Hidden Meanings Read online

  As she stepped into the hallway, Rosita Ortiz came bustling up. “Miss, you ask me to tell you when I saw the man who had me use my passkey,” Rosita said breathlessly. “I saw him leave a room on the ninth floor. I followed him. He went into the big room where the students have dinner.”

  Nancy tensed up. “The Riverview Ballroom?” she checked. “Up the escalator from the Muskoka Lobby?”

  Rosita nodded. “He is wearing a gray coat and pants, and a—” She pantomimed knotting a tie with her hands.

  “A necktie,” Nancy said. “That’s great, Rosita, thanks!” She rushed down the corridor, eager to follow the lead. Karabell was still here!

  Nancy hurried from the elevator to the Muskoka Lobby and strode swiftly up the escalator steps. She dashed into the ballroom and began to look around for a man in a gray suit.

  She saw Gina and Sally, seated at a table near the podium, with Ned standing against the nearest wall. Nancy crossed over to them and told Ned to watch for Karabell, who was wearing a gray suit. Ned nodded and started to prowl the perimeter of the ballroom.

  Just then Gary Ruxton stepped up to the podium. “Good evening,” he said. “While you’re eating, we’d like to show you some of the entries in this year’s photography contest. We’ve had some fine work this year.” He stepped aside as a machine projected the first picture onto a screen behind a long front table. It was a soft-focus shot of a boy playing a guitar.

  Nancy spotted Evan Sharpless at the end of the front table. Paul was at his shoulder, handing him his dinner plate. Then Nancy froze.

  Evan Sharpless was wearing a gray suit and a necktie!

  So it was Sharpless who had “borrowed” Rosita’s passkey! Everything clicked into place in Nancy’s mind. Sharpless could have had as much reason to destroy Sally’s photos as Karabell had. If Karabell was blackmailing him, there must be some terrible secret the newscaster wanted to hide. He certainly didn’t seem like a man who would stoop to crime to protect himself, but what if that was all a cunning facade?

  Nancy shifted her gaze to the screen. There, enlarged against the wall, was a picture from Sally’s contact sheet, showing Sharpless going up the escalator! Nancy prayed he wouldn’t see it. But as a murmur of recognition rose from the crowd, he looked up, twisted his head around, and saw himself onscreen.

  Nancy, acting on instinct, started across the ballroom toward Sharpless. Ned, on the far side of the room, began to move, too. But Sharpless had already sprung from his seat and was lunging for Sally. Everyone in the room turned toward the commotion.

  Grabbing Sally by the arm, Sharpless tore her from her chair and jerked her over to the doors leading to the pantry. He held Sally in front of him, a gun pointed at her head.

  “No one had better stop me!” he shouted wildly. Then he spun around, shoved Sally through the doorway, and followed her out of sight.

  Chapter

  Fifteen

  GINA LET OUT A blood-curdling scream as she saw her roommate disappear at gunpoint. Ned ran to her side. Gary Ruxton leapt to the podium, trying to control the uproar that had broken out in the ballroom.

  Nancy sprinted over to the pantry doors. Peering through a small round window in one door, she saw that Sharpless and Sally were already gone. The only way out of the pantry was by way of the service elevator, she knew. She ducked into the pantry, picked up the house phone, and called the kitchen.

  The phone rang several times. A breathless male voice finally answered. “I’m calling from the Riverview Ballroom on three,” Nancy said quickly.

  “Is that Nancy?” the voice answered. “It’s me, Paul. What’s up?”

  “Oh, Paul!” Nancy exclaimed. “I’m so glad it’s you. Look, Evan Sharpless has just abducted Sally Harvey. He dragged her into the pantry up here, but now I can’t find them. They must have gotten into the elevator. Have they reached the kitchen yet?”

  “No,” Paul said. “But I can see the numbers lit up above the elevator. It’s not coming down here—it’s going up. It’s stopped at twelve.”

  Twelve? Nancy thought. Why would Sharpless take Sally to the twelfth floor? What was there?

  Then she remembered the Riverview Lounge. One floor up from twelve—a part of the hotel no other guests would go to, where no staff had any business. What better place to take a hostage!

