“That’s just it—he didn’t say exactly!” Mrs. Morton replied. “He did mention taking the West Road, but I don’t know where. Oh dear, I never should have let them go!”
“Please don’t worry,” Frank said. “We’ll find them.”
As he hung up, Joe flashed him a questioning look. “What’s wrong?”
“Chet and the girls are missing. Come on! We’ll have to work fast before it gets too dark!”
The boys dashed out to their convertible and sped through the outskirts of town. Frank took the West Road. Outside Bayport, the road ran through a stretch of barren, rocky hillsides.
“Slow down,” Joe said as they came to a turnoff. “Let’s check this road. There might be a cave around here.”
Frank braked the convertible and swung off onto the dirt shoulder. Joe leaped out, hoping to find the tire tracks of Chet’s jalopy. He came back a moment later, shaking his head.
“No luck.”
Most of the area was uncultivated, with scraggy brush and timber growing up the hillsides. As the boys rode along they passed a rock quarry and several gravel pits. Here and there, dirt lanes branched off, leading to scattered farms or other roads.
The Hardys checked several of these rutted paths. On the fifth try, Joe shouted:
“Hey! This may be it!”
Frank hurried to join him. His brother pointed out a set of narrow tire tracks with a worn, old-fashioned tread pattern.
“Those are Chet’s, all right!” Frank confirmed. “I noticed the treads that time we helped him change one of his tires.”
Hurrying back to their car, the boys turned up the lane. The convertible jounced and jolted so badly that Frank shifted into low gear.
Moments later, Joe gave a cry of relief. Chet’s red jalopy was parked ahead. It had been pulled off the lane into a bordering clump of poplars. Beyond the trees, the ground rose steeply.
“There must be a cave entrance nearby,” said Frank. “We’d better take our flashlights.”
Joe grabbed them from the glove compartment and the brothers hopped out. Daylight was fading, but a clear trail of crushed undergrowth plainly showed which direction the spelunkers had taken.
The brush finally thinned out amid tumbled rocks and boulders. A few minutes’ search, however, revealed an opening in the hillside.
Joe cupped his hands and yelled into the yawning darkness. “Hey, Chet! ... Iola!”
No answer.
“Let’s go in!” Frank urged. “The cave probably runs in a long way. They can’t hear us.”
Crouching, the boys entered. Once inside, they were able to straighten up. Frank and Joe stabbed the darkness with their flashlights. The yellow glow revealed a fair-sized cavern, at least thirty feet in width. Straight ahead, the darkness closed in again beyond range of their flashlight beams.
“It’s deep, all right,” Joe muttered.
The boys pressed forward. Eventually the cave narrowed, then forked in two directions. The right-hand opening dwindled into a crawlway of pitch blackness. The left-hand fork, though a cramped tunnel, was high enough for a person to walk through.
“Which way?” Joe asked, hesitating. The floor of the cave was too hard to show footprints.
“Let’s go left,” Frank decided. “Chet and the girls probably took the easiest route if they’d never explored here before.”
Joe nodded. “I sure can’t see how Chet could squirm through a hole that size,” he added with a nervous chuckle, gazing at the small opening.
Frank went first. The tunnel sloped downward, and gradually broadened out.
“There they are! But—oh!”
Frank’s cry was wrought with fear. A few yards ahead, Iola, Callie, and Chet lay motionless on the floor of a small, dead-end chamber!
The Hardys ran forward and anxiously bent over their three coverall-clad friends. To the boys’ relief, all were still breathing.
“What happened to ’em?” Joe asked, bewildered.
“Passed out, I guess. We must revive them!”
“We could use more light,” said Joe. “But we ought to save our batteries.”
Chet’s carbide lamp was empty of water. Rather than waste time refilling it, Joe lighted a candle taken from the stout youth’s kit bag. As the chamber brightened with the soft glow of candlelight, Frank and Joe began working over the trio. They chafed their wrists and bathed their faces with water from Chet’s canteen. Presently Iola moaned, and the other two showed signs of regaining consciousness.
“Whew! I’m getting a headache,” Joe sighed.
“Same here.”
