The Purple Fingerprint

  “Save Mr. Lizard! Save Mr. Lizard!”

  “We have something for Mr. Lizard,” Karen Koombs said to the security guard at the TV station. She held out the envelope containing the petition.

  “I’ll take it,” a woman said. “I’m Jane, the producer of the show.”

  “And I’m that other guy,” a man with bright red hair said with a wink.

  “It’s him!” Bess squealed under her breath. “It’s Mr. Lizard.”

  Nancy and her friends hurried out of the station and onto the sidewalk. Nancy felt very proud—until the doors swung open and Mr. Lizard marched out.

  “Is this some kind of joke?” Mr. Lizard asked. He reached into the envelope and pulled out a sheet of notebook paper.

  Everyone gasped. Written on it in big purple letters were the words “Get rid of Mr. Lizard!!”

  The Nancy Drew Notebooks

  # 1 The Slumber Party Secret

  # 2 The Lost Locket

  # 3 The Secret Santa

  # 4 Bad Day for Ballet

  # 5 The Soccer Shoe Clue

  # 6 The Ice Cream Scoop

  # 7 Trouble at Camp Treehouse

  # 8 The Best Detective

  # 9 The Thanksgiving Surprise

  #10 Not Nice on Ice

  #11 The Pen Pal Puzzle

  #12 The Puppy Problem

  #13 The Wedding Gift Goof

  #14 The Funny Face Fight

  #15 The Crazy Key Clue

  #16 The Ski Slope Mystery

  #17 Whose Pet Is Best?

  #18 The Stolen Unicorn

  #19 The Lemonade Raid

  #20 Hannah’s Secret

  #21 Princess on Parade

  #22 The Clue in the Glue

  #23 Alien in the Classroom

  #24 The Hidden Treasures

  #25 Dare at the Fair

  #26 The Lucky Horseshoes

  #27 Trouble Takes the Cake

  #28 Thrill on the Hill

  #29 Lights! Camera! Clues!

  #30 It’s No Joke!

  #31 The Fine-Feathered Mystery

  #32 The Black Velvet Mystery

  #33 The Gumdrop Ghost

  #34 Trash or Treasure?

  #35 Third-Grade Reporter

  #36 The Make-Believe Mystery

  #37 Dude Ranch Detective

  #38 Candy Is Dandy

  #39 The Chinese New Year Mystery

  #40 Dinosaur Alert!

  #41 Flower Power

  #42 Circus Act

  #43 The Walkie-talkie Mystery

  #44 The Purple Fingerprint

  Available from MINSTREL Books

  THE NANCY DREW NOTEBOOKS®

  #44

  The Purple Fingerprint

  CAROLYN KEENE

  ILLUSTRATED BY JAN NAIMO JONES

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  A MINSTREL PAPERBACK Original

  A Minstrel Book published by

  POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Visit us on the World Wide Web:

  http://www.SimonSays.com

  Copyright © 2001 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  ISBN: 0-7434-3705-5

  eISBN-13: 978-0-7434-3705-9

  First Minstrel Books printing October 2001

  NANCY DREW, THE NANCY DREW NOTEBOOKS,

  A MINSTREL BOOK and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  1

  Bad News Brenda

  Macaroni and cheese, please!” eight-year-old Nancy Drew called out from the lunch line.

  “For all of us!” Bess Marvin said.

  George Fayne gave Bess a nudge.

  “—Please!” Bess added quickly.

  Bess and George were Nancy’s two best friends. They were also cousins who looked very different. George—whose real name was Georgia—had brown eyes and dark curly hair. Bess had blue eyes and long blond hair.

  But all three friends had a lot in common. They were in Mrs. Reynolds’s third-grade class at Carl Sandburg Elementary School. And they couldn’t wait for macaroni-and-cheese Monday.

  Mrs. Enid Carmichael, the lunch lady, stood behind the counter. She wore her usual pink uniform and a hairnet.

  “Sorry, girls,” Mrs. Carmichael said. “No macaroni and cheese today.”

  Nancy couldn’t believe her ears. “But it’s Monday,” she said, surprised.

  “And I said ‘please,’” Bess said.

