Three-Ring Terror Read online

  Instead of answering Carl Nash’s question, Frank said, “One of the jugglers must have lost a ball. Got any idea who it could have been?”

  “Can’t say I do,” Nash replied, putting some ice in a cup and pouring a drink for a little boy who stood by the table.

  “Where are you from?” Joe asked Nash.

  Nash’s bright blue eyes lit up behind his white clown makeup. “Funny you should ask. Not from around here, that’s for darn sure.”

  “I didn’t think so, from your accent, that is,” Frank offered.

  “You got it,” Nash said, raising his bushy orange eyebrows. “I’m a good ol’ boy from deep in the heart of Texas.”

  “Are you a student at Circus U.?” Chet asked eagerly.

  “That’s right.” Nash’s clown mouth spread into a wide red smile. “I graduate this year. Trapeze is my specialty.”

  “Wow,” Chet said, impressed. “I guess you’re not afraid of heights then.”

  Joe laughed. “He’d better not be.”

  “I used to be,” Nash said with a chuckle. “But I got over it pretty fast.”

  “I’ll bet,” Frank said. He kept passing the ball back and forth between his hands. “Are you ready to go, Chet?”

  “If Carl thinks he can handle the crowd on his own,” Chet said, turning to the trapeze student.

  “No problem,” Nash said. “It’s thinning out, anyway. There are just a few circus folks and some VIPs left, from what I can tell,” he added, scanning the crowd. “Go on home.”

  “Thanks,” Chet told him, pulling off his wig and putting it in his tote bag. “I’m just glad to be able to take this thing off,” he said with a grin.

  “I know what you mean,” Nash said, scratching at his wig. “It sure does itch. Oh,” he went on, turning to Frank and Joe. “I almost forgot. Why don’t you two guys come with your friend to class tomorrow? Circus U. is having an open house for students and friends. You’ll also get to watch the circus performers in rehearsal. It should be fun.”

  Chet’s eyes lit up. “That’s a great idea.” He turned to the Hardys. “I can give you guys a behind-the-scenes tour of the circus.”

  Frank looked at Joe. “What do you think?” he asked.

  “Why not,” Joe answered. “We are on vacation after all.”

  “Thanks for the invitation,” Frank said to Carl Nash. “We’ll see you tomorrow then.”

  “Great,” Nash said. He went back to working the refreshment stand.

  “He seems like a nice guy,” Chet commented as he and Joe followed Frank away from the refreshment table.

  “Maybe he can show you some tricks on the trapeze,” Joe said, grinning.

  Chet shook his head emphatically. “Not me. No way. This clown stays on the ground.”

  Frank led them to a less crowded part of the backstage area. He stopped at the edge of a room filled with circus props.

  “Why are we stopping?” asked his brother.

  “We need to plan our strategy,” Frank replied. “How we’re going to find out who that juggler was, why he left this”—Frank held up the gem-studded ball—“in Chet’s bag, and what it all means.”

  Chet bit his lip thoughtfully, smearing his red makeup. “Why don’t we just turn the ball in to the circus officials and let them take care of finding out the answers to all those questions.”

  “Come on, Chet,” Joe said. “Where’s your sense of adventure?”

  “You two are the detectives,” Chet replied. “I’m here to learn how to be a clown, not to solve mysteries.”

  “But Frank and I will need your help,” Joe pointed out. “You’re in a perfect position to supply us with info on the people here.”

  “Look, you guys,” Chet went on, shaking his head in exasperation. “Don’t mess things up for me, okay? If you start snooping around here, the circus people might not like it, and then I could be in trouble.”

  “Wait a minute,” Frank said. “Since when have we put solving a case above our friendship?”

  Chet frowned slightly. “Never, I guess. But don’t do it now, either, okay?”

  “Deal,” Frank said, reaching out to shake Chet’s hand. The polka-dotted sleeve of Chet’s costume flapped wildly as Frank pumped Chet’s hand. “So tell us,” Frank continued, “who should we talk to tomorrow to find out who that juggler is?”

