002 Deadly Intent, Page 5

  “Who?”

  “They should have come in early this afternoon. He’s medium height with frizzy brown hair. She has blond hair a little past her shoulders, and she’s on the short side,” George supplied.

  The man thought for a moment. “Oh, you mean the two Harold Marshall sent over.”

  Nancy’s brow furrowed at Mr. Marshall’s name. “Yes. That’s right.”

  “Oh, you just missed them. They were talking about going out to celebrate something.”

  Nancy felt thoroughly frustrated as she and George started back across the large room. “George,” she said, in what was for her a down voice. “What’s going on with this case? I feel as if I’m following shadows, not leads.” Now she wouldn’t be able to get hold of Alan until their rendezvous at the club that evening. She’d lose several hours of sleuthing time—hours that could be critical to Barton Novak.

  Before George could reply, Nancy saw something that made her pulse speed up. Moving as quickly as she could, she pulled George into an unoccupied work space. “It’s Vivian!” she whispered, peeking out from around the partition.

  “Who?”

  “Harold Marshall’s secretary.” Nancy watched as Vivian emerged from the stairwell carrying a bulky package under her arm. The woman glanced around furtively and slipped down one of the hallways. The young man at the corner desk, his back to the work spaces and network of halls, continued to type, and Vivian passed by unnoticed.

  “Looks to me like she’s sneaking around,” George said.

  “Come on,” Nancy urged. “Maybe the trip down here won’t be a waste after all.” She grabbed George’s elbow, and silently, keeping a safe distance behind her, the girls followed Vivian down the hall.

  Vivian seemed to know exactly where she was going. After proceeding along a maze of corridors past numerous doors, she stopped abruptly in front of one of them. Second-guessing the next move, Nancy pulled George back around the last corner in the corridor—and not a second too soon. Nancy edged around the corner just in time to see Vivian whipping her head around, clearly checking to make sure she was alone. Then she entered the room she had stopped in front of.

  “Now what?” George hissed as they both breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Well, we can’t follow her in there,” Nancy thought out loud, “so we’ll have to wait until she leaves. Then we can see what’s in that room. But let’s get out of here. She’s going to come back this way, and besides, someone might see us.”

  “Maybe there’s a ladies’ room around here,” George suggested. “We could hide in there until she leaves.”

  The girls found one a few doors down and entered cautiously, making sure it was unoccupied. Then Nancy posted herself by the door, leaving it open a finger’s width so she could peer out.

  Vivian didn’t take long. Only a few minutes later, Nancy heard the clicking of her high-heeled black pumps on the tiled hallway floor and noticed that Vivian no longer carried the package that had been under her arm. “She must have dropped something off,” Nancy said, pulling the restroom door shut as Vivian walked by.

  Nancy waited until the footsteps faded. Then she peeked out again. The corridor was empty. “Okay, now!” she instructed George. The two friends made a dash for the room Vivian had entered and let themselves inside, the door opening and closing with a faint squeak.

  The walls of the small room were lined, floor to ceiling, with cabinets, and in the middle of the room were low, free-standing, enclosed bins.

  “It’s some kind of storeroom,” Nancy observed.

  She pulled at the handle of one of the cabinets—labeled 1981, A through C—and found it locked. She tried one on the adjacent wall. The typed sticker on the door read 1982, G through K. It didn’t open either.

  George was walking around, fiddling with the cabinet doors. “These are locked too,” she said, her words colored with annoyance. Then she called out softly, “Nancy, come look at this.”

  When Nancy joined her, the young detective took a look at a list George had been studying. It was taped to the wall. The page was divided into columns headed name, title of master, date borrowed, date returned.

  “Masters. So that’s why all these drawers are locked so securely. George, this is where they keep all the original recordings, the ones they copy when they press the albums they sell.”

  “Right,” George said, “I remember back when we were sophomores, this record store in Mount Harmon was closed down because the owner was selling albums that had been made illegally. I’m not sure of the details, but he was buying the albums for way under the normal costs, selling them for the retail prices, and raking in a fortune.”

