The Disappearing Floor
Page 12
“What were you planning to do with Jack?” Joe asked.
“He told Hirff your dad owed him money and wouldn’t pay up—so now he was sore at you Hardys and looking for some quick dough. We thought if he was telling the truth, he might tell us how much you knew. If not, we’d get rid of him fast. Barney was keeping him at the cabin till I got a chance to question him.”
After Joe had photographed the chart found in Hirff’s plane, Hirff had phoned the news to Strang, and the gang had tried to snatch the film. When that move failed, Strang had radioed Barney to booby-trap the cabin and take off in Skyhappy Sal before the Hardys could get there.
On the Haley Building job, Kelso had learned about the delivery from a stooge in the jewelry company. Kelso had entered the building during business hours and had hidden in a washroom. Later, he had let Waxie in by the fire-escape door.
The two had sneaked downstairs to the lobby, where the watchman had been seated at his desk with his back to the stairway. They had blasted him with the ray gun.
Kelso then had tampered with the elevator and Waxie had installed duplicate fifth-floor numbers and name plates on the sixth-floor offices. Kelso had posed as Paul Tiffman to receive the diamonds from the messenger. The robbery accomplished, they had again blacked out the watchman and removed all traces of their ruse.
“How did Makin learn you were planning to pull the job?” Frank asked.
Strang chuckled. “We squeezed that out of him before we blacked him out. He was watching the mansion that day and trailed Kelso to the building. When Kelso never came out, he figured we were planning to pull a job there.”
“How about that voice I heard over your tunnel intercom?” Joe put in, to keep Strang talking.
The jewel thief laughed. “Pretty fast thinking on your part, kid—I’ll hand you that much. Trigger thought Waxie had forgotten his orders and was calling for a quick fill-in.”
“Good thing I realized the guy on the line wasn’t Waxie,” Trigger said. “He’s a nut! Crazy about the gadgets in this place. Calling on the intercom. Pushing the floor release in that rigged-up room.”
“Maybe Waxie forgot to put the floor back in place the night we first saw it through the window,” Frank suggested, still playing for time.
“Waxie forgot once too often,” Strang grunted. “Last time, I about broke a leg. Got fed up. Lucky for Waxie he scrammed when he did.”
Meanwhile, Professor Darrow had furtively plugged in his blackout invention. Suddenly he snatched it up and aimed the machine at the thieves. But Trigger saw the maneuver.
“Look out, boss!” the gangster yelled, whipping out his own ray gun to fire.
Strang jumped clear in the nick of time. But Trigger had no chance to use his own gun. The blaze of brilliance from the professor’s machine paralyzed all five of Strang’s henchmen.
Strang’s own leap had left him momentarily off balance. The Hardys seized their chance. Frank stunned the gang boss with a hard right to the jaw. Joe wrested away his blackout gun, and in a few moments the two young sleuths had punched Strang into submission.
“It would be safer, if I blacked him out,” Professor Darrow suggested to the boys. “The rays from my device do no permanent damage. They simply affect certain brain centers and temporarily immobilize the subject until the neural circuits have time to clear themselves.”
“Maybe he has a point there,” Joe remarked to Frank with a grin. “We have no handcuffs.”
As the professor was blacking out Strang, Frank spotted car headlights through the trees surrounding the mansion. A short time later Fenton Hardy, Chief Collig, and a squad of police rushed into the house to take over. They stared in amazement when they saw the helpless members of the gang.
“Looks as though we missed the preliminaries and the main event,” the tall investigator remarked to Collig with a chuckle. “They’re all out cold.”
The chief and his men grinned in satisfaction. “I’d say six KO’s are enough of a show for any evening!” Collig quipped.
“Seven.” Joe grinned. “I think you’ll find another KO in the ‘guest room.’ ”
After hearing the whole story, Mr. Hardy and the chief were warm in their praise of Frank and Joe. But the boys pointed out that it was Professor Darrow who had brought victory at the last moment.
“I’m afraid you’ve been badly misled, Professor,” Mr. Hardy said. “Some facts you may not know are these: Strang and his men had their eye on the Perth mansion as a hideout. When you bought it, they arranged to move in with you and used the ray gun as an excuse.”
Frank added, “And Makin, in trying to worm his way into the gang, offered to rent the place. He only wanted to find out if Strang’s group were just helping themselves to the mansion.”
Mr. Hardy went on, “But, Professor, you certainly turned the tables on the gang! I’m reasonably sure that any charges against you, for your part in Strang’s operation, will be dropped.”
“How did you happen to get here, Dad?” Frank asked as the police were removing the prisoners.
“After I heard Tony and Chet’s story, and you two failed to return, I decided it was time to blow the whistle on this setup at the mansion,” Fenton Hardy replied, throwing an arm around each of his boys.
“What I’d like to know is who rigged all those spooky alarm devices,” Joe spoke up.
Professor Darrow gave a wan smile. “I did, partly to keep off intruders and partly for my own amusement,” he explained. “It was while I was wiring them into the mansion’s electrical system that I stumbled on the bedroom-study’s disappearing floor and told Strang about it.”
Next day the stolen, rented motorboat was located, and the Hardys went to the hospital to see Jack Wayne, who had regained consciousness and was rapidly recovering.
“So you’ve wrapped up the case, eh?” the pilot said.
“Frank and Joe have,” Mr. Hardy answered. “But we all feel bad about the loss of Skyhappy Sal.”
Jack grinned. “Don’t worry. She was insured, so I’ll have a new Sal pretty soon.”
“Dad says there’ll be a good bit of reward money,” Frank put in, “and you’ll get half, Jack. That should buy your new Sal a lot of fancy trimmings.”
“We’re still curious about that interrupted radio message of yours, Jack,” said Joe. “How about spelling the whole message out for us?”
Jack thought for a moment, then asked for pencil and paper and wrote down the message as nearly as he could remember it. The boys bracketed the words which had been lost in transmission. The result read:[I’M FLYING DOWN TO TIGERS’ BIGHT TO SEE A GUY HIRFF TOLD ME ABOUT. HE SAYS THAT] IF THE TIGERS’ BIGHT [SETUP CAN USE A PILOT, I COULD MAKE A LOT OF DOUGH. I’M TO USE THE CODE NAME] AMETHYST [TO IDENTIFY MYSELF].
A few days later the stones Makin had stolen were recovered, and an expert survey of the amethyst location showed that the lode, while not highly valuable as a source of ornamental gems, was worth developing for commercial purposes. The story was repeated at the Morton farm to Tony and Chet.
“That’s a break for Nyland,” Frank commented. “Joe and I had decided to use part of our share of the reward money to pay his wife’s hospital bills—but now—”
“My share’s going to help my folks buy a new car,” said Tony.
“You guys have no imagination,” Chet retorted.
“Listen, Chet, how about using your part to buy some detective equipment so you can help Frank and me on our next case?” Joe teased, not knowing that they would soon be called on to solve THE MYSTERY OF THE FLYING EXPRESS.
“Oh yes?” Chet retorted. “Hop over to the Bayport Soda Shop with me, and I’ll show you what I’m investing in—a year’s supply of the biggest banana splits you ever saw!”
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