  Mrs. Carmichael smiled.

  “Today we’re having something from my brand-new cookbook,” she said. “It’s a French dish called quiche à la fromage.”

  “Keesh a la . . .” Nancy tried to say.

  “I hope that’s French for macaroni and cheese,” George said.

  Mrs. Carmichael pointed to a board hanging on the wall. It was where she wrote the lunch menu in bright purple marker.

  “There’ll be something new and yummy each day this week,” Mrs. Carmichael said.

  Nancy brushed aside her reddish blond bangs. She read the lunch board.

  “Stuffed hard-boiled eggs with mushrooms?” Nancy gasped.

  “Zucchini pie?” Bess squeaked.

  “Those sound like something Dalton Feivish would whip up for the science fair,” George said.

  Nancy nodded. Dalton Feivish was in Mrs. Apple’s third-grade class. He was famous for his gross science projects.

  “I heard that!” a voice snapped.

  Nancy, Bess, and George turned around. Standing behind them was Dalton!

  “Excuse me, Mrs. Carmichael,” Dalton called over the girls’ shoulders. “Do you have any moldy bread in your kitchen?”

  “I should say not!” Mrs. Carmichael declared. “All my bread is fresh!”

  “Too bad.” Dalton sighed. “For my next experiment I was going to grow mold inside my gym socks.”

  “Eww!” Nancy and her friends cried at the same time.

  The girls placed their plates on their trays and hurried to a table.

  “Okay,” George said, staring at her plate. “Who’s going to try it first?”

  “Nancy’s a detective,” Bess said quickly. “She can solve the mystery of the weird-looking lunch.”

  “Thanks a lot!” Nancy joked.

  But Bess was right. Nancy loved solving mysteries. She even had a blue detective notebook where she wrote all of her clues.

  Nancy took a deep breath. She tasted the lunch with the funny name and smiled.

  “This is yummy!” she said. “Sort of like a cheesy-tasting pie.”

  Suddenly Bess began to laugh.

  “I just remembered when Mr. Lizard pretended to cook on his show,” Bess said.

  Nancy grinned. Mr. Lizard’s Funhouse was their favorite TV show after school. Mr. Lizard had bright red hair and did the funniest things. He had even made up his own lizard dance.

  “I remember, too!” Nancy exclaimed. “Mr. Lizard was trying to cook fudge.”

  “Except it looked more like sludge!” George giggled.

  The friends began to laugh—until Brenda Carlton sat down next to them.

  “I know something you don’t know,” she began to sing softly.

  Nancy rolled her eyes. Brenda Carlton thought she knew everything. Her father owned a newspaper, and she even wrote her own, called t
he Carlton News, on her computer every week.

  “Mr. Lizard’s Funhouse will not be on TV anymore,” Brenda announced.

  Nancy almost dropped her fork. “How do you know?” she asked.

  “My father told me so,” Brenda said. “The TV station is putting a cooking show on instead. Something called The Clever Cook.”

  “A cooking show?” George complained.

  “That’s for grown-ups!” Bess cried.

  Nancy wondered if Brenda was telling the truth. She had made up stories before.

  “Maybe it’s not true,” Nancy said.

  “Are you calling me a liar?” Brenda demanded.

  “Nope,” George joked. “We already call you Miss Snooty Pants.”

  “Very funny,” Brenda muttered.

  Nancy turned to Bess and George.

  “Let’s ask someone who will know for sure,” she said. “Like Karen Koombs. She’s the president of the Mr. Lizard Fan Club.”

  “Good idea,” George said. “We can go to Karen’s house after school. That’s where she has the fan club meetings.”

  Brenda rolled her eyes.

  “Good luck,” she said. “The Mr. Lizard Fan Club doesn’t want third graders. They wouldn’t let me join.”

  Brenda flipped back her hair. Then she took a bite of her turkey sandwich.

  “Maybe they just didn’t want Brenda,” Bess whispered.

  Nancy returned to her lunch. She hoped the bad news wasn’t true. But they would find out—soon enough!

  After school the girls each got permission to meet at Karen Koombs’s house.

  Nancy rang the doorbell.

