Mystery by Moonlight Read online

  Emily bit her lip and blushed. “Oh, Ravi, I’m sorry. I’m just so busy, I haven’t had time for company.”

  Ravi looked at Nancy, and his eyebrows shot up.

  “I’m not company!” Nancy said very quickly. “I’m staying with my friends at the cottage next door.” She started to back away. Emily was definitely not pleased to see her friend, and Nancy thought maybe she should make herself scarce.

  “You don’t have to leave,” Emily told Nancy, then walked up to Ravi and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. “Sorry, Ravi, I didn’t mean to sound so impolite. But I thought you were in New York, in film school. What are you doing here? How in the world did you find me?”

  Ravi’s smile broadened. “Don’t you remember I was your main competition in our investigative journalism class back at the U? I’m a good detective. Anyway, my classes ended in mid-July, and since then I’ve been working on my master’s project. Remember?”

  “Not exactly,” Emily admitted, looking uncomfortable.

  Ravi rolled his eyes. “I only used to talk about it all the time when we were undergrads. I’m doing a documentary on lost lands, communities flooded out by government hydroelectric projects in the early and midtwentieth century. Moonlight Lake wasn’t far from New York, plus it fit the bill. Then when I checked the alumni Web site I found out you’d bought a place on this very lake and—it was like fate was pointing me here.” He shoved his hands in the pockets of his shorts and looked around. “Pretty impressive spread, Emily. Don’t know how you managed it.”

  “Family money,” she said curtly.

  “Look,” he said, sounding apologetic. “Your phone was unlisted, so I couldn’t call ahead, but if you want me to leave—”

  “Nan!”

  At the sound of Ned’s voice, Nancy turned, relieved to see him heading in her direction. Whatever was going on between Ravi and Emily, Nancy felt it was private. She grinned as Ned walked up. He had changed into baggy swim trunks and was rubbing sunblock on his arms. “Game for a swim?” he asked, then greeted Ravi with a smile. “Hi, I’m Ned Nickerson.”

  “Ravi. Ravi Bindrath.”

  Emily clapped her hand to her forehead. “Sorry. I forgot about introductions. This is Nancy Drew. Like she said, she’s staying with friends in that cottage over there.”

  Ravi looked over at the cottage. “Matches this place. Bet it was a guest house back when this place was built—when was that, Em? Nineteen-twenty or so?”

  “Uh, something like that,” she said. “But look, since you’re here, you might as well crash here tonight,” she added, putting her hand on Ravi’s arm. “You just surprised me, and I have been awfully busy with renovations, repairs, and then some freelance work to keep me afloat.”

  “I promise I won’t overstay my welcome. Like I said, I’m actually on a research mission. I just wanted to drop by since you’re in the neighborhood.”

  “It will be nice to have company for a change,” Emily said. “I’ve been keeping to myself too much. My neighbor Bess was lecturing me about that earlier today,” she admitted with a smile. “Why don’t you guys bring Bess and George over after dinner, and we’ll all watch a movie together?”

  Ravi lit up. “And I know the perfect film. I’ll go back out to town later and rent it!”

  “Great,” Nancy said. “Meanwhile, that lake looks pretty inviting.” She turned to Ned. “A swim sounds perfect. I’ll go change.”

  Nancy started for the house, Ned close behind. “Are Bess and George coming along?” she asked.

  Ned shook his head. “Bess is tackling the laundry, and George didn’t want to leave her alone at the house. Bess is still spooked about the break-in.”

  They had almost reached the property line when Ravi shouted across the lawn. “Hey, guys, watch out for the weather,” he warned. “The radio’s predicting strong storms this afternoon and tonight.”

  “Thanks for the heads-up,” Ned said.

  A few minutes later Ned and Nancy stood on the weathered planks of the lakeside dock behind the cottage. “How about swimming out to that platform?” Ned asked.

  Nancy looked out over the lake. The floating platform was situated about a third of the way between the shore and the hilly island that George had mentioned rowing over to see some sunset. She grinned. “You bet. We can keep an eye on the weather while we catch our breath.” Eyes dancing, she challenged Ned to a race to the platform. “Race you!”

