Night of the Werewolf Page 2

  The stout youth was stripped to the waist and perspiring freely in the hot August sunshine. He struggled to shape a huge strip of bark to a framework of cedar ribs and gunwales fitted around maple thwarts.

  “Hey, not bad,” Joe said admiringly.

  “Except for one thing,” Frank pointed out.

  Chet shot him a peevish glance. “What’s that?”

  “You’re supposed to shape the skin first and fit the ribs inside it. At least that was the Indian way.”

  “Listen! I know what I’m doing,” said Chet, puffing and grunting.

  “You’d better.” Joe grinned. “You might just have to demonstrate that thing to us on a chilly mountain river before long.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We’re going to a cottage in the Adirondacks for a week or two and you’re invited to tag along,” Frank replied. “Want to come?”

  A dazzling smile burst over Chet’s chubby face. “Wow! Do I!” he exclaimed, releasing his pressure on the birchbark.

  Next moment he toppled over backwards as the tough, curling bark flapped back, knocking him galley-west. Roaring with laughter at Chet’s surprised look, Frank and Joe helped him wrestle the birchbark back in place and secure it temporarily with clamps.

  “I’ve been soaking that stuff since breakfast,” their roly-poly pal complained, “but it dries out faster than I get it on.”

  Chet’s usual good humor soon returned as he thought about their upcoming trip to the Adirondacks. “How soon do we leave?” he asked.

  “Tomorrow morning,” Frank responded. “Can you be ready by then?”

  “You bet! This’ll really give me a chance to show you how those old mountain men used to live out in the wilderness! ”

  “I can hardly wait.” Joe chuckled.

  “Don’t worry, you’ll see,” Chet boasted. “Which reminds me. I’ve got something that belongs to one of you.”

  He trotted off to the front porch of the Morton farmhouse and returned with a lightweight jacket, which he tossed to Frank.

  “That’s the one I left at the diner last night,” Frank said. “How’d you find it?”

  “I didn‘t,” Chet replied. “Someone else did.”

  “Who was it?”

  “Search me. He never mentioned his name. I tried to call you last night but couldn’t get through.”

  “Someone cut our phone line,” Joe explained.

  “No kidding!” Chet said that he had received a late call from a man who supposedly also failed to reach the Hardys by telephone. “The guy spotted your name tag in the jacket, Frank. When he couldn’t get you, Nick Pappadopolos remembered seeing us all at the diner together and suggested he call me.”

  “What happened then?” Frank asked.

  “I told him I knew you, so he said he’d drop off the jacket.”

  “Mighty nice of him,” Joe remarked.

  “Sure was. And this must belong to him,” said Frank, picking up a key which had fallen out of a pocket when Chet tossed the jacket to him.

  “How come?” his stout chum asked.

  “It’s not mine, and I’m sure it wasn’t in my pocket last night.”

  “He must’ve stuck it in there absentmindedly,” said Joe. “Tough break. He may be looking all over for that key. We ought to give it back to him. What’d the guy look like, Chet?”

  “I don’t know. He never rang our bell, so I didn’t meet him. Probably came by late and didn’t want to disturb us. I found the jacket lying on the porch this morning.”

  Frank, wanting to return the favor, decided to drive to the diner and see if Nick Pappadopolos knew the man who had found his jacket. To the Hardys‘surprise, Nick had no idea what Frank was talking about.

  “Nobody was in here last night asking about you,” the proprietor declared, “and I never told anyone Chet Morton was a buddy of yours.”

  Frank and Joe looked at each other with puzzled frowns.

  “Oh, Nick, sorry we bothered you,” Frank said. Then the Hardys returned to the parking lot and climbed in their car.

  “How do you figure it, Frank?” Joe asked. “Do you suppose Chet got the story wrong?”

  Frank shook his head. “I doubt it. But there’s something fishy somewhere.”

  “Like the way your jacket turned up on Chet’s front porch, for instance.”

  The older Hardy boy nodded. “Maybe the guy didn’t want to be seen.”

