The Slumber Party Secret

  WHO’S THE PARTY POOPER?

  Rebecca Ramirez’s birthday is just two days away, and she’s having a slumber party. She made the invitations herself, with rainbow ribbon hair clips and everything. But now the invitations are gone. Somebody took them. And the whole party is ruined!

  Or is it? Nancy Drew has promised to help find the missing invitations. Nancy has never solved a mystery before, but she already has a clue or two. Maybe if she writes them down in her special blue notebook . . . maybe if she thinks real hard . . . maybe, just maybe, she can make sure that Rebecca’s birthday is a party after all!

  The Slumber Party Secret

  ALADDIN PAPERBACKS

  A Ready-for-Chapters Book

  Simon & Schuster, New York

  Cover photography by Michel Le Grou at

  Media Photo Group

  Cover photo-illustration copyright © 1999

  by Joanie Schwarz

  Ages 6-9

  Kids.SimonandSchuster.com

  0994

  The Slumber Party Secret

  Nancy squeezed her eyes shut and asked herself a question: Who stole the party invitations—and why?

  Then Nancy opened her eyes. “You know what I think?” she said.

  But her friends Bess and George weren’t paying any attention to her.

  George was watching the video. Bess was staring at something behind Nancy. Before Nancy could turn around, Bess opened her mouth as wide as she could and screamed.

  Nancy turned around. Framed in the window was a horrible, scary monster!

  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

  #45 The Dashing Dog Mystery

  #46 The Snow Queen’s Surprise

  #47 The Crook Who Took the Book

  #48 The Crazy Carnival Case

  #49 The Sand Castle Mystery

  #50 The Scarytales Sleepover

  #51 The Old-Fashioned Mystery

  #52 Big Worry in Wonderland

  #53 Recipe for Trouble

  #54 The Stinky Cheese Surprise

  #55 The Day Camp Disaster

  #56 Turkey Trouble

  #57 The Carousel Mystery

  #58 The Dollhouse Mystery

  #59 The Bike Race Mystery

  #60 The Lighthouse Mystery

  #61 Space Case

  #62 The Secret in the Spooky Woods

  #63 Snowman Surprise

  Available from Simon & Schuster

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  First Aladdin Paperbacks edition September 2001

  First Minstrel Books edition September 1994

  Copyright © 1994 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Produced by Mega-Books of New York, Inc.

  ALADDIN PAPERBACKS

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster

  Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  The text of this book was set in Excelsior.

  NANCY DREW and THE NANCY DREW NOTEBOOKS are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  ISBN-13: 978-0-671-87945-7 (Aladdin pbk.)

  ISBN-10: 0-671-87945-6 (Aladdin pbk.)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4424-6757-6 (eBook)

  Contents

  Chapter 1: Party Problems

  Chapter 2: Hurt Feelings

  Chapter 3: Green Ink and Garbage Cans

  Chapter 4: Nancy’s New Notebook

  Chapter 5: Another Note

  Chapter 6: Party Pranks

  Chapter 7: Noises in the Night

  Chapter 8: The Secret Comes Out

  1

  Party Problems

  But how can party invitations just disappear?” Nancy Drew asked. She stopped right in the middle of the sidewalk and looked at her friend.

  “Don’t ask me,” Rebecca Ramirez moaned. “All I know is my birthday party is ruined. Now no one will come!” She stuck out her lower lip and pouted.

  Nancy took Rebecca’s hand and started walking down the tree-lined street again to Carl Sandburg Elementary School. They were in third grade there.

  Both eight-year-old girls lived just a few blocks from school. This was the first year that Nancy’s and Rebecca’s parents had let them walk to school. For two weeks now, they had walked together every day.

  They lived on different streets. But every morning Nancy stopped to pick Rebecca up. They were starting to be good friends.

  “I’ll come to your party,” Nancy said. Then she put her hand over her mouth. “Oops! I mean, if I’m invited.”

  “Of course you are, silly,” Rebecca said. “I’m only allowed to invite eight people, though, because it’s a slumber party.” She told Nancy whom she was inviting.

  “Well, why don’t you just ask everyone to come?” Nancy said. “Then when you find the invitations, you can give them out.”

  “No, no, no,” Rebecca said. “You don’t understand. The invitations aren’t lost. They’ve been stolen!”

  “Stolen?” Nancy said.

  Rebecca nodded.

  “Okay,” Nancy said. “Tell me everything.”

  Rebecca sighed dramatically. “I don’t know why I’m even going to school. I should go back home and spend the rest of my life in bed!”

  Nancy brushed her reddish blond bangs out of her eyes and smiled. Rebecca was acting upset. Acting was the right word, too. Nancy knew that Rebecca wanted to be an actress when she grew up. She always made a big drama out of everything.