  “Ha! As if you have a chance to win!” he scoffed. “On the count of three!” he said, putting down the sunblock. Nancy kicked off her flip-flops. “One. Two. Three!”

  Nancy dove headfirst off the dock and swam strongly underwater for several yards before she surfaced and broke into a freestyle. She could see Ned out of the corner of her eye. It was a close race.

  Nancy kicked hard and took long, smooth strokes. She felt herself gaining speed as she cut through the water. She gave one last powerful kick and managed to lay one hand on the platform a heartbeat before Ned. “Beat ya!” She laughed, hoisting herself out of the water.

  “By an inch.” Ned huffed, climbing out as well.

  “Doesn’t matter by how much,” Nancy pointed out, and sat down on the wood boards. The platform was pleasantly warm from having baked beneath the sun all day. Sunlight streamed across Nancy’s back.

  Ned settled down next to her. For a moment they simply soaked in the view. The sky and water were blue, though the weather had grown a bit humid, and there was haze on the horizon. Flat-bottomed tour boats cruised in the distance. White, yellow, and blue sails decorated the sailboats lazily skimming the surface of the water in the mildest of breezes.

  From their vantage point Nancy got her first overall view of Moonlight Lake’s north shore. A surprisingly thick remnant of old forest lay to the right of the cottage, curving with the shoreline. Nancy shielded her eyes, and through the trees she caught a glimpse of a rather large dock. It gleamed in the light and looked new. “Must be the Lawrence-Joneses’ place,” Nancy told Ned, pointing across the glittering water.

  “And that must be Steve Delmonico’s camp,” Ned said as he gestured toward a beach that lay to the right of Emily’s property. Empty rowboats bobbed on the blue water next to a fleet of canoes. The dock was sizeable, and from the platform it looked to be in good repair.

  Nancy nodded. She could understand why Camp Moonlight’s owner was ticked off by Emily acquiring the old Malone property. She didn’t know where the property line was, but it seemed like Emily’s purchase abutted his camp—effectively cutting off any possibility of expanding Camp Moonlight’s facilities. Nancy couldn’t quite tell what lay on the other side of the camp’s beachfront. The shore jutted out into a rocky promontory, with a thin strand of stunted pines obscuring the view of whatever lay beyond.

  “Camp looks pretty deserted,” Ned observed. “Guess all the kids are gone.”

  “Bess told me that only the maintenance staff and administration is around this week. By next weekend they’ll probably have stowed all those boats. Looks lonely without the campers,” Nancy said, leaning back on her elbows.

  “Delmonico, the camp owner, came off as a pretty nasty piece of work,” Ned commented.

  “Well, George and Bess’s neighbors, the Lawrence-Joneses, were not exactly pleasant either,” Nancy said, remembering the incidents of the previous evening.

  “What do you think about that attempted burglary this afternoon?” Ned asked.

  “Hard to say,” Nancy remarked slowly. “With so much small stuff in sight that would be easy to grab, why would someone pry up a floorboard?”

  “Like you said earlier, they were probably looking for something in particular.”

  Nancy nodded. She rolled over on her stomach and propped her chin in her hands. “So far, that’s the only explanation.”

  “You did hear someone snooping around outside last night,” Ned reminded her. “Maybe they were casing the joint.”

  “While we were there? I doubt it. Unless, of
course, someone is just trying to spook Bess and George.”

  Ned threw back his head and laughed. “Bess was born spooked! But it would take more than a prowler to unnerve George Fayne.”

  “Emily didn’t really see the car that pulled away . . . ,” Nancy recalled.

  “Or truck!” Ned added pointedly. “I know Bess wants that Jim guy to be some kind of dream man, but he seems like a pretty unsavory character to me.”

  “He’s not that bad,” Nancy said. “Then again, if I could figure out why someone interested in Native American rights would be prying up a floorboard in a house and trying to burgle something, Jim would top my list of suspects.” Nancy thought a minute. “I don’t know how he could have been at the cottage and then run into us when he did.”

  “He knows the back roads. Even driving them slowly, it took us only five minutes or so to get back to the house after we ran into him. So who else is on the list?”

