Disaster for Hire (2 page)

Dr. Winter? Fawcette lying? See Curly at Selva Another Truett?

Frank let out his breath, and looked up at the ceiling thoughtfully. "Joe, come in here."

"If you changed your mind about the BLT, it's too late." Joe appeared in the doorway of the bedroom, the last of a bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwich in his left hand. "What's that?"

"Impressions of a note Dad wrote to himself."

"Let's see." Joe sat next to his brother on the bed.

"What's that smell?"

"Garlic."

"You put garlic on a BLT?"

Joe shrugged. "It's all that was in the spice rack. Now, what does the note say?"

Frank passed it over to him. "Dr. Winter is another professor at Farber University," he said, pointing at the top entry with his pencil. "In fact, he's the head of the biotech department."

"I know that. His name was in the newspaper stories about Professor Bookman's death." Joe popped the last bite of sandwich into his mouth.

"Dad must've had doubts about Winter, since he put a big question mark after his name."

"Either that, or the question mark just means he wanted to ask some questions."

"More likely he was suspicious." Joe persisted. "And there's no doubt that he was suspicious about his client—President Fawcette himself."

Frank tapped a tooth with the eraser end of the pencil, then glanced out the window. "We'll have to find out what Dad thought Fawcette was lying about."

"Which brings us to the next question—who's Curly at Selva?"

"That's two questions, really," said Frank. "One of which I can answer. Selva must refer to the Selva Lumber Corporation. It's one of the two biggest in this state, from what I've read. The lumber business is very important all over the Northwest."

"So Curly, whoever he is, must work for this lumber outfit. Dad was either going to see him or already saw him."

"Meaning we'll have to see Curly." Frank shot a glance at the window again.

Joe said, "That leaves only Truett."

Frank said, "Yes. That's very interesting." He turned to a fresh page on the pad. "I'll have to draw a diagram to explain that one."

"You will?"

Frank started scribbling on the page, holding it up to Joe.

"Don't say anything."

Joe stared from the note to his brother as Frank - kept writing.

Then Frank handed him this message "There's someone standing outside the window."

"STUDY THAT DIAGRAM for a minute," Frank said, heading for the door. "I think I will fix myself a little snack."

"Uh - huh." Joe didn't look at the window, but he was ready to move at the first hint of trouble. "I saw a couple of pork chops in the fridge."

"Sounds good." Frank went into the living room, then hurried to the front door.

"There's also a baked ham," Joe said, pretending to carry on a conversation. "You could nibble on that, I guess."

Frank, after making certain there was no one on the porch, stepped quietly onto it.

There was a mist in the air as twilight came on. Water birds were crying in the distance.

Frank moved up to the corner of the lodge. He slowed, then risked a look around the shingled wall.

The spy was standing on a log below the bedroom window. A faint spill of light didn't illuminate the figure's face. The eavesdropper was slender, no more than five foot five, wearing jeans, a ski jacket, and a dark knit cap.

Frank knew it wasn't either of the men who had shot at them earlier.

Inside the lodge he heard Joe carrying on his one-sided conversation. "Tomato soup's not bad," he said. "That's one of my personal favorites. You've always favored alphabet soup, being something of a brain. When we were kids, you'd spell out all kinds of words at lunch."

Frank edged closer to the listening figure. Then he decided to try a bluff. "Okay," he said loudly, "just raise your hands."

The figure leaped from the log and took off. Frank ran, pursuing the person along the trail to the dock. "Better stop," he called. "I don't want to shoot."

The fleeing figure picked up the pace, running even faster along the now-dark pathway.

Frank sped up, too. He was definitely cutting the distance between them.

Just then Frank caught his foot in a twist of tree root snaking across the trail and jerked to a stop. He fell forward and slammed into the ground. The harsh impact knocked the wind out of him, shaking his bones. He stayed down for half a minute, teaching himself to breathe again.

When he got up, he wobbled and tried to resume running. Instead, he fell back down to one knee.

"What'd he hit you with?"

Looking back, Frank saw Joe running down the trail. "Nothing. I tripped."