  “Let’s have another look at that key, Frank.” Joe took it from his brother and examined it. The key was small and flat, with one serrated edge, and was stamped with the number 27.

  “Looks like the kind that might open an airport locker,” Joe suggested.

  “Yes, except that airports don’t usually have rental lockers anymore,” Frank pointed out. “Too easy for terrorists to stash bombs in them.”

  “Wait a minute! The Bayport bus station still has lockers!”

  “Right. Want to check them out?”

  “Why not?”

  On their way, Frank braked for a traffic light and pulled alongside a pickup truck belonging to the Prito Construction Company. Their pal, Tony Prito, was at the wheel with Biff Hooper beside him.

  “What’s up?” the muscular, dark-haired youth inquired through the open window.

  The Hardys told them about their trip to the Adirondacks and invited their friends to come along.

  “Boy, I wish I could,” Tony said wistfully. “But Dad’s keeping me too busy.”

  “Same here,” said Biff. “I’ve been working at that construction site on Ridge Road.”

  “If the job gets done fast enough, we could come up for a day or two later on,” Tony added.

  “What’s cooking with you Hardys?” Biff asked. “Another mystery?”

  “Sort of, but just a small one right now.” Frank showed them the key and related the odd way in which his jacket had turned up on the Mortons’ front porch after the stranger’s call to Chet.

  “But why would the guy give Chet a phony story?” Biff inquired.

  “That’s what we’d like to know,” Joe replied. “If we can get a lead on who he is, maybe we can find out.”

  Tony and Biff were in no hurry. They had been checking the Ridge Road construction site to make sure no vandalism was taking place over the weekend. So they decided to accompany the Hardys to the bus station.

  Joe’s hunch was borne out when the key proved to fit locker number 27. Frank opened the door. A wrapped package lay inside.

  “Any name or address on it?” Joe asked eagerly.

  “Let’s see.” Frank lifted out the package to examine it. Suddenly he held it toward his ear as if to listen. “It’s ticking!” he announced tensely.

  “Leaping lizards!” Joe gasped. “It must be a bomb!”

  3

  Weird Lore

  The youths stared at each other with stunned expressions. The package in Frank’s hands might be laden with death and destruction!

  “Better call the police!” Tony croaked.

  “No time,” said Frank. “When I moved this out of the locker, I may have armed the detonator and started the ticking.” He glanced frantically at the Sunday travelers milling about the station.

  “At least get it outside!” urged Joe.

  “Right!” said Frank, who was already hurrying toward the entrance. “The problem is where to dump it!”

  As the four dashed out to the street, Tony had an idea. “There’s an old brick warehouse in the next block that’s ready for the wrecker’s ball!” he suggested.

  “Just the place!” Frank agreed.

  The boys ran desperately toward the warehouse, aware that with every passing second the package in Frank’s hands might be ticking closer to disaster. As they reached the building, Frank gave a mighty heave and hurled the package into the fenced-off loading dock area.

  Ka-booom! It hit the ground and exploded in a cloud of smoke and small flying debris. The blast was loud, but the concussion was not great. When the s
moke cleared, there was no visible sign of damage to the building. Passersby paused in alarm and looked at the boys suspiciously, then hurried on about their business.

  All four youths were pale and perspiring, but their faces now wore relieved smiles.

  “Wow!” said Biff in a small voice. “The jolt when it hit the ground must have set off the bomb!”

  “Thank goodness it was just a small one,” Tony declared.

  “It still wouldn’t have done Frank any good if he’d been holding it,” Joe pointed out. “Or the rest of us, either.”

  The next morning Frank and Joe stopped at the Morton farmhouse to pick up Chet. When they got underway again half an hour later, the car was loaded down with luggage and assorted gear, including their pal’s handcrafted bow and a quiverful of arrows. In addition, his unfinished canoe was strapped to the car roof.

  “For crying out loud, Chet,” Joe complained, “we’re only going to a cottage for a week, not on a full-scale wilderness expedition!”

