The Soccer Shoe Clue

  KICK! SPLAT!

  YUCK!

  Who let the air out of the soccer ball? Who added salt to the water on the sidelines? Who put the red glop in the goalie’s soccer shoes?

  It’s gooey. It’s gross. It’s not fair. Soccer is supposed to be a kick. But somebody’s being a drag. Nancy Drew wants to know who’s playing the silly games with her third-grade soccer team!

  A Children’s Book-of-the-Month Club Selection

  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 © 2002

  by Joanie Schwarz

  Ages 6–9

  Kids.SimonandSchuster.com

  0202

  The

  Soccer Shoe

  Clue

  “Eewww!” Amara Shane cried out. Her voice echoed off the metal lockers in the girls’ locker room. “There’s something yucky in my soccer shoe!”

  ‘I can’t see anything,” Nancy Drew said. “You’ll have to take off your shoe.”

  Amara wrinkled up her nose and made a face. But she took her shoe off. She used only two fingers of each hand, so she wouldn’t have to touch it much.

  All the girls in the room said, “Eewww! Gross!”

  Amara’s knee sock was covered with something slimy. Something dark red and slimy. . . .

  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 March 1995

  Copyright © 1995 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Produced by Mega-Books of New York, Inc.

  A Ready-for-Chapters Book

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

  ISBN-13: 978-0-671-87949-5

  ISBN-10: 0-671-87949-9

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4424-6760-6 (eBook)

  Contents

  Chapter 1: Team Tricks

  Chapter 2: Soccer Spies

  Chapter 3: Missing Shoes and Enemy Clues

  Chapter 4: Bad Luck Tigers

  Chapter 5: In the News

  Chapter 6: Doodles and Clues

  Chapter 7: Notebook Snoop

  Chapter 8: Caught Red-Handed

  THE SOCCER SHOE

  CLUE

  1

  Team Tricks

  Eewww. . . .Yuck!” Amara Shane cried out. Her voice echoed off the metal lockers in the girls’ locker room.

  “What’s wrong?” eight-year-old Nancy Drew asked. She looked up as she finished putting on her shin guards.

  “There’s something yucky in my soccer shoe,” Amara said. “Something sticky. It’s gross!”

  Nancy looked around for her friend George Fayne. George was the captain of the soccer team. She would help Amara. But George was not in the locker room.

  All the other girls on the team watched as Nancy got up and walked over to Amara.

  “Let me see,” Nancy said.

  Amara was sitting on a wooden bench in the locker room. School was out for the day. Now the third-grade girls’ soccer team was getting ready for practice. Backpacks and jackets were scattered all over the place.

  “I don’t want to touch it,” Amara said. She stuck out her foot to show Nancy.

  “I can’t see anything,” Nancy said. “You’ll have to take off your shoe.”

  Amara wrinkled up her nose and made a face. But she took her shoe off. She used only two fingers of each hand, so she wouldn’t have to touch it much.

  When she pulled her shoe off, all the girls in the room said, “Eewww! Gross!”

  Amara’s kneesock was covered with something slimy. Something dark red and slimy. Nancy bent down to take a closer look. It really was gross.

  All the other girls crowded around Amara. All except Carrie Rodis. She kept putting on her own soccer shoes.

  Carrie was new at Carl Sandburg Elementary School. She had just moved into Nancy’s neighborhood. She had joined the Tigers team the week before.

  “That’s the third mean trick someone has played on us this week,” Nancy said.

  “I’ll help you clean it up,” Erin Kelly said to Amara.

  Nancy smiled. Erin was just about the nicest person in the whole school.

  “Thanks,” Amara said.

  “Girls? Are you ready to practice?”

  Nancy turned around. Coach Santos was standing in the doorway. She was Julia Santos’s mother. />
  Both Julia and her mother were very good soccer players. They were from Brazil, and soccer was a big sport there.

  “We’re not quite ready,” Nancy told Coach Santos. “Someone put something icky in Amara’s shoe.”

  “Oh, no! Not another prank,” Coach Santos said.

  “I can’t play goalie with my shoe all slimy,” Amara complained.

  “Well, clean it up,” Coach Santos said. She smiled at Amara. “Put on a clean sock, too. And, everyone else, hurry up. It looks as if it’s going to rain. Let’s get practice started.”

