004 Smile and Say Murder

  Nancy glanced around at the people in the office. David was kneeling by the couch next to Yvonne, holding her hand. Sondra was standing in the back, looking terrified. Ned was there, too, with Scott, Leslie, and a few other interns and staff members. But where was Mick? The art director was nowhere in sight!

  The prime suspect was looking more guilty every minute. And if Mick really had shot at Yvonne, that would explain the bad aim and the bad choice of a weapon. As far as Nancy knew, Mick was just an amateur with a grudge.

  All at once Nancy realized she could no longer point the finger at anyone other than Mick. The funny thing was, she didn’t want him to be the murderer. She would have much preferred that creepy, bad-tempered David be the guilty one. But there was David, with a perfect alibi, while Mick wasn’t even around to defend himself.

  Nancy dropped into a hardbacked chair by the door to Yvonne’s office. She felt overwhelmed. She’d never completely believed Mick was capable of masterminding the threats until just that moment. The art director had only one chance left at that point—to come into the Flash offices with an airtight alibi.

  Slowly people began drifting out of Yvonne’s office. Nancy stayed and talked to Yvonne, trying to get a better description of the masked intruder. How tall was he? Thin or heavyset? Was there anything distinctive about him? But Yvonne’s responses were too vague to help.

  However, very shortly three police officers showed up—a tall man who introduced himself as Detective Graham, a tough red-haired woman called Officer Bellows, and a refrigerator-sized man named Officer O’Hara who didn’t say much, but was very intimidating nonetheless.

  Detective Graham and Officer Bellows questioned several staff members. Yvonne had to describe the incident again.

  Then Detective Graham took some pictures of Yvonne’s office and dug the bullet out of her wall to keep as evidence. After that he went back to the precinct, leaving Officers Bellows and O’Hara behind to keep an eye out for any suspicious activity. Yvonne got ready to leave, too, and David offered to take her home in a taxi. No one in the office seemed ready to do much work. The incident was too bizarre to brush off.

  An hour later, Mick sauntered into the office, a camera slung around his neck. “Hey, where’ve you been?” Leslie called to him. “You missed all the excitement here.”

  “What’s going on?” Mick asked.

  “Just a little murder attempt,” Scott replied. “Someone tried to shoot Yvonne! We’ve got no idea who.”

  Nancy said nothing. She had a couple of ideas who, she thought, scrutinizing Mick’s face. He was certainly an amazing actor. He really did seem shocked as Leslie described the whole incident.

  “You’ve got to be out of your minds,” Mick exclaimed. “All this happened while I was out?” He looked completely amazed.

  “What have you been doing?” Nancy asked casually.

  “Shooting photographs on the street.”

  Shooting photographs on the street? Nancy thought. Then he probably has no alibi. No one could vouch for his exact whereabouts at the time of the shooting.

  All at once, Mick’s serious expression softened into a grin. “Okay, guys, it was a good joke. I admit, I almost believed this insane story. Which one of you crazy geniuses thought it up? You actually fooled the Practical Joke King!” Mick looked from face to face, but he was the only one laughing. Finally he said, “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

  “You can see the bullet hole in the wall if you want proof,” Scott said. He stepped out from behind the reception desk. Mick followed him to Yvonne’s office.

  Nancy definitely didn’t want to miss Mick’s reaction to the sight of the bullet hole, so she followed Scott and Mick. It was a good thing, too, because as she stepped into the hall she heard someone walk into the reception area. “Hi, Brenda. Has anyone told you the big news?” Leslie said.

  Great, Nancy thought. Brenda Carlton was not exactly what she needed just then! At least Nancy managed to avoid her again.

  Scott opened the door to Yvonne’s office. “There it is,” he said, motioning to the hole above the desk.

  Mick’s eyes widened. He was speechless.

  Nancy had to admit Mick was doing a great job of seeming flabbergasted. But it had to be an act . . . didn’t it? A tiny sliver of doubt crept into Nancy’s mind.

  “So Yvonne’s all right?” Mick asked.

  “Luckily,” Scott replied.

  “And she went home to calm down?”

  “Yup.”

  “Wow, this is so strange,” Mick said, his tone incredulous. “I’ve got to talk to Yvonne. She must be too flipped out for words!”

