The Hidden Harbor Mystery Read online

  “We’re getting somewhere, all right,” Frank said cheerfully. As he shifted his position in the pit, his canvas sneaker seemed to catch on something solid. Stooping, he loosened and drew out the muddy fragment of a curved surface.

  “Pottery!” he exclaimed. “Here’s another piece. There seems to be more stuff at this lower level!”

  Working swiftly, the boys unearthed several more large pieces of old clay vessels. In addition, Joe found a wedge-shaped stone that might have been used as an axhead.

  He straightened up suddenly. “Fellows, I think we’ve found the site of the ancient Indian village!”

  CHAPTER XV

  Sea City Hoax

  THE HARDYS and Chet felt a thrill of discovery. “So this is the lost Indian village!” Frank said as the three climbed from the relic-filled depression.

  “Now,” said Joe, “we’ll have something to offer Professor Rand in exchange for information.”

  “Yes,” Frank agreed. “Also, Rand, or a trained archaeologist, will consider our find more valuable if it’s relatively undisturbed. We’ll take these arrowheads and pottery shards as proof we’ve found the site.”

  The boys carefully covered over the place they had dug up. After cleaning the relics in the pond, Frank asked Chet to get a bag or carton from Grover in which to carry them.

  “If it means we’re heading for town—and food,” the hungry boy said, “I’ll do it.”

  When Chet returned with a carton, they packed it and started back for the beach. Chet and Joe carried the diving gear while Frank clutched the precious relics.

  They reached the yellow convertible and Frank opened the door to place the carton on the rear floor. He groaned. “There’s a ton of sand in here!”

  The hard-driven sand had filtered into the vehicle and piled up regular mounds on the seats and floor !

  “Hope the engine isn’t full of sand, too,” Joe said, after the boys had cleaned out the interior. He took the wheel and tried to start the car. Nothing happened.

  The mechanically minded Hardys wasted no time in getting the hood raised. Joe cleaned and wiped the spark plugs, then checked the wiring for short circuits. Meantime, Frank and Chet, drawing some gasoline from the tank, bathed the parts which had become clogged by the driving sand.

  Soon the pistons were operating smoothly. Slipping into low gear, Joe gunned the engine. With Frank and Chet pushing, the convertible plowed steadily through the drifted sand to the road.

  “We’d better report to Bart Worth first thing,” said Frank.

  They found Larchmont in the midst of mop-ping up after the hurricane. Power-line crews were busy, and throughout the town fallen trees were being cut up with roaring power saws, and hauled away.

  The boys parked and went up to the offices of the Larchmont Record. “What a madhouse!” Chet exclaimed.

  The place was filled with the din of clacking typewriters and typesetting machines, jangling telephones, and shouting between copy-desk editors and reporters. Printers with ink-smeared aprons rushed in and out of the composing room. Bart Worth, looking exhausted, moved about in shirt sleeves giving directions.

  He hailed the Hardys and Chet with a shout of relief and hustled them into his private office. “I was sure worried about you fellows. Hope you found shelter. We’ve been busy all night covering this storm.”

  “We made out okay,” Joe assured him.

  “Good.” Bart gave a weary sigh and began pacing the floor. “I have more trouble. Blackstone’s used his influence with the court, and had the trial moved up! If I don’t get proof soon, I’m sunk.”

  “We may have some helpful news for you,” Frank announced quietly. “In the first place, we’re convinced that the smuggling story is true.”

  He and Joe went on to give a full account of their experiences and discoveries since they had last seen Bart.

  The editor’s eyes brightened with amazement and hope. “So,” he said, “the Rand-Blackstone pond was once a secret harbor, connected to the sea by a channel! What a perfect setup for the Blackstones to conduct their smuggling operations.”

  Then Bart Worth’s face clouded. “But how can we prove all this?”

  “By finding the family papers,” Frank replied. “They’re buried at the mouth of the old Hidden Harbor. The only problem is,” the boy admitted, “how to locate that.”

  At this point Joe held up the box of ancient Indian artifacts.

  “We’ll try to set up a trade with Professor Rand,” he explained, “by telling him where to find the Indian village, providing he’ll tell us where to find the proof we need—if he knows.”

