Transcript: MaYaND 004: CB 04: The Mystery at Lilac Inn

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[Sound cue: Eerie piano tune reminiscent of the Nancy Drew PC game soundtracks]

Colleen: Hello and welcome to Me and You and Nancy Drew, the podcast where I, Colleen-

Meghan: -and I, Meghan- 

Colleen: -are reading and discussing the Nancy Drew books one at a time and going through the other items in the Nancy Drewniverse. I recently just got the Nancy Drew board game, the, like, newer one from Barnes and Noble, so that'll be in here eventually. I'm very excited about that. But today, we read book four of the original series, The Mystery at Lilac Inn. What'd you think? 

Meghan: This one has been my favorite one so far. 

Colleen: I loved this!

Meghan: I feel like Carolyn Keene is really getting into the groove with her storytelling. 

Colleen: She's hitting her stride.

Meghan: And lots of, I think, good red herrings and clue drops throughout it. So I-  I was really a big fan of this one. 

Colleen: Me too. And this is the first one where I remembered something that happened that's not on the cover. Because previously I- Because I've read them all, but as a kid. And I, you know, was, like, speed reading. I was like, “Look how fast I can read! I did it!” You know. But this one, I was like, “I think I remember, you know, X, Y, and Z,” and it's not, “Oh, there was an old clock. There was a bungalow.” You know, like, something from the cover. 

Meghan: “There's a hidden staircase.” 

Colleen: “There's a hidden staircase!” So this is- So I was right. It's very cool. But this is- We're reading the one from the 50s, not the original 30s one. 

Meghan: I mean-

Colleen: This is actually from ‘61. I was wrong. 

Meghan: Oh, so we have exited the 50s, and we are now into the 60s. 

Colleen: Very exciting stuff. 

Meghan: So looking just at the Wikipedia page- So I didn't do, like, extensive research. 

Colleen: Still more than me!

Meghan: The Lilac Inn seems to be a very heavily-edited- Like, um, not very heavily-edited, but very- It had to be changed a lot. 

Colleen: Between the original run and this one that we read. 

Meghan: And this version, yeah. So this is just an excerpt from the Wikipedia: “In 1961, Harriet Stratemeyer Adams extensively revised the novel, creating a completely different story. The original omitted the lead characters from much of the action, the titular inn was only a place where a crime was committed with minor investigatory follow-up, and a domestic help subplot was out of place in 1961. Ethnic slurs and opinions were removed.”

Colleen: [gasp] I mean, I'm glad they were removed, but oh no!

Meghan: Yeah.

Colleen: Not even just, like, vague, “This is a little weird,” “This doesn't hold up,” “This-” There were just ethnic slurs. 

Meghan: The whole- And it seems like the entire plot was completely reworked so-

Colleen: So the original culprit was a black woman and then that was, like, a whole thing. 

Meghan: I believe so. 

Colleen: So the interesting thing is that they seem to have edited it and then just removed her. Like, she's now white.

Meghan: I think so.

Colleen: Which is an interesting way to edit. So Meghan got me a copy of the original book one, Secret of the Old Clock, from 1930. 1930, right?

Meghan: I think it's from 1930.

Colleen: It smells really good. It's beautiful. It's got the imprint of the classic silhouette with the heels and the magnifying glass on the cover. 

Meghan: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

Colleen: It's very cool. And on the inside cover it has some really good, like, notes from previous owners. My favorite is this little cursive that says, “If this book should ever roam, box its ears and send it home,” to, like, this address in Brooklyn, New York. And then there's stuff from a library, and there's stuff from this. And then Meghan wrote in it! It's very good. But then I was looking through and I'm like, “Okay, not only are the illustrations-” Because, like, these books that we're reading have about five or six. They're, like, very cross-hatched. They're very simple. They're black-and-white drawings. And the other one- Not simple, but, like, more simple than the one in the 1930s book, which was, like, a whole, like, artistic piece.

Meghan: Yeah!

Colleen: Still black and white, but there was only one and it was at the very beginning. And then we- I opened it up, and I'm like, “We're, like, fully in the middle of the mystery in the first sentence.” 

Meghan: Mm-hmm!

Colleen: So that's an interesting change. So I'm, like, really excited. And, like, we flipped through and there was a whole thing about, like, some dead chickens. I'm, like, what's going on here? So-

Meghan: We are very excited for a future episode where we get to investigate further.

Colleen: Right! I was thinking, like, “Oh, it's going to have a few minor things, like, maybe her hair color’s different. Maybe she's two years younger.” It's, like, “No, this is, like, a fully different book.” So-

Meghan: Mm-hmm!

Colleen: But. This is all to say I'm glad that they rewrote it in 1961 because it could have been, like, “No, this [racism] is fine.” 

Meghan: Very nice, I think, to see how much, then- If they, even in the 1960s, were, like, “This is completely inappropriate.” 

Colleen: “It doesn't fly.” 

Meghan: “It doesn't fly. We are scrapping everything. Let's start over with the Lilac Inn.” 

Colleen: Yeah. And so maybe that's why- Maybe I am being too critical of, like, “Okay, so the way we got rid of ethnic slurs is we just don't have any people of color in it.” Interesting. 

Meghan: “Let's start over and let's-” 

Colleen: “-treat people in a humane way.” 

[Sound Cue: Synthesized pentatonic scale underneath the spoken words “Drew Haiku”]

Meghan: I actually wrote mine ahead of time instead of ten minutes ago.

Colleen: [gasp] Ooo!

Meghan: So I'm very excited. 

Colleen: All right.

Meghan: Would you like to go first? 

Colleen: I can go first. 

Meghan: All right, I'm ready. 

Colleen: Haunted Lilac Inn. / One million characters / Diamonds, ghosts, and subs. 

Meghan: I love it, but we also have some very similar-

Colleen: I mean, it was the same book. 

Meghan: It was the same book, but I think we went in a similar style. 

Colleen: All right, hit me up.

Meghan: A doppelgänger? / Lilac Inn under attack. / Ghosts! Jewel thieves! Bombs. 

Colleen: Ooh, I really liked that!

Meghan: It was a very dramatic book. I also-

Colleen: It was a very dramatic book! There was a time bomb! There was a ticking time bomb! 

Meghan: And there was a submarine!

Colleen: A submarine that was maybe shaped like a shark? Unclear. 

Meghan: Unclear, yes. 

[Sound Cue: Clock ticks underneath the spoken words “Thirty-Second Recap”]

Meghan: It is now time for the thirty-second recap, where we tell you our best summary of what actually happened in the book. 

Colleen: Alright, ready, set, go. 

Meghan: [clock ticks underneath the book summary] Nancy and Helen are together again on another adventure at the Lilac Inn. Also, there is a doppelgänger of Nancy who is very convincing and everyone is convinced it is her. She does fraud and steals Nancy's identity, all while Nancy is also investigating this ghost at the Lilac Inn, and there's missing jewels that go missing immediately after they appear. And there's a submarine and Nancy goes diving and she gets kidnapped as per usual. She gets almost blown up. She gets asked out on multiple dates by the same guy over and over again who is a secret agent for the military. [ticking stops, clock bongs]

Colleen: Stop! Very good. 

Meghan: I missed a lot.

Colleen: There is a lot happening in this book.

Meghan: There is a lot happening in this book!

Colleen: So much going on! All right, time me. 

Meghan: Okay, okay. Three, two, one, go. 

Colleen: [clock ticks underneath the book summary] Nancy's friend Emily is getting married and also starting an inn business with her fiancé and so Nancy's helping her, like, get ready for- Oh, Nancy's a bridesmaid! Nancy's a bridesmaid and that's why she's there and she is helping solve the mystery of the inn. There's hauntings, there's stuff going missing, there's a bunch of lilacs, and one of the lilac trees goes missing, I think, which is wild?

Meghan: Yes!

Colleen: There's, like, weird noises and the doppelgänger who steals Nancy's identity. And, uhhh, there's a shark, but it's actually a submarine and there's, like, a vibrating machine, but it's not what you think, and there's a lot of other stuff and the end! [ticking stops, clock bongs]

Meghan: Good job. 

Colleen: There's too much to cover. 

Meghan: There is! It is a very, very busy book. 

Colleen: Yeah. So the vibrating machine is, like, they use it to shake the inn and make the people think there's an earthquake. 

Meghan: Yeah, a fake earthquake. Nancy also gets almost driven off the road. by a red truck. Again.

Colleen: This happens every book. Every book! I marked that ‘cause I thought- ‘Cause you love a good, like, car drama. 

Meghan: Oh my gosh, I know, and I love piercing screams. 

Colleen: Piercing screams!

Meghan: We have piercing screams!

Colleen: Classic. But they were- Ticking time bomb! And- 

Meghan: And a fire! 

Colleen: A fire! The inn goes up in flames!

Meghan: There's an earthquake. 

Colleen: Yeah, Emily's getting her, like, mom's diamond necklace. 

Meghan: No, it's just diamonds. It's just loose diamonds. 

Colleen: Just twenty-one loose diamonds. 

Meghan: Twenty. 

Colleen: Twenty. They're in a case and they're getting them from the bank and they've announced really loudly, “I'm getting my diamonds from the bank and then I'm going to sell them.”

Meghan: “And we're going to sell them for this exact amount of money.” 

Colleen: “And then it will help the inn,” exactly. And then it's shocking. And then the lights go out. 

Meghan: Immediately. 

Colleen: And then the diamond case is entirely gone within, like, a second. And it's, like, as they're being presented to her, like, a little bit early, she's supposed to get them on her, like, whatever birthday. 

Meghan: Twenty-first birthday. 

Colleen: That’s where I got “twenty-one” from. And then they're immediately gone, but then they show up the next day, but then they've been replaced with glass diamonds that are the exact cut of all the diamonds that were there. So there's, like, some speedy turnaround forgery. You can't trust actors. 

Meghan: Yup.

Colleen: That's the main lesson, which I love, as an actor. It's great. 

Meghan: Yup.

Colleen: There's a woman fully named Gay. I didn't know that that was a name. 

Meghan: Very exciting.

Colleen: It's not short for anything. So much happening. Nancy's dad is gone for a while. 

Meghan: Her house gets broken into. 

Colleen: Her house gets broken into!

Meghan: There are secret passages in the inn that are just, like- No one is- They're, like, “Wow, interesting. Anyway, about the fire that just happened.” 

Colleen: There's so much happening! And we still haven't seen Bess and George yet!

Meghan: No. 

Colleen: I don't know where they are. I really thought they were there from, like, day one, and we're in book four and there's no sign. 

Meghan: Helen is her bestie. 

Colleen: Helen is her bestie and I love Helen. 

Meghan: Yeah. This was a very, very busy book. And I think you kind of mentioned in, maybe it was after the haiku, there are so many characters to keep straight.

Colleen: There's so many!

Meghan: And three of them, it turns out, are just the same character. So that at least eliminated-

Colleen: And then one of them's pretending to be a different character, and then somebody's brother, or no, somebody's sister was pretending to be her, while the one girl is pretending to be Nancy. It's a whole thing. 

Meghan: Yes. So very, very busy book, but very exciting. 

[Sound cue: High-pitched whistle-like note descending in pitch underneath the stretched-out, also-descending-in-pitch spoken word “Cliffhangers!”]

Meghan: I think my number one, it is while Nancy is diving and looking for whatever it is that capsized her boat multiple chapters ago. It took her a long time to go back and investigate that. 

Colleen: Well, ‘cause the book starts with her canoeing, or kayaking, with Helen. As you do, you know. Which they're, like, going to visit a friend via the river. 

Meghan: I know!

Colleen: Which is hilarious to me. 

Meghan: I would love to do this. But she goes diving and she sees a shark in the water, question mark?

Colleen: Yeah!

Meghan: Then she's, like, “What's that over there?” And a spear is shot at her into the camera that she's holding?! That was my favorite cliffhanger because it was so, like-

Colleen:  “Where did that come from? This is unexpected.” 

Meghan: Yes, every- Every paragraph was some new- I'm like, “A shark in the river?” And even Nancy was like, “It can't be. Sharks don't live in fresh water!”

Colleen: Right. 

