Stop the Clock (Nancy Drew (All New) Girl Detective Book 12) (5 page)

“Okay, okay, enough!” I said, smiling. “I promise I won’t try to make any obscene fashion statements.”

After Bess and George were gone, I turned to Ellis for some more information about the clock. “Tell me, why is the Mullins family so interested in getting back the library clock?” I asked. “It’s beautiful, but it’s really too big for a house. What would they do with it?”

“Sell it,” Ellis said.

“Sell it?”
I said. “That’s awful!”

Ellis shrugged. “Well, seems to me they’re awful people, Nancy,” he said. “That clock would probably bring in a lot of money if it was put on the market.”

“You’re probably right about that,” I said. “Well, that definitely gives me even more incentive to find
it. That clock was made for the Mahoney Library. It wasn’t made for anybody else.”

“Still, Ben Mullins insisted that the clause appear in the agreement,” Ellis said.

I looked at him. “You certainly know a lot about this, just to have recently arrived in River Heights,” I said.

“I’m a
librarian,
Nancy. That means I work in a library, and there are all kinds of interesting things in a library besides books,” Ellis said. “Ben Mullins left all his papers, diaries, drawings, sketches, sales receipts—you name it—to the Mahoney Library, and I’ve been going through everything.”

“Really?” I said.

Ellis nodded. “When I found out that the clock was to be the focal point of the anniversary celebration, I thought I might find something you could use,” he said.

“Well, that’s nice of you,” I said. I thumbed through the papers in my hand. “There may not be enough of these personal recollections for more than one display, so it’s nice to know that other things are available.” I thought for a minute. “Maybe tomorrow we can look through some of the sketches,” I added. “Let me think about it.”

“Okay,” Ellis said. He looked at his watch. “Well, I’d better get back to work myself.”

“See you later,” I said. I put the recollections on
the desk Mrs. Corning had told me to use and I left.

When I got home, I took the pimentos out of the car, gave them to Hannah, then filled her in on what had happened.

“Oh, my goodness, that’s awful, Nancy,” Hannah said. “That is such a pretty clock!”

It suddenly occurred to me that maybe Hannah had a clock story she could write down for me, but before I could ask her, she said, “I think I’m going to need another jar of pimentos. Do you think you could pick up one for me before you go see Ned?”

“Before I go see Ned?” I said. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, he called right before you came in and asked if you could meet him in the Asian foods area of the university union food court this afternoon,” Hannah said. “When you told me about the library clock, it just slipped my mind for a minute. He needed to talk to you about something.”

“Deirdre,”
I muttered.

“Oh, my goodness,” Hannah said. “Has that girl finally managed to create problems for you two?”

“Oh, you know that would never happen, Hannah,” I said. “It’s just that, well . . . It’s a long, boring story, and I need to shower before I go. If it turns out to be anything more than what I think it is, I’ll fill you in tonight, okay?”

“Sounds good,” Hannah said.

There was just one visitor’s parking space in front of the new university union, and I quickly pulled into it. I was already ten minutes late, so I ran up the steps and through the automatic doors, then headed toward the food court. I saw Ned right away, head buried in a book, totally oblivious to the noise around him.

“Hi!” I said, walking up to the table.

When Ned didn’t respond, I grinned. What a bookworm. I punched him on the shoulder and said, “Sorry, I’m late.” I pulled out a chair and sat down.

“Oh, Nancy, sorry,” Ned said. He grinned, showing his dimples. It’s easy to see why Deirdre and almost every other girl in River Heights flirts with Ned. He’s
so
good-looking. “I was rereading this great poem. Listen.” He paused for a moment, then began. “‘Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? . . .’”

Now this was pure Ned Nickerson. A major catastrophe could be about to happen, but Ned will make sure it gets delayed if he’s found a poem that appeals to him. I’ve never known anyone else who can read a poem and make me feel that it was written especially for me. This was a Shakespeare sonnet, number eighteen. By the time he finished with “this gives life to thee,” my heart was pounding.

“Oh, Ned, that was beautiful,” I said. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Ned said. “Now, what’s this about my being on your library committee?”

