Nancy, Bess, and George joined Zoe behind the check-in counter, then followed her through the doorway and into the back office.
The rosy light of dusk streamed into the room through the slats of a shaded window. On the wall just inside the door was a board with hooks for extra keys to the guest rooms. A metal safe rested on the floor in the far corner, behind a desk covered with stacks of invoices and registration forms.
“First, let me remove everything,” Zoe said. She knelt down beside the square gray safe and pulled out a plastic carton containing stacks of manila envelopes. Nancy, Bess, and George gathered around Zoe as she stood and placed the carton on the desk.
“I can’t stand the suspense,” Bess said, flipping through the envelopes to find the one marked with her name.
“Me, either,” George said. She found her envelope and Nancy’s and pulled both out.
Checking in her pouch, Nancy was relieved to find her passport and traveler’s checks, just as she’d left them. She leafed through the passport, noting the visas stamped on the blue-green pages printed with a bald eagle. “Everything’s here,” she reported.
“Mine checks out, too,” George said.
When Bess said nothing, Nancy looked over at her. Bess’s mouth had fallen open, and there was a look of shock on her face. “My passport’s missing!” she said in a horrified whisper.
“Are you sure?” Nancy asked. She leaned over Bess’s shoulder as Bess looked into the envelope once again. The traveler’s checks were there, Nancy saw, but Bess’s passport was gone.
“Maybe it ended up in someone else’s envelope,” Zoe said hopefully.
George nodded toward the open ledger. “Let’s go over the inventory and see.”
As Zoe read off the names written in Greek in the inventory ledger, George and Bess checked the contents of each envelope. While they worked, Nancy paced the office, looking for a clue as to who might have tampered with the hotel safe.
Kneeling beside the safe, she looked inside and ran her fingers over the walls of the empty interior. Since there was no damage to the safe, Nancy deduced that either someone knew the combination or was an expert at combination locks. Whoever it was must have been in a hurry, she thought, since they hadn’t even closed the safe.
“Who has the combination to the safe?” Nancy asked Zoe.
“Just my father and me,” Zoe answered.
“Do you remember who opened the safe last?”
Zoe frowned. “Not really. Things were so hectic today, with that British tour group checking out and a few families checking in. I must have gone into the safe nearly a dozen times myself. But it’s not like Papa—or me—to forget and leave it unlocked.”
She returned to the inventory with grim determination. “Let’s see if anything else is missing,” she said.
“A diamond necklace!” Bess remarked as a glittering necklace spilled out of one envelope.
“We’ve come across a lot of cash, too,” George added. “It’s hard to believe that a thief would leave all this behind.”
Good point, Nancy thought, checking the area around the safe. A shelf of ledgers seemed undisturbed, as did the wooden file cabinet beside the safe. It looked as if whoever had opened the safe and stolen Bess’s passport knew exactly where to look for it. And it wouldn’t be hard for a staff member to watch Zoe or her father open the safe and remember the combination.
“Who uses this room?” Nancy asked Zoe.
“My father uses it as an office. And sometimes the desk clerks and the cleaning staff come in here,” Zoe explained. “They need extra keys from the board when there aren’t enough master keys to go around.”
Nancy immediately thought of Niki Christofouros. Since she was one of the hotel’s maids, no one would question her appearance in the office. And the girls
had
caught her going through Bess’s luggage. What if Niki had been trying to steal Bess’s passport? Once she saw that it wasn’t in the room, maybe she had looked in the hotel safe. The question was, why would she do such a thing?
Nancy decided not to say anything about Niki for the moment. She didn’t want to implicate the girl without solid evidence, since Niki could lose her job over this. Just to be safe, though, Nancy suggested that Zoe question the entire hotel staff. In the meantime, Nancy would do some of her own checking on Niki.
“Oh, no! Not another one,” Bess groaned a few minutes later. She held up an envelope marked Leo Nelson. “His passport is missing, too,” she told Zoe.
George was frowning into another envelope. “Make that three missing passports,” she said. “Joseph Seidel’s isn’t in his envelope.”
Zoe circled the two names on her inventory sheet. “Two American men—and Bess,” she said wearily.
