Bayport Buccaneers

  THE HARDY BOYS UNDERCOVER BROTHERS®

  #1 Extreme Danger

  #2 Running on Fumes

  #3 Boardwalk Bust

  #4 Thrill Ride

  #5 Rocky Road

  #6 Burned

  #7 Operation: Survival

  #8 Top Ten Ways to Die

  #9 Martial Law

  #10 Blown Away

  #11 Hurricane Joe

  #12 Trouble in Paradise

  #13 The Mummy’s Curse

  #14 Hazed

  #15 Death and Diamonds

  #16 Bayport Buccaneers

  Available from Simon & Schuster

  If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ALADDIN PAPERBACKS

  An imprint of Simon & Schusterc Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Copyright © 2007 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  THE HARDY BOYS MYSTERY STORIES and HARDY BOYS UNDERCOVER BROTHERS are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  ALADDIN PAPERBACKS and related logo are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Designed by Lisa Vega

  The text of this book was set in Aldine 401 BT.

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  First Aladdin Paperbacks edition June 2007

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Library of Congress Control Number 2006937858

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4169-3403-5

  eISBN-13: 978-1-439-10381-4

  ISBN-10: 1-4169-3403-0

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  1. A Thief by Any Other Name

  2. Blowed Up Real Good

  3. One Last Adventure

  4. Eating Crow’s Nest

  5. Rotgut Rigging

  6. A Ship Full of Suspects

  7. Shocking Developments

  8. Diving for Dollars

  9. Thrown to the Sharks

  10. The Brave and the Dead

  11. Dueling Buccaneers

  12. A Slippery Challenge

  13. Treasure Frenzy

  14. Keelhauled

  15. Pirate Legacy

  Bayport Buccaneers

  1 A Thief by Any Other Name

  “Gun it, Frank! He’s getting away!” Joe said.

  “Tell me something I don’t already know!” I replied.

  My brother Joe was right. If we didn’t do something fast, Jules Kendallson, the motorcycle bandit, would give us the slip—again.

  Joe and I opened up the throttles on our custom bikes and roared after Kendallson. The Northside Woods whizzed past. We ducked branches and darted around the tree trunks blocking the overgrown trail. Every twist and turn presented a new danger—a new place to wipe out.

  Kendallson didn’t care. He was an expert rider and could have done well on the motocross circuit. Instead he’d turned to crime—stealing bikes instead of racing them. It was up to Joe and me to catch him.

  “Frank, low branch!” Joe’s voice blared loud and clear over the two-way radio in my helmet.

  As I ducked, the tree branch scraped the top of my helmet. Without it, I’d have gotten a nice set of scratches. But if Joe hadn’t warned me, I might have lost my head.

  “Keep your mind on the trail, big brain!” Joe chided.

  My face went red, partly because of what Joe said and partly because I knew he was right. My brother’s weakness was that he charged in without thinking; mine was that I sometimes thought too much.

  “Worrywart!” I called back. “Just stay with him!”

  Both Joe and the bandit were ahead of me now. Kendallson twisted his bike around a sharp turn and launched into the air, over a shallow ravine.

  Joe skidded in the turn and didn’t get as good a jump. He landed hard just below the ravine’s rim and lost valuable time as he motored up to the top. I hit the jump better and landed in front of him. I grinned. Sometimes it pays to be the more cautious, older brother.

  “Man, that guy is good,” Joe said as he roared up behind me.

  “If he wasn’t, he wouldn’t have eluded the cops for so long after busting out of jail,” I replied.

  “Let’s hope they throw away the key this time,” Joe said.

  “They will, once we catch him,” I added, trying to sound more confident than I felt. Kendallson had slipped away from us twice before. Plus he was definitely the better biker. Fortunately Joe and I had been riding the woods north of Bayport since we were kids. We knew these woods better than the crook.

  “I’m going to motor around to the left,” Joe called over the headset, “and try to cut him off by Benson Ravine.”

  “Check,” I replied. “I’ll herd him in that direction.” I angled to the right and accelerated again, jumping over the low hills like they were whoopde-doos at a motocross track. Joe cut in the opposite direction, with the bandit riding between us about fifty yards ahead.

  The trees zipped past as I easily swerved and bobbed through the familiar terrain. I was catching up to the bandit. Now I just needed to force Kendallson south so Joe could catch him at the ravine.

  Benson Ravine is a wide streambed that cuts through the middle of the wooded hills north of Bayport. The stream rambles through the forest before eventually emptying into Barmet Bay. There’s only one easy way over the ravine, which makes that crossing an ideal trap.

  Kendallson spotted me as I angled in on him from the west. He turned east, just like I hoped he would. He wove between the trees ahead of me, keeping dangerously close to the trunks. He clearly wanted me to crash into one, but I knew the area too well for that. Besides, I’d learned my lesson with the tree branch earlier.

  I couldn’t see Joe through the forest ahead of us, and I hoped the bandit couldn’t see him either. With a little luck, Joe would reach the crossing first.

  Kendallson glanced back at me as he rode. Little by little I was catching up, and he knew it.