  Nancy sighed. “It’s a very short list. There’s no one else on it yet!” With that, she pillowed her head on her arms, and closed her eyes. She pictured the pantry and the pried-up board and reminded herself to confirm that Bess had left the door open and that no one had jimmied the back door lock. “We have to watch the weather,” she mumbled as she began to drift into a nap.

  It seemed a second later that Ned was shaking her. “Nancy, wake up!”

  Even before she opened her eyes, she felt the platform rocking in the water. Nancy sat up quickly and saw clouds mounting on the northwest horizon. They were tall, dark, and menacing. As she rubbed the sleep from her eyes, she heard a clap of thunder. It was still far off, but the wind was picking up.

  “We’d better get out of here, now!” she said.

  Ned shook his head. “I can’t believe we both drifted off like that. I have no idea what time it is.”

  “We’ll figure that out later,” Nancy said. With that, they both jumped into the lake and started swimming toward the shore.

  But the water was much rougher than it had been before, and waves surged above Nancy’s head. She felt as if she were swimming against a current. Though she aimed herself toward the cottage’s dock, she found herself being pulled back toward the platform. She felt like she was swimming in slow motion. The water was slapping her face. Nancy gritted her teeth. She was a powerful swimmer. Doubling her effort, she began to make some headway.

  “We’re not making much progress!” Ned gasped. He was a short distance away from her, and she could see that he, too, was struggling.

  “It’s getting worse!” she yelled over the raging wind. “Let’s head for Camp Moonlight’s dock. We’ve drifted over too far to get back to the cottage. We can wait at the camp until the storm passes,” she shouted over the wind.

  Ned yelled something back. But over the wail of the wind she couldn’t make out his words. He lifted his arm and pointed toward Camp Moonlight.

  Good, he heard me! she thought as she managed to change direction. Though they were still swimming into the wind, the shore seemed closer.

  She glanced over at Ned and panic clenched her chest. She had lost sight of him. A gust of wind sent a spray of water into her eyes. “Ned!” she screamed. She spotted him struggling a few yards ahead of her. He was battling the rough water, but gaining on Camp Moonlight’s beachfront. Phew!

  The waves were getting high, and now the first drops of rain spattered the lake’s surface. The wind’s howl grew piercing, and Nancy noticed the dark gray clouds tinged with a frightening but familiar greenish hue. Do they have tornadoes in this part of the country? she wondered. But she forced back the thought and summoned another burst of strength.

  Ned reached the dock first. He located a ladder and quickly scrambled up to the pier. Nancy soon followed. Lightning flashed in the sky, and thunder crashed too close for comfort.

  “Hurry, Nancy! We’ve got to get shelter!” he shouted.

  Nancy’s fingers closed around Ned’s and she struggled up the slippery steps. “We made it!” she gasped, the force of the gale practically knocking her off her feet. The words had barely crossed her lips when she felt a strong tingling sensation in the air.

  “Get down!” she shouted, hitting the deck and pulling Ned down with her. She flattened herself on the wood surface and prayed lightning wouldn’t strike them. Then thunder clapped, deafening Nancy. An explosive crack followed, shaking the dock.

  Nancy’s head jerked up in time to witness one of the beech trees near the pier split in two—and half of the tree began crashing down toward Ned and Nancy!

  6

  A Killer Storm

  Just before the tree crashed down, Ned pushed Nancy off the dock and onto the sand. The dock creaked and groaned under the tree trunk’s weight. A second later, the edge of the dock broke off.

  “That was awfully close!” Nancy gasped. She lifted her head. Through torrents of rain she could see the sky to the north was already brighter. The fast-moving storm was flying out over the lake. Nancy’s heart rate slowed, and she scrambled to her feet. She let the rain wash some of the sand off her shoulders.

  “We’d better seek shelter here in the camp,” Ned suggested.

  “Hey, here comes Steve now!” Nancy pointed across the beach. The camp director was barreling toward them.

  “Yeah, and there’s Tiny!” Ned groaned. The dog was soaked from the rain and barking furiously. But at the sight of Nancy, Tiny’s tail began to wag. “At least he’s friendly.”

  Steve was shouting something Nancy couldn’t quite hear over the wind. Finally, when he was just within earshot one word reached her: “trespassing”!

