“Hey, where do you two think you’re going?” A burly man in jeans and a black vest stopped them just outside the door. He was holding a clipboard.
“We have a special delivery to make,” Nancy lied, thinking fast. “It’s for Daniel Cribbins.”
“Cribbins?” The foreman narrowed his eyes, looking from the mail bag to a list on his clipboard. “Okay. I know the guy.”
Pushing the cart up to their car, Nancy and George loaded the seal and took off before the foreman had second thoughts.
By the time they arrived at the aquarium, the sun was setting. Thinking about Stuart, who was under police guard until the end of the day, Nancy pulled up on the walkway and parked right beside the seal pool. Then she and George carefully toted the mailbag containing the seal out of the car.
The guard came running out from the private entrance. “What’s going on here? I saw your car on the monitor and—What’s with the mail bag?”
After Nancy explained the situation, he helped the girls ease Asia back into the seal pool. As the pup splashed into the water, a few seals gathered near her, chortling and grunting.
“That is one happy seal family,” said George. “Let’s go tell Dr. Winston.”
“He’s in the lobby at the party,” said the guard.
The party! Nancy had forgotten all about it. “I hope I can catch Megan,” Nancy told George, “before she stages a catastrophe in front of the guests.”
“I’ll call Detective DePaulo,” said George. “We’ll need the police.”
Inside the aquarium, Nancy wove through clusters of guests in elegant evening clothes. Finally clear of the party area, Nancy entered the causeway between the two buildings and broke into a run. When she reached the amphitheater, it was quiet except for the occasional splash or chirp of the dolphins and whales.
Russ wasn’t in his office, but the light was on in the opposite office, and Nancy was surprised to find Megan sitting at her desk, writing notes on the whales’ charts.
“Aren’t you going to the party?” Nancy asked.
Megan looked up and blinked.
“I was sure you’d use the opportunity to cause some trouble,” Nancy continued. “You know, push someone into a pool, kill one of the animals.”
“What are you talking about?” Megan retorted.
“I’ve just come from Paperworks, where I found some records with your name on them,” Nancy continued. “You’ve been on their payroll.”
An angry blush stole across Megan’s face. “I’m not a vicious person, Nancy. I had no choice. After my husband and I split up, I was left with a lot of debts. I needed the money that Paperworks could pay. All I had to do was join the task force and undermine their work.”
Alone in her office, Megan looked thin and pathetic. “So all this is about those three hundred acres of land at Terns Landing?” asked Nancy.
Megan nodded. “The company needs that land.”
“Not to mention the fact that if Annie pressed her case, your brother was going off to jail for illegal dumping in the bay,” Nancy pointed out.
Megan’s blush deepened. “Annie didn’t understand how much Daniel had at stake,” she insisted. “My brother was going to lose his job, along with the hefty bonus he got each year for keeping his department under budget. Daniel saved Paperworks money by getting rid of those barrels in the cheapest way—by dumping them into the bay himself.”
“Don’t you care about the animals at all?” Nancy challenged.
“I needed that money,” Megan snapped. “None of us get big salaries here. When Annie stole that promotion away, well, it pushed me over the edge.”
“You killed her over a promotion?” Nancy said.
“No, I didn’t murder Annie,” Megan muttered. “It was hard enough for me to kill those animals, especially when it came to the seals.” Megan shook her head. “I just couldn’t.”
“So you took Asia from the seal pool and hid her at Paperworks,” Nancy finished for her. “Don’t worry, she’s back in the seal pool now.”
Megan stared down at her desk. “After everything I’ve been through, Asia is the only thing I care about at this aquarium.” Muttering half to herself, she added, “I have half a mind to just take my seal pup and hightail it out of this state.”
Nancy was surprised at Megan’s attachment to the seal, despite all the cruel things she had done to other animals. Deep down, Nancy believed that Megan had some serious problems that weren’t going to be solved by money.
“My sister is soft-hearted about these things,” said a deep voice from the doorway.
Nancy spun around and found herself face-to- face with the burly, red-haired man she had seen in Megan’s office, and again in the corridor at Paperworks. It was Daniel Cribbins, Megan’s brother. Nancy took a few steps back, but Daniel was blocking the only exit.
