Past and Present Danger Read online

  Suddenly Frank grabbed the phone. “How stupid!”

  “Excuse me?” Clayton said.

  “Phil kept saying these guys are pros, with high-tech surveillance equipment! Why didn’t I get it?”

  “They can monitor our cell phone calls!” Joe shouted.

  “Is that possible?” Aunt Gertrude asked. “I mean there are no wires.”

  “And each call is encoded so people can’t just listen in,” Clayton observed.

  “With the right technology, a satellite hookup, and decoder,” Frank explained, “they can pull a signal right out of the air.”

  “Oh no!” Clayton exclaimed. He suddenly ran around his car and jumped into the driver’s seat. “I was talking to my snitch on your phone! We arranged to meet on a street corner near here.”

  Joe jumped in beside Clayton, and Frank slipped into the backseat.

  “And if those guys overheard that call—” Joe said.

  Clayton violently twisted the ignition key “He’s a dead man.”

  13

  Program for Destruction

  “His name is Willie T,” Clayton Silvers explained as he sped through the streets of Bayport. Joe sat to his right, and Frank was in the backseat. Aunt Gertrude had stayed back at the scene of the fire to alert the police and Fenton Hardy.

  “A reporter friend of mine told me about him when I said I was coming to Bayport,” Clayton continued.

  “He’s a stoolie, here in our town?” Joe asked.

  “Willie prefers to be called an information facilitator.” Clayton exaggerated the last two words. “He’ll be called DOA if we don’t get there in time.”

  The car sped down narrow streets with old four-story buildings. This was a popular area for college students and artists. The rents were low, and the old postwar buildings had what some called character. Only every third street lamp worked, and few of the scrawny trees were healthy with leaves.

  Beyond the six-block region stood a large aboveground parking lot and the warehouse district. There were a few stores and fast food restaurants scattered about. Just up the street, Willie T came around the corner and stopped in front of a café.

  “That’s him,” Clayton called out. He pressed down on the accelerator as something else happened. Across the street, just beyond Willie, a set of headlights came on as a parked Land Rover leaped away from the curb.

  “They’re going for him!” Joe exclaimed. He saw the vehicle racing toward Willie.

  Without a word, Clayton jammed his foot down on the gas pedal and aimed his car at the would-be killers. At the last possible second, Clayton slammed on the brakes. “Hold on!”

  Joe leaped into the backseat as the car screeched to a stop between Willie and the oncoming vehicle.

  The driver of the Land Rover swerved to avoid crashing. His bumper scraped along the side of Clayton’s car, tearing up paint and steel.

  Frank caught a glimpse of the two men in the car as it sped away. It was the same two thugs with their doughnut box and all.

  Clayton leaped from the car. “Willie, are you all right?”

  The short, thin informant slowly rose to his feet, his hands and knees trembling. “You know I get extra for near-death experiences,” he said, a slight smile on his face.

  “Stay with him,” Frank called out as he leaped into the driver’s seat. “We’ll try to follow those guys!”

  With Joe in the back and his tires screeching, Frank executed a U-turn and took off in pursuit of the bad guys.

  But before the boys reached the first corner, the crooks had executed two other turns and were out of sight. The Hardys had no idea which way to go. They drove around for a few minutes, then gave up.

  Frank slammed his fist on the dashboard. “These guys are really starting to get to me,” he said.

  “And we have no idea where to go next,” Joe added.

  Frank took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Maybe we do,” he said. “But first …” He turned the car around and went back to see if Willie and Clayton were still on the corner.

  “Good, they’re gone,” Frank told Joe. “Remember I said we had all the pieces but didn’t know how to put them together?”

  Joe nodded.

  “Try this.” Frank pulled away from the curb and drove back toward Bayport’s downtown area. “The thieves’ point man came here to scout out the area for their big job,” Frank mused. “They figure Dad might be a problem because—”

  “He’s already been called in on the case,” Joe chimed in.