  Nancy quickly pulled on her soccer cleats. She checked the elastic on her reddish blond ponytail. It was still tight. Then she glanced around the locker room.

  Hey, Nancy thought. Where is George? Nancy wanted to go look for her friend. But Coach Santos was watching her.

  “Come on, Tigers. The sky is getting cloudier all the time,” Coach Santos urged. “Let’s get outside while we still can play.”

  Nancy pulled a red sweatshirt on over her T-shirt. Then she grabbed her soccer ball and a net bag with two other balls. She hurried to follow the other girls outside.

  “This is creepy,” Lindsay Mitchell whispered to Nancy as they walked toward the field. “On Wednesday someone tied big knots in the laces of my soccer shoes.”

  “I know,” Nancy said with a nod. “Someone let the air out of Julia’s ball on Friday, too.”

  “You’re a detective,” Lindsay said. “Maybe you can figure out who’s doing this—and who put the icky stuff in Amara’s shoe.”

  Maybe I can, Nancy thought. At least I can try.

  She saw Carrie Rodis walking ahead of them all by herself. Nancy had noticed that Carrie had ignored Amara. She hadn’t seemed to care about the goo in Amara’s shoe. Was Carrie the one trying to hurt the team?

  There was no way to know for sure. But someone had been playing tricks on the soccer team. And Carrie had a good reason to do it.

  Before she had moved, Carrie had played for the Lions. They were another elementary school team. And they were the Tigers’ biggest rivals!

  Maybe Carrie still wants the Lions to beat us, Nancy thought. Maybe she’s trying to make our team look bad so that her old friends will win.

  “Hey, Nancy! Lindsay!” a voice called.

  Nancy and Lindsay turned around and saw George running toward them. Her dark curls bounced as she ran. Her long legs carried her quickly across the field.

  “Where were you?” Nancy asked.

  “I couldn’t find my shin guards,” George answered. “I thought maybe I left them in my cubby, so I went back to see. But they weren’t there. Finally I found them in the trash.”

  “You’re kidding!” Lindsay said.

  George shook her head. “Someone must have taken them out of my backpack.”

  “Something else happened in the locker room today,” Lindsay said quickly. She loved to be the first one to tell stories.

  “What are you talking about?” George asked.

  Lindsay told George about the yucky stuff in Amara’s shoe. George frowned. She looked down at her shin guards. “I think it was Carrie.”

  Nancy was surprised that George suspected Carrie, too. She didn’t want to say that in front of Lindsay, though, so she said, “But she’s a good player.”

  “Who cares?” George said. “She acts like she’s the only one who’s any good. She’s always telling me how to pass the ball. Like I don’t already know.”

  The three girls started walking toward the field again.

  Nancy squinted. Carrie was kicking a soccer ball. It flew into the air and went into the goal. It was a good shot. It would have been hard for a goalie to catch it.

  “She’s one of our best players,” Lindsay said.

  George made a face. “So what,” she said.

  Just then a cheer went up from the sidelines. Nancy looked across the field. Two girls were standing there. They were watching the team play.

  The ball rolled toward Carrie, and she kicked it again. Again it sailed into the goal.

  “Way to go, Carrie!” the girls on the sidelines yelled.

  “Who are they?” Nancy asked. “I don’t recognize them.”

  “I do,” George said in a grouchy voice.

  “Well? Are you going to tell me?” Nancy asked.

  “That’s Margot Bachwood and Tonya Morris,” George said. “I remember them from last year’s games. They’re two of the best soccer players on the Lions team. And the Lions are our team’s worst enemies!”

  2

  Soccer Spies

  What are those Lions doing here?” Nancy asked. She stared across the field at Margot and Tonya.

  “I don’t know,” George said.

  “I know,” Lindsay said.

  Nancy shook her head and laughed. Lindsay always knew everything—because she always eavesdropped on other people’s conversations.

  “So why are they here?” Nancy asked.

  “I heard Carrie telling someone at lunch,” Lindsay explained. “Her best friends are picking her up after soccer practice today. They’re having a sleep-over at Margot’s house tonight.”

  “Oh, great,” George said. “She’s probably going to tell them all our soccer plays.”

  “Girls! Let’s go!” Coach Santos called to them from the middle of the field. “I want to talk to you—now!”

  All the girls gathered around their coach.