Meghan: And then she's like, yeah. She's, like, getting closer. I mean, I know there's been multiple times where she has been, like, attacked, imprisoned. Chloroformed. 

Colleen: But, like, I don't know, a weapon is new. I- Or, like, not a blunt weapon. This is a sharp weapon. I don't know. 

Meghan: She gets a rock thrown at her later. Like, she gets a lot. She gets attacked more. 

Colleen: We've had rocks before. We've had “been run off the road” before. We've had chloroform. We've had “knocked with a lead pipe and ceiling fell on her.” But, like, a spear shot directly at her face into the camera. And then it's still not clear if that was meant to get her or just meant to get the camera so she can't take pictures of the sub. 

Meghan: There were a lot of attempts on Nancy's life in this book

Colleen: Honestly, I don't know how she didn't get hurt more because there were so many attempts. Okay, my favorite cliffhanger was- A waitress at the inn is arranging flowers and then she, she looks out the window and gives a startled cry. “She dropped the bowl, scattering flowers and water on the floor. Everyone at the table stared out the window. Two men were peering in. Nancy recognized them and jumped to her feet in surprise,” which on its own is not a very good cliffhanger. Like, I think that dropping the bowl would have been a better way to end the chapter. But the reason it's awesome is, it's not a suspect. It's her dad just, like, showing up outside the window, like a creeper. 

Meghan: I know!  

Colleen: He's like, “Yeah, sorry, I just meant to surprise you. I didn't mean to scare the waitress. That's on me.” I'm like, “All right, Carson, calm down.”

[Sound cue: Ocean waves crash underneath the spoken words “Ship of the Week”]

Meghan: I actually had a hard time with Ship of the Week. I was kind of going back and forth with Nancy and John, which I think we're supposed to kind of, like, see him as a romantic interest for Nancy. And honestly, just, like, from the get-go, I was just not into him. I don't know if it's because he shares a name with an ex-boyfriend of mine. 

Colleen: Well, he's also very suspicious the whole time.

Meghan: He is very suspicious. 

Colleen: Until, like, the last chapter, I think it's not cleared up why he's acting so sus. 

Meghan: Yeah. I also just- You know, I come from a military family background. So him being- Her being like, “What are you doing in the military?” He's like,
“That's classified.” 

Colleen: To civilians. 

Meghan: Like, I took it not as his job was actually classified. I took that as just being a skeezy military guy trying to, like, put on an air of mystery. 

Colleen: Yeah. And I was like-

Meghan: Which in theory Nancy would like, but only if it's a good mystery. 

Colleen: So do you think John was either trying to sound mysterious or trying to sound like he was more important than he was?

Meghan: That's what I took it as, and of course once we get to the end- Which- So, okay, again, having grown up in a military community, I'm like, “Do you have private investigators in the army who are just, like, running around, like, suburban inns investigating?” 

Colleen: Well, ‘cause there's a bunch of electronic equipment and so that's, I guess what made it military-related? Do I know anything about the army? No. 

Meghan: And Nancy, because she helped, got, like, a medal. 

Colleen: Yeah! 

Meghan: The Distinguished Civilian Service Medal for Outstanding Work. 

Colleen: Is that a real medal?

Meghan: There is a Department of the Army Distinguished Civilian Service Award. It's the “highest award that may be bestowed by or on behalf of the Secretary of the Army to Army civilian employees.” So this is only for employees of the Army. 

Colleen: So not Nancy Drew. 

Meghan: No, but it was approved by the War Department in 1945. It consists of a gold medal, lapel button, and certificate. 

Colleen: Ooo, so exciting for her. Is that what she keeps from this one? 

Meghan: No, no, she gets a bracelet.

Colleen: Oh, that's right!

Meghan: So overall, I ended up deciding Nancy and John [were] not to be. They are both far too busy and far too interested in their own investigations, I think, to be able to fully dedicate the time they need to forming a healthy relationship. Unless both of their mysteries happen to overlap, I don't foresee this-

Colleen: Well, and they did in this one and they still weren't- 

Meghan: Yeah, and they still didn't do a good job, so I don't even know. 

Colleen: I don't think that will work. 

Meghan: Did they go diving together at all? 

Colleen: They have a diving day. Either it's at the very end or they're about to. 

Meghan: Nancy just continued to go diving alone even though she's like, “It's super dangerous to go diving alone.”

Colleen: Right. 

Meghan: So she dove alone twice. 

Colleen: Nancy, you are a bad example. 

Meghan: Both ended in tragedy. 

Colleen: But she was in the paper earlier for skin diving and getting a skin diving award. She got awards, like, out the wazoo. 

Meghan: I know. I know.

Colleen: But they were like, “Nancy, you're a famous skin diver.” And I thought that that was the impersonator because she was like, “Oh, what? What are you talking about?” And so I thought that this was, like, “No, I don't dive. What are you talking about?” But no, it was her. She was just being modest. 

Meghan: My ship of the week is another- 

Colleen: It's an anti-ship?

Meghan: As per usual, an anti-ship. 

Colleen: That's fair.

Meghan: I am very anti-relationships for Nancy. I have very high standards for her. 

Colleen: Well, she deserves it. My ship has very little textual evidence, as per usual. I don't know if that's usual, but it's pretty much only on page five. So John McBride is an old friend of Dick's. “‘John is going to be Dick's best man,’ Emily explained. John smiled cordially. ‘Dick and I were boyhood friends in California and roommates at college.’ And he looked at-”

Meghan: They were roommates!

Colleen: “Oh my god, they were roommates.” “He looked at the new arrivals with twinkling eyes,” because everyone's eyes are constantly twinkling. I don't know. I'm still worried about this as a health condition, but I ship Dick and John. I think they at least had something in college. Maybe they were, like, really close friends in childhood and they never really, like, connected that until they were roommates and they were, like, “Ohhhh.” I ship that. I think that it's over now, but I think that they had something once and it could be rekindled. 

Meghan: It could come back.

Colleen: If the wedding gets called off, which- They're about to push the wedding back because the inn is haunted. I'm like, “That's nothing.” Also, like, I mean, it probably was different back then, but I'm thinking of how early I had to book my wedding venue. It was, like, a year and a half out. 

Meghan: They didn't even specify. Were they getting married at the Lilac Inn? 

Colleen: You know what? I bet they are. 

Meghan: It's a very beautiful venue. 

Colleen: And then they're in charge of booking because it's her property. But I guess I wasn't thinking about that. But if they get married at the Lilac Inn, then they can move it whenever they want. But people, you know, they save the date and they get their- Whatever. Yeah, yeah, but “I gotta push it back because the inn's haunted, guys.”

Meghan: Okay. 

[Sound Cue: Kitchen tools clink underneath the spoken words “Cooking Corner”]

Meghan: So here on Cooking Corner, we're going to look at the different foods featured throughout this book. And this book was very, very busy. I know they ate, but they didn't go in-depth as in previous books into what they were eating. 

Colleen: Yeah, literally the only thing I marked was her birthday cake.

Meghan: Um, I definitely have the birthday cake. 

Colleen: When she's getting her diamonds. 

Meghan: Yep, so that's for Emily. 

Colleen: It's surrounded by red roses, which is wild because the whole thing is about lilacs. Everything is about lilacs. “Lilacs can be called blue pipes. They can come in this color. They can do this. Some of them are named after French people.” But then there were some red roses for her birthday. 

Meghan: Hmm. Um, they had a steak cookout at one point that I was really interested in.

Colleen: Oh, I missed that. Yeah, this was not a very snacky book. But also, she didn't spend a lot of time at home with Hannah. It was mostly just checking in, “Oh no, we got broken into. Are you okay, Hannah?” Hannah was like, “Yes, but I'm worried about you.” And Nancy's like, “I'm fine, see ya!” So, like, I wonder if that's why. Because I think of the snacks as, like, she comes home, she debriefs with Hannah. Hannah's like, “Oh, let me get you some cinnamon toast, some hot chocolate. Like, we'll get cozy.” 

Meghan: I did also- They did talk about the first meal that they had at the Lilac Inn, which was creamed chicken on toast- 

Colleen: Gross.

Meghan: -peas, salad, and iced tea. 

Colleen: That's right. I remember reading that and I was like, “Well, surely there'll be a better snack, so I'm not even gonna mark that.” And then, nope, that was it. 

[Sound Cue: European-style emergency vehicle siren sound plays underneath the spoken words “Fashion Police”]

Colleen: Okay, so they're getting ready for Emily's birthday dinner. Nancy has a pink sheath dress and pumps, and I knew what those were. And then Helen wore an aqua organdy and I googled that. 

Meghan: I did too!

Colleen: And my thing says, “Organdy is a sheer fabric.” And it looks like, something you can't wear on its own. Okay, that looks much better. A party dress, maybe many layers of it. It looks kind of like tulle. Yeah, what it looks like, is this is a very sheer fabric. You can see, like- Like, somebody put their hand behind it and you can see the hand completely. It's just a little blurry, but it's, like, still, you can see all of it. So I'm like, “You can't wear that to dinner. That's for just Helen. That should just be for you. Maybe Nancy. But that's not for dinner!”

Meghan: I think it's got lots of different layers. But most of the ones when I was looking it up were very fancy. I was, like, “Helen, you are overdressed for this.”

Colleen: But it is a very fancy dinner where she's [Emily’s] getting, like, thousands and thousands of dollars of diamonds so, like-

Meghan: That is true. That is true. 

Colleen: Like, is it just for friends? Yes. But.

Meghan: But this is- This is, like, really cute. 

Colleen: Very cute! 

Meghan: It's very, very fluffy. They did get changed a lot. And there was also, like- There was a lot of sharing of clothes between Nancy and her doppelgänger,

Colleen: Yes!

Meghan: Where her doppelgänger would break into her house and go steal one of her dresses.

Colleen: Which, then I was like, “You don't really need to do that if you've already got, like, the wig and the similar facial structure, similar coloring they talk about.” But I really appreciate that they're like, “Oh yeah, she wore that dress I've seen you in before. And that's why I knew it was you when you showed up at the clothing store and spent thousands and thousands of dollars that you don't have.” I'm like, “What?!”

Meghan: Yeah, or even John was like, “Yeah, you were wearing that dress you were wearing yesterday when I saw you. Like, it was your pink, your pink sheath dress.” 

Colleen: Yeah. 

Meghan: Good recognizing styles of dress, John. 

Colleen: Sure. 

Meghan: I wrote down the lilac-pink bridesmaid dresses that they were going to wear to go with the lilac theme. 

Colleen: So they must be getting married at the Lilac Inn. 

Meghan: They must be getting married at the Lilac Inn. 

Colleen: I love that Nancy's always a bridesmaid.

Meghan: Always a bridesmaid, never a bride. 

Colleen: Yes, that's basically how they end the book too, and that's my moral of the story. But I can tell you now- Did you catch this? They're like- Because Helen's getting married soon and Emily's getting married soon, and then they're like, “Oh my god, this- Actually, we're actually being such bad friends right now.” “‘Goodness, Nancy, you must be tired of hearing us talk about steady partners when-’ Nancy interrupted, laughing gaily. She said, ‘Not at all. For the present, my study partner is going to be mystery.’” 

Meghan: Yessss.

Colleen: I'm like, “Yes, Nancy!”

Meghan: Wasn't that the last line in the book?

Colleen: It was the very last line! It's a good thing to end on.

Meghan: That's what I mean. I just think the writing in general was better in this book than the other three. 

Colleen: It's good! Good job, Carolyn Keene. 

Meghan: Yeah! Carolyn Keene really, really stepping up here. The other one I wanted to talk about that I thought seemed nice was, she and Helen change when they first arrive. 

Colleen: ‘Cause they get dumped in the river. 

Meghan: And they're wearing, I think, just shorts and tops, but they dress in pastel dresses on page seven. And I'm like, “Are they matching pastel dresses? Did you guys plan it?” I just thought it was cute.

Colleen: Oh, that's very cute. 

Meghan: Yeah, the only other, like, interesting fashion that we see in here is the skin diving outfit. She's got her diving rubber suit. 

