Bess Screams for an Audition

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Carolyn Keene

Nancy Drew Mystery Stories: Volume Seventy-Nine

The Double Horror of Fenley Place

Copyright © by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Nancy visits a movie set and finds terror on location! World-famous director Hank Steinberg is filming a horror flick in Nancy's hometown of River Heights. The movie tells a spine-tingling story about a haunted house. Most shocking of all, though, is what's going on across the street at an old Victorian mansion called Fenley Place.

Whatever happens on the movie set is mysteriously duplicated in the mansion: red smoke billows from the chimney, a ghostly figure appears in the window, and blood oozes from the walls. The special effects are a real scream, but Nancy must find out who is behind them before the movie–and the mansion–reach the final, horrifying climax!

Bess Screams for an Audition

“Aaaaaaaaarrrrrrhhh!”

A terrifying scream spread through Nancy Drew’s house. It was a scream filled with horror and panic and bone-chilling fear.

The moment Nancy Drew heard it, she sprang to her feet. An instant before, she had been reading a magazine on the bed in her sunlit bedroom. But now she was running downstairs in the direction of the hideous sound.

The scream continued. It was coming from the living room, and it seemed to say, “No matter how quickly you reach me, it will be too late.”

With her reddish blond hair flying behind her, Nancy reached the bottom of the stairs just as the scream died. Her breath came fast and her blue eyes widened at what she saw.

In the middle of the living room stood Nancy’s good friend Bess Marvin. Bess’s usually pale skin was flushed from screaming, and there was a look of total terror on her face.

Nancy glanced around the room. What had made Bess scream? There were no dead bodies on the floor, no bats circling the ceiling like a precision aerial flying team, and no mice. There was only Hannah Gruen sitting on the sofa. The Drews’ housekeeper had her fingers in her ears and an expression of intense pain on her face.

“Bess, what is it? What’s wrong?”

“Pretty convincing scream, huh?” Bess said. Her voice was calm, and she was smiling.

“It worked for me,” Hannah said. “Now I think I’ll get back to the kitchen.”

When Hannah was gone, Nancy repeated, “Convincing? Bess, you scared me to death!”

“Yes, I know,” Bess said, beaming. “And that was just a rehearsal!“

“For what?” Nancy asked. “Being eaten alive?”

Bess dramatically brushed her straw blond hair out of her face and produced a yellow sheet of paper from her tote bag.

“Who would believe that a little slip of paper could totally change your life,” she said.

“Not another parking ticket,” Nancy teased. But she took the paper from Bess and read it.

The photocopied flyer read:

AUDITION!!

WANTED—young female extras who can scream for small parts in new Hank Steinberg horror film. 2:00 P.M. today—at the McCauley house on Highland Avenue!!

***

“These signs are all over town,” Bess said when Nancy looked up. Her blue eyes sparkled with excitement.

Everyone in River Heights knew that a movie was being filmed in their city. The world-famous movie director Hank Steinberg had chosen Nancy’s hometown for the location of his newest film. It was going to be called Terror Weekend, and it would undoubtedly be another spine-tingling, stomach-twisting horror masterpiece. And now River Heights citizens were being invited to audition.

For a moment, Nancy thought about being in the movie herself. The lights, the cameras, the action … the screams, the murder, the blood. It would be a lot of fun. But then she looked at Bess and knew that Bess wanted a part in Hank Steinberg’s movie a lot more than she did. It was one of Nancy Drew’s main rules never to compete with her friends for anything important.

“Can you come with me to the audition?” Bess asked. “It’s almost two o’clock now.”

“Definitely,” Nancy said.

“Are you sure?” Bess asked. “I mean, you’ve been promising to go watch them film for two days, now. Are you positive you don’t have some errands to run for your father, or an important case to solve?”

Bess was referring to the fact that Nancy Drew was River Heights’ famous young detective. She was known for her ability to solve all kinds of intricate mysteries. She also occasionally helped out her father, Carson Drew, who was a respected attorney.

