Hidden Meanings

  Chapter

  One

  WOW, WHO WOULD EVER have believed it—a truly awesome hotel here in River Heights!”

  Staring up at the soaring lobby of the Atrium Hotel, Nancy Drew could only nod in agreement with the comment from her boyfriend, Ned Nickerson. Nancy and Ned were standing at the top of a black marble ramp just inside the front doors of the hotel. For months Nancy had noticed the tower of pink granite and dark glass rising on the edge of the college campus. But the new high-rise hotel had opened only the weekend before, and this was her first look inside.

  Three glass-sided elevators glided up and down one side of the atrium. Guests inside could look down upon the lobby as they were whooshed smoothly to their floors. All guest room doors opened directly onto balcony walkways that overlooked the lobby twelve stories below.

  An entire wall was made of glass—huge triangular panes angled to flood the atrium with sunlight. Delicate ficus trees, hanging plants, and banks of lush greenery had been planted all over the lobby. “It’s almost like a giant greenhouse,” Nancy remarked. “I guess all the fountains and reflecting pools keep it cool, even on hot days like today.”

  “I’ll bet you could go whitewater rafting on that layout,” Ned joked. He pointed to a pair of gleaming escalators leading to a mezzanine level, where a café had been set under the immense glass wall. A huge fountain there flowed into a steel water sculpture, which sent the water down into a long central pool in the lobby. A footbridge led over the pool. A series of cascades splashed down to another pool near the reception desk, on a level below the lobby.

  “Nan, let’s take the elevator to the top floor to get the whole view,” Ned suggested, pulling on Nancy’s arm.

  “Okay—in a minute,” Nancy said, tucking a strand of reddish blond hair into her ponytail. “First, I need to bring this bag to Bess.” She swung the pink duffel bag she’d picked up from her friend Bess Marvin’s house onto her shoulder. “She needs a change of clothes now that Mr. Ruxton has asked her to work at the banquet tonight.”

  Ned pointed to a chrome-framed sign on a nearby wall. “There’s a schedule of all the events being held in the hotel today,” he said. “Let’s check it out.”

  Nancy and Ned walked over and studied the list. “This has to be it—‘The Great Lakes High School Press Association,”’ Nancy read aloud. “It says their registration area is in the Muskoka Lobby.”

  “It shouldn’t be too hard for us to find the Muskoka Lobby,” Ned said. “We’ll just follow the crowd.” He nodded toward a chattering swarm of high school students heading down a carpeted side corridor. Ned and Nancy trailed after the group.

  On one side of the corridor was a row of boutiques. On the other, a pair of doors opened onto a carpeted reception area, used for seminars and conferences. As Nancy and Ned entered this area behind the students, Nancy spotted Bess sitting behind a registration table set up under a huge white banner with Welcome Great Lakes High School Press Association sewn across it in red block letters. Nancy waved, but the students crowding around the table completely occupied Bess’s attention.

  “Why is Bess working here?” Ned asked Nancy.

  “This is a summer workshop for high school yearbook editors,” Nancy explained. “It’s being hosted this year by River Heights High, so the River Heights journalism teacher is in charge. He’s also the yearbook advisor. Bess heard that he needed volunteers to help on opening day, so she signed up.”

  “I remember your telling me about the journalism teacher. He had long hair and tinted glasses,” Ned said. “What was his name?”

  “Mr. Ruxton,” Nancy said. She pointed to the end of the registration table, where a man about thirty years old, dressed in a khaki jacket, was giving out registration packets. Nancy smiled, picturing how his gray eyes used to sparkle behind the pink-tinted lenses of his glasses. “Bess used to hang around the yearbook office, just to be near him,” she said. “She always thought he was so cute.”

  “I never could keep track of all of Bess’s crushes,” Ned said with a grin.

  Nancy gave Ned a playful dig in the ribs. “Come on—she wasn’t that bad.”

  “Oh, yes, she was,” Ned insisted. “I’ve always thought she was a terrible influence on you.”

  Nancy grinned. She knew that Ned was teasing her. Nancy and Bess Marvin had been friends nearly all their lives. Nancy depended on Bess and her cousin George Fayne for friendship and support. No one was more aware of that than Ned.

  Nancy edged around the crowd to get closer to Bess. As she neared the table, a boy with a fade haircut reached the front of the line. Bess checked off his name on a long printout. Then she handed him a manila envelope.

