Into Thin Air Read online

  “Wow,” said Frank. It was the first time he’d spoken since I’d shifted into neutral.

  “Thank you, Coach Gerther,” I murmured.

  Frank shook his head. “Unbelievable.” He reached out to touch the windshield, pausing at a small piece of paper that flapped in the late-morning breeze. “What’s that?”

  I shrugged. Frank put down his window and reached around to grab it. He pulled it through and flipped it over. Angry block letters were printed on the other side.

  YOU’RE STUBBORN. I TOLD YOU TO STOP LOOKING.

  NOW IT GETS REAL.

  • • •

  “Joe, are you ready?”

  I looked up at Frank, who stood in my open doorway. I was dressed, my backpack packed, but was I ready? It was Monday, our first day back at school since our brakes had been cut. One day after we’d been given a major chewing out by Chief Olaf at the police station.

  Dad had insisted on taking us down yesterday to report that someone had cut our brakes. We’d conveniently left the note out of our account to Dad, but Chief Olaf caught on immediately.

  “Fenton,” he said with a big smile, “is it okay if I meet with the boys privately to catch them up on some cases I know they have an interest in?”

  Dad looked surprised—the Bayport PD is not exactly in the habit of debriefing us—but quickly agreed and left Olaf’s office. Once the door was shut and we could hear his footsteps fading down the hall, the chief leaned across his desk toward us.

  “What else?” he said simply.

  I glanced at Frank. We didn’t even bother pretending we didn’t know what he was talking about.

  “There was a note,” Frank admitted, pulling it out of his pocket and handing it to the chief.

  Chief Olaf huffed and looked down at it. “Same handwriting as last time,” he said.

  I nodded. “We’re pretty sure it’s the same person, sir.”

  Chief Olaf looked up at me and flashed his teeth in a sarcastic smile. “Are you?” he asked. “Well, I suppose that’s what makes you the Hardy Boys.” He threw the note down on his desk and shook his head. I shot Frank a slightly frightened look. Was the chief losing his patience? Did he suspect that we hadn’t stopped looking into Daisy’s disappearance?

  The chief stared down at his desk for a moment, then looked up at us. “Boys,” he said, in a voice quiet enough that we had to lean forward to hear him, “I cannot tell you how serious I am being right now. This is not a game anymore. Do you understand? This thing you’re doing where you see how much you can get away with before someone kills you—you’re getting dangerously close to the end. Get it?”

  We just stared at him. Honestly, I had no idea what to say. I usually rely on Frank in instances such as these, but his jaw was hanging open.

  “The Daisy Rodriguez case is taking all my manpower,” Chief Olaf went on. “Whoever’s threatening you has made clear that this isn’t a game to them. And I simply don’t have the personnel to send a car to follow you around and save you from yourselves.”

  I gulped. “But—”

  As soon as the word left my mouth, I regretted it.

  The chief turned to me, an Are you kidding? look on his face. “But?” he asked.

  I swallowed again. “Daisy,” I said finally. I gave the chief a pleading look. He had to understand. It was hard enough for the Hardys not to investigate; that was in our blood. But it was even harder not to investigate what had happened to someone I really cared about, and someone I feared more with each passing day could be in very grave danger.

  To his credit, Chief Olaf’s eyes regained a smidgen of their usual warmth. “I’m sorry, Joe,” he said. “I know you boys care about her. But we’re going to find her. You just have to trust us.”

  • • •

  But I didn’t trust him, I realized now, climbing into Dad’s car to drive to school with Frank. I didn’t trust anyone to find Daisy. Anyone but Frank and myself.

  “So,” Frank said as he pulled out of the driveway. (I was on indefinite retirement from driving, at my own request.)

  “So,” I echoed. I knew Frank had something to say. In fact, I was pretty sure I knew what he would say.

  “We have to stop,” he said quietly, turning off our street.

  I was quiet for a few seconds. I knew what Frank was saying was true. But I hated it. I hated that we still didn’t know what had happened to Daisy. I even hated Doug Spencer a little for not being guilty and letting us save her.

  “I know,” I said finally.