  Suddenly he ripped off his helmet and threw it at me.

  Now that was a stupid thing to do!

  The helmet bounced off the forest floor once, and then skipped toward my front tire. I swerved around it and looked up just in time to see a big tree trunk zooming toward my face.

  I turned hard, nearly laying the bike on the ground. My back tire kicked up a cloud of dirt and pine needles. I barely missed the tree in front of me and came close to another on my right.

  I kicked myself upright again and zoomed after the bandit. He was heading toward the ravine, just as Joe and I had planned. I was blocking his way upstream, so he headed downstream, toward a big old tree trunk that had fallen across the gully. The trunk was like a natural bridge, and it was the only way across the ravine and the rushing stream below.

  Kendallson gunned his stolen motorcycle straight for the fallen tree. I looked for Joe and spotted him just before the bandit did. Both of them were heading for the trunk, and it was anyone’s guess who would reach the old log first. I knew they’d both get there before me. That was okay, though. I’d done my job. I just hoped Joe would be able to do his.

  Unfortunately Kendallson got there first.


  He swerved to the right, nearly coming to a stop, and then planted his front tire on the rotting wood. The trunk was wide, but not entirely flat. Staying on it would be a trick, even for a rider as good as Kendallson. He positioned his bike carefully and then began riding across.

  Joe skidded to a stop and angled his bike to go over the tree after the bandit. “Don’t do it, Joe!” I called over the headset. “The vibration from two bikes at once could bring the whole trunk down!”

  Joe looked at me and smiled. “Just what I was thinking,” he said. He whipped his bike sideways, put the back tire against the tree trunk, and gunned the engine.

  The back tire spun and screeched, kicking clouds of dust and soggy splinters into the air. The tree trunk started vibrating like mad as Kendallson crossed.

  The crook’s bike wobbled, and before he could do anything about it, he toppled off the log into the rushing stream below. Lucky for him, the stream was wide and pretty deep at that point. He hit the water with a crash and quickly bobbed to the surface; the stolen bike didn’t come with him. Kendallson looked dazed. He floundered around helplessly as he drifted downstream toward the bay.

  I grinned and shook my head. “He should have kept his helmet on,” I said.

  Joe nodded. “Safety first,” he agreed.

  I laughed, but not for the reason Joe thought. It was ironic, him talking about safety; that kind of thing seldom entered my younger brother’s mind.

  “Come on,” I said, “we’ll pick up Kendallson downstream and come back for the bike later.”

  “I’ll take the far side, in case he swims across,” Joe said. He gunned his engine and zoomed at top speed over the log. It vibrated like it was on the verge of tumbling down, but Joe made it across without even noticing.

  I shook my head and followed Kendallson. Like I said, safety was not high on my brother’s list of priorities.

  We followed the bandit as he floated downstream. Kendallson didn’t seem to have any intention of climbing out. I guess the fall took more out of him than I’d thought. He floated with the current, looking dazed. For a moment I thought Joe or I might have to dive into the river and pull him out.

  Then I noticed a police boat, out on the bay near the mouth of the stream. The cops aboard spotted Kendallson drifting toward them and headed the boat over to pick him up.

  Score!

  Joe and I stopped our bikes before we reached the edge of the woods. Even though we’re deputized law officers, American Teens Against Crime (ATAC for short) works in secret, so we wanted to avoid getting tangled up with the police.

  “The cops will handle Kendallson,” said Joe. “I’m sure they’ll fish his stolen bike out of the stream too—especially if we give them an anonymous tip where to find it.”

  “Lucky thing that patrol boat happened by,” I said, “or one of us would have had to go swimming. I wonder why the boat’s here, though. They don’t run a lot of patrols out along the park shore.”

  “Who cares?” Joe said. “They’re here, we’re done. Mission accomplished.” We both grinned. It always felt good to complete an assignment.

  “Let’s get home,” I said. “Maybe we can catch the arrest on the evening news.”

  “Race ya,” said Joe.

  “No fair!” I called. “You’re already on the south side of the ravine!”

  Joe merely laughed and gunned his engine. I put my bike into high gear, raced back upstream, and zoomed over the rickety log bridge.

  Even though Joe had a good head start, he still needed to cut back in my direction to hit Bayshore Drive, the road that runs along the north shore into town.

  Joe would be sticking to the trail by the lakeside, but I knew a shortcut. With luck, I could catch up to him before he hit the main road.

  I zipped through the woods, dodging low branches and jumping over the bumps in the trail. I couldn’t hear Joe’s motorcycle over the roar of my own engine, and he wasn’t talking to me on the headset.

  Was he ahead of me, or would I actually beat him to the road?

  I topped the last hill before the shore and caught sight of Joe winding down the lakeshore path. He was ahead, but not by much. As I gunned the throttle, he reached the spot where the two paths met. Then suddenly he braked to a stop.

  He gazed out over the bay and I heard his voice on the headset.

  “Pirates!” he said. “No way!”

  I skidded to a halt beside him.

  Sure enough, a huge, old-fashioned pirate ship was sailing across Barmet Bay toward town. A skull-and-crossbones flag flew from its topmost mast, and swarms of pirates in old-fashioned clothing roamed the decks.

