Pure Poison

by Carolyn Keene

  “But we also had a couple of other little operations going on the side. We weren’t stupid, and we knew the government wasn’t going to give us the bonuses we deserved for the hard work we were doing every day. Unfortunately, the government was too busy getting itself out of debt to reward the kind of rugged individualism that made this country great.”

  “By ‘rugged individualism,’ you mean what?” Nancy challenged him. “Extortion? Theft? Treason, maybe?”

  Layton didn’t seem at all angered by Nancy’s taunt. He merely smiled and said, “We had a contact in the quartermaster corps, and so we opened up a little business. We sold a lot of stuff—food, ammo, even weapons when we could get our hands on them. We always had lots of customers—peasants who needed to feed their families, villagers who were anxious to protect themselves from the Vietcong.

  “But, of course, there was never any way of knowing who was going to wind up with all the stuff. As far as we knew, we were just selling it to honest townsfolk, fooling with the bookkeeping a little, and making ourselves some extra cash.”

  Dan sat bolt upright on the couch. “I can’t believe this!” he sputtered. “Are you saying you were stealing from the U.S. government and selling goods to people who might in turn have sold them to the enemy, or who might even have been the enemy? That’s out-and-out treason!”

  “Call it whatever you want to.” Layton scowled. “Dead men have the right to their own opinions.”

  With a wicked smirk, the congressman turned to Nancy. “Your friend is brilliant, Ms. Drew,” he said. “He actually managed to put two and two together.”

  “He’s a lot swifter than your henchmen, Mr. Layton,” Nancy shot back. “They let me slip through their fingers a dozen times in the last day or two.”

  “Quite right.” He sighed sadly. “It’s almost impossible to get good help these days, as everybody knows. The guys in ’Nam were good boys. Unfortunately, none of them made it back stateside—except Louie.

  “But Louie didn’t fare as well as I did when we got to the U.S. He was weak—he let some bad memories get the best of him, couldn’t hold a job or make any real money. At first I tried to help him out by putting him on the country’s payroll, but after I made it to Congress, that got a bit too risky.

  “So I fired Louie from the fictional job I’d given him—paying him a nice chunk of money as severance, though, when he left. But Louie wanted more, and since he knew his information was worth a lot of money, he sold it to the highest bidder: Beverly Bishop, the reporter who’d pay thousands for a good story. Well, she paid, all right. And now—”

  He stood straight, pointing the gun at Nancy again. “If you’ll just be so kind as to tell me where you’ve put Louie’s evidence against me . . .”

  Nancy felt the blood rushing through her veins. The moment of truth had come. She had to delay the inevitable, in the slim hope that help would arrive or that she could find a way out.

  “Come, come, Ms. Drew,” Layton prompted her, gesturing around the room with his gun. “Where is it? I don’t have all night. We politicians are very busy people, you know, especially when we’re running for office.”

  “Why should I tell you?” Nancy spat out. “You’re going to kill us both, anyway, aren’t you? And Marilyn’s going to be arrested for murder!”

  “True,” Layton agreed. “But if you don’t tell me—or if the tape isn’t where you say it is—I might just get very angry and kill your friend Teresa, too.”

  Matt Layton was looking at her amusedly now, a diabolical smile lighting up his face. How could I ever have thought he was attractive? Nancy wondered to herself, seeing those chiseled features transformed into a mask of pure evil. He’s a monster!

  She had to stall him a little longer. “All right.” She sighed, feigning defeat. “You win. The tape is on the roof of the building next to Louie’s apartment. I buried it under a pile of trash. But you’ll never be able to find it by yourself. Why don’t I take you there and find it for you myself—”

  “That won’t be necessary, Ms. Drew,” Layton said, waving his gun at her. “I’m an old hand at finding buried treasure. And now, if you two will be so kind as to accompany me to my car—your bodies will be discovered tomorrow morning on the banks of Rock Creek. I’m sure the police will find some way to trace your murder to Marilyn Kilpatrick.”

  Suddenly he froze as someone pounded loudly on the door of Marilyn’s apartment. “Open up!” a voice yelled from outside. “It’s the police!”

  Layton spun away from his prisoners in the direction of the door. That slip was all Nancy needed. She jumped off the couch and sprang at her captor, tackling Layton by the knees and bringing him to the floor.

  Immediately, though, Layton recovered himself. The veteran of hundreds of hand-to-hand fights rolled Nancy over and sat on her stomach. Raising the gun over his head, he prepared to whack her on the jaw.

