"We ran into Whip Scorpion on the roof of Johns's building right after the bombing," Joe said.
"Whip Scorpion! What happened?' Chet asked.
"He got away, and we ended up getting hauled down to the station house by Sergeant Hanlon," said Frank.
"Have you learned anything new, Chet?' Joe asked.
"The kidnappings are the talk of the con, but nobody really knows much. What I'm hearing is mostly rumors about Harry Saul."
"Well, it seems like all roads lead to Saul," Frank cracked. "I have a feeling we won't get much more done tonight. How about hitting the sack so we can make an early start tomorrow?"
"I'd like to eat something first," Joe replied. "I'm so hungry, those stale doughnuts on Hanlon's desk were starting to look good. You want to join us, Chet?"
Chet shook his head. "Nope. I'm meeting Tom in a little while so we can hit the costume contest. Hey," he added, "if you're knocking off working on your case, why don't you guys come with us? The San Diego Con costume contest is one of the best in the country. Some of the costumes are amazing!"
Frank shook his head. "Sorry, Chet, I'm just too beat. Nearly getting blown up does that to me."
"What about you?" Chet asked, turning to Joe. "There are bound to be plenty of pretty girls in the contest."
Joe looked as if he might consider it, but then he, too, shook his head. "Chet, you know I hate to be a wet blanket, but if I don't catch some Z's tonight, I'll be worthless. Besides, I've already seen enough costumes for one day."
***
"Today's the day the kidnappers' deadline runs out, Frank," Joe said the next morning. "Where to first?"
"To see the only person connected with the kidnapping we haven't talked to yet, Barry Johns's wife. I heard her name was Phoebe," Frank replied.
The Hardys got their car from the hotel garage, stopping only to buy a bag of sweet rolls and two large glasses of juice.
With Frank navigating, Joe pulled their blue sedan up in front of the Johnses' home half an hour after leaving the hotel.
Frank and Joe got out and rang the bell beside the front door of the large ranch-style house.
"Who is it?" a woman's voice asked from a small speaker next to the doorbell.
"We're Frank and Joe Hardy, ma'am. We're investigating your husband's kidnapping," Frank answered.
There was a short pause; then the door swung open and the Hardys found themselves staring at a tall, pretty, dark-haired woman. She quickly sized up the Hardys. "If you're reporters, you should leave now. I'm not talking to any more of you people," she said sharply.
"We're not reporters, we're detectives," Joe reassured her. "We just want to help find your husband."
"Please, Mrs. Johns, we need your cooperation if we're going to save your husband before the deadline runs out. There's not much time," Frank told her.
"You boys seem like a long shot to me, but at this point I'll try anything." Phoebe Johns's face remained stern, but she stood aside to let them in. Silently she led them through the ultramodern house to a large living room furnished with black leather-and-chrome chairs and an expensive-looking black leather sofa. The Hardys took the chairs, and Phoebe Johns perched on the edge of the long sofa, looking at them tensely.
"Did your husband ever say anything about being afraid of Harry Saul?" Frank inquired.
"Barry rarely mentioned Harry after they had their falling-out," Phoebe Johns said.
"Do you think Harry Saul is the kind of guy who'd kidnap your husband for revenge?" Joe asked bluntly.
Phoebe Johns's expression hardened.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Johns, but we have to ask these questions if we're going to find your husband in time," Frank said uncomfortably.
"I don't know what I'll do if you don't find him," she told the Hardys. "I can't possibly pay the ransom."
"What!" Frank and Joe said simultaneously.
"I'm broke," Phoebe Johns said tightly. "After I saw the ransom note, I called our bank. They told me all our accounts were empty except for a few hundred dollars in the household checking account."
"But everyone I've talked to assumed Barry Johns was rich," Frank said.
"I never paid much attention to our finances. Barry handled everything. And until now, I've never wanted for anything. Maybe that's where a lot of our money went. Barry was so status-conscious. He always had to look like a big success and have the best of everything."
Joe thought for a moment, then asked, "Did your husband gamble, Mrs. Johns?"
She shook her head. "No, Barry never went in for that sort of thing. Though he did take a couple of gambles recently."
