Chapter 9 The Password to Larkspur Lane by Carolyn Keene
The Messenger Escapes
Early the next morning, true to her plan to press the investigation rapidly in an attempt to solve the mystery before her father should leave for St. Louis, Nancy telephoned first to Bess and then to George. To her dismay the girls were leaving after luncheon for a vacation, but promised to hurry over to the Drew home right away to help her out. As Nancy usually called for them, they were intrigued to know why she wanted them in such a hurry.
“You are to be my bodyguard while I go downtown,” she told them when they arrived, “and I’m sorry you aren’t going to be in town longer to help me solve a new mystery.”
“Gracious, Nancy,” exclaimed the plump Bess. “What’s it all about?”
“I feel very important,” added George. “Nancy Drew, the great detective, asking me to act as a policeman.”
“Now stop teasing,” pleaded Nancy, “and I’ll tell you something. I’ve promised Dad not to go out alone, because a certain man has been following me lately.”
“How exciting!” giggled Bess. “Is he tall and handsome?”
“No, short and ugly.”
“Is he a bandit with a flowing mustache and brass earrings?” inquired George with a twinkle in her eye.
Nancy joined in a laugh, and then told the cousins of her determination to help an elderly lady whom she suspected might be in trouble. She refrained from mentioning Dr. Spires’s connection with the case, or speaking of the password.
“Who is the woman?” Bess asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Where does she live?” inquired George.
“I don’t know.”
“Goodness, Nancy, you’re more mysterious than the mystery,” sighed Bess. “However, you always manage to find out the secrets of criminals, like you did at Red Gate Farm. So you’ll probably soon guess this one.”
“Where do we go first?” George wanted to know.
“To the jeweler’s,” replied Nancy.
The three chums hurried off in Nancy’s car, and presently stopped at the building where the firm of Argent, Cutter, and Stone was located.
“You girls don’t mind waiting a few minutes, do you?” asked Nancy, as she got out of the roadster.
“Is your bodyguard supposed to watch you or the car?” came from George with mock severity.
Smiling at the joker, Nancy hurried off to see Mr. Stone, the jeweler. That worthy gentleman had barely hung up his hat when she entered the establishment.
“Well, well, Miss Drew, do you work all night?” he asked his visitor. “I sent a tracing of the coat of arms to a genealogical expert, and it may be that there is a reply in the morning’s mail. I shall find out.”
He pressed a button, and his secretary entered the room with a wire basket heaped with letters.
“Is there anything from Abelard de Gotha, Miss Kane?” the jeweler asked. The secretary leafed over the opened letters and selected one which she placed in Mr. Stone’s hands. He beckoned Nancy to read the epistle with him.
“Dear Mr. Stone:
“I am glad to be able to be so prompt in replying to your inquiry. It so happens that the armorial bearings described in your letter belong to a very old family and are recorded in the genealogical records of the English founders of New York State. The arms are those of the Eldridge family, the crest dating back to Henry IV, and the quartering on the shield marking the union of the Eldridge house with the Gerret’s in 1604.
“At the time of the Louisiana Purchase the New York Branch, consisting of Isaiah Eldridge, his wife Prudence and two children, received a large grant of land in what is now Missouri, and I presume their descendants still live in or near St. Louis, although I have no records to prove that.
“Very truly yours,
“Abelard de Gotha.”
“Does that help you in any way?” Mr. Stone asked.
“Indeed it does, yet it serves to widen the search,” Nancy answered. “I will see what can be done by inquiry through the St. Louis newspapers.”
The transaction having been completed, Nancy bade the jeweler good-by.
“We didn’t see anyone watching you,” Bess said as Nancy returned to the car and started the motor.
When the girls reached the Drew home, Nancy decided to show her friends the bracelet, which she had clasped around her arm under the sleeve of her frock as the safest means of carrying it to Mr. Stone.
“How handsome!” exclaimed Bess.
“Does this belong to the old lady?” inquired George.
“Yes,” replied Nancy, “and I want to return it. Just now, though, I’m going to put it away.”
She placed the piece of jewelry in a wall safe in her father’s study, and then said good-by to the cousins, who insisted they must hurry home. Next she went to the kitchen where she found Effie seated at a table looking at a magazine.
“I’ve just read the most thrilling story,” the maid said. “All about how movie actresses have to live on nothing but asparagus and grapefruit to keep thin. Gee, Miss Nancy, you would make a swell movie actress. I was telling my boy friend—did you know I have a new boy friend? He drives an ice wagon, and he said some day he would try to borrow a couple of saddles, and we would go out on horseback along the river bridle path on the ice wagon horses. Isn’t that romantic?”
“Very,” Nancy said, trying to keep a straight face. “Now, I want you to listen to me carefully. I have something important to tell you.”
“I’m listening,” said Effie.
