028 The Black Widow

  "Sure," she said. Anything to pass the time until we get to Rio and I can do something, she added to herself. She was especially anxious to get to a telephone so she could call Ann Granger.

  At noon Nancy and Carson joined the other passengers on the Main Deck, watching the Rio harbor draw closer. It was a beautiful sight.

  Shimmering in the midday sun was a glass wall of tall luxury hotels, overlooking a broad stretch of white sand. Behind the hotels, a forest of high-rises and tenement buildings sloped up a gentle incline to the real forest—the jungle, just visible in the hazy distance.

  Dominating the scene was Sugarloaf Mountain at the city's northern end. A narrow spit of land connected it to the mainland. Nancy could barely make out the two tiny cable cars that were the only way of getting to and from the mountain-top.

  As they pulled into the cruiser's berth, Nancy strained her eyes, trying to spot Ned in the waiting crowd. Her attention was caught by two crew members nearby.

  "Rio at Carnival!" said one. "What a night this is going to be. I can hear the drums already."

  His mate sounded skeptical. "I don't see how we can enjoy ourselves, knowing we have to be back at dawn."

  "Yeah," replied the first, "but Captain Brant is a good guy, giving the whole crew shore leave on a night like tonight."

  At that moment Nancy caught sight of Ned. He was standing right at the end of the pier, his brown hair shining in the sun. Nancy's heart did its usual flip-flop at the sight of his handsome face and broad shoulders.

  She was the first passenger down the gangplank. Smiling, she twirled into Ned's arms. "Hello, stranger," she said softly.

  Ned pretended to look shocked. "Do I know you, miss?"

  "Oh, Ned!" Nancy kissed him hard. "Boy, have I missed you.''

  "All that partying and you still thought of me?" Ned teased gently, as he held her in a bear hug. His wann brown eyes showed how glad he really was to see her.

  He shook hands with Carson. Then, grabbing the heaviest suitcase, he led Nancy and Carson to the minibus for the Imperial Hotel on Copa-cabana Beach, where they would complete their vacation. The cruise ended in Rio.

  "Wait till you see this town!" Ned said to Nancy. "People are dancing in the streets—no one can tell me Carnival only happens after dark!"

  After Carson checked them all into the luxurious hotel suite, Nancy changed into a bright yellow cotton T-shirt, black jeans, and espa-drilles and met Ned on the terrace. She wasn't looking forward to telling him she had a new case—she knew he wouldn't be thrilled.

  Iced fruit drinks had already arrived when Nancy joined him. "Ned," she began a little nervously, "this isn't exactly going to be one big party."

  Ned's grin vanished. "Nancy—you're not on a case!"

  "Don't be annoyed, Ned," Nancy pleaded. "There's something really strange happening on

  the Emerald Queen, and I've got to find out what it is. Just hear me out."

  Nancy quickly outlined the case and the events of the previous three days. "And last night was no joke," she concluded. "Someone means business, and Fm in the way. Which means I must be getting close to some answers!"

  "Nancy, I know Fm going to sound like a broken record, but—don't you think this is a matter for the police?" Ned frowned as he looked into Nancy's eyes.

  "But what would I tell them?" Nancy gave Ned a pleading stare. "I can't just walk into the Rio police headquarters and tell them someone is playing practical jokes with deadly spiders, or that someone fiddled with my light switch."

  "I don't see why not," Ned said.

  "Fve got to get some hard evidence to give them, or they'll think Fm just a teenager with an overactive imagination. And Captain Brant's reputation may be on the line, too."

  Ned looked resigned. "Okay, supersleuth, I might have expected this. So, what do we do now?"

  Nancy took a last sip of her strawberry colada and stood up. "First, Fve got to call Ann Granger at the Record."

  Ann sounded very pleased with herself when Nancy finally got through.

  "Nancy, the whole Sea Queen Cruise Line is

  wrapped in mystery. Did you ever hear about that South American emerald heist a couple of years ago? The one that happened right there in Rio? . . . Well, Hector da Silva, the owner of the Sea Queen line, was about to be indicted for his supposed involvement in that case when he died. And no one has ever found the loot!''

  Nancy's heart pounded with excitement. Da Silva and Ribeiro... an unsolved emerald heist ... a doublecross. ... At last she began to have an idea what this case was about!

  Ann was still talking. Nancy interrupted her friend. "What did they have on da Silva? Was anyone else involved?"