  “Right,” Frank said. The car sped up. “They need to know what he’s up to, so they bug the house before we even met Clayton Silvers.”

  “Sure,” Joe said. “Aunt Gertrude said the cable guy was there a couple of days ago, but only for about twenty minutes. Not enough time to bug the whole house like that.”

  “So Dad’s client is the target,” Frank says. “But who is his client? And who is the third man in the gang?”

  “That guy at Fairmont Industries said that hotel security wouldn’t have an electronic master key like the thing I found,” Joe said thoughtfully. “But if Tally is part of the gang, he’d have access to one. And he’d be in a perfect place to go after Dad’s client since it has something to do with the hotel.”

  “That’s why we’re going there …” Frank turned into the parking lot of the Bayport Plaza Hotel. “Right now.”

  It took the boys a few minutes before they located Mr. Tally in one of the meeting rooms.

  The assistant manager grew nervous and tense when he saw the boys enter. “Please don’t tell me you’ve encountered another prowler,” he pleaded.

  Frank stared at the man. “Worse, Mr. Tally,” he said. “We know that the prowler wasn’t after cash or jewelry. He was working with the people e … uh, our dad is after.”

  “And he left an important clue behind,” Joe added. “We found it, and now we know who we’re—”

  “Then you’ll arrest Mr. Silvers immediately?” Mr. Tally’s eyes grew wide. “You’ll get him before he tries to blackmail the congressman.”

  “Excuse me?” Joe said.

  “Well, we certainly don’t want him to do to Congressman Reynolds what he did to those other people in Washington,” Mr. Tally insisted. “Not in our hotel.”

  “You were watching Mr. Silvers to protect Congressman Reynolds?” Frank asked. “He’s here in Bayport?”

  Mr. Tally stared at Frank for a moment. “Of course he is. Isn’t that why I was asked to keep watch on Mr. Silvers?”

  “Is the congressman in the building now?” Frank asked urgently.

  “Well, no. He’s gone to his meeting.” Tally appeared annoyed. “I’m sure I don’t know why they couldn’t hold their meeting here at the hotel, instead of some secret—”

  “Oh, no,” Joe said through clenched teeth. “Come on, Frank.”

  But Frank was moving almost before his brother spoke. They both knew that their father would never have asked Mr. Tally to watch Clayton Silvers. If he suspected Clayton of something, he would have watched the man himself. The boys also knew that Congressman Reynolds was in the public eye right now for a very serious reason. He was heading up a committee looking into the efficiency of the National Defense System. That committee would be reviewing all early warning systems and defense plans … all of them.

  Frank and Joe ran from the hotel and leaped into the car. As Joe gunned the engine, he knew he shared his brother’s thoughts and fears. If they didn’t move fast and get it all right, the security of the United States was about to go up in a cloud—of nuclear smoke.

  14

  Ground Zero

  “We’ll never find where Dad is holding this meeting.” Joe spoke rapidly as he steered Silvers’s car through the evening twilight. “So we’ve got to find these techno-thieves before they strike. But how?”

  “No time. Should we go back for Silvers? Head back to the warehouse district,” Frank told his brother. “I have an idea.” Frank slammed his fist int
o the palm of his other hand. “How come we didn’t see this before?”

  “Because it was tricky,” Joe replied. “Now it looks like Congressman Reynolds came here to speak with someone. Probably about his defense committee work.”

  “Most likely Senator Ogilvy,” Frank suggested. “He’s not only on the committee, he’s kind of a holdout. He doesn’t want our rights to personal privacy violated in the name of national defense.”

  “But why meet here instead of Washington?” Joe asked.

  “Senator Ogilvy came home from D.C. a few days ago because his wife was ill. Remember?”

  “Right,” Joe replied. He took a sharp turn and headed back toward the warehouse district. “We heard about it the other day.”

  “The senator knows Dad and put him in charge of security. The techno-thieves arrived and bugged our house.”

  “Clayton shows up, on their trail,” Joe adds. “So they try to kidnap him, but we get in the way.”

