Nancy, Bess, and George, encounter a troublesome stray terrier on their way to the opening festivities of a new park and recreation complex in River Heights. The terrier carries a speaker's handbag into a pond and leaves it. Nancy is instrumental in its retrieval, and uses the wet notes, which she uses to prompt the speaker during her address. Nancy learns the woman seeks her estranged husband, long missing. Nancy keeps the terrier temporarily, and takes Togo, her dog, along with her father and friends on a retreat to the seashore. On the train, the girls observe elderly Bernice Conger, and suspect a youthful companion of trying to swindle the woman.

Once there, the girls find a statue with an uncanny resemblence to Nancy, in a whispering pose. Further mysterious actions occur when Mrs. Conger acknowledges she is being swindled, and dismisses Nancy. A seaplane accident leads Nancy to the estranged husband she has been seeking. In the climax of the story, Nancy poses behind the statue and uses her voice to make the statue appear to speak to both Mrs. Conger and the crook.