Update on Crime Read online

  “Nancy’s solved a number of important cases—soon to include this one, I hope,” Mr. Liski explained.

  “Then I’m glad you’re here.” Hal’s grin faded as he gestured toward a videotape sitting on the desk. “This stuffs really getting out of hand.”

  “Is that the threatening tape from last night?” Nancy asked.

  Hal looked surprised. “I see you already know about that,” he said.

  “We’re trying to keep this incident very quiet, along with the other threats Hal’s been receiving,” Otto Liski told Nancy. “That’s why I was glad when your father recommended calling you. We’re trying to avoid contacting the police at this point. Having the public know would only make Hal more of a target.”

  “I agree,” Nancy replied, sitting down on a chair that was next to the desk. “When did the threats start?”

  Hal leaned forward and clasped his hands together on the desk. “It’s hard to say exactly when they started. I mean, periodically I get a few crank calls and letters. When you’re a public figure, that kind of stuff comes with the territory,” he explained. “But about four weeks ago I started getting letters from someone who seemed to know a lot about me. Where I live, personal habits, that sort of thing. Those are the letters.” Hal gestured toward a stack of envelopes next to the tape.

  Picking up the letters, Nancy flipped through them. “All typed on the same stationery,” she observed. “And there’s no postmark. That means they didn’t arrive through the mail.”

  Mr. Liski nodded. “That brings up the most disturbing thing of all. Tell her, Hal.”

  The anchorman glanced at the letters. “I found them everywhere. On my car windshield, inside my office here at the station—I even found one on the anchor desk,” Hal said. “Whoever he is, he could be someone I work next to every day.”

  Nancy’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “You say he. Is there any reason to suspect it’s not a woman?”

  Hal Taylor shrugged and shook his head. “I just didn’t think of the possibility that it could be a woman. But then, it’s hard to think of the idea that anyone here could be behind such a thing.”

  “And you’re sure there’s a connection between the letters and last night’s threat?” Nancy asked.

  “The threat on the tape sounded just like the letters,” Hal said. He leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes wearily. “Here I am, famous investigative reporter—and I can’t even figure out who has it in for me.”

  Nancy glanced at the videotape on the desk. “The first thing I’d like to do is take a look at the tape,” she said.

  Mr. Liski nodded briskly. “I’ll have Valerie play it for you,” he said, standing up. “She’s the production assistant who was in charge of the tape feed booth last night.”

  • • •

  Otto Liski led Nancy through the crowded newsroom. “As our new ‘intern,’ you’ll have free range of the station,” he explained quietly to Nancy. “But I warn you—interns are practically slave labor around here, so don’t be surprised if you have to do a lot of running, fetching, and carrying.”

  Liski paused next to one of the desks in the large newsroom, where the curly haired girl he had been talking to when Nancy arrived was sitting. A name plaque on her desk read Valerie Gibson.

  “Nancy’s going to be Hal’s personal assistant,” the producer explained to Valerie. “Why don’t you show her the tape from last night so that she knows what’s been going on here.” He handed Valerie the tape that had been on his desk.

  Valerie nodded glumly. She led Nancy down several hallways until they reached a tiny booth that was jammed with monitors and a control panel.

  “I can’t believe Otto’s making me play this tape again,” Valerie moaned. “He and Hal must still blame me for what happened.”

  “I don’t think so,” Nancy said gently. She decided to change the subject. “Can you tell me how this feed booth works?”

  Valerie explained her job, which was to collect all of the tapes containing the daily news stories. “When we’re ready to go on the air, I take each story tape from the stack and put it in here,” she said, gesturing toward a bulky tape deck. “This machine sends the story to the control room. From there they press a switch that sends it over the air.”

  Nancy held up the tape from Otto’s office. It was labeled Auto Crash. “And somehow this tape got into the pile?” she asked.

  Valerie nodded grimly. “I thought it was a late-breaking story about some accident. Did I get a big surprise!” she said, shaking her head with frustration. She flipped a toggle switch on one of the machines. “I just have to rewind what’s in here before we play the tape.” The machine made a loud, gibberish-type noise as it rewound.

