Free The Cheating Heart by Carolyn Keene

under her weight. She was thrown forward over them in a jackknife.
    â€œNancy!” Ned cried, dropping the popcorn boxes and reaching down to grab her around the waist. He began to lift her up, but then he slipped on the wet walkway, too—accidentally pushing her down into the gap between the walkway and the next row of seats.
    Nancy’s right leg, and then her hip and torso, bumped and slid through the opening. Ned desperately grabbed hold of her left leg.
    Nancy tipped upside down, dangling under the walkway. Her arms flailed uselessly in empty space.

Chapter

Nine
    H OLD ON, N ANCY !” Ned called down to her as he continued to dangle her by her left foot.
    â€œYou hold on, too!” Nancy shouted back, trying to keep the fright out of her voice. In the darkness she couldn’t see the ground clearly, but the steel girders supporting the bleachers glinted all the way down, and she could tell that it would be a very long drop if she fell.
    Feeling her left ankle slip slightly in Ned’s grip, Nancy desperately sought a toehold with her right foot. Her toe stabbed against the bottom of the steel walkway and she wedged it into the only crack she could find.
    Summoning all her upper-body strength, she raised her shoulders toward the bottom of the bleachers above. With split-second timing, sheswung her right arm at the very instant she was closest to the girders. Her fingers slapped against a small steel strut and closed around it.
    Tightening her fragile hold, Nancy pulled her body upright. As quickly as possible, she grabbed another strut with her left arm.
    Ned took one hand off her ankle and thrust it down through the steel framework. He grasped her left arm firmly. “I’ll let your foot go now, Nan,” he warned her.
    â€œOkay.” Nancy braced herself. As soon as Ned had dropped her leg, he reached down and got a good grip on her other arm.
    â€œReady?” Ned asked, squatting on the walkway. Nancy nodded. “Okay, then, heave ho!” Ned hoisted her up through the gap between the walkway and the girder behind it.
    Nancy twisted her lithe body and squirmed through the space. As soon as her shoulders were above the walkway, she managed to get an elbow up onto the steel plank and pull herself up.
    A crowd of students had gathered to watch, unable to help because of the narrow space. As Nancy hauled herself onto the walkway, they let go a collective gasp of relief and then broke out clapping.
    Ned sank back onto the walkway, exhausted. Nancy collapsed gratefully into his arms.
    â€œNancy, Ned, what’s going on?” she heard Brook’s anxious voice behind the circle of on-lookers.Brook pushed her way through the gathering with Paul right behind her.
    â€œNancy’s seat crashed down,” Ned reported in a shaky voice. “She fell through the bleachers and almost . . . almost . . .”
    Nancy scooped her reddish blond hair away from her perspiring face. “I’m okay, guys,” she said calmly. In fact, her heart was still pounding and her muscles were sore, but she flashed her friends a confident smile. “I’ve had far worse accidents, believe me.”
    Ned chuckled halfheartedly. “Yeah, but that’s only because you get threatened by goons trying to scare you off a case.”
    Brook’s dark eyes grew round. “Do you think that someone was trying to hurt you, Nancy?”
    â€œI doubt it,” said Nancy as she got to her feet. She hadn’t really considered that angle—but as soon as Brook raised the possibility, her mind started working. Despite her discretion, several people now knew that she was checking into the results of the literature test. Maybe the test thief—whoever he or she might be—had gotten scared and was telling Nancy to cool it!
    Just then, the surrounding circle of students broke open to let two campus security officers through. Nancy had worked with various members of