sassydotnet:river heights

@1966. We begin with Nancy’s preparations for attending a flower show. It may be because I am an old lady at heart but I love the olden days where young people acted elderly.

So Nancy and Hannah are in the yard gabbin’ and prunin’ when a bird falls out of the sky and lands in the garden. It turns out to be a homing pigeon carrying a mysterious note:

“‘Trouble here. After five o’clock blue bells will be singing horses. Come tonight.’”

Of course Nancy knows just what to do:

“I’ll wire the International Federation of American Homing Pigeon Fanciers…All homing pigeons are registered by number so the owners can be traced.”

Leaving aside the sad fact that social organizations so rarely use the term “fanciers” anymore, check out Nancy’s uber-competence again! A girl of many talents.

So she sends off a telegram and then leaves for the flower show with her prize larkspur (also know as delphinium, she tells Hannah). On her way home she catches sight of Dr. Spire, “the famous bone specialist,” being whisked away in a black sedan. She thinks it peculiar but goes on her way. When she returns home there is a reply telegram - so telegrams were like slow, expensive email? - from the Pigeon Fanciers who tell her to hang on to that bird and keep its message secret. Mysterious! Nancy is excited, dying for a new mystery “ever since I solved The Sign of the Twisted Candles.” I love to imagine her having a big, leather scrapbook documenting her adventures which she of course gives titles.

While retrieving a jar of sweet pickles from the cellar to go with their dinner of hot biscuits and chicken (umm!), Hannah slips and throws out her back. Nancy drives her to old Dr. Spire’s office straight away but of course he is still out in that mysterious sedan. While they wait, Nancy answers the phone in his office (oddly because Mrs. Spire asked her to) and takes a message:

“If you say blue bells, you will get into trouble, for they are no longer used here.”

Felix Raybolt, what does it all mean?! Dr. Spire returns later that night and spills his guts to Nancy and Carson. He was summoned by who he thought was a patient but once he got into that black sedan he was blindfolded and taken to a place out in the country where he was asked to administer to an elderly woman with a dislocated shoulder. He wasn’t allowed to talk to her but she slipped an engraved bracelet into his hands. The Drews decide to try to find and rescue her.

Hannah is prescribed bed rest and her niece Effie comes to work in her stead. Meet Effie:

“Hi, Nancy!” said the girl as she walked into the living room munching a banana.
“Hello, Effie,” Nancy greeted the thin, seventeen-year-old girl.
Effie had light-blond hair, which she wore close-cropped with feathery bangs over her forehead. She was dressed in a Chinese-style pink kimono, with high-heeled satin mules.
“This outfit is like the one Ling Su wore in the movie, ‘The Chinese Wall Mystery,’” Effie remarked, making an Oriental bow.

So Effie is Juliette Lewis.

Later Nance runs into good old Helen Corning, sorry, Mrs. Jim Archer, in town who asks if she would solve a mystery for her. Nancy explains she’s already got a case but Helen butters her up:

“You’re so clever, Nancy, I’m sure you can solve both at once!”

She takes the bait and goes over to the Archer’s apartment the next day and they all drive out to Sylvan Lake where Grandmother and Grandfather Corning have recently moved. Helen asks after Bess and George and we learn they are vacationing, as per uzh, but will be home tomorrow. Worlds colliding! It turns out the elder Cornings have been experiencing something rather odd at their new house:

“One night about two weeks ago, my wife and I were sitting here enjoying the view when we saw a large circle of blue fire at the bottom of the hill.”
“Blue fire!” Nancy exclaimed.
Mr. Corning nodded. “Yes, it’s a circle about as big as a car wheel and glows with an eerie blue fire. It’s approximately seven feet off the ground.”

“Sounds weird,” Helen remarked. Ya, duh? Apparently their middle-aged houseman Morgan has also been acting strangely lately and keeps disappearing after the blue fire appears. In fact, he’s gone now! And he still is missing the next morning. The Cornings don’t want to call the police because they don’t want Morgan to get in trouble but Mrs. Corning laments that she’d feel safer if someone where there at night. Helen immediately offers - well, no actually she doesn’t. What she says is: “I wish I could be here,” said Helen, “but—” Because as Mrs. Corning points out:

“No, no,” her grandmother said firmly. Your place is with your husband.”

In the next breath Helen offers up Nancy to stay. Y’know, because she’s a dried up old spinster with no other plans? Nancy politely reminds her “but you know I am also working on another case.” Mrs. C counters that the house could be Mystery HQ for Nancy but worries if it’s safe. Helen pipes up again suggesting those other spinsters Bess and George could join her:

“You three could have lots of fun here when you’re not working on your mysteries.”