  Chet shook his head and shrugged. “You got me. So far, I’ve only met Bo Costello. You could ask him, I guess.”

  “Sounds good to me. Have you got any ideas, Joe?” Frank asked his brother.

  “Let’s take another look at the ball,” Joe suggested. “Maybe there’s something about it we missed the first time we looked at it.”

  “True,” Frank said, squinting at the ball. “This may be an ordinary prop, but who knows?”

  He held the ball up to the light. The white gems looked like rhinestones or glass, but he took out his pocketknife and scraped at each one of them just to be sure. The gems flaked away under the pressure of the knife. “That tells us one thing, at least.”

  “What’s that?” Chet asked.

  “The gems aren’t real,” Joe explained to Chet. “Otherwise, the knife wouldn’t have scratched them.”

  Frank looked at the ball carefully again. This time, he saw a thin seam running around the middle of the ball. “I think I’ve found something,” he told Joe, pointing out the seam.

  “Try twisting the ball to see if it opens,” Joe suggested.

  Frank turned the ball over in his hands. Sure enough, Joe was right. The two halves turned and the ball popped open. A small folded-up piece of paper fell out and fluttered to the ground.

  Joe picked up the paper and unfolded it. “Weird,” he said, handing the paper to his brother. “Definitely weird.”

  Frank looked at the paper. On it were three pairs of letters with numbers written on them.

  “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Joe asked his brother.

  Frank nodded. “It looks like we’ve just found some kind of coded message!”

  3 The Human Cannonball

  * * *

  “Well, what do you know,” Joe said, looking at the slip of paper. “I get the feeling our juggler friend left us with more of a mystery than we thought.”

  “I wonder what this code means,” Chet said, taking the paper from Joe and reading the figures 1220, 103, and 214. “That’s a strange set of numbers,” he remarked.

  “And look at the letters next to them,” Frank said, pointing. “CN, JL, GU. I don’t see any patterns, do you?”

  Joe thought for a moment, quickly running down a sequence of simple codes he’d learned over the years. “Nope,” he said finally. “Frank, if this really is a coded message, that juggler was passing information, whether he knew it or not.”

  “But why was he passing information to me?” Chet asked.

  Joe shook his head. “Who knows? But I think we had better try to find out.” He looked around the backstage area. The place was clearing out. Most of the guests had gone, and only a few circus performers remained. “I doubt we’ll learn anything here tonight, though,” Joe said.

  “You’re right,” Frank agreed. “Let’s go home and see if we can crack this code.”

  “Hey, guys,” Chet protested, pointing to the two halves of the gem-studded ball in Frank’s hand. “We can’t leave here with that. It belongs to the circus, or Circus U., depending on who that juggler was. We have to return it.”

  Joe reached out for the ball, which Frank had put back together. “We will,” he said firmly. “As soon as we find out just who this mystery juggler is and what he’s doing passing coded information.”

  • • •

  The next morning, Joe woke up bright and early. He got out of bed, showered, and went down to the kitchen, taking the coded message with him.

  He read the numbers and letters on the slip of paper: CN—1220, JL—103, GU—214. “There’s got to be some way to crack this code,” he muttered to himself as he sat at
the table and poured himself a bowl of cereal.

  Joe was still at it when Frank came down to breakfast half an hour later. “Any luck?” his brother asked, opening the refrigerator and taking out a pitcher of juice.

  “Nope,” Joe said, shaking his head and staring once more at the arrangement of letters and numbers.

  “Where is everyone?” Frank asked, sitting down next to his brother.

  “Dad left a note saying he had to go out of town to the police headquarters in Philadelphia to run a check on someone. A new case, I guess.”

  Frank nodded. The brothers’ father, Fenton Hardy, was a private investigator, and his hours often started early and ended late. “What about Mom and Aunt Gertrude?” he asked.

  “They left a note saying they’d be gone all day,” Joe said, looking up for a second from the coded message. “They’re visiting friends in New York.”

  “We’d better hurry if we’re going to pick up Chet,” Frank said. He checked his watch. “You shouldn’t have let me sleep this late.”