Colleen: I would have said “rubber diving suit.” There was [were] a couple of those in this, where the adjectives were switched around in a way- Because you know there's that unspoken rule of adjectives in English language that-

Meghan: Well it's not even unspoken! I mean, I teach [taught] ELA. I had to teach the kids the order of-

Colleen: Because if you say the “black big barn,” you sound like a lunatic. 

Meghan: Yeah. 

Colleen: And there's a couple of those in here where I was like, “That's an interesting phrasing. Like, it's not wrong, but it sounds wrong.” “Right after supper, Nancy-” This is, like, very late in the book. Like, chapter thirteen. And so Nancy is going to dress up as the doppelgänger. Which is, like, a whole thing.

Meghan: Ohhhh my gosh, I didn't even touch on that. 

Colleen: Which, first of all, then Carson, like, reluctantly gives his consent for this. He goes, “Well, if anything goes wrong, scream as loudly as you can.” Good strategy, thank you sir. She goes, “I will, but I intend to do a good acting job,” and she's great at that. And so she goes to her attic and she gets out an evening dress that's very flowing, and then she finds a black wig that she just has, and a transparent white scarf, and then she wires pocket-sized flashlights to the cuff of each sleeve of the gown to give a glowing effect. 

Meghan: Also featured on the cover. 

Colleen: Yes, exactly. And you can see, like, in her sleeves, little flashlights, which are bright yellow. “These provide a glowing effect,” she thought, which arguably she didn't need to think to herself, because that's just what flashlights are. 

Meghan: And I really do love the part that is depicted on the front cover of when Nancy is like, “I'm going to go scare the ghost.” So she's like, “I'm going to dress up like the ghost.” And then she, like, meets the ghost, and the ghost is dressed up like her. And she's like, “Wait a second.”

Colleen: “Hold on just a minute!” I think it's very funny because the ghost is like, “Wait, just- No, hold on! I'm doing- On your-” 

Meghan: Yeah, “Who is this?” 

Colleen: They're both like the Spider-Man meme where they're all pointing at each other. 

Meghan: Yes. Yes. Oh my gosh .

[Sound Cue: High-pitched sounds imitating a camera flashbulb play underneath the spoken words “Picture Perfect”]

Colleen: So the picture right here is, “Suddenly a panel on the wall slid open!” And it's, like, everybody's gazing- It's drawn from the perspective of we're inside the wall, and everybody at the birthday dinner is looking in and surprised because they didn't even know there was a secret panel, despite this- I think this inn's been in the family for a while. 

Meghan: Yeah, and the previous owner just also happens to, like, work there still. 

Colleen: Yes. They also mentioned, like, the gardener, like, “We convinced him to stay on even though he wants to retire.” I'm like, “That's rude, but okay.” But what just struck me about this is, for, like, a long time, I thought she just had one leg. Flamingo-balancing. And her dress is tailored beautifully to this one leg that she has. So she's making it work, but it just seems hard to get around because she doesn't have any crutches or anything. I think you can see her foot here, like, sideways, but it really does look like she just has one leg, and it's all very tight. 

Meghan: Look at, also, all the trail of the lilacs. 

Colleen: Ooh, good detail. The lilac petals leading into the- And that's how she finds the secret petal [passage]. She's like, “Well, there's all these-” Like, when you see footprints, and half of them goes into the wall, but this is just, like, lilac trail.

Meghan: A trail of lilacs. 

Colleen: And about the lilac trail, she was like, “It must have been a boutonniere or a corsage or something.” I'm like, “No, you live at Lilac Inn. There's dozens of lilac trees.”

Meghan: Everywhere!

Colleen: But it must have been on their outfit. 

Meghan: So I actually don't- I know at this point I was reading from my digital copy and I'm pretty sure- Yeah, this is missing. Your mom took one half of the two-page spread. 

Colleen: So you don't see any of the people in it, because that's what she wanted to scrapbook, but you do see the inn is on fire. 

Meghan: But I'm loving Helen's swooning while John carries her because Helen got knocked out. Nancy did not. Nancy was fine. 

Colleen: Nancy's fine! She's free and clear.

Meghan: But yeah, Helen got knocked out while investigating, while  just wandering at night. She's just like, “Hmm. I'm awake for some reason in the middle of the night. I'm just gonna go for a walk even though everyone said don't leave your room and don't leave your-” 

Colleen: “And also have it locked from the inside,” because someone's clearly breaking in, so they had a lock on the inside and she's like, “I can't sleep, I'm gonna go take a walk.”

Meghan: Helen, Helen, Helen. 

Colleen: And she got clonked. 

Meghan: And then that's also why I was also very suspicious of John because when Nancy woke up I was like, “Oh my god, where's Helen?” And then she's, like, walking, she finds Helen and then John's like, “Oh hi, I also happen to be walking around outside for no real reason. Oh no, Helen is knocked out.” 

Colleen: Helen just wanted Nancy's attention because Nancy's been spending all her time with Emily. 

Meghan: That's true. Ploy for attention. 

Colleen: “If I get knocked out, then surely!”

Meghan: But I honestly did think that this was one of the more dramatic parts of the book. If Helen had not- Although I am being harsh on Helen right now, if Helen had not left- The reason Nancy woke up was a ticking sound that she heard. She's like, “Wow, my alarm clock is loud right now. Anyway, oh gosh, Helen's gone.” What she heard was a time bomb that exploded, that she just happened-

Colleen: The guest cottage blew up! Like- So, if Helen had not gone wandering, she would have- Probably would have died!

Meghan: They would have died! This is dramatic. And I don't know, like, I feel like, with The Hidden Staircase, there were a lot of potential attempted murder[s] by, like, almost running her and her dad over- 

Colleen: Right. 

Meghan: -with a[n] out-of-control truck. And obviously she's been, like, run off the road multiple times. But this one, it feels like she's been in, like, legitimate danger the whole time. 

Colleen: From so many different things. 

Meghan: Yes. So I did- I did like this picture, the two-page spread. On one page, you can see the flaming cottage. 

Colleen: Should that go in Accidentally Gay? Since it's a flaming cottage? Sorry. 

Meghan: On the other side, the one that Colleen's mom stole from this book for scrapbooking purposes, John is carrying a swooning Helen who has her hand dramatically over her face even though she's unconscious. 

Colleen: Well, that's how I- That's how I pass out. 

Meghan: I've always got my hand [over my face].

Colleen: I'm sure my fellow jurors from when I passed out at jury duty can confirm I swooned attractively. 

Meghan: Gosh. Nancy looks just mildly concerned. 

Colleen: Yeah. 

Meghan: In this picture. 

Colleen: It happens.

Meghan: She's just, like, pointing it out to John. John looks like- I mean, his body language- He's like, “Oh my god!” Nancy's like, “Hey, that looks like it's on fire.” 

Colleen: God, she's such a good detective. 

Meghan: She's like, “Oh my.” 

Colleen: “A clue!”

Meghan: A clue. 

Colleen: Oh, is it the burning bungalow? 

Meghan: “With all of my things in there.” 

Colleen: Oh yeah, all her stuff gets burnt up. 

Meghan: Yeah. 

Colleen: Her stuff gets stolen. Her identity gets stolen. 

Meghan: Her wallet gets stolen!

Colleen: Her wallet gets stolen. Okay, so Nancy's wallet gets stolen. So Carson gets her special permission to drive, which is interesting. That's a whole thing. So she can drive until she gets a replacement license. And that's been, like, one day and then the doppelgänger later is, like, “No, it's me. Look, I have my ID.” I'm like, “Nancy reported that stolen! That's worse!” 

Meghan: But I think all that Gay was trying to do, in that moment was earn some time. And the police officer that happened to be there didn't necessarily know all the details of that. And the only thing that saved Nancy right there was that Carson showed up and he knows what his daughter actually looks like.

Colleen: He didn't at first! There was a bit of- 

Meghan: From afar! From afar. You've got to- Yeah, you know. 

Colleen: But, like, she ran over to hug him. He goes, “Oh, Nancy, I'm so glad you're safe.” And Nancy's like, “Um, that's not me.” I wanted Carson to be like, “Tell me something only Nancy would know.” 

Meghan: I was hoping for one of those scenes too. 

Colleen: I love those. 

Meghan: I love a good scene like that. 

Colleen: Here's- I found it. “Mr. Drew had obtained special permission for her to drive until her new license was mailed. Fortunately, he had had a key to her car in his key case.” Just many things in that sentence that aren't things anymore. 

[Sound Cue: Synthesized harp plays descending notes under the spoken words “Blast from the Past”]

Meghan: In this segment, we're going to talk about either interesting things that we had to look up, things that aren't- 

Colleen: As common in our society anymore. 

Meghan: That we've replaced. Earlier technologies. 

Colleen: Or things that just don't hold up. 

Meghan: Yeah. Pretty much anything that can fall under that umbrella. 

Colleen: I have exactly one million of these. 

Meghan: Exactly one million. 

Colleen: Yes. 

Meghan: I think the first thing I wanted to talk about was calling “free diving” “skin diving.” 

Colleen: Is it called “free diving”? I have not heard of any of this. 

Meghan: Yes. 

Colleen: I don't know anything about diving. 

Meghan: Basically it's not using scuba gear, so. 

Colleen: But she had an Aqualung!

Meghan: But, like, you don't have, like, a[n] oxygen tank with you. 

Colleen: Okay. Is that why it's so dangerous and why she wasn't supposed to go alone? 

Meghan: I think just in general, you're not supposed to go diving alone overall. 

Colleen: In case of sharks.

Meghan: But basically, like, yeah! Even in the river, there might be a shark. You don't know! But that's separating it from, like, scuba diving or deep-water diving.

Colleen: There's a lot of objects and a lot of phrases. So, like, John is twinkling his eyes at Nancy and Emily goes, “Now, don't go making up to my friends.” I'm like, “Like, apologizing?” 

Meghan: That's what I, yeah. 

Colleen: But it clearly means flirting. 

Meghan: Helen is engaged to Jim Archer and still- Yeah, I remember we brought that up in book two. We were like, “Is this going to be an ongoing thing?” 

Colleen: Yes.

Meghan: Apparently!

Colleen: “And Nancy, well, she's mighty busy these days.” Mr. Daly, the gardener, just randomly has a Revolutionary War musket on him. 

Meghan: He's like, “It's just been here.” 

Colleen: Yeah, it's not loaded. I thought it would just scare off an intruder, which, you know, great strategy.

Meghan: I mean, that's the reason I have a sword. I'm not going to use it. I just figure if I come around a corner with a sword!

Colleen: Yeah! Yeah!

Meghan:  It's not sharp on the edges. It's a replica. 

Colleen: Yeah, fair enough. 

Meghan: But I figure it'll scare someone. So I get Mr. Daly.

Colleen:  They have to firefight the cottage. We didn't talk about this. They have to do that themselves. They have to get, like, a bucket brigade going.

Meghan: And they do. They are able to put it out. 

Colleen: They are, but it's, like- In my head that's never going to be as effective as the fire department. But if it's in the country, and I guess that just, stuff was spaced out enough that that was not going to come fast enough. 

Meghan: Yeah. 

Colleen: And you have to go find a landline to call them. There's no sprinklers obviously. 

Meghan: Yeah. Yeah. They're kind of out in the country. 

Colleen: Ooh, would this be a situation where a fireboat could come? We used to have a kiddie pool that was shaped like a fireboat. 

Meghan: Oh my gosh. 

Colleen: And then if you hooked the hose up, the hose of the fireboat would spray water.

Meghan: That's amazing. 

Colleen: It was so cool. But I've never seen a fireboat in real life. If they're on the river, and people are coming up to visit them on the river-

Meghan: I saw fireboats in Venice. 

Colleen: Ooh, that makes sense. 

Meghan: I also wanted to talk about the eavesdropping on the phone. 

Colleen: Yes!

Meghan: Because I obviously remember that as a possibility from my childhood. 

Colleen: Nancy's calling somebody and then she, before she hangs up, she hears a click, as if somebody else on the landline on another, like, phone in the other room has hung up as well, so.

Meghan: Yeah, it turns out the phone is actually tapped, not- 

Colleen: Not someone in the house. It's an inn and there's, like, a lot of different rooms and they're like, “Which of them are hooked up? Because I know the inn's not ready yet, so it's not every phone. We've got it narrowed down to a couple of rooms.” I think it's, like, the rude Maude lady, who we have not talked about at all. We've got to bring her up later. Did you, growing up, have to deal with that? 