  “Now they’ve got all the Hardys to deal with,” Frank said. “Even our aunt.”

  Joe almost laughed. “That’s more trouble than any crook can handle. There’s the warehouse district ahead. Now what?”

  Frank stared out at the desolate-looking area a block ahead. “Stop here,” he said. “Somewhere around here there’s one of those Dip ’n’ Sip doughnut shops. The ones ith the bright orange and red signs.”

  “The same colors as on the doughnut box those thugs had!” Joe exclaimed.

  “We find that shop and see if the clerks can tell us anything,” Frank said. “I’m betting our thugs hang around here because that’s the only one in town.”

  It only took the boys a few minutes to find the doughnut shop. The dingy white building stood out against the dark red and brown brick tenements on either side. Soft light glowed through the plate glass windows, and the boys could see a small crowd of people sitting at the tables inside.

  “Coffee?” the teenage clerk asked as the Hardys stepped up to the counter. She was slender, with reddish brown hair pulled back in a ponytail. She looked bored. “Our specialty is French Brazilian Mocha Nutty Delight. Buy one and get a free chocolate glazed—”

  “Uh … no, thanks,” Frank replied. He glanced from the skinny waitress to the three or four men sitting around the shop and back to the clerk. “We’re looking for a couple of guys we thought might be here,” he said.

  “Can’t help you.” The clerk placed one hand on her hip, popped her chewing gum, and glanced past Frank. She saw Joe Hardy and smiled pleasantly. “Next.”

  Joe returned the smile, eased past Frank, and stepped up to the counter. “Excuse my brother,” Joe said. “He’s all business.”

  “No problem,” the girl replied, her voice soft and playful.

  “We need to find these guys because they offered us a job,” Joe explained. He leaned forward a bit. “And a guy’s got to earn some cash so he can go places, meet people, and … have fun.”

  Frank rolled his eyes and turned away. Joe would be meeting a lot of hospital personnel if Iola saw this, he thought to himself.

  “Who are these guys?” the clerk asked. She didn’t seem to care about the three other customers who had stepped up behind Frank and Joe.

  “Don’t know their names,” Joe replied. “They said they worked at one of the warehouses near here. They said if we wanted a job we could always find them here.”

  “Could we get some service?” one of the annoyed customers asked.

  The doughnut clerk ignored him. “What do they look like?” she asked.

  Joe described the two thugs. “Sure, I know them.” Her face wrinkled into a nasty frown. “Rude, crude, and lousy tippers.”

  “They work near here?” Frank asked anxiously.

  “Sure,” the waitress replied without looking at him.

  “Glad somebody works around here,” one of the customers grumbled.

  Again she ignored them. “You probably don’t want to work for them,” she told Joe. “But we could use another clerk here.”

  Joe smiled. “They were offering good pay,” he said. “More money, more fun.”

  “They come here twice a day, and the one with the blond hair is a jerk,” the waitress announced. “He buys a dozen doughnuts, jelly only. He doesn’t share them with his buddy. He doesn’t buy coffee, and he never tips.”

  “I can see why,” another customer in line called out.

  Joe shifted to the side so she could take some of the orders. She met the customers’ comments and irritation with a stony face. But she smiled when she looked at Joe.

  Frank glanced at the girl, then at the condition of the doughnut shop. Most of the unoccupied tables were messy. Used napkins and crumbs littered the floor, and the single garbage can was overflowing. He suddenly felt that people eating here were putting their lives in more danger than he and Joe were about to face.

  Frank wondered where his father and the congressman were at this very moment. Were they at Senator Ogilvy’s home? Possibly. Or had they arranged to meet somewhere else? Either possibility was valid. A secret place would make it harder for anyone to preset any spying devices. But it also made finding them that much harder. Finding the thugs was still their best option, but time was growing short. Frank flashed a concerned look at Joe and indicated his watch. Joe nodded gravely, then his smile returned as he turned to the waitress.

