The Jungle Pyramid (2 page)

“Right,” said Frank and Joe in unison.

“Let's talk about something else,” Chet said.

“Like what?” Joe inquired.

“Like gold!” Chet answered. “Do you know the melting point of gold?”

Joe grinned. “Over a thousand degrees centigrade.”

Chet looked crestfallen. “Oh, so you know that. Well, what can you dissolve gold with?”

“A mixture of hydrochloric and nitric acid.”

“You Hardys know everything,” Chet complained.

Frank decided to soothe their friend's feelings. “Not as much as you do, Chet. It's just that we ran some lab tests on gold for one of our clients.”

The Hardys had a criminology laboratory over their garage, where they did scientific analyses for their clients. They matched fingerprints under the microscope and carried out chemical tests of poisons, explosives, and other materials from the scene of a crime.

While the boys were talking, they approached a hill with a stone wall on the right. Joe drove up as fast as he could within the speed limit. Suddenly a large station wagon hurtled over the crest of the hill. The driver, a burly man, was hunched over the wheel. He was on the wrong side of the road and raced directly at their car!

“Watch it, Joe!” Frank shouted.

Because of the wall, Joe could not move any farther to the right. With split-second timing, he swerved to the left. The station wagon swept past on the right. The Hardys' car skidded out of control for a moment, but Joe pulled it back into the correct lane and went on.

“Lucky you kept your cool,” Frank complimented his brother. “There wasn't enough room for a dime between that station wagon and us.”

“You can say that again,” Chet remarked. “That knucklehead shouldn't be allowed to drive a kiddie car.”

The three settled back for the rest of their trip to Wakefield, and Chet continued his lecture on gold. He described how prehistoric people used the yellow metal for jewelry, such as rings and bracelets, and later for money. He added that currently most of the gold was obtained from the deep mines in South Africa.

“The Russians,” Chet revealed, “mine gold in Siberia and sell it on the international market. Headquarters for the gold exchange is Zurich, Switzerland.”

“Perhaps the stolen Wakefield gold came originally from Siberia,” Joe reasoned. “But who knows whether or not we'll ever see it.”

“Talking about gold,” Chet informed them, “there's an exhibition at the Early Art Museum in New York. Old Scythian artifacts. I hear it's fabulous.”

“Sounds interesting,” Joe said. “Maybe we can go there after we find Dad.”

He turned left to get off the highway at the Wakefield exit, and ten minutes later drew into the Archway Motel parking lot. The boys went inside, where a teen-age youth stood at the registration desk.

“Any message from Fenton Hardy?” Joe asked him.

“No. But I have one for Frank and Joe Hardy. Is that you?”

“Yes,” Frank replied.

“Somebody called,” the clerk stated. “Didn't give his name. Just said for Frank and Joe Hardy to come to the Stacy Hotel.”

“How do we get there?” Frank asked.

“Go left to the end of the road, make a right, then another right at the second traffic light. It's a flea-bitten rattrap in a rough neighborhood. Watch your step.”

“Will do,” Frank said. “And thanks for the tip.”

The drive to the Stacy took the boys into an area of run-down houses and dismal streets. Local toughs sauntered by, glowering at them.

“I hope we don't run into street gangs,” Chet remarked. “A guy could be mugged in this end of town without half trying.”

Joe parked in front of the Stacy. The boys climbed out and stood on the sidewalk, gazing up at the grimy exterior of the hotel. A bewhiskered tramp strolled up the street toward them. He was dressed in old clothes, battered shoes, and a slouch hat. They stepped aside to let him pass.

Abreast of them, the tramp suddenly turned and deliberately bumped into Joe. “Follow me,” he snarled, “if you know what's good for you!”

 

 

 

 

Reacting instinctively, Frank and Joe grabbed the tramp's arms to keep him from pulling a knife or a gun. Chet waved a fist under the man's nose.

“Fellows, hold it!” said a familiar voice. “I'll go quietly.”

The tramp was Fenton Hardy!
As the boys showed their surprise, he whispered, “Don't give me away. Play my game.”

“Okay,” Frank replied. “But we're glad to see you.” Aloud he said, “All right, Harry, we'll buy your dinner.”