Meghan: No. I don't know. My family is- We're pretty respectful of each other. But I remember that being, like, a hallmark of, like, sitcoms and stuff, like, the nosy friend or the nosy parent, like, listening in on the line. And it just struck me, I'm like, “Oh shoot, like, that's not a thing at all anymore.” 

Colleen: It's really not.

Meghan: Just within the last decade. Really, like, my parents just got rid of their landline.

Colleen: My dad has a landline but it's pretty much only for spam. Nobody really calls it!

Meghan: My husband's parents still have a landline, and the only person that calls is his grandpa and spam. 

Colleen: Yep!

Meghan: They always answer it because it's either Grandpa or spam. 

Colleen: Our great-aunts will switch between calling my dad's cell or the house one and I don't know what they, how they decide. They're just weird in general. We love them. 

Meghan: I had forgotten that that was a possibility. There's not really the same way of- I mean, I'm sure that you can still listen in on phone calls in different ways. 

Colleen: I'm sure we've invented new ways. That was just very common, like, someone in your house is, like, very easily, like, any day- 

Meghan: Yeah. 

Colleen: Just could pick up the other end of the line.

Meghan: Yeah, you did not necessarily know, as long as they were quiet on the other line. 

Colleen: And they wait for you to hang up first so you don't hear a click. 

Meghan: Then all of your conversations could theoretically be listened to. So you gotta be careful about what you say on the phone. 

Colleen: I want to talk about the charge plate. 

Meghan: That is my next thing too!

Colleen: Great. Tell me more about this. So her identity gets stolen, but before- It's not even her whole wallet. It is just for this, like, department store. They're like, “Yeah, you showed up and then you bought stuff you couldn't afford and blah, blah, blah.” And so yeah, her charge plate is gone. What is this? 

Meghan: Well, and also-

Colleen: It's not even just a credit card for the store, like you would have, like, a Kohl's credit card or whatever. 

Meghan: Well, I think it is. 

Colleen: It is?

Meghan: Yeah, a charge plate is a precursor to a credit card. 

Colleen: Okay.

Meghan: So a charge plate is an identification plate, one that you can take an impression issued to a customer and use to make purchases on a credit basis. 

Colleen: When you say take an impression, is that, like, put a paper over it and, like, rub it, like, a gravestone-rubbing-type-thing? 

Meghan: Yep. Exactly. I have some pictures of what a charge plate looks like. 

Colleen: Oh, interesting.

Meghan: So, see, it's got, like, the name and the address. It's got a little case that you slide it into. 

Colleen: Now that, to me, feels easier to fake than, like, a credit card. 

Meghan: They've got the official one and Nancy has to sign it. Like, you have to sign with it. 

Colleen: The rubbing?

Meghan: And honestly, it's a pretty good, like, identity theft.

Colleen: Oh yeah, and she studies her signature. 

Meghan: It's very convincing. So she looks just like her. She's wearing one of Nancy's actual dresses. Like, she's apparently very good at voices. I don't know how she knows. 

Colleen: But it's not just store people. Some of her- Not friends, but, like, acquaintances are fooled. And then Carson for a second there. 

Meghan: Yeah. 

Colleen: ‘Cause actors. You can't trust them.

Meghan: She's got the charge plate. She knows Nancy's address. She's got Nancy's signature. Even Nancy is like, “Wow, that does look like my signature. Yes, that was my dress. Yes, that is what my hair looks like, and that is my charge plate.”

Colleen: “However!”

Meghan: “But this was not me!”

Colleen: And I appreciate that. I think the only reason that they're believed is Chief McGinnis stands up for her, like, “If Nancy says she didn't do it, she didn't do it.”

Meghan: “She didn't do it!” Like, but Nancy is very lucky that she did not, like, get arrested or charged with fraud, like- 

Colleen: That was almost foolproof. Good work, Gay! 

Meghan: Yeah, like, incredibly impressive. Very good plan. 

Colleen: And before- The first thing that they noticed stolen is Nancy's picture so she can, like, study and get her makeup and everything right too. 

Meghan: Yes. So yeah, very specific things that she stole from Nancy's house because it's, like, a dress Nancy hasn't worn, like, in a little bit. Her picture to study her and the charge plate. And I wonder, like, none of the things that were charged were, like, used at all in the book? I wonder if it was just, if that was a test. To see if she could get away with it. 

Colleen: It wasn't even that. She said she just likes fine jewelry and clothes and stuff like that. And so she was like, “Well, first I'll do this, because that's for me.” 

Meghan: Yeah. 

Colleen: “Then-” 

Meghan: “Then we're going to the real plan.” So if Gay had just stuck with, like, “Let me just steal Nancy's identity, get a few things before Nancy catches on and then-”

Colleen: Probably would have got away with it.

Meghan: “Move on to the next person, scout out-”

Colleen: This could have been a career!

Meghan: It could have been a career for her. Career criminal. 

Colleen: “If it wasn't for this meddling Nancy.” John has a Jeep. I didn't know we had jeeps back then. 

Meghan: I also think- 

Colleen: I- Specifically we’re calling them this with a lowercase “J.” 

Meghan: They are not that different than, like, “That is a 1950s Jeep.” 

Colleen: Well, and I knew that “jeep” was short for, like, “GP,” like, a “general patrol” [Transcription-Colleen’s note: “general purpose” or “government purposes,” actually, but this word origin theory isn’t confirmed] or something and then it turned into a brand maybe? 

Meghan: I don't know enough about that.

Colleen:  Okay, this is not a brand. This is not, “I'll go get my Toyota,” whatever. This is “I'll get the jeep.” We just have jeeps. Hmm. Nancy tries later to get Emily to not tell somebody everything. And so, like, she gives her a warning look. And Emily goes-

Meghan: Yes, 

Colleen: “Nancy, why did you give me the high sign?” The what? 

Meghan: “The high sign?” 

Colleen: We all know about that. H-I-G-H. Yeah. 

Meghan: [makes a “high” gesture that Snoop Dogg would approve of]

Colleen: No, I don't know that it was-

Meghan:  I didn't think it was that, but that was the only thing I could come up with. 

Colleen: The high sign. Not a high five. And it was, like, it just was a warning look. 

Meghan: And what then is that warning look? You know, there was, like, that TikTok trend for a little bit, like- 

Colleen: Like trying to get out of a conversation with a creepy guy?

Meghan: Like the eyes that you do? I'm like, “Was it a really obvious, like, [clearing throat] mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, Emily!!!” Like-

Colleen: According to Merriam-Webster, it's a “surreptitious gesture, often prearranged, giving warning or indicating that all is well.” 

Meghan: [clearing throat, sliding index finger across throat in a “cut” gesture]

Colleen: Yes, just a little cutting off your throat. 

Meghan: Sorry for all of my visuals right now in this auditory form. 

Colleen: I just hate that it can give warning or indicate that all is well. That doesn't work for me. I need to either know that this is a bad or a good thing. 

Meghan: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's just, like, a predetermined sign ahead of time, so she and Emily must be pretty close then. If they have a predetermined sign. My college friends and I had a [sign], for when we had a conversation we wanted to get out of. Because of when I went to college, the finger mustache was a big thing. My freshman year of college, we were all very into the finger mustache. 

Colleen: Oh my god. 

Meghan: And so, so what we had started doing is, like, when we were in an awkward conversation we wanted to get out of, we would be, like- [puts index finger horizontally under nose] 

Colleen: Like, put your finger under your nose as if you have a finger mustache, to be, like- Subtly, like you're scratching.

Meghan: Because we used that as, like, “Awkward!” Like- [poses with “finger mustache”]

Colleen: That's cool!

Meghan: And so that was, like, our awkward symbol. 

Colleen: That's a subtle high sign. 

Meghan: Yeah, it was a good high sign actually. But I did not know that's what they were called.

Colleen: It says, like, the earliest use is 1899. I'm, like, when was the latest? 

Meghan: Typically- This book [was] the last time it was used 

Colleen: “1961 for The Mystery at Lilac Inn.” Did you notice the typewriter clues? 

Meghan: The A? 

Colleen: The A on this typewritten thing from the imposter-Nancy is very faint. And I remember this being a thing with, like, Encyclopedia Brown mysteries. 

Meghan: Oh I didn't like Encyclopedia Brown.

Colleen: Oh, I used to. And so, like, you know that this was not typed at this person's house, because every typewriter is going to be a little different. This is another thing where, like, this is very helpful, and it's not a thing anymore cause all computer-typed stuff is going to look the same.

Meghan: Yeah!

Colleen: Maybe your printer's out of ink, but that's very easily replaced. Where it's, like, oh, if the A's a little faint [on my typewriter], I'm not going to go get that fixed. It's fine. Or, like, something chipped off on the E, so all the Es look like Os or whatever. Like, something like that. So, so then the, like, the weird Maude character, she's like- She's got a typewriter in her room. “I wonder if this is [the typewriter that left this note].” And so she [Nancy], like, goes over and nonchalantly types “Nancy.”

Meghan: I know! 

Colleen: It's, like, sure, but the- You- Now you've ruined that whole page. 

Meghan: That's what I was thinking! 

Colleen: Nancy!

Meghan: She just is, like, talking to Maude and she's like, “Okay, I'm no longer as suspicious anymore.”

Colleen: “Oh, all the letters are the same, the A's not fainter.” 

Meghan: “Oh, never mind!” 

Colleen: Yeah, I guess that is-

Meghan: She just walks away! She doesn't even say anything! She just goes over to her typewriter, types her name and leaves.

Colleen: Like a normal person!

Meghan: So, to Maude, it's just the most off-the-wall- Like, “You never know what that Nancy Drew's gonna do next!” 

Colleen: Yeah, I don't know, man. That's very odd. 

Meghan: One other thing I wanted to talk about-

Colleen: Yeah. 

Meghan: -was the word “titian.”

Colleen: That's strawberry blonde! 

Meghan: Yes. 

Colleen: I only know that from Nancy. 

Meghan: Yes. 

Colleen: I think it's gonna be in a lot of other books. 

Meghan: So when I searched the word “titian,” because mostly I also wanted to know how to pronounce it, because it is spelled “T-I-T-I-A-N,” so I was like, “Tit-ee-an.” And I was like, “That can't be right. But maybe it is. Who knows?” It's Titian. [ty-shen] 

Colleen: I've only ever seen it in Nancy Drew. 

Meghan: They described her hair as titian three different times

Colleen: Because of the wigs and everything. But previously she was- 

Meghan: She's always been blonde. 

Colleen: So now it's strawberry blonde. I'm used to her being a strawberry blonde, but in the first couple books it was just blonde. 

Meghan: Yes. The term originates from Titian, an Italian painter who would often depict women with red hair of this description.

Colleen: Ohhhh.

Meghan: So, like, that was, like, his favorite color to paint his women with this color hair. And so now the entire hair color apparently was identified by, like, a Renaissance painter. 

Colleen: “Michaelangelo hair.”

Meghan: And this is, this is again- Yeah, right? Exactly. Or, like- But, like, you think about, like, Botticelli! Like, you- 

Colleen: Like, Botticelli woman-

Meghan: Like a Botticelli shape. 

Colleen: -body type. Yeah. How interesting. I did not know that. 

Meghan: And so this is also from my favorite source, Wikipedia. 

Colleen: Great. 

Meghan: The titian hair Wikipedia page.

Colleen: Ohhh.

Meghan: “Characters in Popular Culture with Titian Hair.” 

Colleen: Is it Nancy? 

Meghan: Anne Shirley, of Anne of Green Gables, is described as having titian hair. 

Colleen: Great. 

Meghan: Nancy Drew. 

Colleen: Great! 

Meghan: “The titular…” That's how you say it? 

Colleen: Titular. 

Meghan: Titian. Titian, tite-ular. “The titular character of the mystery fiction series of books was described as, and depicted with, titian hair from 1959.” 

Colleen: So they even point out that it's not the whole time. 

Meghan: And Midge the Barbie doll has titian hair. And Dana Scully from The X-Files has naturally titian hair. 

