The Message in the Hollow Oak

by Carolyn Keene

Not knowing what might confront them on the other side of it, the four young people went ahead cautiously, single file. Ned had insisted upon taking the lead in case there was any trouble. When they reached the far side, they saw an empty car parked in a clearing.

  On a hunch that someone would soon come for it, Nancy suggested, “Let’s retrace our steps and spy around the side of the hill.”

  In a few minutes their caution was rewarded. They could hear voices. Soon three men approached on foot. The watchers gasped.

  In the center was Bob Snell, blindfolded and gagged!

  On either side of him were the fake museum guards who had come to the farmhouse.

  “Don’t try any funny work, young man!” one of them said in a harsh voice.

  The watchers looked at one another, then got ready to attack!

  CHAPTER XIX

  Surprise!

  THE fake guards were taken completely by surprise. Ned and Dave gave them a football rush that knocked the two men over.

  For a few seconds Bob did not know what was going on. He put up his fists to ward off anyone who might attack him. Instantly Nancy and Bess came to his rescue. Quickly they untied his blindfold and pulled the gag from his mouth.

  “Nancy!” Bob cried out. “Where did you come from?”

  Without waiting for an answer he pitched into the fight to help Ned and Dave. The kidnappers were quickly subdued. Exhausted, they did not try to escape.

  Nancy introduced her friends to Bob. He thanked them for rescuing him, and said, “How did you ever find me?”

  Nancy explained and added, “Oh, Bob, we’re so glad to see you!”

  He managed a smile. “Am I glad to see you! How’s everything at the dig?”

  Quickly Nancy told about the attempted thievery, then asked, “Who kidnapped you?”

  Bob confirmed that it was Kit Kadle. “By the way, he does use the alias of Tom Wilson.”

  Nancy quizzed the prisoners, but they sat on the ground, looking glum and refusing to answer. Bob said he did not know their names but the men were pals of Kit Kadle.

  “Did you hear the radio message I sent that a ham picked up? Evidently he passed it on.”

  “Yes, to a broadcasting company,” Nancy replied. “Later we learned the ham thought you were in this general area.”

  Just then George and Burt came around the side of the hill. They stopped short at the surprising scene before them, then hurried over, full of questions.

  Swiftly Ned explained the situation and Nancy introduced the newcomers to Bob. Then she turned to George. “Why did you leave the well house?”

  “Because the police have the well house surrounded. One of the officers spotted us and said it wasn’t necessary for us to keep watch. We came to see if you needed our help.”

  Bob nodded. “How about tying up these men? There’s some rope in that car of theirs, and by the way, the ignition key is in it.”

  The two prisoners suddenly tried to make a break, but they were quickly stopped by the four boys. Since it seemed best for all of them to hold onto the men, George went to the car and found the rope. She helped tie the men’s hands behind their backs and hobbled their feet.

  The prisoners sat down again, glaring at their captors. Burt offered to bring back a couple of policemen who were staking out the well house.

  While Burt was gone, Bob explained how he had been kidnapped. “It happened while I was near the dig,” he said. “These two guys came out of nowhere. While one of them stuffed a gag in my mouth, the other one grabbed me and tore my shirt. A piece of it came off in my hand when I tried reaching for the guy’s arm. Before they had a chance to tie me up, I pretended to pass out. I staggered toward a tree and stuck the material in it. They dragged me away and made me walk in a brook a long distance. The whole time I kept wondering what my capture was all about.

  “Later I found out Kit Kadle was in back of the whole thing. He was very nervous about being found, so he had these men moving me from place to place in their car. They had another car they had stolen but were afraid to use it.

  “I told them I didn’t know anything about the hollow oak, but they didn’t believe me. Kadle figured that the message contained directions to a hidden treasure. If he could find it, he would be a rich man. And I guess he also planned to sell whatever he could steal from the dig.”

  George said, “We found the note you left in the well house. Did they keep you a prisoner there part of the time?”