  “Listen, when you head into rugged country like the Adirondacks, you have to be ready for anything,” retorted their stout chum, who was wedged into the car’s narrow back seat. “I aim to be prepared!”

  Their route from the Morton farm led back through Bayport. On the way, Joe suggested stopping at the library to see if they could find a book dealing with the subject of werewolves.

  “What do you want that for?” Chet asked curiously.

  “That’s why we’re going up to the Adirondacks. To hunt down a werewolf!” Joe explained.

  “A werewolf!” Chet exclaimed, bug-eyed. “Are you serious?”

  “Sure, it’s a new case we’re on,” said Joe. “Didn’t we mention that?”

  “No, you didn‘t! If I’d known you were going to be tangling with some bloodthirsty wolfman nut, I’d have thought twice about coming!”

  “What’s to be scared of?” Frank teased. “If you run into him, the worst he can do is sink his fangs into your throat.”

  “Very funny,” Chet said sourly. “Har-de-har-har with the Hardy boys.”

  “That’s the spirit.” Frank chuckled. “If the werewolf gets you, at least you’ll die laughing!”

  At the library, the Hardys consulted Miss Shannon at the reference desk. She went straight to a bookshelf of new editions and brought back a volume with a color ful wrapper.

  “This may be just what you’re looking for,” she advised. “It’s a recent best-seller by a writer named Desmond Quorn. He’s compiled all sorts of folklore and superstitions about werewolves, and he describes a number of alleged cases from old records.”

  “Sounds perfect,” Frank said. “Thanks a lot.”

  After checking out the book, the Hardys rejoined their roly-poly chum, who was waiting sulkily in the car.

  “Cheer up, Chet,” said Joe. “Just one more stop.”

  “Now where?”

  “Police headquarters.”

  “Oh, no!” Chet groaned. “Don’t tell me there’s even more trouble ahead, besides werewolves?”

  “Nothing serious,” Joe replied, suppressing a grin. “Just want to see about a bullet I dug out of our front door Saturday night.”

  “I knew it! That means there’s a gunman after you guys, probably some mobster on the FBI’s Most Wanted List!”

  “Why do you suppose we brought you along?” Joe said with a straight face. “If there’s a car chase and the bullets start flying, we’ll have a shield of blubber protecting us in the back seat!”

  Even Frank could not help laughing as he saw Chefs expression in the rearview mirror. But despite Joe’s teasing, both Hardys knew there was no better friend in a tight spot than Chet Morton.

  At headquarters they spoke to Chief Collig, a long-time acquaintance of their father’s. He had a technician bring the bullet to his office from the ballistics lab.

  “What can you tell us?” Frank inquired.

  “It’s definitely silver,” the lab officer said. “Hand cast in a mold, I imagine.”

  “Enough marks to identify the gun?”

  “No way. It’s too mashed up. But my guess, judging from the weight of the slug, would be that it was fired from a .22.”

  “Probably some nut heard about the spooky dog you fellows sighted at the diner the other night,” Chief Collig suggested. “So he got the wild notion there was a werewolf haunting Bayport and figured he might scare it off with a silver bullet.”

  “Could be,” Frank murmured doubtfully.

  “Anyhow, we’ll keep an eye out for any local mental cases or oddballs on the loose with a gun,” the chief promised.

  “Thanks. By the way, Joe and I are going away for a few days. If you could have the scout car in our neighborhood check our house now and again at night, we’d appreciate it.”

  “Will do!”

  The Hardys drove out of town and by eleven o‘clock were on the New York State Thruway, heading north to the Adirondacks.

  “My stomach’s hollow,” Chet complained. “Couldn’t we stop for a bite to eat?”

  “Too early for lunch,” Joe objected.

  “I don’t mean a full meal. Just a quick snack to keep going, like a couple of burgers and fries.”

  “Okay.” Frank grinned, veering off the road toward a diner. “This place looks decent.”

  Joe took the library book on werewolves inside and looked at it while they were in a booth waiting to be served. A picture of the author, Desmond Quorn, was on the back flap of the jacket.

