Evil, Inc. Read online

  Hardy Boys Casefiles - 02

  Evil, Inc.

  By

  Franklin W. Dixon

  Chapter 1

  THE FRENCH POLICE officer kept his eyes on the two teenagers from the moment they sat down, at the outdoor cafe across the street from the Pompidou Center in Paris.

  Those two kids spelled trouble. The cop knew their type. Les punks was what the French called them. Both of them had spiky hair; one had dyed his jet black, the other bright green. They wore identical black T-shirts emblazoned with the words The Poison Pens in brilliant yellow, doubtless some unpleasant rock group. Their battered, skintight black trousers seemed ready to split at the seams. And their scuffed black leather combat boots looked as if they had gone through a couple of wars. A gold earring gleamed on one earlobe of each boy. What were they waiting for? The cop wondered.

  Somebody to mug? Somebody to sell drugs to? He was sure of one thing: the punks were up to no good as they sat waiting and watchful at their table, nursing tiny cups of black coffee. True, one of them looked very interested in any pretty girl who passed by. But then a couple of girls stopped in front of the table, willing to be friendly, the second punk said something sharp to the first, who shrugged a silent apology to the girls. The girls shrugged back and went on their way, leaving the two punks to scan the passing crowd.

  The cop wished he could hear their conversation and find out what language they spoke. You couldn’t tell kids’ nationalities nowadays by their appearance. Teen styles crossed all boundaries, he had decided.

  If the cop had been able to hear the two boys, he would have known instantly where they were from.

  “Cool it. This is no time to play Casanova,” one of them said. Aw, come on,” the other answered. “So many girls-so little time.”

  Their voices were as American as apple pie, even if their appearances weren’t. .

  In fact, their voices were the only things about them that even their closest friends back home would have recognized.

  “Let’s keep our minds on the job,” Frank Hardy told his brother.

  “Remember what they say about all work and no play,” Joe Hardy answered. “And you remember that if we make one wrong move here in Paris,” Frank said, “it’ll be our last.”

  Chapter 2

  JUST TWO DAYS earlier, Frank Hardy’s hair had still been brown, Joe Hardy’s had still been blond, and they had still been in America.

  They had not, however, been at home in Bayport. They were in lower Manhattan, shopping for a computer circuit board. More specifically, Frank was shopping for it. Joe had come along with him just to look around the city after a month of riding his motorcycle or hitting the beach every day, and going through his black book of girls’ telephone numbers for a steady succession of dates.

  For Frank, eighteen and a year older than Joe, the summer, meant catching up on his reading, doing serious weight and “martial-arts training, and dating his girlfriend, Callie Shaw. Then one day a messenger had arrived at their home with a package, and Frank had scheduled a trip to New York City.

  The package came from the ultrasecret government agency known as the Network. With it came a message from the Hardys’ contact with the Network-the man they knew only as the Gray Man.

  The Gray Man’s message was short and not very sweet. “This is the computer modem I mentioned to you. But remember, don’t call me, I’ll call you.”

  The Hardys had first met the Gray Man at the memorial services for the only girl that Joe Hardy had ever truly loved, Iola Morton, the victim of a terrorist bomb. Frank and Joe were leaving the chapel when the Gray Man appeared, a small, balding man in a gray suit, with grayish hair and gray eyes, and even skin with a gray pallor. He was a man who faded effortlessly into any background and disappeared in any crowd.

  The Gray Man was interested in. Iola’s death but not nearly as interested as Joe, who was burning with anger and ravenous for revenge. The common goal of catching the killers was enough to put the Hardys and the Gray Man on the same team. In fact, it was probably the only thing that could have done so. During the Dead on Target case, the Gray Man had made no secret of the fact that he considered the Hardys a couple of teenage amateurs, while Frank and Joe found the Network pros both too cautious and too headstrong-and accustomed to a brand of violence the Hardys disliked intensely.

