Later, Nancy realizes her father, who is staying out of town on a business trip, has not checked in with her or her aunt Hannah recently. The rest of the strange phenomenon is explained by a rig that emits concentrated nutmeg through the house's air conditioning, which triggers hallucinations. The secret passage also contains props the intruder used to simulate a haunting, such as a rigged fuse box to manipulate the lights in the house. Nancy and Helen investigate and find a secret passage that leads outside, revealing how the "ghost" entered the house. The next day, Nancy believes that someone broke in and tried scaring them out. That night, strange things happen, lights go out and then explode, cabinet doors and drawers open, and a cloaked figure appearing and warns Nancy to give up her mystery.
Determined to solve and excited to have a new mystery Nancy stays overnight at Flora's home, along with Flora's niece Helen.
Nancy meets Flora, an elderly woman needing help with an apparent haunting in her home while doing community service as punishment for a prank on a school bully. A local thug named Willie Wharton threatens Nancy one night to try to scare her father into backing down. While Nancy struggles to fit in, Carson is active in local politics, fighting the development of a train line through the town. A bit of an outsider struggling to fit into her new surroundings, Nancy and her pals set out to solve a mystery, make new friends, and establish their place in the community.Īfter her mother's death, 16-year-old sleuth Nancy Drew and her father Carson relocate from Chicago to rural River Heights.