Mystery of the Winged Lion Page 4

Bess, on the other hand, had awakened out of her deep sleep and upon discovery of Nancy’s message, she had quickly freshened up. She took the elevator to the lobby and strode toward the door, stopping midway when the night clerk greeted her.

  '“Where are you going in such a hurry?” he said, flashing a smile as he approached the girl. “You must slow down. Enjoy yourself.” He added something in Italian that Bess did not understand.

  “I have to meet my friends in front of St. Mark’s,” she told him.

  “Well, perhaps I will go with you.”

  Bess looked at him quizzically and although she didn’t wish to offend the man, she said abruptly, “I’m sure I can find the piazza without assistance.”

  “I’m sure you can, but I would like to come anyway. We go.”

  So rather than discuss it further and lose more time, Bess let him follow her outside.

  “Shouldn’t you be working?” she asked him.

  “Not till later,” he said. “Now tell me about you and your friends. Do you plan to stay in Venice a long time?”

  “Not really. Just a week. Of course—”

  “Of course, what?”

  By now, the two had passed over a small bridge leading to a string of calli that fed into the square, and Bess tried to avoid giving an answer.

  “Thank you very much for accompanying me,” she said pleasantly, hoping at last to part company as the basilica loomed into view.

  But the man pretended not to hear the remark and picked up his pace as they crossed under the arcade. When they reached the main portal of the church, however, Bess was disappointed to find her friends weren’t there.

  “I don’t see them anywhere,” she said anxiously.

  “Perhaps they are inside.”

  “Perhaps,” Bess replied. A glance at her watch told her she was only a few minutes late, so it was quite possible that the young detectives had not yet left for headquarters.

  “Follow me, please,” the man said in a tone of authority. “We’ll find them.”

  “But—” Bess tried to protest, thinking she would miss the girls if they stepped outside while she went in. Even so, she tagged close to her guide, concluding that Nancy and George might, by chance, wait for her.

  Once inside the building, however, Bess almost lost sight of the man as he dived between the huge marble columns leading to the north transept. Before taking another step, she glanced through the crowd, but not seeing Nancy or George, she darted ahead, following the clerk a few feet. Then she stopped, suddenly aware that he had drawn her away from the rest of the tourists.

  Instinct told her to turn back, but the man’s voice echoed out of the shadows, halting her.

  “They’re here,” he called, and drew the unwitting girl forward.

  7. Reverse Approach

  Bess eased through the darkened chapel, which now carried only a faint scent of candles. “Where are you?” she asked, failing to conceal her nervousness.

  “Over here.”

  But in the bleak emptiness of the room, the man’s reply seemed to come from different directions.

  “Where? I can’t see you,” Bess cried.

  He struck a match and lit one of the candles, casting an eerie glow on the far door and sending a shiver of fear through Bess. She started to turn away, but it was too late. A thick, woven scarf billowed over her head and was pulled back tight between her lips, preventing her from screaming. She stumbled forward, trying to wrest herself from her attackers, but it was no use. They shoved her through the open door, and in her blindness, she tripped over her friends and fell between them, eliciting loud moans. Instantly, her wrists and ankles were tied like theirs. Then, the door clicked shut and the men departed.

  Until that moment, Nancy and George had remained hopeful that Bess would be the one to rescue them. Somehow, though, she too had been tricked. Now they wondered if anyone, even the Emerson boys, would ever find them!

  Despite the duchessa's promise, it was almost eight before Ned, Dave, and Burt were permitted to leave police headquarters. At the Gritti Palace, they registered and went to their room quickly, then dialed their friends on the next floor. To the boys’ surprise, the girls weren’t there.

  “Very strange,” Ned said. “I wonder why Nancy didn’t leave a message for me.”

  “Maybe they got tied up somewhere,” Burt answered, unaware of the truth in his comment.

  “But it’s so unlike her,” the boy continued, feeling strangely uneasy. He spoke to the night clerk again. “Are you sure you have no idea where Miss Drew, Miss Fayne, and Miss Marvin went?” Ned inquired, observing beads of perspiration along the man’s forehead.

