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Informationen zum Autor Carolyn Keene is the author of the ever-popular Nancy Drew books. Klappentext Nancy may have successfully cleared Ned from suspicion when the local carnival's cash box went missing! but along the way she uncovered a deeper plot. In the stunning conclusion! Nancy finally uncovers who is sabotaging the Daughters of River Heights carnival. Leseprobe DAY THREE I clutched my oversize paper Club Coffee cup and swished the cold, sugary dregs of caffeine around. I took a sip and winced at what had once been a delicious drink. Earlier this morning it had been an extra-large caramel macchiato with extra caramel drizzled over the extra whipped cream with an extra shot of espresso. Earlier this morning it had been amazing and warm and delicious. Sadly, now the coffee was cold and bitter and no longer a priority for me after an hour of sitting in the front office of the school, watching the video footage of the thief over and over. My only hope was that Bess or George would remember to bring me another caramel macchiato when they arrived later. Fingers crossed! To make sure, I pulled out my PDA and sent them each a text as a reminder. EXTRA-LARGE CARAMEL MACCHIATO. EXTRA CARAMEL DRIZZLED OVER EXTRA WHIPPED CREAM. ADD AN EXTRA SHOT OF ESPRESSO. Bess responded first.omg! George responded next.lol! As for the thief, I’d watched the video footage, endlessly, on repeat—but I still couldn’t make out much about the actual thief. I had been poring over every inch of the screen. It was a somewhat shorter man dressed all in black, and that was about all I could see. Whoever he was he’d stolen the cash box full of carnival ticket money and gone to great lengths to make sure he couldn’t be identified by covering his tracks, casting blame onto others who happened to be in the area, and concealing any of his identifiable features such as hair color. A real professional, if you asked me. The creepiest detail of all was that he seemed to know where the cameras were stationed around the school and therefore strategically kept to the shadows and out of their line of sight. Once in possession of the cash box, the thief had left the ticket booth and then immediately disappeared. This knowledge of the cameras’ location indicated a certain familiarity with the school. But how so? Was he a teacher? A current student? A former student? An administrator? A member of the janitorial staff? He had done an expert job, mapping out a near-perfect escape route, avoiding additional security cameras, and leaving little evidence behind. In fact, leaving behind only this footage. So far in my review of the tape, all I’d noticed was that he’d stopped to scratch a spot to the bottom left of his collar a couple of times before placing his hands on the cash box to steal it away. This spot really seemed to bother him for some reason. But by my seventeenth view or so of the footage, I noticed something different. If you blinked, you would have missed it. I watched it some more, and the more I watched the footage, the more clearly the gesture became somewhat of a clue to go on. The mystery man stopped, looked up toward the camera, and winked. He actually winked! It was kind of far away and not the clearest of footage, granted, but I also knew a wink when I saw one. Yes, admittedly, I sometimes tended to take my cases a bit too personally, since I was the one who tended to solve them, rather than law enforcement, but for some reason I felt as though that wink was directed right at me. Like he knew I was hot on his trail. This only made me want to solve the mystery even more. I mean, how could it not have been directed at me? I had been on the trail of this criminal for two days now, moving into a third. I wanted nothing more than to bring this whole string of criminal activity to ...
