Chapter 16 The Sign of the Twisted Candles by Carolyn Keene
The Ruse
The crash and ear-piercing yell startled Nancy and Ned.
“What was that?” he asked. “It sounded right outside!”
They both went to the stairway window and struggled to lift the stiff, warped sash.
Nancy leaned out. “Oh!” she cried. “A man’s on the porch roof with a ladder on top of him!”
Ned looked down. “It isn’t the guard,” he said. “Who can he be?”
“We’d better run down,” Nancy suggested, “and help the poor man.”
The couple raced down the steps to the second floor and made their way to a front room, whose windows opened onto the roof of the porch. The man lay unconscious beneath the ladder. Nancy and Ned climbed out to the roof and pulled the ladder off the prostrate form.
“I never saw him before,” Nancy said. “Evidently he was trying to get into the house.”
“I’ll go down and get the guard,” Ned offered.
In a few minutes he was back to report that the guard was not in sight.
“That’s strange,” said Nancy. “Anyway, I think this man should go to the hospital. Ned, will you drive to a phone and call the police to send an ambulance?”
“I hate to leave you alone here, Nancy.”
“Oh, I’ll be all right,” she assured him.
Reluctantly Ned hurried to his car and drove off. Nancy decided to hunt for the guard.
As she neared the hall, she heard a step behind her and turned. The man whom she had thought to be unconscious stood there, an evil grin on his face! Nancy started to run, but he caught her in an iron grasp.
“Let go of me!” she demanded.
He gave a mean laugh. “I got my orders to get rid of you!” the man mumbled. Nancy now realized he had been faking unconsciousness all the time.
“Who gave you the orders? Frank Jemitt?”
“You know too much,” the man answered.
As she struggled to get away, the man pulled a small bottle from his pocket and waved it under her nose. Nancy held her breath, all the while fighting like a tigress. She heard a car drive in. If she could only hold out until help came!
But the room began to reel. Nancy couldn’t breathe. Then she blacked out. When the young sleuth revived, she was lying underneath a bed. Its deep-fringed spread hid her from view.
“I guess that’s why no one found me,” she thought. Her head ached. “I need fresh air.”
Staggering, she made her way to the window. Vaguely she noticed that the ladder was still there.
“Where is everybody?” Nancy wondered. Suddenly she noticed that Ned’s car was not in sight. “Hasn’t he come back yet?”
A sudden fear gripped her. Had the powerful stranger knocked Ned out when he returned, hid him some place, and then taken his car?
Feeling stronger now, Nancy decided to investigate. Going from room to room, she called loudly for Ned, but received no answer. Panic-stricken, Nancy began to search under beds and in closets. Ned was nowhere in sight.
Sitting down on the steps of the front porch, Nancy tried to imagine what had happened during her blackout. “I must think,” she told herself. “This is dreadful! What’ll I do? No phone, no car—”
Her eyes were suddenly attracted to a startling sight. A pair of men’s feet protruded from beneath the porch! Ned’s? Sick with fear, Nancy jumped up, seized the man’s ankles, and pulled him out.
“The guard! He’s been drugged too!”
Almost at once the man’s eyelids flickered open and presently he was able to tell Nancy what had happened. He had been knocked out by the same man who had drugged her.
“I shouldn’t have trusted that guy.”
Nancy told the guard that she was alarmed over the safety of the young man who had come there with her.
“I wish I could help you,” the guard said.
Just then a car turned into the driveway and Nancy’s heart leaped. It was Ned’s! She rushed to meet him.
“Nancy! You’re all right! Where did you go?”
“I was under a bed asleep.”
“What!”
She told what had happened to her and the guard. Ned was astounded.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” he said, stepping from the car and putting an arm about her shoulders. “The police and I thought you’d been kidnapped. They’re still looking for you.”
“And I thought you had been knocked out also. What did happen?” Nancy asked.
Ned explained that soon after he had returned from making the phone call, the ambulance had arrived, only to find that the “patient” had vanished.
“I immediately called the Inlet Village police and they sent three men out here right away. You were well hidden, Nancy. When you didn’t answer our calls, we figured that fellow kidnapped you.