  "Well," said Ann, "I checked the line's personnel records—don't ask me how, because I'm not revealing my source. The hotel manager was named Antonio—hold on, I've got it right here—" Papers rustled.

  Nancy didn't need to hear the rest. She knew the name would be Ribeiro. "Great stuff, Ann!"

  "Do any of these other names ring a bell?" Ann reeled off a few more names. "Avrel, Hinkley, Lopez, Masters, Wolfe—"

  "Wolfe! Is that Randy Wolfe?"

  "You got it," said Ann. "Randall Wolfe, seaman second class. He quit the Emerald Queen about a month before da Silva's death."

  "Really! Thanks, Ann." So Randy had served on the Emerald Queen before! He probably knew a lot more about Ribeiro than he had told her at

  first. No wonder Ribeiro wanted him out of the way. Well, Randy Wolfe had some explaining to do,

  "Ann, I've got to go. Remind me to buy you a deluxe pizza when I get back!"

  Nancy hung up the phone. Randy first. She dialed the hospital. After some trouble, she was put through to a supervisor who spoke English.

  "Wolfe?" the man's voice replied in answer to her question. "Fm sorry, miss, but we have no American by that name here."

  "What?" Nancy was stunned. "Are you sure?"

  "Quite sure, miss." The voice sounded annoyed.

  Nancy thanked him and hung up. She turned to Ned, alarmed.

  "Ned, Randy Wolfe is not in the hospital, which is where he's supposed to be. Do you think something could have happened to him?"

  Ned shrugged. "Maybe he discharged himself. It doesn't sound as if he was seriously hurt."

  "I hope you're right." Shaking oflf an uneasy feeling, Nancy went up to her room and changed into sneakers. When she came back down to the lobby, she told Ned, "I hope Randy can take care of himself. Right now we've got to return to the ship/'

  Nancy started walking briskly toward the door. "I know now what Ribeiro is after—and it looks as if he's just about to find it!"

  Chapter Eleven

  "WAIT A MINUTE, Nancy!'' Ned finally caught up with Nancy at the lobby doors. He grabbed her by the shoulders and turned her to face him. "What's going on? Why are we rushing out to the ship?"

  Nancy grabbed his hand and pulled him along the beach, picking her way between clusters of sunbathers.

  "Ned, I promise I'll explain everything to you as soon as we're on our way to the Emerald Queen/' she said breathlessly, hauling him toward a minibus stand. "All you need to know right now is that there's a cache of stolen jewels somewhere aboard that ship, and we've got to find it before the bad guy does!"

  "Oh, okay, Drew. No problem." Ned grinned at her as they ran. ''I can see you've got it under control. Why should I even worry?"

  Nancy grinned back. "You've got to admit, life with me is never dull. Oh, hurry, there's the bus!"

  "Hey, how do you know this one will take us where we want to go?" Ned asked as the doors slid shut behind them.

  Nancy looked sideways at her boyfriend. "I don't exactly know," she admitted with a guilty shrug. "Call it an educated guess."

  Ned heaved a deep sigh. "I'm in love with a lunatic," he complained to the ceiling,

  Ned and Nancy took seats near the back of the vehicle, Nancy peered out the window at Sugar-loaf, which loomed on the right as they whizzed up the avenue toward
Rio's city center.

  "See?" she chided Ned. "We're going in the right direction. You should trust me. I know what I'm doing."

  "Trust you." Ned groaned. "You get into more trouble than anyone I know, Nancy Drew. All right, so tell me what this is all about." He folded his arms and tried to look gloomy. "I just want to know what we're getting into."

  "Ann Granger's information filled in a lot of gaps for me," Nancy began. She told Ned about the emerald thefts and Mr. da Silva's indictment.

  "So I put that together with what I already knew. One: Antonio Ribeiro was trying to extort some kind of map from Mrs. da Silva. Two: the da Silvas had had serious money problems. Three: Ribeiro and Mr. da Silva had had some correspondence about a map. And then I realized that da Silva must have collaborated with Ribeiro.

  "He and Ribeiro together stole this cafgo of emeralds somehow and hid it aboard the Emerald Queen!"

  "Wait a minute—you've lost me/' Ned said. "First of all, what makes you think the emeralds are still there? Why didn't da Silva or Ribeiro collect them?"

