The Circus Scare Read online

  The circus is coming to River Heights! The flyers claim this circus will be the biggest and best show around, with the funniest clowns, the cutest animals, and the most daring acrobats. Nancy and the Clue Crew can’t wait to see it! But when the performers are forced to go on without some very important props, Nancy begins to wonder, Is someone clowning around with this circus? She’s not sure, but one thing is certain-what Nancy and the Clue Crew discover proves that the circus really is the greatest show on Earth!

  TEST YOUR DETECTIVE SKILLS WITH THESE OTHER CLUE CREW CASES!

  ALADDIN PAPERBACKS

  Simon & Schuster, New York

  A Ready for Chapters Book

  Cover designed by Lisa Vega

  Cover illustration copyright © 2007

  by Macky Pamintuan

  Ages 6-9

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  See inside for a free activity!

  Is the Clue Crew up to

  the task?

  “Are you sure no one suspects what we’re doing?” the boy asked.

  “I’m sure,” Deirdre said.

  “What about those three girls you call the Clue Crew?” the boy said.

  “Ha!” replied Deirdre. “This mystery is way too hard for them!”

  Join the CLUE CREW

  & solve these other cases!

  #1 Sleepover Sleuths

  #2 Scream for Ice Cream

  #3 Pony Problems

  #4 The Cinderella Ballet Mystery

  #5 Case of the Sneaky Snowman

  #6 The Fashion Disaster

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ALADDIN PAPERBACKS

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Text copyright © 2007 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Illustrations copyright © 2007 by Macky Pamintuan

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  ALADDIN PAPERBACKS, NANCY DREW AND THE CLUE CREW, and colophon are

  trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  NANCY DREW is a registered trademark of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Designed by Lisa Vega

  The text of this book was set in ITC Stone Informal.

  First Aladdin Paperbacks edition April 2007

  Library of Congress Control Number 2006939099

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4169-3486-8 (Print)

  ISBN-10: 1-4169-3486-3

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4424-5910-6 (eBook)

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE: DEIRDRE’S SECRET

  CHAPTER TWO: BROWNIE THE BEAR

  CHAPTER THREE: WHAT HAPPENED TO THE NOSES?

  CHAPTER FOUR: THE MYSTERY BOY

  CHAPTER FIVE: A FAMILY OF THIEVES?

  CHAPTER SIX: A NEW TWIST

  CHAPTER SEVEN: DEAD END?

  CHAPTER EIGHT: A REALLY GREAT TRICK!

  CHAPTER NINE: THE MYSTERY IS SOLVED!

  CHAPTER TEN: CIRCUS STARS!

  The Circus Scare

  Chapter One

  Deirdre’s Secret

  “There’s a parking spot, Hannah!” eight-year-old Nancy Drew shouted. “It’s right by the mall entrance.”

  Hannah Gruen, the Drew family’s housekeeper, expertly pulled her car into the space and turned off the engine. “Are you ready to shop till you drop?” she asked.

  Nancy giggled.

  “Yes!” Bess Marvin and George Fayne shouted from the backseat.

  It was Thursday morning. Hannah had driven Nancy, Bess, and George to the River Heights Mall to buy new swimsuits for the summer. Besides being cousins, Bess and George had been Nancy’s two best friends since kindergarten. The three girls went everywhere together.

  They were also famous for solving local mysteries. The friends had even started their own detective club, which they called the Clue Crew. Their headquarters were in Nancy’s room, and they kept every clue they found in Nancy’s desk drawer. George wrote their detective files on Nancy’s computer. George knew more about computers than almost anyone else in their third-grade class.

  For the next hour the three friends tried on swimsuits in Merkle’s Department Store. Finally Nancy chose one in lavender, her favorite color. Bess picked a blue one, and George got a red one.

  “I want to look in housewares now,” Hannah said. “Your father told me to buy some new everyday dishes.”

  “Could we sit on the benches out in the mall and wait for you?” Nancy asked.

