“How do you have time?” Marcy asked. “Aren’t you guys solving the case of Kendra’s missing ice-cream recipe?”
Nancy, Bess, and George shared surprised looks.
“Who told you that?” Nancy asked.
“I read it on Deirdre’s Web site,” Marcy said. “She wrote that the Clue Crew will solve the case for sure. There was even a neat picture of you guys all giving a thumbs-up!”
“Did she give away Kendra’s recipe?” Nancy asked.
“Nope,” Marcy said.
Nancy sighed with relief. “At least she didn’t do that,” she said.
“Hey,” Marcy said, looking to her side. “Where’s Cassidy?”
The girls spun around. Cassidy was sitting on the doorstep eating Clue-berry ice cream from the coffee can!
“Yummy for the tummy!” Cassidy shouted.
“Drop that spoon now, you little pest!” Marcy shouted as she raced over to Cassidy.
“Our second batch of ice cream,” George groaned.
“Maybe we aren’t meant to enter this contest.” Bess sighed.
Nancy smiled as she watched Marcy wrestling the spoon out of her little sister’s hand.
“Oh, yes we are,” Nancy said. “Cassidy likes it. So maybe Jim and Barry will too!”
“I think Daisy did it, Dad,” Nancy said that night. “She was standing right behind Kendra. And she said their new recipe was top secret and a winner!”
Mr. Drew looked up from the newspaper he was reading. He liked reading the paper in his favorite chair every night. “Try not to jump to conclusions, Nancy,” he said.
Nancy wrinkled her nose and said, “Jump where?”
“It means don’t end your case before you check out everything,” Mr. Drew said with a smile. “Things aren’t always what they seem to be, you know.”
“Okay, Daddy,” Nancy said. “But it sure seems like Daisy took Kendra’s recipe.”
It was still light outside, so Nancy had permission to play in the yard. With Chip at her heels, she skipped to the front door.
“Come on, Chip,” Nancy said. “Let’s see if you can catch a Frisbee!”
Nancy swung the front door open. As she stepped outside she felt something crunch under her foot. She looked down and gasped. A message had been left on her doorstep. It read, “GIVE UP!”
Nancy looked closer.
The message was written with wooden Popsicle sticks!
“Eww, don’t touch them!” Bess warned. “If they’re Popsicle sticks—they’ve been licked!”
It was Friday morning. The Popsicle sticks from the weird message the night before were spread out on Nancy’s desk.
“Licked Popsicle sticks usually have ice-cream stains on them,” Nancy said. “These don’t.”
“That makes it even weirder!” George said.
Nancy picked up a stick and flipped it over in her hand. “Each stick has the words Lickety Sticks Company stamped on it,” she said. “That must be the place where these Popsicle sticks were made.”
“Who would leave such a creepy message?” Bess asked.
“Thanks to Deirdre, everyone knows we’re trying to solve Kendra’s case,” Nancy said. “So the person who stole Kendra’s recipe probably wants us to give up.”
“But who would have that many Popsicle sticks?” Bess asked.
The girls thought in silence. Suddenly George snapped her fingers and said, “Kevin had a box of Popsicles in his shopping basket.”
“A box like that holds only six Popsicles,” Nancy said. “A lot more sticks were used to write that message.”
“Maybe it’s more than one person,” Bess said. “Daisy’s fan club eats ice cream all the time. And Jim and Barry make Popsicles too.”
“I wish we could go to a club meeting,” Nancy said. “Then we could find out what kind of ice cream they’re making for the contest.”
George pointed to a calendar hanging over Nancy’s desk. “Today is Friday,” she said. “Doesn’t the Jim and Barry Fan Club meet every Friday?”
“How can we go to go a meeting if we’re not members?” Bess asked.
The girls didn’t say a word as they thought. Then Nancy had a brainstorm.
“I know! Let’s join the club!” Nancy said.
“I don’t want to join that dumb club!” Bess whined. “Daisy is so bossy.”
“And we already have a club,” George said. “A detective club.”
“We’ll just be joining to get their top secret recipe,” Nancy explained. “We don’t have to go to any meetings after that.”
