The bidding started. One hundred, two hundred, up to five hundred dollars!
“It’s only estimated at one hundred fifty,” Nancy informed the cousins. She held up her hand, signaling an offer.
“Are you crazy?” Bess cried under her breath, as the auctioneer announced Nancy’s bid of five hundred fifty.
“I’m just curious,” the young detective replied, waiting for one of two other bidders to respond.
Both of them had seemed unusually eager to buy the piece, but now they were silent.
“Going once, twice,” the auctioneer said slowly. He held his mallet ready to pound on a desk.
Panic-stricken, Nancy realized that she was about to become the proud owner of something she really didn’t want. Not only that, she would have to drain her savings account to pay for it!
7
The Fake Bidder
The auctioneer held the mallet a moment longer, glancing at the men who had bid first on the medallion. Nancy’s heart pounded as she prayed that one of them would raise his hand.
She didn’t see the signal, but the auctioneer suddenly said, “Six hundred dollars. I have a bid of six hundred. Do I hear more?”
“Whew!” Bess exclaimed, echoing Nancy’s own relief. “What would you have done?”
“I’d probably have to scrub Dad’s office for the rest of my life!” Nancy said.
“Why did you bid on that thing, anyway?” George inquired.
Nancy shrugged. “I did it on the spur of the moment, thinking perhaps I’d get some reaction from those men by starting to compete with them.”
Nancy paused a moment, then added, “And I was hoping that if I entered the bidding, I might pick up a clue as to why they both wanted the medallion.”
“Well, it didn’t happen,” George said.
Nancy nodded. She wondered if the men would challenge each other further, but the medallion went to the one who had offered six hundred dollars.
Eagerly the girls watched the rest of the auction. A set of Meissen dinnerware was sold to a woman. Georgian candlesticks went to someone else and an unusual array of dinner bells to a third person. The men who had bid for the medallion remained silent throughout the balance of the sale.
When it was over, Nancy rose to her feet. “I’d like to congratulate the winner,” she told her friends.
“We’re sticking with you,” Bess said, following her cousin and Nancy through the crowd.
The man who had bought the medallion was short, with a bald head that shone like a billiard ball, and Nancy was able to keep him in sight easily. He went to a counter already filled with winning bidders who wished to claim their prizes. When one woman stepped away with a small carton, he quickly took her place.
Nancy and her friends moved behind him, noticing the name stamped on the check he signed. It was Russell Kaiser!
Was he related to Galen Kaiser? the girls wondered. If so, why would he have bid on something that belonged to the Kaiser family in the first place?
“Mr. Kaiser,” Nancy said as a clerk handed him the medallion, “I wanted to—”
“Aren’t you the person who forced the bid to six hundred?” he grumbled.
“Yes, I am,” Nancy replied, somewhat embarrassed.
“Humph.”
“May I ask you a couple of questions?” she went on boldly.
“What about?”
“The medallion, of course.”
“I’m sorry, miss. I have a dinner party to go too and I’m late already. Excuse me.”
He brushed past her, muttering under his breath, and hurried toward an exit sign.
“He certainly wasn’t very friendly,” George said. “I wonder why that medallion is so important.”
“I guess we’ll never know,” Bess commented with disappointment.
Just then a voice behind them stopped the conversation. “Miss Nancy Drew?” a man asked, causing the girls to face the other bidder on the medallion.
He was blond, about forty, and had thick, straight eyebrows that lay close together over a long and rather slim nose.
“I’m Nancy Drew,” the young detective spoke up, surprised that he knew her name.
“I’m Russell Kaiser.”
“Huh?” Bess replied, incredulous.
“No, that was—” Nancy started to say, quickly catching herself. She let the man continue.
“I recognized you from a newspaper article that covered a recent mystery you solved,” he went on.
“Which one?” Nancy replied.
“I’m sorry to say I really don’t remember,” he said, blushing.
“Are you sure your name is Kaiser?” George asked, unable to restrain herself any longer.
“Of course.”
“We don’t mean to sound presumptuous,” Bess said, “but the gentleman who just bought that medallion claimed he was Russell Kaiser.”
“What? That’s impossible.”
“His name was on the check he signed.”
Immediately, their listener pulled out a checkbook, then other identification cards, glancing through them rapidly.
“Everything’s here,” he said, slipping them back into his coat pocket. “But I’ve got to stop payment on that man’s check in case he’s trying to draw money out of my bank account!”
He hurried to the desk clerk, spoke to him briefly, then returned to the girls.
“Mr. Kaiser—” Nancy began.
“Call me Russell.”
“Okay, Russell. If you don’t mind my asking, I’d like to know why two men would bid three times the estimated value of that medallion.”
Her listener hesitated a moment before speaking. “I just returned from a business trip and found a letter from an old friend of my uncle‘s,” he began.
“Your uncle was Galen Kaiser?” Nancy inquired.
“Yes. His friend indicated that he wished to have the medallion for sentimental reasons. Everything, though, had been shipped to the auction house already, and there was no way to get hold of the medallion before the bidding started. So the only thing I could do was bid on it myself.”
