“Thanks, Dad. That does it . . . oh, except for one thing. Does the term push mean anything special to you?”
It did. Nancy listened for a few seconds longer, then said a hasty goodbye. Hanging up, she turned to Bess and George.
“Okay, let’s roll!”
“Wait a minute! What’s going on, Nancy?” George demanded.
“Yeah,” Bess echoed. “Aren’t you going to fill us in?”
“There isn’t time. The culprit is probably getting ready to escape right this minute. We’ve got to stop him!”
Nancy paused to check one final fact, however. Opening the directory that hung on a chain below the pay phone, she looked up a number: the number on the scrap of paper she’d picked up in the bookstore phone booth. Then, satisfied, she started down the main corridor, away from the gym. She motioned for her friends to follow her, then zipped down a stairway.
As they walked, the sounds of the game faded behind them. The final buzzer must be near, Nancy knew, but they would have to wait to find out who won. There wasn’t a second to lose!
The final corridor to which they came was just as Nancy remembered it. Like the first time she had gone down it, it was silent. The noise from the gym was no more than a memory here. Stopping at a familiar door, she whispered to her friends.
“You guys are my backup. If things get out of hand in there”—she pointed to the door—“I’ll scream my head off.”
“But, Nancy, who’s inside?” Bess hissed.
“You’ll see. Remember, listen for my scream . . . if you hear it, run for the police!”
This was it. If everything went as she hoped, the case would be wrapped up in a matter of minutes! Nancy took a deep breath. Stepping up to the door, she opened it without knocking, slipped around it, and closed it behind her.
Dr. Riggs was standing behind his desk, stuffing files and notebooks into a gym bag. As she came in, his head snapped up.
“What the—”
“Hello, Doctor,” she said with a smile.
“Nancy Drew! What do you want?”
“I want to congratulate you on the success of your gambling ring,” she said. “Tell me, Doctor . . . how does it feel to retire rich?”
Chapter Seventeen
Silence fell. Dr. Riggs said nothing. Instead he stared at her for a full minute. He didn’t even blink. She had to give him one thing, Nancy decided: He was cool. Very cool.
Finally, the doctor returned to his files and notebooks. One by one he placed them in the gym bag. His movements were slow and deliberate. He was buying time, she knew.
“Well, Miss Drew,” he said at last. “That’s an interesting accusation. I’m running a gambling ring, you say?”
“From this very office. If I were you I’d go to the police right now and make a full confession,” she said.
“Why should I do that?”
“Because they’ll go easier on you if you turn yourself in voluntarily.”
“Really!” He shook his head in amusement. “That’s fascinating.”
Suddenly Nancy’s patience gave out. “Come on, Doctor . . . stop pretending. You’re guilty and we both know it!”
“Do we?” His face grew hard. “All I’ve heard so far is wild fantasies from a would-be detective, Miss Drew.”
“You want proof?”
“If you have any. Frankly, though, I think you’re nothing more than a teenager with an overactive imagination.”
An overactive—! Nancy was furious. Had she imagined the black Camaro? The list in Mike’s locker? Her near-death in the sauna? No way! She crossed her arms.
“I should have realized what was going on my second day on campus,” she began. “I overheard a student called Captain Hook asking for a ten-timer. That’s a fifty-dollar bet, but I didn’t know that at the time.”
Dr. Riggs continued to pack his gym bag, but his eyes never left her.
“Strangely enough, I ran across Captain Hook again,” Nancy went on. “This time he was out cold. He had been beaten up because he couldn’t pay off his gambling losses. Even then I still didn’t guess the truth. I was too busy hunting for the practical joker.”