  Frank glanced over at me. “I know it’s hard, bro,” he said. “But we can’t help Daisy much if we’re dead. We just have to help the police where we can. And we’ll have to keep an eye on each other for the next few days. Whoever’s sending the notes might not realize right away that we’ve stopped investigating. I don’t want either one of us to get hurt. So let’s stick together as much as we can, and watch each other’s backs.”

  “Okay,” I said. Sure. Fine. Whatever.

  It turns out that life is incredibly boring when you’re not investigating something. When your only goal in life is to make sure your brother knows where you are, and that you’re okay. I’m a decent student, but I’d never paid 100 percent attention in any of my classes before, because in the back of my mind, I was always thinking over a case. Now I really tried to focus on things like geometry, and was shocked. Are people aware of how much of our studies focus on triangles? Triangles.

  Before lunch, Frank collected me from our designated checking-in spot, my locker. I followed him through the crowded halls to the cafeteria. I had a horrible feeling that even my beloved lunchtime ritual—ordering the special, no matter what it was—would be stripped of excitement. Maybe the special had never been that exciting. Maybe it was just the thrill of sleuthing that made it seem that way.

  “Come on, Joe,” Frank said, pulling me out of line after he’d apparently paid for both our lunches. “You seem down. Maybe when we finish we could get some ice cream. Ice cream is fun.”

  But I could tell he didn’t believe it. Sleuthing is as much in Frank’s blood as it is in mine, and I was sure he was feeling the same lack of je ne sais quoi—I did pay attention in French class—that I was. I wondered if this was how some guys felt about football. Computer games. Science fiction. Maybe everyone has their version of sleuthing to get them through life, or at least high school.

  “Oof!” I suddenly ran into a huge, heavy object, and my tray crashed against my shirt, splattering Daily Special all over my henley. I’d rammed into Lamar Kendall, one of the biggest football players. A few spots of Daily Special clung to his football jersey too. He snarled down at me.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t see you there. Hey, you must be really depressed now that football’s over.”

  Lamar’s eyes seemed to burn down at me. I could tell he didn’t appreciate my sudden understanding of the meaning in his life.

  Time for reinforcements. “Frank?” I said, looking around for my brother. “Hey, where’d you—?”

  He was gone. How was that possible? Frank was so hot to keep us together. And now, as Lamar picked a pea off his jersey and smushed it into my shirt, I understood why.

  “Frank!”

  But before I could find my brother, a huge, burly arm reached out from behind and grabbed me. A gruff voice announced in my ear, “You’re coming with me!”

  THE RED ARROW

  9

  FRANK

  I HAD STOPPED BY THE condiment station to get some mayo for my sandwich when I turned around and realized Joe was gone.

  “Joe!” I called, looking all around me. He couldn’t have gone far. “JOE!”

  A gaggle of cheerleaders walked by, looking at me like I was crazy, but Joe was nowhere to be seen. I threw my tray down on the condiment station and ran back to the food line. “Joe? Joe!”

  “Yes?” A smiling brunette turned from the line. Joanne Sikorsky. Darn my parents for giving Joe such a common name!

&nb
sp; “Sorry—wrong Jo,” I said, turning back the way I’d come. “Joe! Joe?”

  But soon I’d made a lap of the cafeteria and found no trace of him. I even asked as many people as I could, but no one seemed to know where he’d gone.

  Then I spotted it: an overturned and abandoned tray of Daily Special over by the nacho bar.

  There’s one person in the school who actually eats the Daily Special, and that person is my brother. Sometimes I think the cafeteria workers only bother making it to humor him.

  I turned away from the tray with a sinking feeling.

  My only job that day was to keep my brother safe, and I’d failed. There was a seriously screwed-up person after us. Who knew what kind of trouble Joe might have found?

  My heart was starting to thump loudly. I could feel my breath quickening. I was panicking. Joe wasn’t here, in the cafeteria—what if he’d gone back to our meeting place when we were separated? It seemed unlikely, but I had to at least check. Besides, it wasn’t like I had any other ideas yet.

  I ran to the doors and shoved one open.