  “Did you notice anyone else around this booth last night?” Nancy asked.

  Valerie shrugged. “Things get pretty hectic around here right before airtime,” she explained. “Lots of people come and go. I do remember Marilyn Morgan coming into the booth at one point. She was yelling about a glitch—that’s a sloppy edit—in one of her stories. Ever since she and Hal broke up, she’s always upset about something.”

  Nancy looked at Valerie in surprise. “Broke up? I thought Hal and Marilyn were a real item.”

  “Were is right,” Valerie replied. “They had some kind of big blowup about six weeks ago. Marilyn took it pretty hard, I guess. Anyway, I took her story tape back to the editor, but he couldn’t find the glitch she was complaining about.”

  If there was a glitch, Nancy thought. “So you left Marilyn alone in here?” she asked.

  “Yeah, she was gone when I got back,” Valerie said. “The only other person I remember seeing was one of the engineers, Bill Steghorn. He was working on some wires in the hallway.” The whirring sound of the machine stopped. “Now we’re ready,” she announced.

  Valerie switched off the booth’s overhead light, then popped the tape into the machine. At once a dark-robed figure appeared on screen, its face hidden by a hideous mask. Then the room was pierced by a strange, menacing voice. The voice growled, “Leave the station, Hal Taylor—or die!”

  Chapter

  Three

  THE VOICE and the horrible masked face faded from the screen. Silence filled the booth.

  For a moment, Nancy just sat there, stunned. Someone had gone to fiendish lengths to terrify Hal Taylor.

  “The voice was obviously electronically disguised,” Nancy said at last.

  “Yeah, you can’t begin to tell who the guy was,” Valerie agreed.

  Or woman, Nancy thought.

  Valerie gave Nancy a puzzled glance. “Why are you so interested in this tape, anyway?”

  Nancy tried to act casual. “Hal just asked me to look at it for him. I guess because I’m going to be his assistant.”

  She was relieved when Valerie nodded and busied herself with the control panel. It wouldn’t do to blow her cover!

  While Valerie’s back was turned, Nancy quickly scanned the contents of the booth. She spotted a glint of something shiny between the wall and one of the monitors. Running her hand alongside the monitor, she fished out an odd-looking pen. It was a novelty pen, the kind that companies hand out to promote business. The top of the pen had a liquid capsule containing a miniature truck. When she shook the pen, the truck ran back and forth.

  Looking more closely, Nancy saw that most of the lettering on the pen had worn off. She could barely make out the letter K on it. She supposed anyone could have dropped it there, but her detective’s intuition told her that she had just stumbled across a clue.

  Nancy pocketed the pen and thanked Valerie for her help, then returned to the newsroom.

  She found Hal Taylor in his office, which was down the hallway from the newsroom. The anchorman’s desk was covered with all sorts of unusual knickknacks. He noticed her staring at one of the goofier items, a long-necked bird that endlessly bobbed its head into a glass of water.

  “This is Harry the absurd bird,” he said, grinning. “Collect
ing this kind of stuff is a passion of mine. If it’s totally useless but fun, it’s for me.

  Nancy laughed. Then, turning serious, she closed the office door and said, “I wanted to ask you about your relationship with Marilyn Morgan.”

  Hal took a deep breath and exhaled sharply. “Boy, you don’t beat around the bush, do you?” he said. “That’s all right, though. I like that. You’d make a good reporter.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment,” Nancy said, and smiled. “Now, about Marilyn . . .”

  Hal shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “I guess you’ve heard Marilyn and I aren’t seeing each other anymore.” Nancy nodded. “I have to take the blame for the breakup,” he continued slowly. “It’s just that Marilyn got so competitive with me on major stories. My work is all about competition. I guess I just didn’t want my personal life to be that way, too.”

  Nancy could understand that. It had to be hard working at such a high-pressure job with someone you were dating. “How has she been acting since the breakup?” she asked, sitting down in one of the two chairs next to his desk.