  Bart nodded. “It’s the way to Rue! Rand’s heart, all right,” he agreed. “But can you catch up with him in time?”

  “We’ll do our best,” Frank promised.

  “Say! I have another lead,” the editor burst out suddenly. “Almost forgot with this hurricane business. This morning I received a call from a man who claimed to be Jenny Shringle’s cousin in Sea City. According to him, Jenny has changed her mind—wants to tell me something important about the case. I’m supposed to meet her late this afternoon in the lobby of the Surfside Hotel in Sea City, and bring you fellows with me.”

  “Sounds phony to me!” was Joe’s prompt reaction. “A convenient way to get us all in one place, then get rid of us!”

  “Still, it may be a real lead,” the editor insisted. “We can’t afford to pass it up.”

  “Then why the secrecy?” Joe demanded. “And why does she want Frank and me along?”

  “She may be afraid of Blackstone,” Worth argued. “Besides, I think she’s grateful to you boys for rescuing her in the fun house.”

  “We’ll go, then,” Frank assented, “but I wouldn’t be too hopeful about it, Bart.”

  While Bart Worth toiled feverishly to get his hurricane edition on the presses, the three hungry friends went to a restaurant which Chet Morton had selected well in advance. After a hearty steak and dessert of fresh peach shortcake, Chet revived noticeably.

  “One little thing bothers me,” he said. “We don’t have a camp any more. No tent, no food. Our clothes and blankets are at Grover’s hide-out, and most of our utensils were buried in the sand. Besides,” he added, “you fellows need digging tools and a metal detector.”

  “In other words,” Frank said, laughing, “you’re volunteering to stay here, buy what we need, and set up camp again.”

  “You’ve guessed it!” Chet admitted. “I’m more sure of regular meals and sleep, too.”

  Soon the trio separated, and Chet took the yellow convertible to do his errands. A little later Frank, Joe, and Bart Worth set out for Sea City in the editor’s green sedan. Clouds had covered the sun again, and gusts of wind shook the car as it sped along the highway.

  “We’re early,” Frank noted. “We may as well pick up Jenny at her cousin‘s, Bart.”

  The three went up and knocked at the little white bungalow. The same middle-aged man they had met previously opened the door.

  “We’ve come about your phone call this morning, Mr. Shringle,” Bart explained.

  “Phone call?” the man repeated, bewildered. “Jenny! Did you telephone and ask these folks to come here?”

  Now the short, plump woman appeared at her cousin’s side. She peered at the visitors suspiciously.

  “I told you all once—I’m not allowed to talk to you,” Jenny said.

  The Hardys and Bart Worth exchanged meaningful glances. The phone call had been a hoax!

  Frank turned to the seamstress. “Sorry to have bothered you, Miss Shringle. Guess it was a mix-up.”

  When the three returned to the car, Joe urged, “Let’s go to the hotel, anyway. Maybe we can turn the tables and nab the gang we told you we heard on the fishing boat.”

  The others agreed and soon Bart parked near a long, two-story wooden building that was badly in need of fresh paint. Old-fashioned, high-backed rocking chairs, mostly empty, were distributed along a front porch which w
as as wide as the old hotel itself.

  “Bart, you go up on the porch and wait,” Frank proposed, “Joe and I will circle the place to see if anybody’s lurking outside.”

  Quickly the Hardys moved around the run-down hotel. In the rear were several wings, also with porches, looking toward the beach. No one was in sight.

  “Must have been quite a place in its heyday,” Joe observed. “Sure is dead now, though.”

  The brothers returned to the porch to look for Bart Worth. But the editor was not in sight. A bald old man, seated in a rocking chair next to the main entrance, eyed them with open curiosity.

  “Maybe Bart went back to the car,” Joe suggested. “I’ll check.” He soon came back, shaking his head.

  “Let’s go into the lobby,” Frank said.

  Perplexed, the two boys walked into the dark shabby foyer, with its worn carpets. A curtain of hanging strands of bright-colored beads covered a doorway at the back of a hall next to a stairway. The place seemed empty; even the room clerk’s desk was deserted. Frank and Joe strolled out to the porch, where the bald man in the rocking chair stared at them once more.