As the boys paused, they realized that their eyesight was becoming affected. Vision grew blurred and they began to pant.
“Joe, this place is short of oxygen and that candle’s burning up what’s left!” Frank gasped. “We must get out of here—fast!”
Frank lifted Callie to her feet and Joe did the same with Iola. The girls’ knees buckled.
“Be simpler to carry ’em!” Joe said.
“Okay, but we’ll have to speed it up fast!”
Frank swung Callie over one shoulder, while Joe picked up Iola. Nightmarish moments followed as the brothers wormed their way back through the tunnel to the mouth of the outer cave. Perspiring and panting, the boys gulped in lungfuls of fresh air, as they placed the girls on the grass. Then they hurried back to the dead-end chamber.
With lightning speed they gathered up Chet’s spelunking equipment, stuffing most of it into their pockets. Then Frank put his hands under Chet’s shoulders while Joe grabbed the stout boy’s legs. Each held his flashlight clamped under one arm.
“Man! Chet—must weigh three hundred pounds!” Joe gasped out.
By the time the rescue mission was completed, Frank and Joe were so woozy from the bad air that they were nearing collapse themselves. Both dropped to the ground to catch their breath. In a few minutes Chet and the girls had revived enough to be able to tell their story.
“I knew we shouldn’t stay in that dead-end cubbyhole too long,” Chet moaned. “But when we started to come out through the tunnel, we heard some men talking, so we stopped.”
The Hardys looked puzzled, and Joe asked, “Is that any reason for asphyxiating yourselves?”
“Wait’ll you hear the rest!” Chet said. “They were talking about you two!”
“That’s right!” Iola chimed in. “We heard one of them say, ‘We’ll have to take care of those Hardy boys before they spoil everything!’ ”
“They sounded plenty tough, too!” Chet said. He added plaintively, “I sure wish you guys wouldn’t get mixed up in mysteries!”
Frank and Joe exchanged troubled glances. “What else did they say?” Frank asked.
Chet shrugged. “Don’t know. They talked too low, but they started to come in farther. So we figured it would be safer to lie low till the men were gone, and we went back to the inner chamber. Then we blacked out.”
Callie, who was trying to smooth her rumpled hair, flashed a grateful smile at Frank. “We’d still be there—and maybe dead by this time—if it hadn’t been for you Hardys. Thanks a million for saving us!”
“She means you, naturally,” Joe quipped to his brother. Then he blushed as Iola said:
“Well, I think you’re wonderful, too! So there!” To back up her words, Iola planted a quick kiss on Joe’s cheek, which left him gulping in surprise.
Before leaving the area, the Hardys decided to look for any clues that might lead to the men whom the spelunkers had overheard. They checked the ground carefully outside the cave and found several sets of men’s footprints which differed from their own and Chet’s.
“And notice this. The prints leading away from the cave are deeper than the ones leading toward it,” Frank observed.
Joe nodded with keen interest. “You’re right. Those guys must have been carrying something plenty heavy!”
“We didn’t see anything in the cave when we entered,” Chet spoke up.
“Which me
ans,” said Frank, “that it must have been taken out some time before you came—probably only a little while before.”
“Oh!” Callie caught her breath. “You mean we just missed meeting those awful men!”
The two boys made an effort to trace the footprints to learn the direction the Hardys’ enemies had taken, but lost them where the tracks connected with tire marks.
“We’d never catch those men now, anyway,” Frank said as they gave up. “Let’s go back to the cave and see if we can find any clues.”
He went on to say that if something large and heavy had been hidden inside, the cave might have other chambers, perhaps purposely blocked from view by piled-up rocks.
Callie and Iola, and even Chet, showed signs of their recent ordeal, so Frank and Joe decided to call off their sleuthing for that evening. The group piled into their cars and drove to the farm.
Mr. and Mrs. Morton hurried out onto the front porch as soon as they heard the automobiles arrive. “Thank goodness you’re all safe!” Mrs. Morton exclaimed, throwing her arms around her son and the two girls.
Chet and Iola’s father said little, but smiled his relief, and gave Frank and Joe each a warm hand-clasp. “We’re mighty grateful to you boys!” he murmured.