"Break anything?" Joe asked, flying past Frank to try to stop the intruder.

Frank shook himself vigorously. "Well, nothing fell off."

A powerful motor launch roared to life down through the trees, then it sped away from the island.

"That's not our boat," said Joe, rejoining his brother.

"A much bigger one, from the sound of it."

"Did you get a look at him? Was it one of those guys we met earlier?"

"No. Somebody else."

Joe frowned. "You know," he said, "this island is turning out to be a very popular place."

"A girl?"

"I'm fairly certain."

The Hardys were back at the lodge, giving the place one last going over. Joe, who was searching behind the books on the shelves in the living room, said, "You really think that was a girl you chased?"

"Yes." Frank sorted through the contents of the spilled drawer from the living room chest.

"Better hope Callie Shaw doesn't hear about this," Joe kidded. Callie was Frank's girlfriend. "Chasing strange women and falling hard. Well, at least there was one good thing," Joe continued, checking behind the final book on the shelf. "She didn't have a gun."

"We don't know that." Frank slid the drawer back in place. "She didn't need one to stop me."

Joe leaned against the fireplace. "Just my luck. You get to chase the girl." He shook his head. "I bet if I'd gone after her, she wouldn't have gotten away."

"Sure, she'd have taken one look at you and given up," Frank said. "Okay, I think we've gone over this whole place pretty thoroughly. And the only helpful thing we found is this copy of Dad's note, which isn't too bad."

"What's too bad is that we didn't get here before those guys destroyed his papers and notes."

Frank went back through the lodge, turning off lights in each of the rooms. "That slip of paper may be all we need," he said. "At least it gives us a couple of leads." He opened the front door.

Joe stepped out. "I wonder."

"About what?" Frank asked, killing the last light and joining Joe on the porch.

"Three people—besides us—were poking around on the island today." Joe headed down the steps. "At least two of them didn't want us to find out anything about what Dad was working on."

"That's a fair assumption." Frank started for the trail to the dock.

"The other person—the girl—is probably interested in keeping us off the track too."

"Could be that she's just interested in what we're up to," Frank said.

"Are there any women, young women, involved in this case?" Joe asked.

"Yeah. Professor Bookman has a daughter about our age, the papers said."

"Right. So does President Fawcette. His daughter attends Farber University—so does Bookman's," said Joe. "There was also that associate professor who worked with Bookman at the university."

"There weren't any pictures of them though."

"Not in the papers, no."

Joe jammed his hands in the pockets of his windbreaker. "You know, Frank, this case of Dad's can't be some little college scandal. People don't get killed for dipping into the petty cash or stealing test answers. It has to be bigger than that."

"I agree," said Frank. "We'll know more about what's really going on once we talk to Fawcette."

They were almost to the dock where they'd left their boat.

"As soon as we get back to Seattle, let's go to the university and — oh, no." Joe stopped dead. "Do you see what I see — or rather, what I don't see?"

Frank came up and stood beside him in the dark. He nodded grimly.

Their boat was gone.

Joe went down on his knees, frowning at the place where the speedboat had been. "Doesn't look as though they sank her," he said as he stood up.

"No, it was probably just set adrift." Frank stared at the wall of mist. "Our only way off Berrill Island is floating out in that dark fog someplace."

"Who are you betting on?" Joe asked.

"Take your pick," replied Frank, turning away from Puget Sound.

"I bet on those two hoods," said Joe. "Marooning us is pretty nasty."

"Effective, though." Frank rubbed his chin and looked at the small island. "Too bad Mr. Berrill likes privacy so much."

Joe slapped his forehead. "That's right. No phone, no radio," he realized. "No way of calling for help."

"Risky way to live," commented Frank. "If you broke a leg, you'd be in deep trouble."

"Or if you lost your boat," added Joe. "Which reminds me, it's going to be fun explaining all this to the guy we rented the boat from."

"It isn't exactly lost—it is out there somewhere." Frank started back up the dock. "Come on. There's got to be some way off here."

"Frank, we were all over the lodge and grounds. I didn't see a boat," said Joe. "Or even a bicycle."

