Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who is reading and following this story. Thank you especially to Iheartninjago2010, BMSH, EvergreenDreamweaver, max2013, and Cherylann Rivers for your reviews on the last chapter! It means a lot to me.

Chapter VI

Nancy was sound asleep, despite all the mysteries that were rumbling around her brain. There was the Arthur case, the Moriare case, the Robin Hood case, and all of them might be related, or two of them, or none of them. Then there had been her conversation with Frank earlier, and she found herself worrying about what was going on with him and Joe, and why it was just Frank who was going to help her. She had thought about calling Joe. Joe was such an open person that she thought he might just tell her, but then she had decided against it. She didn't want to be that friend who was always prying into her other friends' business.

She'd managed to put that all aside and get to sleep. She was pretty good at that when she knew she was going to have to be well-rested for the next day. The next day was Thursday, and since Ned didn't have classes on Fridays, she had already called him and asked him to come up Thursday evening. Hopefully, they'd be able to get some detective work in. If they did, they would probably be up late the next night.

It was a sound enough sleep that a text coming in wouldn't have woken her. However, her phone buzzed repeatedly as a barrage of texts came pouring in. Sleepily confused, she looked at the screen of her phone which told her that it was a quarter after one in the morning and that she had fourteen text messages from George. In the time that it took her to see that, another text came through.

Instantly, Nancy was awake and on alert. George wouldn't send that many texts at this time of night without a good reason. That was why Nancy was utterly bewildered when she saw that all the texts were all exactly the same – just the one word: "Beaumains."

"It's too late at night to pull something like this, George," she said to her phone as she typed out a message asking what George meant.

She waited a moment and then another text came through: "You'd been given the answer already, Nancy. JK. Be here, or wait for the arrow to point the way."

"Okay, this is too much," Nancy said as she pressed the call button. The phone rang until George's voicemail message came on.

Nancy frowned. This didn't sound like George at all. After a moment of internal debate, she placed a call to Bess's phone. It rang long enough that Nancy began to worry that she wouldn't answer either, but then finally Bess's sleepy voice came over the phone.

"Sorry to wake you up, Bess, but is George at her house?" Nancy asked.

"How would I know, Nancy?" Bess yawned.

"Could you go to the window and see if her car's in the driveway?" Nancy tried to stay patient, but the strange text messages concerned her.

"Okay. Just a second." A few moments passed before Bess, now sounding more awake, said, "Her car's not there. Where would she be in the middle of the night?"

"I don't know." Nancy bit her lip. "I got some really weird texts from her phone, but when I tried to call, she didn't answer. But we don't need to panic yet. Maybe George's parents know where she is. I'll call them and tell you what I find out."

Although Nancy hated to wake George's parents and tell them the worrisome news, she didn't waste any time in doing it. George's mother answered and told her that her daughter had left that morning, saying she would be back late, but she didn't know where she had gone.

After this conversation, Nancy put the phone down slowly on her nightstand, thinking. Maybe George was just getting back late, like she had said, although this seemed like she was pushing it. Nancy's phone landed crookedly on the stand and she glanced over to see what she had set it on. It was the copy of Le Morte d'Arthur.

"Oh no," Nancy groaned as a thought struck her. She snapped on the lamp beside her bed, snatched up the volume, and began flipping through it. After a few moments, she came to the story she wanted – "Book VII: The Tale of Sir Gareth". She skimmed through it, feeling herself get tenser as she read.

Deciding she had better tell her dad this latest development, she jumped out of bed and hurried down the hall. When she reached the door of her dad's bedroom, she knocked softly and said, "Dad?"

"What is it, Nancy?" Carson responded right away and his voice was wide awake.

"Dad, something bad has happened," Nancy replied.

Carson opened the door a second later, a concerned look on his face. "What happened? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," Nancy told him. "It's not me. It's George. Just fifteen minutes ago, she sent me a whole bunch of texts that only say, 'Beaumains'. When I asked her what she was trying to say, I got a reply telling me I already knew and then it said some weird stuff about an arrow. Dad, George left earlier today and she's not back yet and no one knows where she went."

"Why are you so sure something bad has happened to her?" Carson asked.

"Because of this." Nancy held up the book. "One of the stories in here is Sir Gareth. His nickname was Beaumains."

"So what exactly does that tell us?" Carson's voice was grim; he already guessed the answer.

"Gareth went on a quest –" Nancy paused, "- to rescue a kidnapped woman."

Carson put a hand to his forehead with a groan. "Okay. Uh. We need to call the police. There's not a whole lot they're going to be able to do until we find out where George went. Who all did you talk to?"

"Her mom and Bess," Nancy told him. "Bess didn't know she was gone at all, and she didn't tell her mom where she was headed."

"Didn't you talk to her earlier?" Carson asked. "She didn't give any indication at all what she was going to the rest of the day?"

