The London Deception Read online

  “Where’s the equipment room that Neville Shah said he was in when the accident occurred?” Frank asked.

  Chris pointed to the door in front of them. Frank opened the door and saw a storage room filled with broad, deep shelves. Theater lights, some of which looked decades old, lined the shelves.

  “I would say about thirty seconds passed from the time the sabotaged lights were turned on to the time Chris spotted Neville Shah coming from the stage left wing,” Frank said.

  “Yes?” Chris said, not following Frank’s thinking.

  “You’re wondering whether Shah could have been the person you spotted in the booth and still have had time to appear on stage when Corey Lista saw him,” Joe said, continuing his brother’s thought.

  Frank nodded. “Joe, you head up to the lighting booth. Chris, wait at the bottom of the stairway,” the older Hardy instructed. “When I give the signal, Chris will yell for you to start—”

  “And I burn rubber down here,” Joe jumped in.

  “I’ll time you,” Frank added as Chris and Joe headed back down the long hallway to the back staircase.

  Frank yawned and stretched as he waited for the other two to reach their positions. It had been a long day—and night, he thought. Frank froze in mid-yawn when he saw someone’s shadow on the wall of the stairwell leading to the stage. “Chris?” Frank called, turning his head.

  “Yes?” Chris’s voice echoed from down the hallway.

  Frank turned back, but the shadow was no longer there. “Uh, nothing,” Frank said.

  “Joe has just started up the back steps,” Chris called again.

  “Okay. I’m going to check something out,” Frank replied, pushing the bar to open the metal fire door leading to the stage.

  One bare light bulb on a stand was the only illumination onstage. Frank heard a sound, something like a latch on a door closing. Across the stage he saw another metal fire door in the other wing.

  He moved toward the door and opened it. Walking down some steps, Frank found himself in a hallway with many doors.

  In the first room on the left, he flipped on the light switch and saw three chairs at a low counter. Mirrors above the counter were framed by light bulbs. Across the room stood a rolling coat rack hung with men’s clothing. Frank recognized one of the costumes that Chris wore in Innocent Victim.

  “A dressing room,” Frank surmised. His nostrils flared as the smell of smoke reached him. He hurried down the hall and threw open the door to another dressing room. On another rolling rack a woman’s dress was ablaze. A red candle and candleholder lay on the floor at the base of the costume rack.

  Frank grabbed a pitcher of water and a handkerchief from the makeup table. Covering his mouth, he rushed toward the fire and tossed the water on it.

  The fire sizzled but had spread too far to be extinguished. Within seconds the whole rack of costumes was burning and smoke had filled the room. As Frank turned to run for help, the door to the dressing room slammed shut.

  Frank tried the doorknob and pulled, but the door didn’t budge. Another dead-bolt lock, Frank realized, and someone with a key must have locked it from the outside.

  “Help!” Frank shouted at the top of his lungs. “Joe, Chris!”

  Frank backed up and threw his weight against the door, but it held fast. Coughing, Frank sank to the floor, breathing in what little good air was left in the room through the handkerchief. His eyes fluttered as he began to lose consciousness and the fire continued to burn out of control.

  4 The Suspect Handkerchief

  * * *

  Frank barely felt the spray of water against his face as the sprinkler system in the ceiling came on. The door suddenly bumped against his head.

  “Move, Frank, you’re blocking the door!” Joe shouted, but Frank was too dazed to respond.

  Joe reached around, using his muscular arm to push his brother out of the way. When he had the door fully open, he dragged Frank to safety.

  “What happened?” Chris asked.

  “Someone locked me in,” Frank replied, still coughing from the smoke he had inhaled.

  Joe peered into the still smoky dressing room, where the emergency sprinkler system had extinguished the fire. A single key stuck out of the dead-bolt lock.

  “You two must have seen whoever it was,” Frank continued. “He would have had to pass right by you.”

  “We didn’t see anyone,” Chris replied.

  “Unless there’s a back way out of here,” Joe added, helping Frank to his feet.

  “There is an emergency exit,” Chris told them.