Holy Smug Married Helen. Do you not remember how Nancy saved you from drowning in a lake?!

Nancy says she’ll think about it and goes home where bumblin’ Effie and a neighbor boy end up letting the pigeon free. Nancy is PISSED.

Flustered, Effie climbed in [the car] beside Nancy, taking off her apron and chattering apologies.
“Don’t talk! Just watch,” Nancy said crisply.
…
Effie gulped. “I’m sorry. I can’t see him. Oh, I could cry!”
“Well, don’t,” Nancy commanded.

Fucking Effie.

They follow the bird to its coop and Nancy gets menaced but escapes. The bad guys are out to get her now though so it’s decided she’ll decamp to Sylvan Lake with George and Bess who have returned from vacation (just in time for another vacation!). But how to leave in secret? Oh, how about this NEW CAR Mr. Drew bought for his little girl? They pull the old switcheroo with the help of Carson’s various business associates and Nancy makes it safely to the Cornings where Morgan the houseman has still not returned. The next morning Nancy goes into town and learns from a jeweler that the bracelet the old woman slipped to Dr. Spire bears the crest of the Eldridge family, whose descendants live in or near St. Louis. Jewelers were more full service then.

Then Bess and George arrive and soon the girls are headed off to the lake in their “swim suits and beach coats.” Beach coats! My next project should be The Wondrous Outfits of Nancy Drew. Adventure resumes at the beach where Nancy rescues a little girl from a speedboat who just happens to be an Eldridge and subsequently learns from the child’s mother that her old Aunt Mary is missing. Aha, so Mary Eldridge is the old woman Dr. Spire met.

But who cares about old ladies when the boys arrive! Ned, Bess’s beau Dave Evans and Burt Eddleton (“He was George’s special friend.”) arrive in a canoe from the camp they’re counselors at across the lake. The girls go to a yacht club dance with them and then go visit them at the camp for a swim meet. After the races, Ned proposes a little diving competition which Nancy of course owns. The camp director even offers her a job but she declines: “Thank you,” Nancy said, smiling, “but I already have a job.” No, you don’t, actually.

The girls get back to the Cornings where Morgan has returned and Nancy puts together the pieces of that mystery: Morgan is being blackmailed into stealing the Corning’s crystal garden (a collection of crystal flowers with jewels in them). A plan is devised to trap the thieves but Morgan screws it up and ends up getting kidnapped.

They still don’t call the police and let Nancy have another day to try and find the house where Mrs. Eldridge is being held. The girls drive around until they at last come upon a large estate surrounded by larkspur. This is the place! They bumble through the woods and come to an electrified fence. But wait - an old lady in a wheelchair is on the other side. It’s Mrs. Eldridge! Nancy explains how she found her and that she is going to rescue her. A guard comes by and the girls take off but not before overhearing clever Mrs. E mention which room she’s in. A plan takes shape.

Then, Chapter XV, titled Daring Plans:

[George returns bandaged and ready.]
“Good,” said Nancy. “Are you ready for danger?”
“Of course we are,” George answered steadily.

It’s like the Teen Expendables up in here.

This plan, by the way, involves renting a car and Nancy meeting back up with G+B “her arms filled with packages.” She has GOT to be selling term papers or old-fashioned meth (?) on the side. Nancy dresses up like the old lady they overheard was due to arrive at 9 tonight and Bess is to be her nurse/driver. George with her lame ankle is to man the convertible in case of trouble.

 But first, a meal:

They found a small restaurant on a side street and ordered hot sandwiches and milk.

The milk kills me. It’s like Muppet Babies Undercover. They drive up to the mansion and say the password from the pigeon’s message, way back at the beginning of this too-long recap.

“Singing horses,” repeated the guard. “Right you are.”
The password had permitted them to enter!

It gets really confusing after that but they find Mrs. Eldridge and also Morgan locked in an attic. Nancy gets caught but escapes and manages to send off some pigeons with the message “SP at once” and to drain the fuel from the thieves’ plane. In the end, she is rescued by Ned, dad and the State Police.

” ‘SP at once,’ ” Ned said with a grin. “Sailplane at once!”
“Also, send police,” Nancy added.
…
“All we had to do was find two sailplanes…”

You think your girlfriend is high-maintenance? Try being Nancy’s boyfriend.

Memento time! Mrs. Eldridge tells Nancy to keep her bracelet and Mr. Corning, not to be outdone in the generosity game, pipes up:

“And I am going to order French crystal earrings in the form of tiny larkspurs for you and the other girls.”

So heartfelt, how he doesn’t even feel the need to know those “other girls” names. But all Nancy really wants is another mystery, and you know Nancy always gets what she wants…

Edited to add: In case you’re wondering, Nancy also won first prize in the flower show.