  “Paul, you stay by that elevator. If Sharpless comes down, don’t let him off!” Nancy ordered. “I’m going up to the rooftop lounge to try to find him.” Hanging up, she dashed back into the ballroom.

  As she sprinted around the tables, she saw Ned talking on another house phone near the doors. He waved to her and called, “I’ve got Peabody. She’s calling the cops!”

  Nancy nodded, grateful for Ned’s quick thinking. “Have them cover all the exits and send some up to the rooftop lounge!” she shouted. Then she ran out the door.

  Nancy ran hard through the empty meeting area, catapulted down the escalator, and tore off through the Muskoka Lobby and down to the main lobby. Crowds of people milled about: new guests arriving, other guests leaving the hotel for dinner, and diners coming to eat at the hotel’s restaurants.

  Nancy pushed impatiently through the crowds to the elevator bank. An Up elevator was just closing. Nancy flung herself through the doors just in time.

  The other guests in the elevator stared at Nancy. As she fought to catch her breath, she tried to look nonchalant, smoothing back her hair. There was no point in alarming the guests, she realized.

  Nancy pressed the button for the twelfth floor, noticing that buttons for several floors had already been pushed. She was in for a slow ride with many stops. She only hoped Sally would be safe until she got to her!

  No one else was left on the elevator when Nancy reached the twelfth floor. She jumped off and raced to the fire stairs she’d gone up earlier. Climbing the stairs, she tried to be as quiet as possible. She didn’t want to scare Sharpless unnecessarily, not while he held that gun.

  As she neared the top, she heard voices arguing—two male voices. She pushed the door at the top open ever so gently. Cautiously, she peeked around it.

  Sharpless was standing near the window. River Heights was spread out behind him, glowing as the sun began to set. With his left hand clamped around Sally’s upper arm, he held the revolver in his right hand, close to her temple. The barrel of the gun nestled into her soft brown curls. Sally’s face looked gray with terror.

  Facing them, a few yards away, stood Harold Karabell, in his old baggy khakis.

  “Contribution, you call it!” Karabell shouted at Sharpless. “That wasn’t just background research I did for you. I gave you entire stories—facts, figures, quotes, the whole works. All you did was rewrite them a little, in your fancy hotel rooms. Then you’d go on the air, reading them as though you’d dug them all up yourself. You are a fraud.”

  Sharpless twitched angrily, giving Sally’s arm an inadvertent yank. “And you were paid for your work,” he snarled.

  “Paid?” Karabell said. “That money wasn’t even a fraction of what your salary was. But I wasn’t in it just for the money. You said you’d give me credit, help me find another job. You never did. My name never appeared in the credits at the end of the newscast. You never mentioned me in your big bestselling book—even though I wrote half of it for you. You got paid thousands of dollars for speeches about the stories I covered for you, and I can’t even make my mortgage payments.”

  “You should be glad I even gave you work, after you printed those false rumors in Rome,” Sharpless retorted. “No one else would hire you then.”

  “Where do you come off, acting so righteous?” Karabell said hotly. “I published that story in good faith. It’s not my fault those rumors were false. But that’s nothing compared to what you did. Your famous interview with the guerrilla leader in Afghanistan—you made the whole thing up, from start to finish. There never even was such a man. And then you won the Hazelden Prize for it!”

  “Look, I paid you to shut up about
that,” Sharpless said angrily.

  “You can’t even be honest about that,” Karabell replied. “You said you’d give me five thousand dollars, but you gave me only two thousand. I knew I should have stopped to count it on the mezzanine the other day.”

  Sharpless uttered a short, nasty laugh. “So what are you going to do, go to the cops?” he scoffed. “You accepted money. That makes you a blackmailer. And the way you’ve been dogging me the past few days, I could probably sue you for harassment, too. Expose me now, and you go to jail.”

  “That whole room of kids downstairs has seen the pictures,” Karabell said in a leaden voice. “You might as well give up. You’re ruined. We both are.”

  “How do we know?” Sharpless answered. Nancy, listening at the door, thought his voice sounded higher than usual, and strained. “Maybe they won’t figure out what’s going on in those photos.”