  “Then let’s go,” Frank said.

  Joe stopped to jiggle the key from the lock of the dressing room, pocketed it, then followed Chris and Frank toward the back of the building. A red warning label on the door at the end of the hall read Emergency Exit—Alarm Will Sound if Opened.

  As Chris pushed through the door, a shrill siren erupted in the hallway. Although Joe closed the door tightly once he was through it, the siren continued to sound.

  “We’ve tripped the alarm,” Chris told Joe. “Only the fire department or someone with the security code can turn it off now.”

  The emergency door led into an alley. Frank checked in both directions. “Whoever it was got away,” he said in a low, downhearted voice.

  “But not this way,” Joe said. “The emergency siren would have already been tripped if he had come out this door.”

  “If he went the other way, he would have run into you and Chris,” Frank pointed out, pocketing the handkerchief he was still carrying.

  “Maybe she walked through the walls,” Chris said.

  “She?” Frank asked.

  “The ghost,” Chris replied.

  “Are you being serious?” Joe asked.

  Chris shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  • • •

  An hour later the Hardys and Chris stood in front of the Quill Garden Theatre, relating the story to some firefighters and a police detective inspector named Stuart Ryan.

  “Who would leave a candle burning in a dressing room?” Detective Inspector Ryan wondered.

  “Emily Anderson,” Dennis Paul replied, suddenly appearing behind Frank and Joe.

  “Who are you then?” Ryan asked.

  “Dennis Paul,” Mr. Paul replied. “I’m directing this show.”

  “We tried ringing you, Dad,” Chris said. “No one answered at home.”

  “I was eating a late meal across the street,” Mr. Paul replied, clearing his throat and returning his attention to Detective Inspector Ryan. “Emily has all sorts of superstitions she follows. She had a red candle burning in her dressing room when she had her first big success, so now she always has one burning for good luck.”

  “You allow her to leave it burning all night?” Detective Inspector Ryan asked.

  “Not at all,” Mr. Paul replied. “She must have forgotten to extinguish it.”

  The night air was chilly, so Frank put his hands in his pockets. He felt something and pulled out the handkerchief he had used to cover his mouth in the burning dressing room. A monogram was stitched into a corner of the cloth.

  Bringing it close to his eyes to read the monogram, Frank smelled a familiar scent and noticed a large tan-colored stain on the handkerchief. Greasepaint, he thought to himself. The two-letter monogram read E.A.

  “Well, whoever’s to blame, it will cost a pretty penny,” Detective Inspector Ryan told Mr. Paul. “The fire triggered the emergency sprinklers in the other dressing rooms as well. Some of your costumes were burned and the others were water damaged.”

  Mr. Paul sighed heavily. “That’s a five-thousand-pound accident.”

  “We’re not so sure it was an accident,” Joe said. “Someone locked Frank inside that burning room.”

  “We’ve searched the premises,” Detective Inspector Ryan said. “There’s no one in the theater.”

  “You said yourself, Frank, no normal person could have escaped our detection,” Chris
noted. “Oh, and by the way, no one could have run from the light booth to the stage in twenty seconds. I timed your brother.”

  “Perhaps the dressing room door just got stuck,” Detective Inspector Ryan offered.

  “It was locked,” Joe replied, pulling the dressing room key from his pocket, “with this key.”

  “Would Ms. Anderson have the key to her dressing room?” Frank asked.

  “No,” Mr. Paul replied. “Why do you ask?”

  Frank showed them the handkerchief with the greasepaint on it and explained about the possible connection to the sabotaged lights.

  “Emily Anderson is a highly respected actress, and besides, Mr. Jeffries issued keys only to myself and Jennifer Mulhall,” Mr. Paul told them.

  “Mr. Paul, would you—” Frank began, finding it difficult to ask, “would you mind showing us your key to the dressing room?”

  Mr. Paul shrugged, unoffended, and showed them the key that exactly matched the one in Joe’s hand.

  “That leaves Jennifer and Mr. Jeffries,” Frank said.

  “What leaves Jennifer and Mr. Jeffries?” Jeffries asked, walking up behind Frank.