But Nancy shook her head no to both questions.

“All right. Then let’s get out of here before Hannah comes in and asks you to do twelve loads of wash or something,” Bess said.

“I heard that,” called the voice of Hannah Gruen from the kitchen. Hannah had lived with the family ever since Nancy was three years old.

Bess and Nancy poked their heads into the kitchen and were relieved to find Hannah smiling.

“Go on,” Hannah said. “I’ll see you later. You can tell me all about these Hollywood horror people then. At dinner?”

“I don’t think so,” Nancy confessed. “Bess and I will probably eat out.”

“All right. I guess I can wait until morning,” Hannah said as Nancy and Bess headed for the door.

Once the two girls were in Nancy’s blue sportscar, Bess put on a large pair of dark round sunglasses.

“Yesterday I was just someone standing in the crowd,” she explained. “But today I have to make an entrance.“

The warm summer breeze felt good to Nancy and Bess as they drove down the back roads that led through some of the prettiest residential areas of town. Soon the two girls arrived at Highland Avenue.

Highland Avenue was one of the oldest streets in River Heights. The houses were all large, stately Victorians built almost a hundred years ago. Some of them looked their age—tired, overgrown, and in need of a paint job. Others had been spruced up by young families who had recently moved in. Down the middle of the street stretched a strip of dark green grass, bordered by gravel, with tall trees that shaded most of the roadway.

The street had been blocked off at one end so that Hank Steinberg could park his movie trucks and camper vans. That was the end Nancy had driven to. She parked on Margery Lane, a block away.

“Okay, Bess, let’s see that entrance you’ve been talking about,” Nancy said.

Bess stepped slowly out of Nancy’s car as if she were being photographed.

It was a dramatic entrance—everything Bess had hoped for. Unfortunately, no one but Nancy was there to see her.

The girls walked eagerly down Margery Lane and turned the corner.

“Oh—there’s Fenley Place!” Nancy said. “I’d forgotten how spooky that house looks.”

On one side of Highland Avenue sat the McCauley house, where Terror Weekend was being filmed. Directly across the street from it was Fenley Place—the gloomiest, most sinister-looking house on the street. Garver Fenley, the man who built the house, had died the first night after he moved in. Ever since then, strange stories had been told about the place.

“Don’t look,” Bess said. “Every time I come over here, I turn my back on that horrible old mansion as quickly as I can.”

“I know what you mean.” Nancy nodded. “Even I used to believe that if you passed in front of Fenley Place on the night of a full moon, you’d turn into a werewolf. But that was when I was six.”

“You mean it’s not true?” Bess said half-seriously.

Nancy laughed. “You’re too easy to scare. I remember the Halloween when I was in fifth grade and a bunch of us came to Highland Avenue to trick or treat.”

“I remember coming here, too,” Bess said, shuddering. “When we passed Fenley Place, I was positive I saw a glowing green shape in one of the windows. You could have heard me screaming all the way down the block.”

Nancy smiled. “It was your imagination. Anyway, it’s just a house. Let’s just forget about Fenley Place and go to your audition.”

“I’ll never forget about it.” Bess shuddered again. She purposely walked the long way around the barricades, to stay as far away from Fenley Place as possible.

As they approached the movie location, Bess’s thoughts returned to the movie.

“I haven’t been able to get near the action,” she said. “They’ve got a hundred security people keeping the crowds away from the McCauley house. But just watch me today.”

The hundred security people turned out to be four young men and two young women, all wearing walkie-talkies in their back pockets. But even though they were young, they did their jobs well, with a lot of authority. As a result, the spectators were kept a good distance from all the lights, electrical cables, cameras, and action that filled Highland Avenue.

Bess pushed her way to the front of the crowd and started to cross one of the barricades.

“You again?” a female security guard said to Bess. “I’ve told you a million times you have to stay back.”