  “Please!” Bess said. “I am totally tired from modeling swimsuits!”

  Nancy and George rolled their eyes at each other.

  “All right,” Hannah said, “but stay together.”

  “We know the rules,” the three friends replied.

  Just as they left the store, Nancy exclaimed, “Hey, there’s a poster for the circus. I can hardly wait until it gets here!”

  “Me either!” George said.

  “Oh, look! There’s Deirdre,” Bess said. “Hmm. Why is she going into Feathers and Beads?” Feathers and Beads sold fashion accessories at a discount.

  “That’s weird,” Nancy said. She brushed a strand of reddish blond hair out of her eyes. “Deirdre usually only shops where she can spend a lot of money.”

  Deirdre Shannon was in the girls’ third-grade class. Everyone knew that her parents gave her everything she wanted.

  “That’s the truth,” George said. She sighed. “I could buy a computer for what Deirdre spends on one pair of shoes.”

  “I smell another mystery here, Clue Crew!” Bess said. “Nancy, get out your purple notebook and pencil and write this all down.”

  “There’s no mystery here, Bess,” Nancy said.

  “Oh, but there is!” Bess told her. “Why is Deirdre in a store where things don’t cost a lot of money?”

  “That’s easy,” Nancy said. “She’s already spent her allowance this month.”

  “But Deirdre doesn’t get an allowance,” Bess said. “She gets money on demand.”

  “And she’s always demanding it,” George added with a snicker.

  “Well, I guess we could . . . ,” Nancy started to say, but just then Hannah came out of Merkle’s Department Store. “Girls! I am so excited!” she said. “I found a lasagna dish just like the one we used to have, so I’m going to make vegetable lasagna tonight.”

  Nancy blushed. “I owe you part of my allowance, then, because when I broke the other one I told you that I’d—”

  “No, you don’t owe me part of your allowance, dear,” Hannah said. She gave Nancy a big hug. “That old dish was chipped in so many places, I had already decided we needed a new one.”

  Nancy’s mother had died when Nancy was three, and Hannah had been taking care of her ever since. Not only was Hannah the best cook, she was also the best hugger, and Nancy knew how lucky she was.

  “Thanks, Hannah,” Nancy said.

  “Are you girls hungry?” said Hannah. “Mr. Drew is treating us to pizza at Pick a Slice here in the mall.”

  “Oh, I love their pizza!” Nancy said.

  “I wasn’t hungry until you mentioned Pick a Slice, Hannah,” George said. “Now I’m starting to drool.”

  “Nancy!” said Bess. “Haven’t you forgotten something?”

  Nancy turned. “What?” she asked.

  “The mystery!” Bess said.

  “What’s this?” Hannah said. “A mystery?”

  “Bes
s saw Deirdre in Feathers and Beads and wanted to know why she was there,” Nancy explained. “Nothing costs very much there, and we all know how much Deirdre likes to spend money.”

  “That is a mystery, isn’t it?” the housekeeper said.

  Bess put her hands on her hips. “See, Nancy!” she said.

  “But we’re hungry,” Nancy and George said.

  “Well, Pick a Slice is probably really crowded right now, anyway,” Hannah told them, “so I guess it wouldn’t hurt to check it out.”

  “I think we need to make Hannah a member of the Clue Crew,” Bess said. “She seems to be the only one besides me who sees a mystery here.”

  George tossed her dark curls. “We’re not going to win this, Nancy,” she said with a grin. “We might as well do some sleuthing.”

  Nancy nodded. “Let’s go,” she agreed.

  The four of them headed across to Feathers and Beads, but when they got inside, Bess cried, “Deirdre’s disappeared!”

  “She probably left,” Nancy said.

  “No, she didn’t,” Bess said. “I was watching the front door the whole time I was talking to you.”

  “Feathers and Beads is a very small store, Bess,” said George. “You can see everything standing in one place.”

