM IN DANGER AS WELL AS YOU. LEAVE IT IN THIS BOX TONIGHT UNDER THE RHODODENDRON BUSH AT THE FOOT OF THE MOTEL DRIVEWAY.
It was signed “The Well-Wisher.”
Nancy showed the note to her friends, who gasped in astonishment. As the three girls walked away, Nancy said, “We’ll leave the box tonight, but not the moonstone, and we’ll be on watch to see who comes!”
CHAPTER XIX
A Cry for Help
AS Bess peered at the strange note which Nancy had received, she said, “More than one person may come to get the moonstone back. And if they’re husky men, we wouldn’t stand a chance.”
George looked at her cousin disdainfully. “Why not? We’re not weaklings!”
“They might be armed,” Bess cautioned.
Nancy thought only one person would appear. “I have an idea someone in the gang took the moonstone and sent it to me. We know now it actually belongs to Raspin, and I think he has ordered the person who sent the stone to get it back quickly.”
“In any case, Nancy, you have stolen property,” Bess said. “The quicker you get rid of it the better!”
Nancy agreed that the rightful owner should have the moonstone back, but thought Raspin should put in a claim for it himself.
“He wouldn’t dare do that!” said Bess.
“Exactly,” Nancy replied. “Therefore, we’ll know that whoever comes tonight is in some way connected with Raspin.”
George remarked that there was one fact still unexplained—why did this mysterious person call himself “The Well-Wisher”? “That doesn’t sound like one of the gang—rather a person who is on your side.”
“I admit it’s all very contradictory,” said Nancy. “Let’s hope we get the answers tonight.”
The girls climbed into the convertible and went to police headquarters. Fortunately, Chief Burke was there and they were ushered into his office at once. As Nancy completed her story, the officer’s eyebrows lifted in amazement.
“It certainly sounds as if you’ve stumbled onto a big fraud,” he said.
“It may be bigger than we think,” Nancy went on. “There are similarities to the way poor Mrs. Wilson is being treated and the way Mrs. Horton was some fifteen years ago.”
“That’s right,” the chief said. “Do you think these servants are up to a racket that they’ve been pulling for some time?”
“It looks that way,” Nancy replied.
On purpose Nancy refrained from saying anything about Joanie Horton—that was still her father’s case.
The officer said he would send two squad cars out to Mrs. Wilson’s home at once. “I’ll include a doctor because she may need medical attention.”
Nancy asked, “May we go along?”
Chief Burke smiled. “I can’t blame you for wanting to see this case through, but I don’t want you to get hurt. Suppose you trail the police cars but stay in the background.”
He went on to say that his men would confront the Omans with what Nancy had told him and he hoped for a confession from the couple. “Actually we have no conclusive evidence on which to arrest them, but maybe we can get some.”
Nancy was glad that the two squad cars drove to Mrs. Wilson’s without using sirens or giving any other warning of their approach. She followed in her convertible. When the two dark sedans parked in the driveway, out of sight of the house, she stopped behind them.
In a short time the police had surrounded the old house. Tensely the three girls watched from behind the big trees along the driveway. A plainclothesman went to the front door and lifted the knocker.
There was no answer. But suddenly the anxious group heard a faint cry for help!
“That must have been from Mrs. Wilson!” said Bess, clutching Nancy’s arm.
A few seconds later a loud order came from an upstairs room, “Be quiet and sign this!”
A woman’s scream followed and another cry for help. Again the plainclothesman pounded loudly on the door, demanding, “Open up! Police!”
When there was no response to further commands, two other policemen and the doctor joined the plainclothesman. Together, they broke down the door with their shoulders. The men swarmed into the house.
The girls waited anxiously. “What do you suppose is happening in there?” Bess asked.
Nancy and George did not answer her. They were listening for further sounds from the house. Fully five minutes went by, and still they heard nothing.
Then the plainclothesman reappeared. “You can come in now,” he called to the girls.
He led the way into the hall and up the front stairway. The detective indicated an open bedroom. Nancy and her friends entered.
“You!” a handcuffed man cried out. He was the person who had posed as Mr. Seaman. He glared malevolently at Nancy.
The young sleuth ignored him and gazed at the two women in the room. One, evidently Mrs. Oman, was also handcuffed.
On a large, old-fashioned bed lay an emaciated-looking elderly woman. The doctor sat beside her.
“This is Mrs. Wilson,” he said, and told her, “These are the girls who saved your life.”
The woman smiled wanly and said in a weak voice, “I thank you. And I am glad these wicked servants have been caught.”
The doctor said Mrs. Wilson would be removed to a hospital and with proper food and good care would be all right. The police, meanwhile, had been examining things in the room. They had found an open checkbook on a New York City bank.
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