Normally, Bess wasn’t pushy at all. In fact, it usually took a lot of Nancy’s energy just to get her friend involved in one of Nancy’s mysterious adventures. But now Bess was really excited. She was determined to get a part in this movie.

Bess said only one word to the security guard, but she said it slowly and dramatically. “Audition.”

The young woman rolled her eyes and waved Bess and Nancy by. The girls wandered around among the technicians for a while, trying to figure out where to go. Noticing their confusion, one of the technicians asked, “Looking for someone?”

“Auditions,” Bess repeated, more quickly this time.

“Are you a screamer, a bleeder, or a corpse?” the technician asked without much concern.

“Screamer!” Bess said.

“Brandon,” was all the man said, jerking his thumb toward the wide, green lawn of the McCauley house.

Bess and Nancy walked in the direction the thumb had indicated. But the front yard of the McCauley house was an obstacle course. There were thick electric cables, fake plastic shrubbery, and large pieces of lighting all over the place.

Finally, they came to a young man wearing a name tag that said Brandon Morris—Casting on it. He was about twenty-five years old, and he wore khaki shorts with a Hawaiian shirt. He was talking to two teenage girls and writing what they said on a clipboard.

“I’m a natural for this,” one of the girls said to Brandon. “I have seven sisters. Believe me, I have to yell just to be heard.”

Brandon smiled, handed them each a number, and told them to get in line over by the fence. Then he turned to Nancy and Bess.

“Name?” he said to Nancy. “Age?”

“Nancy Drew, eighteen, but I’m just here to watch,” she replied.

“Watch quietly,” Brandon warned her. “We’re setting up a scene right now in the house.”

Nancy stepped back while Bess gave Brandon her name, address, age, and telephone number. Just then a prop man came by carrying a stack of books.

“’scuse me, coming through,” he grunted. Nancy had nowhere to go to get out of his way except up the steps of the McCauley house and onto the porch. From there, she realized she could see right into the McCauleys’ living room, where the scene was going to be shot.

It only took Nancy an instant to recognize the actor who was starring in the film. Deck Burroughs’s dark wavy hair was unmistakable, even from the back. In the scene they were preparing, Deck was standing perfectly still, gazing out a side window. Meanwhile, books were flying off the book shelves and zipping across the room toward Deck’s head. Nancy could see that the books actually traveled on very thin, clear plastic wires.

“Hey, Nancy Drew—off the porch!”

It was Brandon’s voice behind her. She turned around. Brandon was smiling, but his tone meant business. Then he pointed to Bess, who was waiting her turn to scream. Nancy walked down the porch steps to her friend.

“Good luck, Bess. Don’t be nervous,” Nancy said, giving Bess’s arm a squeeze.

The squeeze took Bess by surprise and she let out a small screech. The other girls in line immediately started complaining.

“Save it for the audition, showoff,” grumbled a blond teen standing in front of Bess.

“Yeah, wait your turn,” said her friend.

“Do you believe I have to take this from them?“ Bess said under her breath to Nancy. “They’re not even from River Heights!”

Nancy just laughed. “Then they probably don’t know how creepy Fenley Place is,” she said. “So they won’t scream as well as you will.”

“Don’t remind me,” Bess said, turning her back to the house again.

“Relax,” Nancy said. “You’ll be okay. I’m going to sit on the grass in the center of the street and watch from there.” As she left, she held up her crossed fingers to wish Bess luck.

While she waited for the auditions to start, Nancy gazed at the McCauley house in front of her. Normally the three-story, clean white house had a friendly look to it.

Its big, wide porch was welcoming, and the apple tree in front usually had a swing hanging from its thickest limb.

But today the swing was gone. Rows of big movie lights attached to tall scaffolding flanked the house. The scaffolding looked like a dinosaur skeleton with gigantic eyes, and it gave the house an unreal, spooky feeling. Broken shutters and cracked windows had also been installed. As a final touch the outside walls had been covered over to look as if they hadn’t been painted in years.