“I’m sorry about that, Ned. If you really don’t have time, I’ll understand,” I said. “I’d been meaning to ask you, but you were always so busy, and now, with the library clock gone, I’m going to have my mind on more than just decorating for the celebration. But I know I should have asked you first.”

“What, and spoil your reputation for surprises?” Ned said, winking. “You know you can count on me, Nancy.”

“Yes, I do, Ned,” I said. “Okay, let me fill you in on what we—”

“Actually,” he interrupted, “Deirdre did a pretty good job of that already. The reason I wanted to meet you here is that I’ve been doing some sleuthing on my own, and I’ve uncovered some information that I think you’ll be interested in.”

Ned’s not really into mysteries the same way I am, but he’s always ready to help me out with whatever I’m investigating. Since his head is full of all kinds of details, more than once he’s given me just the right piece of information to put all the pieces of the puzzle together.

“Great!” I said. “Let’s hear it.”

“Well, it’s about Ralph Mullins,” Ned said. “He’s—”

“Oh, you should have been there, Ned,” I cut in. “It was all so odd!”

Ned shook his head. “I can imagine,” he said. “Anyway, I decided to do a little research on him, and I found out some really interesting things.”

I leaned closer. “What did you find out?”

“First of all, Ralph Mullins is in debt over his head,” Ned said. “If he doesn’t come up with a lot of money fast, he could lose his home. Also, Ralph Mullins works here at the university. He’s a locksmith.”

“A locksmith?” I asked. “Is he in charge of making the keys for the university?”

Ned nodded. “Don’t you find that interesting?”

“Sure do,” I said.

“That means it probably wouldn’t be much of a problem for him to make a key to fit one of the Mahoney Library doors,” Ned added.

Just what I was thinking. “Do you think Ralph Mullins stole the clock himself, so he could ‘find it’ and then sell it for a lot of money?”

Guilt by Association

I
looked at my
watch. It was four o’clock. And now, I had a plan that, I hoped, would help us recover the library clock.

A few weeks ago, when Ned’s car wouldn’t start, he called me, frantic to get to the library to check some sources before a class discussion. Thanks to that trip, I knew that the maintenance workers start an hour before most of the other university employees—they work from 7
A.M.
until 4
P.M.
That meant that Ralph Mullins was just getting off work.

“Come on, Ned,” I said. “It’s time to do some work!”

“Nancy, I’m not through reviewing for this test tomorrow,” Ned said.

“Bring along your notes when you pick me up for
the party tonight,” I said. “I’ll quiz you after we get bored and want to go.”

Ned laughed. “You’d do that?” he said. He sounded genuinely surprised—and pleased.

“Of course!” I told him. “You should know that.”

Ned stood up, gathered his papers, and said, “Okay, then. Where are we going?”

“Ralph Mullins’s house,” I replied.

“Okay, but let’s take my car, Nancy,” Ned said. “That way you can concentrate on sleuthing.”

“What’s the matter, Ned?” I said, giving him a big grin. “Don’t you think I can drive and sleuth at the same time?”

“Uh . . . no comment,” Ned said.

Ned’s car was parked on the opposite side of the university union from mine. He used the remote to open it, and we got inside.

As we headed out of the parking lot, something hit me. “Oh, great,” I said. “I don’t even know where Ralph Mullins lives. What was I thinking?”

“Open the glove compartment. You’ll find a miniature city telephone directory inside,” Ned said. “I’m always doing errands for Dad, so it really comes in handy.”

That’s my boyfriend. Always prepared. I got out the directory, turned to the
M
s, and found Ralph Mullins’s address. I read it out to Ned.

“That’s not too far from here,” he said. “I know the area. It has inexpensive but well-kept houses.”

I was looking up ahead. “What kind of vehicle would you think Ralph Mullins drives?” I asked.

Ned shrugged. “There’s no telling,” he said. “If he and his family are hurting for money, then it’s probably not a brand-new luxury car.”

“What about an old pickup truck?” I said.

“That would fit. A lot of the maintenance people at the university drive those,” Ned said. “Why?”

“Because there’s one up ahead of us with a university parking sticker on the back window,” I said, pointing. “It looks like the driver’s headed where we’re headed.”

Ned looked. “That could be anybody, Nancy,” he said. “There are probably other people who work for the university who live in that neighborhood too.”