  "Da Silva didn't retrieve them right away, because he was suspected of having stolen them. Then he died before the inquiry was over. And Ribeiro couldn't get them, because he didn't know where they were! Da Silva double-crossed him!"

  Ned gave a long whistle. "That would certainly explain why he wasn't overly fond of Mrs. da Silva. But where exactly does she fit in? What were you saying about a map?"

  Nancy reached over and ruffled Ned's hair. "I'll make a detective of you yet, Nickerson," she teased. "You're asking all the right questions.

  "Before he died, da Silva made a map, showing the location of the emeralds. He gave it to his wife SO that she'd be able to find them and cash in on them."

  "Now, hold on, Nancy," Ned interrupted. "How do you know she hasn't already found them? She could be in Miami living it up!"

  "Because she didn't have all the clues!" Nancy replied. "Da Silva wasn't a total crook. He wanted Ribeiro to get his cut. He just wanted to make sure his wife got her share when Ribeiro finally dug them out of their hiding place! He wrote to Ribeiro, telling him that Nina had the key to the emeralds' hiding place. That's the letter I found in Ribeiro's desk.

  "But the idea backfired. When Nina came on this cruise, hoping to find the emeralds for herself, Ribeiro tried to intimidate her into giving him the map."

  "But she wouldn't," Ned prompted.

  "She couldn't," Nancy corrected him. "She couldn't—because she'd already passed the map on to me!"

  Doubt shadowed Ned's eyes. "You mean the drawing of the spider? Is that the 'map'?"

  "It has to be. At first I thought it was the blueprint of the ship that Ribeiro was after, but then I realized that if it had been anything that simple, Mrs. da Silva would have figured it out and retrieved the emeralds long ago. No, I think that da Silva somehow coded his hiding place in that bizarre drawing, and Mrs. da Silva slipped it

  under my door. She knew I was a detective. Maybe she hoped that somehow Fd realize what it was and decipher it for her. Or maybe she just lost her nerve and decided to try and hide it from Ribeiro.

  "Anyway, I couldn't figure out what the drawing was supposed to mean. I'm hoping Ribeiro hasn't solved it yet."

  "So now we have to find the emeralds and get them oflf the ship before he does." Ned shook his head. "Tall order, Nancy."

  Nancy nodded. "Don't I know it." Suddenly she straightened in her seat. "We're here, Ned."

  The two teenagers got off the bus and walked along the pier to the cruise ship's docking berth. There wasn't much activity, compared to the morning's bustle. Nancy kept a careful eye out as they walked up the gangplank to the deserted Main Deck. "I'm sure there must be some crew members left on board," she said quietly to Ned.

  "Where to?" Ned whispered.

  "Upstairs—the Amethyst Deck. Ribeiro's cabin."

  "Do you have a credit card?" Nancy whispered to Ned at Ribeiro's door. Ned nodded and handed her a thin plastic card.

  "Last time I broke in," Nancy said, smiling as she maneuvered the card between the doorjamb and the tongue of the lock, "all I had was a nail file. These doors are too easy to open, if you ask me." She released the lock and turned the doorknob. "Keep your fingers crossed."

  Ribeiro's room was disappointing—they found nothing except business papers. He must have decided to carry his personal papers with him.

  Next they tried Randy's room. Maybe, Nancy thought, she'd come across something that would tell her what Randy's part in all this was.

  Nancy's pulse quickened as she opened the top drawer of Randy's desk. In the back, half hidden under a pile of canceled checks, was a bundle of letters. She started to read the top one.

  "Dearest Randy," it began, "how can I ever thank you for making this cruise the best ever for me? ..." Nancy quickly skimmed the next few letters. All of them seemed to be from old girlfriends.

  There was little of interest in Randy's room. "How about trying sick bay?" Ned suggested. "We may be able to learn where they sent him, if he can't be found at the naval hospital."

  "Good idea." Nancy nodded. "Let's go."

  It was eerie to walk through the deserted corridors. The only sounds were the distant thrum of the ship's engines and their own sneakers softly thudding. Nancy led the way to sick bay, which was aft on the Amethyst Deck. Luckily, there was no one on duty.

  But they encountered a snag—the medical logbooks were in a cabinet secured by a combination lock that Nancy couldn't crack.

  "Let me try," Ned suggested. He crouched by the lock and cracked his knuckles. In spite of her frustration, Nancy couldn't help but smile.