Luckily, the remaining envelopes contained everything they were supposed to. When the girls were finished, Zoe pushed away the list and leaned back in the desk chair. “So three passports were stolen in all. I can’t believe this is happening. It’s not good for the hotel. If word gets out, we’ll lose customers.”
“Not to mention the fact that three passports are now in the hands of strangers,” George said.
Bess drew her breath in sharply. “I don’t like the idea of someone using my passport illegally,” she said in a shaky voice.
“You’ll need to get a new one,” George advised her.
Leaning over, Zoe squeezed Bess’s hand. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “The police will know the best way to report it to your embassy.”
Just then a tall, husky man with salt-and-pepper hair walked into the room. He assessed the scene, a bewildered expression on his face, then addressed Zoe in rapid-fire Greek. She answered, nodding at Nancy, Bess, and George as she talked.
“This is my father, Kostas Kavalis,” Zoe said, introducing the man to Nancy, Bess, and George.
Mr. Kavalis gave each of the girls a hearty handshake. “I’m very sorry about your passport, Bess. I will report it to the police immediately.” He glanced back at Zoe’s list and frowned. “I must notify those two American men, too.”
Shaking his head, Zoe’s father went into the front office to call the police.
Nancy sat down on the edge of the desk and mulled over the situation. Three passports had been taken, but dozens of others had been left behind. The thief hadn’t touched any of the cash or jewels, either. It didn’t make sense.
“What are you thinking, Nan?” George asked.
“Just that the thief seemed to know exactly what he or she was looking for and where to find it. I hope the police can tell us why someone would take three passports and leave everything else.”
“I hope so, too,” Zoe said. “This is very upsetting.”
Nancy turned to Zoe. “Please don’t be insulted, Zoe, but under the circumstances, I’d feel a lot better if George and I could keep our passports and traveler’s checks with us.”
“Of course,” Zoe said. “I understand perfectly.” She went through the envelopes and handed Nancy and George theirs.
When an officer finally arrived, Nancy’s questions had to wait until a barrage of Greek questions and answers had flown among Zoe, her father, and the policeman. Zoe introduced the uniformed man as Officer Rossolatos.
At last Officer Rossolatos turned to Bess. He was a heavyset, gray-haired man with a wide, curled mustache. In heavily accented English, he instructed her to report her stolen passport to the U.S. Embassy in Athens. “If you tell them your passport number, there will be no problem to replace it,” he said.
“My passport number!” Bess repeated worriedly. “I was supposed to write it down. I
knew
there was something I forgot to do before we left River Heights.”
“Why don’t you call the embassy now?” Mr. Kavalis offered. “I will help you.” He grabbed the carton of guests’ valuables. “And these I will put in the safe in our apartment,” he added gravely, “where no one else can get to them.”
Nancy knew this was her chance to question the officer. “Excuse me, but don’t you think it’s odd that the thief left with only three passports?” she asked him.
Officer Rossolatos seemed surprised by Nancy’s question, until Zoe explained that Nancy was a detective in the United States. “A detective, on our island—we are honored,” he said, bowing graciously. He went on to explain, “In the criminal world American passports are prized because they allow access to the United States. They also allow easier passage through Europe.”
“So you think Bess’s passport will be used by a stranger?” George asked, coming over to stand next to Nancy.
“It is very likely,” Officer Rossolatos answered. “They will change the photo, of course. Sometimes they take the booklet apart and replace the entire photo page, inserting a new name and address, too. There are many ways to forge a passport.”
Forgery! Nancy’s mind reeled at the prospect of Bess’s passport in the hands of criminals. What if a crime was committed by someone using Bess’s identity? Bess could be in serious trouble. Nancy didn’t have much to go on, but she decided to watch out for any clues that might lead her to the trail of the missing passports.
By the time Bess made her call and the police report was complete, it was too late to make another trip back into Chora. The girls decided to take it easy and have a late dinner in the hotel’s taverna. Nancy went to get Mick in his room, and soon the teenagers were sitting at a table on a terrace that overlooked the Aegean Sea.
“We just got here, and already you girls are involved in a mystery,” Mick said after the girls told him about the passport theft.
“It
is
a mystery,” Zoe added. “I spoke to the hotel staff, and no one has any clue as to who might have broken into the safe.”
