The Secret of the Wooden Lady Read online

  “Never mind.”

  “You’ve sailed on her before?” There was no answer to that, so Nancy continued, “The snuffbox has some connection with the Bonny Scot, hasn’t it? The cameo is like the figurehead that used to be on it.”

  Involuntarily the man opened his big hand and glanced at the snuffbox. “Where’d you get that idea?” he grunted.

  Nancy felt that she was getting somewhere. If she could take him off guard, perhaps he would say something revealing.

  “You stole the box!” she accused him suddenly.

  “I did not! It belongs to me!”

  “Is that so?” Nancy looked at him skeptically. “You stole it from Captain Easterly’s cabin.”

  “You think you know a lot, don’t you? Well, maybe you can tell me how the mate happened to have it, then.”

  “The mate?” Nancy repeated eagerly.

  Red Quint gave her a startled look, as if just realizing he had said something wrong. With three long strides he was at the top of the nearest sand dune and down the other side.

  Nancy ran after him, tripped as her heel caught the top of a hummock, and fell. By the time she struggled to her feet and reached the top of the dune, Quint had vanished.

  The little mounds of sand, tufted with stiff grass, stretched for miles along the shore. He probably had dropped flat behind one of them and was waiting for her to go away.

  Quint was an unsavory character, Nancy knew. She decided it would be wiser for her to return to the clipper than to hunt for him.

  “But I ought to notify the police,” she told herself. “After all, Quint was mixed up with the captain’s kidnapper.”

  Nancy retrieved her handbag and then retraced her steps to town and found the local state trooper’s office. He promised to start a search for Quint at once and to alert headquarters.

  “I hope he won’t shave off his grizzly beard, so he can’t be identified,” Nancy reflected as she hurried back to the beach.

  She shoved the dinghy into the water, and jumped into the boat. As Nancy bent to the oars, she reflected on the strange information Red Quint had given her. Where had he managed to hide on the ship so that even the captain could not find him? What had he meant when he said the mate had the snuffbox? The mate of the Bonny Scot in the old days? She wondered if Red ever had sailed on the clipper.

  She was still some distance from the ship when Bess shouted, “Here she comes!”

  The girls put down the ladder and helped Nancy aboard, scolding her and asking dozens of questions.

  “We thought you’d been drowned, kidnapped, or cut in small pieces!” George told her. “Where were you?”

  Nancy told them and Captain Easterly of her visit to Mr. Frisbie and of the struggle with Grizzle Face.

  “I’m sure he’s the one who dropped the snuffbox in your cabin, Captain Easterly,” she concluded. “He says he got it from ‘the mate.’ What mate do you suppose he means?”

  The captain said he had no idea.

  “Quint said there are hiding places on the clipper that even you don’t know about,” Nancy went on.

  “That’s possible,” Captain Easterly admitted reluctantly. “Especially if the ship was ever used by pirates. They were a devilish, clever lot. But look here, it’s high time to eat.”

  Nancy and the girls followed him down to the galley where they ate the delicious supper Bess had prepared.

  Next morning George and Bess said they wanted to go along with Nancy to Mr. Frisbie’s shop. They left Captain Easterly to guard the clipper and enjoy the cool breeze under the deck awning.

  The three girls rowed to shore. The first thing Nancy did was call State Police headquarters and ask if Red Quint had been found. There was no word about the man.

  When they arrived at the barn, Mr. Frisbie greeted them with a smile. “I see you brought reinforcements,” he said.

  “Yes,” said Nancy, and introduced her friends. “We’d like to see your interesting old books and drawings again, if you don’t mind.”

  “Go ahead. Glad to find somebody that enjoys them,” he said.

  All morning the girls pored over the volumes whose pages were yellow with age.

  Later the three friends dined in a little garden tearoom, and afterward walked along a winding road to a cluster of weathered gray cottages. They were occupied by artists who came to paint the sea and the quaint village. The girls watched some of them at work.

  Then, at Nancy’s suggestion, Bess and George returned to the ship, donned their swimsuits, and spent a delightful afternoon in the water and on the beach.

