Free 062 Easy Marks by Carolyn Keene Page B

a single penny of it for myself, and you both know it,” Kim continued.
    Nancy simply stared at the girl. What was she talking about?
    “Kim, listen to me,” Nancy said. “I’m a detective. Whoever you think I am, you’re wrong. My real name is Nancy Drew. The reason I’m at Brewster is that someone on the board of trustees asked me to find out who is responsible for the grade-changing racket. And I’m pretty sure you can help me.”
    “Oh, su-u-re,” Kim replied, rolling her eyes. “This is a test, right? To see if I can be trusted? Don’t worry. I’ll live up to my end of the bargain.” With that, she collapsed into a chair and began crying bitterly.
    Nancy waited until Kim calmed down and straightened in the chair, wiping the back of her hand across her cheeks. “I guess that’s it, huh?” Kim told her. “Now you’ll lower my grade-point average, just the way you said you would if anything went wrong. I can kiss college goodbye.”
    Nancy went over and held Kim by the shoulders. “Listen to me! I am not the person responsible for this. I swear! You’ve got to tell me what’s going on, Kim. It’s the only way I can help you.”
    Kim stared up into Nancy’s eyes. “Are you for real?” she finally asked.
    Nancy nodded.
    “I was so sure you had to be involved. I just couldn’t see Victor running this on his own,” Kim continued. “He loves fooling around with the school computer and getting it to do weird tricks, but once he’s figured something out, he gets bored and goes on to something else. He couldn’t be bothered to do the same thing over and over, not even for money. So I figured he had to have a partner. Then you showed up, and I was sure.”
    “If Victor did have a partner, it would be someone at the school,” Nancy pointed out, perching on the edge of the sofa. “But I’ve only just started there, and this grade-changer has been operating for almost two weeks. Besides, what makes you so sure Victor’s involved?”
    Kim stared down at her lap and said so softly that Nancy had to lean in closer to hear, “He told me so. He said that he’d changed someone’s grades. He pretended to feel really bad about it, but now I can see that was just a put-on. If he’d meant it, he wouldn’t have kept doing it, and he wouldn’t have forced me to get involved.”
    Nancy’s breath caught in her throat. “Why did you write that note to the headmaster?” she asked after a pause. “It was you, wasn’t it?”
    “Sure. I was furious at you and Victor for what you were doing to me,” Kim replied, her pale blue eyes flashing. “I wanted to get you in as much trouble as I could without getting myself in hot water. It didn’t work, did it?”
    “It might have,” Nancy told her, “except that Mr. Friedbinder knows who I am and why I’m at Brewster. How did you get involved in this racket?”
    “There was a message in my E-mail,” Kim explained. “Whoever sent it knew I couldn’t afford to pay to have my grades changed, but he said I could improve my transcript if I ran a few errands. He also said that if I didn’t agree, my transcript could end up looking a lot worse than it really is. So I opened the account wearing this dumb wig. And he tells me when to pick up the money.”
    “Why didn’t you go straight to the headmaster and tell him about it?” Nancy asked.
    Kim shook her head sharply. “I couldn’t bring myself to turn Victor in. I’m really hung up on the guy.”
    “Victor’s not the only one who could be responsible,” Nancy told Kim. “If I’m going to catch the culprit, I need to know how the money transfer works. I know you have a bank card for that account, but how do you know when to use it, and what happens to the cash?”
    “I get an E-mail message,” Kim replied. “In code. If it says M five, I know I should withdraw five hundred dollars on Monday. T ten means one thousand dollars on Tuesday, and so on. It’s usually after or before school, but today the