Mrs. Morton served a hot dinner for everyone while Callie Shaw telephoned her parents. Later, as the whole group sat in the living room, Iola exclaimed:
“Oh, I almost forgot! Look what I found this afternoon. It was on the ground just outside the cave.”
Iola reached into the pocket of her coveralls and took out a gold cuff link. In it was set a bluish fluorescent amber, cut in the shape of a tiger.
The Hardys stared at each other, then Joe cried out, “One of the cuff links Dad told us to try to find!”
CHAPTER VIII
Stolen Evidence
ONLY the Hardy boys knew the significance of Iola’s find. She asked innocently, “You mean your father lost this cuff link?”
“No, but it has something to do with a case he’s working on,” Frank revealed. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you any more than that.”
Iola had turned the cuff link over. “Here’s some Oriental wording on the back,” she said. “Let’s ask Jim Foy to come out and decipher it.”
Frank and Joe telephoned their friend at once. He said he would drive over. When the Chinese-American boy arrived, he gazed at the cuff link in amazement.
“These symbols are Cantonese and mean Hong Kong,” he translated. “And this beautiful bluish amber is highly prized by the Chinese. It is often used for carving little figures of Buddha-sitting-in-the-lotus.”
Jim went on to relate that amber was called “tiger soul” in old Chinese legends. It was believed that when a tiger died, its spirit penetrated the earth and turned to amber.
“I don’t know whether there’s a spirit in this,” Chet spoke up, “but I do know it came from Hong Kong and so did the Hai Hau. I’ll bet this cuff link was part of the smugglers’ contraband on it!”
“You could be right,” Frank said reflectively. “Well, one thing’s sure. They won’t be back to the cave. Whatever they had hidden in there they’ve taken away.”
“One guess,” said Joe. “Boxes of smuggled goods.”
“I don’t like this,” Chet grumbled. “Sounds to me as if all of us are getting mixed up with a gang of smugglers!”
Frank and Joe themselves felt a little worried. They had been suspicious that members of the Chinese factions interested in the Hai Hau might trail them to Bayport. The cave incident would seem to prove they had. But how did the Chameleon fit into the picture of the smuggling racket?
“Did those men you heard at the cave sound like Chinese?” Frank asked Chet and the girls.
Iola and Callie debated this. Neither had noticed a foreign accent, they said.
Chet shrugged. “We couldn’t tell for sure. We caught only a few words.”
Frank asked Iola if he might take the cuff link with him. She said yes, and Joe slipped the piece of jewelry into an envelope she gave him and put it in his pocket.
When the excitement died down, Mr. Morton picked up a copy of the evening newspaper and began turning the pages. Suddenly he remarked, “That’s quite an ad you fellows dreamed up.” He chuckled. “Almost makes me want to take a ride on your junk!”
“Let’s see, Dad!” Iola exclaimed excitedly. She sprang up and went to perch on the arm of her father’s easy chair. Chet and Callie looked over her shoulder. The announcement read:Have fun sailing to Rocky Isle aboard a fabulous Chinese junk. It’s the oldest in sailing, yet the newest in today’s exciting boat age. Made to order for Bayport swashbucklers. The exotic Hai Hau brings an exciting glimpse of the mysterious Orient to Barmet Bay. The boating adventure of a lifetime. Three round trips a day!
“Wow!” Chet said. “That ought to bring us business!” He beamed with anticipation.
“What do you mean us?” Joe winked at the others. “You’ll probably be off spelunking somewhere.”
“How did you guess?” Chet admitted, grinning. “I’ve made up my mind to explore the right-hand fork of that tunnel—if I can squeeze through, that is. But don’t worry, fellows. I’ll serve on the crew later.”
When the gathering finally broke up, Frank and Joe took Callie Shaw home. Then they drove directly to their own home. The Hardy house lay dark and silent in the moonlight.
“Guess Aunt Gertrude’s asleep,” said Frank. “What say we test the cuff link for fingerprints?”
The boys went down to the basement, where Frank took out their kit of detective equipment. He dusted the jewelry for fingerprints, then examined the results under a magnifying glass.