  But Nancy was too quick. She grabbed his hand as it came down and, twisting it with all her strength, bashed it into an end table.

  The gun went flying, just missing Dan’s head. Dan leapt toward the foyer and quickly threw open the door for the police. With a second swift move, he scooped the revolver off the floor and aimed it at Matt Layton. “Freeze!” he yelled as Layton raised his hand for a karate death strike to Nancy’s throat. The hand stopped in midair, then slowly sank, as the congressman realized the game was up.

  Nancy felt weak with relief as Dan pulled Layton off her. Sitting up, she turned toward the open doorway. Captain Flynn stood there, along with at least a half-dozen police officers, their guns trained right on Layton.

  “Get the cuffs on and get him out of here, Mackle,” growled Flynn, stepping into the room.

  “You have the right to remain silent—” Sergeant Mackle began, but Layton cut him off.

  “I know what my rights are! And when I get my lawyer on the phone, he’ll tell you which ones you’ve already violated!” he threatened, glowering at the policeman.

  As the sergeant snapped the cuffs on the furious Layton and continued to read him his rights, Captain Flynn helped Nancy up from the floor. “Well,” he said admiringly, “looks like you two didn’t even need our help.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t go that far, Captain,” Nancy said, brushing herself off. “Say—how did you know just when to show up, anyway?”

  Flynn smiled. He went over to the chandelier, reached up, and came down with a small wireless microphone in the palm of his hand. “We’ve had this place wired for the last thirty-six hours,” he said. “The other morning when I came here to visit Senator Kilpatrick, I stuck it up there when she went to get her gun registration out of her desk. I hated to do it to an old friend like the senator, but I thought it might help us catch the murderer somehow.”

  He dropped the microphone into his vest pocket. “But I hardly expected a full-length confession!” he admitted, putting an arm around Nancy’s shoulders.

  As Sergeant Mackle pulled the congressman toward the door, Layton turned around and glared at Nancy, his steel blue eyes radiating pure hatred. “You’ll pay for this!” he said between gritted teeth.

  “Nancy,” Captain Flynn said, an eye on Layton’s departing figure, “you showed intelligence, strength, moral fortitude—” He chuckled. “Maybe you ought to consider running for office someday—I hear there’s a congressional vacancy in your state.”

  “I’ll be back!” Matt Layton raved as he stumbled backward out the door, two policemen tugging him.

  “I doubt it,” Nancy called after him. “Not in this lifetime, anyway,” she said, smiling at Dan and the captain.

  Chapter

  Seventeen

  SECONDS AFTER MATT Layton had been whisked off in a police car, there was a commotion in the doorway. The cordon of police parted to admit Marilyn Kilpatrick and Teresa.

  “Nancy! You’re okay!” cried Teresa, running to her look-alike and hugging her hard.

  “Thank goodness! You’re alive and well! We were so worried,�
� said Marilyn, joining in the hug. Then the senator’s arm went around Nancy’s shoulders, and she sighed with deep relief. “We listened to the whole conversation down at the station. I still have a chill up my spine—”

  “Um, hello. I’m all right, too,” said Dan Prosky, edging over to them with a little wave.

  All three women cracked up simultaneously. “Oh, Dan,” said Nancy with a warm smile. “You were terrific. Honestly—the best!”

  “Well, don’t tell them I saved your life,” Dan warned Nancy. Turning to the others, he explained, “This girl disarmed Layton all by herself. The gun just happened to drop at my feet, that’s all.”

  “Oh, Nancy!” Teresa’s eyes brimmed over with tears. “Once again, you saved our lives!”

  “How did you figure out it was Layton?” asked the senator incredulously. “The thought never entered my mind!”

  “Well, I had to think fast on that one. It’s pretty complicated. If you want to find out, maybe you should take us all out for a celebratory dinner,” Nancy suggested with a wink.

  “Absolutely!”

  “Hey, what happened down at the station house?” asked Nancy, with an eye on Captain Flynn. “How did they treat you?”

  The senator smiled. “Well, I did call my lawyer, if that’s what you mean—” She turned toward the doorway, and there was Carson Drew standing there, attaché case in hand.

  “Dad!” Nancy cried, running to embrace him. “Oh, Dad, you don’t know how glad I am to see you!”