  Nancy watched Mick in amazement. He seemed so sincere! Suddenly a blood-chilling thought crossed her mind. Maybe Mick really was a split personality! One side of him was wild and funny and concerned with people’s feelings. The other side was the crazed killer who could set up the severed head and rubber ax to scare Nancy—or try to shoot his partner and longtime friend in cold blood!

  Nancy, Mick, and Scott left Yvonne’s office, closing the door behind them. Mick disappeared into his office, while Scott headed toward the reception area.

  Nancy started to follow him, then said, “Scott, I’m going to work in the darkroom for a while.”

  “Okay,” Scott answered.

  When Scott was out of sight, Nancy tiptoed to Mick’s office. As quietly as possible, she turned the doorknob. She pushed open the door without the slightest creak and peeked in, praying to be invisible.

  Mick was opening his bottom desk drawer. Nancy had seen him stash his camera there before. All at once a look of utter confusion swept across his handsome face. He reached into the drawer and pulled out a small silver revolver!

  Before the rational side of her brain could stop her, Nancy had thrown open the door and was dashing across the room. She threw herself across Mick’s desk and tackled the art director.

  “Hey!” Mick cried, struggling.

  “Drop it, Mick,” Nancy advised. “Make it easy on yourself.” She grabbed Mick’s arm and twisted with all her might.

  “Ow!” Mick yelled, but he kept an iron grip on the revolver, hugging it to his chest.

  “I’m sorry to have to do this to you, Mick,” Nancy panted. Then she socked the art director as hard as she could in the stomach.

  Mick doubled over at the same moment that the gun went off. He fell to the ground, and the gun tumbled out of his hand and onto the shiny wooden floor.

  Nancy stared in horror at Mick’s prone figure. “Oh no,” she whispered. “What have I done?”

  “All right,” came a shout from the doorway. “Freeze!” Nancy looked up—and into the cocked gun of Officer Bellows. “Nancy Drew,” she cried, “you’re under arrest!”

  Chapter

  Ten

  GET YOUR HANDS in the air.” Officer bellows ordered Nancy. “And don’t touch that body,” she said, indicating Mick, who was immobile on the floor.

  Slowly Nancy raised her hands and stepped back from Mick and the gun. She felt helpless and terrified and confused. It had all been an accident, but would that matter to a court of law? She’d been caught red-handed in what looked like murder!

  Nancy heard the pounding of feet in the hallway. Officer O’Hara burst into Mick’s office, gun in hand. To make things worse, most of the Flash staff arrived, too. Ned was there, standing protectively close to Sondra. Suddenly Nancy caught her breath. Brenda Carlton had appeared and was looking at her with a disturbingly triumphant smile on her face. Oh no, Nancy thought, can anything else possibly go wrong?

  “Well,” Brenda said smugly, “if this isn’t the scoop of the year! I can just see the headlines. ‘Amateur Detective Nancy Drew Murders Top Exec.’ ”

  Nancy felt sick. Brenda had just blown her cover in front of the entire Flash staff!

  “She’s a detective?” Sondra cried. “Then Yvonne did hire you to spy on my brother—and now you’ve killed him!” Sondra burst into tears, crying as if she’d never be
able to stop.

  To Nancy’s amazement, Ned put his arm around her, trying to comfort her. The rat! Nancy thought furiously.

  “Sondra, it’s not like that,” Ned said. “Nancy’s a good person! This is all a mistake!” But his arm stayed around her shoulders. Nancy felt betrayed and wounded. There she was, being arrested for murder, and her boyfriend was worried about another woman!

  Ned’s words didn’t make any difference to Sondra, who kept crying, or to the rest of the staff, either. They stared at Nancy in stunned and disgusted silence. She felt like a traitor. Brenda’s beady eyes glittered happily. She was thoroughly enjoying Nancy’s misfortune.

  “Okay, Drew,” Officer Bellows ordered, “O’Hara’s got you covered. Don’t try anything funny.” Bellows whipped out her handcuffs and snapped them neatly onto Nancy’s wrists. Nancy forced back tears. No way was she going to cry in front of all those people.

