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Authors: Franklin W. Dixon

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BOOK: The Secret of Skull Mountain

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“I can't set 'er down,” the man replied. “The water's too rough. I'll go as close as I can.” He dropped the whirlybird down and kept the light trained on the wreckage.

Joe's heart sank. The broken boat looked like the
Sleuth.
Then suddenly a huge wave crashed over the wreck and part of it broke free. As the wood swirled in the surf, Joe spotted letters on it.

With a surge of relief he exclaimed, “No! It's not ours! Her name's the
Mary Anne.”

Mr. Hardy gave a sigh of relief.

“Mary Anne!”
exclaimed the sergeant. “So we found her at last! That's the speedboat which was swept away from her moorings in the last big storm we had. Luckily there was nobody aboard.”

The pilot reported the discovery into his radio as he turned the helicopter back toward the bay. The Hardys resumed their watch, but in vain.

“I'm sorry, sir,” the pilot told Mr. Hardy at last. “I'm afraid it doesn't look good.”

“And we can't keep this âbird' out much longer,” the sergeant said. “The storm's getting worse.” He suggested that they search again in daylight and Mr. Hardy said they would.

“Let's try just one more place,” Joe pleaded. “Merriam Island.”

The sergeant looked skeptical. “If your brother were there,” he said, “the lighthouse keeper would have radioed the shore.”

“Frank may be there without the keeper's knowledge,” Joe persisted. “He could be lying hurt somewhere on the island.”

The pilot and sergeant exchanged looks. “It's not much out of the way,” Joe urged.

“Okay,” the pilot conceded. “But we've got to make it snappy.”

He headed seaward again and soon the searchers sighted the windswept, wave-lashed mass of rocks directly ahead of them. The helicopter came down on its pontoons in the shelter of a rock cove. Joe jumped into the shallow water and waded to the narrow, sandy beach. “Look!” he shouted.

The revolving beam of the lighthouse's powerful navigation light had exposed the white hull of the Sleuth! The speedboat lay alongside a tiny dock. Joe made his way toward it.

A grizzled, white-haired old man wearing a turtleneck sweater leaned down over the rail of the tall lighthouse's circular runway. He put a megaphone to his lips.

“Who are ye? What do ye want?” he shouted.

“I'm looking for my brother!” Joe yelled.

The lighthouse keeper shook his head. “What?” he roared.

Joe cupped his hands so that his voice would carry over the pounding surf. “I'm looking for my brother!” he shouted again.

“He's not here!” the keeper yelled. “There's nobody on this island but me!”

“He must be here!” Joe shouted. “His boat is moored at the dock!”

He pointed to the boat, and saw the keeper look in that direction. Then the old man shrugged. “Not here!” he repeated, and went inside the lighthouse.

Joe turned to see his father, who had waded to him. “I don't like this at all,” Mr. Hardy said.

“Dad, maybe Frank went away on another boat!” Joe suggested. “If he did, he may have left a note!”

The two waded over to the
Sleuth
and examined it carefully. In the cockpit they found Frank's shoes and jacket. The gas tank registered empty. Quickly Joe searched the places he thought Frank might have hidden a note.

“Here's something!” he exclaimed.

Jammed into the short-wave set was a folded piece of white paper! While Mr. Hardy held a flashlight, Joe opened the note. It was from Frank!

The police sergeant came over to them. “Are you almost finished here, sir?” he asked the detective anxiously.

“Officer, my son and I will return to Bayport in the speedboat, if you can lend us some of your spare gasoline!”

“We'll be glad to,” the sergeant answered, “but that's likely to be a dangerous trip.”

“My son is a skilled pilot,” Mr. Hardy said calmly. “Besides, this way we might spot a clue to Frank's whereabouts which we missed from the air.”

“We'll be okay,” said Joe. “The
Sleuth's
ridden out some rough seas before now.”

The sergeant went back to the helicopter and returned with containers of fuel for the
Sleuth.