“What a shame,” Bess commented, thinking the man had not only lost out on the piece for his uncle’s friend but an impostor had walked away with it!
“Are you sure your uncle’s friend only wanted the medallion for sentimental reasons?” Nancy inquired.
Russell seemed puzzled by the question. “What do you mean?”
“Well,” Nancy went on, “isn’t it strange that someone else would have bid so much for the piece?”
“Nancy’s right,” Bess said. “There must be something about the medallion that none of us realizes.”
“I certainly don’t know what it is,” he said. “I bid as much as I could possibly afford, but then—” His voice trailed off and he looked as if he were about to cry. “My uncle was a fine man—good to his friends, and they loved him. I happen to know that the man who wrote to me helped my uncle at a time when he needed it.”
Although the girls knew nothing about the Kaiser family, they were overwhelmed by the nephew’s obvious sensitivity. If only they could capture the stranger and rescue the medallion!
“Will you help me find the impostor?” the man pleaded.
“Definitely,” Bess replied.
“I’ll give a complete description of him to the police,” Nancy volunteered and stood up to go to the nearest telephone.
“Wait!” Russell said. “I’d rather postpone that for the time being. You see, my family is well-known, and I’d like to avoid any publicity about this. If you don’t track the man down on your own, we can call the police then.”
Nancy hesitated a moment, but then acceded to the man’s wishes. “We’ll see what we can come up with,” she promised. “Where can we reach you?”
“Here,” he replied, handing her a printed card. “I work out of my home,” he added.
The address, to Nancy’s surprise, was not in a chic East Side neighborhood. It was in the heart of midto
wn, west of Fifth Avenue.
“We’ll be in touch as soon as we have something to report,” she said.
On the way back to Aunt Eloise’s apartment, the girls discussed the strange events of the evening.
“It’s really peculiar,” George commented. “We go to an auction looking for Ted Henri and wind up hunting for Russell Kaiser’s impersonator.”
Nancy nodded thoughtfully. “I guess we’ve stumbled on a completely new mystery!”
8
A Precious Secret
The next morning, the girls were up early. “What’s our program for today?” Bess asked when they all were seated around the breakfast table.
“I think we should go the police station and take a look at the mug shots. Perhaps we can find a lead to the identity of the fake Russell Kaiser,” Nancy declared.
“Good idea,” George declared.
“I also want to call Jackie, just to make sure that neither of the two men we saw last night was Ted.”
As soon as Nancy swallowed her last mouthful of scrambled eggs, she contacted the model. Jacqueline confirmed that her brother did not have a bulbous nose or any pock marks under his eyes.
“I’m sorry you weren’t successful,” she added.
“Well, we’ve come upon another interesting mystery in the interim,” Nancy said, and told the young woman about the medallion with the lion’s head on top and the two Russell Kaisers. “I don’t know if there’s a connection between the symbol on your brother’s note and the figure on the medallion, but we’re following it all up. I am leaving for the police station now.”
“My, you are a busy detective.” The model laughed into the phone.
Nancy smiled. “My stockpile of mysteries is getting a little heavy,” she admitted. “After we finish talking to the police, I’ll have to stop by Mr. Reese’s office.”
“He happens to be near a wonderful little dress shop, which you all must see,” Jackie said. “Promise me you’ll go.” She gave Nancy the address.
The girl detective chuckled, secretly wondering if the dresses would be as outlandish as the makeup results on Bess.
“We’ll let you know if we buy anything,” she concluded the conversation.
Bess and George had already slipped into their coats and waited impatiently for Nancy to put hers on. Then they said good-bye to Aunt Eloise, who was also preparing to leave.
“Marjorie and I have to tally the proceeds of the show this morning,” she informed her niece.
“Well, I hope you made a whole bucket full of money and—” Nancy said when the ring of the telephone interrupted her.
“You take it, dear,” Aunt Eloise said.
To Nancy’s surprise, it was a telegram from her father! She listened intently to the message which the operator read:
COULD NOT REACH YOU BY PHONE. SENDING IMPORTANT PAPERS TODAY. PLEASE WAIT FOR THEM.
“How strange!” Nancy said to her friends as she hung up the receiver.
“Who was it?” Bess asked.
“Dad—I mean a telegram from Dad.”
“That is odd,” George remarked. “Of course, we came in late last night, but he could have called this morning. Maybe you ought to try phoning him.”
The same thought had occurred to Nancy. She made two telephone calls, one to the house where Hannah told her that her father had already left for the office, and the other to the office where his secretary informed her that Mr. Drew was off on an all-day business appointment.
“Well, I can’t chance it,” Nancy told the other girls. “If Dad wants me to wait for documents, I’d better do it.”
She took off the coat that hung loosely on her shoulders and returned it to the closet.
“Of course, this doesn’t mean you girls have to stick around,” she added.
Bess and George looked at each other unde cidedly. George finally suggested that they could save some time if she and Bess checked out the police mug shots.
“Good idea,” Nancy concurred. “By the time you get back, I ought to have the papers, and then we can head for Mr. Reese’s.”
“Are you sure you don’t mind?” Bess said, knowing that Nancy would have liked to review the police pictures herself.