  While they were swimming, Nancy again searched for a clue in Mr. Frisbie’s old books. She read for some time, but came upon no information on ships with names whose initials could be P. R.

  At five o’clock the girls picked her up and rowed back to the Bonny Scot. After supper they came up on deck and dropped into comfortable chairs.

  The captain leaned back and lit his pipe as the girls discussed the missing figurehead. “More than one ship has lost its figurehead, for one reason or another,” he said.

  “Did they ever change the figurehead on purpose?” George wanted to know.

  Captain Easterly puffed on his pipe. “Sometimes they did. For instance, if a ship had a new captain, maybe he wouldn’t like the figurehead. So he’d change it for one he picked out himself.”

  Nancy was thinking about another figurehead —the lovely woman carved on the snuffbox she had found.

  “I wish I knew more about the mystery of that snuffbox,” she said. “It must be valuable if old Grizzle Face wanted it. I’ll keep on looking till I find the history of it. I have a hunch that figurehead was on this ship.”

  “Can you still remember what it looked like?” Bess asked.

  “I can now, but I’m afraid I’ll forget later,” Nancy admitted. “I’ll make a sketch of it first thing in the morning.”

  “I’m glad you said morning,’ ” George confessed. “I can hardly keep my eyes open.”

  The girls said good night to the captain and went below.

  Captain Easterly stayed on deck and slept fitfully. Nothing happened, and morning dawned peacefully.

  After breakfast Captain Easterly handed Nancy a box of pencils, crayons, and drawing paper he had on board. She set to work sketching the cameo from the snuffbox as best she could from memory. Nancy was so busy that she did not hear an approaching rowboat.

  “Ahoy, there!” called a man’s voice.

  “Dad!” Nancy jumped to her feet.

  He came aboard, smiling. “Looks like an industrious and peaceful crew you’ve got here, Captain Easterly.”

  The skipper shook hands with him. “At the moment, Yes. But we’ve had our troubles.”

  “What’s this?” Mr. Drew turned to his daughter. “More excitement aboard the Bonny Scot?”

  “Mr. Drew, you should have been here during the storm!” Bess exclaimed. “It was simply horrible.”

  “It was exciting,” George and Nancy said together, laughing.

  The girls told him about the voyage from Boston, the fire, the storm, and the two stowaways, one of whom had jumped overboard.

  Mr. Drew frowned. “You’re lucky to be alive.” “The other stowaway was Red Quint. He was aboard all the time,” George reported.

  “He was looking for something,” Nancy explained. “But we have no idea what. He dropped a snuffbox with a cameo of a lady on it—like this.” She showed her father the half-finished sketch.

  “Handsome woman,” Carson Drew commented. “Why are you sketching her?”

  “Because I think she was a figurehead,” Nancy replied. “I have a hunch she was the figurehead on the Bonny Scot!”

  The lawyer became more interested. “I see you’ve made some progress on the case.”

  “That she has,” said the captain.

  “I still have a long way to go before solving the mystery.”

  Her father looked at her intently. Then he turned to the skipper of th
e Bonny Scot. “Captain Easterly,” he said, “I’m afraid I have bad news for you.”

  CHAPTER XII

  A Pirate’s Prize

  “DAD,” Nancy said in alarm, “what has happened?”

  “Oh, nothing to frighten anyone,” the lawyer replied. “Just a big disappointment. I have absolutely nothing to report about the title to this ship. I studied every record I could get hold of. Visited shipbuilding companies and libraries, even talked to old seamen. There isn’t a single mention of a clipper named the Bonny Scot, and nobody’s ever heard of her.”

  “And no clue to any other name?” Nancy asked.

  Mr. Drew shook his head. “Of course,” he admitted, “there are no records for many of the old ships. It hurts my pride to render a negative report, Captain, especially now that I must give up the case.”

  “What do you mean, Dad?” Nancy asked.

  “I’ve been called back to River Heights,” her father said. “A case coming up in court. I must leave here this afternoon. Terribly sorry, Cap. tain.”

  Mr. Drew looked at his daughter. There was a challenge in his eye. “But how about you staying? If you use the ingenuity and the perseverance I credit you with, Nancy, I believe you’ll solve the case. What do you say?”