  “What’s the password?” a girl’s voice called from behind the door.

  “Is it lizard dance?” Nancy guessed.

  The door flew wide open. Karen stood there wearing a Mr. Lizard T-shirt.

  “Follow me,” Karen said.

  Nancy, Bess, and George followed Karen down to the basement. Nancy saw six kids sitting in front of a TV. Some were wearing Mr. Lizard T-shirts. Others wore bright red Mr. Lizard wigs.

  “This is Nancy, Bess, and George,” Karen said. “They knew the password.”

  Peter DeSands from Mrs. Reynolds’s class stood up. “How do we know they’re not spies?” he asked.

  “Don’t be silly,” Nancy said. “If we were spies, would we be able to do this?”

  Nancy wiggled her fingers behind her head. She flicked out her tongue. Then she, Bess, and George danced the lizard dance—perfectly.

  “Wow!” Karen said, smiling. “You really do like Mr. Lizard!”

  “That’s why we want to know if the news is true,” Nancy explained. “Is Mr. Lizard’s Funhouse going off TV?”

  Everyone looked very sad.

  “It’s true.” A girl wearing a red wig sighed. “Mr. Lizard just said so himself. His last show will be on Thursday.”

  Karen pumped her fist in the air. “Unless we can think of a way to save Mr. Lizard,” she said.

  “I know!” a girl with curly hair said. “We can cross our fingers and our toes—and wish really, really hard.”

  “We can send station WRIV a pizza,” a boy with freckles said. “And write ‘Save Mr. Lizard’ with pepperonis and olives.”

  Nancy had an idea, too. “Why don’t we get all the kids who like Mr. Lizard to sign a petition?” she asked.

  “A pet-what?” Peter asked.

  “It’s a list of names,” Nancy explained. “The fifth grade started one last year when they wanted granola bars in the snack machine.”

  “It worked,” the curly-haired girl said. “We got granola bars and raisins!”

  “We can bring the list to station WRIV,” Nancy went on. “Then they’ll see how many kids really like Mr. Lizard.”

  “Awesome idea!” Karen declared. “Will you put together the petition, Nancy?”

  “Me?” Nancy asked. She looked at Bess and George. They were nodding hard.

  “Sure,” Nancy said. “I’ll get kids to sign it in the lunchroom tomorrow—”

  Nancy was interrupted by a loud pounding on the door.

  “Let me in!” a boy’s voice yelled. “I want to watch Artie the Aardvark!”

  Nancy guessed that the boy was Karen’s little brother, Jimmy.

  “Go away!” Karen shouted. “We’re trying to save Mr. Lizard!”

  “Mr. Lizard! Mr. Lizard!” Jimmy shouted. “I hope he goes away forever and ever and ever!”

  Nancy’s eyes opened wide.

  That will never happen, she thought. Not if I can help it!

  2

  Nightmare for Nancy

  Would anyone like to sign our petition?” Nancy asked her class in the lunchroom the next day.

  “For what?” Jason Hutchings joked. “Cherry soda in the water fountains?”

  “Less homework,” Amara Shane said.

  “More jump ropes in the schoolyard!” Molly Angelo cheered.

  “No,” Nancy said. “It’s to keep Mr. Lizard on TV.”

  The kids nodded. Most of them had heard the bad news on TV the day before.

  “The Mr. Lizard Fan Club gave Nancy a special job,” Bess bragged.

  “She’s getting all the kids who like Mr. Lizard to sign their names,” George added.

  Nancy heard a sputter. She looked up and saw Brenda wiping tomato juice from her chin.

  “The fan club let you in?” Brenda gasped. “All three of you?”

  “Sure,” Nancy said. “I guess they like third graders. Right, Peter?”

  “Right,” Peter DeSands said.

  Brenda turned as red as her tomato juice. Then she seemed to force a smile.

  “I’ll sign the petition,” Brenda said sweetly. “Anything to save Mr. Lizard.”

  Nancy laid the petition on the table. She had worked on it the night before.

  There were three sheets of lined paper for kids to sign. On top was a colorful picture of Mr. Lizard that Karen had given her. On it Nancy had written “Save Mr. Lizard” in big black letters.