  “Your room key is in here, plus a list of the seminars you signed up for,” Bess told him. “You’ll also find your name tag and conference schedule, as well as information about the contests.”

  The boy blinked in confusion. “Contests?”

  “We have several competitions you can enter,” Bess explained to the boy. “Feature writing, caption writing, headline writing, photography, layout, design—the works. Prizes will be announced at the final banquet Friday night.”

  As the boy stepped away from the table, Nancy waved to get Bess’s attention. Bess glanced up and Nancy lifted the pink duffel bag over the students’ heads. Bess nodded, holding up one finger to signal that she’d be with Nancy in a moment.

  Ned came up behind Nancy. “Did she see you?” he asked her softly. Feeling his breath warm in her ear, Nancy leaned back against his broad chest and sighed contentedly.

  With Ned away at Emerson College, they’d been apart for most of the year, and Nancy had missed him. Both of them had dated other people occasionally, but right now there was no one else in Nancy’s life—and she had to admit that Ned looked more attractive than ever.

  Just then Bess skirted around the table and met her friends. “How’s it going?” Nancy asked, handing Bess the duffel bag.

  “Oh, it’s so exciting,” Bess said. “These kids come from all over—Cleveland, St. Louis, some from Canada. They’re all so keyed up, it’s sort of contagious.” She unzipped her bag and peeked inside. “Good—Mom remembered my hair dryer. I want to look great tonight. I’m working very closely with Gary. He treats me like a real adult now.” She glanced back at the registration table just as Gary Ruxton crossed the lobby toward them. Bess looked suddenly nervous.

  “Hello, Mr. Ruxton,” Bess called out.

  The teacher smiled. “Hello, Bess. And look who’s here—Nancy Drew.”

  “I’m impressed that you remember me,” Nancy said.

  “Of course I’d remember an all-around good student like you, Nancy,” Mr. Ruxton said. “And besides,” he added with a chuckle, “your picture was in the yearbook on a dozen pages your senior year.” Mr. Ruxton turned to Bess. “Taking a break?” he asked.

  “Oh, no, Mr. Ruxton, not if you need me,” Bess replied eagerly.

  “Can you take my place for five minutes?” he asked. “Our keynote speaker for Friday night is due to arrive any minute, and—” He broke off, his gaze shifting to the conference area entrance. “There he is now. Excuse me.”

  “I’ll introduce you later,” Nancy said to Ned as the three friends turned to watch the teacher hurry to the doorway. Just inside stood a trim, broad-shouldered man in a perfectly cut blue suit. With his steel gray eyes, brown hair turning silver at the temples, and craggy good looks, he was instantly recognizable: Evan Sharpless, network TV reporter.

  Even Nancy felt the impact of Sharpless’s good looks. She glanced at Bess and saw her friend catch her breath. “Wow, he’s good looking enough on television, but you just don’t expect someone to be that handsome in person,” Bess said with a sigh.

  “
That old guy? He must be nearly forty,” Ned said disdainfully. Nancy smiled, amused by Ned’s jealousy.

  “Who cares?” Bess moaned.

  “He’s supposed to be an ace reporter,” Nancy said, knowing her comment would needle Ned. “Didn’t he win some big award recently?”

  “He’s won loads of awards,” Bess claimed. “He just won the Hazelden Prize for his reporting from Afghanistan. And he has a new book out. I’ve seen stacks of them in all the bookstore windows. It’s about how he goes all over the globe, chasing down big international stories. And he has that dreamy deep voice—” She lowered her voice. ‘“This is Evan Sharpless, reporting from Moscow,’ ” she said, imitating his on-screen sign-off.

  Across the reception area, students clustered around the famous newsman. Some held out copies of his book, asking for his autograph. “I wonder if Mr. Ruxton could introduce me to him,” Bess said.

  “You mean Gary?” Ned asked Bess. Nancy elbowed Ned to stop teasing, but Bess hadn’t noticed.

  “Bess, I think you were supposed to cover the registration table,” Nancy reminded her gently.

  Bess looked over at the lines of students. “Oops—sorry. I’d better go,” she said. “Well, see you guys later.” She hurried back to her post.

