The Mystery At Lilac Inn

 

Hey all!  It's time for Do the Drew!  Like a lot of these stories, this was originally penned by Mildred Wirt Benson in 1930.

Characters: Nancy and Carson Drew (with a cameo appearance by Helen Corning)

Premise: Nancy investigates a theft from an inn/tearoom.

Nancy's called into action when a woman, Mrs. Willoughby, loses her purse full of valuable jewels while at lunch having gotten distracted by an accident that has happened (which, okay, I can see getting distracted, but why oh why would you take valuable jewels out of a safety deposit box?  This lady was stupid). She's convinced that someone who works at the tearoom is the one who stole it and enlists Nancy to help her prove it as the jewels are important to her because they're the inheritance of her ward, Emily Crandall and she doesn't want to disappoint the girl who plans to use the gems to finance her fiancée's career, which is admirable and I probably would've done the same thing.

At the same time, Nancy's forced to get a temporary housekeeper when Hannah Gruen has to go take care of a sick relative, and this is where Nancy meets Mary Mason who applies for the job but doesn't get it because Nancy doesn't care for her attitude. Later, while shopping with Helen Corning, Nancy sees Mary at a high end shop and is suspicious as she's "not the sort" (due to her color and economic status) who would shop there. Honestly, as much as I love the older stories, I will absolutely admit that some of the thinking when it comes to people of color and class is abysmal. It's not right and I don't condone it, but at the same time, I'm not going to  

Nancy later views Mary as a person of interest in the case and after some investigation, finds that it was in fact Mary who had stolen the jewels while everyone else had been distracted by the accident and was working with her brother Bud and a man named Tom Tozzle (good grief, what a name!) who plan to split the loot and make their getaway. 

Nancy gets caught spying by the crooks and is captured, but is rescued by the River Patrol and they quickly capture Mary, Bud, and Tom.

This was revised in 1961 by Patricial Doll along with Harriet Stratemeyer Adams and as such has a brand new story.

Characters: Nancy Drew, Carson Drew, Helen Corning (secondary character), Hannah Gruen, and a guest appearance by Chief McGinnis. 

Premise: Nancy investigates mysterious happenings at an inn and searches for a bride to be's missing diamonds.   

Nancy's invited into a mystery by her friend, Helen Corning, when the two girls are invited to be the guests at Lilac Inn as members of the bridal party at the wedding of a mutual friend, Emily Willoughby, even as she and her fiancée, Dick Farnham (that's a name 😂) plan to renovate the inn, even though there have been strange happenings, which culminated in one of their waitresses, Mary Mason, quitting.

Nancy finds out that Emily's aunt, Hazel Willoughby, plans to give her some diamonds as a wedding present, which Emily and Dick plan to use to renovate and open the inn, (which, it makes sense, but I don't know if I would be willing to sell an actual diamond if I had any), but the diamonds are stolen during a power outage.  Nancy of course investigates this and eventually becomes suspicious of the inn's social director, Maude Potter, which is seemingly confirmed by the new waitress, Jean Holmes.  However, it turns out that while Maude had her own beef with Hazel Willoughby, she was not in fact involved with the problems at the inn.

Along with the mystery at the inn, Nancy has to deal with an identity theft issue as her charge plate (a precursor to a credit card as I understood it) and some of her clothes were taken from her room, ultimately learning that the woman who stole them----a disgraced actress by the name of Gay Moreau---was working with Lilac Inn's gardener, Gil Gary under the guise of Jean Holmes, and some others to cause problems at Lilac Inn and it was the group who had stolen Emily's diamonds.  As it turns out, Gay wanted revenge on Carson for getting her convicted of forgery, which, girl, you brought that on yourself.

As with a lot of stories, Nancy finds herself being kidnapped, (which, girl, oh my gosh, notify the police when you go after the crooks, honestly!), and during her captivity, Gay boasts about her disguises, displaying them for Nancy, as she makes herself up to look like the detective.  Nancy is eventually rescued and the crooks are caught, though Gay at first tries to fool Carson with her "Nancy" disguise, which doesn't work, and she's taken away.

I enjoyed both versions of the story, even though in some ways, Nancy is a bit unlikeable in the original story regarding her thoughts towards minorities and those of a lower-class status (this seems to be a trend with the Mildred Wirt Benson volumes and I suspect that this might be a failing of hers rather than Nancy's.) Givenn the fact that Lilac Inn wasn't a central location in the original tale, I'm a little annoyed that it made it into the title, but the reworking of the setting in the newer volume makes better sense.  And as always, it's nice to see Helen Corning in a larger role than just her cameo appearance, though I miss her as Nancy's confidant and crime-solving partner as she was in Password To Larkspur Lane. However, this was when they were phasing Helen out to explain her disappearance from the series rather than just having her suddenly not appearing anymore. 

Thank you for joining me in this session.  Good night and do the Drew.