“Thanks very much for your assistance,” Mr. Hardy told the sergeant. “I'll let you know if we find Frank.”

The officer wished them luck, touched his cap, and waded out to the police craft. Joe and his father watched the whirlybird as it rose from the water, then headed toward Bayport, its lights blinking in the darkness.

They reread Frank's brief message: “Going to Sweeper'sâ”

Why hadn't Frank completed the message? Had he been in too much of a hurry? Or had he been interrupted? And why had he taken off his shoes and jacket?

The two detectives looked out at the wind-whipped, murky water as if it held the answer.

CHAPTER XI

Cast Adrift

WHEN FRANK swung the
Sleuth
out of the boathouse and roared after Sweeper's speeding craft, he knew his mission was a tough one.

“Can't let him know he's being followed,” the young detective cautioned himself.

He guided his boat skillfully across Barmet Bay, skirting ships and smaller craft, going fast enough to keep Sweeper in sight without attracting his attention.

The thin man's speedboat headed out to sea. After half an hour Frank saw his quarry approaching rock-bound Merriam Island. Sweeper stowed his boat and disappeared behind a jutting finger of rocks. Frank cut his motor and let the
Sleuth
drift toward a tiny dock which extended from a narrow beach.

He leaped out as his speedboat swung alongside the dock, and secured it. He saw no sign of activity in the lighthouse tower.

“Guess the keeper's asleep,” he muttered.

Staying near the shore, Frank clambered over sharp rocks and ran along short stretches of sand toward the spot where he had seen Sweeper's boat disappear.

Cautiously he approached a cove and saw the craft rocking gently a short distance from land. Sweeper was pacing the beach and glancing frequently out to sea.

“He must be waiting for someone,” Frank told himself. To watch the man, he stretched out on a smooth boulder, hidden from Sweeper's view by a low shelf of rocks.

Minutes ticked by. When an hour had passed, Frank saw that Sweeper was becoming impatient. The man paced the sand with short, jerky steps, stopping from time to time to glare at the sea. Finally he rolled up his trouser legs and waded toward his boat.

At that instant came the
put-put
of a launch. It rounded the high rocks sheltering the cove and stopped well beyond the surf.

The man at the wheel fumbled with something in his hands, and tossed a tin can into the water. He waved to Sweeper, pointed at the can, and swung the launch back toward Bayport.

Frank, puzzled, watched the can dance on the waves. Then the surf caught it, and a white lip of foam hurled the container toward the beach.

Sweeper waded out and plucked the can from the water. He pried open the lid and took out a slip of paper. After scanning it, he shook his head, crumpled the paper into a ball, and threw it into the ocean.

The thin man waded to the speedboat, got in, and cast off. A few seconds later he eased his craft out of the cove and sent it roaring through the waves.

Frank rose from his hiding place, ran to the sandy beach, and waded into the surf. He snatched the soggy ball of paper from the churning water. Returning to the beach, he unfolded the dripping sheet carefully. The typewritten message was still legible. It read:

Meeting postponed until midnight tonight. Will meet you at buoy off Barmet light.

Frank looked across the water. A hundred yards offshore a buoy bobbed. “That must be the one!” he thought, then glanced at his wrist watch. He still had time to return to Bayport and be back to spy on the meeting!

“Wonder who sent Sweeper the message,” Frank mused as he made his way back to the
Sleuth.
He cast off the mooring line, climbed into the cockpit, and backed the sleek craft away from the dock.

It was not long, however, before the
Sleuth's
motor began to sputter. Frank looked quickly at the gas gauge and saw that the fuel was nearly gone. Instantly he headed back toward the island. The motor coughed into silence as the
Sleuth
swung alongside the dock.

Frank tried to radio home for fuel, but found his short-wave set was dead. “What a break!” he muttered.

After working over the equipment for several hours without success, he realized he would have to use the lighthouse radio.