  Nancy hugged her father, then laughed. “You know, for a minute I thought you were going to make me go home with you. Of course I’ll stay, if Captain Easterly will let me.”

  The skipper grunted. “Don’t you girls dare leave me alone with this mystery!”

  He said he had a feeling that by solving the mystery of why the intruders came on the ship, the matter of title would be cleared up too.

  “And I think Nancy’s the one who can do it,” the captain said staunchly.

  After lunch Nancy told her friends she would row her father over to the village, to take his bus for the airport. “I think while I’m in town, I’ll stop at Mr. Frisbie’s.”

  “Again?” George teased. “Count me out this time.”

  “If you don’t mind,” said Bess, “I’ll stay here and write a letter home, then go for a swim.” George decided to stay with her cousin.

  Nancy wanted her friends to have some vacation fun at Cape Cod, and said that there was no need for them to accompany her.

  Before going to the barn, Nancy once more called the State Police. There was no report on Grizzle Face Quint.

  Mr. Frisbie did not seem surprised when Nancy walked into the studio. He said, “Good afternoon!” with his usual abruptness, but his frosty blue eyes softened in a smile as he waited for her to climb the steps to the second floor. Instead, Nancy stood still, staring at what had once been a large block of black wood on the workbench. Now it had the rough outline of a small body.

  “Is this going to be a figurehead?” Nancy asked.

  “Yes, and by the time she’s finished, the young lady will weigh only twenty pounds,” Mr. Frisbie said. “She started out at four hundred.” He grinned.

  “You mean you have to throw away all that wood?” Nancy thought this was a dreadful waste.

  “Nowadays, figureheads are carved from a solid block, and usually from ebony, like this one,” Mr. Frisbie explained. “Then no heads or legs can drop off like in the old days when the parts were jointed together.”

  The sculptor said even hard woods like oak were not as durable as ebony, and in his work he would use nothing but the best. “After all, I’m creating a beautiful young lady,” he said.

  Nancy chuckled as she left to go upstairs. Presently she was deep again in the study of Mr. Frisbie’s books on sailing ships.

  Suddenly a new thought struck her. Perhaps the initials P. R. stood for a person instead of a ship! If the design carved on the snuffbox were a ship’s figurehead, couldn’t the P. R. refer to the ship’s master?

  Eagerly the young detective began looking for the names of captains whose initials were P. R. She would pay special attention to ships whose fates were unknown.

  This new lead had some exciting results. She learned from one of the books, which looked as if it had been through many a hurricane, about a vessel named the Dream of Melissa.

  The clipper was on her way home to Provincetown from Bombay, under the command of Captain Perry Rogers. When last seen she had been heading for Sunda Strait, between Java and Sumatra.

  No one knew what had happened to the Dream of Melissa. She had simply disappeared. So far as was known, no trace of the ship or cargo had ever been found. Neither captain nor crew had ever been heard from again!

  Nancy’s eyes were bright with excitement. The Melissa’s captain, Perry Rogers, had the initials P. R. The snuffbox could have been his! The figure on it was a dreamy-faced woman. She might well be the Melissa of the ship’s name!

  The Dream of Melissa had carried a costly cargo of rugs, silks, and perfumes.

  “Surely a pirate’s prize!” Nancy reflected.

  Captain Easterly had told her that the clippers sailing to and from the Far East had often been attacked by pirates. He had even mentioned that the islands off Java were a favorite hideout for these sea gangsters.

  Perhaps, Nancy thought excitedly, pirates had seized the Dream of Melissa. If they intended to keep the ship, of course they would have to change her name. And naturally they would get rid of the figurehead—it was too good a clue to the ship’s identity.

  Nancy closed the book. “The Bonny Scot,” she told herself, “may really be the Dream of Melissa.”

  Her eyes aglow, she ran to the first floor to speak to Mr. Frisbie. All she found was a crisp note:Lock up when you leave.

  Smiling, Nancy looked at her watch. Six o’clock! She locked the barn door, hurried to the dinghy, and made fast time out to the clipper. Her eager face told the others she had found something this time.

