Stage Fright (Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys Book 6) by Carolyn Keene, Franklin W. Dixon

to the theater and find out who. “We’re leaving—I don’t want to see you again. Is that clear?”
    “Yes,” Madonna said. “Sir,” she added after a second’s pause.
    As we walked out of the hospital room, I looked back and saw her frantically typing away on her cell phone. Something told me her version of our little visit wasgoing to be all over the web within minutes—if it wasn’t already. Madonna seemed to be quite the fast typist.
    “Do you think she’s telling the truth?” I asked Joe as we left the hospital.
    He thought for a second. “Yeah,” he said. “She might be a drama queen, but I think she was honest with us at the end.”
    That was my read on it too. Joe and I might have our differences, but when it came to our cases, we were like-minded.
    “What is with all of these people and their obsession with Claire?” I wondered out loud. Maybe it was just that in our work with ATAC we met a lot of famous people, but celebrity obsessions didn’t make much sense to me. They were just people, after all. Busy, rich, sometimes talented people—but people nonetheless. Some were nice and some were mean, but none of them deserved to be worshipped the way so many people seemed to worship Claire.
    On the street, my pocket started buzzing. My heart jumped. What if it was Nancy, calling us because something was happening at the theater? Today was opening night, after all, and if our killer was going to make a move, it had to happen soon. Luckily, it was just Vijay.
    “Hey hey hey,” he said as I picked up. “You were right.”
    “Always,” I said. “What was I right about this time?”
    “It’s Vijay,” I mouthed to Joe. He gave me the thumbs up, and we continued walking as Vijay and I talked.
    “That sticky stuff you found in the airplane engine compartment? It’s definitely a fire accelerant. It’s kind of clever, really. All they had to do was smear the inside of the compartment with that stuff. Once the engine got going, it was just a matter of time until the heat made the chemicals combust. Then, poof! It’s World War II all over again.”
    I’d almost forgotten that we’d sent the sample off to ATAC to be analyzed. Madonna might have been a bust, but maybe this would be the clue to crack the case.
    “Any idea what chemical our would-be arsonist was using?”
    “Yup, it’s … uhhh … hold on one second. I wrote it down somewhere. It had a funny name. I’ll find it.”
    I could hear the sound of mounds of paper being rifled through, and the occasional electronic beeping noise that seemed to follow Vijay wherever he was. He had so many computers on him at all times that he was one small step away from being a cyborg.
    “Ape Affixer?” he mumbled. “Monkey Mud? It was something like that. I’m going to find it, I swear.”
    But I didn’t think he needed to. I was pretty sure I knew what it was.
    “Gorilla Glue?” I said.
    “Yes!” he shouted. “Ding ding ding! What is that stuffanyway? I thought you were working on Broadway, not at the Bronx Zoo.”
    “You’d be surprised how similar the two are….” I told him. “Anyway, Gorilla Glue is an adhesive, a kind of really strong glue they use a lot backstage. And I think I know someone who has it. Good work Veej.”
    “Always,” replied Vijay. He was nothing if not humble. “Anything else I can do you for?”
    “Yes, actually—can you run a trace for me on a text message?”
    “Joe gave me the number already. Death threats for your prima ballerina, right? It’s a prepaid cell phone, bought in cash near the theater. Dead end. If you can let me know when it’s in use, or might still be on, I can track it. But when it’s off, there’s no way.”
    Rats. I’d been doing pretty well there for a second. Still, one clue was better than a grand total of none.
    I said good-bye to Vijay and turned to Joe.
    “Vijay says it was Gorilla Glue inside the engine.”
    “That sounds really familiar. Where have I heard of that