“I’m positive,” Nancy said. “You saw the same man I did at the auction.”
That was reassurance enough to send the girls on their way.
“Oh, wait a minute,” Nancy said. “Here, take this. It’s the address of a dress shop Jacqueline told me about. Since we’re running short on time, maybe you ought to stop there before you come back.”
“Great!” Bess exclaimed.
Nancy handed each of the girls an umbrella from the closet. To Bess she said, “It’s supposed to rain today. I’m sure you don’t want those new curls to come undone.” The tiny curls that had framed her face the day before had begun to sag a bit, but Bess was determined to keep the hairdo.
In reply, Bess merely rolled her eyes and said, “Be back soon.”
Leaving Nancy to wait for the mysterious documents, Aunt Eloise followed the cousins out the door. When they arrived at the police station after a circuitous ride in a taxicab that had deposited Eloise Drew en route, George introduced herself and Bess.
“We’re friends of Nancy Drew, the amateur detective.”
The sergeant on duty had heard of Nancy and smiled. “Are you helping her on a case?” he inquired.
George nodded. “That’s why we’re here. We’d like to take a look at mug shots, if you don’t mind. We’re searching for a man whose name we don’t know.”
“What’d he do?” the sergeant asked.
“Impersonated a client of ours who doesn’t want any publicity about it. We promised to try finding the man on our own.”
“I see. Well, go ahead. Take a look at our file.”
He led them into a room and provided the photographs they had requested.
“Thanks,” the girls chorused almost in unison.
“Let me know if you recognize the guy!” The sergeant grinned.
For several minutes, the young detectives pored over the pictures, stopping once in a while to stare at a face that seemed familiar. A couple of the men bore similar features to the impostor—a bald head, for instance, but the shape of the eyes or nose was different.
“Hey!” Bess said suddenly as they reached the bottom of the pile. “Look at this!”
The girls stared at a photograph of a man in his late thirties, maybe early forties, whose eyes were pinched together under thick, straight brows. His nose was long and slim, the mouth full, and the face was framed by blondish hair.
“It’s Russell Kaiser!” George gasped. “Not the bald man who bought the medallion and who we assumed to be the impostor. It’s the man who approached Nancy and asked us to help him!”
“His real name is Pete Grover, and he’s wanted for check forgery in the State of California,” Bess added. “It says so right here under the picture.”
“Maybe the sergeant has more information about him: Let’s ask,” George suggested.
The officer was very interested when he heard that they found a man in the mug shots who resembled someone they had met the night before.
“Now, you say you saw him at an auction,” the sergeant asked. “Did he buy anything?”
“No,” George replied, “but he bid on a medallion. He didn’t get it, though.”
The policeman nodded. “We’ll look into it.”
“What do you think is going on?” Bess asked her cousin on the way out.
“Beats me, but I have a hunch we’ll have to do a little more investigating before we find out. Pete Grover’s hair was a little different, but I’m sure he was the man we met last night.”
The girls headed for the dress shop on East 67th Street. It was small and stocked with expensive, imported clothes.
“No wonder Jacqueline comes here,” Bess commented. She thumbed through the hangers, pausing to look at a gold lamé jumpsuit. “These pants are meant for stic
ks to wear.”
George laughed. “Well, that lets you out!”
“Very funny,” said Bess, who was used to being teased by George about her waistline. She shoved the suit along the rack. “Now, here’s something. Oh, I want to try it on.”
Before George could get a close look at what it was, Bess dashed into a dressing room in the back of the store. Within a few minutes, a clerk went after her, then returned to the rack for a larger size.
George sat down on a velvet cushion, preparing for Bess’s entrance. She heard peculiar noises from the dressing room—sighs, and then giggles.
“Ready or not,” Bess called out at last.
She stepped into view, watching the frozen look in her cousin’s eyes.
“Like it?” she asked gaily.
George gulped.
The one-piece pants suit was a shimmer of silver and black that ballooned over Bess’s figure, ending in a tight hug over her ankles. Bess turned in front of a mirror and grinned at George.
“Cat got your tongue?” she asked.
“Mm-hmm,” George said. “You’re a true vision.”
“Thanks,” Bess replied, evidently pleased. “How much is it?” she asked the clerk.
“Only four twenty-five.”
“Four hundred and twenty-five dollars?” Bess gasped. “Oh, and I do love it! ”
“Well, maybe you can find a dressmaker in River Heights to sew something like it,” George consoled her.
“These are one of a kind,” the clerk insisted haughtily.
“I’m sure,” George replied. “Let’s go.”
“I’m so disappointed,” Bess said when they were outside again.
“Just think of it this way. If you had bought that outfit, Dave would have thought something had happened to the good old Bess he once knew! Besides, it would have looked better on a thinner girl.”
“Good old Bess. That’s me,” Bess sighed. “I guess I’m just never going to be very sophisticated.”
When they reached the apartment again, they were still talking about their excursion. George described the silver-black creation Bess had wanted to purchase, then they discussed the visit to the police station. Nancy was flabbergasted when she heard about the photograph they had seen.