“Do not let any strangers into this house,” adjured Nancy. “If anyone comes, keep him waiting on the porch.”
Nancy turned away, but the maid followed.
“Oh, I meant to tell you,” Effie went on. “I put that pigeon of yours out in the sun so it would get well quicker. I put a rock on the lid of his box, so he couldn’t get out. Are you going to raise pigeons, Miss Drew? I don’t fancy them myself because they can’t sing, but my boy friend, not the ice man but another one, oh, the nicest fellow, Miss Nancy, he works in a garage and when he tries out cars after they have been fixed he takes me riding—well, he said that pigeons——”
“Where did you put the pigeon?” Nancy interrupted. “I want you to watch it very carefully, for it is an important clue to a mystery that I am trying to solve.”
“Why, it is in the middle of the back yard,” Effie said. “If you will look out this window, you can see it. I’ll keep an eye on it, all right. A boy I knew once said he never knew a girl for seeing everything that goes on the way I do.”
Nancy stepped to the window indicated by Effie and looked out. In the middle of a stretch of lawn she saw the pigeon’s box. Standing there, and very much engrossed over it, was little Tommy.
“Tommy!” Nancy cried fearfully. “Don’t touch the box, please.”
“Ike Harris wants to get out,” the boy called back.
“No, it does not,” Nancy retorted. “When it wants to, I will let it free.”
“I bet you he wants to go,” Tommy cried. “He flaps his wings like anything. Look!”
“That boy is taking the lid off the box,” Nancy exclaimed. “Stop that, Tommy! Effie, come with me quickly! He must not let the pigeon out!”
“You little snoop,” Effie shouted to the lad. “I’ll put you in a box, I will.”
The two girls darted from the kitchen and through the rear entry to the back steps, which they reached just as Tommy succeeded in lifting the lid from the pigeon’s cage. The frightened and bewildered bird hopped to the edge of the box and sat there, balancing and stretching its beautiful blue wings for a moment, and peering to left and to right.
“Don’t move, Tommy!” Nancy cried. “Don’t frighten it!”
“He isn’t scared of me,” Tommy answered confidently. “He likes me.”
As swiftly as caution permitted, Nancy advanced toward the liberated bird, while Effie tiptoed at her heels, muttering terrible threats at Tommy all the while.
“I’ll fix that little busybody,” she was saying.
“Easy now,” Nancy warned. “Just a few steps more, and we’ll have it.”
“Let me grab it,” Effie suggested.
“I’ll get it myself,” Nancy replied.
She crept up behind the bird, her hands extended to seize it.
“I heard what you said,” Tommy bawled out suddenly. “You want to hurt me!”
With that he threw down the lid of the box and darted off toward his own home. The pigeon, alarmed at the sudden movement, flapped its wings and rose awkwardly into the air, soaring high over Nancy’s head as she made a vain leap to catch it.
“Oh, oh, there it goes,” Effie mourned. “I’ll try to hit it with a rock.”
“Don’t you do it,” Nancy said sharply. “See, it is settling on the garage. Oh, I wish one of your boy friends were here now so he could climb up there and catch the bird. Wait, I’ll do it myself. Keep your eyes on the pigeon while I get the stepladder.”
Nancy had scarcely turned on her heels, however, when Effie shouted, “It’s off again!”
Wheeling about, Nancy saw with sinking heart that the pigeon had taken to the air. It flew very slowly and uncertainly, flapping about in a great circle as if trying to get its bearings as well as to exercise its bruised wing.
“Watch it, Effie,” Nancy commanded. “If it flies off, tell me what direction it takes.”
“What are you going to do?” the maid asked, her eyes glued upon the bird.
“I am going to follow it in my car,” Nancy called over her shoulder as she raced to the front of the house where her roadster was parked.
She started the motor, and then drove slowly along the curb to where she could see Effie, still gazing skyward, and craning her neck in all directions to keep the bird in sight.
Suddenly the girl’s gaze became fixed, and she lifted a hand to shield her eyes.
“Has it flown away?” Nancy called to her.
“Yes, it is going southeast,” Effie replied. “Flying very low and not fast at all.”
“Hurry! Climb in, and don’t lose sight of it,” Nancy directed. “It will fly to its owner.”
Effie obeyed at once, running across the lawn and getting into the car. “It went that way,” she said, pointing. “I can’t see it now on account of the trees.”
“We mustn’t lose it,” Nancy gasped. “It’s an important clue to those scoundrels. Effie, try to locate the pigeon,” she cried out, as she zigzagged through the streets trying to keep in a southeast direction.
“But I can’t see it, Miss Nancy. Truly I can’t.”
“Oh, Effie, I’ve taken such good care of that bird, and now to have it disappear just when it was leading us to its owner is a tragedy!”
Effie gulped. “I could cry.”
“Don’t!” commanded Nancy. “It’s my best clue, and we must find it.”