Part 1 (2/2)
”That's funny. I checked my E-mail when I left school today and there weren't any messages. This must have come in after three.”
”See what it says,” Nancy urged her.
Sally tapped a couple of keys and the screen cleared. Then lines of writing began to scroll upward from the bottom. Nancy leaned over Sally's shoulder to read them:
Your record has been corrected. Keep your mouth shut about this. What goes up can come down. And little girls who play with fire sometimes get burned.
Chapter Two.
”THAT'S A THREAT!” Sally cried, a small quiver in her high-pitched voice. ”This person is turning out to be a major creep!”
”That's for sure,” agreed Nancy, frowning. She did some quick mental arithmetic. If more students were involved, each paying a thousand dollars, then a lot of money was at stake. No wonder the grade changer was so nasty-he wanted to make sure no one threatened his operation.
”Would you print that out for me?” Nancy asked.
”Sure.” Sally hit the Print Screen b.u.t.ton on her keyboard. The printer began to chatter, and a moment later Sally tore off the page and handed it to Nancy.
”Hmm,” Nancy said as she studied the paper. ”What are these numbers across the top? I recognize today's date, but what are the rest?”
Sally glanced at the page. ”That's the time of transmission. And see this-09.176? The 09 refers to the E-mail facility, and 176 is my box number. And that IW443 is the sender's pa.s.sword. The first two letters are usually initials. I don't know anyone with those initials, though.”
Nancy made notes next to each number as Sally explained. ”How could I find out which terminal this was sent from?” she asked.
”I'm not sure. I'll ask around and see if anyone knows,” Sally volunteered.
”Good,” Nancy said. ”You were right that this message was sent after school hours. It says 4:09 here. Do you know which parts of the school stay open after three?”
Sally shook her head. ”Not really. I'm not big on after-school activities. Some of the cla.s.srooms must be open, though,” she said. ”There are all sorts of clubs and meetings after three.”
Still gazing at the paper, Nancy went to sit on the edge of Sally's bed to think. After a moment she looked back up at the blonde and said, ”Okay, here's what we're going to do. First I'm going to try to trace the bank account number. If we're lucky, that information will lead us right to the grade-changer and the case will be wrapped up.
”If that doesn't work,” she continued, ”I'll have to go undercover at Brewster.”
”Wow,” said Sally in an admiring tone. ”Sounds like a great plan.”
”Let's just hope it works,” Nancy told her. ”In the meantime I need you to try to find out if there are other kids who've been contacted by this anonymous grade-hiker. Try not to be obvious about it, though. Whoever it is could be dangerous if he senses you're trying to find out his ident.i.ty.”
Sally nodded. ”You can count on me.”
Nancy smiled at her. ”Good.” She flipped her notebook shut and tucked it in her purse, then stood up. ”That's about it, except for one last thing. Is there anyone you suspect?”
Sally ran a hand through her blond hair. ”Well... there is one person, but-” she began hesitantly.
”But what?”
”But he's a real sweet guy,” Sally replied. ”The only reason I thought of him is that he's a computer whiz. His name's Victor Paredes. If anyone could break into that computer, it would be him. He's a senior.”
Nancy nodded, making a mental note of the name. The two girls went downstairs just as Harrison Lane was coming in the front door. After greeting him, Nancy made arrangements with him to check out the account number. Then, after saying goodbye to Sally and her father, she left.
Twenty minutes later, as she pulled into her driveway, Nancy saw Hannah Gruen, the Drews' long-time housekeeper, rus.h.i.+ng out the door. ”What's the matter, Hannah?” Nancy called from her car.
”Nothing, dear,” said Hannah, smiling warmly. ”I'm spending the evening with a friend, that's all. Oh-here comes my taxi now.” Hannah waved and headed down the driveway toward the cab that had pulled up. ”Dinner's warming in the oven,” Hannah called over her shoulder. ”Eat it before it gets dried out.”