  Suddenly Nancy found her voice. “You’ve got it all wrong,” she cried, struggling against the handcuffs. “Mick was the one who tried to kill Yvonne! When I walked into this office, he was pulling that silver revolver out of his bottom desk drawer!”

  “Liar!” Sondra exclaimed, still sobbing.

  “I swear it’s true! We were struggling for the gun when it went off! It wasn’t my fault!” Nancy could feel the tears building up uncontrollably within her.

  “Mick’s no murderer!” Sondra screamed.

  “I saw the proof with my own eyes,” Nancy replied vehemently.

  “Hey, could you hold it down?” came a voice from the floor. “I’ve got a horrible headache.”

  “Mick!” cried Sondra. “You’re alive!” She burst into a fresh storm of tears. “Thank heavens!”

  Nancy breathed a giant sigh of relief.

  “My head’s killing me,” Mick said. “I think I must have hit it on the edge of the desk when I fell.”

  “All right, Swanson,” Officer Bellows said to Mick. “Off the floor. Why don’t you tell me your side of the story? Drew here’s just accused you of trying to kill Yvonne Verdi.”

  Mick stared at Nancy, a look of hurt betrayal in his blue eyes. “How can you possibly think that?” he asked.

  Nancy rolled her eyes. “The gun, Mick, the gun! Don’t you remember? You were pulling it out of your desk when I walked in here.”

  “But it’s not mine!” Mick said, turning from Nancy to Officer Bellows. “I’ve never seen it before in my life. I don’t own a gun! The only kind of shooting I know about is photography!”

  Officer Bellows stared suspiciously at Mick and Nancy. At last she said, “Looks as though you’re both going to have to come down to the station.” She turned to the others in the room. “The rest of you clear out of here. Detective Graham will be back to question you all.”

  Slowly, the staff filed out. Brenda threw Nancy a sleazy smile before she left. Soon only Ned and Sondra were left. “Uh, Officer Bellows,” Ned said tentatively, “do you think you could take those handcuffs off Nancy? I’ll vouch that she’s not dangerous, and I think she’s pretty uncomfortable with them on.”

  “Sorry,” said Officer Bellows. “Cuffs are standard procedure for bringing in a murder suspect.”

  “But, Officer, nobody’s been murdered,” Ned pointed out. “So how about it?”

  Officer Bellows blushed, embarrassed. Then, without a word, she set Nancy free. Nancy was filled with grateful relief. For a moment she wanted to throw her arms around Ned and kiss him. But the fact that he had his own arm around Sondra killed the urge right away.

  “Let’s get moving, you two,” Officer Bellows said. Still holding her pistol, she and the silent O’Hara ushered Nancy and Mick down the hallway, past the gawking staff members and into the elevator. The doors opened and Mick turned to Nancy. “After you, Miss Detective,” he said wryly. Ned and Sondra followed, like mourners at a funeral.

  Nancy was beginning to have compassion for all the criminals she’d helped to arrest over the years. The public embarrassment of being led off by the cops was horrible! Ned and Sondra hailed a cab and headed toward the police station. Nancy and Mick got into the back of the patrol car while Bellows and O’Hara settled into the front. After a short, miserable ride, they arrived at the precinct.

  Officer Bellows had confiscated the revolver as evidence before she’d left Flash. As soon as Nancy and Mick had been fingerprinted, she sent the gun to the police lab to be tested against the bullet that Detective Graham had taken out of Yvonne’s office wall. Then she let Nancy and Mick make one phone call each.

  Luckily, Nancy’s father and her attorney were one and the same. It just so happened that Carson Drew was one of the state’s finest criminal lawyers. When he heard that Nancy was being held at the police precinct, he promised to be there as fast as he could.

  Once Mick had called his lawyer, Officer Bellows and Detective Graham sat down to interrogate their two suspects. The questioning was grueling. The police went over every aspect of the afternoon repeatedly.

  The ordeal was made even worse by Ned and Sondra standing around watching the whole thing. Since neither Nancy nor Mick had been accused of a crime yet, they weren’t interrogated in private. That meant that Nancy had to watch Ned consoling Sondra, comforting her, trying to calm her fears.

  Nancy struggled to keep her mind on Detective Graham’s and Officer Bellows’s questions, in spite of Ned and Sondra. She had to. If she seemed unsure of her answers, the police would be less likely to believe her side of the story.

