10 Password to Larkspur Lane

CHAPTER XVIII
The Underground Cell
MORE running steps came closer and
stopped outside the bushes.
“Come out of there!” ordered a harsh voice.
Nancy’s heart sank. The speaker was Adam
Thorne! Knowing resistance was futile, she
crept from the brush and stood up in the glare
of a powerful flashlight. In the darkness just
beyond, Nancy could hear the dog snarling
and her captors breathing heavily.
“It isn’t the old lady!” came Miss Tyson’s
voice. “It’s Nancy Drew!”

---

Adam Thorne growled. “What? I thought
we’d knocked her out of action.”
Miss Tyson said in a worried voice, “That’s
what Tarr and Jackson reported. Tarr himself
pushed her—”
“Quiet!” snapped Thorne. “She’s tricked us.
Take her to the house. We’ll lock her up.”
Quick as lightning, Nancy plunged out of the
light and desperately raced down the hill.
Taken by surprise, her captors hesitated, then
pounded after her, the dog barking furiously.
84
Blinded by the sudden change from light to
darkness, Nancy stumbled and fell. An instant

---

later the Great Dane leaped on her.
“Grab that leash!” shouted Thorne. The dog
was yanked back, then someone jerked
Nancy to her feet.
“We’ll take her to the house!” panted Thorne.
With the ex-lawyer in the lead, flanked by the
nurse and the attendant, and guarded in the
rear by the gatekeeper and his dog, Nancy
was marched to the mansion. Bell was
waiting in the main hall.
“Who is this?” he demanded. “Where’s Mrs.
Eldridge?”
“We haven’t found the old fox yet,” Thorne
answered. “This is the Drew girl I warned
you about.”

---

Bell’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean by
trespassing on private property?”
“I meant no harm,” Nancy replied truthfully.
Thorne snorted scornfully. “She’s been
spying. It’s your fault, Bell. I told you not to
bring Dr.
Spire here. If the old woman’s shoulder was
dislocated, you should have let it stay that
way.
Too bad you aren’t a real doctor,” he added
unpleasantly. “You could have set it yourself.”
“Never mind that,” Miss Tyson put in sharply.
“How did she get in here?”

---

“Luther, bring the gatekeeper quickly!” Bell
ordered. “Just how did you get in, Miss
Drew?”
“I came in at the entrance,” Nancy replied.
“The larkspur is beautiful—”
“I’m not interested in flowers. I think—” Bell
checked himself.
He turned to Adam Thorne and spoke in an
undertone, but Nancy, straining her ears,
heard him say “password to Larkspur Lane”
before their voices became hushed.
After a few minutes the attendant appeared
with the gateman. “Jones, have you ever seen
this young woman?” Bell demanded, glaring
at the man standing before him.

---

“I? No, sir,” the guard declared, not
recognizing Nancy dressed in her own
clothes.
“Did anybody come in by the gate tonight?”
Bell asked sharply.
Nancy saw fear flicker in the man’s eyes as
he met Bell’s hard stare. Through no fault of
his own, the gateman had let intruders into the
grounds!
Jones swallowed. “Uh-no, chief,” he said.
“Nobody came in or out.”
85
A wave of relief swept over Nancy. No alarm
would go out for Mrs. Eldridge. The gang

---

would continue to think she was hiding on
the grounds.
“All right,” Bell said. “Get back to the gate.”
Then, turning to Thorne, he said, “Let’s
continue this in my office.”
Miss Tyson grinned maliciously as she
prodded Nancy along and into a large,
luxurious room. A thick green carpet covered
the floor and in the center stood a large
mahogany desk.
The walls, paneled in a rich-looking wood,
were hung with costly oil paintings.
“Shut the door, Luther,” Bell ordered.
Bell seated himself behind the desk,
motioning Nancy to stand opposite him.