  “Yes,” Bob replied. “One or the other of the two armed guards always kept watch outside the places where Kadle and I stayed. Kadle was away a lot, so I had plenty of time to try figuring out how I could save myself.”

  Nancy was curious about the strange row of stones she had found. “Did you leave them?”

  “Yes. When the men took me out for exercise, they untied my hands. I spotted the spearheads in a heap. While they were busy talking, I filled my pockets with them. Later, they moved me. When they weren’t watching me for a few seconds, I dropped the spearheads onto the ground one by one. Once I tried to get away but it was hopeless.”

  Bess spoke up. “I think you were marvelous to rig up a sending set and get a message out. Where did you find the equipment?”

  Bob laughed. “I’m studying to be an electrical engineer, and you’d be surprised at all the odd little things I gathered in that shack where Kadle was staying. I worked on the set whenever he was out.”

  “Where is this shack?” Nancy asked.

  “I don’t know,” Bob replied. “In the woods somewhere. I was blindfolded whenever they moved me in and out of it.”

  “Is he at the place now?” asked Ned.

  Bob said Kadle had gone off somewhere but had told the men he would join them later.

  “In the meantime they were to move me to a new hideout. Kadle caught me sending the radio message last night and figured the police would soon locate the place where we were staying.”

  “When is he going to the well house to pick up the ransom?” Nancy asked.

  “Sometime this morning,” Bob replied. “That’s all I know. Nancy, did you find the message in the hollow oak?”

  “No,” she said, “but apparently Kadle thinks I did, because he made it part of the ransom.”

  Bob shook his head. “Kadle doesn’t know whether you have or haven’t. He just put that in the ransom note in case you had. Anyway, he figures he’ll get five thousand dollars.”

  Ned grinned. “Is he in for a surprise!” Bob laughed when he was told about the dummy sack.

  Ned turned to the prisoners and questioned them about where they had planned to take Bob. The men remained silent.

  “It doesn’t matter now, anyway,” said Nancy. “The police should be here soon.”

  To her dismay Burt returned without them, saying he could not find any of the officers. “I figure they either captured Kadle or are trailing him.”

  After a discussion it was decided that Bob and Burt would use the prisoners’ car and take the kidnappers to the authorities.

  “Bob, please don’t go before you answer a few more questions,” Nancy requested. “Did you ever find out why you were abducted?”

  “Yes,” Bob replied. “Two reasons. One, Kadle hoped my disappearance would frighten you off the case. Two, he thought I could give him a clue to the hollow oak. He was sure I had picked up information about it from you.”

  “How did he learn the story of the oak?” Nancy asked.

  “He overheard the New York detectives talking about it when they were out here,” Bob answered.

  Nancy asked him if he knew one of those detectives had been kidnapped by Kadle. “No. But I’m not surprised. Kadle is a fanatic on the subject of the hollow oak. He’s determined to find it first and won’t let anything stand in his way.

  “I’d say,” Bob went on, “that because you found both Mr. Armstrong and myself, Kadle will pretty nearly go berserk. Nancy, I’m afraid you are in serious danger.”

  The young detective
brushed off the idea. She whispered to Bob, “Did you pick up any clues about a hollow oak?”

  “Maybe,” he replied. “I did see something that the men didn’t notice. About two hundred feet beyond the open field there’s a giant oak. I don’t know if it’s hollow, but there’s a tremendous lump on the trunk. Perhaps something is underneath it.”

  Ned remarked in a concerned tone, “I think the quicker we get these prisoners to State Police Headquarters the better.”

  The other young people agreed he was right. Bob and Burt started off with their captives.

  After they had gone, Nancy and her friends hurried across the open field and found the oak tree easily. There was indeed a good-sized hump on the trunk, but the tree was not hollow.

  Ned brought out his hunting knife and chipped off the bark over the lump. The others watched intently. Finally his efforts were rewarded.

  “Here’s a lead plate,” he said, and pried it loose. After he had cleaned it off, the initials P.F. were revealed. This was followed by an arrow pointing directly north.