”'Bye, Hannah,” Nancy told her. ”Have fun.”
Going inside, Nancy saw that there was mail on the low table in the entrance hall. Most of it was for her father. But Nancy felt her heart skip a beat when she came to a letter with familiar handwriting. A letter from Ned!
A tingle ran through her as she took it up to her room to read it.
Ned Nickerson, Nancy's boyfriend, was away at Emerson College. This was the first letter she'd received from him since he'd returned to school from summer break. It wasn't a very long letter-just news about cla.s.ses and his friends. But the part at the end about how much he missed her made Nancy resolve to visit him soon.
She settled back against the pillows on her bed to write him back. By the time she was done, her father had come home and it was time for dinner.
Over baked chicken with chestnut stuffing, Nancy told her father about her case. Carson Drew had a respected law practice in River Heights and was often a help to her.
”I'm not sure if other kids are involved, or if Sally was singled out. And what makes it especially tricky is that changing a grade in a computer file doesn't leave any trace,” she concluded, spooning a second serving of stuffing onto her plate. ”You can't examine a floppy disk for erasure marks or a.n.a.lyze how old the ink is, the way you can with something on paper.”
Her father smiled. A distinguished-looking man in his forties, he had dark hair that was flecked with gray at the temples. ”Don't I know it! A few years ago, people were talking about the 'paperless office' that computers were supposed to create. But I probably use more paper in my practice now than I did before we computerized. We print out every version of every doc.u.ment we draft, so that if any problems come up we can pull the file and put our finger on the exact bug. I'm surprised that Brewster Academy doesn't do something of the sort as well.”
”Maybe they do,” Nancy said. ”But I don't know about it. I hope I don't wind up having to go over a ton of paperwork to check which grades have been changed,” she added, sighing. ”But if that's what it takes, I'll do it. I'd rather catch this hacker by checking the bank's information.”
”Hacker,” Carson Drew repeated. ”What a funny word that is! I remember the first time I heard it. It was six or seven years ago. A high-school girl here in River Heights managed to figure out how to monkey with the billing on the telephone company's computer.” Carson Drew repeated. ”What a funny word that is! I remember the first time I heard it. It was six or seven years ago. A high-school girl here in River Heights managed to figure out how to monkey with the billing on the telephone company's computer.”
”Uh-oh, I think I see what's coming,” Nancy guessed. ”She had a boyfriend in Tokyo, right?”
Her father smiled. ”Not exactly, but you aren't far from wrong. At summer camp she had gotten to be very close friends with her counselor, who was also from River Heights. But in September the counselor went off to college on the West Coast. The girl was having some emotional problems, I gather. She got into the habit of calling her former counselor two or three times a week and talking to her for an hour or more at a time.”
”Sounds like a pretty expensive habit,” Nancy remarked. She scooped up the last of the chicken with her fork and popped it into her mouth.
”Eventually it was,” Carson replied. ”But for several months, she managed to, ah, hack the telephone company computer and erase the calls from her parents' bills. Apparently she was very clever about it, too. The telephone company had quite a job catching up with her.”
”And when they did?” Nancy asked.
Her father leaned back in his chair. ”Her parents asked me to step in and deal with the telephone company. I talked them into settling for the amount they were owed on the calls, plus a detailed explanation from the girl of how she had broken into their system and altered the bills. They needed that even more than the money, you see. Otherwise, someone else might have come along and found the same weak point in their security. I understand their computer experts were very impressed by the girl's skills.”
”So she didn't end up with a police record or anything like that?” Nancy said with a laugh. ”She was lucky to have you for a lawyer!” She stood up and collected the plates from the table. ”Hannah left fruit salad in the fridge. Want some?”
”I think I'll pa.s.s.” Her father stacked the serving dishes and followed Nancy into the kitchen with them.
”Whatever happened to the girl?” Nancy asked. ”Did she go on to be a computer crook or a computer genius?”
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