The House on the Cliff (4 page)

The woman ran ahead and held the door open. The boys carried the stranger into the house and laid him on a bed in the comfortably furnished first-floor bedroom. The farmer's wife hastened to the kitchen to prepare a hot drink.

“Rub his ankles and wrists, and get those wet clothes off him,” the farmer told the boys. “That will step up his circulation. I'll get him some pajamas.”

“How about calling a doctor?” Frank asked.

“No need. He'll be okay,” the farmer declared.

The victim was soon under the covers. Frank and Joe continued to massage his wrists and ankles.

At last the stranger stirred feebly. His eyelids fluttered. His lips moved, but no words came. Then his eyes opened and the man stared at those around him, as though in a daze.

“Where am I?” he muttered faintly.

“You're safe,” Frank assured him. “You're with friends.”

“You saved me?”

“Yes.”

“Pretty near—cashed in—didn't I?”

“You nearly drowned, but you're all right now. When you feel like talking, you can tell us the whole story,” said Frank. “But, in the meantime, we'll call the police or the Coast Guard and report those men who tried to murder you.”

The man in the bed blinked and looked out the window. Finally he said, “No, no. Don't do that.”

The boys were shocked. “Why not?” Joe burst out.

The man was thoughtfully silent for a moment, then said, “Thanks, but I'd rather let matters stand as they are. I'll take care of it as soon as I get my strength back.” The rescued man turned to the farmer. “Okay with you if I stay here overnight? I'll pay you, of course.”

The farmer put out his hand. “The name's Kane and you're welcome to stay until you feel strong. Nobody can say I ever turned a sick man away. And what's your name?”

The patient hesitated a moment. “Jones. Bill Jones,” he said at last.

It was so evidently a false name that the Hardys glanced knowingly at each other. Mr. Kane did not seem to realize that his guest was apparently trying to hide his identity.

Mrs. Kane appeared with hot broth and toast. She suggested that her husband and the boys let the patient rest for a while. When she joined them in the living room she invited the boys to have a snack. Chet readily accepted for all of them.

The snack consisted of sandwiches of home-cured ham with cheese, glasses of fresh milk, and rich lemon pie, frothy with meringue. Chet beamed. “Mrs. Kane, you ought to open a restaurant. I'd be a steady customer. You're the best pie maker I've ever met.”

Frank, Joe, and Biff chuckled. How often they had heard their stout, food-loving chum make similar remarks! But in this case they had to agree with him and told Mrs. Kane so.

She smiled. “It's the least I can do for you boys who just saved someone's life.”

Her young guests said nothing of their early afternoon's adventure inside the Pollitt house, but Frank casually asked the Kanes if they had known the deceased owner and if anyone were living there now.

“Sure I knew Felix Pollitt,” the farmer replied. “Closemouthed old codger, but I did hear him once say somethin' about havin' a no-good nephew. Pollitt said he was his only livin' relative and he supposed he'd have to leave the property to him.”

“But who'd want the place?” Mrs. Kane spoke up. “It's falling apart and would cost a mint of money to fix up.”

Joe grinned. “Sounds like a haunted house,” he remarked pointedly.

“Funny you should say that.” Mrs. Kane looked at Joe. “There was a family stopped here the other day. Wanted to buy some eggs. One of the little girls said they'd had a terrible scare. They'd stopped at the old Pollitt place to have a picnic, and were scared out of their wits by moans and groans and queer laughs from the house.”

Mr. Kane's face broke into a grin. “The kid's imagination sure was runnin' away with itself.”

“I'm not so sure of that,” his wife disagreed. “I think some boys were in there playing pranks.”

After Frank and Joe and their friends had left the farmhouse, they discussed the strange noises at the Pollitt place from this new angle.

Biff frowned. “If those ghosts are from Bayport High, they'll sure have the laugh on us,” he remarked.

“They sure will,” Chet agreed. “I'd hate to face them on Monday.”