  Joe stood up, stuffed the paper in the pocket of his jeans, and headed for the kitchen door. “I was busy trying to crack this code and I lost track of time,” he said, grabbing his jacket from the coatrack by the door.

  After the Hardys had picked up Chet, Frank drove the brothers’ black police van toward the Bayport Arena. On the way, the three of them talked about the mystery juggler.

  “Do you think he was a spy, passing secret information?” Chet asked. “That would be too much, wouldn’t it?”

  Joe laughed and twisted around in the front seat to look at Chet. His friend wasn’t wearing his clown costume but had his Circus U. tote bag with him. “We shouldn’t jump to any conclusions,” Joe said. “At least not until we ask around and find out just who this guy is.”

  Frank steered the van into the arena parking lot. “We still need to find out what the message means,” he said. “And why he dropped the ball in your bag.”

  “The ball!” Joe exclaimed, slapping his forehead with his palm. “We left it at home.”

  Frank shot his brother a look as he switched off the ignition. “You mean, you left it at home.”

  “You were the one who rushed me out of the house,” Joe protested. “If you hadn’t overslept, this wouldn’t have happened.”

  “Hey, guys,” Chet said, crawling over the seat to follow Joe out the passenger side of the van. “It’s no big deal. You can go home and get it after Dean Turner’s speech.”

  “Who’s Dean Turner?” Frank asked.

  “He’s the dean of Circus U.,” Chet answered. “He’s giving a speech this morning about Circus U. for students and guests. And then he’s going to perform a trick he used to be famous for.”

  “Oh, great,” Joe said absently. He was still mad at himself for leaving the juggler’s ball in his room. He could see it now, sitting on top of his desk where he’d left it the night before.

  “Dean Turner’s going to be shot out of a cannon,” Chet said. “Isn’t that neat?”

  “Definitely,” Frank said. He looked at his brother, who was staring off into space, a glum expression on his face. “Forget about the ball, Joe. We don’t really need it to find out who the mystery juggler is.”

  “I guess you’re right,” Joe agreed reluctantly. “All we really have to do is describe the ball and see if anyone with the Montero Brothers Circus or Circus U. knows a guy who wears green rhinestone-covered pants and a blue wig and juggles gem-studded balls.”

  “Exactly,” Frank said. “It just means a little more legwork.”

  “Let’s move it,” Chet urged, looking at his watch. “We’ve only got fifteen minutes before Dean Turner’s speech.”

  The Hardys and Chet headed across the parking lot. Chet led them around to the back of the Bayport Arena. It was cold out, but the sun shone brightly, reflecting off the stark white walls of the huge, round, domed building.

  “Where are we going?” Joe asked as Chet opened a door marked Private.

  “This is the entrance to the arena’s offices and multipurpose rooms,” Chet explained as they stepped into the building. “I want to give you a quick tour of our classrooms.”

  Chet turned left and led the Hardys down a hallway that curved past a bank of elevators.

  “This is where we learn makeup,” Chet said, pointing to a room on their left. He opened the door to the next room. “And here’s the prop classroom.”

  Joe saw the room was full of wood, paint, and worktables. There was even a huge table saw and drill. The room looked a lot like his shop class in school. “You have to make your own props?” he asked.

  Chet nodded. “Every clown learns how to make his or her own props. That’s part of building a clown character.”

  Frank let out a whistle. “Boy, you’re serious about this clowning thing, aren’t you?”

  Chet grinned. “As serious as any clown can be.”

  They continued down the hall. When they reached the elevators, Chet said, “Down the rest of the hallway are the offices for arena employees and the offices Circus U. people are using. The circus animals are also kept down here. The elevators lead to the arena and locker rooms.”

  “I searched around the locker rooms and down here when I was looking for the juggler last night,” Joe said.

  The Hardys and Chet rode one of the passenger elevators up to the main floor. They walked down a short hallway toward double glass doors that said Entrance to Arena.

  When they stepped through the doors, they found themselves at the top of the last aisle of seats. Way below them were the three circus rings. A cannon was placed in the middle of the center ring, and there was a podium next to it. The seats were beginning to fill up with families and students. Some of the students were dressed in leotards and sweatshirts and had Circus U. tote bags with them.