  “It says he lives near Kingston, New York,” Joe remarked. “We’ll be going right by there!”

  “Hm, that’s a thought,” Frank agreed. “He might be able to give us some useful information.”

  The Hardys decided to call the author from the phone booth in the diner. Frank soon found his number by dialing information. Quorn immediately recognized the Hardys by name and invited them and their friend to have lunch with him.

  “Thanks, we’ll be happy to, sir,” Frank said.

  He and Joe had nothing but root beer and let Chet polish off the hamburgers they had ordered. But by the time they reached Kingston, Chet assured them that the snack had in no way spoiled his appetite for lunch.

  The author’s home proved to be a lovely old Dutch Colonial farmhouse. Desmond Quorn himself was a tall, thin man with graying blond hair and horn-rimmed glasses. An interesting talker with a fund of occult lore, he fascinated the boys throughout lunch with yarns and legends about vampires and werewolves.

  “What’s your opinion, Mr. Quorn?” Chet asked uneasily between mouthfuls of apple pie. “Are there really such things as werewolves?”

  Quorn shrugged and smiled. “I neither believe nor disbelieve. It just happens to be my hobby to collect all the folklore on the subject. But werewolves have certainly been reported in many countries, and a lot of people did believe in them in olden days.”

  “There’s a scientific word for the belief that people can turn into wolves, isn’t there?” said Frank.

  “Yes, the word is lycanthropy. There’s also a disease called porphyria, which may lead to mental disturbance. It can cause hair to grow on the skin and even make a person so sensitive to light that he prefers to stay in the dark and go out only at night. Possibly some so-called werewolf cases were just people suffering from porphyria.”

  “Where do you dig up reports on werewolf cases?”

  “In old records of European court trials, to name one source,” the author explained. “You see, in the Middle Ages, werewolves were supposed to be possessed by the Devil, or to have made a pact with him. The judges who condemned people to be burned at the stake as witches sometimes had so-called werewolves put to death, too. The name werewolf, by the way, comes from Anglo-Saxon words meaning ‘man-wolf’.”

  Desmond Quorn added that there are also a number of old books and writings on the subject, besides the stories handed down from one generation to another. He said he had many cases in his files, collected from all these sources.

&nb
sp; “Would you by any chance have a record of a Bohemian werewolf named Tabor?” Joe asked as they all rose from the lunch table.

  Quorn flashed him a curious glance. “Of course. And how odd you should ask. It so happens that twice recently I’ve had occasion to look up that case.”

  He led the boys into his study and pulled out a file drawer. The next moment he turned around with a startled expression on his face.

  “What’s wrong, sir?” Frank asked.

  “My data on the Tabor case!” Quorn exclaimed. “It’s been stolen!”

  4

  Telltale Limp

  The Hardys were as startled as their host. They could not help wondering if the theft had anything to do with their own investigation.

  “What makes you so sure the information was stolen?” Frank asked.

  “Because the papers were right here in this folder last Friday,” Quorn replied. “And I haven’t consulted the file since then!”

  “Any idea who might have taken them?”

  “Indeed I do,” the author replied angrily. “I had a visitor on Friday named Julien Sorel, who also inquired about the Tabor case. He must have snitched the records from the file folder when I left the room for a few moments.”

  “Know anything about him?”

  “Nothing, except that he spoke with a French accent. He phoned and said he had read and enjoyed my book, and asked if he could stop in to get my autograph. Then when he was here, he brought up the Tabor case.”

  Frank said, “Did he mention where he was from?”

  Quorn hesitated. “No, but from things he said, I got the impression that he had just arrived in this country recently, perhaps as a tourist.”

  Their host soon recovered from his annoyance and was able to tell the Hardys the main facts of the case in question, since he had checked and discussed it only a few days earlier.

  “According to legend, the Tabors bore a curse,” he related. “The family was said to spawn a werewolf every seventh generation, which was roughly every two hundred years. The last case occurred in the eighteenth century, somewhere around 1760. But there are records of two previous ancestors being condemned as werewolves in the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries.”