Just then Bess burst out the door. Startled, Nancy stared at her in alarm.
“Nan,” Bess gasped, “we’ve got to go back to River Heights right away!”
Chapter Five
“What! Why?”
Bess’s face was pale. “Never mind why! Just warm up your car. We’ve got to get out of here as soon as possible!”
Nancy ran her fingers through her reddish gold hair. Great, she thought. Now, on top of everything else, Bess was freaking out! What could have made her so upset?
“Bess, calm down, okay? Try to tell me what happened.”
“Oh, Nancy, it’s awful. The room . . . our clothes . . . what if we hadn’t gone to the party? What if we had been there!”
The room? A feeling of dread shot through Nancy. Brushing past her friend, she unlocked the entrance and raced up the stairs. She saw right away why Bess had freaked.
The room was a mess. The door had been jimmied, and their clothes were strewn everywhere. Desks and chairs were overturned. The bed coverings had been torn off. Nancy felt sick. Who could have done this? she wondered. A burglar? A vandal?
It was neither. Alerted by the smell of paint, she whirled around. There, spray painted on the room’s large plate-glass window, was a bloodred warning: Go Home, Drew!
So! The practical joker was on to her!
Bess came in behind her. “See what I mean? Let’s get out of here, Nancy.”
“No way!” she declared. Her fists curled in anger. “You can split if you want to, but I’m going to stay as long as it takes.”
“But our stuff . . . the room . . . ! As soon as we report this, the school is going to throw us out anyway, I just know it.”
“I doubt that. The mess can be straightened up, and the paint will come off. They’ll let us stay. By the way, where’s George?”
“She went for a security guard,” Bess said.
A minute later George returned with both the guard and the dorm advisor, a senior named Lynn. Lynn was horrified but assured Nancy that they could remain.
“Your boyfriend vouched for you girls when he arranged for the room. I know this isn’t your fault. It could have happened to anyone.”
That wasn’t exactly true, Nancy knew, but she decided not to mention it. Instead, she zeroed in on the cleanup.
“Some turpentine would help that window. Is there any in the building?”
“Yes, in the basement,” Lynn confirmed. “I’ll get it.”
When she was gone, the guard conducted a brief investigation. The moment he had enough information for his report, he stuffed his pen back into his shirt pocket.
“No permanent damage to school property, fortunately,” he remarked. “Sorry about your clothes, though.”
“Me, too. Any chance of having that lock fixed tonight?” Nancy asked.
“Yes. I’ll phone the central maintenance office and have them send their night man right over,” he offered.
“Thanks. Oh, one more thing. Any idea how the . . . uh . . . vandal got into the building?”
The guard scratched his head. “Well, the front door is guarded around the clock, so I guess he came in the side entrance, same as you.”
“But I have a key!”
“So do lots of people. There are one hundred kids living in this dorm, miss. It’s fairly common for them to copy their keys for their friends. Anybody could get one easily.”
“I see. Thank you.”
Rats! she thought. No help there. Why were clues so hard to come by on this case? Either the practical joker was very lucky, or he had more on the ball than she thought!
The next morning, Nancy and her friends ate breakfast in the student union. Bess still wanted to return to River Heights, but after an hour of heavy persuasion Nancy was able to convince her to stay.
“You’re sure we’re not in any danger?” Bess asked for the third time.
“I’m positive. Look, you have to understand how practical jokers think . . . they don’t get their kicks from injuring people. They make their victims suffer in other ways.”
“Oh, thanks. Now I feel a lot better!”