Suddenly Nancy heard some gravel crunch behind her. She turned around and saw a pair of running shoes standing next to her. “Screamer, bleeder, or corpse?” asked the voice belonging to the shoes.

Nancy looked up and saw a man in his mid-thirties wearing jeans and a sloppy knit shirt. He carried a walkie-talkie in his back hip pocket, just like the other crew members. But Nancy recognized the face immediately. It was the director, Hank Steinberg.

Nancy got to her feet. “Spectator,” she said. “My friend’s a screamer.”

“Okay,” Hank Steinberg said gently and smiled. Then he walked toward the McCauley front lawn.

A moment later the auditions were underway. Brandon called out the numbers and Hank Steinberg listened as various residents of River Heights screamed for their lives.

But between screamer number four and screamer number five, Nancy glanced over at Bess and stiffened. What was it that Bess was staring at and frowning at across the street?

Suddenly Bess’s pale skin grew even paler. She pointed across the street at something up in the sky and out of her mouth came an even more terrified scream than Nancy had heard at home, earlier. Then she slumped to the ground in a dead faint. Hank Steinberg, Brandon, all the screamers, and all the crew looked at Bess—and applauded.

But Nancy knew that there was real horror in Bess’s scream. She turned her head in the direction Bess had been pointing, to the roof of Fenley Place.

A cloud of thick red smoke—the color of blood—was billowing out of the chimney as from an open wound.

Bloodred Smoke

The eerie crimson cloud puffing out from the chimney of Fenley Place held Nancy’s eyes captive for just a moment. Then her attention snapped back to the scene on the McCauley lawn.

Bess lay on the ground, motionless. Brandon stood over her, his hands on his hips. “Very realistic,” he said in mocking voice. “You can get up now.”

“No fair!” the other screamers shouted angrily. “It wasn’t her turn!”

“Let me through,” Nancy insisted, pushing her way through the crowd. “She really fainted.” Nancy finally reached the lawn and knelt by her friend.

It was only a short while before Bess began to stir. Then she sat straight up like a corpse in a horror film and began talking in a foggy voice.

“Did you see it, Nancy? It was coming out of Fenley Place. I knew I shouldn’t have come near that house. It was the color of blood. Did you see it?”

“What is she talking about?” Brandon asked.

“Red smoke,” Bess whispered. “Coming out of the chimney.”

Everyone looked at the somber house across the street but the smoke was gone.

“I saw it, Bess,” Nancy said seriously. She didn’t care that the crew members on hand and the other screamers looked at her as if she and Bess were both crazy.

“That’s only half of it,” Bess said. “Look at my script. This page says a girl walks down the street and suddenly sees bloodred smoke coming out of a chimney.” She stared at Nancy, her eyes wide. Isn’t that weird?”

Nancy nodded her head slowly in agreement. Just then, Hank Steinberg appeared and stooped down by Bess.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I guess so,” Bess said. Then, forgetting it was a great opportunity to make an impression on the director, she simply stared back at him.

Hank Steinberg said “Good,” then stood up and went back to work with his crew.

When he was gone, Brandon tried to regain everyone’s attention. “Okay, girls,” he said, “let’s get on with the auditions. Mr. Steinberg is very busy.” He grinned down at Bess. “Your audition is over.”

Bess got to her feet, helped by Nancy. She glanced at her friend. Nancy had a look on her face that Bess recognized immediately. The look said, “There’s a logical explanation for this, and I’m going to find it.” She grabbed Bess’s arm and they both started walking down the lawn to the street.

“Where are we going?” Bess asked. “And don’t say to Fenley Place,” she added firmly.

“We have to go across the street and check out the house,” Nancy said matter-of-factly.

“Forget it,” Bess said. “You can go without me if you want, but I’m not moving an inch.” Bess stopped walking and stood in the middle of the street.