  She’s probably acting more upset than she really is, Nancy thought. Still, a party was important. Especially a slumber party! This would be Nancy’s first one.

  “Here’s the worst part,” Rebecca wen
t on. “I made the invitations myself. It took three hours! I put a party favor in each one. So the favors are gone, too!”

  “Maybe that’s why someone took the invitations,” Nancy said. “For the party favors.”

  “You could be right,” Rebecca said. “They were really pretty, too—hair clips made with lots of tiny rainbow ribbons.”

  Nancy frowned. “I would love to have a rainbow ribbon hair clip,” she said. “Maybe I can help you get them back.”

  “Really?” said Rebecca. She flipped her long black hair over her shoulders. “But how?”

  “I’ll start by asking you questions,” Nancy said. She thought for a minute. “When did the invitations disappear?”

  “I don’t know,” Rebecca said. “I had them yesterday. I don’t have time to make more. My party is this Friday night.”

  “This Friday?” Nancy asked. She was surprised. It was already Wednesday.

  Rebecca groaned. “I told you it was a big problem. My mom forgot to mail the invitations. I was going to hand them out in school today.”

  “Wow. We really have to hurry,” Nancy said. “Where were the invitations the last time you saw them?”

  “I put them on the kitchen counter by the back door last night,” Rebecca said. “Then I went to take a bath.”

  “Maybe the invitations aren’t really stolen,” Nancy said. “Maybe you just can’t find them. Let’s look for them after school.”

  “I’ve already looked. Twice!” Rebecca said in a huffy voice.

  Nancy grinned. “But I didn’t look yet. I’m very good at finding things. I find my dad’s keys all the time.”

  “Okay.” Rebecca smiled for the first time that morning. “Maybe you can find them. Thanks. You are absolutely my best friend in the whole world, Nancy Drew!”

  That wasn’t true, and Nancy knew it. Jessie Shapiro was Rebecca’s best friend.

  Rebecca and Nancy walked into the school building. Then they hurried to their classrooms. Rebecca was in Mrs. Apple’s third-grade class. Nancy was in Ms. Spencer’s room, at the very end of the hall.

  When Nancy got to her classroom, all the other students were in their seats. Nancy closed the classroom door behind her.

  “You’re almost late!” said George Fayne as Nancy passed her desk at the front of the row.

  “I know,” said Nancy. The bell rang just as she sat down at her desk by the window.

  “Why are you so late?” Bess Marvin asked. Her seat was right next to Nancy’s.

  “I was talking to Rebecca,” Nancy whispered. “I’ll tell you at lunch.”

  Nancy couldn’t stop thinking about the missing party invitations. But first she had a different problem to solve: 111 + 32 = ?

  For the next hour Ms. Spencer’s class did math review. Math was not Nancy’s favorite subject. But it was easy for her. Nancy did most of the problems in her head—just to make them harder.

  After math the class did science. Then history.

  Finally the lunch bell rang.

  Nancy and Bess hurried out of the classroom. They met George at the door.

  Bess was one of Nancy’s two best friends. She was pretty, with long blond hair. Bess was fussy about her hair. She combed it a lot and liked to wear headbands or bows.

  George was Bess’s cousin. She was Nancy’s other best friend. Her real name was Georgia, but no one called her that. She was taller than Nancy and Bess and not fussy about her hair at all. George had dark curls that bounced when she ran. She rarely wore ribbons or headbands. She didn’t like anything in her hair that could fall out when she was doing a cartwheel. Or playing hopscotch. Or climbing a tree.

  Sometimes the girls brought their lunches. Other times they ate the cafeteria food. That day the three of them went through the lunch line together. Then they found seats at an empty table.

  While they ate, Nancy told Bess and George that they were invited to Rebecca’s party. Then she told them about the missing party invitations and favors.

  George wrinkled her nose. “I don’t care about the party favors,” she said. “But I can’t wait to go to a slumber party! That will be so much fun.”

  Bess frowned at George. “Well, I care about the party favors,” Bess said. “I would love to have a rainbow ribbon hair clip.”

  “Me, too,” Nancy agreed. She put a straw into her milk carton. “So I’m going to help Rebecca find the invitations. But I have to work fast. The party is this Friday night.”

  “This Friday?” Bess said. “Uh-oh.”

  “Yeah, that’s pretty soon,” George agreed.

  “No, that’s not the problem. I think there’s going to be trouble at her party,” Bess said.

  “Why?” Nancy asked.

  “Because guess who’s having a party the same night? And on the same street where Rebecca lives?”

  “Who?” Nancy and George both asked.

  Bess pinched her nose closed and scrunched up her face. “The boys!” she said.

