The Secret in the Old Attic

Table of Contents

 

 

Nancy Drew races against time to unravel the dues in a dead man’s letters. If she succeeds, Philip March and his little granddaughter can be saved from financial ruin. Following the obscure clues, Nancy undertakes a search for some unpublished musical manuscripts which she believes are hidden in the dark, cluttered attic of the rundown March mansion. But someone else wants them enough to put many frightening obstacles in Nancy’s way.

It takes courage and ingenuity for the alert young detective to discover the significance of the skeleton with the upraised arm and to find the source of the spooky sounds of music in the old attic.

Startling developments await Nancy when she aids her lawyer father in doing some detective work on a case involving a stolen formula for a unique silk-making process. How she outwits a trio of ruthless thieves and solves the Marches’ problems as well as her father’s case makes exciting reading.

Acknowledgement is made to Mildred Win Benson, who under the pen name Carolyn Keene, wrote the original NANCY DREW books

Copyright © 1970, 1944 by Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

Published by Grosset & Dunlap, Inc., a member of The Putnam & Grosset Group,
New York. Published simultaneously in Canada. S.A.
NANCY DREW MASTERY STORIES® is a registered trademark of Simon & Schuster,
Inc. GROSSET & DUNLAP is a trademark of Grosset & Dunlap, Inc.

eISBN : 978-1-101-07722-1

2008 Printing

 

 

 

“IT seems strange to hunt for a clue among these, Nancy, but that’s exactly what I’ve been asked to do.”

Carson Drew was gazing at a pack of letters tied with blue ribbon, which he had taken from his pocket. He laid them on the dining-room table.

He was the outstanding attorney of River Heights and had won many difficult cases by his brilliant, clear thinking.

“What’s the clue about?” Nancy asked.

“Some lost music.”

“Music? What kind?”

“Popular songs, I believe, which haven’t been published yet,” Mr. Drew replied. “This task isn’t exactly to my liking. I understand these are love letters, and—”

Nancy smiled as he rather clumsily tried to loosen the knot in the ribbon that bound the letters. She offered to do it for him, and he looked relieved.

“Please tell me more about the case,” she begged. “Maybe I can help you with it.”

“I believe you can,” her father replied, his eyes twinkling. “I’d say this is more your kind of mystery than mine, Nancy.”

He looked affectionately at the slim, blue-eyed girl. Mr. Drew was proud of his eighteen-year-old daughter, who had gained a reputation of her own by solving many mysteries. She and her father had been very close since the death of Mrs. Drew when Nancy was only three, and had come to depend on each other for advice and assistance.

“What are you supposed to look for in these letters?” Nancy asked.

“I don’t know,” her father replied. “The instructions were vague. This afternoon, while I was away from my office, an elderly man named Philip March left the letters with my secretary. He asked that I look through them for a clue as to where certain original songs that have disappeared might have gone.”

“Who composed them?” asked Nancy.

“I don’t know.”

Nancy had untied the ribbon, and now handed the letters to her father. He pulled one from its envelope and read it hastily.

“I don’t find any clue here,” the lawyer said a few moments later. “Read this, Nancy, and see what you make of it.”

The letter had been written four years ago by a young lieutenant named Fipp to his wife Connie.

“I don’t see any clue, either,” Nancy said. “Do you suppose Fipp is a nickname for Philip, and he’s Mr. March’s son?”

“Probably,” Mr. Drew agreed, handing the other letters to his daughter. “I’m mighty embarrassed going through these. Love letters never were meant to be read by the outside world.”

Nancy respected her father’s opinion. Yet she felt that if Mr. March was a close relative of the writer, he would not have shown the letters to anyone without a very good reason.

“Have you ever met Mr. March?” she asked.

“I think not. But he may be a member of a family that lived on an estate up the river a few miles. Well, we’ll soon know about the letters. Mr. March is coming here this evening.”

Nancy was eager to meet him. While waiting, she read the letters, pausing at several lovely verses in them. Nowhere, however, could she find any clue to lost or hidden music.

“Do you suppose these verses are the words of the songs?” she mused. “Maybe they’re—”

Just then the bell rang and Nancy hurried to the door. The caller was a gray-haired gentleman of military bearing. His clothes were somewhat worn, but his shoes were polished and his suit neatly pressed. He bowed politely to Nancy and introduced himself as Philip March.

“Oh, yes, my father is expecting you. Please come in.”

Nancy led the man into the living room where Carson Drew was waiting. When she started to leave, Mr. March invited her to stay and hear his story. He sank wearily into a chair.

“I owe you an apology, Mr. Drew, for asking such a strange favor,” he began in a tired voice. “A feeling of desperation came over me this afternoon. On the spur of the moment I decided to come to your office. You and your daughter have helped so many people, I thought you might advise me.”

The elderly man was very pale and ill at ease. To give him time to compose himself, Nancy offered to serve coffee. This seemed to refresh him somewhat and Mr. Drew then inquired if the writer of the letters was someone close to him.

“Yes, he was my son. My only son,” the caller said sadly. “In fact, he was my only child and a soldier as I once was. But he lost his life four years ago on a routine training mission.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Mr. Drew said sympathetically, and Nancy added a word of condolence.

“Fipp—that’s what my Philip called himself when he was a little boy, and the name stuck,” Mr. March went on. “Fipp was married to a lovely girl, but she passed away soon after he did. Then my wife died. Now all I have is little Susan. Her mother entrusted her to my care.”

“She is your grandchild?” Nancy asked.

“Yes. Susan is six years old, and I want to keep her with me, but—” The elderly man closed his eyes as if to shut out an unhappy thought. “To bring her up properly I should have a housekeeper. But I can’t afford one unless Fipp’s music can be found and sold. Besides, I may lose my—our—home. My income is so small.”

“Please tell us more about the music,” Nancy begged, touched by the man’s story.

“Perhaps I should start by briefing you on my family. The Marches have been proud, well-to-do people—several generations of us in River Heights. I’m not going to be the one to ask for charity for my granddaughter. Fipp wouldn’t want me to.”

As Mr. March paused to take another sip of coffee, Carson Drew inquired how the lost music could bring him any money.

“The songs were never published,” the caller replied. “And they were very fine.” He turned to Nancy. “The kind of up-to-date music you young people like, but much better than a lot of it I hear.”

Nancy was interested at once.

“My son could not bring himself to take the songs to a publisher, for he was never quite satisfied with his work,” Mr. March explained. “Then, just before he entered the service, Fipp put the music away in some secret place. If it can only be found and sold, little Susan will be amply provided for.”

“Mr. March, what made you think there is a clue to the songs in these letters?” Nancy asked.