  “Was there a man with reddish hair waiting here when you sat down?” Joe asked him.

  The elderly man did not answer immediately and continued to gawk at the boys. Finally he drawled, “Yes. One was standing here. Bellman came out—said the stranger had a phone call. Must still be talkin‘, I reckon.”

  “Where’s the phone?” Joe asked quickly.

  “Go though the hangin’ curtain,” the man directed. “Phone’s in the corridor there—right beside the back stairs.”

  “Bart must have walked right into the snare!” Frank whispered worriedly as the brothers stepped to the entrance.

  Suddenly Joe grasped Frank’s arm and pointed into the dim lobby. A man had appeared behind the reservations desk. The boys recognized him instantly: Mr. Stewart, Henry Cutter’s partner. Now Stewart leaned across the counter to talk to a uniformed bellman.

  “What’s he doing here?” Joe muttered. “Working? Antique business must be bad.”

  The next moment, to the boys’ surprise, the bellman came striding out to the porch.

  “Frank and Joe Hardy?” he asked them. “Telephone call for you in the back hall. It’s by the stairs.”

  CHAPTER XVI

  Enemy Tactics

  QUICK as a flash Frank decided on a plan of action. “I’ll take the call,” he told the bellman.

  As the employee walked off, Frank murmured to Joe, “If it’s a trap, I’ll chance it alone. You stay free in case I need help.”

  “Okay. I’ll go up the main staircase in the lobby,” Joe volunteered, “and look for the back steps next to the phone.”

  Re-entering the lobby, the boys noted that the room clerk’s desk was vacant once more. Joe climbed the wide stairway, while Frank ducked through the curtain of hanging beads.

  He found himself in a dim hallway lighted only by a tiny window at the end. Near the rear, Frank spotted an old-time wall telephone, with the receiver dangling almost to the floor. Warily, he approached it.

  Frank noted that all the room doors were closed except one just across from the phone. This was slightly ajar. Watching the door carefully, he reached the telephone. Frank stood listening intently. The old hotel was almost unnaturally quiet. Suddenly the young sleuth stiffened. From behind the open door came the familiar sound of hoarse, wheezy breathing!

  “Jed!” Frank thought.

  Deliberately, the boy turned his back. At the same time, he grasped the telephone cord in his right hand.

  His straining ears caught a footfall on the carpet. Whirling, Frank swung the heavy receiver by its cord and caught the flat-faced man a smashing blow on the ear. With a cry of pain, the angered thug lurched forward and seized Frank’s right arm in an iron grip. Frank immediately sent three chopping left jabs into the fellow’s midriff. Now another figure came racing down the dim hallway. Stewart!

  “Got him!” he cried, reaching Frank and pinning the boy’s arm behind his back.

  At the same instant there was a screeching whoop from above! Both assailants’ heads jerked upward. Joe Hardy had vaulted onto the backstairs banister, and slid down full speed, crashing feet first against the burly man’s chest. Frank wrenched free and landed a stiff uppercut on Stewart’s jaw. The two boys bounded up the staircase and along the second-floor corridor.

  “Here!” cried Joe, ducking into an open, vacant room. From the staircase came the pounding steps of their pursuers. Then the boys heard the opening and slamming of doors along the hall.

  Passing from one suite to another through connecting doors, the boys dodged their enemy. When the chase was over, and it was quiet in the corridor, they cautiously tiptoed outside.

  The next instant Joe cocked his head. “I’m sure I hear groans—in here!”

  He yanked open the door to a large linen closet. Bart Worth, bound and gagged, lay on the floor. Quickly Frank and Joe released him. Overhead, the ceiling shook under heavy running footsteps up and down the third floor.

  “Good! Those crooks are looking for us upstairs!” Joe said.

  But before the trio could slip out of the hotel, they heard Stewart and Jed dashing downstairs. Pulling the closet door shut, the three friends lay low while the men rushed past and down to the lobby.

  Frank, Joe, and Bart stepped into the hall. Frank, carrying a large hamper of clean linen, went to the second-floor landing and looked around. The floor boards creaked loudly beneath him.

  “There they are!” cried Stewart from the foot of the stairs.