The girls knew that Daisy lived on Sparrow Street. George turned on the computer and found Daisy’s street on a special Map Search site.
“Only four blocks away,” George announced. “We can go there together.”
Bess and George already had their bikes and helmets at Nancy’s house. Nancy grabbed hers and the three pedaled to Daisy’s house.
As the girls rode, the Mr. Drippy truck rambled past them. Henderson stuck his head out the window and shouted, “Ewww! It’s the Clue Creeeeew!”
“How does he know we’re the Clue Crew?” Bess called from her bike.
“Probably from school,” Nancy called back.
“We’re famous!” George declared with a smile.
The three girls turned onto Sparrow Street. They parked their bikes against a big tree on the sidewalk. Then they walked up the cobblestone path to Daisy’s house.
A teenage boy opened the door after the girls knocked. “You’re here for my sister’s meeting?” he asked. “So what’s the secret password?”
Password? The girls traded worried looks.
“Um . . . cone?” Nancy guessed.
“Sprinkles?” Bess asked.
“Banana split?” George said.
The boy stared at the girls. Then he cracked up laughing. “There is no password!” he said. “You fell for it. I am so gooooood!”
George rolled her eyes as the boy yelled for his sister. “Brothers!” she groaned. “I’ve got two of them!”
Daisy came running to the door. She looked surprised to see Nancy, Bess, and George.
“Hi, Daisy,” Nancy said. “We want to join the Jim and Barry Fan Club!”
“You want to join right before the contest?” Daisy asked. “You don’t want to steal our secret recipe, do you?”
“No way!” Nancy said. “We have our own recipe for the contest, remember?”
Daisy folded her arms as she looked from Nancy to Bess to George. “Okay,” she said. “But every member has to pass a taste test first.”
“You mean taste ice cream?” Bess asked.
“All right!” George cheered. “That’s one pop quiz we want to take!”
Nancy, Bess, and George followed Daisy into the house. As they walked through the kitchen, Daisy introduced them to her mother. Mrs. Dorfer was on her knees stuffing cans and boxes into a big blue recycling bag. Daisy then led the girls downstairs to the basement. The fan club was sitting cross-legged on the floor. Melissa and Peter waved to the girls. Nancy thought most of the kids looked friendly.
“Peter’s T-shirt says Marshmallow Martian,” Bess whispered. “Yuck-o!”
“Shhh!” Nancy warned. “We have to love all the flavors or they won’t let us join the club.”
Daisy walked to a desk near the door. She held up a writing pad and said, “I just wrote our recipe nice and neat for Jim and Barry to read tomorrow.”
Nancy, Bess, and George stepped forward.
“Nuh-uh!” Daisy said. She ripped the page off the writing pad. “Not until you join the club.”
“Sure,” Nancy said. “Let the taste test begin!”
Soon Nancy, Bess, and George were sitting on chairs in the middle of the room. Club members giggled as they tied colorful bandannas over the girls’ eyes. Nancy couldn’t see but she could hear everyone chatting excitedly. She could even smell something sweet—like ice cream!
“George is first,” Daisy said. “Give her
the bowl, Melissa.”
Nancy heard George’s spoon clatter against ceramic. Then she heard a gulp as if George was swallowing.
“Well?” Daisy asked.
“It has a definite nutty taste,” George’s voice said. “With a touch of caramel . . . and just a hint of—”
“What is it already?” a boy demanded.
“Peanut Brittle Blast!” George said.
The club members applauded.
“Correct,” Daisy said. “You can take your blindfold off, George.”
Next was Nancy’s turn. She felt an ice-cream bar being shoved into her hand. Taking a bite, she began to chew. The ice cream was crunchy, as if it had bits of candy inside.
“I’m pretty sure this is Toffee Coffee,” Nancy said.
More applause.
“You guys are good!” Daisy exclaimed.
Nancy whipped off her blindfold. Still eating the ice cream, she turned to George and winked.
“Bess is last,” Daisy said. “Give her the ice cream, Melissa.”
Melissa smiled as she stepped forward with a bowl. Nancy gasped when she saw the mound of ice cream inside the bowl. It was bright green!
Oh, no! Nancy thought. It’s Marshmallow Martian!