“No use attracting attention to my presence before the meeting here,” he decided. “I'll contact the keeper afterward. It'll be easier to spy on Sweeper's boat if I swim out to it.”

Frank sat in the cockpit and waited until red streaks of sunset flamed across the sky. Dusk fell and the island grew dark. Frank dozed.

Suddenly he was jarred awake. A motor!

Alert, Frank stared into the darkness in the direction of the sound. In the distance he saw the red and green running lights of an approaching speedboat.

Frank noticed then that the time was twenty minutes to twelve. “Wow!” he exclaimed. “I'd better hurry!”

He got a pencil and a scrap of paper and addressed a note to Joe and his father, in case they should trace him to Merriam Island.

“Going to Sweeper'sâ” Frank wrote hastily. At that moment the pencil point broke.

Annoyed, Frank searched for another pencil, but gave up after a few moments and jammed the partly written message into the short-wave set.

Swiftly Frank removed his jacket and shoes, then dived cleanly into the water and struck out for the buoy.

The surf was rough and he gasped as the cold waves broke over his head. Settling into a steady crawl, Frank swam toward the blinking light on the buoy.

After a hard swim, he reached it and grabbed hold of an iron chain which dipped deep into the water.

Moments later the speedboat swung past the buoy, coming to a stop. A dinghy was tied behind it. Sweeper stepped to the speedboat's deck and Frank could see that he was looking around.

Watching the man, Frank swam quietly toward the dinghy. As Sweeper's attention turned to an approaching launch, Frank drew himself stealthily into the dinghy. He stretched out on the bottom of the boat. His hand touched a tarpaulin and he pulled the canvas over him.

Wood scraped wood as the launch came alongside the speedboat. Frank lifted a corner of the tarpaulin and peered at the strange craft.

Two men emerged from its cabin and stepped into the speedboat. One was a stranger. The other Kleng!

They sat with Sweeper in the cockpit of the speedboat and the three began to talk earnestly. Frank strained to hear what they were saying, but the sound of the waves washing against the boats and the tinkle of the bell on the buoy drowned out their words.

Frank inched toward the bow of the dinghy and felt cautiously for the painter that held it to the speedboat. Pulling on it, he brought the small craft near the one which held the three conspirators.

The boy could hear their voices distinctly now. He slid under the tarpaulin once more.

The stranger was speaking. “Alibis! That's all I hear. The syndicate wants action!”

“We need more time,” said Kleng.

“Time for what?” the first man snapped. “For those engineers to fill the valley with water and ruin our plans? For Carpenter's detectives to make trouble?”

Frank grinned as Sweeper retorted, “They're just kids! I'll take care of them!”

“See that you do!” the first man told him gruffly. “Kleng, I'll give you four more days! If Foster hasn't completed his tests by that timeâ”

He broke off as a rattle of tin came from the dinghy. “What's that?” he demanded.

Frank suppressed an exclamation of annoyance. His foot had knocked over an oil can, and it rattled from one side of the boat to the other with every roll of the waves!

“Sounds like a tin can,” Kleng remarked.

“I'll get rid of it,” Sweeper said. “That racket makes me nervous.”

Frantically, Frank felt with his foot, found the can, and pressed it against the side of the dinghy. The rattle stopped.

“Never mind, Sweeper,” the stranger said.

Frank breathed in relief until he heard the thin man say softly, “I'm not sure it was just a can. I didn't pull this dinghy right up to the boat, and it didn't drift up! And I didn't spread canvas all over the bottom of it!”

He walked toward the dinghy, bent over its bow, and yanked off the tarpaulin. “Okay, kid!” he snarled. “Get up! The hide-and-seek game's over!”

As Frank stood up, he cast a quick glance toward Merriam Island. His heart sank. The boats had drifted out from the buoy too far for him to swim to safety.

Sweeper turned to the stranger and declared, “This is one of the snoopers who's helping Carpenter and Ames!”