#7 The Clue in the Diary
Copyright 1962. Nancy is:
…pretty in a distinctive way. Her eyes were blue, her hair titian blond. She expressed her opinions firmly, but did not force them on others. Nancy’s abilities of leadership were welcome and depended upon in any group.
If that’s from her application essay, no wonder Nancy didn’t go to college.
George gets the first sentence and poor Bess, described on page 1 as reaching for her third sandwich and on page 2 reaching for a deviled egg, gets the second, which is “And missing all this good food!” I’m going to lose you all with this next reference but this hyperbolic food consumption nonsense is a pet peeve; Bess eating three sandwiches is about as likely as Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Millhone eating two Quarter Pounders per sitting as she is oft described. I get it, they’re women with healthy appetites but I am a big, round person and I can only eat one sandwich at a time. Although I could totally eat a whole bag of chips with that sandwich.
But I digress. The girls are returning from a trip to the carnival where they met and inappropriately hyperbonded with some new strangers: Mrs. Swenson and her daughter Honey. We don’t learn Mrs. Swenson’s first name, Helen, until page 99 when her husband Joe says it. She’s just called Mrs. Swenson for 11 chapters. Well, of course, she is poor.
They are lamenting the Swensons troubles (Joe went away to find work but hasn’t been in touch nor sent any of the money orders he’d promised) when they drive past a house that explodes! They rush over to help but the smoke is too thick. Nancy goes around back and sees a man running away from the burning house. Guilty! She and the girls get separated in the smoky commotion and she finds a diary on the ground which of course she feels free to pick up and “thrust…into the pocket of her sports dress.” I think I should like a sports dress. Sounds comfortable.
Then who to our wondering eyes should appear but St. (Ned) Nick(erson)! We meet him attempting to steal Nancy’s convertible. Or so the suspicious sleuth thinks; in reality, the gallant young man was just moving it out of range of the burning embers. Ned is described:
He was about nineteen, Nancy decided, surveying him critically. His hair was dark and slightly curly, his eyes whimsical and friendly. He wore a college fraternity pin.
I am going to picture Ned as an N’Sync-era Justin Timberlake.
There is a bit where Nancy’s car is rear-ended by a weird, nervous man but that seems to be just a way to get Nancy and Ned to interact again before the girls leave. Ned is directing traffic off the burned house grounds and when Nancy pulls over to examine her busted car he offers to help them to the local garage. They are So Meant For Each Other!
The diary turns out to be in Swedish which, shockingly, Nancy can’t read (although she knows a few key phrases of course, courtesy of old school chum Karen from Sweden) but Hannah Gruen reminds her of their “old Swedish bakery friend, Mr. Peterson” who could surely help them out. Oh and right before Hannah reveals her brilliant idea, Nancy says “Mm, blueberry muffins” which hopefully means we’ve seen the last of “Umm.”
Unfortunately Mr. Peterson is laid up until chapter 18 so Nancy has to make do with investigating the owner of the burned house, Felix “Foxy Felix” Raybolt, a man with a bad reputation for stealing others’ inventions. “Felix Raybolt!” is my new exclamation of choice. Felix Raybolt, that’s a low price!
Foxy Felix has gone missing and his equally suspicious wife claims he died in the fire at their house. All signs point to poor Joe Swenson being the culprit, as he was swindled by Raybolt and had a meeting with him the morning of the explosion. Also, St. Ned found a signet ring at the Raybolts house after the fire with the initial D, and Joe’s mother’s name was Dahl. Most damning is later when Nancy tracks down (or rather, happens to drive past after visiting the nervous rear-ender to extract repair money) Joe, she realizes he’s the stranger she saw running from the house.
But after Mr. Peterson gets off his lazy Swedish ass and translates the diary, Nancy figures out a plan to trap Raybolt. The girls lay in wait at the house for him to come back and dig up some secret documents. Yet again they basically fail and are rescued by the appearance of Ned and Mr. Drew. And there is the weirdest line ever:
“How in the world did you and Dad get here at the psychological moment?” Nancy asked Ned.
Felix Raybolt, what does that mean?!
Once in custody, Felix and his wife give up in classic “we would have gotten away with it, if not for those meddling kids” fashion. Raybolt writes Joe Swenson a check right then and there for the money he stole from him and Nancy is gifted with the signet ring.
