Carolyn Keene - White Water Terror

“So you picked your winners at random?”

“Yes,” Paula bragged.

“Well, that was smart,” Nancy said, stalling. If only the group on top of the tower could hear her above the wind! “People are always putting their names into a box for one contest or another. I guess you figured they’d think they’d just forgotten about entering this one.”

“You got it, Nancy Drew.” Paula sneered. “You’re bright, all right. Too bad you’re not bright enough to get yourself out of the mess you’re in now.”

Nancy ignored her. “And you sent the letter to George because you knew that she’d be enthusiastic about a white water rafting trip,” Nancy prompted.

“Of course I knew it. I’ve been doing my homework. I know all about you and your friends. It was a sure thing that George Fayne would ask you to come on this trip with her.”

“The map? The missing barricade?”

“They were easy,” Paula said scornfully. “You know, you would have made a lot less trouble for me if you’d sailed off that cliff.” She sighed. “But I’m glad those tricks didn’t work. It’s going to be a lot more fun to watch you die.”

“What about the slipped mooring line?” Nancy asked before Paula could make a move. “Was that another one of your clever tricks?”

“I figured it would be interesting to watch the expressions on your friends’ faces when we fished your body out from under the falls,” Paula explained. She stepped up closer to Nancy. “But I’m getting tired of all this talk.”

Nancy retreated a step higher. Just three or four more steps and she’d be on the tower’s lower platform. If she could lure Paula up there, she might be able to maneuver her into a more vulnerable position. “Max-” Nancy said, “was he in on your plan?”

Paula gave a disdainful laugh. “Not at all-at least not until he began to figure out what was going on. Of course, I didn’t count on his capsizing the raft-”

“I guess that was a stroke of good luck for you,” Nancy put in. “It put one of the rafts out of commission. When that happened, you probably thought it would be a better idea to get me off into the woods and kill me there.”

“Very impressive brainwork, Detective Drew. When the first raft was destroyed, I had to finish off the other one, too-to keep you from going downriver the next morning. And I nearly did get you in the woods.”

“You certainly did. If it hadn’t been for Ned-”

“The boulder would have crushed you,” Paula finished. She smiled cruelly.

“You know, I’ve got to admire you,” Nancy said, grudgingly. “We actually thought you were dead-that Max had killed you and was out to kill us, too. I bet I know how you arranged that,” Nancy said.

“I don’t care if you know or not,” Paula snapped, her face twisting. She lunged for Nancy, surprising her.

Nancy took two steps up and back but couldn’t escape Paula’s grasp on her arm. They fell together onto the wooden deck of the platform. Nancy felt Paula’s elbow dig into her side. She rolled onto her back and raised her feet, catching Paula’s shoulders. Then she shoved as hard as she could.

With a howl of rage, Paula launched herself forward from the railing. “I’m going to kill you!” she shouted, but this time Nancy was ready for her. As Paula rushed with full force, Nancy sidestepped adroitly and tripped her.

For an instant, Paula’s arms flailed wildly. Then she crashed against the weather-beaten wood. There was a splintering sound as the railing gave way under her weight. She tried to catch herself. Then, in a clumsy slow-motion swan dive, she fell over the edge, screaming.

The scream broke off, and Nancy looked over the splintered railing. Paula was sprawled faceup and motionless on the concrete apron at the foot of the tower, one arm bent under her, eyes staring up at the sky.

The wind had died down. The air was perfectly still.

From the contorted position in which Paula lay, Nancy knew Paula was dead.

“Hey! What’s going on down there?”

Nancy looked above her and saw Sammy peering down at Paula’s sprawled body. Sammy looked as if she were seeing a ghost. “Is Paula really dead?” Sammy asked.

Bess was kneeling next to the body, feeling for a pulse. “I think so,” she called up soberly.

Nancy leaned weakly against the solid part of the railing until Ned streaked up the stairs and pulled her into his arms. After clinging together for a moment or two, they followed the group, who had just raced down from the lookout tower.

“I don’t understand,” Linda said. “How did Paula survive the fall from the cliff?”

“She never fell off the cliff. Max did-or, rather, he was-”

“Pushed.”

It was Max’s voice. Nancy looked up. Max was leaning against the doorjamb of the shed.

Ned and Tod hurried over to Max and helped him walk across the yard.

Bess approached him anxiously. “Are you sure you’re up to this? The helicopter is bringing a doctor in a little while.”

“I’m all right,” Max said weakly, but his breathing came in jagged gasps.

“Paula pushed you-is that what you’re saying?” Ralph asked in astonishment. “But we heard Paula shout… And we saw…” He stopped. “Oh, I see,” he said. “Paula faked it-the shout and everything.”

Ned’s arm had been around Nancy. “You’re trembling,” he said to her. “Are you cold? Do you want to borrow my jacket again?”

Nancy gave one last nervous shiver. Then all at once she smiled at Ned. “No, thanks,” she said, as if she had a secret. She turned to Max. “But that’s what Paula did, didn’t she, Max-give you her jacket?” Max nodded weakly and tried to talk. “Let me tell it,” Nancy said.

“When you got to the top of the cliff, you confronted Paula with what you knew, and then you got into a big argument. She distracted you and knocked you over the head with something-a rock maybe?”

“Yes,” Max said, fingering the gash over his eye.

“And when you fell,” Nancy went on, “that’s when we heard the thump. The jacket-now that was a clever move on Paula’s part, since she knew I’d be on my guard against her every second if I thought she’d pushed you off the cliff. That’s why she had to make believe she was the victim.

“And until I remembered that Ned had loaned me his jacket, she almost had me fooled. It took me a while, but suddenly I realized how easy it would have been for her to put her jacket on you-it was big enough.”

Max coughed and spoke. “The trick boomeranged, though. Her jacket is what saved my life. It was so big, air got trapped in it and helped keep me afloat until I could grab on to a limb and pull myself out.”

Wincing in pain, he sank to the ground. “But I think I broke a couple of ribs in the fall.”

Bess knelt beside him and wiped away the beads of sweat on his forehead.

Sammy looked from Max to Paula’s body. “But why did Paula do it? Was she responsible for holing the raft and stealing the crystal out of the radio?“.

“Paula was responsible for everything,” Nancy said. “She invented the contest-”

“Invented the contest?” Mike exclaimed.

“Yes, it was a trick to get me here.”

“See?” Linda said smugly to Ralph. “I told you the whole thing had to be a joke.”

“Some joke,” George said bitterly. She turned to Nancy. “But I don’t understand why Paula did all this.”

“Revenge,” Nancy replied simply, and she told everyone the story of Peter Hancock.

“So she didn’t care who else got hurt in the process,” Tod put in, shaking his head.

“You’re right,” Max said, sounding the slightest bit stronger. “On the cliff, she said she was going to kill me because I knew too much. And she told me she’d kill everybody else if she had to-just to get to Nancy Drew.” He turned to Nancy with a lopsided grin. “That’s what I was trying to tell you when I pulled you into the woods this morning. I didn’t mean to knock you out. I just wanted to warn you about Paula.”