  “I guess she took it pretty hard,” Hal said. “I’ve been sort of seeing someone else recently—a waitress who works across town. Marilyn saw us together before we finalized the breakup. That didn’t go over too well with her.”

  “Do you think there could be any connection to the threats against you?” Nancy interrupted.

  Hal looked genuinely shocked. “No! Marilyn’s been difficult recently, but she’d never risk her career by pulling the kind of stunts we’re talking about.”

  Nancy wasn’t convinced, but she decided to let the matter drop for the moment. “What about a connection to someone outside?” she asked. “Have you been working on any stories that could have provoked a retaliation?”

  “As a matter of fact, I am,” Hal said. He opened his desk drawer and pulled out a bulky file, which he pushed across the desk to Nancy. “It so happens I’ve been thinking along those same lines myself.”

  Hal explained that the attacks had begun while he was developing a story about State Representative Steve Gilbert, a local politician. “Gilbert has a Mr. Clean reputation, but in reality he’s been accepting bribes left and right,” Hal said. “I found a source who’s willing to spill the beans on camera. We go to air with it on Monday. Gilbert’s career will be finished, and he knows it—I wouldn’t put it past him to be behind something like this.”

  “So Steve Gilbert knows about the story,” Nancy said.

  Hal gave her a wry smile. “Let’s just say I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s guessed. My interview with him was rather stormy. Even though I didn’t make any direct accusations, I think he understood what I was getting at.”

  “What about the legal aspects of a story like this?” Nancy asked. “Have you called the police?”

  Hal shook his head. “No, this story is what we call enterprise reporting,” he explained. “I’ve collected all the evidence myself. What usually happens in these types of stories is that after the story runs, the district attorney will follow up with his own investigation.”

  Nancy asked for a list of the companies that supposedly had been bribing Steve Gilbert. Hal dug out a sheet of paper that had several names on it. Topping the list was a company called KSM Express.

  “KSM is a local trucking company that’s been bribing Steve Gilbert to avoid complying with safety and pollution laws,” Hal explained. “I’m hitting Gilbert and the company pretty hard in my upcoming report.”

  “Where can I find Steve Gilbert?” she asked.

  “At the statehouse in Springfield,” Hal said. He glanced at his watch, then jumped to his feet. “One of our reporters is on his way there to get a few more shots for my story. If we hurry, maybe we can catch him.”

  The two of them raced out to the parking lot, where a man in his late twenties, with brushed-back sandy hair and dark eyes, was standing beside a camera and some other equipment that was piled next to a news van. The man had a lean, wiry frame and a sour look on his face.

  “Gary Krieger, this is my new intern, Nancy Drew,” Hal said as he and Nancy stopped next to him. “Since she’s training to be a reporter, I want her to get her feet wet on a real assignment.”

  Gary scowled. “Got anybody else you want me to baby-sit today?” he snapped.

  “C’mon, Krieger—” Hal began.

  “Thank you, I promise I won’t get in the way,” Nancy said quickly. Before the reporter could object, she climbed into the backseat. A red-haired young man appeared a moment later and loaded some equipment in beside her.

  “Hi, I’m Danny McAnliss,” he said to Nancy. He handed her a bulky tape machine that had a cable and microphone attached to it. “I’m the cameraman. Your job will be to monitor the sound levels while we’re taping our assignment today—I’ll show you how once we get to the state capitol building.”

  With that, he closed the van’s sliding door. Then he and Gary Krieger climbed into the front seats.

  The ride started out in an uncomfortable silence. Gary didn’t say a word until after he had turned onto the highway leading toward Springfield. Looking at Nancy in the rearview mirror, he said, “I didn’t mean to be so rude back there. It’s just that Hal Taylor gets on my nerves in a major way.”

  “Why is that?” Nancy asked.

  “I’m doing all his work while he’s busy being a pretty boy on camera.” Gary slapped the car seat for emphasis. “Like today’s assignment. I’ve done all the legwork on this story about Steve Gilbert. But when it goes on air, you can bet Hal Taylor won’t share any of the credit. Isn’t that right, Danny?”