  When the two officers had finished questioning Nancy, they turned to Mick. To her surprise, he didn’t deny anything that had happened. He admitted that the gun had been in his desk, that Nancy hadn’t been trying to kill him, that it had all been a crazy mistake. But over and over again he repeated adamantly that the gun had been planted in his desk. “For once,” he said, “the joke’s on me. And it’s not very funny.”

  Nancy actually felt sorry for Mick. How could he expect the police to accept his silly story when all the evidence was against him? He had no alibi for the afternoon, and any number of motives for wanting to knock off Yvonne.

  Nancy wasn’t too worried about herself. What could the police accuse her of? Nothing illegal. However, she greeted her father with great relief. He looked so sure of himself and so in control. “Nancy,” he said, coming over to kiss his daughter. “Honey, are you all right? I know this isn’t pleasant, but just hang on for a little while longer. We’ll have you out of here in no time.”

  Nancy gave her father a huge hug. He’d made it from River Heights in under forty-five minutes. He must have sped all the way here, Nancy thought to herself. Probably the only time he’s ever gone above the speed limit in his entire life!

  Moments later, the results came back from the lab. The gun and bullet matched.

  Officer Bellows turned to Nancy. “Ms. Drew, you’re free to leave.” Then she faced Mick. “Mr. Swanson,” she said solemnly, “you’re under arrest for the attempted murder of Yvonne Verdi.” Quickly she read him his rights. “Would you come with me? We’re going to have to put you in a cell.” For the second time that day, the policewoman pulled out her handcuffs.

  At first Mick didn’t move from his seat. He just blinked uncomprehendingly. Then he jumped up, knocking over his chair. “You think I’m a murderer? Me?” he cried. “But I didn’t do it, I swear. That gun isn’t mine! Someone planted it!”

  “You’ll have to explain that to the judge and jury,” Officer Bellows said calmly.

  “And how long will that take?” Mick asked. “A month? Two months? More?”

  Suddenly Mick’s face turned bright red. Nancy had seen his expression change in the same way on the first day she’d met him—just before he’d smashed Yvonne’s vase. He seemed to be losing control of himself.

  Grabbing Officer O’Hara’s gun out of his holster, Mick shrieked, “You are not going to lock me up for a crime I didn’t commit!” He kicked the overturned chair out of his way and made a desperate dash
across the room, straight for the precinct door!

  Chapter

  Eleven

  MICK WAS HALFWAY across the room before anyone reacted to his insane dash toward freedom. And because of his head start, it looked as though he might just make it out of the police station untouched! Then Detective Graham pulled out his pistol. “Stop or I’ll shoot!” he cried. But there was no way he could fire with so many people in the room.

  Nancy thought fast. She picked up the chair and slid it across the floor, hitting Mick hard in the legs. Mick went down, sprawling just out of reach of the precinct door.

  Officer Bellows pounced on the now-prone Mick and snapped her handcuffs on him. “It’s a good thing this young woman stopped you,” she said. “If you’d escaped, we’d only have tracked you down, and the jury would have been much tougher on you. Now let’s go.” She pulled Mick to his feet.

  “No!” Mick screamed. “I didn’t do it!” But Officer Bellows pushed him toward the hallway that held the temporary cells. Soon Mick had disappeared and his cries had died away.

  It was then that Nancy noticed Sondra quietly weeping in the corner. But Mick’s sister wasn’t alone in her misery. Ned was right there with her. Nancy almost swallowed her teeth when she saw him take her in his arms and gently stroke her hair.

  “It’s all right, Sondra. Don’t cry.”

  “Mick,” Sondra sobbed.

  Ned continued stroking Sondra. “Don’t worry,” he told her softly. “If your brother’s innocent, we’ll get him cleared. Nancy will help us. She’s the best detective around!” Ned glanced pleadingly at Nancy.

  But Nancy was seething. “I can’t believe what “I’m hearing,” she said through clenched teeth. “Look at you. You’re hugging her, and I’m standing right here! You’re supposed to care about me, Ned. I’ve been through a lot today. But you don’t so much as say a comforting word!”

  “Nancy,” Ned said, letting go of Sondra and walking hesitantly over to Nancy, “you know it’s not like that.”