Frank and Joe were not convinced. After they had dropped their chums at the Morton and Hooper homes, they discussed the day's strange and varied adventures all the way to the Hardy house.

“I'm sure that ghost business was meant to be something more than a prank,” Frank stated.

“Right,” his brother agreed. “I just had an idea, Frank. Maybe nobody was in the house, but he could have rigged up a tape recorder to make those sounds and a remote control to start it. What say we go back sometime and take a look?”

“I'm with you.”

By this time the boys had turned into the long driveway of the Hardy home, a spacious, three-story clapboard house on the corner of High and Elm streets. The large two-story garage at the rear of an attractive garden had once been a barn.

Frank and Joe parked their motorcycles, unstrapped the telescope, and carried it to the back porch. As they entered the kitchen, they found their mother, a pretty, sweet-faced woman, with sparkling blue eyes, preparing supper.

“Hello, boys,” she greeted them. “Did you have a good day? See any smugglers?”

They kissed her and Frank said, “We have a lot to tell you and Dad.”

“He's in the study upstairs. I'll go up with you right away and we can talk while the chicken's roasting and the potatoes baking.”

The three hurried up to the room where Mr. Hardy was busy looking in a large metal file in which he kept important records. The detective stopped his work and listened with rapt attention as Frank and Joe gave a detailed account of their adventures.

“We sure fell for that cry for help,” Joe explained. “I'm sorry about the stolen eyepieces from the telescope.”

“And I hope it wasn't damaged when I had my spill,” Frank added. He smiled wanly. “You'll probably want to dismiss us from your detective force.”

“Nothing of the kind,” his father said. “But now, let's discuss what you saw through the telescope. You said you spotted a man who climbed down the ladder of a boat and went off in a smaller one. Could he have been this same fellow who calls himself Jones?”

“We couldn't identify him,” Joe replied, “but he might be.”

Frank snapped his fingers. “Yes, and he could be one of the smugglers.”

“But who threw that hand grenade at him?” Joe asked. “Not one of his own gang, surely. And those guys in the other speedboat—they couldn't have been Coast Guard men, even in disguise. They wouldn't use grenades.”

“Joe's right on the second point,” Mr. Hardy agreed. “But Jones may still be a smuggler.”

“You mean he might have done something to make his boss mad and the boss sent out a couple of men to get him?” Joe asked.

The detective nodded. “If this theory is right, and we can persuade Jones to talk before he either rejoins the gang or starts trying to take revenge, then we might get him to turn state's evidence.”

The boys were excited. Both jumped from their chairs and Joe cried out eagerly, “Let's go talk to him right away! By morning he'll be gone!”

“JUST a minute!” Mrs. Hardy said to her sons. “How about supper?”

“We can eat when we come back from our interview with Jones,” Joe answered. “Mother, he may decide to leave the farmhouse any time.”

Despairingly Mrs. Hardy returned to her husband. “What do you think, Fenton?”

The detective gave his wife an understanding smile, then turned to Frank and Joe. “Didn't you say Jones was in pretty bad shape?”

“Yes, Dad,” Frank replied.

“Then I doubt very much that he'll try to leave the Kanes' home before the time he set—tomorrow morning. I'm sure that it'll be safe for us to eat Mother's good supper and still see our man in time.”

Joe subsided, and to make his mother feel better, said with a smile, “Guess I let this mystery go to my brain for a minute. As a matter of fact, I have an empty space inside of me big enough to eat two suppers!”

Mrs. Hardy tweaked an ear of her energetic son, just as she had frequently done ever since he was a small boy. He smiled at her affectionately, then asked what he could do to help with supper.

“Well, suppose you fill the water glasses and get milk for you and Frank,” Mrs. Hardy said, as she and Joe went downstairs together.

At the table, as often happened at meals in the Hardy home, the conversation revolved around the mystery. Frank asked his father if he had made any progress on his part in the case concerning the smugglers.