  Danny, the cameraman, nodded in agreement. “Sharing the limelight isn’t Hal Taylor’s specialty,” he declared. “I say they never should have made him anchor over you, Gary.”

  “You were supposed to be the anchorman instead of Hal?” Nancy asked Gary, suddenly alert.

  Gary’s scowl returned. He didn’t reply, but Danny continued talking eagerly. “Gary was up for the job when it came open last year. Then the station’s execs went out and brought in Hal Taylor from Seattle. To get better ratings, they said.”

  “I guess my eyes weren’t green enough for the camera,” Gary muttered. “What makes it worse is that Hal Taylor isn’t worth his salt as a reporter,” he added bitterly.

  Nancy decided to press Gary for more information about the threats against Hal. “Everyone’s talking about what happened on last night’s news,” she said. “Who do you think is threatening him?”

  “Someone who’s trying to do us all a favor,” Gary said, letting out a snort.

  Nancy was shocked by the hatred in his voice. It was clear that Hal had made at least one enemy in his rise to the top! As soon as they returned to the station, she intended to look for evidence linking Gary Krieger to the threats against Hal Taylor.

  The ride to Springfield took more than two hours. Fortunately, it was a clear day, with no hint of snow. Finally they pulled within sight of the capitol. As the van pulled over the top of the hill, Nancy could see the glittering gold dome of the state capitol building.

  Moments later, the van pulled into the sweeping circular drive that led to the statehouse. Gary leapt out of the van even before it came to a complete stop at the curb.

  “Can you manage the recorder, Nancy? It’s pretty heavy,” Danny said as he unloaded some of the equipment.

  “No problem,” Nancy replied. She grabbed the bulky recorder with its microphone, then followed Gary and Danny up the capitol steps.

  Inside the statehouse, Gary led the way down a maze of polished hallways until they reached the large, paneled door of the Senate Transportation Subcommittee Room. They made their way past several politicians and aides who were waiting for the meeting to get started.

  Gary turned and looked over his shoulder at Nancy. “Just try not to get in our way while Danny and I are working,” he snapped.

  “Don’t mind him,” Danny whispered apologetically as they went
into the meeting room. “He always gets this way when he’s working on a story.”

  Nancy helped Danny set up the recorder and check the sound levels. Then she felt someone tap her on the shoulder.

  “Nancy Drew, what are you doing here?” a familiar voice spoke loudly behind her.

  Nancy whirled to find herself staring at Brenda Carlton. The petite, dark-haired reporter was dressed in a white silk blouse, a butternut leather miniskirt, and matching boots. Nancy felt her heart sink.

  Brenda was notorious for running sensationalized stories in Today’s Times, a tabloid that was owned by her father. She was always meddling in Nancy’s investigations, and she had come close to wrecking several of them. Now she was gaping at Nancy’s microphone with open curiosity.

  “Working for WRVH-TV now, are you?” Brenda asked. “Isn’t that a bit of a switch for our local girl detec—”

  “I could just as easily ask the same of you,” Nancy interrupted smoothly. She stifled a sense of panic. Brenda had almost blown her intern cover! “What brings you here today?” she asked, hoping to change the focus of the conversation.

  Brenda took the bait. “I’m doing an exclusive feature profile on the committee chairman, Steve Gilbert,” she said, flicking back her hair with an impeccably manicured nail. “He’s a rising star in the political world, you know. Today he’s getting an award for legislation he lobbied for on behalf of the trucking industry.”

  All the votes that money can buy, Nancy thought, recalling Hal’s information about the bribes that Steve Gilbert had accepted in exchange for votes that were favorable to the companies paying him. However, she wouldn’t blow Hal’s scoop by passing along that information to Brenda.

  “So are you here working on a case?” Brenda pressed. Nancy was grateful that Gary and Danny were out of earshot, getting a light reading.

  “No, I’m just working as an intern until the holidays. I’ll tell you all about it later,” Nancy promised as she moved away quickly. She pretended to take notes while Steve Gilbert and the other members of the committee entered the room. Brenda looked annoyed, but she didn’t follow Nancy across the room.