  That’s when a bony arm reached out and grabbed my elbow. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  I turned around. It was George Flanagan, a small, freckly kid from my history class. He wore the bright orange vest of a hall monitor. Technically, we’re not allowed to leave the cafeteria during lunch.

  “Look, George, it’s an emergency,” I said, yanking on my arm, but George held tight.

  “There are restrooms by the nacho bar,” he said solemnly.

  “Not that kind of emergency.” I yanked harder on my arm and this time managed to throw him off. I slammed through the doors and ran down the hall, making for Joe’s locker as fast as I could.

  A shrill whistle sounded behind me, followed by George’s voice. “Violator! Violator! We have a violation!”

  Our high school used to have pretty lax rules, but things have gotten a little crazy since our old principal was convicted of extortion and several other crimes, and our new principal took over.

  One big change is these hall monitors. You have to go through a special application process to become one, and in exchange you get a special recommendation for the college of your choice. The monitors are posted all over school, enforcing rules that no one cared about a couple of months ago.

  Now as I skidded down the hallway, I saw two monitors emerging at a big intersection a few yards away. I whirled around to try another route, but George was right behind me—with another monitor.

  I turned back around. The two I’d seen at the intersection were hurtling toward me. I had nowhere to go.

  I slowly held up my hands. “I give—OOF!”

  Before I could surrender, I was tackled from all sides, crushed under a wriggling pile of orange vests.

  • • •

  They took me to Principal Gerther.

  Before they made him principal, he was just Coach Gerther—study hall monitor, driver’s ed teacher, and basketball coach.

  As far as I could tell, Coach Gerther hated children, teaching, and happiness—qualities that made him an odd choice for principal. He’d also lost something like 80 percent of his hearing in Vietnam, so he yells constantly and doesn’t understand why everyone else doesn’t yell too.

  “WHAT’S THE BIG IDEA, HARDY?” he bellowed now, pushing his fancy ergonomic chair back from Principal Gorse’s old desk. “LEAVING THE CAFETERIA? DISRESPECTING THE MONITORS?” He gestured to a huge file on the side of his desk. It was easily the width of three dictionaries. The label on the tab read HARDY, FRANK. “I’VE BEEN WARNED ABOUT YOU AND YOUR BROTHER.”

  I cleared my throat, then yelled back, “I was worried about my brother! Am worried about him, sir!”

  Gerther raised his bushy eyebrows. “YOUR BROTHER? ISN’T HE A CAPABLE YOUNG ADULT? WHY DOES HE NEED YOU TO LOOK AFTER HIM?”

  I shrugged. It was a good question. “I guess . . .”

  Gerther interrupted me. “I CAN’T HEAR YOU. WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, SOME KIND OF VIGILANTE? SOME KIND OF AVENGING ANGEL?”

  Now he raised only one bushy eyebrow at me, giving him a sly look. He pushed the folder toward me, knocking his name plate in the process. It was big and gold, and read PRINCIPAL GERTHER in huge capital letters. It was much bigger than Principal Gorse’s had been. Probably a gift from someone, I figured. Maybe there was a long-suffering Mrs. Gerther out there, her eardrums shot to heck, thrilled that her husband had finally made good with this huge and inexplicable promotion.

  As I examined it, something caught my eye and made my heart skip a beat. It was just a tiny thing—nothing I would ever have noticed had Gerther not bumped the name plate toward me.

  In the corner, in pencil, someone had doodled the symbol of the Red Arrow.

  The huge, shady criminal organization we hoped we’d wiped out by catching Principal Gorse—but really, who knew?

  My mind raced with questions as I looked at the huge, seemingly dense man before me.

  Was it someone’s idea of a joke?

  Or was Principal Gerther working for the Red Arrow?

  If I assumed Gerther was working for the Red Arrow, that led to all sorts of new questions. Questions like: Did this somehow relate to the monitors spreading all over the school?

  And most troubling: Had Gerther done something to Joe, in retaliation for what we did to Principal Gorse?

  Principal Gerther didn’t seem like the sharpest tool in the shed, which would make his involvement in a sophisticated criminal organization seem unlikely. Still, it would definitely explain why he’d been chosen as principal, against all logic or good sense.