“I had to go to headquarters and give a description of you along with his. The police are now combing the highway and turn-offs. Nancy, I came back here just in case—”
Before he could finish, a small truck pulled up in front of the inn. It belonged to the telephone company and in a short time their man had the service restored. At once Ned called police headquarters to brief the captain on the situation. He said efforts would be doubled to find the stranger.
“Tell Miss Drew we haven’t picked up any information about the Jemitts,” the captain said.
When Ned relayed the message, Nancy remarked, “I have a hunch the Jemitts sent that stranger who knocked me and the guard out. If we could find him, he might lead us to them.”
“But not tonight.” Ned was firm about Nancy returning home.
“On one condition,” she answered. “That you stay to dinner.”
“Agreed.”
Nancy telephoned her father and suggested another guard be sent out to relieve the one who had been drugged.
“I’ll attend to it at once, Nancy.”
“There’s a lot more to tell you, Dad, but let’s wait until dinnertime. By the way, when will I be able to go into the tower room? I’m sure the answer to many secrets is right there.”
“You may go in tomorrow afternoon,” the lawyer replied. “Men from the courthouse and an appraiser will be there in the morning. The door to the tower is to be kept locked even after the appraisal is completed. But I’ll give you my key.”
“Great. Ned and I are coming home now. See you later.”
Nancy explained to the guard that he would be relieved in a short time, adding, “Will you be all right if we go now?”
“Oh yes. I have a slight headache but otherwise I feel okay.”
When Nancy and Ned were about halfway home, he looked at the gasoline gauge and said, “I couldn’t make it to River Heights without filling up. Is there a station near here?”
“Yes,” she replied. “Take the next road to the right to Maywood.”
Ned drove there. As the tank was being filled, Nancy glanced at a car headed for Maywood. Her pulse quickened. The driver was the man who had drugged her and the guard!
“Hurry!” she called to the attendant. As Ned looked at her, puzzled, Nancy whispered, “I just saw the man who knocked me out. We must follow him!”
Ned called out to the attendant, “That’ll be enough.” The surprised man shut off the pump.
Ned glanced at the price gauge and quickly paid for the gasoline. “Keep the change,” he said.
“Where’d the man go?” Ned asked Nancy.
“Toward Maywood. Oh, please hurry. He ought to be arrested, and besides, he may be going to meet the Jemitts.”
The suspect was not driving fast and Ned soon caught up. “Now what do we do?” he asked.
“See where he goes and then get a policeman.”
Presently the man turned into an old area of Maywood where the houses were in a shabby state. He parked in front of one on which hung a sign: Mrs. Dilberry’s Guest House. The man let himself in with a key.
“Ned, go for the police, will you? I’ll wait here in case he or the Jemitts come out.”
“Promise me,” he said, cupping Nancy’s chin in his hand, “that you won’t disappear again.”
“Not even to chase them?”
“No.” Ned sat still until she gave her word, then hurried off. Nancy got out and stood back of a tall hedge so she could not be seen from the windows of the guest house.
It was not long before Ned returned with two plainclothes detectives who he introduced as Manton and Wright. Manton said he would cover the rear door of the house while the others went inside.
A woman in her sixties answered their ring. Detective Wright showed his badge and asked if she was Mrs. Dilberry. When she replied Yes, he said, “You have a guest here who is wanted for assault.”
“Not here,” Mrs. Dilberry declared. “All my folks are respectable.”
“If you don’t cooperate,” he said, “you will be liable for aiding and abetting a criminal. He just came in here. Where is he?”
“You mean Mr. Krill?” A look of fright had come over Mrs. Dilberry’s face. “He’s in the room at the head of the stairs.”
As Wright and Ned started up the stairway, Nancy paused to ask the woman a question. “Do you have any guests here named Jemitt?”
“I did have but they moved out about an hour ago,” Mrs. Dilberry said. “Right after the husband got a phone call.”
“Where did they go?” Nancy asked.
“They didn’t say, miss.”
“Tell me,” Nancy went on, “were they friendly with Mr. Krill?”
“Oh my, yes! I could hear them walking back and forth to each other’s rooms all the time.”
“Thank you,” Nancy said, then dashed up the steps to confront the suspect.