“She didn’t have trouble with the small things,” he added, “like setting up that net in the rain forest and sending you those dead fish. Fortunately, I’m not as squeamish as Megan is.”
Before Nancy could react, Daniel lunged toward her and clamped his muscular arms around her. “Get some of that rope from beside the pool,” he barked at Megan as Nancy struggled to free herself.
Nancy managed to get one of her arms loose, but Daniel was too strong for her. In a matter of minutes, Daniel and Megan had Nancy restrained. Her wrists and ankles were bound with rope, and Daniel had tied her feet to one of the weights used to train the dolphins.
“You’re not going to get away with this,” Nancy warned them. “The police are closing in on you. If you turn yourselves in, you might—”
“The police don’t have a case against us,” Daniel insisted.
“They have solid evidence now,” Nancy called out in a last ditch effort to change Daniel’s mind. “They have documents and—”
“You’re bluffing,” Daniel said as he dragged Nancy over to the large, glass-sided pool. “But don’t feel too bad. You’ve just saved a dolphin’s life. When you burst in, I was back in the animal care complex, preparing a lethal injection. The party is moving into the amphitheater for a nine o’clock show, and we were sure that a dead dolphin would liven up the festivities.”
He smiled. “Instead, tonight’s grand finale will be a dead detective at the bottom of the pool. That will burst the task force’s bubble.”
“Wait a minute,” Nancy said.
“Save your breath, Nancy. You’ll need it.” Daniel gave Nancy a shove, and she splashed into the water.
Frantically, Nancy kicked and wiggled, struggling to keep her head above water despite the bonds on her hands and feet. She was bobbing on the surface when she saw Daniel nudge the weight into the pool.
A moment later, she felt a tug on her feet. Nancy took a deep gulp of air before the sinking weight pulled her down. She sank like a stone, moored to the bottom of the tank. In another few minutes, she would be dead!
Chapter
Fifteen
THE AIR in Nancy’s lungs dribbled out in tiny bubbles.
Her hair floated around her face as she looked frantically around the tank for a way to escape. Two of the dolphins circled, eyeing her curiously.
She was losing more and more precious air. Suddenly the dolphins paired off and swam up behind Nancy. One of them nudged her foot. As she watched, the two dolphins pressed their noses against her feet and pushed her through the water, dragging the weight along the bottom of the pool.
Nancy felt a glimmer of hope. This was the trick she had seen them perform with Russ! Could the dolphins push her to the surface, even with the heavy weight bogging her down?
Feeling as if her lungs were about to burst, Nancy straightened out her legs, just the way Russ had locked his, and pointed her head toward the surface. A jolt of adrenaline shot through her as the dolphins nudged her again.
At first the progress was slow. Then the dolphins seemed to pick up speed, until they were pushing her, despite the weight trailing beneath her. At last Nancy
was coursing through the water, rising up along the side of the pool, until she splashed through the surface.
“Ahhh!” She gulped the air, then threw her bound hands over the edge of the pool. With the weight at her feet, she couldn’t pull herself out of the pool, but at least she could hold on to the side and catch her breath.
“Nancy!” George exclaimed. After calling the police, she had gone to look for Nancy. When George found Megan’s office empty, she had decided to try the amphitheater.
“Get me out of here! Quick!” Nancy said breathlessly. She explained what had happened as George untied her hands. Next, George, fully clothed, dove into the pool to untie the weight. Soon Nancy was free.
“Detective DePaulo is on his way with two patrol cars,” George explained. “But it looks like Megan and Daniel have slipped away.”
• • •
“That young lady is dripping wet!” A woman in a green sequined gown glared at Nancy, who was trying to pass by the lobby without causing a stir.
“She’s our resident mermaid,” Chris said. He excused himself and strode over to Nancy. “What’s going on?”
“It’s a long story.” Nancy grabbed his tuxedo sleeve and tugged him out of the view of the party guests so that she could tell him what had happened. “The police are coming, but we don’t want them to disrupt the party and alarm the guests. The problem is, Megan and Daniel have disappeared.”
“I found them,” George called from down the hall. “I told the security guard about Megan, and he said she’s over by the seal pool with a van. She gave him some excuse, but she’s trying to steal Asia again.”
“We’d better get over to the seal pool,” Chris said. “Come on, I can get us there through the back halls.” The three of them raced up and down staircases and through halls until at last they reached the private entrance.