  For a moment Nancy was rendered speechless.

  Ned charged right up to Steve. “Trespassing? Have you lost it or what?! This storm is serious. We should all get inside somewhere till it blows over.”

  “Get out of here now!” Steve fumed. He was the same height as Ned, but outweighed him by at least a third.

  “Ned.” Nancy stepped up, and grabbed his arm. “Let’s go.”

  Ned huffed, but didn’t balk at Nancy’s suggestion. She steered him toward a path leading into the woods that fringed the beach near the camp.

  “Not that way!” Steve planted himself directly in her way, barring her from the path. He moved surprisingly quickly for a big man. Still clutching Tiny’s collar, he said, “That’s my land at least for a good half acre, and you are not welcome on my land. No one connected with that Malone property is. Go back the way you came.” He jerked his head toward the water. “I don’t tolerate trespassers, period”.

  Nancy’s blood began to boil.

  Trespassing! Nancy was incredulous. “There’s a dangerous storm over the lake, and you want us to swim back to our place?”

  “I don’t care what’s going on. So get out of here now, or I’ll set Tiny on you!”

  Nancy tried not to laugh, but then looked at the dog. Apparently Steve’s anger had the animal agitated. Besides, they were on the dog’s territory.

  Ned glared at Steve, but Nancy caught his arm. “Don’t bother with him.” Without a backward glance at Steve, she declared coolly, “We’re going through the woods. I don’t care whose woods these are. But I’m not getting back into that water.”

  She walked right around Steve, trying not to wince as the sand gave way to a narrow trail.

  “You’ll regret this!” he railed after them.

  Nancy paid him no mind. She kept marching with as much dignity as she could muster. When they reached a bend in the path, she sagged against Ned. “I forgot I had no shoes!” she admitted, rubbing her feet.

  “Tell me about it,” Ned moaned. “But look at it this way—at least the rain is lighter here.”

  “And the thunder’s pretty far off now,” Nancy noticed. “At least we don’t have to try to run barefoot through the woods.” She paused at a trail marker. Arrows in various colors were painted on its side. Nancy’s instinct was to go straight, but the path stopped at the marker, branching off to the right and the lef
t. A tangle of rhododendron bushes would have made abandoning the path a challenge—even if Nancy and Ned were wearing shoes.

  She checked out the trails. The one to the right led back down to the lake, through what looked to be very scrubby, thorny bushes. The trail on the left climbed up the side of the hill, where a low cliff of black rock glistened through the trees. The forest looked deeper here, but the path had less underbrush and was covered with soft pine needles. Nancy figured that campers or staff maintained the trails. “I guess we go this way!”

  “We could hit Emily’s by going up a bit, then cutting over,” Ned suggested.

  Nancy made a face. “Can’t say I love the idea. She and Ravi seem to have something to work out, so I’d rather not run into them again. But you’re right. Let’s stick to the path here awhile then cut over. As the trees get bigger there’s less undergrowth, so the going will be easier even without a path.”

  As they proceeded down the trail, sunlight filtered through the trees, making steam rise from the recently soaked forest floor. Birds sang high overhead, and the leaves were dripping. As she gingerly made her way, Nancy tried to focus on how pretty the forest looked and smelled after a rain, and to forget about her poor feet.

  Up ahead a branch creaked. Nancy froze. “Did you hear that?” she whispered, curious to see what kind of wildlife was rummaging in the brush.

  Ned nodded.

  “Think it’s a deer?” she whispered again. She took a few cautious steps forward.

  “Too quiet to be Tiny or Steve!” Ned joked.

  Nancy laughed silently and walked as quietly as she could a little farther up the path. Through the leaves of the trees, she glimpsed something dark crouching down in front of the face of the cliff. It didn’t look like a deer.

  “What are you doing here?” Ned’s voice behind her made the crouching figure jump up.

  “Jim?” Nancy couldn’t quite believe her eyes. Then she looked from him to the base of the cliff. At first she didn’t notice the shallow cave. A low cairn of rocks was arranged at the mouth of the cave. Jim was holding something in his hand, but Nancy couldn’t quite make out what.