  “You were saying,” Joe said as she served the last of the customers in line.

  “Those guys must work in one of those buildings over there.” The waitress pointed out the front window.

  Across the street Joe and Frank could see a small cluster of warehouses and storage places—four in all. A single narrow street ran down between them with two on either side.

  The two in front were completely dark, but there were a few lights on in the two back buildings.

  “Thanks a lot,” Joe said, turning to leave.

  “Hey, I expect to see you in here a lot more if you get that job.” She placed a single finger to her lips.

  Joe thought of Iola. Her smile was better. “Believe me,” he told the waitress, “if I get a job over there, you’ll see me again.”

  Frank had already started the car when Joe finally jumped in. “That was a sad performance on your part,” he told his brother.

  Joe shrugged. “Nothing’s going to happen,” he told Frank. “And besides … I did it for Dad.”

  “What a sacrifice.” Frank drove slowly down the narrow street between the four buildings. He and Joe watched for anything that would tell them which building the men might occupy. The dark brick walls were decorated with spray-painted words and pictures. The small parking lots for all four buildings were empty. Nothing seemed to move, and there were no apparent signs that anyone was around until they reach the far side of the fourth building.

  Frank had driven behind it to turn around and cruise back up the street. Tucked in an alley behind the building, away from the street, the boys spotted the Land Rover. “Bingo!” Frank whispered.

  The vehicle was parked next to a Dumpster. Its back door was open, and the Hardys could see a few small boxes in the back. There was a steel door a few feet past the Dumpster. A single outdoor lamp hung overhead, casting a harsh white light on the stained and dirty alley floor. Frank quickly cut his headlights and cruised past the Land Rover down to the far end of the alley. He turned the corner of the building and stopped.

  “What now?” Joe asked. “Do we take ’em or go for help?”

  “Big problem,” Frank said. He squeezed the steering wheel hard with both hands. “We can’t use our cell phones to call anyone because the crooks might pick up the call. And if we leave, they might get away.”

  “Even though the hatch was open, we’re not sure they’re both in there,” Joe said. “Let’s check that out first, then decide what to do next.”

  Just as the boys opened their car doors, they heard the sound of a car engine back down the alley. By the time they crept to the corner of the b
uilding and peeked around, the motor had been shut off. Frank and Joe peered down the alleyway and noticed that the metal door near the Dumpster was just swinging shut. Parked next to the Land Rover was a sleek black sedan with tinted windows.

  “That’s an expensive piece of machinery,” Joe commented. “It’s also familiar.”

  “Sure is,” Frank agreed. “So we know that the third man is probably here, too.”

  Just then, the metal door opened and the dark-skinned thug came out. He walked to the back of the Land Rover and slid out a large box halfway. Before picking it up, he opened the top and rummaged through the contents.

  The metal door swung open again, and his partner stuck his head out.

  “It’s our doughnut-loving thug,” Joe whispered.

  “Come on, Rudy,” the man called out in a harsh whisper. “The boss says it’s going down in ten minutes.”

  “Keep your shirt on, Nick,” Rudy replied. He picked up the open box with one hand and shut the door with the other. A few seconds later he was back inside the warehouse.

  “That settles it,” Joe said through gritted teeth. “We don’t have the time to go for help. They’re going to steal something from Dad and his client right now.”

  “Okay, let’s split up,” Frank suggested. “Maybe we can find out what they’re going to do, and how.”

  “Then we can take ’em down!” Joe insisted.

  “Or go for help,” Frank said. He noticed an open window near a stack of crates, not far from where they were hiding. “I’ll go in that way, and you try to find another way in around the far side of the building.”

  Joe nodded, and Frank watched his younger brother creep down the alley past the metal door. When Joe reached the far corner of the building, he glanced back at Frank and gave him a high sign. Frank’s stomach tightened as Joe disappeared around that corner. He had no idea what was down there, and he didn’t like the idea that they had so little information. How many were there, in total? What were they actually about to do?