"What do you mean?" Frank asked.
"Business gambles. He lost a large sum of money on the Metaman movie. I'm not sure how much, but it was a lot, because Barry insisted on producing the movie himself."
"Did your husband have any other unsuccessful projects recently?" Joe asked.
Phoebe Johns thought for a moment. "There was a toy deal the year before, to merchandise his characters as action figures. That was a big disappointment. He got very irritable and preoccupied after that deal fell through."
"But if Zenith Publishing was as successful as we've heard, your husband could have afforded a few setbacks," Frank pointed out.
"Zenith was successful, but Barry plowed a lot of the money back into the business. The last few years, he's been complaining about how his labor costs eat up most of his profits."
"Wait a minute," Joe cut in. "I thought Barry Johns was famous for writing and drawing his own comics. Why did he need to pay his staff so much?"
Phoebe Johns looked down at her lap. "Barry used to do two or three books a month, but lately, running the business has been taking up so much of his time that he had Kaner and Parente ghosting most of his work."
"What's ghosting, Mrs. Johns?" Joe asked.
Phoebe Johns sighed wearily, then explained, "A ghost is someone who does work for an artist or writer but lets the other person sign his name to it. Barry wouldn't talk about it with me, but I knew he couldn't work. He was burned out. For months he just couldn't come up with any new ideas. Jack Parente was writing all the titles Barry was supposed to be handling."
Frank listened intently. Everything Phoebe Johns was telling them only confirmed all they'd heard about trouble between Johns and his staff. But what was the connection between Johns's business troubles and Harry Saul? That was one thing that just didn't make sense, even though Saul obviously had the biggest motive for wanting Johns kidnapped.
Changing the subject, Frank asked, "Do you know where the kidnappers want the ransom delivered?"
"Not yet." Phoebe Johns shook her head. "The first ransom note said only that they'd contact me."
She abruptly stood up. "Since I don't know when the message is coming, I want to be ready for - whatever comes next. I'll have to ask you boys to excuse me."
Frank and Joe stood up and said goodbye. "Don't worry, Mrs. Johns. We'll find your husband in time, I promise," Joe said.
***
As they walked out to their car, Joe tossed Frank the car keys. "Why don't you drive back to the hotel, Frank?"
Frank caught the keys. As he and Joe got into the car he saw a metallic glint at the top of the hill. He thought he saw a flicker of movement, but it was so quick he couldn't be sure that he actually saw anything.
He was steering up the hill from the Johns house when he looked ahead, and his mouth fell open.
The Human Dreadnought was standing at the top of the hill, and he was hefting a giant boulder with his bare hands. Frank couldn't believe what he was seeing. The Dreadnought braced himself with his left leg forward, then leaned back, holding the boulder high overhead.
"What the - " Frank began, but he stopped short when, with a mighty effort, the Dreadnought threw the boulder in their direction.
The huge boulder hit the street not far from the Dreadnought and rolled right toward their car, picking up speed as it bore down on them.
; "It's going to plow right into us, Frank!" Joe shouted.
Chapter 11
Frank cut the wheel sharply to the left, careening off the road and onto a green lawn just as the boulder rolled by. He slammed on the brakes, just missing a wrought-iron lamppost. He got the car under control and brought it to a halt back on the road.
The Hardys jumped from the car as the boulder continued down the hill, heading straight for the Johnses' house.
"Frank, it'll cream the house! Mrs. Johns - "
The huge stone bounced up over the edge of the sloping curb, then rolled right up against the front of the house.
Joe tensed, prepared to see a hole in the house. But although the boulder made a loud crash when it hit, it wasn't very destructive.
Joe looked quickly up the hill, but as he'd expected, the Dreadnought was gone. Then he and Frank raced back down the hill to the house.
There was no visible damage. The boulder had bounced and was sitting in the front yard a few feet from the house. Joe went over to examine it.
"Hey!" he called to Frank. "It's a fake! This boulder's made from some kind of plastic."
Frank came up to stand beside his brother, and when he rapped on the side of the boulder with his knuckles it made a hollow sound. "It's fiberglass, Joe, like the prop boulders in movies."