  “She has to be here,” Bess insisted. “She did not leave.”

  “Maybe she went to the restroom,” Hannah suggested.

  “See! That’s another reason Hannah needs to be a member of the Clue Crew,” Bess said. “She’s sleuthing while you two are thinking about pizza.”

  “Read that, Bess,” said Nancy. She pointed to a small handwritten sign taped to the wall next to a light switch.

  “‘No Public Restroom,’” Bess read. She shrugged. “That wouldn’t stop Deirdre.”

  “Bess is right, Nancy,” George said. “I’ll go ask that clerk over there if Deirdre went into the restroom.”

  “We’ll look around the store while you do that, George,” Nancy said.

  While George talked to the lady behind the counter, Nancy and Bess made their way through the crowded displays of earrings, combs, headbands, and strings of beads.

  Suddenly Nancy spotted a familiar pair of sneakers sticking out from the bottom of some long feather boas.

  “Well, she’s not in the bathroom,” George reported, coming up behind them. “The clerk insisted that they don’t let customers use it.”

  “Hi, Deirdre,” Nancy said.

  George and Bess looked puzzled until Deirdre pulled aside the feather boas and stepped out to face them.

  “Nobody was supposed to see me in here, Nancy Drew!” Deirdre hissed angrily. “It’s a secret!”

  “I told you!” said Bess triumphantly.

  Chapter Two

  Brownie the Bear

  “We know what your secret is,” George said.

  “What?” Deirdre demanded.

  “You’re shopping in a store where you don’t have to spend a lot of money,” Nancy replied.

  “And you don’t want anyone to find out about it,” added Bess.

  Deirdre rolled her eyes. “Wrong! And I thought you three were good at solving mysteries,” she said. “My secret is that I’m going to have a circus in my backyard this Sunday. And it’ll be better than the one that’s coming to town too.”

  “You can’t do that, Deirdre!” Bess exclaimed.

  “Why not?” asked Deirdre.

  “Because our whole class promised to go to every performance of the real circus this weekend, that’s why,” George said.

  “We want to enter all our ticket stubs in the drawing to win the big stuffed Brownie the Bear for the children’s hospital,” Nancy said.

  “But I want to have my own circus!” Deirdre said. “And my parents said I could.”

  Nancy, Bess, and George glared at her.

  Finally Deirdre said, “Okay, okay. I’ll tell everybody on my website that they should still go to the other circus too.”

  Deirdre was the only one of their friends who had her own website. She was always writing articles and taking pictures to post on it.

  Deirdre smiled. “Everybody at school reads it,” she added. “It’s like I’m famous, and they all come to me for advice.”

  “That’s scary,” George muttered.

  Nancy giggled.

  “So why are you in Feathers and Beads, then?” Bess asked.

  “My mother is making our costumes,” Deirdre said. “We’re going to wear feathers and beads and sequins, too, just like all the circus performers do.”

  “Who’s ‘we’?” Nancy asked.

  “So far it’s Trina, Ned, Nadine, Marcy, Peter, and Andrea,” Deirdre said.

  “Why didn’t you ask us?” said George.

  Nancy was wondering the same thing, since Deirdre had just named several of their friends from school.

  “I thought you’d be too busy solving mysteries,” Deirdre answered.

  “You’re right,” Nancy shot back. “And we just solved this one, but there are hundreds of others waiting for us, so we’d better be on our way.”

  Just then Hannah walked up and said, “That was your father on my cell phone, Nancy. The circus train is arriving ahead of schedule. He wants us to meet him at home, and then we can all go to the station to see it. The pizza will have to wait.”

  Mr. Drew was a busy lawyer, but he was never too busy to do things with Nancy and her friends.

  “Do you want to come with us, Deirdre?” Nancy asked. “You might get some ideas for your circus.”

  “I’m supposed to stay here until my mother comes back,” Deirdre said. “I’d call her on my cell phone, but it went dead just as we got to the mall.”