“Very little,” the detective replied. “Snattman is a slippery individual. He covers his tracks well. I did find this out, though. The law firm which is handling old Mr. Pollitt's affairs has had no luck in locating the nephew to whom the property was left.”

“Mr. Kane said he'd heard Mr. Pollitt call his nephew a no-good,” Frank put in.

“That's just the point,” Mr. Hardy said. “The lawyers learned from the police that he's a hoodlum and is wanted for burglary.”

Frank whistled. “That puts the nephew in a bad spot, doesn't it? If he shows up to claim the property, he'll be nabbed as a criminal.”

“Exactly,” Mr. Hardy answered.

“What will become of the property?” Joe queried.

His father said he thought the executors might let the house remain vacant or they might possibly rent it. “They could do this on a month-to-month basis. This would give added income to the estate.”

“Which wouldn't do the nephew much good if he were in jail,” Mrs. Hardy put in.

“That would depend on how long his sentence was,” her husband said. “He may not be a dangerous criminal. He may just have fallen into bad company and unwittingly become an accessory in some holdup or burglary.”

“In that case,” Frank remarked, “he may realize that he wouldn't have to stay in prison long. He may appear to claim the property, take his punishment, and then lead a normal, law-abiding life out at his uncle's place.”

“Well, I sincerely hope so,” Mr. Hardy replied. “The trouble is, so often when a young man joins a group of hoodlums or racketeers, he's blackmailed for the rest of his life, even though he tries to go straight.” The detective smiled. “The best way to avoid such a situation is never to get into it!”

At this moment the phone rang and Frank went to answer it. “It's for you, Dad!” he called, coming back to the table.'

Mr. Hardy spent nearly fifteen minutes in conversation with the caller. In the meantime, the boys and Mrs. Hardy finished their supper. Then, while Mr. Hardy ate his dessert, he told his family a little about the information he had just received on the phone.

“More drugs have disappeared,” he said tersely. “I'm positive now that Snattman is behind all this.”

“Were the drugs stolen around here?” Frank asked.

“We don't know,” his father answered. “A pharmaceutical house in the Midwest was expecting a shipment of rare drugs from India. When the package arrived, only half the order was there. It was evident that someone had cleverly opened the package, removed part of the shipment, and replaced the wrapping so neatly that neither the customs officials nor the post office was aware that the package had been tampered with.”

“How were the drugs sent to this country?” Joe queried.

“They came by ship.”

“To which port?”

“New York. But the ship did stop at Bayport.”

“How long ago was this?”

“Nearly two months ago. It seems that the pharmaceutical house wasn't ready to use the drugs until now, so hadn't opened the package.”

“Then,” said Joe, “the drugs could have been removed right on the premises, and have had nothing to do with smugglers.”

“You're right,” Mr. Hardy agreed. “Each time drugs are reported missing, there's a new angle to the case. Although I'm convinced Snattman is back of it, how to prove this is really a stickler.”

Mr. Hardy went on to say that the tip he had received about Snattman being in the Bayport area had been a very reliable one. He smiled. “I'll tell you all a little secret. I have a very good friend down on the waterfront. He picks up many kinds of information for me. His name is Pretzel Pete.”

“Pretzel Pete!” Frank and Joe cried out. “What a name!”

“That's his nickname along the waterfront,” Mr. Hardy told them. He laughed. “During the past few years I've munched on so many of the pretzels he sells, I think I'm his best customer.”

By this time the boys' father had finished his dessert, and he suggested they leave at once for the Kane farmhouse. He brought his black sedan from the garage and the boys hopped in. It did not take long to cover the six miles to the place where Jones was spending the night.

“Why, the house is dark,” Frank remarked, puzzled.

“Maybe everyone's asleep,” Joe suggested.

“This
early?” Frank protested.

Mr. Hardy continued on down the lane. There was no sign of anyone around the place. Frank remarked that perhaps the farmer and his wife had gone out for the evening. “But I'm surprised that they would leave Jones alone in his condition,” he added.