  As the thugs, followed by the bellman, charged up the wide staircase again, Frank suddenly heaved the big hamper at them. A blizzard of white sheets, towels, and pillowcases billowed down upon the men. While they struggled to disentangle themselves, Bart cried, “Leave them alone. We’ll get the police!”

  He and the boys sprinted for the front door. They ran to Bart’s car and roared away from the old hotel.

  “Sorry to get myself caught like that,” the editor apologized. “But I’d told my office to reach me here if I received an important phone call I’ve been expecting. So I really fell for it, when the bellman paged me.”

  “Who jumped you?” Joe asked. “Stewart and his crony Jed?”

  “Yes. I heard them talk about somebody they called ‘the boss,’ who wanted the ‘three troublemakers gotten rid of this time without fail!’”

  “We were sure Blackstone wasn’t behind this scheme,” Joe remarked. “Now, I don’t know what to believe, after that faked call from Jenny Shringle.”

  By this time Bart had pulled up at the Sea City police headquarters. Inside, the editor reported the assault on himself and the boys. Two squad cars were dispatched with sirens screaming. The chief asked the Hardys and Bart to remain in case they should be needed to identify their assailants.

  Frank and Joe, however, felt sure that Stewart and Jed had already left the hotel. Their conclusion proved to be correct. When the officers returned, they reported that the thugs and the bellman, whom the men evidently had bribed, had fled. The manager, who doubled as clerk, had been away during the fracas.

  “We’ll find those hoods!” Frank declared as Bart and the Hardys drove off. “They can’t get away with this!”

  Bart said he would treat the Hardys to supper in Larchmont. As they ate, the brothers tried to cheer the young editor, who appeared greatly depressed.

  “I’ll bet Blackstone was behind this ambush,” Bart insisted. “He’d be most apt to use Jenny Shringle’s name. But I can’t prove that, either!”

  “Somehow I doubt he’d go to such lengths to win a libel suit,” Frank stated. “Even if his family’s reputation is at stake. Don’t forget,” he reasoned, “Cutter’s men worked this trap. We did overhear Cutter in a real argument with Black stone this morning. Of course, they could be working together to get rid of us, and still fighting among themselves.”

  “In any case, the three o
f us are in real danger,” Bart stated grimly.

  “Yes, the three of us,” cried Frank, rising suddenly from the table, “and Chet! He’s all alone! Those hoods know we’d do anything to rescue Chet if they kidnaped him!”

  Hastily Bart paid the check and they ran to the car. All maintained an anxious silence as they sped for Larchmont. At last the sedan was on the fishermen’s road, heading for the campsite.

  When they reached it, Frank, Joe, and the editor leaped from the car and turned on flashlights. A scene of devastation such as that caused by the hurricane met their eyes. Food, clothing, equipment lay strewn around. A brand-new tent slashed in ribbons hung from its pole. In the sand was a confusion of footprints.

  “We’re too late!” Joe groaned. “Chet’s gone!”

  Suddenly, on the shore road, two yellow headlights approached the stunned trio.

  “They’re coming back!” Frank said.

  Quickly the three put out their lights and ducked behind a clump of small pines. The car drew up and stopped. The door slammed. Someone shuffled across the sand. An unmistakable tuneless whistle warbled on the night air.

  “Chet!”

  Frank, Joe, and Bart rushed forward in joyful relief to greet their friend.

  “Sure it’s me,” replied the stout boy. “Who else? Hey!” He clapped a hand to his head. “Leapin’ lizards! What went through this place? The new tent ruined! My pots and pans! My food!”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Frank said. “The main thing is, you’re okay. Where did you go?”

  “Got lonesome and went to the movies. I’m sorry, fellows. Guess I’m a punk guard.”

  “You did the right thing,” Frank assured him. “You wouldn’t have stood a chance against those crooks! They wrecked this place.”

  The boys then told their friend of the Sea City adventure.

  Chet gulped. “I sure was lucky. We can always get a new tent—and more food!”

  Everyone laughed, including Bart, whose spirits seemed to have lifted. Some minutes later, the editor said good night.

  As the taillights of Bart’s car disappeared down the road, Chet and the Hardys set about restoring what order they could. Suddenly Joe called out, “Hey—a light! Way in the distance. Might be in the swamp around Rand’s property!”