“Come on, Bess,” Nancy said. “It’s just a big ugly house, that’s all.”

“No, it’s not,“ Bess said.

Bess looked across the street at Fenley Place and thought about the stories she had heard all her life. Who knew whether they were all true?

No one who moved into Fenley Place stayed very long. People said the sidewalk in front of the house was always cracked, no matter how many times it was fixed. Bess could see that was true. It was rumored that the rusty wrought-iron fence surrounding the house and yard occasionally dripped blood. It was also said that the house itself could tell what kind of a person you were as soon as you walked through the front door. Bess often wondered what horrible things would happen if the house didn’t like you.

Nancy kept on walking, and before Bess knew it, her friend had opened the gate, marched up the stone path, and was standing on the shadowy porch of Fenley Place.

“Don’t go in there!” Bess yelled. She ran to catch up with her friend. She couldn’t let Nancy face that horrible house alone, no matter how scary it was to go with her.

As Bess hurried through the open gate, a sharp point on the wrought-iron fence caught her sleeve and tore it.

“You see?” Bess said. “This house hates me already.”

Nancy rang the doorbell once, twice, and again.

“No answer,” Nancy said.

“No one home,” Bess said, quickly hurrying back down the porch steps.

“The two are not always the same,” Nancy pointed out in her logical detective voice. She walked around to the back of the house, and Bess reluctantly followed.

Nancy knocked on the back door, peeked in the side windows, and checked out the garage. It was empty.

“No one home,” Nancy concluded. “So where did the smoke come from? It doesn’t make sense.”

“Hey, you two!” a crusty voice called out. “What do you girls want?”

Nancy and Bess turned around and saw a man in his seventies standing in the driveway, glaring at them. He wore a white shirt with a tie and a cardigan sweater even though it was a hot summer day.

“My name is Nancy Drew, and this is Bess Marvin,” Nancy said. The man didn’t say anything.

“Do you live here?” Nancy asked politely.

“I’m the next-door neighbor,” said the man. “And you two don’t look like you’re selling Girl Scout cookies, so what are you doing snooping around?”

“Would you tell us who lives in Fenley Place?” Nancy asked.

“Mr. and Mrs. Teppington and their two children,” the neighbor answered. “What concern is that to you?”

“Is that the Mrs. Teppington who teaches English at the high school?” Bess asked.

“Yes,” the man said grumpily. “Now, look here. We’re both asking a lot of questions but I’m the only one doing any of the answering.”

“Have they gone away?” Nancy asked with a smile.

The man threw his hands up in frustration. “Been gone a week. Coming back soon,” he said testily.

“Have you seen anything strange going on here today?” asked Nancy.

“You mean besides this conversation and your snooping around?”

Nancy and Bess nodded their heads.

“Young ladies, I’ve lived next door to this place for forty years. I’ve seen enough strange things to fill a dozen scrapbooks.”

“Have you ever seen red smoke come out of the chimney?” Bess asked.

The man squinted one eye at her. “No. Have you?”

Bess dropped her voice to a mysterious and dramatic whisper. “Yes,” she said.

“Well, I’d suggest you wear a hat and keep out of the sun,” the man said. “It’ll cut down on the hallucinations.”

“We’ll come back when the Teppingtons are home,” Nancy said to the next-door neighbor. “Thanks. You’ve been a big help.”

The man went back toward his own house, and Bess sped up her exit toward the street.

As Nancy followed along, she began thinking out loud.

“There’s no ladder around,” she said. “So no one climbed to the roof to set off a flare or anything like that. Someone inside the house had to start the red smoke.”

“But there’s no one home,” Bess said. “Would you please walk a little faster and keep up with me, Nancy? Aaaahh!” Bess screamed.

Bess had walked right into a young man standing at the front corner of the driveway.

“I’ve been looking for you,” he said to Bess.

Nancy recognized him immediately. He was one of the four people working crowd control on the set.