  “Let’s get a good seat,” Chet urged. “I want to be up close.”

  “Not too close,” Frank said with a grin. “We don’t want Dean Turner to come flying right at us.”

  The three friends took seats in the third row of the center section. Joe noticed that there was a safety net strung up in front of the seats on his right, and that the cannon was pointed at the net. He nudged Frank and pointed to the net. “Just in case you were really worried that we’d be hit by the human cannonball,” he said, smiling.

  Soon the bleachers around them were full of students and parents with young children.

  “How many students are there at Circus U.?” Joe asked Chet.

  Chet scanned the crowd. “There are ten from Bayport High. I’m not sure how many full-timers are interning with the Montero Brothers Circus.”

  Just then a short, thin man with dark hair and glasses stepped up to the podium. He was wearing a tweed coat and brown slacks. Joe thought he looked almost like a college professor. “That’s Dean Turner?” Joe asked Chet in a whisper.

  Chet shrugged. “I guess so. I’ve never met him. I’ve only seen his picture in the Circus U. catalog.”

  “He’s not exactly the kind of guy you’d expect to be shot from a cannon, is he?” Frank asked Joe.

  The crowd grew quiet as the dean began to speak. “I’d like to welcome you all here today. I’m Paul Turner, dean of Circus University and a member of the board of directors of the Montero Brothers Circus. We’re very proud to have you here for this annual open house. Bayport has always welcomed the circus and Circus U., and we’re glad to have this chance to thank you.”

  For the next few minutes, Turner explained the purpose of Circus U. for the crowd of students and Bayport residents. At the end of his speech, he told them, “Please feel free to stay and watch the circus performers rehearse, and to ask the students and performers whatever questions you have. There will be circus performances all week, and I hope you will want to attend at least one.” Dean Turner smiled. “The performance Friday night should be particularly exciting, because the Bayport High students will be performing along with the circus performers.”
/>   A buzz of excitement ran through the audience. Frank and Joe turned and looked at Chet. “Did you know that was going to happen?” Joe whispered.

  Chet nodded and smiled happily. “And you guys had better be there.”

  “And now, without further ado,” Dean Turner continued, “I’d like to show you all a trick I used to perform back in my professional circus days, before I became the dean at Circus U.”

  “I can’t believe he’s going to get in that cannon with his tweed jacket on,” Joe said.

  But Turner had stepped back from the podium and removed his jacket. He rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and straightened his bow tie. Nearby, a man in a tuxedo sitting at a drum set began to play a snare drum. Turner bowed to the audience and walked slowly toward the cannon.

  “That’s one of the things I love about the circus,” Joe whispered. “The suspense.”

  “Shh,” Chet said. “I can’t concentrate.”

  When Turner reached the ladder that led up to the cannon’s mouth, he turned to the crowd. “Don’t try this at home,” he joked. “This stunt requires special training. The kind of training a place like Circus U. offers, in fact.”

  He turned and began to climb the ladder. When he got to the top, he grabbed the rim of the cannon and hoisted himself feetfirst into the barrel. Two men in circus blazers removed the ladder. Then a tall woman with long brown hair stepped across the ring to the end of the cannon. A long fuse reached out of the cannon and trailed to the ground. The woman lit the fuse with a flourish, and it began to burn, sending out sparks.

  Next to him, Joe heard Chet draw in his breath. He glanced over at his friend. Chet was sitting on the edge of the bleacher, watching every move. As the fuse came closer to the cannon, Chet’s eyes widened.

  Then, in a flash, the fuse went off, lighting the gunpowder inside the cannon. A huge boom exploded from the barrel, and smoke came pouring out.

  The crowd let out a gasp. Joe waited to see Turner shoot from the cannon’s barrel, but nothing happened. More and more smoke appeared, but there was still no sign of the dean.

  Then he heard the sound of coughing coming from the cannon and Dean Turner’s voice cry out, “Help! Someone help me!”