Colleen: This is a good group of women and I would read a book of them. 

Meghan: Right? I'm like, “Okay!” And you can still, mostly we call it, I think, strawberry blonde or red blonde, but you can buy this hair dye that's titian red blonde Color Charm. Look at that color. 

Colleen: Yeah, I don't think I've seen that on a lot of hair. Like, that's not the usual. 

Meghan: And well, and now, yeah. And I haven't, I hadn't ever really heard it described like that. But then when I was looking, like, it seems to still- It's not unused. It's still a word that we, like, use in advertising and things like that. 

Colleen: Interesting.

Meghan: I mean, even The X-Files. But yeah, titian, I feel like, is a very- Very blast from the past. Cause it goes- 

Colleen: It goes all the way back to the Renaissance. 

Meghan: Yeah. It goes all the way back to the Renaissance. I almost texted you while I was reading it. ‘Cause I spent twenty solid minutes looking up things about titian hair and I was like, “I am still on page one [of the actual Nancy Drew book].” 

Colleen: Great work. 

Meghan: “I have fallen down the rabbit hole.” 

Colleen: Yeah. That's us. I have one more. It's a word I got hung up on, but it's not as good. “Just then, Nancy noticed an envelope stuck in the crotch of the tree.” Like, it just- It just means the intersection. I know it's what it means, but I've never heard it used for anything other than the intersection of legs. And then she just keeps talking about, “Nancy picked up the damp envelope, wondering if it had been blown there or placed in the crotch for someone to find.” I was like, “You need to stop, ma'am!” And, oh, and this probably isn't right, but you think of a crotchety old man and that's, they're very cross. It's not- It's not related, right? Because it's, like, the cross of the branches, it's the cross of the legs, it's the intersection, that can't be right. But I just- 

Meghan: The crotch of the tree.

Colleen: The crotch of the tree. Call it something else. There's so many other words, ma'am. That's all. That's a great one to end on, right?

[Sound Cue: The spoken words “Wound Watch” are followed by a low voice exclaiming as if punched in the stomach]

Meghan: In this segment, we focus on the wounds sustained by our dear darling Nancy. 

Colleen: She, despite being in danger from probably twenty different things, doesn't really get hurt?

Meghan: Yeah!

Colleen: I just wrote down that she got tied up and bound and was kind of thrown around a submarine. And then the submarine also crashes and is, like, burning up as well. And so she has to escape from that. So she might have some smoke inhalation, but, like, she's pretty much fine. 

Meghan: Yeah. She survives a crashed canoe, a bomb. The fire set by the bomb. 

Colleen: Guest cottage is burning down. A skin diving incident with a spear. A rock gets thrown at her car. She almost gets run off the road. She's kidnapped and the submarine is sinking. There's something else too, I think. But she's fine. She doesn't get hurt, which I'm happy for, but I'm like, “Wow.” Carson doesn't get, you know, chloroformed. Helen gets knocked out by a blunt instrument by the imposter. But yeah, no, that's it. There's no wounds to watch for on our dear protagonist or even her father.

Meghan: Yeah!

Colleen: So good job, Nancy. Yeah. This is the safest you've been despite everything that's happening. 

Meghan: Thus far, safest she has been. Where is our- Oh, that is actually something I did want to maybe consider adding to this section, is the number of drownings or close- Or close calls. Girl has been in so many boating accidents in four books. 

Colleen: So many! And there's two in this one. So, like, it's getting higher and higher. 

Meghan: Yeah. 

Colleen: How often are you in the water? I'm never in the water.

Meghan: Me neither. I'm also, like, kind of afraid of it because I'm afraid of getting in a boat accident.

Colleen: ‘Cause of all these?

Meghan: Last time I was in a kayak, I did get into a kayaking accident and drowned my phone and punched a rock. 

Colleen: Oh that's right. I remember this. That was fun. 

Meghan: Yeah. But, like, that happened to me once and it was fairly traumatizing where I was like, “Oh shoot, this is why people drown.” I'm a very good swimmer and I've lived by the water, actually, most of my life because of the Navy. But I mean, I know Nancy lives on a river and I guess she, like, goes places.

Colleen: Does she live [next] to it? Does she just- 

Meghan: I mean she's in River Heights so I assume, like-

Colleen: [singing] I never connected that! I'm not a good sleuth!

Meghan: In the first book, she does not go in the river or any water. 

Colleen: But then there's, like- She's boating to her friend's camp, to summer camp with Helen. 

Meghan: In The Bungalow Mystery. 

Colleen: Is that The Bungalow Mystery? I thought that was another one. She's, like, always almost drowning. 

Meghan: I know. So- 

Colleen: She had to fix a boat in one of them, because the boat engine- 

Meghan: Yeah. I mean she almost drowns in a storm. She doesn't drown at all in the first book. But the third book, she almost drowns twice in that one! 

Colleen: Yeah. 

Meghan: They started sinking and they had to call for help. And that girl was like, “I'll save you. My parents drowned.” And Nancy's like, “Wow, that must've been traumatizing. Tell me more. Also, I just almost drowned.” And then she almost drowns again.

Colleen: Nancy. 

Meghan: Yeah. So girl needs to stay away from the water. 

Colleen: But she's a good swimmer. 

Meghan: She's a very good swimmer and diver. 

Colleen: And diver! She has awards. Awards for diving. She's in the newspaper about it. 

Meghan: Yeah. I don't know if we also wanted to, at any point. do a count of how many times Nancy has been kidnapped and tied up. 

Colleen: That's true. We could start now. 

Meghan: Because that was something my sister and I always thought was really funny was that these books always had something that were like, “Kidnapped!” “Trapped!” “No escape!”

Colleen: Oh yeah. Constant kidnapping. 

[Sound Cue: The spoken words “Drew’s Clues” are followed by the sound of the dog from Blue’s Clues barking four times in a recognizable pattern]

Meghan: In this segment, we look at clues that just help us build Nancy out into a well-rounded character. All the details we can [find] about her as a person. 

Colleen: Yeah. She's good at puns!

Meghan: She's good at puns? 

Colleen: Yes. So page four, after they've gotten sunk and they can't figure out why, because it's the river- Helen- There's a guy that, like, doesn't help them. And Helen goes, “He didn't even try to help us. Do you think maybe he upset our canoe?” And Nancy goes, “I don't see how he could have, but he has upset you.” 

Meghan: Aw. 

Colleen: I really like that. 

Meghan: She's got some good jokes. 

Colleen: It was very charming. I don't know that Helen liked it because she was, like, dripping wet and like, “I have been drowned. Do not make puns about me.” But it was very cute to me. 

Meghan: The other thing I wrote down, on page twenty-four, and this is actually, I think, where I want to start talking about one of the characters we haven't really talked about much, which is Maude

Colleen: She was very suspicious too. 

Meghan: Yes, but- 

Colleen: But too suspicious. I was like, “It can't be her because-”

Meghan: She's so suspicious. 

Colleen: Because she's so suspicious. 

Meghan: But Nancy is going back to River Heights to go get more stuff, including the diving equipment. And Maude, who is an employee at the inn, just decides she's also coming and she doesn't really have a reason. She just is like, “Oh, I'm coming too. Yeah.” And gets in the car. 

Colleen: She's the social director?

Meghan: Yeah. She's the social director for the summer and everyone in the car is like, “Ooooookay.” 

Colleen: “Great.” 

Meghan: And she's been also very erratic already, where she was screaming and yelling earlier and very grumpy. And then she was like, “Oh, hi everyone, I'm Maude.” 

Colleen: She does. And she doesn't know how to mind her business. So she's always like, “Well, I think I could do this better and I could do this better.” Like, that's literally not your job. You're hired for the social director. Stop telling this person and that person what to do. 

Meghan: So as they're driving, which I think it is just Nancy and Maude, she's got all these, like, tasks to do. Nancy has to go to her house and get more clothes. She needs to get her diving suit. She needs to go check on Hannah because her house got broken into and her room is destroyed. 

Colleen: Yeah! She's been asked to go to the employment agency, which we didn't talk about in Blast from the Past, but I thought that was cool. Like, listen, I need a job. My job is: Tell people [that] this person needs a job. 

Meghan: So Maude is just, like, all, “Me too! I'm coming too.” And Nancy's too polite to be like, “No, I'm going by myself.” 

Colleen: “To my home.” 

Meghan: “To my house.” “She hopped in beside Nancy without waiting for an invitation.”

Colleen: Hmm.

Meghan: And as they're driving, Maude just keeps asking her all these very direct questions, like, “Any ideas about your burglar?” And she's like, “No, but they might have been trying to get into Dad's safe.” And she's like, “Well, how- Does your dad keep lots of important things in the safe? Like, what's in there?” And Nancy's like, “Mm, yeah, I guess sometimes.” “And she tried to hide her annoyance at the woman's inquisitiveness.” And I was like, “Okay.” 

Colleen: Hypocritical? Miss Hypocrite! Yeah, no.

Meghan: Yeah! Miss Hypocrite here, not liking to be interrogated.

Colleen: Uh-huh, whereas she's like, “Oh, your mom drowned? Tell me more.”

Meghan: Yeah. Or “Who lives in that house? How well do you know them? Have you ever seen anything suspicious?” 

Colleen: Right. 

Meghan: “Why are you acting so suspicious?” 

Colleen: Oh yeah. 

Meghan: I'm like, “Dude.” 

Colleen: At first, I was like, “That's nice that she's trying to hide her annoyance because this woman is annoying.” And then I was like, “Wait, you do this stuff, too.” However, Maude is also trying to, like, get with Carson. Like, “Oh, he's a widower. Tell me more about your super cute dad.” 

Meghan: And she's like, “Oh hi, Mr. Carson Drew.” “Flutter my eyelashes.” 

Colleen: Literally. She probably twinkled her eyes. 

Meghan: She tried. So Maude spends the whole book being very suspicious and very annoying. 

Colleen: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. She knows best. She knows what's going to happen at the inn. Nancy's been asked to go get a new maid because the maid quit because it was haunted. The maid was freaking out. Now the maid was Gay. Was the woman named Gay who is impersonating everybody. And so she's like, “It's too haunted here! I can't do it!”

Meghan: Right. Yep. She was the first maid. 

Colleen: And she was also the second maid. So then Nancy's like, “Hey, I'll stop at the employment agency. See if anybody's like, ‘So I could use work.’” Maid or waitress? 

Meghan: Waitress, actually. 

Colleen: Oh, okay. Then Maude's like, “Don't worry. I already stopped by for you. And there's somebody there and, and she'll come by tomorrow for an interview.” And she actually came by that night and it's, you know, to avoid the employment agency having a record of her because she wants to be on the down-low. And it is the same girl, but she's so good at makeup and disguises that they don't notice, blah, blah, blah. 

Meghan: Well, and actually Gay actually even says at the end, she's like, “Wow, it was, like, really convenient. I was going to register there and do all the work, but I got to skip that section.” 

Colleen: Yup, exactly! Well then, specifically Nancy was like, “Did anybody stop by about this? Yeah, because I know Maude's nosy,” and the girl's like, “Nope, nobody stopped by!” 

Meghan: And Maude is looking for- It turns out she went to the agency because she's looking for a new job because she's very unhappy. 

Colleen: And she's been blackmailing Emily's aunt!

Meghan: Yes. And then when Nancy finally gets around to be like, “Cut the crap. What's going on?” She ends up finding out that Maude actually has a lot going on. She's also, it turns out, a widow. She's been having financial struggles and she just seems like not a very stable person to be able to deal with these problems and is making some really poor decisions, hence her suspiciousness. But I guess, those things being said, I found Nancy to be a little bit hypocritical in that moment. 

Colleen: Oh yeah. 

Meghan: As well as showing an immense amount of patience for dealing with Maude because-

Colleen: Also that, because she is relentless.

Meghan: Yeah, Maude is the most obnoxious character and honestly the character I have liked least out of any of the extra back-up characters. 

Colleen: Yeah!

Meghan: There have been some characters, like, that that we see for a scene. But to have this character as pretty much a core character for this, I was like, “Oh my god.” 