  Nancy nodded. “Right. If these masters get into the wrong hands, they can be used to make a lot of illegal money. Record piracy, I think they call it.”

  As Nancy talked, she skimmed the list in front of her for Vivian’s name. It wasn’t there. What was Vivian up to? she wondered. She guessed that the parcel contained masters Vivian had sneaked out and then sneaked back in. Was Vivian getting them for Harold Marshall so he could mint illegal albums and sell them as the real thing? If so, then Barton was right to wonder about Bent Fender’s royalties. They wouldn’t earn money on copies sold illegally.

  Nancy pondered that, continuing to study the list. Suddenly a familiar name near the bottom of the page caught her eye. “George!” she gasped, pointing to the bold script.

  George’s gaze followed Nancy’s finger. “Oh wow! Barton Novak!”

  “And he was here just a few days ago!” Nancy added. “George, I bet Barton came here and discovered something. Maybe he found out that some of the masters were missing!”

  “And then someone found out that Barton knew, and had to make sure he didn’t tell anyone.”

  Nancy nodded, her face taut. “That’s a really strong motive. Now I’m sure Barton didn’t disappear on his own. He must have been kidnapped!”

  Chapter

  Seven

  THE PIECES OF the puzzle were finally beginning to fall into place. “This explains why there was no ransom note,” Nancy continued. “Barton’s kidnappers weren’t interested in getting money, just in keeping him from spilling the beans. I bet all this has something to do with his wanting to talk to me after the concert.” Nancy leaned back against one of the cabinets, digesting the implications of the new discovery.

  Suddenly, a thought occurred to her that made her blood go colder than an arctic ice floe. “George,” she said, “if Barton’s kidnappers don’t want a ransom for him, maybe they don’t intend to free him at all.”

  George’s ruddy complexion drained to pale.

  The two girls stood in silence, the horrible realization sinking in until the stillness in the room was shattered by the soft but unmistakable squeal of the door opening. Nancy gasped.

  A sandy-haired man with a mustache stepped inside. There was no place to escape his gaze in the small room. “Who are you?” he asked gruffly. “No unauthorized personnel allowed in here.”

  Nancy thought quickly. “We, um . . . we’re with the NYU group.”

  “Film students,” George added, backing up Nancy’s story.

  “Oh. Well, what are you kids doing in here? Your group is over in one of the editing rooms.” He motioned for them to leave. “Down this hall and to the left.”

  For a moment, Nancy was flooded with a sense of relief. “Oh. Thank you, sir.” She and George moved toward the door.

  But as soon as they were safely out of Oraye Sound and outside again, Nancy’s relief dissolved in a flood of nerves. What if she couldn’t locate Barton before it was too late? Or was it already too late? Who was at the bottom of the sordid mess, and how much did Alan know about it? How safe was Bess if she inadvertently had been caught smack in the middle of a record pirating conspiracy?

  Stop! Nancy admonished herself. Standing in the middle of a busy New York street thinking about all this wasn’t going to get her any closer to answering the questions that were gnawi
ng at her. She took several breaths, taking the air deep into her body and breathing from her stomach, the way she’d been taught in karate class.

  “Okay,” she told George, “the first thing to do is to find out which people have access to the room with the masters in it, and then find out what they know.” Nancy made a beeline for the nearest pay phone, fishing around in her jeans pocket as she ran.

  A loud, jarring crackle came out of the earpiece as she picked up the receiver. “Broken.” She slammed down the phone and moved over to the next one. “Good,” she told George. “This one’s got a dial tone.” She pulled her little notebook out of her shoulder bag and quickly turned the pages until she found Roger Gold’s number.

  Be home. Please be home. She punched out his number on the pushbutton telephone.

  “Hello?” Roger’s voice came over the wire.

  “Roger. It’s Nancy Drew. Thank goodness you’re there.”

  “Nancy, what’s wrong? Is it about Barton? Do you know where he is?”

  “Not yet,” Nancy replied, trying to keep from sounding frightened, “but I think I’ve got my first solid lead.”