  “I’m quite sure, but—ah, come to think of it, they did mention going to the Lido.”

  “That’s the beach.” Dave laughed. “I doubt they’d get much of a tan in the Venetian moonlight.”

  “As a matter of fact—” The man bristled. “There is quite a bit of night life over there. Perhaps your friends found some charming escorts.”

  The remark nettled Dave since he was positive the girls would not succumb to casual dates with strangers. If anything, they were probably on the trail of a dangerous criminal!

  “Listen,” Ned went on, “how do we get to the Lido?”

  “By the hotel boat. Or,” he added quickly, “if you don’t care to wait for the next one, which is due here in an hour, I can arrange for a water taxi.”

  The boys quickly looked at each other, agreeing to the latter suggestion immediately.

  “Just go through that door,” the clerk instructed, nodding past the newcomers. “And welcome again to the Gritti.”

  “Thanks,” Ned said. He stepped outside, but realized a moment later that he had left his wallet in the boys’ hotel room and excused himself. “Don’t leave without me, okay?”

  “Don’t worry!” Dave and Burt called back as he darted into the lobby a second time.

  Now asking for his room key once more, Ned flew to the elevator and took it one flight up to Room 124, but when he tried to open the door, it wouldn’t budge. Again and again he jiggled the lock without success, then gave up and returned to the lobby only to discover that the clerk had left the desk unattended.

  Now what? the boy wondered as a voice from behind pulled him toward an adjoining office. There, he found a man in a hotel blazer talking animatedly on the telephone. He glanced at Ned, but made no effort to end his conversation.

  “Ned!” Dave shouted through the door off the landing-stage. “Taxi’s waiting!”

  “Okay, okay,” his friend answered, dropping the key on the front desk. “I just hope you guys have enough lira for all of us tonight.”

  He quickly explained what had transpired, causing Burt’s and Dave’s eyebrows to lift. “Maybe we’ll wind up sleeping on some baroque sofa in the lounge,” Burt groaned as the trio climbed into the boat.

  Ned let the comment pass, speaking to the driver instead. “Lido,” the boy said briefly just to confirm their destination.

  “Si. Capito,” the man replied, sending the boat through the inky-black water toward the lagoon where a cruise ship lay anchored in a brilliant dazzle of lights.

  “I guess he understands,” Dave commented, descending to the cabin below.

  Ned and Burt, however, chose to remain outside. They were fascinated by the foamy trail of whitecaps that curled in the wake of their boat as it streaked along a channel of log markers flanking the course to the Lido. As it came into view, Burt pulled out a map of the beach resort, noting the main hotels offering musical entertainment. One of them was the Excelsior where they seemed to be heading.

  “It sure is dark around here,” Dave said, sticking his head out of the cabin to feel the cool settling of air as the boat slackened its speed.

  “I’ll say,” Burt remarked.

  “And you and I had better duck before we get our heads knocked off by that bridge coming up,” Ned told him.

  The driver had already motioned them down. Keeping his
eyes fixed straight ahead, he cut the engine and allowed the boat to glide slowly between the brick walls until it cleared the low, stony arch.

  At the same time, Ned noticed the dark figure of a man on the other side of the bridge. He had lowered himself with a rope and was dangling to the right of the arch, holding himself with one hand while the other swung out, sending a small shapeless object in their direction.

  “Watch out!” Ned cried to the boatman who instantly shifted the gear into reverse and stopped. The mysterious object fell a few yards shoft of its target and sank into the water.

  “What was that?” Burt asked, mystified.

  “Well, I don’t think he would’ve climbed down a rope just to throw a stone at us,” Ned said soberly.

  “You’re right. It was probably a bomb of some sort,” Dave grumbled.

  “Good thing it didn’t hit the boat and go off. We’d be a plate of spaghetti by now,” Burt said.