  “Mr. Jeffries, what are you doing here?” Joe was surprised.

  “Well, since my theater was burning down, the police were gracious enough to contact me,” Jeffries replied sourly.

  “Do you have a key to the dressing rooms?” Frank asked Jeffries.

  “Of course,” Jeffries replied.

  “Could we see it?” Joe asked.

  “Who do you think you are?” Jeffries scoffed. “I don’t have to answer to a young boy.”

  “I’d like to see it then, sir,” Detective Inspector Ryan said with a tight smile.

  Jeffries produced his key chain and showed them the matching key.

  “That leaves Jennifer,” Chris said to the Hardys.

  “No,” Joe said in her defense. “Anyone who ever rented the theater and been issued keys could have had copies made before returning them to Mr. Jeffries.”

  “Didn’t Emily Anderson mention another show she had done in this theater?” Frank recalled.

  “The way I see it, Mr. Paul, you’re just trying to cover up more bungling,” Jeffries said. “One more bit of negligence, and I’ll bring in my solicitor and close down the whole production.”

  “Mr. Jeffries, the only damage is to the dressing rooms,” Mr. Paul explained. “Your insurance and ours will cover the damage to your theater, though I doubt it will help us replace all the costumes.”

  “What do you mean, Dad?” Chris asked.

  “The man producing the show, Mr. Kije, purchased the cheapest insurance he could. I believe there’s a three-thousand-pound deductible, so he’ll have to pay out that amount to replace the costumes,” Mr. Paul replied.

  “Where is this Mr. Kije, anyway?” Jeffries demanded. “If he’s a legitimate producer, he surely has access to that kind of money.”

  “Mr. Kije has told me he doesn’t have another pound to invest in this production,” Mr. Paul replied, bowing his head.

  “Well, sink or swim, it makes no difference to me,” Jeffries said, then turned to Detective Inspector Ryan. “Show me the damage.”

  The detective sent Jeffries into the theater with one of the firefighters.

  “We’ll be contacting Ms. Mulhall and Ms. Anderson,” Detective Inspector Ryan assured Mr. Paul, then went back into the theater to continue his investigation.

  Mr. Paul heaved another heavy sigh. “Let’s get home, boys—we have a long day ahead of us.”

  A few minutes before midnight, the Hardys, Mr. Paul, and Chris boarded the last train of the night. On the tube ride home, the boys discussed the suspicious fire. “I’ll feel better when Jennifer shows up with her makeup room key tomorrow,” Frank said.

  “You think Jennifer would try to burn down the theater?” Joe asked.

  “Perhaps she just wanted to burn up Frank,” Chris joked.

  “But why?” Joe asked. “What motive would she have?”

  “We don’t know enough about anyone involved with this show to know why,” Frank said. “But I think we’d better start finding out.”

  • • •

  Frank could barely keep his eyes open in drama class the next day. Mr. Paul, who was his instructor, looked equally tired, as no one in the Paul household had gotten more than a few hours’ sleep after the events of the night before.

  “We’ll start with a relaxation exercise today,” Mr. Paul told his class, putting on a cassette tape of classical music. “I’m sure we could all use a bit of relaxation,” he added to Frank and Chris.

  Following instructions, Frank and the other students lay on their backs on the floor. Mr. Paul then directed them to relax their bodies a bit at a time, starting with their toes and working their way up.

  By the time Mr. Paul told them to relax their eyes, Frank was fast asleep.

  • • •

  Meanwhile, Joe was surfing the Internet in the media center during his free period. After typing “Quill Garden Theatre” into the search box, he hit Enter. In a few seconds the screen revealed a list of sixteen entries. Most were reviews or publicity from past productions, but one listing was a magazine article about the sale of the theater.

  Joe double clicked on the title, and read the details of the sale of the “haunted” theater five years earlier to Timothy Jeffries.

  • • •

  Joe found Frank leaving drama class, yawning wide as he apologized to Mr. Paul. “Sorry I fell asleep, Mr. Paul, I really was interested in doing the exercise.”