  “Was he kidnapped?” Roger sounded nervous.

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “I knew it! No way did Barton go off on his own. He was too involved in those concerts.” Roger paused. “So what do you think’s going on?”

  “I think someone’s pirating Bent Fender’s records. And probably other groups’ records, too.”

  “Pirating our records?” A string of angry words streamed out of Roger Gold’s normally soft-speaking mouth. Nancy waited for him to calm down. “I’m sorry,” he said finally. “Listening to me get mad isn’t going to help Barton, is it?”

  “That’s okay, Roger. I’m not exactly a bearer of good tidings. But there is something you can tell me that will help get to the bottom of this.”

  “Anything.”

  “Who has access to the cabinets in the masters room at Oraye Sound?”

  “Well, all the techies—the recording technicians—at Oraye, for starters. And they usually give a key to the musicians who record there.”

  “Like you and Barton and the rest of the band?”

  “Right. I mean, we do most of our work at our own private studios, but we do some mixing and stuff there sometimes. Yeah.”

  “Anyone else?” Nancy asked.

  “The top executives at World,” Roger said.

  “Harold Marshall?”

  A moment of silence, then Roger exploded. “Is that creep in on Barton’s disappearance?”

  “Well, he has an interesting reason for why Barton didn’t make the concert.”

  “I don’t buy it,” Roger said firmly, after hearing Harold Marshall’s story. “Barton would want the sales of our records to center around our music, not around gossip about where he is. Besides, he doesn’t like the idea of people poking around in his private life. Nope. Marshall’s story just doesn’t make sense.”

  Nancy wasn’t surprised by Roger’s opinion. Marshall’s story had too many holes in it for her to swallow it completely. “Roger, thank you. You’ve been a big help. Oh, and one more thing. How does Harold Marshall get along with his secretary?”

  “Vivian? They’re a perfect team. The witch and the warlock. Marshall thinks she’s the greatest thing since stereophonic sound. The rat has had his eye on her since the day she came to work for him. And she’ll do anything he asks. And I mean anything.”

  “Roger, would Vivian do Marshall’s dirty work?” Nancy pictured Vivian sneaking into the masters room.

  “Sure.”

  “And would Marshall be low enough to pirate his own company’s records and pocket the profit?”

  “That toad is low enough to do anything,” Roger answered.

  “You know, it’s possible that we might have our man,” Nancy said. “But we have to catch him in the act to make sure.”

  “You just tell me what I have to do to help,” Roger offered. “I’d be only too happy to nail that bum.”

  “The best thing you can do is act as if nothing’s happened. Meet us at the club tonight, work on your new songs, do whatever you would normally do. We don’t want Marshall to think we’re on to him.” Nancy inhaled sharply. “Because if Barton’s disappearance is any indication, what we know could be hazardous to our health!”

  She hung up the phone and looked at George. “Come on. We’ve got to find out a lot more before we crack this case.”

  “Action!” George rubbed her hands together. “This is the part I like the best.”

  Nancy shook her head. “I’m not so sure this is action you’ll enjoy . . .”

  • • •

  “Ugh. I feel like I’m back in school again,” George moaned.

  “School was never a life-or-death situation,” Nancy responded gravely. “Now read.”

  The girls were seated in the research room of the Jefferson Market Library, a brisk walk from the studios of Oraye Sound. Books and back copies of magazines were piled next to them on the old wooden tables.

  Nancy skimmed through an article in Allegro, the monthly newspaper of the musicians’ union. “George, listen to this.” She read out loud, keeping her voice low, so as not to disturb the people around her. “ ‘One billion dollars per year are lost in residuals, due to pirated sound and video recordings in the United States and abroad.’ One billion dollars worth of royalty money! Can you believe that?” she exclaimed. “Wow, I had no idea what a huge black market there is for pirated recordings. There’s certainly enough money at stake to make some crook want to get rid of anyone in the way.”

  Nancy’s stomach did a slow somersault as she thought about Barton’s safety.