  “Girls, I’m very unhappy about what happened to Amara’s shoe today,” Coach Santos began. “These pranks have got to stop. To be a good soccer player, you have to work hard on your skills. And you can’t work hard if you’re busy playing pranks on one another. Do you understand?”

  The girls nodded.

  “All right,” Coach Santos said. “Then let’s line up. We need to work on kicking now.”

  Nancy, George, and Lindsay hurried to get in line. They lined up facing the goal.

  Amara had pinned her hair in a bun so it wouldn’t get in her eyes when she tried to catch the ball. Amara played goalie. As each girl kicked the ball, Amara tried to keep it from going past her into the net.

  Melissa Adams was first in line. She was short, with red hair and dimples.

  “Melissa’s not a very good player,” George whispered. “She needs a lot of practice.”

  Nancy and George watched Melissa. She took a long time to kick the ball. When she finally did kick it, her foot slipped. She fell. The ball barely rolled across the grass. It didn’t even go near the goal.

  Nancy heard Carrie’s friends laughing.

  “That’s not nice,” George whispered to Nancy. “Even though she is a lousy player.”

  Nancy nodded, then glared at the girls. Who did they think they were, anyway?

  Carrie was next in line. She kicked the ball so hard, it zoomed into the net right past Amara’s fingertips.

  “Yay, Carrie!” the two girls on the sidelines cheered.

  Carrie waved at them. Then she ran around to the back of the line, where Nancy and George were standing.

  “Nice shot!” Coach Santos called to Carrie. “Keep up the good work!”

  George and Nancy looked at each other and rolled their eyes.

  “No wonder she’s so stuck-up,” George whispered. “Coach Santos loves her. And she even has her own cheerleaders right over there.”

  Carrie tapped George on the arm. “Hey, George,” she said. “If you use the top of your shoe when you kick, instead of your toe, the ball goes farther.”

  “Yeah, right. And if you use a rocket launcher, I’ll bet it really flies,” George answered.

  Carrie looked hurt, but Nancy laughed at the joke. Then she leaned closer to George, so that Carrie wouldn’t hear.

  “Is she right?” Nancy whispered. “Is that the way to kick the ball really far?”

  George nodded. “Yes. Coach Santos showed us last year. I’ll show you later—when she’s not around.”

  “Thanks,” Nancy said with a smile.
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br />   Nancy wanted to learn as much as she could about soccer. Most of the other girls on the team had played before. This was Nancy’s first season. She had just joined the team that spring.

  A minute later it was Nancy’s turn to kick. She ran up and kicked the ball the way Carrie had said—with the top of her shoe. The ball sailed straight for the goal. But Amara caught it.

  “Nice try,” Coach Santos called. “But next time try not to kick it right to the goalie.”

  Nancy looked over at Carrie’s friends from her old school. They were looking at her and giggling.

  For the rest of the soccer practice, Carrie’s friends watched Nancy and the other Tigers. They giggled and pointed at them when they made mistakes. Nancy couldn’t wait for the practice to be over.

  Finally it was time to go back into the locker room and change.

  “Wait for me!” George called as Nancy ran toward the school.

  “Hurry!” Nancy called.

  “Why?” George asked.

  Nancy didn’t answer. She just ran into the locker room and went straight to her backpack. She took out her special blue notebook. It was the one she used when she was trying to solve a mystery.

  Nancy sat down on the floor and crossed her legs. She opened her notebook to the first clean page. Then she took out her favorite new pen. It had purple ink.

  At the top of the page Nancy wrote, “The Soccer Mystery.”

  Then she wrote:

  Suspects:

  Carrie Rodis

  Margot Bachwood

  Tonya Morris

  Then Nancy looked around the room. All the other girls were coming in. They took off their shin guards and soccer cleats, and put on their regular shoes.

  Nancy just sat on the floor and watched them for a while. Who else could have done it? Nancy wondered.

  The answer was easy—almost anyone!

  “What are you doing, Nancy?” Melissa Adams asked. “You’re just staring at us.”

  “She’s trying to solve the mystery,” George said. “Shhh. Don’t talk to her. She’s probably thinking really hard.”

  Nancy gave George a small smile. George was right. Nancy was thinking hard.

  Finally most of the girls finished changing their shoes and left.

  Julia Santos was waiting for her mother. Coach Santos was in the office next to the gym. Nancy stood up and looked around. “Hey, where are my sneakers?” she asked.