  The driver, meanwhile, had continued backing away from the bridge, and Ned stepped quickly toward him. “We must keep going,” he said. “Prego. Please. We have to go to the Hotel Excelsior!”

  But the boatman shouted back in Italian, refusing to shift forward again.

  “He’s scared,” Burt said. “He knows it was an attack, not just some kid’s prank.”

  “At the rate we’re going,” Dave said, worried, “we might not get another taxi for hours. I think this calls for drastic measures.”

  “Like what?” the other boy replied, watching his friend’s eyes travel to the murky, black water.

  “I’ll show him it’s safe,” Dave said, stripping down to his shorts. “Follow me!” he yelled to the helmsman.

  “Dave? Are you crazy?” Ned called out but his words faded under the shouts of the driver, as the boy dived in.

  “Now he’s really in a tailspin,” Burt whispered, watching the man angrily shift the boat forward.

  “Have to admit it worked, though,” Ned said.

  Dave had succeeded in swimming several yards beyond them before the boat caught up to him, and he was reluctant to come aboard again. Apart from a possibly heated confrontation with the driver, he feared that the man might turn back. But the boys insisted that Dave had had enough exercise and pulled him out of the water.

  The driver merely glared at him as Dave spoke, shivering, “It’s freezing down there.”

  “Here. Dry yourself off, good buddy,” Burt said and handed him a towel from the cabin.

  “For this, you deserve a big dish of pasta on me!” Ned chuckled. “Too bad I don’t have my wallet.”

  The remark drew a good-natured frown from his companion, who put his suit on quickly. “T can always take a raincheck,” he said as the boat swung under a second bridge and finally pulled up to the hotel float.

  He paid the driver, who offered a grim steely grunt in return, and then followed his friends into the hotel and down a long carpeted hallway. From the second floor, they heard a drumbeat and leaped up the stairway two steps at a time, hurrying past guests in glittering evening attire. The boys paused, however, when they reached the noisy room above.

  “There she is! That’s Nancy!” Dave gasped, directing Ned’s attention to an attractive, titian-haired girl in a green silk dress. She moved off the dance floor with her date behind her and sat down at an empty table for six.

  Soon a shock of wavy blond hair resembling Bess’s also bobbed into view.

  “See?” Burt said. “They did find dates and came here to dance.”

  “Hmph. It would serve them right if we left Italy without even telling them,” Dave said, pursing his lips.

  “I have a better idea,” Burt replied, an air of mischief in his voice.

  8. The Cap Clue

  While the boys stood gaping at the crowd of dancers, Nancy, Bess, and George lay bound and gagged in their dark prison, their skin prickling with its damp chilliness. The hours had slipped away, and they wondered if their captors intended to abandon them forever!

  I’ve got to get us out of here, Nancy said to herself, feeling the rope on her wrists cut deeper as she tried to work it loose.

  Her companions shifted into slightly more comfortable positions: Bess sat against one wall and George leaned against the other with the mysterious opening in it. If only she could get to her feet to explore the rest of it!

  She pressed her shoulders back and dug her toes into the floor beneath the blanket, pushing her weight upward. She made small progress before sliding down again, then repeated the exercise, getting no further than before.

  Come on, George Fayne, where are those old judo muscles? she prodded herself.

  She continued her attempts to stand up until the ache around her bound ankles became unbearable and she was forced to stop. Bess, on the other hand, had discovered a rough projection of wood at the base of the wall. She rubbed her wrist binding against it, snapping a few of the rope threads, and pressing hard to break the rest.

  Although the girls’ captors had buried them in impenetrable darkness, they hadn’t taken away their ability to hear; and the sound of rope splitting over something sharp gave renewed hope for escape.

  Nancy pulled herself next to George, groping for a nail or a piece of chipped wood, anything to help cut her bindings. George did the same but, finding nothing, determined to make one last attempt to get up.

  She rapped her knuckles against the wall and hoped Nancy would understand that she needed her assistance.

  She wants me to help anchor her, Nancy concluded, swinging her legs against George’s feet.