---

There was tense silence for a moment. Then
Bell reached for a desk telephone.
“I am going to call the police, Miss Drew, and
turn you over to them on a charge of
trespassing, breaking, and entering with
attempt to steal.”
“I wish you would,” Nancy replied, “if it is
possible over that dummy telephone.”
“Didn’t I tell you she was sharp-eyed?”
Thorne scolded. “You can’t fool her. Follow
my advice and put her away. This is a waste
of time.”
“What do you mean? Do you wish to have
me summon the police?” Bell blustered.
“Why do you call this a dummy telephone?”

---

“Because, in answer to your first question, I
should be happy to be escorted from here
under police protection,” Nancy retorted. “I
know the telephone is a dummy because there
are no—”
She checked herself abruptly. No use proving
her powers of observation!
“See here, Nancy Drew,” Bell said, pointing a
finger at her. “Stop all this talk and tell me
how you entered these grounds—and why. I
know all about you. Sylvan Lake is a long
distance from here, and you did not walk.”
“There are various ways of traveling.”
“Bell, I’m telling you it’s just foolishness to
try to match wits with this girl,” Thorne put
in. “I know a way to make her talk—and

---

what’s more, I’m sure her illustrious father
will pay plenty to get his precious daughter
back.”
“An excellent idea, Thorne,” Bell said with
an evil smile. “What would you suggest we
do first?”
86
“Put her in the cistern,” said Thorne. “I guess
a couple of days without food or drink, down
in the dark and cold, with the rats and spiders,
will make Miss Drew answer any question
we ask.”
Miss Tyson laughed harshly, looking straight
at Nancy to see if she winced at the prospect.

---

“That will take some of the snap out of her,”
she said.
A shiver went down Nancy’s spine, but she
did not change expression.
Bell’s cold eyes studied her carefully.
“You’ve caused us a lot of trouble,” he said
softly.
“Because of you we had to give up our other
headquarters. My partner Mr. Tooker will not
overlook that very readily.” Bell toyed with a
sharp-pointed letter opener on his desk.
Miss Tyson spoke up. “The pigeon keeper
guessed she had found that bird, kept it, and
then followed it to Tooker’s. Now I’m sure he
was right. Only from the message that pigeon
carried could she have learned the password.

---

And I still say she couldn’t have entered
without it.”
Luther cleared his throat. “But Jones said—”
“He was lying,” Miss Tyson broke in.
“Where’s the car you came in?” she asked
Nancy.
Nancy thought it best to keep stalling. The
farther away Bess, George, and Mrs. Eldridge
got, the safer they would be.
Nancy smiled. “Why don’t you search the
grounds for the car?”
“That’s enough!” snapped Bell. “Take her
away.”

---

Nancy knew she was in a hopeless
predicament, and reasoned that more was to
be gained by strategy than by a desperate
attempt to break loose. As she was marched
out of the room, she heard Bell say, “The
disappearance of the Eldridge woman and the
Drew girl showing up have me so upset I
can’t think. I’m going upstairs and tell Adolf.
Let him handle this. It’s dynamite.”
“Do as you please,” Thorne said coldly.
Nancy, her arms pinned behind her back, was
shoved out onto the porch and toward the
buildings beyond the house. Just outside the
pigeon loft, Thorne stooped and jerked at an
iron ring in the ground. It was attached to a
round steel lid about three feet in diameter.
Beneath it gaped a black hole.

---

“Well, down you go, Nancy Drew!” Thorne
laughed.
Nancy looked around desperately. There was
no escape. As the nurse pushed her, the
trapped girl was forced to start down a
swaying, flimsy wooden ladder into the dark,
damp 87
hole. Down, down, ten or twelve feet Nancy
went, until she could feel the slimy bottom
under her feet.
“This is worse than I bargained for,” she
thought ruefully.
The ladder was jerked up and Thorne called,
“Don’t worry. You may have it back.”

---

There was a series of splitting noises, and
pieces of the ladder came raining down
around Nancy’s head. As she threw up her
arms to protect herself, she heard Thorne
laugh sardonically.
Then the lid clanged shut!

---