  “Maybe not, but they sure did see you abduct the girl,” Karabell said. “With a gun, too. So stupid. I suspected you were going off the deep end a while ago, Evan, but I never thought you’d turn to violence.”

  Sharpless waved his gun in the air with a loony little laugh. Nancy saw Sally shiver with fear. “You know why I brought this gun to River Heights?” he said. “I was thinking of shooting you, Harold.” He swung the gun around to point it at Karabell. “That would be a lot cheaper than paying you off, and more permanent, too.”

  “Shoot me, shoot the girl—then you’ll be facing a murder rap,” Karabell said in an oddly calm voice. “And that’s a whole lot worse than a plagiarism charge. I wouldn’t take the chance.”

  Sharpless snorted. “Murder rap?” he said. “Who knows if they could make it stick. I’ve been pretty crafty so far, haven’t I? I went into action as soon as I saw this little snoop with her camera.” He gave Sally’s arm a particularly vicious tug.

  “No one saw me go back down to the lobby and push the trolley to knock her camera into the water,” he went on, bragging. “No one knew I got that passkey to break into her room. No one knew I tried to poison everyone at the banquet They all thought I was a hero for saving that one boy!”

  “You tried to poison all those innocent kids?” Karabell asked, horrified.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t have let anyone die,” Sharpless said. “I knew how to save their lives. But I figured if they all got sick, the conference would be cancelled and she’d go home—away from you, Harold. I figured only you could tell her what was going on in those photos.”

  “You really are paranoid,” Karabell said. “All this fuss just to get rid of a few shots . . .”

  “Well, I got rid of them, didn’t I?” Sharpless claimed. “I got to know this hotel inside out. I even dressed up as one of the maintenance crew. What better way to make myself invisible! I finally had to pull a fire alarm, but I got those negatives. And then another little blaze took care of the prints.”

  “If you got rid of them, then why were they shown at the banquet downstairs just now?” Karabell said. “When I looked through the doors and saw them, I thought I’d have a heart attack.”

  Sharpless turned to Sally, yanking fiercely on her arm. “I don’t know. Where did they come from?” he demanded. “You little sneak.”

  Sally’s mouth opened and closed soundlessly. Nancy guessed she was too terrified to speak.

  Suddenly the elevator bell rang. Ping! The police, Nancy thought with relief. Ms. Peabody must have had someone reprogram the elevators so the police could go all the way up.

  Sharpless and Karabell wheeled around to face the elevator, at the end of the room. With their eyes turned away, Nancy could risk moving. Ducking down, she crept behind a polished wooden food counter nearby. She slid stealthily closer to the two men and Sally.

  With a whir of gears, the elevator doors rolled open. Nancy saw Ned step out. As if it were happening in slow motion, she saw Evan Sharpless train his gun on Ned.

  Then, moving surprisingly fast, Harold Karabell made a flying leap at Sharpless. He knocked the revolver out of Sharpless’s hand and onto the floor.

  Sharpless reeled backward from the blow. Still clutching Sally’s arm, he crashed against the window behind him. Nancy gasped as she saw the glass shatter and break open.

  Sharpless was falling out of the window—and Sally would go with him!

  Chapter

  Sixteen

  SALLY CLAWED WILDLY AT the window frame and held on for dear life. As Evan Sharpless pitched backward out the window, his hand slipped from her arm.

  Then Sally did something Nancy would never forget. Twisting her body around, she grabbed Evan Sharpless’s hand and she held on fiercely. Sharpless had threatened to kill her, and yet she was saving his life.

  Then Harold Karabell dashed over and threw his arms around Sally’s waist, so that the weight of Sharpless’s body wouldn’t pull her out the window. He, too, was helping to save the man who had double-crossed him.

  Nancy and Ned arrived a second later, and they reached out to seize hold of the famous reporter’s arms. Slowly, carefully, they hauled him back to safety.

  A burst of applause broke out from the ground below. Nancy and Ned leaned over and looked down to see a crowd gathered on the ground far below, around the pair of police cars. Nancy thought she could see Bess and George there, too, waving enthusiastically up at them.