Nancy glanced sideways at George. She was staring at the green ice cream too.
“Um, Daisy,” Nancy said. “That flavor is too easy!”
“What are you talking about?” Daisy asked.
“Bess likes hard test questions!” George piped in.
“Since when?” Bess said. She smiled under her blindfold and shouted, “Bring it on!”
Nancy held her breath as Bess took the bowl. Still blindfolded, Bess felt around for the spoon. Carefully she took a spoonful, than stuck it straight into her mouth.
Bess’s chin moved up and down. Suddenly her eyebrows flew up above the blindfold. She puffed out her cheeks and spit the ice cream back into the bowl. “Bleeeech!! Marshmallow Martian! Gross! Phooey!”
Bess whipped off her blindfold. She jumped up, leaving the bowl of ice cream on her chair. Nancy and George jumped up too.
“Maybe there was a hair in it!” Nancy said.
The club members stared open-mouthed at Bess. Daisy folded her arms across her chest and said, “We only take members who love all of Jim and Barry’s ice-cream flavors.”
“Yeah,” Peter sneered. “Maybe Mr. Drippy has a fan club you can join!”
Nancy stared back at the club members. They didn’t look so friendly anymore.
“Er—we have to go,” Nancy said quickly.
“We have tons of homework!” George said.
“In July?” Daisy asked.
“It’s never too early to start!” Nancy said with a smile. In a flash the girls raced out of the basement room. They said a polite goodbye to Mrs. Dorfer, then raced out of the house to their bikes.
“It’s my fault!” Bess wailed. “I blew it!”
Nancy took one last bite of her ice-cream bar. “You were just being honest, Bess,” she said. “Besides, we didn’t want to join that club anyway.”
“Now we’ll never find out their secret recipe for the contest,” Bess wailed.
“Who says we won’t?” George asked.
Nancy and Bess turned to George. She was holding a piece of paper in her hand and grinning from ear to ear.
“Look what I grabbed on the way out,” George said. “It’s the paper that was underneath the recipe they wrote.”
“It’s blank!” Bess said.
“Not exactly,” George said. She pointed to the paper. “Check out the scratches on it. Those are the marks the pen made when Daisy wrote the recipe on the top page.”
“I get it!” Nancy said. “If we can read the scratches, we can read the recipe.”
“How?” Bess asked.
Nancy stuck the Popsicle stick in her pocket. She pulled a pencil out of her waist pack and said, “Watch. It’s a trick I learned in a mystery book.”
Nancy used the side of the pencil point to lightly draw over the scratches. The words appeared like magic!
“What does it say?” Bess asked.
The girls studied the paper.
“It says . . .
‘Oatmeal Cookie and Raisin Crunch Ice Cream,’” Nancy said. “Not Chock Full of Chocolate.”
“How do we know it’s for real?” George asked. “Maybe they just wrote a fake recipe to trick us.”
Nancy carried the Popsicle stick to a trash can in front of the Dorfers’ house. On the sidewalk next to the can was a big blue recycling bag—the same bag Mrs. Dorfer was stuffing things into before.
Nancy kneeled down and peered through the clear blue plastic. “Look!” she said, pointing with the Popsicle stick. “This bag is filled with empty raisin containers and oatmeal cookie boxes.”
George looked at the list of ingredients on the scratchy paper. “That’s what they used to make the ice cream,” she said. “I guess the club didn’t make Chock Full of Chocolate.”
Nancy glanced at the Jim and Barry Popsicle stick in her hand. The words “Lickety Sticks Company” were not stamped on it. “They didn’t write the creepy message, either,” she said.
The girls took the Jim and Barry Fan Club off the suspect list. They decided to sit down and come up with more suspects.
“Can we talk over fruit smoothies?” George asked.
“But we just had ice cream!” Nancy said.
“I only had one spoonful,” George said.
“And I spit mine out,” Bess said. “So that doesn’t count.”
The girls pedaled their bikes two blocks to River Street. As they parked them, they noticed a sign in the window of the Mean Bean Health Food Store. It read SMOOTHIES! 100% REAL FRUIT.