  2

  Hurt Feelings

  But that’s neat!” Nancy said. She put down her egg salad sandwich. “That makes two slumber parties on Friday. It’s like a special sleepover night.”

  “No, it isn’t,” Bess said, shaking her head. “The boys will ruin everything!”

  “What do you mean?” Nancy asked.

  “I heard Jason Hutchings inviting his friends,” Bess said. “They’re all bringing giant squirt guns. There’s going to be a water war.”

  “Sounds like fun,” George said. She popped a pickle into her mouth. “What’s wrong with that?”

  Bess rolled her eyes. “I told you already! Jason lives down the street from Rebecca. They’ll probably all come over and ruin our party.”

  “How?” George asked.

  “Just by being boys!” Bess said. “By acting like jerks!”

  “Maybe,” Nancy said. “But if they do come, we’ll get rid of them. Won’t we, George?” Nancy poked George under the table.

  “You bet. We’ll let them take someone as their prisoner,” George continued. “Someone with long blond hair. Someone who—”

  “You wouldn’t dare!” Bess said.

  “Anyway, the boys don’t know about Rebecca’s party yet,” Nancy said. “No one knows except us—because the invitations are missing. And I don’t think the boys will care.”

  “You don’t know Jason the way I do,” Bess said. “He’s such a creep!”

  Just then Rebecca came over. “You’re all three invited to my party,” she announced. “Sorry I don’t have invitations. They were stolen by some horrible thief.”

  “That’s all right,” Bess said sweetly. “We understand.”

  “Thanks,” Rebecca said. “You guys are my best friends in the whole world!”

  The girls looked at one another and tried not to giggle.

  “But don’t talk about my party in class,” Rebecca went on. “It’s a secret because my mom said I could only invite eight friends. Okay?”

  “Okay,” Nancy, Bess, and George said together.

  Rebecca started to walk away. “And bring your sleeping bags!” she called back to them in a loud voice. Then she hurried over to another table.

  Nancy watched as Rebecca whispered something to Sarah Churnichan and Katie Zaleski. Next Rebecca whispered to Jessie Shapiro, her best friend. Then she walked over to two other third-grade girls. She didn’t even bother whispering to them. She invited them to the party out loud.

  “Oh, boy,” Nancy said. “She tells us to keep the party a secret. Then she blabs it all over the place!”

  “Blabs what?” someone behind Nancy asked.

  Nancy turned around in her chair. Jason Hutchings was standing right behind her.

  “Don’t tell him!” Bess cried.

  “Don’t tell him!” Jason repeated. He made his voice high and imitated Bess. He burped on purpose. Then he laughed loud enough for everyone around to hear and walked away.

  “See what I mean?” Bess said. “He’s a jerk! He’
ll ruin Rebecca’s party for sure.”

  “Not if we keep it a secret,” Nancy said. She bit into a cookie.

  “Keep what a secret?” There was a new voice at Nancy’s back.

  Nancy turned around. Why was everyone listening to her today?

  Now Lindsay Mitchell was standing there, holding an empty lunch bag. Lindsay liked to eavesdrop. She always ended up hearing things she shouldn’t have. Then she got her feelings hurt.

  “I can’t tell you what we were talking about,” Nancy said. “I promised I wouldn’t.”

  “I already know,” Lindsay said. “It’s about Rebecca’s party, isn’t it? I can’t believe she didn’t invite me.”

  Nancy felt her face turn red. “It’s a slumber party, Lindsay. Rebecca’s mother said she could only invite a few friends. Rebecca didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.”

  “Then she shouldn’t have talked about it at school!” Lindsay said.

  That was true, and Nancy knew it.

  “I’ll never invite her to a party as long as I live,” Lindsay said. Then she stomped off.

  Bess, Nancy, and George picked up their cafeteria trays, emptied them in the trash, and stacked them on the shelf. Then they went outside.

  Nancy loved going outside at lunchtime. But the playground wasn’t much fun that day. Before lunchtime was over, a lot of the third-grade girls had divided up into two groups.

  Rebecca was in the middle of one group, with the eight girls who had been invited to her party. They were playing on the swings.

  Lindsay Mitchell was in the middle of the other group. She was with some of the girls who had not been invited. They weren’t playing anything at all. They were just standing around and talking.

  When the bell rang, everyone went inside. The boys pushed and shoved. They were trying to get to the water fountain first.

  “This is my first slumber party ever,” Jessie said as they waited to get a drink.

  “Mine, too,” Nancy said.

  “Can we have a pillow fight?” Jessie asked.

  “Sure,” said Rebecca.

  “Ooooh. A pillow fight!” Jason said. “How exciting. NOT!”

  Jason and his friends laughed. Mike Minelli laughed so hard he spit water all over the floor.