  Still, working together, they had come out on top against a heavyweight terrorist hit squad, which had made the Gray Man decided reluctantly to hook up Frank’s computer to the Network’s communication system in case the Gray Man ever found another use for the Hardys.

  The Hardys accepted the offer of continued contact with the Network because of Joe’s hunger for further action against the kind of killers who had taken Iola from him, and because of Frank’s deep desire to see deserving bad guys brought to justice. To them, it was worth enduring even as dull and unpredictable a character as the Gray Man if it meant getting a crack at terror in any of its evil forms.

  When Frank opened the package from the Network, his instant reaction had been, “Typical. They sent me the modem, but not the interface I need to hook it up to my computer. And to think those guys are watching over national security. Our country’s survival has to be due to pure dumb luck.” “Think you ‘should break the news to the Gray Man and have him send the interface?” asked Joe.

  “How?’ replied Frank. “This modem is the only way we can contact him.”

  “Well,” said Joe, “we’ll just have to get one ourselves.”

  They had taken the train to the city, after telling their father they’d decided on a mini-vacation in New York. They didn’t mention the Gray Man’s gift. Fenton Hardy was a retired New York cop who had become a renowned private detective. Frank didn’t want to stir up those detective instincts, so he said that he and Joe were taking a couple of days as a final fling before summer ended.

  So far, though, it hadn’t been much of a fling. Frank had been hitting electronics shops since ten in the morning, with no luck. It was twelve thirty now, and he couldn’t argue when Joe announced, “Let’s take a break. I’m starved.” Frank grinned. “And I know the reason why.” “Why?” said Joe.

  “Because if we walk just a little farther north, we’ll be within striking distance of Katz’s Delicatessen,” replied Frank. “Amazing, Holmes,” said Joe.

  “It’s elementary, my dear Watson.” Frank sniffed the air. “I can practically smell the corned beef.”

  Katz’s Delicatessen was a huge cafeteria-style restaurant founded in the days when New York’s Lower East Side had been peopled by Jewish immigrants. It had survived and continued to flourish when more recent immigrants from Puerto Rico arrived. And it stayed filled with Hearty eaters and the delicious scents of food as new faces and new generations”, discovered the restaurant and neighborhood.

  “I wonder if we’ll run into the Gray Man here,” said Frank as they approached Katz’s. The Gray Man had introduced the Hardy boys to the restaurant, taking them there” as a modest expression of his less-than-overwhelming gratitude for their help in foiling the terrorist plot He told them during the meal that Katz’s was one of his favorite places to meet his agents. He claimed it was the perfect cover for a secret rendezvous. Frank and Joe suspected, though, that Katz’s great corned beef sandwiches had something to do with the Gray Man’s fondness for the place.

  “I hope we do run into him’,” said Joe. “Maybe he’d put our meal on his expense account. My stomach tells me that we’re going to run up quite a bill. Although an inch shorter than Frank, who was six-feet-one, Joe was broader and slightly huskier than his older brother, and his appetite was sizable.

  Suddenly Frank stopped short, in front of the entrance to an alleyway.

  “Hey, do you see what I s
ee?” Joe followed his gaze. “It’s him!” he exclaimed. “I don’t believe it!”

  “Let’s go!” cried Frank, dashing into the alley. Joe was right behind him.

  The Gray Man was in the alley, but he wasn’t alone.

  Two big bruisers with their hair cut into pink Mohawks and wearing black leather motorcycle jackets had backed the Gray Man against a brick wall, next to an overflowing garbage can. They were slapping his face to the rhythm of hard rock from a huge boom box resting on the litter-covered ground. One would slap him from the right, then the other would come in from the left, sending the Gray Man’s head bobbing like a punching bag. From the look on the thugs’ faces, they were having fun.

  Their fun ended abruptly. They never knew what hit them.

  The Hardys’ running footsteps were masked by the blasting music. Vicious chops to the backs of the thugs’ necks sent them pitching forward on their faces.

  Joe looked down at the thugs at his feet, then turned to Frank. “I’ve got to admit, you were right to persuade me to take a few karate lessons.