"No," Nancy said. "It didn't sound like she had made up her mind yet. I told you we were planning on driving over to Baker today, so she didn't have any other plans. She seemed pretty disappointed that I cancelled the trip." Nancy and her father looked at each other, the same thought occurring to both of them. "You don't suppose she would have?"

"Knowing George, it's possible," Carson replied.

"How are we going to find out?" Nancy sighed. "We don't know anyone in Baker to call, and you're not going to let me drive all the way over there in the middle of the night."

"You're right about that," Carson told her. "As for the first part, not so much. We'll just call the police over there and give them George's car's license number. You know it, don't you?"

"Of course, I do," Nancy replied. "I've got all that information written down for all of my friends. I'll go get it."

She was back in a minute with a notebook where she written down the license numbers of all her friends' cars and other information that might be necessary to know at some point in one of her investigations. Meanwhile, Carson already had the River Heights police on the phone and was filling them in.

As he was talking, Nancy's phone rang. "Hi, Bess," she said, answering it. "Sorry, I forgot to call you back."

"Well?" Bess demanded. "What's happening? Have you heard from George?"

"No," Nancy confessed. "Her parents don't know where she went. I'm afraid she might have gone over to Baker by herself to investigate the Robin Hood thing."

"She wouldn't do something that dumb," Bess said. "Actually, scratch that. She totally would. What are we going to do?"

"Dad's talking to the police right now," Nancy told her. "With the roads the way they are, we can't drive over there in the dark."

"The roads," Bess gasped. "If she drove all the way over to Baker, Nancy, you don't suppose –"

"Don't think about that," Nancy advised her. "I'm sure that's not what happened. From the texts I got, I think she might have been kidnapped."

"Kidnapped?" Bess burst out. "Nancy, that's not any better. It could be worse! What's going on? Why would someone kidnap her? Do you think it's this Robin Hood guy?"

"I don't know," Nancy told her. "I'm afraid it might be someone who's out to get revenge on Dad."

"Through George?" Bess asked.

"No, she's just the bait," Nancy explained. "What they probably want to do is get hold of me."

"That means they wouldn't care about George and they'd –" Bess started again.

"It doesn't mean anything of the kind." Nancy spoke firmly. "I said they want her for bait. She's only useful to them as long as she's alive."

"Oh," Bess moaned. "What are we going to do? Nancy, they must have given you some clue to check out. I mean, if they're trying to lure you to your doom or whatever, they have to push you in the right direction."

"I know. They should have." Nancy bit her lip. "Maybe I haven't looked at it hard enough yet. Don't worry, Bess. The minute it's daylight, we'll start a full-scale search. And I'll call the guys right away. They'll take the day off to come and help us."

"All right, Nancy," Bess agreed reluctantly. "If George tried to play detective on her own and got into trouble, I'm going to kill her the minute we find her. And if she's not in any trouble and she's just worrying us for no reason, I'm gonna kill her."

"It doesn't sound like she can win either way." Nancy tried to joke, but her heart wasn't in it. "I've got some more phone calls to make. If I find out anything before morning, I'll call you. If you don't hear from me, just be ready to go do some major sleuthing the minute the sun is up."

Carson hung up from his call at the same time as Nancy hung up from the call to Bess. "The River Heights police are spreading the word to the Baker police, as well as spreading a general alarm to the whole area. They're bending the rules a little since George is over eighteen and there's no absolute evidence that there's been foul play, but I guess a close association with you is enough to make it highly probable."

Nancy nodded with a sigh. "I guess I have caused a lot of trouble for my friends."

"And gotten them and dozens of other people out of even more trouble," Carson told her. "I was kidding, Nancy."

Nancy smiled weakly. "Sorry, Dad, it's just – Wait. Say that again."

"Say what again?" Carson asked, wrinkling his forehead in confusion.

"Kidding. Just kidding. JK," Nancy murmured. "It doesn't make sense."

"What doesn't?" Carson shook his head as he tried to sort out what his daughter was saying.

Nancy pulled out her phone and showed her dad the text message that had come from George's phone, reading it aloud as she did. "'You'd been given the answer already, Nancy. JK. Be here, or wait for the arrow to point the way.' What do you think they mean that they're 'just kidding'? Do they mean I really don't have the answer?"

"Maybe they're saying the answer's not as obvious as it looks," Carson suggested.

"Their grammar is terrible, too," Nancy mused. "Do you think that has something to do with it? And what do they mean by 'be here'? Be where?"

Carson's phone rang before he could reply. He answered it and listened to the caller, making only a few one-word comments. After a few moments, he asked if that was all and then hung up. He looked at Nancy. "The Baker police already found George's car."

Nancy flinched. "They're certainly fast. Is – is that good news?"

"The car's just parked outside the hall where there was a charity dinner going on tonight," Carson explained. "The event got held up by 'Robin Hood.' George isn't anywhere around, but the police especially noticed her car while they were investigating the robbery."

"Why?" Nancy asked.

"Because somebody jabbed an arrow into the headrest of the driver's seat."