“I told you,” said Will. “She thinks I’m more popular with the fans than she is. And she’s right. So she’s always trying to get free publicity. Why do you think she came to this convention in the first place?”
“You’re here too,” said George.
“I’m doing it because it’s in my contract that I have to help publicize the show. I have to go wherever the show’s producers and public relations people decide to send me. But the clause isn’t in Sally’s contract. She can do whatever publicity she wants. Her darling manager, Denise Ellingsen, took care of that. Denise Ellingsen takes care of everything.”
“Where is Denise Ellingsen?” Nancy asked.
“She should be arriving any minute,” Will said. “Along with my manager, if he manages to show up. But I can’t wait to see the look on Denise’s face when she sees what a cheap stunt her precious client pulled. She won’t believe it.”
Laughing to himself, Will closed the door.
“I’d like to see Denise Ellingsen too,” Nancy said. “Let’s find out if she’s checked in yet. She can probably tell us a lot more about Sally Belmont.”
The girls took the elevator back down to the lobby and padded silently across the thick, flowered carpet. The lobby had emptied out in the past few hours. The only people there were a maroon-uniformed hotel clerk and a man and a woman standing at the registration desk.
The man was in his midthirties, tall and broad-shouldered, with hollowed-out cheeks and silky, wispy blond hair. His companion was a pretty black woman. She wore a bright blue dress with a colorful scarf draped over one shoulder.
The two were arguing so loudly that Nancy, Bess, and George could hear them all the way across the lobby.
“Don’t blame me because we had to sit in the smoking section!” the man yelled. “Those were the only seats they had left.”
“We wouldn’t have had to sit in the smoking section if you’d made the reservations two weeks ago when I told you to instead of waiting till the last minute!” the woman yelled back.
“Excuse me, Ms. Ellingsen,” the clerk cut in, “but your room is ready now. If you’ll just sign here . . .”
“That’s her!” Nancy whispered. “Sally’s manager.”
“And I’ll bet that guy is Will Leonard’s manager,” Bess said.
“Sounds like they don’t get along any better than Sally Belmont and Will Leonard do,” commented George.
“Let’s catch her before she goes upstairs,” Nancy said. She ran across the lobby, with Bess and George close behind. The girls were moving so quickly, they practically crashed into Denise Ellingsen.
“Why don’t you watch where you’re going?” Denise Ellingsen said irritably.
“We’re really sorry, Ms. Ellingsen,” said Nancy, “but we have to speak to you.”
Denise Ellingsen took a step back. “How do you know who I am?”
“Will Leonard said you’d be arriving, and we overheard your name. But that’s not the important thing. Sally Belmont’s missing!”
The star’s manager raised her eyebrows. “Missing? What do you mean, missing?”
“She invited us up to her room, and when we got there it was ransacked and there was a note saying she’d been kidnapped.”
Denise Ellingsen gasped. “I can’t believe it!”
“I can.” The blond man smirked. He narrowed his blue eyes. “Sounds just like something she’d pull.”
“That’s exactly what Will Leonard said,” said Bess.
“This is Will Leonard’s manager, Peter Thornton,” Ellingsen said shortly. “And I don’t know your names.”
Nancy introduced herself and her friends, then said, “Ms. Ellingsen, you know Sally. Do you really think she’d set up her own kidnapping just for the publicity?”
“Of course not,” Ellingsen said. “Sally doesn’t have to go to all that trouble. She’s been a star since she was five years old.”
Nancy suddenly remembered the blue contact lens she found in Sally’s bathroom. “What color are her eyes?” she asked the star’s manager.
“Blue, of course,” said Denise Ellingsen impatiently. “Everyone in America knows that. Look, what does the color of Sally’s eyes have to do with anything? If she’s been kidnapped—”
“I have a real reason for asking,” Nancy said quickly. “Is blue their real color?” Nancy asked. “She doesn’t wear tinted contact lenses, does she?”
“Did you see her in Under the Christmas Tree?” Ellingsen asked. “That was her first picture, twenty-five years ago.”
“I’ve seen it at least ten times,” said Nancy. “They show it every year at Christmas.”
“You remember the last scene in the movie?” asked Ellingsen.
Nancy remembered the movie so well she could practically turn on a projector in her head. Five-year-old Sally was crying because she finally got the puppy she always wanted. The camera moved in real close on her blue eyes, and her mother said, “Don’t turn those beautiful blue eyes red.”
“Of course!” said Nancy. “Her eyes really are blue because they didn’t have tinted contacts back then!” Nancy took the glass with the blue contact lens out of her purse. “I found this in Sally’s bathroom,” she said. “I have a feeling this belongs to the kidnapper.”
“You said the kidnapper left a note too?” Ellingsen asked anxiously.
Nancy took the note out of her purse and handed it over to Ellingsen. The girls waited while Ellingsen and Thornton read it.
“Well,” Sally’s manager said with a sigh, “it does sound a lot like a note that was featured in a recent ‘Nightside’ episode.” She shook her head. “But I still can’t believe Sally would have set up something like this.”