Colleen: She's making herself a core character. She shows up and says, “I'm supposed to be a part of this.” I've worked with people like that, of, like, “This isn't about you. I would love if I could just have my own conversation or deal with my own problem, and you could not be a part of it because nobody wants you to, and nobody asked you to, and you're actively making it harder to deal with it. And I see that you need attention but can you find it in a different way?” 

Meghan: “And not with my dad.”

Colleen: And not- Exactly. “Go away!”

Meghan: She very much- Yeah, she's very attention-seeking. But I'm very impressed with Nancy's patience and it's Emily who finally, like, breaks down and is like, “Get out of here!”

Colleen: “Get out!”

Meghan: “Go somewhere else! Stop talking. Stop doing this. Oh my god.” 

Colleen: I love that. Thank you, Emily. Yes. 

Meghan: I know. So those are my Drew's Clues for Nancy. She goes to church again in this book. 

Colleen: I've got one more and it is Mr. Drew confessing alarm about Nancy meeting with her double. He goes, “No telling what she and her accomplices may be up to, but whatever you do, Nancy, don't overstep anyone's legal rights.” “I'll remember.” Thanks, Dad, for that reminder. Most people don't have to be reminded. It's fine. 

Meghan: You know who needed some more reminders of things like that? Veronica Mars. Who- 

Colleen: Honestly, she's always doing crimes!

Meghan: I know, and her dad is also involved in law enforcement. He never is, like, “You know, Veronica, maybe you shouldn't go break into people's houses.”

Colleen: Mm-hmm, until she's fully at the police station for breaking into someone's house and then they have to be like, “This is awkward. You're always here. Thoughts?” Crime Bad, unless I'm doing it. 

Meghan: Yes, right. I have one more, which is that Nancy is terrible at coming up with fake aliases. 

Colleen: I was also thinking of Veronica Mars for this because Veronica Mars goes by Nancy Drew at one point and introduces her dad as Carson, which was very funny to me. 

Meghan: Yes. So what is Nancy's fake name here? Dru Gruen. 

Colleen: Her first name? Dru, D-R-U. Her last name? Hannah's last name! Good work. 

Meghan: But it also just, like, I don't- 

Colleen: It's a catchy- Dru Gruen. 

Meghan: Gruen. 

Colleen: It's got some assonance there.

Meghan: But does she- She introduced herself as a[n] aspiring actress as well?

Colleen: Yeah. 

Meghan: Yeah, it is a good stage name. 

Colleen: Yeah. But it could be so easily traced.

Meghan: But I do think knowing Nancy, I just feel like it could have been an opportunity for a lot more creativity. 

Colleen: She's busy. She's getting blown up constantly. 

Meghan: That's true.

Colleen: She doesn't have time to be creative. It's that Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Bottom tier, don't get blown up. Then at the top, you can do creative stage names. 

Meghan: Perfect.

[Sound Cue: Simple piano tune underneath the spoken words “Sleuthing Skills”]

Meghan: In this segment, we help you, the listener, gather the skills necessary so that you can follow in Nancy Drew's sleuthing footsteps. 

Colleen: Her nice, beautiful, exclamation-point-shaped high-heeled footsteps. 

Meghan: Yes. 

Colleen: These are things you need to have already in your skill toolkit before you even start on your first mystery. If you don't know these, don't even try. 

Meghan: If your mystery is starting now, you have to bow out because you might not have all the skills necessary.

Colleen: Yeah. So first off, I noted that they are not only excellent swimmers, but when they sink, Nancy and Helen instinctively grab their buoyant waterproof canvas traveling bags. 

Meghan: All of your supplies must be waterproof and buoyant in case you end up in a boating accident. 

Colleen: Several times per book. What have you caught? 

Meghan: Another skill you need is diving. 

Colleen: Yes. 

Meghan: You need experience in diving as well as your own diving equipment.

Colleen: Correct. That is more of a toolkit. But.

Meghan: You will not be given diving equipment. You must provide your own. 

Colleen: You must provide your own. And I did highlight the headline for the write-up of Nancy Drew's diving and the headline says, “Daughter of Local Lawyer Carson Drew Learns Her A-B-Seas in Skin Diving.” 

Meghan: And the “Cs” is spelled “S-E-A-S.” 

Colleen: Although it is in the river, but it's fine. She finished first by total points in the twenty-student group. So you have to not only be good at skin diving, you have to get points at doing it, which I don't know-

Meghan: An award-winning skin diver.

Colleen: An award-winning skin diver. How do you get points at skin diving? 

Meghan: I don't know. 

Colleen: I thought it was just kind of- 

Meghan: Depth? Length of time able to stay down? You must have amazing reflexes. You need to be able to catch spears that have been shot at you with your camera lens. You need to be able to dodge rocks thrown at you as you are in your investigating- 

Colleen: Vehicle. 

Meghan: Vehicle.

Colleen: Whether that's your Mystery Machine, your- 

Meghan: Your adorable convertible. 

Colleen: Your adorable convertible.

Meghan: But even just, you hear the ticking, you need to get up. 

Colleen: The instincts have got to be on point.

Meghan: Mm-hmm. 

Colleen: Yep, exactly, right. Similar to in previous books, you have to be really good at getting villains to talk. Nancy's not even doing anything. She's not doing the whole thing where she's like, “Well, if you confess now, then you- We can find some prison reform for you, blah, blah, blah.” Gay has kidnapped her and then talks for paragraphs and paragraphs about every detail of the plan. Nancy's just sitting there getting this out of her.

Meghan: And also-

Colleen: She's bound and gagged!

Meghan: She just has some really compelling eyes. 

Colleené: Yes, exactly. 

Meghan: Makes you want to confess. 

Colleen: Exactly. Like, Gay's fiance, a man for some reason, just goes, “You talk too much, Gay.” He growls this. But Nancy is so compelling. 

Meghan: And the last skill that I have: You need acting and costuming skills, à la Count Olaf, of A Series of Unfortunate Events. 

Colleen: Yes. Yes.

Meghan: So, a trunk in your attic full of random costumes that you might need at a moment's notice, including a ghost costume. 

Colleen: Obviously. Which is put together from- She said the wig was from a costume party and the dress is from something else. And then the flashlights, I would not have thought of as a costume piece, but they are used in this way. 

Meghan: And they're in her costume trunk, apparently. You know, this is something that you can be building from all sorts of different resources. As you've seen, Nancy has- It's Halloween costumes and other different things that she has around. Make sure you are putting together your disguise case. 

Colleen: Exactly. My last one is you have to be able to kind of look at a wall, maybe feel it once, and identify the secret passageway at once. So she sees these little lilac buds, she's like, “How'd they get here?” And nobody says, “Because we're at The Lilac Inn, ma'am!” She looks at the wall thoughtfully, she taps the wall a little bit, finds one spot that sounds different, has a hollow ring, and then presses against it and the panel slides aside. People lived there for decades and they didn't know there was [were] any secret passageways there and Nancy's like, “This wall is wrong. Got it.” 

Meghan: Yep. 

Colleen: It reminds me of when she, like, sits upright in bed and remembers something from the attic that looked weird. Of, like, that's not a thing! But okay!

Meghan: So carpentry? 

Colleen: Carpentry. Ooh, that would probably help a lot. Just wall knowledge in general. Wallage, if you will. 

Meghan: Wallage. 

[Sound Cue: Four distinct drum beats that mimic the opening of the song “Accidentally in Love” by Counting Crows, followed by the sung words “Accidentally Gay”]

Colleen: All right, this segment is where we talk about things that probably were not intended to seem queer, [but] either due to the language used or due to the subtext we have identified from our modern lens as seeming a little fruity, as it were. I can say that. I'm a little fruity. And it's great. So obviously we've got the main villain named Gay. She signs a letter “Hastily, but with love, Gay.” And I love this very much. And at the end, you know she's like- She was disguised as Mary, disguised as Jean or whatever. And at the end she goes, “You can just call me Gay now.” Like, very angry. I thought that was very entertaining just because I didn't know that was a name. It's delightful. Like, I've heard of- What am I thinking of when I think of the word Gaylords? Like, that was a thing. 

Meghan: Gaylord was a name. 

Colleen: It's a name. Is it a guy's name? 

Meghan: Male name.

Colleen: I've never heard just, like, the girl name Gay. And then Jean, who was also Gay in disguise, is like, “Well, I'm going to the optician’s first, and then I'll stop at my girlfriend’s.” But obviously that is probably just a friend that's a girl, as is used today, but I thought, just thought that was very entertaining. What have you- Have you noticed anything in here? 

Meghan: Obviously a lot about Gay. 

Colleen: Gay. 

Meghan: When you said, “Gay's partner,” not romantic partner, just crime partner, correct? 

Colleen: Yes.

Meghan: But she writes a letter to Lillie, another actress. 

Colleen: And she's jealous of her, because Lillie gets all the good roles. 

Meghan: But, like, “Hastily, but with love.”

Colleen: But she still cares about her. 

Meghan: Even though she's like, “Oh, I was always so jealous of her.” She steals something to give to her dad. 

Colleen: Like, a really nice hand-carved blue pipe made out of wood from the blue pipe tree, which is the lilac tree. 

Meghan: Yeah, and I mean, she doesn't seem to have contacted anyone else under her true alias. 

Colleen: Oh, and! The girl that she- That was one of the first people she stole from, and that person's, like, totally forgiven her. 

Meghan: Yeah. 

Colleen: I didn't even catch that. I was so hung up on Dick and John at the beginning being, like, college friends. Well, this is cute. 

Meghan: Yeah. So I feel like, she's- She's got some very complex feelings for Lillie.

Colleen: She's got a lot going on for her.

Meghan: I don't remember what Lillie's last name- Lillie Merriweather. 

Colleen: That sounds right. 

Meghan: An actress.

Colleen: I keep seeing, like, “Lil,” and it's for “Lilac,” so I'm like, “That's not helpful.” 

Meghan: I put Helen and Nancy sharing a cabin as per use [shortened form of “usual”]. 

Colleen: Yes, and then Mr. Drew is like, “Helen, you got, like, knocked out, you need to go home.” And she goes, “I can't desert Nancy!”

Meghan: I know. 

Colleen: It's so cute. I do ship them very much. Joan of Arc is brought up, one of the queerest saints. I mean, we were talking about this earlier off-mic, but there's- Obviously she didn't use any of these words that we would use to identify herself, but she really resonates with a lot of, like, transmasc people and nonbinary people. A big part of the reason why she got burned at the stake is not for her- 

Meghan: Religious heresy. 

Colleen: Religious heresy. It's because she wanted to wear pants and not a dress. There's a lot of gender stuff involved with her, and we don't have time to go into all of it here, but I was just like, “Oh, hello. I noticed you. I see you.”

Meghan: I have, on page ten, “Queer things have been going on at this inn.” 

Colleen: I marked that too. “I'm thinking of quitting” is the next line. “I can't deal with that.” 

Meghan: Out of context, out of context. 

Colleen: Yeah, it's just like, “The inn's haunted.” My last one is, we mentioned earlier, of, like, “Don't go making up to my friends.” You know, “Nancy's mighty busy these days.” And that sounded like a euphemism to me of, like, “Oh, this is the confirmed bachelor. You know, he's too busy for love.” I'm like, “Yeah, yeah, he's confirmed. Mm-hmm. Bert and Ernie, confirmed bachelors.” So I thought that was a nice little out if she's not into it.

[Sound Cue: Scribbling as of a pencil on paper underneath the spoken words “Miscellaneous Mysteries”]

Meghan: In this segment, Miscellaneous Mysteries, we talk about anything else that didn't really fit anywhere else but seems important enough to discuss. 

Colleen: Oh yeah. 

Meghan: What Miscellaneous Mysteries have you brought forth for us?

Colleen: I'm concerned that Nancy Drew is a radium girl. 

Meghan: Tell me more. 

Colleen: Do you know about the radium girls? 

Meghan: I do. 

Colleen: Tell me about them. 

Meghan: The radium girls were in factories making the glowing parts of, like, wristwatches. So they would have, like, radium on, like, paintbrushes, and paint the parts that needed to glow. And oftentimes the work was so very small, like, they would, like, either hold it in their mouth, like, in between different things. 