A lock of blond hair hung down into his eyes, and he grinned at both girls with a shy, friendly smile. Like all the crew members, he was wearing a white T-shirt. It said Terror Weekend in red letters that looked like blood smears. He had a walkie-talkie hooked to the belt of his white jeans.

“Hello, screamer,” he said. “Listen, I’m sorry about what happened before. We didn’t realize you fainted for real. Are you okay?”

“How would you feel if you saw bloodred smoke come out of a chimney?” Bess asked.

“I’ve worked on three Hank Steinberg films,” he said. “I guess I’m sort of used to that kind of stuff.”

“Well, I’m not used to it,” Bess said.

“I’ve got to get back to work in a minute,” the young man said. “But Hank sent me to find you. He loved your scream, and he wants you to be in the film.”

Bess’s face quickly went through about eight different expressions. They registered every emotion from fear of Fenley Place to dreams of major stardom.

“He does?” she finally gasped.

“I wouldn’t kid you,” the young man said. “Now, what’s your name?”

“Fantastic!” Bess said, squeezing Nancy’s hands tightly.

“Very unusual name,” he said with a laugh.

“Her name is Bess Marvin,” Nancy said. “I’m Nancy Drew.”

“Hi,” the young man said, smiling shyly again. “I’m Chris Hitchcock.”

“Hitchcock?” Nancy knew that Alfred Hitchcock had been one of the greatest horror film directors of all time. “Terrific name for someone in the movies.”

“Well, it’s not my real last name,” Chris admitted. “Can you believe Chris Smith—instant boring, right? So I changed it. Named myself for one of my idols.”

“I like his movies, too,” Nancy agreed. “Did you ever see North by Northwest?“

“Are you kidding? Of course. Twenty-two times,” Chris said. “And I’ve seen Psycho at least ten times.”

Bess cleared her throat to get back in the conversation. “So what do you do on this film?” she asked.

“All kinds of stuff. Production assistant, crowd control, and I did the location scouting.”

“What’s that?” Bess asked.

“Hank said he wanted to film somewhere in this area, so I found River Heights for him. And I picked the McCauley house, too.”

“Too bad you’re not using Fenley Place,” Nancy said. “It’s a natural for a horror movie.”

“I tried, believe me,” Chris said. “And, you know, we pay a lot of money to use someone’s house. But Mr. Teppington refused. He didn’t care about the money or fame or anything—case closed! He was really nasty about it, too.”

“Never say case closed around Nancy Drew,” Bess said.

Nancy could tell by the way Chris scrunched his eyebrows that he wanted to know what Bess meant. But he didn’t ask.

Instead he said, “I’ve really got to get back now. Bess, report to Brandon Morris tomorrow morning at eight and he’ll take you to wardrobe.”

“Do I get one of those T-shirts?” Bess wanted to know.

“Well, actually they’re only supposed to go to regular cast and crew members, but… I’ll see if I can get you one,” Chris said. “Hey—maybe you guys can show me around River Heights sometime.”

“Sure,” Bess called as Chris left them.

She let him get a safe distance away before she burst.

“I’m going to be in a movie! I could just scream!” Bess said. “I knew it would happen the minute I saw those signs. Isn’t this great, Nancy?”

It was then that Bess realized Nancy wasn’t listening to her. She was staring up at a third-floor window under the roof of Fenley Place with a look of shock and amazement on her face.

The look was enough to turn Bess’s blood icy cold.

“Do me a favor,” Bess said to Nancy. “If you’ve just seen something awful, please keep it to yourself and don’t tell me. Okay?”

Nancy grabbed Bess’s cold, trembling hand and held it tightly.

“I’m just wondering,” Nancy began. Her own hand was trembling a bit, too. “If no one’s home, why did I just see a woman in a white nightgown standing in the third-floor window?”

The Schoolyard Restaurant

“Woman? Nightgown? Window?” Bess said each word slowly and quietly. She still hadn’t turned around to look.