  Both Joe and I were amazed.

  But we were even more amazed as the ship’s cannons started firing—right at us!

  2 Blowed Up Real Good

  “Joe, hit the deck!”

  Frank nearly burst my eardrums as he yelled into my headset.

  Hit the deck when you’re being shot at. No, duh! My brother can be really obvious sometimes. My motorcycle and I were already hugging the ground.

  The cannonball—or whatever it was the ship was shooting—blazed over our heads and crashed into the woods right behind us. The ground shook, and a huge puff of smoke billowed into the air. A cheer broke out from the pirate ship. I didn’t know who these guys were, but apparently they didn’t like the brothers Hardy.

  The cannon blazed again.

  “Get going!” Frank said, again stating the obvious.

  We scrambled forward as quickly as we could, half pushing our bikes, half dragging them, while still keeping our heads low. As we went, Frank kept his eyes glued to the old galleon.

  “Less watching, more moving,” I said as Frank stepped in front of me. My older brother can be like that sometimes—well, a lot of the time, actually. He analyzes things to death when what’s really needed is some solid action.

  By the time the pirates blasted their third shot, we’d ducked into the forest and out of the line of fire.

  Frank peered through the trees at the ship. “I don’t think they’re shooting at us,” he said.

  “Not now, they’re not,” I said. “We’re out of range.”

  “I doubt that,” Frank said. “Those weren’t real cannonballs they were shooting, anyway. It was just a blast of fire—some type of malfunction, maybe.”

  “Cannonball or fireball, what does it matter?” I asked. “You’re just as dead if one hits you.”

  “Maybe,” said Frank. “But for the most part, the shots seemed to have more flash than bang.”

  “Well, while you dope out the special effects, I’ll go warn the town,” I said. Before Frank could react, I took off down the trail, heading for Bayshore Drive. Frank gunned his motorcycle after me.

  “You know, we could just call ahead on our cell phones if we stopped,” he said over my headset.

  “Where’s the fun in that?” I called back.

  By the time I hit the pavement, Frank had nearly caught up to me again. I watched in my side mirror as he angled for a small hill. He launched his bike into the air and came down on the blacktop right beside me.

  “Bro!” I said, surprised. “That was pretty reckless—for you.”

  “You’re not the only daredevil in this family,” he replied.

  I didn’t mention that I’d seen him checking the traffic in both directions before pulling his stunt. My brother Frank: cautious even when he’s daring.

  “Stick to the speed limit now that we’re on a real road,” he said.

  “Hey, we need to warn the town,” I replied.

  “The town probably already knows,” Frank said. “The ship’s kind of hard to miss—especially with cannons blazing. Besides, Officer Sullivan gave both of us warnings last month—and a speeding ticket would be a rotten way to end a successful mission.”

  “Hey, we could get ATAC to fix it for us,” I said. “We were on a mission when we got those warnings in the first place.”

  “Maybe ATAC could take
care of the ticket,” said Frank, “but could they fix the hot water we’d be in with Mom and Aunt Trudy?”

  He had me there. Though our dad is one of the founders of ATAC, Mom and Aunt Trudy don’t know about the organization—and we can’t tell them. (What would be the point of having a secret crime-fighting league if everyone knew about it?)

  “Okay,” I said, “so I’ll stick to the speed limit, even though we could warn the town faster if we didn’t.”

  “We could warn the town faster if we stopped and used our cell phones,” Frank repeated.

  Sure, he had a point, but there was no way I was going to admit he was right.

  Bayshore Drive was deserted out near the state forest, but as we neared the beaches, it started to get more crowded.

  “North Beach would have a good view of what’s going on,” I told Frank over the headset.

  “You’re right,” he agreed. “There seems to be a big crowd, too. Let’s stop and take a look.”

  We turned our bikes down the ramp and found a place to park. A swarm of people crowded the beach, watching as the pirate ship headed for the Bayport docks. A lot of people in the crowd were holding up signs that said things like WELCOME BUCCANEERS! and PREPARED TO LOOT AND PILLAGE!

  “Has everyone in town gone crazy?” Frank asked me.

  I pulled my helmet off and shrugged. “Maybe.” Then I spotted someone we knew in the crowd. “Chet!” I called, waving. “Chet Morton!”

  Chet turned his big blond head toward us and waved back. “Yo!” he said. “Hey, guys!”

  As Frank and I made our way through the crowd toward him, I noticed a pretty brunette standing at Chet’s side. She smiled at me and I realized it was Iola, Chet’s younger sister.

  “Did you guys come to see the show?” Iola asked us. “Or are you going to try out?”

  “Try out for what?” Frank said.

  Chet rolled his eyes. “Where have you guys been, living in a cave somewhere?”

  “Nah,” I said. “We were in London chasing motorcycle thieves.”

  Frank shot me a nasty look. What I’d told them was pretty close to the truth—too close for Frank’s liking. Of course the case we’d been on had started in New London, Connecticut, not London, England, but I knew Chet and Iola wouldn’t believe me anyway.