  She got to her feet. "Good luck, Houdini." Looking around the room, she noticed a crumpled white dinner jacket hanging over a chair. She picked it up and examined it. It still had Randy's assistant cruise director nameplate pinned to it. There was a sticky black smear by one of the pockets. It must be curare, from the dart that Randy was shot with.

  Nancy frowned. Why did that seem strange?

  Just then she heard men's voices in the hall outside. Someone was coming! Quick as a flash, she sprang to the door and locked it.

  The voices moved closer, and then Nancy saw the doorknob jiggle. She cast a frantic glance at Ned, who was frozen by the locked cabinet.

  "Sorry, sir, I don't have my keys with me," one of the voices said. Nancy closed her eyes in relief. Then the other man spoke.

  "Never mind. I'll get mine." The cold tone sent a shiver up Nancy's spine. As both pairs of footsteps moved off, she turned to Ned.

  "We've got to get out of here. That was Ribeiro!" she whispered. Ned's eyes widened, and he nodded.

  There was no way they could lock the door again once they were outside, but Nancy couldn't worry about that. She grabbed Ned's hand, and they raced up the nearest companionway.

  "I just want to get one last look at Mrs. da Silva's cabin/' she explained. "Maybe it'll tell me something. I get the feeling Ribeiro's doing the same thing we are. If we don't figure out da Silva's secret soon, he'll beat us to it."

  But it was Ned who found it. He'd been feeling around on the upper shelves of the closet, when suddenly Nancy heard him utter a soft exclamation. He turned around, holding a rectangular velvet box in his hands. Nestled in the silk lining was a blaze of gems.

  "We found it!" Ned crowed. He drew out a long strand of emeralds in an antique setting and held it up to sparkle in the light.

  Nancy grabbed Ned's arm. She'd seen that necklace before! "No, we didn't," she said in a taut voice. "But we may have found Mrs. da Silva. Ned, those are her jewels! She'd never have left them behind. Something must have happened to her!"

  "Could Ribeiro have killed her?" Ned asked, his voice grim.

  Nancy shook her head, her mind racing. "Possible, but I doubt it. She's more useful alive, until he finds the emeralds. No, I think he must be holding her prisoner—and I bet she's somewhere aboard this ship!"

  "We'll have to search the whole ship."
Ned strode to the door. "Her life's at stake."

  Nancy leapt after him. "Ned, that's it! You're a genius! It's got to be."

  "What on earth are you talking about?*'

  "Life! What's the one place on this ship where no one ever goes, except in emergencies? The lifeboatsl Follow me!"

  Taking the forward companionways so they wouldn't run into Ribeiro, Nancy and Ned dashed down to the Lifeboat Deck. Nancy ran to the railing and scanned the rows of davits. "That one," she said, pointing to a boat that was winched slightly lower than the others.

  Together, they raised the lifeboat to the deck. Nancy cleated it into place while Ned rolled back the canvas. She heard him draw in his breath.

  "Nancy," he said, "I think we're too late."

  Chapter Twelve

  "Oh, no! We can't be!'' Nancy sprang to Ned's side and peered into the hfeboat.

  Nina da Silva lay in the bottom of the boat, still and pale as a wax statue. Nancy bit her lip, then reached in and gently pressed a fingertip into the hollow at the base of Nina's throat.

  After a moment she looked up at Ned. ''She is alive—I can feel her pulse. But it's irregular. And she's so cold! She must be heavily sedated. We've got to get her to a doctor somehow."

  ''At least she's alive," Ned said, relief evident in his voice. "What are we waiting for?"

  Nancy stared. "Do you know how we're going to get Mrs. da Silva down the gangplank in broad daylight, especially in her condition?"

  "We don't have to." Ned made a sweeping gesture toward the lifeboat. "Your chariot awaits, m'lady. Step in."

  Nancy gaped. "Ned, have you gone—oh, I get it!" She laughed out loud, then clapped a guilty hand over her mouth and stepped quickly into the boat. "Brilliant, Nickerson!" she whispered.

  "Call me Houdini." Grinning, Ned climbed in after her. Then he took the hand-operated winch from the boat's locker and attached it to the ropes. As he cranked the handle, the boat sank to the water. Within moments they were afloat.

  Nancy and Ned then turned their attention to Nina. "We'll just have to row as close as possible to our hotel in the lifeboat," Ned said. "Then all we have to do is get her onshore, and we're home free."