Nancy finished buttering a roll, then turned to Zoe. “Did anyone seem upset by your questions?”
“Not really,” Zoe replied. “But one of the maids, Niki Christofouros, seemed nervous when I mentioned Bess’s name.”
Bess exchanged a curious look with Nancy. “We’ve met Niki,” Nancy said, without mentioning how. She didn’t want to get the maid into trouble unless she had more to go on.
“I’m beginning to feel like one of those people in
Casablanca
who can’t escape until their papers come,” Bess said, stabbing a tomato in her Greek salad. “I must have tried to reach the embassy a dozen times, but I couldn’t get through to them.”
“Our phone system is unreliable,” Zoe told her, “especially during the busy summer season. You’ll get through eventually.”
Bess tried to smile. “Thanks for cashing my traveler’s checks, even though I don’t have my passport,” she told Zoe. “I hope that miniature windmill won’t be sold before tomorrow.”
“This store—it contains many tiny replicas—boats and fish and things?”
“That’s the one!” Bess said, nodding excitedly.
“It is owned by a man named Spiros. He is a friend of my father’s,” Zoe continued. “If you like, I will call Spiros and ask him to hold the windmill for you,” she offered.
“Would you?” Bess asked. “Tell him I’ll stop by as soon as we get back from Delos tomorrow.”
Zoe nodded. “It’s the least I can do. I hope this theft doesn’t ruin your stay here in Mykonos.”
George looked over at Bess, who was smiling at a passing waiter. “I don’t think there’s any chance of that,” she said.
Nancy was awakened early Tuesday morning by the sounds of the island coming to life. After throwing back the crisp white sheets, she pushed open the wooden shutters and stepped onto the balcony.
All around her, Mykonos was bustling. Hotel workers wheeled carts of food along the path below her. To her left, three mopeds raced up the hill toward Chora. Motorboats and sailboats zigzagged through the shimmering sea on the horizon, and a group of college guys jogged along the beach.
She was watching the joggers when she spotted a young man and woman standing in the sand at the bottom of the path from the hotel. From their gesturing arms, they seemed to be arguing, though Nancy couldn’t hear them from the balcony.
She blinked as she recognized the white uniform and blue apron worn by the maids at the hotel. The girl was Niki, Nancy realized, and she was talking to Dimitri, the photographer.
Curious, Nancy leaned against the balcony rail and watched. Niki was shaking her head adamantly. She reached into a large tote bag, took out a manila envelope, and thrust it into Dimitri’s hands. Then she waved Dimitri off, turned away, and stalked up the path to the inn.
What’s inside that envelope? Nancy wondered. It was certainly large enough to contain three passports. And considering Niki’s suspicious behavior, Nancy wouldn’t be surprised if the maid was the one who had stolen the passports. She still didn’t know
why
Niki would steal them, but she was definitely going to try to find out.
“Wake up, you guys,” Nancy said, going back into the room. While Bess and George sleepily got out of bed, Nancy told them what she had just seen.
“That definitely seems suspicious,” Bess said, pushing her hair back with a headband and going into the bathroom to wash her face.
George glanced at the watch resting on her bedside table. “Too bad we can’t do anything about it now. We still have to get dressed and eat breakfast,
and
Bess has to call the embassy in Athens,” she said. “We’d better hurry if we’re going to catch the boat to Delos at ten-fifteen.”
Two hours later Nancy stood beside Mick on the deck of a thirty-foot fishing boat that was used as a ferry in the summer. Tourists milled along the deck, taking in the sunshine and the views. Bess, George, and Zoe stood by the rail, tossing bread crumbs to the gulls that flew alongside the boat, while Nancy and Mick watched.
As Nancy turned toward Mick, he slipped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close.
“Look at you, with your white sundress and golden tan,” he said, “You’re beginning to look like an Aussie girl.”
“I hope that’s good,” Nancy said.
“Good? You look fabulous!”
Nancy couldn’t help thinking that he looked pretty good himself, in his khaki shorts and white T-shirt.
“We’re almost there,” Zoe said, joining Nancy and Mick as the boat nosed toward a bare green island that was no more than a few miles long. Already Nancy could see the ruins of a huge, pillared building on a hill above the tiny harbor.