“Well, then, I think we’ve found what we came for,” she told the manager and stood up.
“So, we can scratch Dandridge as a suspect,” Ned remarked as they threaded their way through the crowd of afternoon shoppers on Saint-Antoine Street.
“I suppose so,” Nancy said, stopping to eye a fashionable flowered sundress in a shop window. “His bank account confirms what he’s already told us. Too bad—he was such a promising suspect. I mean, just look at the clues!”
“Yeah,” Ned said, linking his arm in hers as they started to walk again. “First the liquid nitrogen, then the impression of the prescription written on notepaper from his desk.”
“And don’t forget that he knew we’d be in the plaza at five,” Nancy added. “Everything definitely points to Dandridge. It’s almost as if somebody wanted us to suspect him. But here we are, up against a stone wall.” She shook her head gloomily. “And we thought this was going to be such an easy case.”
A clock in a nearby church struck the half hour.
“Hey, it’s ten-thirty,” Ned said. “We’d better hurry if we want to see George run in the stadium.” He tugged at Nancy’s arm. “I want to stop by the apartment and get my camera. We have to get pictures of this!”
Nancy and Ned got out of the taxi at the edge of Olympic Park. Before them loomed a huge oval stadium. It was made of concrete and steel and supported by V-shaped concrete ribs.
“It’s huge!” Nancy exclaimed, staring up at the gigantic building. Standing beside one of the massive supporting ribs, she felt tiny.
“Over here,” Ned said, pointing to a sign that said Press Entrance. He slid his camera case higher on his shoulder. “The press box must be this way.”
They presented their passes to the guard at the gate, who looked at them curiously.
“Where’d you get these passes?” he demanded.
“From Lake Sinclair,” Nancy told him.
“Oh, that’s fine, then,” he said, his face relaxing. “We don’t usually let people into the building except on guided tours.” He shrugged. “Someone else with a pass came through here a few minutes ago. She a friend of yours?”
“That must be George,” Ned said. “Come on, Nancy! I want to see the inside of this thing.”
The stadium seemed even larger inside than it had from the outside—maybe because it was absolutely empty. The press box was a long glass booth along one side of the open-roofed structure. From there they had a bird’s-eye view of the track, far below. The far side of the track was over a hundred yards away.
Nancy sat down at the table along the window, holding an imaginary microphone in her hand.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” she said, “we’re here in world-famous Olympic Stadium to watch the running debut of Ms. Georgia Fayne, international champion jogger. Beneath us is the track, where Ms. Fayne will perform. Above us we can see the sky. All around us are empty seats—rows and rows of empty seats.”
Ned laughed. “Almost sixty thousand empty seats,” he said. He opened his camera bag and carefully removed a long lens, fitting it onto his camera. “This is a great place to try out my new telephoto lens,” he said enthusiastically.
“Oh, look, Ned!” Nancy exclaimed, pushing up the sleeves of her red blouse. “There’s George! Doesn’t she look tiny down there?”
George came into view far below, moving swiftly from left to right around the track. She was wearing an Olympic running shirt and red, white, and blue shorts. Nancy waved as her friend passed in front of the press box, but George didn’t look up.
As Nancy turned back to Ned, who was still busy with his camera, she noticed a second person coming down the ramp at the far end of the stadium. Apparently, George was going to have company on the track because the person was dressed in a white jogging jacket with the hood pulled up.
Ned stopped fiddling with his lens and raised the camera to his eye. “Hey, neat,” he said, looking around the track. “Just like a telescope.”
“What do you see?” Nancy wanted to know.