"We'd better find something," said his brother.

Frank spotted the rowboat. It was in a weatherbeaten wooden shed near a small dock on the far side of the island.

Joe wasn't especially enthusiastic when his brother explained how they'd get back to Seattle. "Row?" he said in disbelief. "In that thing?"

"It's better than swimming," Frank pointed out. "Or waiting to be rescued. Besides, we might be spotted by a powerboat and get a lift back," Frank said.

"Or we may hit an iceberg," Joe grumbled, but he carried his half of the weathered rowboat down through the brush. They launched it and, with considerable splashing, got aboard.

Joe took the first shift on the oars. "I saw a movie like this once," he said. "A bunch of people spent days adrift in a lifeboat."

Frank laughed. "This won't be that bad."

The night fog grew thicker. It was cold and felt damp and prickly.

Joe concentrated on rowing, until he asked, "You sure we're going in the right direction?"

Frank nodded, saying, "Trust me."

Joe rowed in silence for several more minutes, then said, "Tell me something about the biotech department at Farber. Do you know what they do?"

"Professor Bookman was working in genetic engineering, DNA and that sort of thing." Frank looked over his shoulder into the misty night.

"Secret experimental stuff for the government?"

"I'm not sure, but I don't think Bookman or Winter was mixed up in anything like that."

"So you don't think we're dealing with foreign spies?"

"No." Frank shook his head. "At least I guess not."

Joe rowed on, then asked, "Do you know the specifics of Bookman's work?"

"We need details on his current project. But I do know he and Winter had perfected a genetically altered bacterium. It's been tested on oil spills. The bacteria more or less eat up the oil, or at least make it harmless to birds and marine life."

"Something like that would be worth a lot."

Frank nodded. "The products of the work they do at the Farber biotech lab bring in millions every year. The end products of their research, that is."

Joe let go of an oar for a second to wipe his palm on his pants leg. "So a new discovery could be worth—what? A million?"

Frank nodded. "More. A stolen formula, or even some of the research, could even be valuable."

"Valuable enough to frame Dad over," Frank added.

"Looks like we have a lot of questions for President Fawcette," said Joe. "And we'd better get some good answers, or — Hey!"

The rowboat suddenly lurched in a heavy wave, causing one oar to whip out of the water.

"That nearly swamped us," Joe said.

"We have more pressing problems," Frank said, staring at the bottom of the old boat.

The wave had split a rotten floorboard—and the black waters of Puget Sound were rushing in.

"THERE'S NO WAY to patch this," said Joe, icy water swirling around his ankles. The boat was being sucked into the Sound and the Hardys with it.

"We have nothing to bail with anyway." Frank took off his shoes and socks, slinging them around his neck.

"Guess we jump into the water, then." Joe said, also removing his shoes and socks.

"Then we can turn the boat over," his brother said. "We can hang on to it until somebody spots us." Frank stepped out of the rapidly sinking rowboat.

Joe waited until his brother was in the water, then he climbed out.

The boat tugged at him, struggling to take him down with it.

Joe fought free and dived into the water. It was dark and cold, and it took his breath away for a moment. His teeth chattered and he shivered uncontrollably. "Frank?"

He couldn't spot his brother anywhere in the inky blackness surrounding him.

Joe took a deep breath and called out again, "Frank!" Nothing. Only his own voice being swallowed up by the fog and mist.

"I'm coming your way." Joe couldn't see him, but Frank was swimming toward him.

"Where were you?"

"I got turned around in the dark," said Frank, shivering. "Let's get this thing belly up."

Finally the boat was floating bottom up and the Hardys were both clinging to it.

"Wish I'd thought to bring along a scuba suit." Joe gritted his teeth.

"There's all sorts of traffic on Puget Sound," said Frank. "We're bound to be spotted sooner or later."

"I hope it's sooner," Joe said. "Do you figure our boat was sabotaged?"

Frank tapped the hull. "I think it's just an old rowboat with a rotten bottom."

Joe sighed. "I guess you're right. It's just that after a day like today — folks shooting at us, spying on us, and letting our boat go—I get suspicious of just about everything."