The front door of the house opened, and Phoebe Johns stuck her head out.
"What's going on?" she asked fearfully.
"You just had a visit from the kidnappers," Joe told her. "One of them rolled this into your house."
"Hey, what's this?" Frank asked, dropping to his knees beside the boulder. There was a ripping sound; then Frank turned to his brother, holding a heavyweight manila envelope with strips of silver tape stuck to either end.
"Looks like duct tape," Joe noted.
Frank shook his head. "It's gaffer's tape. Electricians in movies use this to attach stuff to light stands."
"Interesting," Joe said. "Another movie connection."
Phoebe Johns held out her hand. "Give me that envelope."
Joe and Frank both watched closely as she tore it open. Inside was a piece of white paper with a computer-printed message: Deliver the ransom in $20s, $50s, and $100s to the garbage can near the stern of the Star of India by midnight. Come alone. No police, or your husband and the others will be killed instantly.
The Human Dreadnought.
"The Star of India's that old sailing ship moored down by the Embarcadero, isn't it?" Joe asked his brother.
Frank nodded. "Putting the ransom drop-off along the waterfront allows the kidnappers plenty of ways in and out of the area."
Phoebe Johns looked down at the ransom note blankly. "I can't pay this," she said in a flat voice. "What am I going to do?"
"I think the first thing you should do is go inside and sit down," Frank told her. "Then I think you should call Sergeant Hanlon and tell him about this note."
Phoebe Johns nodded. "I'll do that."
"We'd appreciate it if you could do one thing for us, Mrs. Johns," Joe told her. "Don't mention our visit to Hanlon. He doesn't really understand that we're only trying to help."
"Boys, if you can rescue Barry, I'll do whatever I can to help you. Right now, I don't have much confidence in the police or the FBI." With that, Phoebe Johns turned and went inside her house, locking the door behind her.
"If the cops or FBI are coming, we'd better make ourselves scarce, Frank," Joe said, starting to move back up the hill toward the car.
Frank held up his hand to stop him. "Hold on a minute, Joe. I want to take a closer look at this boulder."
Frank went to the boulder and rolled it completely over so he could see all of it.
"Aha!" he exclaimed.
Joe hurried back over, and Frank showed him a flat rectangular area on the boulder.
"What is it?" Joe asked.
"I'm not sure," Frank replied. He took out his pocketknife and began scraping the paint off the flat area, exposing a small impression that read, Luxor Special Effects Corp., S.D., Calif.
Frank showed the impression to Joe. "We'd better check out this Luxor Corporation," he said.
***
Joe spotted the Luxor Special Effects Corporation as soon as he turned their car onto the street where it was located. It was a huge warehouse with a snarling gargoyle, seemingly made of stone, projecting from the front of the building. Joe shook his head as he and Frank got out of the car and headed for the entrance. If this is California architecture, you can have it, he thought.
The first person they ran into was a dark, athletic-looking man wearing jeans and a cutoff sweatshirt.
"Can you tell us where to find the head honcho?" Joe asked.
The dark-haired man nodded. "That'd be Dave Wolfe, and you're looking at him. What can I do for you guys?"
"Just a little while ago we almost got run over by a giant boulder with your company's name on it," Frank told him.
Wolfe's bushy eyebrows shot up. "A boulder, huh?" he said. "Was it about eight feet across?"
"That's it," Joe replied. "How'd you know?"
"It was stolen from here about a month ago," Wolfe explained, "along with a bunch of other stuff. I'm still making an inventory for the insurance company."
Frank pulled out his notebook. This might be the break they'd been waiting for. "Do you have any idea who did it?" Frank asked.
"Yeah, but it was such a slick job I can't prove it. I think it was Lenny Goldson, my old pyrotechnics man. The burglary happened a few months after I fired him," Wolfe told him.
"Why was he fired?" Joe asked.
"His special effects always looked good, but he was careless. On the Metaman flick, an explosion went off prematurely and a couple of stuntmen had to go to the hospital with burns."
"Did you work with Barry Johns?" Frank jumped in.