The first to reach the guard’s desk, Nancy was surprised to see that it was empty. As she burst out the door to the seal pool, she found the guard passed out on the pavement.
“I gave him a nice dose of an animal tranquillizer.” Standing on the platform in the seal pool Megan waved a syringe in the air. A portable medical kit lay open at her feet. “And I’ll give you one, too, if you come any closer.”
Daniel leaned out of a van, which was parked close to the seal pool. He groaned when he saw Nancy. “Not you again! Come on Megan, let’s go!”
Stopping short, Nancy motioned for George to stay behind her. She hoped that neither Megan nor her brother had seen her friend come out of the building. Right then surprise was her only weapon.
“I’m not going without Asia,” Megan insisted as she leaned down to coax the seal pup onto the platform.
“Megan . . .” Clearly annoyed with his sister, Daniel jumped out of the van and climbed over the stone wall of the seal pool.
Chris used that moment to leap out from the doorway. Thinking fast, he jumped over the wall, grabbed a syringe from the kit, and jabbed it into the back of Daniel’s shoulder.
“Hey!” Daniel bellowed, trying to twist away.
Nancy didn’t waste a second. A few quick steps brought her to where Megan was still leaning over the pool. Nancy used a karate kick to knock the syringe out of Megan’s hand. Set off-balance by the blow, Megan tumbled off the platform into the water.
“All right!” George said, rushing over to help Chris restrain Daniel while the injection took effect. “Will he be okay?” she asked.
Chris nodded. “It’s a mild sedative that we use on animals. He’ll be groggy, but he’ll live.”
“I just wanted to take Asia and leave.” Megan stood in the pool, weeping. “I was sick of hurting people. I wanted it to be over.”
“It will be,” Detective DePaulo said as he came up the walkway. “Everything is over now.”
Two patrol officers were right behind him. They lifted Megan from the pool and escorted her to a patrol car. Then Daniel was handcuffed and led away.
“Well,” Detective DePaulo said. “I’m certainly sorry we missed this show!”
• • •
The party was such a hit that no one seemed to notice when two police cars and an ambulance pulled away from the seal pool. Nancy was happy to see the security guard come to as he was lifted onto a stretcher.
Still damp and shivering, Nancy and George retreated to Dr. Winston’s office, where Chris brought them blankets and mugs of hot chocolate. Detective DePaulo followed them up to go over the case.
The detective didn’t seem surprised when Nancy recounted all the evidence she had found—and the confessions of Megan and Daniel. “Once we get a look at their records, I think we’ll see quite a few of the top people at Paperworks paying for the company’s mistakes,” DePaulo told Nancy, “and that deal on Terns Landing. There’s no way the city will let that happen now.”
“That’s a relief,” said George. “Was Lydia Cleveland in on the scheme?”
“No, it doesn’t seem so,” said DePaulo.
Chris gave Nancy’s arm a squeeze. “Annie would be proud of you two,” he said with a smile.
Dr. Winston entered, followed by Jackson carrying a tray of hot appetizers from the party. “I heard the news,” said Dr. Winston. His gray eyes shone with gratitude. “I don’t know how to thank you two.”
“My only regret is that this case has wreaked havoc on my wardrobe.” Detective DePaulo looked down at his leather shoes, which had been stained when he stepped in a puddle near the seal pool. “This is the third pair of Italian shoes that’ve been ruined by salt water.”
Nancy glanced out the window at the inner harbor. “I’ll be sorry to leave Baltimore. And I’ll miss all the friends I’ve made here at the aquarium, especially the ones who saved my life.”
“Don’t mention it,” Chris said modestly.
“I meant the dolphins!” Nancy quipped, smiling.
“Our return flight isn’t until Monday,” George reminded her. “We’ve got a few days left to do some sightseeing.”
“And you know, we have a program called Aquadopt,” Dr. Winston explained. “For a donation, you can adopt one of the animals here at the aquarium.”
“Then count me in for two dolphins,” said Nancy.
“And I’d like to adopt Ike.” George smiled. “I’ve kind of grown attached to the big guy.”
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Simon Pulse
An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division
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Copyright © 1991 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.
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ISBN: 978-0-6717-3072-7 (pbk)
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Carolyn Keene, Crosscurrents
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