“This has Iola’s prints on it, ”Joe announced, after comparing them with an inked set on a card. The Hardys had built up a sizable fingerprint file, including records on all their family and acquaintances. “If there were any other prints, Iola’s have blurred them out.”
“Let’s phone Dad just the same,” Frank proposed and put in the call to Los Angeles.
To the boys’ disappointment, neither Mr. nor Mrs. Hardy was in the hotel, so Frank requested that his parents call back early in the morning.
Joe yawned. “Let’s hit the hay, Frank.”
The next morning at the breakfast table Joe asked his aunt what she had found out about Dr. Montrose. “Do you still think he’s in cahoots with that broker pal of his to swindle people?”
In response Miss Hardy did a rare thing—she blushed! “I’m ashamed to tell you boys I didn’t learn a thing. Instead, I went to sleep!”
“What!”
“Dr. Montrose gave me a pill to take, then he kept talking about how I felt, so I couldn’t get started on the other topic.”
“Where was Mrs. Witherspoon all this time?” Frank put in.
“Oh, wandering around the house. She‘s—uh—kind of an inquisitive person,” Miss Hardy replied. “Pretty soon my head began to nod. I remember the doctor saying, ‘Why don’t you go upstairs and take a good sleep? We’ll leave now, Mrs. Witherspoon.’ They left and I started upstairs. The next thing I knew I woke up in my room. The clock said ten minutes past noon—I could scarcely believe my eyes!”
Frank told his aunt that Chet had come there and found the door open. “I guess it’s my fault,” she said, and berated herself for such carelessness. “An invitation to sneak thieves!” She hurried to check the silver in the buffet drawer. It was intact.
“And of course the alarm didn’t go off and alert you that Chet was approaching the house,” Joe remarked.
“It certainly won’t happen again,” Miss Hardy declared. “But you know I do feel better—in fact, I’m fine.”
At that moment the telephone rang. Joe answered. “It’s Dad!” he exclaimed. Frank hurried to join his brother in the front hall. “He’s calling long distance from the West Coast,” Joe added.
Both boys shared the phone during the conversation that followed. They told their father eagerly about the Hai Hau and
the exciting events following its purchase. Joe also mentioned the two visits by mysterious prowlers and finally the finding of the one cuff link.
“Amazing!” the detective exclaimed. “I probably should come home to pursue this cuff-link clue. On the other hand, it may tie in with a new lead I have—that the Chameleon has recently had some business with certain Chinese in California. I believe I’ll stay here, since he may be in this vicinity.”
Frank asked, “How’s your case coming along, Dad?”
“Not much luck yet,” Fenton Hardy reported. “I need certain data from my safe. Get out all the top-secret records on Balarat and shoot them to me here in Los Angeles by airmail special delivery. You’ll find them in a Manila packet labeled The Chameleon.”
“We’ll send it right away, Dad.”
“Fine! See you later, boys! Good-by.”
The brothers hurried upstairs to their father’s study. Joe dialed the secret combination of the safe, then opened the safe door.
He stared inside, gulped, and cried out in dismay, “The file on the Chameleon is gone!”
Frank nodded, grim-lipped. “This’ll be a blow to Dad. That envelope contained all his private evidence against the Chameleon.” He grabbed his brother’s arm. “Do you know what this means? One of the Chameleon’s henchmen must be watching this house. When he saw the front door open, he walked in without the alarm going off.”
“Right. And, Joe, he must be an expert at safe-cracking! I think we’d better notify Dad at once.”
“First, let’s see if anything else is missing,” Joe suggested.
On the inside of the safe door the boys’ father had pasted a printed list of the contents. As Joe read each item, Frank checked. Finally he said, “Everything’s here. That burglar only wanted the Chameleon file.”
Frank placed the call to his father’s hotel in Los Angeles. Fenton Hardy took the bad news with little comment, but said he was disturbed for the safety of the boys and his sister.
“You’d better be extra careful from now on,” the detective warned. “And call the police to investigate.”
The Mystery of the Chinese Junk Page 5