  That’s it. Good, the other girl thought and pushed back and up again, allowing her toes to press into Nancy’s tightening muscle. Inch by inch she moved until at last she felt a latch.

  She’s found something—a door handle perhaps! Nancy gasped excitedly. She dared not budge, however, waiting for the next signal.

  George slid her body to one side and continued to hop back on her feet until she was able to stand, using the wall as her support. The latch, she soon discovered, was a few inches out of reach and she sighed unhappily. Nonetheless, the bindings on her ankles had loosened a little and she decided her exercise hadn’t been entirely in vain.

  Bess, meanwhile, had tired of her own labor and gave Nancy a turn at the piece of wood. The young detective ran her rope cuff over it in a sawing motion, stopping only once when a twinge of pain shot through her arm. No doubt she would find deep welts in her wrists she decided, but put the thought out of her mind as the rope started to snap. Just like Bess’s, the threads broke a few at a time, then more, but the remaining ones were stubborn. They held fast like steel; and suddenly the young detective realized that only part of the cuff was rope. The rest was wire!

  Now, for one of the few times in her life, Nancy felt beaten. She could never break wire over wood. She needed something stronger, like metal, and yet there was no way to communicate her discovery to George or Bess who had met the same obstacle.

  Unaware of their friends’ predicament, the Emerson boys had ventured across the dance floor at the Hotel Excelsior. Ned in particular kept his eyes on the table where the titian- haired girl had recently sat down.

  “All set?” Burt asked his two companions.

  He had noticed an attractive group of three girls, who seemed to be together, and walked toward them.

  “American by any chance?” Burt inquired, drawing giggles from two of them.

  “Not quite,” the third one answered a bit disdainfully. “I’m from London, and they’re from Austria.”

  “Well,” Burt went on clearing his throat. “I’d like to introduce myself and my friends.”

  “We’re very happy to meet you,” the blondest girl replied. “My name is Helga Doleschal and this is Elke Schneider.”

  “I’m Christine Mott,” the Londoner said.

  As the boys told about their recent trip through Vienna, the conversation rippled with laughter until everyone rose to dance. Ned swung his partner toward the end of the ro
om hoping to catch Nancy’s eyes, but at the same instant, he realized that her table was now empty! He scanned the dancers, but she wasn’t among them.

  “Is something wrong?” Christine asked.

  “Huh? Oh, no,” Ned answered in the midst of his distraction. He wondered, though, how he and the other boys could have missed seeing Nancy and the cousins leave; and when the music finally stopped, he whispered to Burt and Dave.

  “Obviously they’re gone. Maybe we ought to go too,” Ned said. “I’m bushed, anyway.”

  “Me too,” Dave said. He muffled a yawn. “It’s not everyday in the year I get to swim in a canal!”

  “You—swim in canal?” Helga asked. “I did not think you were permitted to do such a thing.

  “You’re not,” Burt laughed, “but he doesn’t understand Italian warning signs.”

  “Tsk, tsk, tsk,” the girl replied in mock disapproval. “Perhaps you will have to stay in Venice until you learn. We’ll be here at least through Saturday.”

  “So if we need a few lessons in Italian, can we depend on you to teach us?” Dave grinned.

  “Senza dubbio. By all means.”

  The young men offered a few more pleasantries, then waved good-bye, wondering if their American girl friends had already returned to the Gritti Palace. Considering the lateness of the hour, it seemed more than likely.

  “Shall we call them when we get in?” Burt asked.

  “Why not?” Dave said, while Ned reserved his answer until they were down the corridor.

  “Actually, I’d like to check out that bridge,” he said.

  “The one where the bomb came from?” Dave replied.

  “Yup.”

  “But I thought you were tired.”

  “Well, let’s say the brisk night air just woke me up.”

  As a matter of fact, Ned had been itching to investigate the area but had decided not to until he had tracked down Nancy. Now he was ready to begin again, and led his two companions out of the hotel to the street.

  He tore down a flight of steps and cut through clumps of oleander into an empty garden that trailed along the small canal.