Colleen: They would tend to lick the paintbrushes to get it really pointy. In the way that you might, like, get an end of thread. 

Meghan: Yeah. Which, I mean, I do that way too much. 

Colleen: Oh, me too, but I also don't work with radium. 

Meghan: No. 

Colleen: And also the radium was very expensive, so it was like, “Don't waste it by being sloppy. You need to get the radium on a very fine point.” So their teeth would start glowing and then their teeth would start falling out and they would die of radium [poisoning]. Now I don't think that Nancy works in a radium wristwatch factory. These are around 1917, starting then. But her watch has a luminous dial and I'm very concerned that it's radioactive and that this is going to be a source of later injuries and she's not gonna know where it's coming from. It's gonna seem very mysterious. Because the radium girls knew that, like, “If I'm glowing when I get home, it's ‘cause I've got radium on me and it's very fun and cool.” But they didn't realize that, like, “Oh, my teeth are rotting out of my head and, like, my organs are failing. That's ‘cause of the radium.” So I'm just concerned about that. So I wanna keep an eye on her luminous watch.

Meghan: [reading from the internet] “Radium became more popular in the intervening years and was used in almost every watch between 1917 and the early 1970s.” Wow.

Colleen: So we're in the right time period for this, unfortunately. 

Meghan: Yeah. 

Colleen: So just concerning. 

Meghan: I didn't have a ton of Miscellaneous Mysteries. Most of the ones that I had here I was able to place into other segments. But I just felt like- My question is more just for Carolyn Keene. The end was so rushed. 

Colleen: It was! There was so much happening- 

Meghan: -within two pages. I don't even think-

Colleen: Do we talk about- Why is it a shark? Why do they have the submarine? 

Meghan: That one, that's never clear. 

Colleen: Okay. 

Meghan: Why do they have a submarine? 

Colleen: Can you physically have a sub in a river?

Meghan: Well, and they're like, “It's a really small one.” 

Colleen: Oh, well, if it's a small one, that's fine. 

Meghan: But, like, Nancy- There are different sections of it. She's in one section and the drivers are in a different section. 

Colleen: So they've got a sub in the river. They're diving for stuff and they're doing something in a building next door and so they have the vibrating machine to shake the inn. I don't know.

Meghan: It's not really clear what their, like, overall plan is. 

Colleen: Something with the electronics that John is hunting down? 

Meghan: They're selling it, like- And that's what happens- 

Colleen: And in the last chapter it's all being explained, but not very well. The sub looks like a shark to scare off people? Or just ‘cause the shape of it?

Meghan: Just ‘cause it's fun. So, like, they find the diamonds in the sub. They find out that John is on a secret mission from the Army. 

Colleen: John says some top-secret electronics parts were stolen from the base. Suspicion fell on this guy that got dishonorably discharged before it. 

Meghan: But yeah, like, all these things are revealed. It's like, “Oh, and this happened.” Nancy's like, “Okay, cool.” And then it's, like, “Next person's turn to talk.” And they're like, “We also found this.” She's like, “Great.” It's, like, a big summary. 

Colleen: Not to be confused with the little submarine. 

Meghan: Yeah, the submarine. They find the diamond. But over time, a lot of time passes between these last three pages. It took them, I think, hours to find the diamonds. And Nancy ends up getting an award from the Army. A week later, she got- She had a colorful Army ceremony. 

Colleen: Love that for her. 

Meghan: And presented with a distinguished civilian service medal for outstanding work. Then she goes back to the Lilac Inn on the eve of Emily's wedding. And we wrap up the story in, like, five paragraphs. It's just very rushed considering-

Colleen: It is. There was so much happening that I don't know. It was- 

Meghan: Everything else I felt like was so detailed prior to this that it just felt a little, like, whiplash at the end, where I'm like, “Whoa, whoa!”

Colleen: She was- I- My- Here's what happened. Uh, this is definitely true. Um, she [Carolyn Keene] got, like, 165 pages in, and she's like, “This is great. This is going great. Uh, I am really good at, like, weaving all this different stuff in.” And they're [the publishers] like, “All right, you got five pages left. Can't go back. Just finish it all up in five pages.” Like, “Oh god, what?” 

Meghan: “Okay, and this is why this happened and this is why this happened and the end.” 

Colleen: “The end!”

Meghan: And we figure out about the other Mary Malone and how she was the sister of- 

Colleen: Of Gay. So she took her name.

Meghan: And it wasn't her brother, that was her husband. Like, a lot of exposition to wrap up the story very quickly, because it was a very involved story and I was a little disappointed, to be honest, with just the ending. 

Colleen: Yeah.

Meghan: Everything else I really, really, liked.

Colleen: It was very fun! It just didn't get concluded very well. I agree with that.

Meghan: Those are my Miscellaneous Mysteries. 

Colleen: I've got three small ones. We've got somebody on the property that grabs Nancy when Nancy is dressed up as the ghost and she's not actually the suspicious one but this guy thinks he is. She goes, “Who are you?” He goes, “I'm a guard, Carl Bard.” And I can't wait for his spinoff! Tell me more about Carl Bard the Guard. It's so hard to say. Carl Bard the Guard. 

Meghan: It's like, Paul Blart: Mall Cop. 

Colleen: But worse. I mean better. 

Meghan: Worse but better. 

Colleen: It's my new theater warmup. Carl Bard the Guard. 

Meghan: Carl Bard the Guard. 

Colleen: Carl Bard. Unique New York. 

Meghan: You have to do it three times fast. 

Colleen: Exactly. Another mystery I have is- This is not a mystery. This is just a great example of why commas are important.

Meghan: Oh boy, my favorite. 

Colleen: That's right. “Gay tossed her head defiantly. The mink stole, evening gowns, and watch will fit into my new social life.” And even though the commas are correctly in there, I was like, “The mink stole evening gowns? I gotta watch?” It was great. I'm so proud of that mink. 

Meghan: I was also confused. I remember reading that and I'm like, “The mink stole. The minks stole what?” 

Colleen: The minks stole evening gowns. And watch! 

Meghan: And watch!

Colleen: Watch!

Meghan: It'll fit into my new social life. 

Colleen: “Okay, hold on. I gotta restart that sentence.” And then my other mystery is what Dick thinks Cinderella is. 

Meghan: Tell me more. 

Colleen: So after Nancy's out being a ghostie, she comes back in and she has the wig in her hand. She takes it off to show the guard, like, “No, it's me, it's Nancy, blah, blah, blah.” So she comes in with the wig in her hand and Nancy, like, didn't know that she was gonna be, like, parading in front of everybody and Maude goes, “‘Tired of being a blonde, Nancy?’ Maude asked sarcastically. ‘Or are you the mysterious ghost of Lilac Inn?’” And Emily's like, “Let me cover for her.” “‘Nonsense. I'll bet Nancy's date took her to a masquerade dance.’” Maude goes to bed and, like, accepts this. And then Dick is like, “I can tell Emily was kind of, like, covering for you.” “‘I need to hear why one of Emily's pretty bridesmaids-to-be is masquerading as Cinderella.” 

Meghan: What part of this feels like Cinderella?

Colleen: It's not, like, Cinderella's known for, “Wow, she wears a wig, or has dark hair.” Like, none of that was-? “Has flashlights in her sleeve.” Cinderella is, like, maybe blonde, maybe not. 

Meghan: Loses a shoe.

Colleen: Loses a shoe, has mice and a pumpkin. Nothing was Cinderella. Is Cinderella just what you think dressing up is always gonna be? I don't know. I was, like, that was not a clever line and you seem to think it was, like, really cool and, like, smooth and it doesn't mean anything! So that's my mystery. 

Meghan: Dick didn't have much personality though. 

Colleen: Dick did not have much personality or experience with fairy tales as a child apparently. Those are all my-

Meghan: Or experience [with] advertising, ‘cause, like- 

Colleen: Oh yeah!

Meghan: Actually, he's like- They're like, “Well, we have to finish all these things that are already in the brochure that everyone has already booked.” I'm like, “Guys.” 

Colleen: Then don't put it in the brochure!

Meghan: “Maybe you need to wait to make the brochure until you've made the changes.” 

Colleen: No. That's the only thing Dick knows how to do is make brochures! And send out thousands of them, apparently. 

Meghan: And they're booked solid for the summer. But I'm like, “Guys, the inn is haunted. You have fake earthquakes happening. Things are catching on fire!”

Colleen: Constantly!

Meghan: “There are bombs! People are stealing your motorboats!”

Colleen: And your trees?

Meghan: “And canoes! Maybe focus on that before you start, like, ‘Well, we have to build a pool.’” 

Colleen: Brochures! 

Meghan: The brochures must be completed. 

Colleen: Now! Just incredible.

[Sound Cue: Upbeat synthesizer chords reminiscent of a game show introduction play underneath the spoken words “Gumshoe Game Show!”]

Colleen: Welcome to the Gumshoe Game Show: Diamond Edition. 

Meghan: Ohhh, no! 

Colleen: All these questions are gonna be about diamonds, and especially diamonds in media. But not exclusively, because this one is about an author, this first one. Okay, Question One.

Meghan: Wait, wait, wait. We have to discuss my reward. 

Colleen: Oh yes, yes. 

Meghan: My prize. 

Colleen: Yes, yes. What are you playing for? Your reward if you win is gonna be what Nancy got or what we think she should have got. So in Secret of the Old Clock, it was an old clock. In The Hidden Staircase, she got a valuable silver urn, but we decided the better prize is the tricorn hat. 

Meghan: Yep. 

Colleen: And in The Bungalow Mystery, both the actual prize and your prize is the aquamarine ring. So what, what did she acquire in the Lilac Inn? 

Meghan: At the end of the Lilac Inn, Emily, the bride and the owner of the Lilac Inn, gave her a diamond bracelet in the shape of lilacs, I think. Let me see the exact description. 

Colleen: Was it with some of the diamonds, or at least the money from the diamonds from her set from her mom?

Meghan: I think so. Yeah, “The bride-to-be gave her two attendants pins set with tiny diamonds. Nancy's was in the form of a lilac spray.” So I would like Nancy's lilac spray. 

Colleen: That is good. Also, a spray of flowers is such a weird phrase to me. 

Meghan: It is. I want the lilac spray pin. 

Colleen: All right, that's what you're playing for. Okay. Are you ready for- 

Meghan: I'm ready.

Colleen: -trying to win your diamonds in the shape of a lilac spray? 

Meghan: Yes.

Colleen: Question One. A diamond brooch and ring once belonging to Agatha Christie were sold for $60,000 (converted from pound sterling) (by me) in 2014 after what event?

Meghan: Okay.

Colleen:  So what prompted these diamonds to be sold for a large amount of money? A) Her estate was running low on money and held an auction for the diamonds. B) A series of riddles and clues were solved that led to the finding of the diamonds. 

Meghan: I hope it's that one.

Colleen: C) A woman found them in a trunk she bought for $120 at a sale held by the estate, or D) They were found at the spa to which Christie disappeared claiming amnesia for eleven days in ‘26. 

Meghan: The one that's featured in the Doctor Who episode? 

Colleen: The one that is featured in the Doctor Who episode “The Unicorn and the Wasp.” Yes. 

Meghan: I knew it had the wasp in it. I couldn't remember what the first part was. The unicorn. 

Colleen: Okay. What's your thought process? 

Meghan: A sounds the most realistic. 

Colleen: Where they were running low on money and just had an auction?

Meghan: But I think that that is incorrect. I want that to be incorrect. 

Colleen: ‘Cause it's boring? 

Meghan: Yeah. The spa, I feel like I would have seen that. 

Colleen: That's fair. 

Meghan: I feel, like, Tumblr would have flipped out to be like, “Remember that Doctor Who episode? And when she had amnesia?” 

Colleen: Reaction GIFs.

Meghan: So I'm going to feel, like, that-

Colleen: “What's that?” “Salt.” “It's too salty!” “Oh, it's too salty, he says!”

Meghan: I'm going to go with C. 

Colleen: Correct. She bought a trunk from them for $120, it was 100 pounds, it was $120, and then she found the $60,000 diamond set! 

Meghan: Yes! So good. I really wanted the rules and clues to be correct. 

Colleen: I know, I know.