“Someone is in there, Bess,” Nancy said firmly. “And I want to find out who it is.”

Nancy let go of Bess’s hand. A moment later Bess realized she was standing all by herself on the front lawn. She turned and shuddered. Fenley Place was looking scarier than ever. But as Bess’s eyes scanned the third-floor windows looking for a face, she found nothing.

“Nancy!”

“Pssst!” Nancy answered, giving Bess a wave from the front porch. “Come on up.” Bess didn’t budge. Nancy rang the bell more insistently this time, and she knocked on the door loudly. While she waited, her foot tapped an impatient rhythm on the porch.

“I don’t see anyone in any of the windows up there, Nancy,” Bess called. “That old man next door must be right. The Teppingtons are gone.”

Nancy stepped off the porch, looking confused. She glanced up once more at a window under the roof. No one was there.

“Maybe you just thought you saw someone,” Bess said. “It could have been a reflection from the movie lights across the street. It is getting dark, you know.”

“Maybe,” Nancy said half-heartedly. She didn’t have a better explanation herself.

“Let’s go,” Bess said nervously. “I’ve got to stay away from this place so I can rest my voice. In fact, I feel a scream coming on right now!“

“Okay,” Nancy sighed. “I’ll drive you home.”

“What about dinner?” Bess asked.

“I thought you wanted to rest.”

“I said rest. I didn’t say starve!“ Bess said.

Soon the two friends were safely back in Nancy’s sportscar, headed toward one of their favorite restaurants—The Schoolyard.

The Schoolyard was one of the most unusual restaurants in River Heights. It was owned by a former cafeteria cook from the high school.

The menu consisted of all school-type foods: sloppy joes, mystery meat, pizza by the slice, burgers, and jello with whipped cream, all served cafeteria style. But unlike the food in most of River Heights’ schools, the food at The Schoolyard was delicious.

Bess, Nancy, and their friends loved it. They had spent so much time in school cafeterias that the Schoolyard food had a familiar look, taste, and aroma. And the food came in large quantities for small prices.

“I don’t see George yet,” Bess said, slipping into a booth in the restaurant.

“She’s probably stuck in traffic trying to get around the movie crew.”

Nancy and Bess had made plans to meet George Fayne, who was Nancy’s other best girlfriend and Bess’s cousin.

Although they were cousins, the two girls couldn’t have been more unalike.

Bess was short, blond, and a little lazy, while George was tall, thin, dark-haired, and full of energy. Bess liked to steer clear of danger and action. George liked to think on her feet, and she was always quick to offer an opinion, too.

And unlike Bess, George didn’t care about fancy clothes. Bess dressed to be noticed. George dressed to be comfortable—although she had her own style that was flattering to her.

Despite their differences, the two cousins loved each other and always stuck together. And, through thick and thin, they stuck by their best friend, Nancy Drew. George arrived at The Schoolyard wearing black pants with suspenders and a bright blue T-shirt.

But just as Bess was about to blurt out her exciting news, George started talking.

“Hi, Bess. Hi, Nancy. Sorry I’m late, but you won’t believe what happened to me, or what I have to tell you!”

She pulled up a chair and sat down with one of her legs folded under the other. “Who wants to hear what Hank Steinberg eats for lunch? Wouldn’t you just die to know who Deck Burroughs—hunky star of Terror Weekend—was talking to at breakfast? And is it true that Jenny Logan, Hank Steinberg’s favorite actress, really brings a teddy bear with her to makeup every morning? Guess who knows the answers to these and many more questions? Me!”

“How do you know all this stuff?” Bess asked, leaning toward her cousin expectantly.

Nancy was silent, watching a splash of milk form a thick cloud in her iced tea. Her faraway look did not escape George’s attention.

“I got a new part-time job today,” George explained. “I’m a food server for Elegant Eats. You know, it’s Pat Ellis’s catering service, which is feeding the movie people while they’re in town. I will be handing Deck Burroughs his breakfast, lunch, and dinner just about every day until he leaves River Heights. Do you believe it?”