“Get closer so we can find out for sure, Ned,” I said.

“You want me to tailgate?” Ned said.

“No. Just get close enough so I can see through the rear window,” I said. “I want to know if that’s Ralph Mullins.”

Ned sped up, but he kept a safe distance between us and the old pickup.

Finally I was able to peek into the driver’s seat. “It is!” I said.

“How can you tell from this distance, Nancy?”
Ned asked. “There’s no way you can see his face.”

“I don’t have to see his face, Ned. I can still picture the back of his head as he stalked out of the library,” I said. “We were all so stunned, we just stood there and watched. It’s solidly imprinted in my memory.”

Ned suddenly turned a corner and headed down a side street.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“If Ralph Mullins thinks we’re following him, he might get suspicious,” Ned said, “so now that we know who it is, we’ll come to his house from a different direction.”

“Good thinking.”

The part of town we were in now was really a hodgepodge of streets going at all kinds of weird angles, but we finally managed to find our way out and back onto a street that I knew would take us to Ralph Mullins’s house.

Ned let his car crawl down the street, so we could do a little spying. When Ralph got out of his pickup, he seemed to be having an angry conversation on a cell phone. Suddenly a woman whom I assumed was his wife came out the front door and started shouting something at him. Ralph Mullins gestured for her to be quiet, but she kept yelling. As we slowly passed, I turned around so I could see what else was going to happen. Now the woman seemed even angrier, but
then, so did Mr. Mullins. Without saying anything to the woman, he got back into his pickup and pealed out of the driveway. I’m glad he was headed away from us, because I don’t think he was looking where he was going.

I turned back around. “That is one angry man, for sure,” I said to Ned.

Ned nodded. “He could be under a lot of pressure from his family to bring in more money,” he said. He was looking in his rearview mirror. “I’d say Ralph Mullins was capable of stealing anything he thought he could make some money off of, including a library clock,” he said.

I nodded. “I think you’re right about that, Ned,” I said.

“Where to now, Nancy?”

I took out the telephone directory, turned to the
F
s, and ran my finger down a column. “Nine twenty-two Cleveland Street,” I said.

“That’s on the opposite side of River Heights, Nancy,” Ned said. “Who lives there?”

“Willy Franklin,” I replied. “The janitor at the library.”

I had suddenly thought of how the library clock could have disappeared. As we headed in the direction of Willy Franklin’s house, I told Ned about how the janitor had acted this morning during the
committee meeting. “All he wants to do is plaster over the hole in the wall and forget about the clock.”

“It definitely sounds like he’s trying to get people to think it’s not worth finding,” Ned said.

I grinned at him. Why would you want to find something, if you already knew where it was?

Ned grinned back. He knew that I might just have put together some pieces of the puzzle, but he didn’t ask me to explain what they were. That’s another thing I like about him: he just lets me think when I need to think.

“What do we do now?” Ned asked. “Park? Drive by slowly? Get out and stroll past? What?”

I looked at my watch. “Mr. Franklin’s shift at the library starts at six
P.M.
, so he could still be home,” I said. “Slow down a little, so I can get a good look, but not so much that we look like we’re casing his house, on the chance he’s standing at the window.”

I began reading the house numbers out loud. “It should be the next one,” I said. When we reached it, I saw that Mr. Franklin had a carport instead of a garage, so it was easy to tell that he wasn’t at home.

“Maybe he had some errands to do before he went to work,” Ned suggested.

“Or,” I said, finally giving Ned the pieces of the
puzzle I had put together, “maybe he knows Ralph Mullins, and maybe Mr. Mullins was talking to him on the telephone when we saw him getting out of his pickup!”

“That’s kind of a stretch, isn’t it, Nancy?” Ned said.

“Why? Stranger things have happened, Ned,” I said. “Together they easily could have hatched a plan to steal the clock.”

Ned thought about that for a minute. “Yeah, actually, that makes sense.”

“Maybe the fact that Ralph Mullins is a locksmith has nothing to do with breaking into the library to steal the clock,” I continued. “He could have reminded Mr. Franklin of the library’s agreement to take care of the clock, and convinced him to help Mullins with the robbery. Mr. Franklin could simply have let him in after hours so the two of them could take it out of the wall.”