Meghan: That would have been very fun. 

Colleen: And yet. 

Meghan: As I do this for an imaginary diamond prize. 

Colleen: Yeah, that would have been very cool. Number Two. In the children's novel The Twenty-One Balloons, a professor crash-lands and discovers twenty fabulously rich families living off the wealth of the diamond mines on the volcanic island of Krakatoa. And basically what they do is they- They are very rich, but they know that if they bring the diamonds back to, like, not the island of Krakatoa, they will no longer be rich, because it'll crash the value. So they just know that they're rich, bring some diamonds back, get stuff and then go back there and be rich together.

Meghan: Got it. Okay. 

Colleen: The families are all named after letters for simplicity. They've shed their old names, I believe, and they cook and serve food to the rest of the families once every twenty days. So we've got, like, the As, the Bs, the whatever. 

Meghan: Twenty-five families. 

Colleen: There's twenty. 

Meghan: Twenty. 

Colleen: Yeah. 

Meghan: Oh. 

Colleen: Yeah, I don't know. Also, there's twenty-six letters. Did we know this? 

Meghan: Yes. I thought it was gonna be a question to say, like-

Colleen: Oh, which letter's not-

Meghan: Which letter isn't in there, or something like that.

Colleen: No, there's twenty families and so, and then so when this guy shows up, they're like, “Well, you could be Mr. U, but then it'll be- It'll get confusing because we'll say, ‘Hey, U,’ and we won't know if you mean ‘you’ or ‘U.’” All right, so which of these is not one of the themed alliterative home-slash-restaurants? Which one is not one of them? 

Meghan: Okay. 

Colleen: A) Mr. and Mrs. A's American restaurant, featuring apple pie. B) Mr. and Mrs. F's French restaurant, featuring a replica of the Hall of Mirrors. C) Mr. and Mrs. M's Moroccan restaurant, featuring mobile furniture that operates like bumper cars, or D) Mr. and Mrs. S's Swedish restaurant, featuring lingonberry jam delicacies? 

Meghan: Can you repeat them again? 

Colleen: Yes, we've got A) for American.

Meghan:  With apple pie. 

Colleen: B) for French with the Hall of Mirrors, 

Meghan: Okay.

Colleen: C) for the Moroccan restaurant with bumper car furniture including the tables and chairs, and D) for the Swedish restaurant with lingonberry jam delicacies. What have you crossed out? 

Meghan: I crossed out the Swedish one because blegen- Blegenberries? 

Colleen: Lingonberries.

Meghan: It was hard for you to say. 

Colleen: It was hard for me to say. 

Meghan: I feel like-

Colleen: So I wouldn't make that up. 

Meghan: Yeah. I think you would have chosen a different berry. 

Colleen: That's fair. 

Meghan: I am confused. Wait, so is B) F? 

Colleen: Yeah, that was Mr. F's. That was just Option B.

Meghan: I was like, “B. A) American, B) French, M) Moroccan, S) Swedish.” I was like, “Wait a second, hold on.” [inaudible] 

Colleen: You think the American apple pie is, like, too-

Meghan: I crossed it out, but I'm actually regretting. 

Colleen: You're regretting because you're using pen. 

Meghan: I actually think I'm gonna go with A. 

Colleen: It is actually the Swedish restaurant. The Swedish restaurant is not part of it. 

Meghan: Aww! I'm surprised!

Colleen: I was gonna make it even sound faker because the lingonberry jam sounds, like, an Ikea thing, but it is actually, like, a thing. But then I was gonna put in the little Ikea shark and I had to look up how to say it, it's “blow-high.” The “B-L-Å-H-A-J,” which I would have said “Blahage,” which is the shark that is- 

Meghan: A submarine. 

Colleen: Yes, it's a submarine. Yes, it's a stuffed shark. I was going to add that in too. Like, yes, they have a shark. No, and everyone apparently hates when it's M Day because they're like, “I hate eating here because the tables and chairs are moving and I get sick.” 

Meghan: I felt like that one was definitely true. 

Colleen: Yeah. 

Meghan: And actually, so- Considering I crossed out A and D. Even though I thought B and C, as I was thinking about like, “No, those ones are correct. Those ones definitely are right.” 

Colleen: Yeah, that was an interesting [inaudible]. That one was a really detailed one. And I'm sorry about that. But I just love that they're like, “Yes, we have all of our diamond mines and we're going to do all this different stuff with it and keep it separate.” And so, like, they have, like, sunglasses that they go, that they wear if they want to, like, go into the mine and just be like, “Look how rich I am. This is all my section.” 

Meghan: “This is mine.” 

Colleen: Exactly. “I'm going to leave it here because otherwise I won't be rich.” All right. Question Three. You're one for two so far. You're doing great. Question Three. In The Hunger Games, Effie Trinket is trying to point out that Katniss and Peeta aren't hopeless just because they come from the coal mining district. However, rather than pointing out the similarities between coal and diamonds, what does Effie erroneously say? A) “You can even find coal inside an oyster!” B) “If you put enough pressure on coal, it turns to pearls!” C) “Hashtag coal? More like hashtag goals, amiright?” D) “If we didn't have coal, we'd never have onyx.” So A) is oyster. 

Meghan: B) is comparing coal to pearls. 

Colleen: B) is pearls. C) is hashtag coal, hashtag goals. And D) is onyx. 

Meghan: It's not C. 

Colleen: It's not C. Correct. We didn't have hashtags back then. [Transcription-Colleen Note: Unclear what “back then” means because there certainly were hashtags back when The Hunger Games was published, but then the book itself takes place in the far future sooooo…IDK]

Meghan: I am going to say B.

Colleen: Correct. If you put enough pressure on coal, Effie thinks it turns to pearls. And that's very nice for her. And then it's brought up again in Catching Fire when Finnick is, like, diving for oysters to eat and he finds a little pearl inside and then Peeta and Katniss are like, “LOL, that's us.” 

Meghan: “Oh, that's us!”

Colleen: “That's us.” 

Meghan: “Underwater.” 

Colleen: Exactly. 

Meghan: “In the coal mines.” 

Colleen: “In the coal mines that are underwater.” Question Four. In Greek mythology-

Meghan: [gasp] Okay. 

Colleen: In Greek mythology, Uranus' or Uranus' [two different pronunciations] mother Gaia gives him a diamond sickle. What does he do with it? A) Castrate his father. B) Behead a Gorgon. C) Impress his lover. D) Mine for redstone. 

Meghan: I am gonna go with A. 

Colleen: Correct, he castrates Kronos. 

Meghan: ‘Cause I know he castrates Kronos. That's one of the only things I know about him. 

Colleen: Very good. 

Meghan: I was like, “I hope he used the diamond sickle.” Is that what it is? 

Colleen: Yes, it is the diamond sickle. Now, bonus, what is B referencing? 

Meghan: Jason.

Colleen: Nooooo.

Meghan: No, doesn't Jason? 

Colleen: It's the other one. 

Meghan: Perseus. 

Colleen: Perseus does use the diamond sickle to behead Medusa. 

Meghan: Oh, I didn't know he had a diamond sickle. 

Colleen: While she's asleep.

Meghan: I know he did behead- I didn't- Yeah, I didn't think that-

Colleen: I couldn't remember. 

Meghan: -Uranus was involved in. 

Colleen: For D) I had just written “Play Minecraft” so I was trying to change it. So it was, like, slightly less obviously Minecraft. [Transcription-Colleen Note: No it’s not.]

Meghan: Yeah.

Colleen: Okay. If you get this right, you can win all the marbles. or all the diamond pin. This is not multiple-choice.

Meghan: To be fair, I have already won. 

Colleen: You have already won. That's true. But you can get, like, a perfect score if you get this.

Meghan: Okay. Okay. And it's not multiple-choice. 

Colleen: It's not multiple-choice. Get rid of your multiple choices. I like that you were taking notes on this. It's great. 

Meghan: I just am a visual person. 

Colleen: That's fair

Meghan: I like to be able to think and see.

Colleen: Question Five. Name three songs that are mashed up in Moulin Rouge's song, “The Sparkling Diamond,” which is Satine's introduction in Act One. 

Meghan: Oh, okay, okay. 

Colleen: There's, like, seven to pick from. 

Meghan: Okay, “Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend.” 

Colleen: Good. 

Meghan: I have to think of the songs. 

Colleen: That's fair. 

Meghan: Oh gosh. I know, because I just remember that's, like, the last line of it. 

Colleen: And I did- And I used the musical soundtrack.

Meghan: And I haven't listened to the musical.

Colleen: But it does overlap with the movie quite a bit. You could just think of diamond songs. 

Meghan: “Material Girl.” 

Colleen: Correct.

Meghan: I have to think of- This is really hard. I want to get it right, because I love Moulin Rouge. 

Colleen: It's true. Would you like a hint? 

Meghan: No, not yet. I might later. Okay. I just have to think of the first part. ...I do want a clue. 

Colleen: Okay, think of a Beyoncé song referencing diamonds. Perhaps her most famous song. 

Meghan: “Single Ladies.” 

Colleen: Correct. “Single Ladies,” parentheses, “(Put A Ring On It).” Very good. Would you like to know the other ones? 

Meghan: Yes. 

Colleen: “Diamonds Are Forever.”

Meghan: Okay. 

Colleen: “Diamonds” by Rihanna, as well as “Brick House” and “My Love,” in parentheses, “(You're Never Gonna Get It).”

Meghan: I don't think all those were in the movie version. 

Colleen: No, they are not all in the movie version. I believe it's “Diamonds Are Forever,” “Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend,” “Material Girl,” and then, like, there's the “Hindi Sad Diamonds” where he's, like- 

Meghan: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Colleen: Yeah. And then I don't think those other four are in the movie.

Meghan: No, they definitely aren't. I also- Just because- I'm thinking the movie was made in, like, 2000. [Transcription-Colleen Note: 2001! Very close!]

Colleen:  I think some of these would have been out. Like, “Brick House” would have been out. 

Meghan: But, like, I don't think Rihanna was. And Beyoncé’s “Single Ladies” definitely wasn't.

Colleen: No. But very, very good. You have won this beautiful pin. 

Meghan: Yay! It's so sparkly. 

Colleen: It sucks, because Nancy is supposed to read it, uh, wear it for the wedding, and now she can't match the other bridesmaids, which is kind of rude of you. But you know what, you earned it. Honorable mentions that I was going to include in this but didn't: National Treasure 3: The Diamonds of South America. The geometric definition of a diamond. And F. Scott Fitzgerald's story, “The Diamond as Big as the Ritz.” 

Meghan: Oh!

Colleen: As well as the Hope Diamond.

[Sound cue: Same eerie piano tune reminiscent of the Nancy Drew PC game soundtracks that played at the top of the episode, now extended to play underneath the rest of the episode.] 

Meghan: Thank you so much for joining us on Me and You and Nancy Drew. 

Colleen: This podcast is lovingly dedicated to the memory of my wonderful mother Char, World's Best Mum, and the woman who got me hooked on sassy female detective stories. I also want to thank my brother, Ben, for creating most of our sound and music cues for this podcast. Thanks, Ben.

Meghan: You can check out our website, meandyouandnancydrew.com, for show transcripts, links to our social media, and our Patreon, where we'll post any images that we described during the podcast. Those will be visible to anyone without a paywall, so that we're not describing nebulous images that you can't see at home. But if you'd like to become a patron, there are various perks there, including outtakes or things that got cut for time, stickers and cross-stitch patterns to create your own Drewseum at home, and more. 

Colleen: Thank you, Meghan, for editing the podcast, doing a lot of research about podcast creation, and adding a few additional sound cues, as needed.

Meghan: Thank you, Colleen, for also editing the podcast, for transcribing it, and for helping create our logo. 

Colleen: Thank you to our partners for all the support and love, and especially for lending us their microphones that they bought for a completely different purpose but said we could borrow once in a while. And finally, thank you, of course, to Carolyn Keene for independently writing each of the Nancy Drew books from 1930 to modern day. 

Meghan: And remember:

Colleen: “Whatever you do, don't overstep anyone's legal rights.” 

Meghan: See you next time! Nope, won't see ya. We won't.

Colleen: You'll hear us next time!