  As Nancy stood watching Evan Sharpless, Ned took her by the elbow. “Okay, mission accomplished,” he said impatiently. “Let’s head out. I want to try those elevators.” Nancy nodded, and she and Ned trailed after the crowd following the famous newscaster back to the main lobby.

  Reaching the lobby, they saw Mr. Sharpless shake hands with Gary Ruxton, wave goodbye to the students, and step onto the escalator leading up to the mezzanine. As the reporter glided upward, Nancy saw one of the students pointing a camera with a jutting telephoto lens at him. Pushing back her thick, curly light brown hair, the tall girl crouched for a better angle. Nancy admired her instinct for a dramatic shot.

  Nancy saw the newscaster step off onto the mezzanine. “Looks like he’s meeting someone there,” she commented to Ned. Another man who had been leaning over the railing watching the lobby straightened up and walked over to Evan Sharpless.

  Ned shrugged. “Maybe another adoring news fan.”

  Crossing over to the far side of the lobby, Nancy and Ned waited near the elevators, surrounded by chattering high-schoolers. Three girls were standing on the footbridge that arched over the central pool, posing for a snapshot. Nancy noticed that the tall girl taking the picture was the same one who’d just been shooting pictures of Evan Sharpless.

  As her friends mugged for the camera, the girl climbed up on the marble ledge around the pool to focus her shot. As she leaned over the water, she took the picture. Then another girl ran over and took the camera, so that the tall girl could get in the next picture.

  Nancy turned to study Ned’s face. “You look a little distracted, Nickerson,” she said, gently prodding his shoe with the toe of her sneaker. “Too many pretty high school girls to look at?”

  Ned flushed slightly as he turned back to her. “You know I have eyes for no one but you, Drew,” he said good-humoredly, though it was clear to Nancy that he had been looking. “Anyway, it isn’t that. I was thinking that I wish I hadn’t agreed to end my job so early. I didn’t save as much money as I should have. I don’t know where it all went.”

  Nancy tensed. As a detective, she couldn’t resist a juicy case, and a mystery had recently taken her away from River Heights. What had Ned been up to while she was away? she wondered.

  “On the other hand,” Ned went on in a brighter voice, “it is nice to have a little free time before I go back to Emerson.”

  “Well, maybe we can go away somewhere before the summer’s over,” Nancy suggested. She slipped a hand in the crook of his elbow and gave him a flirtatious tug. Ned met her eyes for a moment, and a wave of emotion seemed to rock them both.

  But just then they heard a hollow rumble, a splash, and a scream. Nancy leapt up onto a chrome planter near the elevator bank to see what was the matter.

  The dark-haired girl who’d taken the camera had tumbled into the pool. Her arms and legs flailing, she choked and sputtered wildly.

  Suddenly the girl’s head slid under the surface of the water. Nancy watched in horror as the girl was pulled along by the current—head first toward the cascade!

  Chapter

  Two

  ACTING ON INSTINCT, NED vaulted up onto the black marble ledge beside the reflecting pool. “Get Mr. Ruxton!” he yelled over his shoulder to Nancy. Then he flung himself into the pool.

  Knowing Ned would rescue the girl, Nancy peered over the heads of the crowd that had rushed over to the water. Mr. Ruxton had been here a few minutes earlier, saying goodbye to Evan Sharpless. Had he already gone back to the registration lobby?

  Nancy leapt down from the planter box, then raced up the side corridor and into the Muskoka Lobby. Spotting Gary Ruxton near the picture window with another teacher, she called to him from the doorway. “Mr. Ruxton—a student fell into the pool!”

  Mr. Ruxton moved quickly. “Swimming pool or lobby pool?” he asked, sprinting for the door.

  “Lobby pool,” Nancy replied. She spun around and ran beside him toward the lobby. “Ned jumped in to try to get her before she went down the waterfall.”

  They charged up the corridor and into the main lobby. Nancy spotted an overturned luggage trolley at the foot of the black marble ramp running down from the front doors. A bellman in a red uniform was picking up the pile of suitcases that had fallen off it. Stepping over the bags, Nancy sized up what had happened. The trolley must have rolled out of control down the ramp and crashed into the ledge right by the footbridge, knocking the girl into the water.

  Nancy and Mr. Ruxton reached the girl, who was sitting on the marble ledge, her friends gathered around her. Ned, soaking wet, was climbing out of the pool.

