The Haunted Carousel (14 page)

Again, Joy stared at the teenage sleuth. “I—I don’t understand. What do you mean?”

Instead of replying, Nancy opened the door and beckoned to someone waiting outside. An attractive woman with dark reddish-brown hair walked into the room.

“This is Mrs. Rose Harrod,” Nancy announced to the wide-eyed girl, “your mother’s twin sister!”

Joy uttered a cry of astonishment. Mrs. Harrod, who by now had completely recovered from her kidnapping ordeal, came toward her, smiling and with outstretched arms, and gathered her into a fond embrace. “Oh, Joy dear! I’ve been trying so long and so hard to find you!

It was a highly emotional moment. Both Rose Harrod and Joy were soon weeping tears of happiness. Rose then filled in the missing parts of the story.

She, too, like her sister Iris, had become estranged from her harsh aristocratic parents because they disapproved of her marriage. Rose’s husband, then a sergeant but now a major in the U.S. Marine Corps, was currently on sea duty. But seven or eight years ago, while he was stationed in Japan, a friend had sent Rose a magazine clipping in full color, with a scribbled notation: Doesn’t this little girl look just like you did at her age!

The picture, which seemed to have been clipped from some industrial publication or trade journal, showed an unnamed business executive buying a carousel horse for his little daughter.

“It wasn’t until much later,” Rose Harrod told Joy, “that I realized the little girl in the picture must be Iris’s child. You see, I was out of touch with my parents and somehow lost touch with your mother, so I never learned the full story of your mother’s marriage or how she came to be separated from your father.”

After Rose’s parents died, however, she did learn the full story and decided to trace Iris’s

lost daughter. Unfortunately, the clipping included no caption, and she was unable to find out what magazine it had come from.

“Then I read in the paper about the haunted carousel,” Rose went on. “I saw the name on it—the Wonderland Gallop—and I suddenly realized it was the same merry-go-round shown in the clipping.”

Accordingly, Rose had come to River Heights and talked to Leo Novak. Novak, prompted by his own greed and suspicious nature, had jumped to the conclusion that she was really after the valuable horse carved by Walter Kruse. So he deliberately misled her, pretending he had had no connection with the carousel at the time the picture was taken.

Instead, he had turned over her name and address to Fingers and Baldy. They had kidnapped Mrs. Harrod, hoping to extort any clues she might have to the whereabouts of the missing carousel horse.

Before this happened, however, Rose had gone to the River Heights Chamber of Commerce and shown them the magazine clipping. They had immediately recognized the man in the picture as the late, local machine-tool tycoon, John Trent.

After thus finally tracing her dead sister’s spouse, Rose had gone to the Trent house, trying to meet Joy—only to be painfully rebuffed by Mrs. Yawley. She had then turned to Nancy for help.

“But I did so very cautiously, as you know, Nancy,” Rose Harrod added with a rueful smile. “I wasn’t sure whose side you might be on.

“The real choice, I believe,” said a man’s voice, “now lies with Miss Joy Trent herself.” All eyes turned to the speaker, a white-haired man who had entered the room quietly behind Mrs. Harrod. He was John Trent’s lawyer.

“What exactly do you mean, Mr. Trimble?” Joy asked him.

“I mean, my dear, do you prefer to place yourself under the care of your father’s sister, Mrs. Selma Yawley—or your mother’s sister, Mrs. Rose Harrod?”

“Now just a minute! ” Mrs. Yawley cut in shrilly. “This child is not mature enough to make such a decision herself! Let me remind you that John’s will names me as Joy’s guardian!”

“Only temporarily and conditionally, madam,” the attorney corrected her. “It so happens my late client, John Trent, left a codicil to his will which you have never seen.”

As he spoke, Mr. Trimble extracted a paper

from his briefcase and handed it to Mrs. Yaw- ley.

“As you will see there,” he went on, “Mr. Trent realized that you and Joy might not get along well. He also foresaw that if Joy solved the riddle which he left her, she might eventually meet her mother’s twin sister. He therefore added the codicil stating that, if this happened, Joy could decide for herself whether you or her other aunt should be her guardian until she comes of age.”

With a glad cry, Joy rushed into Rose Har- rod’s embrace. Brilliant flashes blazed in the playroom as reporter Rick Jason raised his camera and began snapping photos.

For a fleeting moment, Nancy wondered if her next mystery would be as exciting as this one. She would know very soon when she accepted the challenge of the Enemy Match.

Her blue eyes twinkled as she whispered to Ned, “Those two crooks, Fingers and Baldy, will still have to stand trial, but I think one case, at least, has just been settled out of court!”