"Sure," said Wolfe. "Johns produced it. But the picture was never finished. Johns ran out of money. I got paid, but a lot of other people didn't and are still suing Johns to get their money."
Frank's brow furrowed and he chewed his lower lip. "Mr. Wolfe, did Barry Johns and Lenny Goldson meet while making the picture?" he asked eventually.
"Yeah," Wolfe answered. "They were on the set at the same time for a couple of weeks. Why?"
"Just wondering," Frank said, quickly adding, "Can you tell us what else was stolen from here?"
"Yeah," Wolfe replied with a shrug. "If you're really interested. Come on." He turned and went into the warehouse, waving for the Hardys to follow him. Leading them to a cramped, tiny office at the rear of the warehouse, Wolfe showed Frank and Joe a clipboard with a sheaf of typewritten sheets on it.
"Here's a mostly complete list of what was stolen," Wolfe told them.
Joe scanned the top sheet and gave a low whistle. "That's a lot of equipment, Mr. Wolfe."
Frank leaned over Joe's shoulder. "Yeah, and look at what kind of equipment - power winches, a wind machine, a couple of compact hydraulic jacks, smoke grenades, lasers, and a mini-flamethrower!"
Joe ran his eyes down the list with growing excitement. Here was the break they'd been hoping for. The kidnappers had used most of the equipment on the list of stolen goods. Joe's mind clicked into action, fitting the pieces together. There were several hydraulic jacks on the list. No doubt the Dreadnought had used one of them to tip their car down the hill. The winches, cables, and mountain-climbing gear on the list had been used by the gang to make it seem like Whip Scorpion "crawled" up the wall of the big building.
Joe pointed to the mini-flamethrower noted on Wolfe's list. "That's got to be the one Flame Fiend used," he said excitedly.
"Mind telling me what you're talking about?" Wolfe asked.
Frank shook his head. "I can't really say right now, Mr. Wolfe. But trust us, it's not just idle curiosity."
"If Lenny Goldson is mixed up in something, then I'd steer clear of it. He isn't somebody to mess around with," Wolfe warned, his dark face serious. "Ever get a look at him? G
oldson's six-feet-six and weighs about two-eighty, all muscle. He's a championship-level bodybuilder."
"He sounds big enough to be the Dreadnought," Joe told Frank. Turning back to Wolfe, he asked, "Do you know where we can find him?"
Wolfe looked skeptical. "It's your funeral, guys. Personally, I wouldn't come within a mile of Goldson. He's bad news."
Wolfe checked his address file and wrote down Goldson's address and phone number, handing the paper to Joe.
"Did Goldson have any close friends that you knew about?" Frank asked Wolfe.
"Lenny wasn't a very friendly guy," Wolfe answered, "but I guess he was pretty chummy with a couple of stuntmen who worked on the Metaman flick, Ted Basilio and Wally Trent. They're bad news, too. Ted used to work as a knife thrower in a circus, and he still likes to toss knives around. Wally's pretty weird, too. He used to do all the fire stunts Lenny rigged, right? But even off-camera, he was always playing with matches, you know? Doing little magic tricks and stuff."
"Thanks for the information, Mr. Wolfe," Frank said, jotting down the names in his notebook. "If we're going to track down Goldson, we'd better get going."
Wolfe nodded and led them toward the front of the warehouse.
As they made their way through the assortment of fake boulders, racks of monster costumes, catapults, and medieval war machines, Wolfe turned his head and said, "Oh, yeah, there's something I forgot to tell you guys about Goldson-"
Wolfe stopped in midsentence as a loud creaking sound cut the air. "Hey, what's - "
Joe turned toward the noise and saw that one of the war machines, a wheeled rack containing twenty arrows, was being trained on them.
In the next instant his blood ran cold as he heard the screech of the arrow catapult being cocked!
Chapter 12
Joe dived for Wolfe, tackling him out of range of the arrows, which whistled harmlessly overhead. Joe looked around for his brother.
"Frank!" he called out, sudden fear chilling him. "Frank!" he yelled again.
A tall shield leaning against a pile of suits of armor stirred and fell to the floor, revealing Frank.
The Last Laugh Page 7