  Bess sighed. “Père François certainly must have traveled around to many Indian villages. When are we going to come to the end of our search?”

  “Good question,” George replied. “Well, let’s head north!”

  The five friends walked along silently, watching for a hollow oak. After a while they heard the sound of a waterfall. In a few minutes they arrived at the edge of a steep embankment. It led down to a rushing stream which tumbled over a rock ledge. In the wet and shadowy depths under the falls Nancy saw something which made her heart beat faster.

  “Look!” she exclaimed. “There’s an oak tree wedged under that waterfall. It’s being held in place by rocks.”

  “Great!” Dave remarked and added, “Here’s the stump on the embankment. The tree must have rotted, then been blown over by a heavy wind. It rolled down into the stream.”

  The whole group was excited now. They realized that if the mammoth tree was rotten at the stump, it no doubt was hollow all the way through.

  “I’m going down to investigate,” Nancy announced.

  “Not without me,” Ned said firmly.

  He took her arm and the two started down the slippery embankment. A moment later the earth gave way. The couple lost their footing and slid toward the water.

  “Oh!” Bess screamed above them.

  Nancy and Ned managed to break their fall just before reaching the rocky stream. Now they stood up and gazed at the giant oak which reached from bank to bank. They leaned down and peered through a hole in it. The tree was indeed hollow.

  “Could this be the real hollow oak?” Nancy asked excitedly.

  “Let’s inspect it!” Ned urged.

  The two waded into the stream and examined the bark. Nancy hoped fervently that if there were a hump indicating an object underneath, it would not be on the underside of the tree.

  “Here’s something!” she called out in a few moments.

  George shouted down, “What do you think?”

  “Tell you in a moment,” Ned replied. “Dave, did you bring along your little hatchet?”

  “I sure did,” Dave replied.

  He came down the embankment cautiously. George and Bess stayed at the top and kept looking around them to see if anyone were watching. If Kadle had not been captured and were in the neighborhood he would surely try to interfere.

  Using the hatchet, Dave soon uncovered another name plate. On it were the initials P.F. but there was no arrow!

  “We’ve found it! We’ve found it!” Nancy cried gleefully.

  The tree was quite rotted. The young people figured it could not have been in the water very long, or it would have fallen apart. After a few gentle whacks with the hatchet they came to the hollow section.

  “Oh!” Nancy murmured.

  Inside lay a long, narrow metal box. Ned lifted it out, then the elated finders started up the embankment with it.

  “I can’t believe it!” Bess called down. “You’ve found the treasure!”

  Nancy was almost too excited to speak. She could hardly wait to see what was in the box. Because of its size and weight she realized there must be something more inside than just the message. The metal box was laid on the ground at the top of the embankment and brushed off.

  “Here are Père François’s initials.” George pointed.

  There was a lock but no key. The metal had rusted, however, and with little effort Ned pried the lid open. In the box lay a copper hunting horn decorated with exquisite Limoges porcelain work depicting scenes in France.

  “It’s beautiful,” said Bess as Nancy lifted the horn from the box.

  “The message must be hidden inside!” she exclaimed .

  Nancy was about to put her hand into the horn when a voice near the group commanded:

  “Hand that over to me!”

  CHAPTER XX

  Kit and Caboodle

  NANCY and her friends whirled to see who had ordered her to hand over the treasure.

  Kadle! Beside him stood a man with a gun.

  Nancy’s heart sank. After all her hard work, was she going to have to surrender her discovery to a thief? Defiantly she asked, “Why should I give this to you?”

  “Never mind the reason!” Kadle shouted angrily. “Come here, all of you!”

  Bess, trembling, started to walk ahead. Dave stepped to her side.

  The next moment Nancy, Ned, and George spotted two state troopers hurrying toward them among the trees. The three friends exchanged looks. Then, playing for time, Nancy continued to oppose Kadle.

  “What would you do with this?” she asked. “And how much would you pay for it?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous!” Kadle shouted, stepping forward a pace.