  “Why don’t you borrow the tape,” Mr. Paul said, handing him the cassette and a sheet of instructions. “You can do the relaxation exercise with your brother. It truly clears and refreshes the mind if you’re stressed out.”

  Mr. Paul smiled, then moved down the hall.

  “Hello, Joe,” Chris said, coming out of the classroom. “Are those notes for your history quiz?”

  “Very funny, Chris,” Joe said, smiling and handing them a printout. “While you and Frank were sleeping through class, I was digging up information. Mr. Jeffries bought the Quill Garden Theatre five years ago. Seems the old owner thought it was haunted, too.”

  “ ‘Of the thirty shows that have been in that theater in the last twenty years,’ ” Frank read aloud from the article, “ ‘not one has been a hit.’ ”

  “No one wanted to rent the theater any more because it was ‘cursed,’ ” Joe said, pointing to another paragraph. “So the old owner sold it, cheap.”

  “I don’t see the old owner’s name,” Chris remarked.

  “The article says he wanted to remain anonymous,” Joe told him.

  “Wow, even I’m beginning to think this ghost is for real,” Frank said, handing the article back to Joe. “I’d like some proof, one way or the other.”

  “Maybe this will help,” Joe said, taking a folded piece of paper from his pocket.

  Frank scanned the list of Quill Garden entries from Joe’s net search. One entry was circled.

  “Haunted London?” Frank said aloud to his brother.

  “It’s one of those walking tours for tourists,” Chris explained.

  “The Quill Garden Theatre is one of the haunted locations where the tour stops,” Joe added.

  “Paranormal historian James Bamberg leads the tour,” Frank noted. “I’ve never heard of a paranormal historian, but maybe that’s who we need.”

  “You meet your guide at seven P.M. outside the entrance to the underground at Tower Hill,” Joe reported.

  “Oh, you must see the Tower of London,” Chris said. “That’s where we keep our crown jewels. It’s also the place where we locked up anyone no longer in power before beheading them.”

  “And even if Haunted London turns out to be a lot of baloney,” Joe said, “it sounds like fun!”

  “Are you up for it, Chris?” Frank asked.

  “I have something to do later, but you two go ahead,” Chris told the
m, then left for his next class.

  • • •

  That afternoon the Hardys walked to the underground station and waited for a train on the Circle line platform. As the train pulled into the station, Frank caught an unshaven man with dark hair peeking at him over the top of his newspaper.

  Frank and Joe stepped into the car and sat down. When Frank looked at the man again, he was busily reading his newspaper and apparently paying no attention to Frank and Joe.

  The Hardys took the tube to the Tower Hill stop and rode the escalators up to street level.

  “Whoa, there it is,” Joe said, pointing to a castle that loomed above the Thames River. “The Tower of London.”

  Inside the cobblestone courtyard of the castle, Frank and Joe decided not to take a guided tour and picked up a brochure instead.

  “ ‘Implements of torture,’ ” Joe read aloud from the pamphlet.

  “Sounds like fun,” Frank joked.

  The Hardys followed the directions to one of the castle’s four towers. Joe joined the end of a line of people passing by display cases filled with thumb screws, chains, and manacles, and even an executioner’s ax.

  Frank found the exhibit kind of creepy. Seeing a narrow stairway, he decided to explore a little. The stone steps spiraled upward to a landing about halfway up the tower. Here Frank found cells with cold stone floors.

  Frank heard footsteps coming up the stairs behind him. “Joe?” Frank called back.

  The footsteps stopped suddenly, and there was no response. Frank realized he was alone and saw no other exit from the tower. A chill ran down his spine.

  Frank pushed his back against the wall at the head of the staircase and listened. After several seconds the footsteps resumed.

  The unshaven man from the train stepped onto the landing, cautiously looking around. His trenchcoat hung open, and Frank caught a glimpse of a shoulder holster with a silver revolver.

  5 The Surprise Investigator

  * * *

  When he saw Frank, the unshaven man closed his coat over his gun and smiled. “Hello,” he said with a Cockney accent.

  “Can I help you?” Frank asked.