  But then . . .

  “AAAAAAAUUUUUGGGGHHH!”

  A female scream cut into my racing thoughts. It sounded like it was coming from the gym, just a few doors down. Joe! What if this scream was related to his disappearance? I leaped to my feet.

  Gerther looked at me like I was insane. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” It took me a few seconds to realize that he hadn’t heard the scream.

  But I had to investigate. “I—um—I just need to use the bathroom. I’m sorry. I’ll be right back.”

  I turned and ran out of the office and to the gym as fast as my legs would carry me.

  Behind me, I could hear Principal Gerther yelling. “I CAN’T HEAR YOU. WHAT IS WITH YOU TEENAGERS? YOU ALWAYS INSIST ON WHISPERING!”

  THE TRUTH COMES OUT

  10

  JOE

  THE OWNER OF THE BURLY arm dragged me kicking and screaming out of the cafeteria. I was screaming, but nobody could hear me because the sizable bicep was shoved right up against my mouth. I hoped the hall monitors would stop us as he dragged me toward the swinging doors, but for some reason stupid George Flanagan just nodded at us as I was dragged past. What the heck? If whoever was dragging me into the hall had been unwrapping a piece of gum, boom: automatic detention. But apparently, kidnapping and assault: all good, see you in English class.

  The world was really beginning to seem like a cold, cruel place.

  My assailant dragged me down several hallways. I couldn’t see much past the arm, but I tried to keep track of where we were going by feel. I was pretty sure we were headed toward the gym. My heart pounded as I wondered what horrors awaited me there. Was this guy going to try to strangle me with a volleyball net? Suffocate me with a tumbling mat? Who was this guy, and why had he grabbed me?

  He pushed me through a swinging door into a small, dank room. I could see fluorescent lights mounted to the ceiling, lockers on the walls. I could hear a shower.

  Then, all at once, I hit the floor with an “Oof!” The sudden impact startled me and knocked the air from my lungs. I looked up into the face of my kidnapper.

  Neal Bunyan?

  “Neanderthal!” I cried, which is Neal’s loving nickname. Neal is a big shot on the football team. Awhile back, Frank and I had busted him for using steroids. He was a rather vocal critic of ours until recently, when, as part of the whole Principal Gorse c
ase, we worked with him to find out why the Red Arrow seemed to have marked him for punishment. Since then, I thought we were cool. I thought we were on our way to becoming buds.

  Apparently not.

  I struggled to sit up. Looking around, I realized we were in one of the locker rooms.

  “You know, Neal, if you needed to talk to me, you could have just asked me if I had a moment,” I said, giving him the crooked smile that I have been told is charming.

  Neal didn’t seem charmed. “I was asked to get you and bring you here,” he said with a shrug, “not ask politely.”

  That’s when I caught sight of something hanging out of an open locker. Something that made me feel deeply uncomfortable. It was a bra, and I realized all at once that we were in the girls’ locker room.

  I straightened up. “Neanderthal, I don’t think we’re supposed to be in here.”

  I tried to get to my feet, but Neal put a meaty paw on my shoulder and unceremoniously pushed me back down. “They’re waiting here,” he said.

  “Who’s waiting here?” I asked. What was going on? Was Neal trying to get some weird revenge on me by planting me in the girls’ locker room? But why? Last I checked we were allies.

  Neal looked at me morosely. “Do you want to know the truth about Daisy?” he asked in his deep, ponderous voice.

  That made me sit still. “Of course I do.”

  Neal didn’t say anything else. After a few seconds, I heard light footsteps coming from the shower room and turned to look.

  Coming toward me were Jamie King and Penelope Chung.

  I swallowed. Jamie and Penelope? I remembered Penelope’s sharp words when we told her we were investigating Daisy’s disappearance. Could they be the mysterious enemy who wanted Frank and me to stop looking into what happened to her? It seemed impossible. I couldn’t imagine Penelope cutting a brake line, or Jamie wrangling a rattlesnake.

  They walked over to the low bench Neal had dumped me next to and sat down. “Hello, Joe,” Penelope said. Her cool expression gave nothing away.

  “Hi,” I said, waiting.