Nancy, Bess, and George walked inside. The store always smelled like the inside of a vitamin bottle.
“This is the place that Kevin’s parents own,” George whispered. “If he’s here, maybe we can ask him questions.”
“Sure,” Nancy said. But deep inside she still didn’t think Kevin stole Kendra’s recipe.
Mr. Garcia stood behind the juice counter. He made three smoothies—strawberry for Bess, banana for George, and banana-strawberry for Nancy.
“Is Kevin here?” Bess asked.
Mrs. Garcia walked over from the vitamin shelf. “Kevin is out spending his birthday money,” she said.
“Hopefully on that new Yoga for Kids DVD!” Mr. Garcia said with a grin. “I heard it really rocks!”
“Can we add some wheat grass juice to your smoothies?” Mrs. Garcia asked. “Very healthy!”
“And tasty!” Mr. Garcia added.
“Grass?” George gulped.
“Um . . . no, thank you,” Nancy said.
The three friends carried their smoothies out of the store. They were about to stick their straws through the plastic lids when Kendra huffed over.
“Smoothies?” Kendra cried. “You’re supposed to be finding out who stole my recipe. The contest is tomorrow!”
“We were having a high-energy snack,” George said. “So we’ll have lots of strength to solve the case!”
But Nancy knew Kendra was right. Time was running out.
“We’ll do our best, Kendra,” Nancy promised.
Kendra heaved a big sigh. Then she ran to catch up with her mother.
“We have to solve this case, Clue Crew,” Nancy said. “Let’s sit down somewhere and really get to work!”
The girls saw a bench in front of the Chocolate Soldier Shop. As they walked toward it, the door of the shop swung open. A boy rushed out with a box tucked under his arm. On the box was a picture of a chocolate soldier.
“It’s Kevin,” Nancy whispered.
The girls ducked behind the bench. Between the wooden slats they watched Kevin running to a shiny blue bike parked at the curb. He dropped the box into the bike basket, then pulled on a helmet, climbed on, and pedaled away.
“That didn’t look like a yoga DVD to me,” George said. ?
??He spent his birthday money on chocolate!”
“No one can eat that much chocolate,” Bess asked. “Not even Kevin Garcia!”
“Unless he’s not eating it,” Nancy said slowly.
“What do you mean?” George asked.
“Maybe Kevin did enter the ice-cream contest,” Nancy said slowly. “And maybe he is making Kendra’s ice cream!”
“Let’s follow Kevin on our bikes,” Nancy suggested. “And see what he’s up to.”
“And lose our awesome fruit smoothies?” George asked. “Nuh-uh!”
The girls sat on the bench slurping their drinks.
“Maybe there’s a way to find out if Kevin entered the ice-cream contest,” Nancy said.
“The Jim and Barry Ice Cream Factory is on this street,” George said. “Do you think the guys would let us see the sign-up list?”
“We can ask them,” Nancy said.
The girls finished their smoothies. Then they rode their bikes all the way down the street to the Jim and Barry Ice Cream Factory. After filing through the revolving doors they looked around. The lobby wall was covered with pictures of Jim and Barry. A guard was sitting at a big wooden desk. Her nameplate read BEVERLY SHAW.
“We’re not giving away ice cream, kids,” Beverly said.
“We don’t want any ice cream,” Nancy said.
“We just want to see the sign-up list for the contest, please,” George said.
“Sorry, girls,” Beverly said. “That list is private.”
“Then can we meet Jim and Barry?” Bess asked.
“Jim and Barry are hard at work,” Beverly said, shaking her head. “They’re coming up with the next flavor.”
“What is it?” Nancy asked.
“That’s private too,” Beverly said. Her phone rang. She picked it up and said, “Jim and Barry’s Ice Cream.”
The girls traded glances as Beverly began talking. There had to be a way to get inside the factory and speak to Jim and Barry!
“Hold on, sir. I’ll check the calendar,” Beverly said into the phone. She opened her desk drawer and began rummaging through it.
“Come on!” George hissed.
In a blink, the girls were tiptoeing quickly and quietly down the hallway. At the end of the hall was a big steel door. A sign on it read EMPLOYEES ONLY!