  That teacher of yours showed me exactly where to hit somebody to put him out like alight.”

  By now the Gray Man had recovered enough to say, “Frank? Joe? What are you doing here?”

  “Saving your neck, as usual,” said Joe.

  “Maybe you should make us your body guards,” added Frank. “You sure seem to need some kind of protection.”

  “Didn’t your mother ever tell you not to go down dark alleyways with pink haired punks in leather jackets?” asked Joe.

  The Gray Man looked slightly embarrassed. “I didn’t expect this.”

  “I bet you didn’t,” said Joe.

  “But I do owe you some thanks, I suppose,” the Gray Man said grudgingly. .

  “I think some corned beef sandwiches, french fries, and cream sodas would do nicely,” said Joe, his stomach already growling in pleasant anticipation.”

  “Plus, of course, an explanation,” added Frank, who couldn’t stand the thought of any unsolved mysteries.

  “The food is easy,” said the Gray Man, “though I hope you’ll restrain your appetite a bit. The last meal I treated you to put me over budget.” “And the explanation?” said Frank.

  “It’s best to keep you out of this affair,” replied the Gray Man. “It’s big-time, not for kids.”

  Joe felt his temper rising. “Just like it would have been best for us to keep out of this alley, right?”

  “Let’s not argue about it,” said the Gray Man firmly. “I’ll buy you a meal, and that will be that.”

  He started to stride decisively out of the alley when Frank said, “Hey, what about these two guys here? We’ll have to call the police to haul them away.” The Gray Man cleared his throat. “Let’s not bother. I really don’t think it’s necessary to involve the police.”

  Frank’s eyes narrowed, then a grin appeared on his face. “But as good citizens, we have to notify the police-unless, of course, you give us a full explanation of why we shouldn’t.”

  The Gray Man opened his mouth to argue. Then he saw the anger on Joe’s face and the determination on Frank’s, and he said, “Okay, okay. I guess I can trust you. I have to trust you. I’ll give you your explanation.” “Over corned beef sandwiches,” Joe added.

  Twenty minutes later, the Hardy boys were listening with their mouths full and their ears wide open as the Gray Man explained. “I was using those two thugs as part of an operation. Among other unpleasant things, they’re street level gun merchants who call themselves the Jackson brothers. I was pretending to be a big buyer - too big for their league. I wanted them to lead me to whoever could fill that kind of order. The plan was working perfectly, until today. They’d had a few too many drinks and decided to rob me of the bankroll I flashed them as a sign of good faith. That’s one of the problems with dealing with criminals-they’re so unreliable.”

  “Yeah,” said Joe, reaching for a dill pickle.

  “It’s so hard to find good help nowadays, especially when you need an honest crook.”

  “So you’re still in the dark about who the big arms dealer is?” asked Frank, getting back to the subject at hand. When Frank scented a mystery, his bloodhound instincts came to life right away.

  “Actually, we have a pretty good idea,” said the Gray Man. “There’s a French firm that calls itself Reynard and Company. Its president is a distinguished Frenchman named Paul Reynard, and the company is supposed to be in the import export trade. But we suspect that its real business is selling goods and services to every kind of crook around-drug smugglers, bank robbers, terrorists, you name it.”

  Joe swallowed hard. “Terrorists?” he repeated.

  “They’re Reynard’s biggest customers for guns, bombs, phony passports, even professional killers,” said the Gray Man. “Reynard and Company will supply anything for a price. Or at least we think they will. We still need hard evidence. That was what this operation was so important.

  Those two punks were supposed to lead me to Reynard’s representative in this country. After I’d made a few buys, I could start dealing directly with Reynard and get enough on the company to shut it down and lock up the people in charge.” “What about the French police?” said Frank. “I mean, it’s their territory.” “They’ve been notably unsuccessful,” answered the Gray Man, a touch of scorn in his voice. “Of course, eventually we would have to inform them of what we found so they could do the actual mopping up: But they simply lack the Network’s expertise in handling undercover work like this, not to mention the possibility that Reynard may have infiltrated them.” “And now your operation’s off?” asked Joe.