  “Out with it,” George demanded.

  After Nancy had told her story, Bess shivered. “My goodness, to think I may have been sleeping in some pirate’s bunk!”

  “Those stowaways may know about the pirates and think there’s hidden loot on board!” George added.

  “Now just a minute, girls,” Captain Easterly spoke up. “Seems to me you’re jumping to conclusions. In the morning we’ll make plans for tracking down this dream ship of yours, Nancy,” he said. “No more work tonight.”

  But Nancy could not get the Dream of Melissa out of her mind. She lay awake, wondering if the Bonny Scot could have borne that other name. If it had been captured by pirates, what had happened to Captain Perry Rogers? Was it to his mate Grizzle Face had referred?

  Such exciting thoughts kept Nancy wide awake until after midnight. Captain Easterly, she knew, had been too tired to remain on watch and had gone to his cabin. George and Bess were sleeping peacefully in their bunks. Nancy heard nothing but the soft slap of water on the ship’s side and the creaking of the masts.

  Suddenly a new sound made her sit straight up, nerves tingling. Just outside her porthole she heard a soft thump, thump, thump!

  Nancy slid out of her bunk and threw on a coat. Slipping a flashlight from under her pillow, she tiptoed into the passageway and knocked on the captain’s door.

  “Captain Easterly, there’s someone on boardl” she called softly.

  Then, without waiting for him to appear, she ran up to the deck.

  CHAPTER XIII

  The Shadowy Figure

  NANCY stopped at the top of the companionway. She could see nothing clearly. If someone had come aboard he might be crouching close to her on the shadowy deck. She moved forward cautiously.

  Heavy mist swirled about the ship, making the masts and rigging seem vague and unreal. Somewhere in the distance a foghorn wailed.

  Suddenly Nancy froze, her hands clenched. A figure was coming over the rail, directly in front of her! Nancy slipped quickly into the shadows. Whoever he was, he had not seen her. She had the advantage!

  The intruder dropped catlike to the deck, then moved quickly out of sight in the mist. Nancy made her way cautiously after him. If onl
y she could see the stranger’s face!

  Would he turn around if she flashed her light on him?

  “I’ll try it,” she decided, and snapped on the light.

  The man was startled but did not turn around. Bent almost double, with his sleeve raised to conceal the side of his face, he scurried ahead into the shrouding mist.

  Nancy ran after him, but he disappeared in the inky shadows. She had not heard a splash. He must still be aboard!

  Nancy’s heart beat rapidly. It was one thing for her to follow a fugitive she could see, but quite another to have a stranger jump at her from some dark spot.

  Where was Captain Easterly? Nancy thought uneasily as she pondered what to do next. To her relief, the skipper’s voice boomed out behind her.

  “Nancy, where are you? What’s up?”

  Quickly Nancy retraced her steps and in whispered tones told him what had happened. “I’m sure the man’s still aboard,” she concluded. “Maybe he’s gone below.”

  “We’ll look up here first,” the captain ordered. Swinging their flashlights, he and Nancy covered the damp planking, the coiled ropes and hawsers, the rigging, the hatch covers. There was no sign of the man they were hunting. Before going below to continue the search, Captain Easterly said: “Where did he come aboard?”

  Nancy led the skipper to the spot where she had seen the intruder come over the side. As they reached it, their flashlights revealed a rope wriggling over the rail. A moment later it dropped to the water. Together they bent over the rail, sweeping the water with their flashlights. A man was sitting in a rowboat!

  “Who are you? Stop!” the captain roared.

  The fugitive did not answer. He hunched his head into his shoulders, shoved an oar against the Bonny Scot, and the rowboat slid away into the billowing mist.

  “Oh, dear,” Nancy sighed. “I didn’t get a good look at him. Did you, Captain?”

  “No, but he’s probably a desperate character, Nancy. You were mighty foolish to come up here without me.”

  “I know,” Nancy said contritely, “but I was afraid we’d lose him.”

  In the dim light Nancy could see the captain’s face break into a broad smile. He took her arm. “Now that I’ve scolded you, I want to thank you for driving him off the ship. Better get below and finish your night’s sleep,” he added.