  Brenda signed the petition first. Then she passed it down the table.

  “Bess and I can get the other tables to sign in the meantime,” George offered.

  “Thanks,” Nancy said. She handed Bess and George the other two sign-up sheets.

  Mrs. Reynolds’s class finished signing the petition. Nancy glanced around the lunchroom. Who would sign next?

  “Keep those trays moving!” Nancy heard Mrs. Carmichael shout.

  Mrs. Carmichael! Nancy thought excitedly. I’ll get her to sign. She’ll be our first grown-up.

  Nancy carried the petition to the counter. “Hi, Mrs. Carmichael,” she said.

  “Hi, yourself,” Mrs. Carmichael said brightly. She held up a dish. “How about some crème caramel for dessert? It’s from my new cookbook.”

  Nancy’s mouth watered at the creamy dessert. But she had work to do.

  “No, thank you,” Nancy said. “But would you like to sign our petition? It’s to save the Mr. Lizard show.”

  Nancy held up the picture of Mr. Lizard. Mrs. Carmichael’s eyes opened wide. The plate in her hand shook.

  “I c-can’t sign that petition,” Mrs. Carmichael stammered. “I won’t! I refuse!”

  “But—” Nancy started to say.

  “Keep the line moving!” Mrs. Carmichael yelled at the top of her lungs.

  Nancy was confused. Why was Mrs. Carmichael acting so strange?

  Then Nancy saw a cookbook on Mrs. Carmichael’s side of the counter. The name of the book was The Clever Cook Cooks.

  So that explained it.

  Mrs. Carmichael is a Clever Cook fan! Nancy thought. That’s why she doesn’t want to save Mr. Lizard’s Funhouse.

  Nancy spent the rest of the lunch period getting more signatures. When lunch was over she met Bess and George by their cubbies outside the classroom.

  “Three pages of signatures!” Nancy cheered as they checked out the papers.

  “Both sides!” George pointed out.
>
  “Where are you going to keep the petition during class, Nancy?” Bess asked.

  Nancy put the petition and picture of Mr. Lizard inside a big yellow envelope.

  “It won’t fit in my desk,” Nancy said. “So I’ll keep it inside my cubby.”

  Very carefully Nancy slid the envelope into her cubby. She looked over her shoulder and saw Jimmy Koombs. He was leaning on a cubby shelf and watching her.

  “Mr. Lizard, Mr. Lizard,” Jimmy muttered. “That’s all my sister ever talks about. Blah, blah, blah,blah!”

  “What’s his problem?” George whispered to Nancy.

  “Not everyone has to like Mr. Lizard.” Nancy shrugged. “Just like not everyone likes chocolate ice cream.”

  The girls filed into the classroom. They sat down at their desks. Nancy tried to pay attention to Mrs. Reynolds, but her thoughts kept going back to the petition.

  What if the envelope fell out of my cubby? Nancy wondered. Or got crushed?

  Nancy wanted to make sure her envelope was safe. So when Molly needed to go to the washroom, Nancy raised her hand to be her hall buddy. Molly picked Brenda instead.

  Oh, well, Nancy thought. I’m sure the envelope is just fine.

  After a spelling quiz and current events, three o’clock finally arrived.

  Nancy pulled the big yellow envelope from her cubby and hugged it to her chest.

  “All systems go!” she announced.

  Mrs. Marvin picked the girls up from school. After making a couple of stops, she drove them to the TV station in her red minivan.

  “There’s the fan club!” George called. She pointed out the window.

  Nancy leaned over Bess and George to look out. The whole fan club was marching in front of the station. They were carrying homemade signs that read, Save Mr. Lizard!

  “Wow!” Bess said. She popped the last of her chocolate bar into her mouth.

  “I’ll pick you girls up in an hour,” Mrs. Marvin said with a smile. “Good luck!”

  Nancy, Bess, and George waved to Mrs. Marvin as she drove away. Then they ran straight to Karen.

  “Three pages of signatures!” George told Karen. “Check it out!”

  “No time for that,” Karen said. She grabbed the envelope. “Now let’s march through those doors and save Mr. Lizard!”