  “Nancy, here’s something,” George whispered a moment later. “Certain countries have no copyright laws at all. They simply obtain existing printed or recorded materials from other countries and publish or manufacture copies of their own, or they purchase pirated copies at a cost far below the market value. No revenue from these sales goes to the artist or company that holds the copyright.”

  Nancy listened intently. “Wow! You mean somebody could take records that were made illegally here and sell them in certain other places where there are no copyright laws?”

  “Right.”

  “And these foreign governments wouldn’t consider it a crime?”

  George nodded and continued, her brown-eyed gaze gliding across the page as she read. “The one major country to operate without copyright laws is the People’s Republic of China.”

  “China!” A bell went off in Nancy’s head. “George, that wallet I found backstage during the concert—it had a dragon on it—a Chinese dragon! I wonder if that’s more than just a coincidence.” Nancy rested her elbow on the table and propped her chin on the palm of her hand.

  “Do you think Harold Marshall might have some connection to the Chinese?” George asked. “Or Vivian? Somehow, I can’t imagine her trudging through rice paddies in those high-heeled shoes.” George let out a giggle, despite the severity of the situation. Then she clapped a hand over her mouth. “Sorry, Nan.”

  But Nancy wasn’t at all annoyed with George. “You’re a genius!” she said excitedly, trying at the same time to keep her voice down. “Maybe Vivian wouldn’t be able to wing it on a tour of the rice fields, but I know someone who would.”

  “Nancy, what are you talking about?”

  “That picture you had of Vivian reminded me of a poster I saw of Chinese workers harvesting rice. I saw it just this morning . . . hanging on the wall in Ann Nordquist’s office!” Nancy grabbed George’s arm. “Ann is Bent Fender’s agent. And she just came back from China. She was telling my dad and me about her trip.” Nancy’s pulse was racing. “What if that wallet belongs to her? And what if she wasn’t just sight-seeing?”

  “But what about Mr. Marshall?” George reminded her.

  “Yes, then there’s Harold Marshall.” Nancy pondered that for a few moments. “You know, he and A
nn Nordquist both made a point of telling me how much they disliked each other. But what if they did that just to throw me off the track? It’s possible they’re working together.”

  “But Nancy, you told me that Ann Nordquist seemed like a nice woman.”

  “She did. I mean, she does. I liked her. And I don’t see why she would own a wallet with the initial L. Still, I don’t think we can rule her out entirely. You can never be too sure.”

  “I guess not. We thought Alan was playing straight with us, and look what happened. If he drags Bess into this, he’s going to be really sorry.”

  Nancy nodded. “Speaking of which, let’s get back to the hotel. I want to pick up Ned and get to the club. Bess’s wonder boy and I are in for a little heart-to-heart.” She gathered up the books and bound volumes of magazines and began replacing them on the shelves. “And,” she added, “I think I ought to do a little checking up on Ms. Ann Nordquist.”

  “Yeah,” George said. “Maybe she got tired of earning her ten percent and decided to make a real killing.”

  “I hope it hasn’t gone that far.” Nancy hesitated before going on. “. . . As far as murder.”

  Chapter

  Eight

  NED!” NANCY THREW her arms around the tall, broad-shouldered young man. “Sorry to keep you waiting. Have you been here long?” Nancy had found Ned sitting on the plush velvet sofa in the hotel lobby.

  “Got here just about five minutes ago,” Ned said, bending down to give her a powerful hug. A lock of thick dark hair fell forward over his eye, and Nancy brushed it away.

  “I want you to know,” she said, her mind still reeling from her frenzied afternoon, “your visit is the one bright spot in this entire trip.”

  “Uh-oh. Sounds like my favorite detective is wrapped up in a tough case. What’s happened since we talked on the phone?”

  Nancy let out a sigh. “First I had so few real clues that I didn’t even know if I had a mystery or not. Now, all of a sudden, there are all sorts of leads . . . and I don’t know which ones to follow first.” Nancy could see George coming across the lobby with the room keys she had picked up from the front desk. “Listen, why don’t you come upstairs, and I’ll tell you everything?”