The Mystery at Lilac Inn - Carolyn Keene [14]
“What is it?” Emily asked.
“Believe it or not, it’s my stolen charge plate!” Nancy answered. “I may be jumping to conclusions, but I’m sure now that my impersonator is the jewel thief. She dropped the charge plate from her pocket or purse, probably when she put the jewel case in it.”
“This is positively eerie,” Helen remarked. “Maybe that fake Nancy dropped something else.”
The girls started a search and presently Helen found a tiny envelope, farther under the chair. Nancy’s name and address were typed on it!
“The charge plate must have been in this and slid out,” she said. “My impersonator must have decided to type the envelope to be sure that she did not make a mistake when the clerks at Burk’s Department Store asked for her address for the sales slips. I notice the letter a is faint.”
Suddenly Nancy chuckled. “Em, you didn’t want the police notified about the jewel theft, but here’s a chance to get police help without telling them.”
“How?”
“Chief McGinnis knows that my charge plate was stolen by an impersonator,” Nancy answered. “With this typed clue, maybe he can find her. And I suspect that when he does, your thief will be caught!”
Nancy called Chief McGinnis at his home. She told him about the charge plate and envelope, and her suspicion that her impersonator, though not known to the inn’s owners, must have been there.
“Please send the plate and envelope to me for fingerprint analysis,” Chief McGinnis requested.
Nancy promised she would and hung up, wishing she could have reported the jewel theft to him. It was after eleven o’clock when Helen and Nancy said good night to Emily and walked to their cottage. Both girls fell asleep almost as soon as their heads touched the pillows. But around three in the morning, Nancy was partially awakened by a noise.
“What was that?” she thought, looking around the cottage with sleepy eyes. She listened. But all was silent now. Finally Nancy went back to sleep.
She awoke at seven. Helen was still asleep. Nancy put on a casual sweater and skirt and loafers. She tiptoed from the cabin and headed for the inn. No one else seemed to be outside.
For the next half hour Nancy looked near the front door for footprints, lilac buds, or anything else to give her a clue to the jewel thief. She found nothing.
She strolled around back and met Hank, the gardener, who greeted her pleasantly and said he had decided not to give up his job. “My injured leg’s better. But I have other worries now,” he said. “Some outdoor equipment was taken last night from the tool shed.”
“Really?” said Nancy. “What?”
Hank led her to the small wooden structure used by the outdoor workers. “We’re missing several shovels, rakes, some wire, and small parts,” said Hank. “But worst of all, an expensive jig saw that Mr. Farnham just bought is gone.”
“More thefts,” thought Nancy. Aloud she asked, “Is the shed locked at night?”
Hank said it was, and that he was responsible for securing the shed after work. “Probably none of the other men thought to ask Miss Willoughby for the spare key to lock up when I wasn’t here.”
Nancy examined the soft dirt outside the shed. There were a number of footprints, all blurred and leading in different directions. As Jim, Gil, and Luke—the three other gardeners—reported for work, Nancy questioned each of them in turn. They confessed that they had forgotten to lock the shed, and said they had no idea who might have taken the tools. Before Nancy left the men, she suggested that Hank search the grounds once more before reporting the theft.
As Nancy started up the front porch steps of the inn a few minutes later, she was hailed by John McBride. “Look what I found!” he cried triumphantly.
He held out Emily’s white velvet jewel case!
CHAPTER VII
A Diver in Peril
“JOHN, you found the diamonds!” Nancy exclaimed.
The young man opened the case and displayed its contents. The twenty diamonds, of various sizes, glinted in the morning sunlight.
“Astounding, isn’t it?” John grinned, adding that he had found the case under one of the lobby windows. “I must