Carolyn Keene - Nancy Drew by The Kachina Doll Mystery

real progress, don’t you think?”
    Heather and Chuck seemed unconvinced, but after cups of thick, sweet, hot chocolate and cream prepared by Maria, they all went to their rooms without further discussion. A long, relaxing bath gave Nancy plenty of time to think, but she still hadn’t a clue about the person who’d thrown the rattler down on her. She slipped between the cool sheets and pulled the bright quilt over her shoulders with a sigh.
    She’d been asleep for several hours when the strange sounds woke her again. This time, she lay still and listened, identifying them as chanting, though she couldn’t distinguish any words. After several minutes, she got up and padded to the door, quite sure what she’d find on the other side.
    The Kachina she saw was much closer this time, and the moment she opened the door, it seemed to beckon to her, then moved on along the hall. Nancy followed without hesitation. As before, it floated along the hall till it reached the same painting. Then, with what appeared to be a signal of some sort, it disappeared into the painted wall, leaving Nancy alone in the hall.
    Nancy stared at the painting for a long time, studying each individual section. It wasn’t till her eyes reached the left hand that she realized something. The Kachina was holding what looked very much like a pencil or pen—something no Indian Kachina could possibly be concerned with!
    Frowning, she went back to her room to get the powerful flashlight and the magnifying glass she kept there. Since Jake Harris had been a friend and admirer of the Indians and their Kachinas, she was sure that he wouldn’t have put the writing instrument into the picture by mistake—which had to mean that it was a clue. But to what?
    Using the flashlight and magnifying glass, she began to make an even closer inspection of the painting. She studied each individual brick, tracing it carefully, trying not to let her eye be confused by the complex design that Jake Harris had painted so long ago.
    Eventually, she found what she was looking for. The pencil or pen was pointing to a brick that wasn’t mortared into place like the others. Nancy slipped a fingernail into the tiny seam, trying to work the brick loose. It didn’t move. She went back to her room for a metal nail file and used it to pry at the seam. The brick squealed and grated in protest as she dragged it out of the patterned design of the Kachina.
    “Nancy?” George’s head appeared around the door of the room she shared with Bess. “What in the world is going on?”
    “I saw the Kachina again and it seemed to want me to investigate this painting, so...” Nancy lowered the brick to the floor. “Now we’ll see what it wanted me to find!”

9
    A Wonderful Discovery
    Bess and George quickly joined Nancy as she directed the beam of the flashlight into the hole left by the brick she’d removed. The light reflected dully off what appeared to be an old, tin box.
    “Have you found the Kachina’s treasure?” Bess asked breathlessly. “Do you suppose the box could be full of gold?”
    “I don’t think so,” Nancy said as she pulled the tin box out. “It isn’t heavy enough.”
    “Maybe it has the treasure map in it,” George suggested.
    Nancy blew the dust off the box and lifted the lid with trembling fingers, then jumped nervously as another door opened down the hall and Heather emerged. “What’s going on?” their hostess inquired as she approached the three girls.
    “Nancy has found something,” George explained. “The Kachina led her to it.”
    “What is it?” Heather asked, joining them in front of the painting.
    “It looks like a diary or journal,” Nancy answered, lifting an old, leather-bound book out of the tin box. She opened it with care.
    “That’s all that was in it?” Bess asked, taking the box and peering into it.
    “It’s Jake Harris’s journal!” Nancy announced after she’d scanned the first page.
    “Maybe he wrote something in it that