  Bess turned her head. “You’d better do as he says, Nancy. We don’t want to get hurt.”

  “She’s right!” Kadle called out.

  Before he could move again, the troopers sprang from the woods and seized the two men.

  “Hey! What’s going on here?” Kadle sputtered. The man with him looked thunderstruck at being disarmed.

  One of the troopers said, “We’ve been looking for you a long time. You’re wanted on several counts and now we can add to the list threatening the lives of these young people.”

  “It’s a lie!” Kadle blustered. He pointed to Nancy. “She has something that belongs to me!”

  The trooper asked Nancy, “Is this true?”

  “Of course not,” she replied. “I’d say that if this property belongs to anyone, it would be the State of Illinois. I promise to turn it in.” She told the officers a little of the mystery on which she was working.

  “It’s lucky you arrived when you did,” Ned said to the troopers. “How did you find us? Did our friends tell you?”

  “No, we haven’t seen them.”

  “They’ve taken the phony guards to jail.” Kadle winced at hearing this.

  The trooper went on, “We were hiding near the well house, and spotted you going through the woods. A few minutes later Kadle and his pal came along, following you. We trailed them, figuring we’d catch the two in action.”

  Ned turned to Kadle. “Then you never did go to the well house to pick up the ransom?”

  Kadle shook his head. “When I noticed you heading in this direction, I was sure you were up to something and I’d better find out what it was.”

  Dave said, “There was a nice fat sack of paper and stones waiting for you at the well house.”

  Kadle scowled. “I might have known Nancy Drew would pull a trick on me.”

  Seeing that his position was hopeless, he talked freely. Nancy learned the answers to some of the questions which had puzzled her. The two men who had later posed as museum guards had come to the dig soon after her arrival and called out her name softly at the bedroom window. They were supposed to get Nancy to step outside and then kidnap her, so she could not pursue her search for the message in the hollow oak. The men had also stolen
Clem’s goat to frighten her in the dark bedroom.

  “But nothing worked,” Kadle admitted. One of his men left the note on the farmhouse bureau, hoping to scare Nancy off the case. Kadle had planned to steal the fossils and artifacts in the excavation and the barn, and admitted posing as Tom Wilson.

  “Whenever I thought it wasn’t safe for me to appear, I gave the job to my men.”

  Nancy asked, “Did you mutilate an oak tree in your search for the real hollow oak?”

  Kadle admitted doing it.

  George spoke up. “How did you learn Nancy Drew was on the case?”

  Kadle replied, “When I couldn’t get any information from Armstrong about the hollow oak, I flew East and spied on the other detectives. I overheard Boycey Osborne say Nancy Drew from River Heights was taking over. I managed to get on the same flight with her to St. Louis.”

  The trooper asked if the prisoners had any more to say. They shook their heads and were led away.

  “Now let’s see what’s inside this hunting horn,” Nancy suggested.

  While Ned held the beautiful instrument, she put her hand down inside the tube. Her fingers touched something metal. She pulled out a heavy solid-gold chain and cross.

  “That’s exquisite!” Bess exclaimed.

  “And worth a fortune, I’ll bet,” Dave added. Next Nancy removed a man’s large signet ring with a religious design on it. She tugged at the next piece but could not move it.

  Finally she said, “Ned, you try.”

  The object was wedged in tightly. Ned rocked the horn from side to side and finally the metal object in it gave way. He pulled out a slender brass box.

  “This is a surveyor’s kit,” Dave remarked as Nancy raised the lid. “Père François must have been a surveyor as well as a missionary.”

  Carefully Nancy removed an egg-shaped piece of metal with a rotted fragment of string attached to it.

  “That’s a plumb bob,” said Ned. “It hangs on the end of a line to find the center of gravity.”

  “And here’s a compass,” George added. “What’s this?” Nancy asked, picking up a brass tube.

  “Père Francois could have used that for sighting,” said Ned. “Today we look through a telescopic instrument called a transit.”