  “We’re back to square zero,” said the Gray Man, shaking his head. “And we were so close. Those punks actually boasted that they had set up a meet with Reynard’s man, a fellow named Dupree, at the Hotel Pierre at eight tonight. Then they laughed and said they’d rather party all night with the money they were going to lift off me.”

  Frank looked at his brother hard. He could see that Joe had something on his mind. Something big enough to make him leave the rest of his second sandwich untouched.

  “So Reynard will be able to keep supplying terrorists,” Joe said, and then Frank knew what he was thinking. Joe was remembering Iola.

  “For the moment, Reynard has slipped out of our grasp,” the Gray Man admitted.

  “Look, why don’t you use - us?” Joe asked abruptly. “You?” said the Gray Man.

  “Frank and I can pretend to be the gun buyers. We can go to the meet and start getting the goods on Reynard.”

  The Gray Man chuckled. “You’ve been reading too many superhero comic books, young man. You’d better leave matters like this to professionals. “

  “Yeah, professionals like you,” said Joe. “You did a great job out in that alley.”

  The Gray Man flushed. “I think we’ve talked about this matter enough. I gave you the explanation I promised. Let that be the end of this. If I ever need your services, or you ever have any information that the Network should know, we’ll be in touch via that modem I sent you.”

  “I’m looking for an interface to make it work,” Frank said pointedly.

  “Yeah, your professionals forgot to include one,” added Joe.

  “Well, I’m sure you’ll be able to find the part,” said the Gray Man. “You young people are relatively competent in dealing with computers. And there’s no need for the modem right now, anyway.”

  The Gray Man got to his feet, ready to leave. But before he could go, Joe said, “Look, just in case, do you have a number where we can reach you? You never know what we might stumble on. Frank and I get around.”

  Frank looked at his brother sharply. Joe’s tone was mild, as if he had forgotten his disagreement with the Gray Man. It wasn’t like Joe to forget something like that or to give up so fast.

  The Gray Man saw nothing strange in Joe’s acceptance of his authority, though. He simply said, “There’s a temporary number
you can use-five-five-five-one-one-one-one-while I’m still in the city. I’ll be here for another two weeks. After that I’ll be back at headquarters.”

  “Right,” said Joe, committing the number to memory. “And thanks for trusting us with it.”

  “You kids may be a bit impulsive, but I think you’re trustworthy enough,” said the Gray Man. “Just don’t start thinking you can do things that are better left to older, trained professionals.”

  The Gray Man turned and walked away. As he was paying the cashier, Joe turned to his brother and said, “Come on. We’ve got a couple of days. We could do it.”

  “I hate to admit it,” said Frank, “but the odds against us being able to pull off a stunt like you suggested are just too high. If I worked it out on my computer, it would probably come out to be about a million to one.” He took a last bite of his sandwich and said, “Speaking of computers, let’s get back to our hunt.”

  Joe shook his head. “Look, Frank, I’m tired of going through all those high-tech treasure houses. I want to check out some sports stores. Let’s separate and meet in an hour and a half at Houston Street and Broadway.”

  “Good enough,” said Frank, as he and Joe got to their feet. “See you there.”

  But an hour and a half later, Frank didn’t see his brother.

  What he saw was a weird-looking kid with bright green spiky hair, an earring, and black punk clothes. “No,” said Frank, shuddering.

  “Yes,” said Joe. “I found a great barber and a clothes store right next door. You can get fixed up in half an hour.”

  “No way,” said Frank. “I told you before, it’s a crazy scheme, no matter how mad you are at terrorists.”

  “I’m not getting mad, I’m getting even,” replied Joe, his face hard with determination. “If you don’t want to go along, then I’ll do it alone.”

  Before Frank could stop him, he turned and headed down the street.

  “You’ll get yourself killed!” Frank yelled after him. Joe kept walking. “All right,” Frank shouted. “We’ll both get ourselves killed.”