Nancy showed him the scrap of flannel and explained what had happened.
Terry’s mouth tightened in a taut line. “Someone’s still watching the house, and we didn’t see him.”
“What do you mean?” Nancy asked.
“We parked about a quarter of a mile away,” George explained. “Then we all hiked to the other side of Terry’s property just in case you needed backup.”
“You mean you were here all along?” Nancy asked.
“Of course,” Amy said. “Did you really think we’d let you take on the bad guys all by yourself?”
• • •
That evening Joanne Koslow and her fiancé, Keith, drove to the Kirklands’. When Bess had called her to say that she and her friends were staying with the Kirklands, Joanne had promptly invited Terry and Amy to the wedding and then invited herself and Keith for a visit.
Joanne had gotten much taller and thinner since Nancy had last seen her. She had the same straw-blond hair, but now she wore it very short. Joanne was the type of person who always stood out in a crowd, Nancy thought. Keith was quiet, with curly light brown hair and glasses.
“We’re getting married in a barn,” Joanne announced. “It’s on this farm up on a hill overlooking the ocean. We’ve invited about three hundred people.”
Bess’s eyes grew wide. “Three hundred?” she repeated.
“It sounds wonderful,” George said.
“I’m so glad you three are here,” Joanne went on. “The wedding is a week from tomorrow, and I thought I’d have most everything done by now. But I still need to make the casseroles, bake the cake, and get the decorations. I was thinking of silver bells with garlands of wildflowers. What do you think, Bess?”
Before Nancy knew it, Bess had promised Joanne that she, Nancy, and George would take care of the decorations. “We will?” Nancy murmured, wondering where she’d find the time, but no one seemed to notice.
Keith was so quiet that Nancy began to be very curious about him. When at last there was a lull in the discussion of wedding plans, Nancy managed to say, “Keith, are you a photographer, like Joanne?”
“Nothing that practical,” Keith answered with a lopsided grin. “I’m in school, doing graduate work in Asian art history.”
Nancy wondered briefly if Keith might know anything about the trunk from Vietnam, but before she could ask, Joanne was talking again.
“Keith’s so lucky,” she told them. “He gets to work with all these wonderful old scrolls and paintings. Two months ago we went to see an exhibit of antique silk kimonos, and I got the most fabulous idea. Guess what I’m wearing in the wedding?”
“A silk kimono?” Bess asked in disbelief.
“Just wait till you see it,” Joanne said.
Nancy tried to picture a wedding in a barn with the bride in a kimono. George must have been doing the same, because she blinked her eyes, shook her head, and said, “So, Joanne, what have you been photographing lately?”
“Everything from mountain-climbing senior citizens to migrating whales. Some of the seniors are coming to the wedding.”
“It’s a wonder the whales aren’t,” Keith murmured.
By the time Joanne and Keith left that evening, Nancy, Bess, and George had a long list of decorations to buy. Nancy was glad to have a chance to help Joanne, but she knew that for her, the mystery would have to come first.
• • •
Early the next morning Nancy, Bess, and George got started on their shopping trip. Since Terry was going to one of his art shows, he took the van and gave the girls the use of his car. Amy elected to go with Nancy, Bess, and George.
The shopping trip lasted all day. Slowly the car trunk was filled with bags of ribbons and bells, candles and tablecloths, napkins and napkin rings, balloons and Oriental fans. Finally, Bess checked off the last item on the list and said, “That’s it. We’ve got it all.”
George uttered what sounded like a prayer of thanks, and the girls headed back to the Kirklands’ house. As they drove, it began to rain.
“This rain is excellent,” Amy said. “We’ve been having a drought. But our driveway’s going to be a mess. The car won’t be able to make it up. We’ll have to park at the bottom of the hill and walk up to the house.”
“No problem,” said Nancy, who was driving. But what she hadn’t counted on was how foggy the Cherry Creek area became in the rain. The dry, grassy hills vanished from sight, and even the huge redwoods were sucked into the soft white mist. Dusk was falling. The only thing Nancy could see clearly was the stretch of road ahead of her illuminated by the car’s headlights.
At last she turned onto the Kirklands’ drive and parked the car at the bottom of the hill. As Amy had predicted, the driveway was a wash of mud. The rain was still coming down hard, so the girls decided to leave the packages in the car until it let up. They began the hike up the hill, George and Amy in the lead, followed by Bess.
Nancy was last. Rain streamed down her hair and into her eyes. In a matter of moments she was thoroughly soaked. I want my bathrobe and a mug of hot cocoa, Nancy thought. She was so busy imagining being warm and dry that she almost didn’t notice the sound—the sound of someone running through the woods.
Nancy stopped, not believing anyone would really be out in this weather. Ahead of her, George, Amy, and Bess walked toward the house. Nancy peered into the dark, mist-cloaked trees. She couldn’t see anything, but she could hear someone on her right breathing hard, scrambling down the muddy hill.
Cautiously Nancy moved toward the sound. And then a boy—he couldn’t have been more than fifteen—broke out of the woods and raced onto the driveway.
“Stop!” Nancy shouted, taking off after him.
Neither one could move very fast on the muddy road. The boy was ahead of her, sliding. Nancy forced herself to go faster, then she lost sight of him as he disappeared into the woods on the other side of the drive.
Nancy stepped off the road and hesitated. The rain was still beating down in a steady rhythm, and the trees were shrouded in white mist. Then she heard the sound of an engine being kick-started and saw the light of a small headlamp. She ran toward it and reached the dirt bike just as the boy got on.
“Wait,” she said, grabbing his arm.
The boy glared at her. She saw that he was Asian. His black hair was cut short on the sides and long in back, and a small silver dragon dangled from one ear. Up close he looked even younger than she had originally thought. “Let me go,” he said angrily.
“Just tell me why you were running from the house,” Nancy said. “Are you the one who’s been breaking in?”