  “What happened?” Gary Ruxton demanded. The crowd parted, and Nancy looked at the girl. Even with water streaming from her long dark hair and clothes, Nancy could tell the girl was strikingly beautiful. Her figure was petite but shapely and her delicate, olive-skinned face had a full mouth and huge dark eyes.

  The girl drew a deep breath. “I was on the ledge, trying to get everyone in the picture,” she told Mr. Ruxton. “Then I heard a loud noise behind me. I looked around and saw this big luggage cart rolling down the ramp. It came right at me!”

  She shivered and went on. “I think a garment bag swinging from the rail on top knocked me into the pool,” she added. “The current—it started to pull me down. And then . . . someone saved me.” She twisted around, and her dark eyes stared up into Ned’s. Nancy felt her stomach flip over with jealousy.

  “Can someone go get a towel?” piped the tall, curly-haired girl, standing by the wet girl’s side.

  “Uh, of course,” Mr. Ruxton responded, looking around. “At the swimming pool—level three—”

  Bess materialized out of the crowd. Nancy guessed that she’d been too curious to stay behind, once she’d seen Nancy run in to get Mr. Ruxton. “I’ll go,” Bess said, and hurried away.

  Mr. Ruxton knelt beside the dark-haired girl. “What’s your name?” he asked her.

  “G-Gina. Gina Fiorella.” She forced out the words between chattering teeth.

  Nancy noticed the teacher rock back on his heels and let out a slight gasp. “From Lloyd Hall, right?” he asked. “Near Chicago?” Gina nodded.

  “She’s editor of our yearbook, the Cameo,” her friend added.

  Mr. Ruxton twisted around to look at the curly-haired girl. “And you are—?” he inquired.

  The girl blushed shyly. “I’m her coeditor, Sally Harvey,” she replied. “And her roommate.”

  “Oh, yes—Lloyd Hall is a boarding school, right?” Mr. Ruxton said. Gina nodded.

  Just then Sally drew a startled breath. “Gina—the camera! You had it in your hand when you fell—”

  Gina waved a careless hand toward the pool. “Oh, it’s in
there somewhere,” she said.

  Sally jumped up onto the marble ledge and began to look for the camera at the bottom of the pool.

  As Ned climbed up beside Sally to help her look, Gina reached up and tugged on his wet T-shirt. “Hey—you’re my knight in shining armor,” she murmured. Her voice had gotten low and husky. Ned, looking down, flashed her a broad grin. Nancy, wedged in the crowd behind Gary Ruxton, did a slow burn.

  Just then Bess hurried up with an armload of fresh white towels and handed them to Gina. The girl pulled two off the top of the pile and handed them up to Ned. “Come down and dry off,” she commanded, with a mischievous look from under thick dark lashes. Ned, with another grin, obeyed.

  A woman in a business suit ran over the bridge. “Mr. Ruxton, I just heard about the accident. Is everything under control?”

  “I think so, Ms. Peabody,” Mr. Ruxton answered. “Right, Ms. Fiorella?”

  “I’m fine,” Gina replied.

  “Ms. Fiorella?” The woman seemed to react to the girl’s name in the same way Mr. Ruxton had—with a tinge of awe. She leaned over solicitously. “I’m Maureen Peabody, the general manager of the Atrium Hotel,” she said, introducing herself. “You have towels, I see. Let me get you a hot drink. Can I help you to your room?”

  “What’s going on?” a male voice boomed. A tall, muscular man in a dark sweater and jeans lumbered up, stuffing the last of a sandwich into his mouth. Gina turned toward him with narrowed eyes.

  “You’re late, Nick,” she snapped.

  “I told you I was getting lunch,” he protested.

  “You were hired to protect me,” she said. “You were supposed to be back at two. I almost drowned! If it hadn’t been for this guy—” She reached up to grab Ned’s hand.

  Ned looked over at Nancy and gave a helpless shrug. Nancy lifted her chin. Ned didn’t pull his hand away, she noted. Her face set in cool indifference, Nancy turned to Bess. “Let’s check out that luggage trolley,” she murmured.

  Nancy and Bess slipped away through the dispersing crowd and wandered over to the trolley. The two girls stood nearby as the bellman, whose name tag read Ralph Winkler, reloaded the luggage trolley. Holding onto the brass top rail, Ralph fidgeted as a thickset middle-aged man in a polyester sport jacket spoke to him.