  “I have a fair idea,” Carson Drew replied as he watched a police officer put Matt Layton’s gun in a plastic bag for evidence. “Looks as if I missed all the fun,” he quipped.

  “Not all the fun,” Marilyn Kilpatrick corrected him, slipping her arm through his. “You’re just in time for the best part!”

  • • •

  That evening Nancy, Teresa, Marilyn, Dan, Captain Flynn, and Carson Drew gathered for dinner at Dion’s, the most elegant restaurant on Pennsylvania Avenue. Not surprisingly, they were eager to discuss the case that had almost cost them their lives. Nancy was glad to have taken a short nap and a shower, and to be wearing her own clothes—and hair color—again!

  “But I still do not understand how they got your revolver,” Teresa said. She took a sip of ice water and waited for the senator to reply.

  “Well,” Captain Flynn answered, “I talked with that assistant of yours—Richard.”

  “Yes, what about him?” the senator asked.

  “He told me that before you left for the day, and as you were getting your things together, you stopped at his desk for a second. Apparently you left your bag there while you went down to check on a problem one of your speech writers was having.”

  “That’s right, I did!”

  “But why would you leave your purse somewhere when you knew there was a gun in it?” Nancy asked, surprised. “That’s not like you.”

  “I know,” admitted the senator, nodding. “But I think I was just so flustered that I didn’t know what I was doing.”

  “I agree,” said Dan. “You haven’t even looked like yourself these past few days!”

  “While Marilyn was off on another floor,” the police captain continued, “Richard got a call from Congressman Layton’s office—they wanted him to pick up a batch of papers at the Congressional Office Building. But when he got there, no one knew what he was talking about. And Layton’s secretary had just left for the day. Richard says he waited around for a couple of minutes to see if anyone could clear up the confusion, but then he gave up and went back to his own office. On the way he passed Layton in the hall, but since Layton was often in the Senate Office Building, he thought nothing of it. It must have been then that Layton took the revolver and left the metal weight in Marilyn’s purse.”

  “Pretty risky,” Nancy’s father commented.

  Nancy agreed. “Matt Layton certainly has guts, I’ll give him that.”

  Teresa frowned. “May I ask a question?”

  “Go right ahead,” Captain Flynn answered.

  “Who put that message on the wall of my apartment?”

  “That I don’t know yet. My staff is doing a thorough investigation, talking to all your neighbors, tracing the phony blood to its source. We should know in a week or so.”

  “I bet it was someone from San Carlos who found out about Beverly’s book. I wouldn’t be surprised if Matt Layton put through a person-to-person call to your enemies down there, Teresa, just to get them angry and to make all of us more nervous,” submitted Nancy. She buttered a roll and took a bite.

  “Confidentially, Nancy, I think you’re absolutely right,” Ed Flynn commented. “But until we find out for sure, I can’t say anything.”

  “Okay,” Dan said, his face screwed up in concentration, “so how did Layton know that the senator had bought a gun? Did he bug her office, her apartment, what?”

  “The senator’s office was bugged,” Captain Flynn explained, “and one of Layton’s thugs was obviously listening to the transmission night and day. He knew she had a gun, he knew when she was planning to go to Beverly’s—the rest was up to him.”

  “I suspect that Marilyn’s apartment was also being watched constantly,” Nancy put in. “And whenever one of us left it, we were followed by one of Layton’s men. That’s how they knew to follow Dan and me to the morgue and how to trap me in that cab, and after I came home that morning just for a few minutes before going to Pringle Press, they knew I was going there, too.”

  “And Matt knew where to find us when he wanted to kill us, because the person who was sitting outside saw you walk in the front door!” Dan concluded.

  “Speaking of Pringle Press,” Nancy said, a little sheepishly, “what’s going to become of Beverly’s book, now that the ‘big four’ chapters are lost? Marilyn, did you get a chance to talk to the president?”

  She smiled warmly at Nancy. “I did. Ms. Pringle isn’t even interested in those final chapters—she’ll just publish what she’s got. But she’s already signed up a hot new author—Jillian Riley’s going to do a book on Beverly Bishop’s murder!”

  Nancy laughed. “Why doesn’t that surprise me? Well, I guess it’s just what you should expect in this town. I can’t wait to get back to River Heights and live a normal, peaceful life.”

  “Normal? Peaceful?” Carson Drew protested. “I only wish you would.”

  “You might as well get used to it, Carson,” the senator told him. “When it comes to danger or intrigue, Nancy Drew always gets elected.”

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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