“Then why is Eleni such a big secret?” George asked.
Nancy thought she knew the answer, but she waited for Theo’s reply. Staring at Zoe, he said, “I didn’t want to hurt you. I know you’ve been mad at me for breaking up, but I want to stay friends.”
“I’ve been mad at you for acting so strange!” Zoe protested. “What kind of friend refuses to talk about what he does all day, every day?”
Theo shrugged. “I’m sorry. Will you forgive me?”
Zoe rolled her eyes and sighed. “Only if you promise to be honest with me from now on,” she said. “And wipe that sheepish look off your face.”
“I promise,” Theo said, smiling.
Nancy was glad that Zoe was on better terms with her friend, but she knew that Theo couldn’t be ruled out as a suspect yet. His explanations were reasonable, but how could she be sure that he was telling the truth?
“I don’t understand how Dimitri can still be a suspect,” Bess said as she toweled off her hair.
After a walk down the beach to check up on Dimitri’s whereabouts, the girls had returned to their room to shower before lunch.
“She’s right,” George added. “Those British tourists said that Dimitri spent the entire morning with them, so he couldn’t have been the guy with the spear gun.”
“That proves he didn’t attack us,” Nancy said, “but Dimitri could still be the forger.” Nancy slipped on a royal blue tank top and tucked it into her white denim miniskirt.
“What about Theo?” George asked. “Didn’t you believe his explanation?”
Nancy let out a sigh. “I want to believe him,” she said, pushing back her hair with a blue cloth headband. “But we can’t be sure until we have proof—not just his word.” She opened the wooden shutters to the balcony, and sunlight streamed into the room.
“I wish we knew who we were up against,” Bess said.
“It’s a dangerous situation for all of . . .” Nancy’s voice trailed off. She was standing with her back to the balcony doorway. The sunlight that streamed in hit the top of the dresser, illuminating Bess’s gift-wrapped package.
“Wait a minute,” Nancy said, stepping over to the dresser. Because of the sunlight directly hitting the package, she could see tiny, squiggly blue lines on the wrapping paper.
“What’s wrong?” George asked, standing up.
The intricately patterned blue-green wrapping paper looked familiar to Nancy. She picked up the package and looked more closely. She could make out an eagle in the center of the page. “That’s it!”
She whirled toward Bess and George, who had paused in the middle of dressing to gaze at her. “The answer has been sitting right in this room for days.”
“What are you talking about?” Bess asked.
Nancy waved the package in the air. “See the wrapping paper on this gift? When Dimitri wrapped it in Spiros’s shop, he must have used the wrong paper. This is engraved with an eagle—just like the pages of a U.S. passport.”
George hurried over to Nancy and grabbed the package. Bess moved in close to study it.
“That means Spiros could be the one who’s forging the passports!” George exclaimed, looking up at Nancy in awe.
Nancy nodded. “Exactly.”
Chapter Fourteen
“I can’t believe that clue was in our room all along—right under our noses,” Bess said.
After she, Nancy, and George had shared their revelation with their friends, the group decided to talk over the case at lunch. Now they were at a small waterfront sandwich shop on the harbor in Chora.
“I am disappointed that my father’s friend would steal from our hotel,” Zoe said as a waitress brought a tray of iced lemonade to their table. “But if Spiros is the forger, the police should know about it.”
Nancy took a long drink of lemonade. She was glad that Zoe understood the need to follow through on their suspecting Spiros.
“I don’t get it,” Kevin said. “How could Spiros be so stupid as to wrap a gift in a fake passport page?”
“Spiros didn’t do it,” George explained. “Dimitri wrapped the gift while Spiros was out of the room.”
“Which proves that Dimitri isn’t involved in the passport forgery,” Nancy added. “He would never have used that paper if he knew what it was intended for.”
“I’ll bet Spiros will be steaming mad when he figures out Dimitri’s mistake,” Mick said.
Nancy nodded. “I just wish I could figure out how Spiros got his hands on those stolen passports.”
“I think he stole them himself—right from our safe,” Zoe said grimly. Seeing Nancy’s surprised expression, Zoe explained that Spiros had been visiting her father at the inn the morning the thefts occurred. “I forgot that he was there, since I never considered him a suspect.”
“If you were opening and closing the safe as often as you said, it would have been easy enough for Spiros to see what the combination was. Then he probably opened it when you or your father were at the front desk,” Nancy said.
Picking up on Nancy’s thoughts, Mick said, “And since your father is so close to Spiros, he never suspected him, either.”
Now that she had a target, Nancy felt a new sense of urgency. “I’ve got to find a way to catch Spiros red-handed—before he gives those passports to the terrorists. We need to watch him closely.”
“I have a girlfriend who lives across the lane from Spiros’s shop,” Zoe explained. “She is away in Athens this week, but her balcony has an outside entrance, and we can use it to watch Spiros without being seen.”
“Sounds perfect,” Nancy said, picking up a piece of tost, a roll stuffed with spiced pork and pressed into a crispy toasted square.
Kevin passed the sandwich platter to George and asked, “Does this mean we’re staging a stakeout?”
“I guess you could say that,” Mick replied.
“But stakeouts can be boring,” Nancy warned everyone, “especially when they drag on for hours. Maybe we should work in shifts to make it easier on everyone.”
The others agreed that Nancy’s idea was a good one. It was decided that Nancy and Mick would take the first watch after lunch. George and Kevin would relieve them an hour later, and Zoe and Bess would take the third shift.
“This balcony gives us a perfect view,” Mick said. He was kneeling and peering over the waist-high ledge of the stucco balcony. The house that Zoe had brought him and Nancy to was just across the narrow lane from Spiros’s shop. From the balcony they could look right into the windows of the studio and of the shop below it. All they had seen of Spiros so far was the top of his head in the store as he sat behind the counter, reading a magazine.
“I just hope we’re not too late,” Nancy said. She was kneeling, too. She also hoped that George and Kevin would show up soon; her knees were getting sore.
“I don’t think anything’s happened yet,” Mick said, giving Nancy’s ankle a squeeze. “It’s just a matter of time before this whole case is wrapped up. And then what? What’s in store for us?”
Nancy glanced at his angular, rugged face. She leaned back, into a semisitting position. “I’ve been thinking about your proposal,” she said slowly. “And I’d really love for you to show me Australia.”
“Great!”
Before Mick could get carried away, she added, “But Australia is really faraway. I’m just not sure about—”
“We can visit River Heights,” Mick interrupted. “After you meet my parents. It’ll be terrific, Nancy. You’ll see.”
“I haven’t made a decision yet,” Nancy said, holding up her hands.
“And I’m not rushing you,” Mick told her. He dropped a kiss on her cheek.
“Are we interrupting something?” Bess asked from behind them. Turning, Nancy saw Bess and Zoe climbing the closed stairway to the balcony.