  “That’s too bad,” Bess said. “Well, good luck with your circus costumes.”

  Hannah drove them home. Mr. Drew was waiting for them in the driveway.

  The railroad station was only a few blocks away, so it didn’t take them long to get there. When they arrived, the circus train was just pulling into the station.

  Mr. Drew parked the car, and Nancy, Bess, and George leaped out onto the sidewalk.

  “Stay together,” Hannah shouted to them.

  “We know the rules!” Nancy shouted back.

  Nancy, George, and Bess all had the same rules. They could walk or ride their bikes five blocks from each of their houses as long as they were together. If they wanted to go anywhere farther away, they had to be driven by either Hannah or a parent.

  “Wouldn’t it great if we could solve a circus mystery?” Bess said.

  “Who knows?” Nancy said. “We might get lucky.”

  Just as they passed one of the passenger cars, some circus performers jumped off.

  “Wow! Now I know why Deirdre was in Feathers and Beads,” Bess said. “These performers are dripping with them.”

  “They’re ready for the circus parade through downtown River Heights,” Nancy said. “It’s a tradition.”

  “The animal cars are down this way,” said George. “Let’s go!”

  The girls wound their way through the crowd of people on the platform. For the next several minutes they watched as the circus workers unloaded the elephants, camels, and horses. The lions and tigers stayed in their cages, but they were hitched to horses and carts for the parade.

  When Nancy, Bess, and George got back to the car, Mr. Drew and Hannah were standing at the curb.

  “This is a good place to see the parade,” Hannah said.

  Just then a band started playing. Within a few minutes, the band came down the platform and turned onto the street right in front of them.

  The band was followed by men and women in colorful costumes. Some were walking. Others were riding elephants, horses, and camels. The clowns were stuffed into tiny automobiles, which couldn’t seem to go in straight lines. The clowns were followed by the lions and tigers in cages on wheels, drawn by beautiful horses.

  “Look, Nancy,” George said. “It’s Brownie the Bear!”

  Br
ownie was new to the circus. Everyone was excited because his first performance was in River Heights!

  Brownie was walking beside his trainer. Sometimes the bear would stop, stand on two legs, and do a little dance. The crowd would applaud.

  Behind Brownie and his trainer was a horse pulling a cage. Inside the cage was the huge stuffed bear that the circus was giving away.

  “It looks just like the real Brownie!” cried Bess.

  “All the children in the hospital will love that!” Nancy exclaimed.

  “They sure will,” George agreed.

  Just then Brownie stopped dancing. He looked over at Hannah. Suddenly he ran over and grabbed her purse!

  Hannah screamed.

  “Brownie! Bad bear!” the trainer shouted. “Give the nice lady back her purse!”

  Brownie handed the purse back to Hannah. The crowd laughed.

  Nancy looked at Bess and George. “I guess that was just part of his act.” She laughed nervously. “But I think we need to keep an eye on that bear. We need to make sure he doesn’t take anything else that doesn’t belong to him.”

  Chapter Three

  What Happened to the Noses?

  Mr. Drew parked the car in a reserved lot not far from the main entrance to the circus tent. It was Friday night and the girls were attending the circus’s opening show.

  “Look!” Bess shouted. “Elephants!”

  “Peanuts! Get your peanuts here!”

  “Dad, may we buy some peanuts to feed the elephants?” Nancy asked. “They look kind of hungry to me.”

  “All right,” Mr. Drew said. “We have a few minutes before the circus begins.”

  Nancy bought three big bags of peanuts from the vendor. Then the three friends ran over to the elephants.

  “What are their names?” Nancy asked the elephant trainer.

  “Julie, Mary, Fiona, and Nancy,” the trainer replied. “Nancy’s the hungriest.”

  Bess and George laughed.

  “That’s the truth!” Bess said.

  The girls put a pile of peanuts in their hands. The elephants used their trunks to pick them up and put them in their mouths.