“Well, maybe you’ll be handing me my meal, too,” Bess said to her cousin. “Because today Hank Steinberg chose me to be in his movie.”

George’s mouth flew open. “A part in the movie, Bess?” she said. “That’s fabulous. Do you get to talk?”

“Sort of,” Bess said.

George looked at Nancy. She always looked at Nancy when she wanted a straight answer.

“Bess screams,” Nancy said.

“Oh, yes, I’ve heard her,” George said. “You should have heard the scream she delivered last week when she caught me trying on her new denim jacket.”

Bess blushed and cleared her throat to change the subject. “Nancy, are you going to finish your dinner?”

Nancy shook her head. “I’m too full,” she said, passing her plate over to Bess.

“Gristle Pie was never this tender at good old River Heights High,” Bess said, digging in.

“George,” Nancy asked, “did you hear any of the movie people talking about Fenley Place while you were catering today?”

“Not a syllable. Why?”

Nancy looked disappointed, but George’s eyes sparkled with curiosity. “I knew you were working on a mystery, Nancy.”

“How did you know?”

George laughed. “Oh, something about the way you stirred seven packets of sweetener into your iced tea told me your mind was elsewhere. What’s going on?”

“It was incredible,” Bess blurted out. “And I saw it first. There was ugly red smoke pouring out of the chimney of Fenley Place.”

“Interesting,” George said, leaning forward to get all the details.

Nancy filled George in, describing the day’s mysterious events during Bess’s audition for Hank Steinberg. And she told George how no answers had turned up when they checked out Fenley Place. If no one was home, Nancy wondered out loud again, who set off the red smoke, and why was there a woman looking out the window?

George’s face grew more serious the more she heard.

“If the movie people knew what we know about Fenley Place, they’d really freak out,” George said. “The word around the set is—”

Nancy shook her head no to signal George to stop. “Not in front of Bess,” Nancy said. “She’s too upset already.”

“Uh, Bess, go get us some dessert while I tell Nancy some stories that I know you don’t want to hear.”

“I’m on my way,” Bess said, carrying her tray away.

“So what’s the news?” Nancy said.

George dropped her voice. “The word around the set is that the movie is jinxed. One stunt man broke his leg jumping out of a tree. Now the other stunt guys are saying that Steinberg just wants good stunts and doesn’t care about keeping people alive.”

Nancy looked interested and puzzled. “I wonder what that has to do with the red smoke?” she said, more to herself than to George.

“I don’t know, but listen to this. People have been talking about a bunch of props and equipment doing a disappearing act.”

“Lost or stolen?” Nancy asked.

George shrugged. “I don’t know. Also, Jenny Logan and Deck Burroughs were filming a fight scene, and Jenny was supposed to hit Deck with a chair.”

“Oh, right. A stunt chair,” Nancy said. “I’ve seen them. They’re made out of balsa wood and—”

“Correct. But Jenny hit him with a real chair by mistake. It knocked Deck cold. Jenny was scared to death. She thought she’d killed him or something. And Hank Steinberg blew up. He’s convinced that someone is trying to sabotage his film.”

It was all good information. But as far as Nancy could tell, none of it seemed to directly connect with the mystery at Fenley Place.

“I hope the Teppingtons get home soon.” She sighed.

Bess returned with a tray of desserts. “Are you through?” she asked.

George nodded.

“Well, you’ve convinced me not to be a screamer,” Bess said. “It sounds too dangerous.”

“What do you mean? You didn’t hear any of the stories,” George said.

“No, but I watched Nancy’s face from across the room,” Bess said.

“Listen, Bess, don’t quit the movie. There’s nothing to be afraid of, believe me. Nothing’s going to happen to you.”

Just then all of the lights in The Schoolyard went out.

Bess screamed.