  Nancy drew a deep breath and smiled at Ned. Just then, a half-dozen police officers stampeded up the fire stairs and circled Sharpless and Karabell. Hurrying in behind them, Maureen Peabody ran to Sally and put her arm around her shoulders.

  Sally, shaking with relief, turned to Nancy. “Can we get out of here now?” she asked.

  “Sorry, miss, but first we’ll need to get a statement from you,” a policeman said, snapping handcuffs onto’ Evan Sharpless’s wrists. “And then I think you’d better give yourself a little rest. Sounds like you’ve been through a lot today.”

  Nancy reached over and squeezed Sally’s hand. “I’ll go to the banquet and tell Gina you’re all right,” she said, reading Sally’s mind.

  “Thanks, Nancy,” Sally said with a grateful smile. “And one more thing. Can you find out if my photos won the competition?”

  Nancy laughed. “After you so bravely exposed a fraud, how could anybody else possibly win?”

  • • •

  The buzz of young voices filled the banquet room as the student editors finished their last breakfast together. Nancy, George, and Bess paused on the threshold of the room. “I’ll finally get to sit down in this room,” Bess declared. “The food sure looks more tempting when you’re going to eat it instead of serve it.”

  “Watch your backs!” Ned shouted from behind them. The three girls turned to see him wheeling a luggage trolley with a heavy bundle of newspapers.

  “What’s that, Nickerson?” Nancy asked.

  “The morning edition of the River Heights Record,” Ned announced cheerfully. “Gina has ordered a copy for every student at the conference.” He trundled on into the room, and the girls followed.

  “Why is she being so generous all of a sudden?” George asked.

  Parking the trolley, Ned broke the cords tying the bundle and lifted the top newspaper so they could see the front page. The main headline read, Network Newsman Arrested in Abduction of Student Photographer. And right below was the byline: Gina Fiorella.

  Nancy gave a low whistle. “Gina had an article published in the paper?” she asked, impressed.

  Ned nodded as he picked up a stack of papers. “Who else would know so much about the story already?” he said. “Didn’t you notice how she pumped you for details, Nancy, when you returned to the banquet to tell her Sally was all right? As soon as you left, she ran out and called the editor, promising him an exclusive. You have to admit, the girl’s got guts.”

  Gina came up behind Ned. Sally, still looking worn out, tagged along behind her. “Has everybody seen my story, Ned dear?” Gina asked.

  “I’m handing them out right now, Gina,” he sa
id. With a wink at Nancy and her friends, he stepped away to hand newspapers to students at the nearest table.

  “Congratulations, Gina,” Nancy said.

  Gina shrugged and threw Nancy a dazzling smile. “Thanks. Quite a scoop, wasn’t it?” she said, bragging. “They held the presses until I was finished writing, at three A.M. I ought to be exhausted, but I’m too excited to notice. And guess what?”

  “What?” Nancy asked.

  “The editor thought I did such a great job, he’s offered me an internship on the paper next summer,” Gina said. “So I guess you will all be seeing me next year. Isn’t that great?”

  Nancy could feel Bess poke her in the back. “Uh, yeah, great, Gina,” Nancy stammered.

  “I convinced the editor to give Sally an internship, too,” Gina added, slipping an arm through her friend’s elbow. “After all, it was her fantastic pictures that caught Sharpless in the act.”

  Sally smiled shyly. “It’ll be fun to work on a daily paper,” she said. “I’d much rather take pictures than be in the headlines myself.”

  Just then Jane Sellery walked by, a newspaper in her hand. “See my story on the front page, Jane?” Gina asked pointedly.

  “Yeah,” Jane said with a sneer. “Did you ask your father to buy a new printing plant for the Record?” Jane flounced away, and Gina, scowling, trotted after her—to carry on their feud, Nancy thought.

  Gary Ruxton walked up and joined the group. “Sally, I’m glad to see you back with us,” he said. “You gave us quite a scare last night.”

  Sally rolled her eyes. “I certainly didn’t mean to,” she joked.

  Mr. Ruxton smiled. “Well, I hope winning the photo contest helped to make up for your trouble. Congratulations. You deserved the prize.”