He led the way into the hotel, where they sat down at a table in a secluded corner of the dining room. The other customers looked seedy, and the waitress chewed gum loudly as she took their order. When the food arrived, Chet seized his knife and fork and began to eat with gusto.

“I was in my room,” Mr. Hardy said in a low tone, “when a couple of men came in—”

He broke off as he noticed that the waitress was still standing near their table, flipping through her order pad. Then he said loudly, “A couple of men came in and asked me if I wanted to buy an encyclopedia.”

The waitress went to another table to present the check. Mr. Hardy resumed his story. “They jumped me while I was talking to you on the phone, and slipped a cloth saturated with chloroform over my face.”

Frank nodded. “We heard a thud and figured somebody was dragging you out of the room.”

“Right. When I came to, I was in an old abandoned garage. I—” Mr. Hardy suddenly changed the subject and talked about finding a job at the Wakefield lumber company, since the waitress again stood within earshot. After she had left, he continued, “That girl seems rather nosey. Well, anyway, I picked the lock, got out, went to my car, and put on this disguise. Then I called the Archway Motel from a pay phone and left the message about meeting me at the Stacy.”

“What's it all about?” Frank asked.

“The Wakefield Mint has been robbed of a big consignment of gold bars. The haul is worth over a million dollars!”

Joe whistled. “That's a big deal!”

Mr. Hardy agreed. “I've been hired by John Armstrong, the administrative assistant to the director of the mint. He asked me to keep this secret. That's why I couldn't tell you what the investigation was about. Then I received a threatening phone call warning me to get off the case. At that point, I decided I'd better send you an SOS.”

“Good thing you did,” Frank said.

Mr. Hardy went on, “Incidentally, Chet, I'm glad you came along. That fist you waved under my nose seems like a mighty lethal weapon.”

Chet tried to grin, but was not very successful since his mouth was full of baked potato.

“Got any leads, Dad?” Joe asked.

Fenton Hardy shook his head. “Not really. I assume the pair who chloroformed me belong to the gang that stole the gold. Beyond that, nothing.”

Frank and Joe ruminated over their father's experience as they finished the meal. Chet downed his last mouthful of apple pie. As the waitress was adding up the tab, Frank handed his father a ten dollar bill.

“There, Harry, that should help you out for a while,” he said.

“Thanks, my boy,” Mr. Hardy replied, speaking in the whine of a tramp down on his luck.

Leaving the hotel, he whispered to Frank, “Stay at the Shadyside Motel down the street tonight. Meet me at my car at nine in the morning. It's parked in a private garage at ten Pine Street. The people who own it are away, so I'm using it as my dressing room. I can change my disguises there without being seen.”

The elder Hardy slouched away into the darkness, and the boys drove to the Shadyside Motel, where they spent the night. In the morning they met Mr. Hardy as arranged. The detective no longer looked like a tramp. He had stashed the old clothes and the fake whiskers in the trunk of his car and resumed his usual appearance.

“Mr. Hardy, you sure fooled me last night,” Chet said.

“That was the idea,” the sleuth told him. “If my disguises didn't fool everybody, I'd be in big trouble. Boys, suppose we take your car.”

Frank got behind the wheel. “Where to?”

“The Wakefield Mint.”

The mint was a square three-story building. Faced with white stone, it had rows of narrow windows along the second story. The ground floor was sheathed in stone and steeL

The foyer inside contained a collection of coins and medals produced by the mint. A crowd milled around the main exhibit, a medal representing John Smith at Jamestown.

Fenton Hardy showed his pass to a guard, who escorted him and the boys down a corridor, through a door lined with steel bars, to the office of the administrative assistant.

John Armstrong was a friendly looking man who wore horn-rimmed glasses. He got up from the swivel chair behind his big desk and shook hands with Mr. Hardy, then with each boy, as he was introduced.

“They've helped me on previous cases,” the investigator explained, “and I'll need them to assist me on this one.” He described the kidnap attempt.

Armstrong expressed concern, then said he had no objections to the boys' participating. “Perhaps, then, you can solve our problem quicker,” he remarked. “I want this case cracked before Director Wadsworth gets back from his vacation. I'm responsible for the mint while he's away, you know.”

“Mr. Armstrong, suppose you clue us in,” Frank suggested.

Armstrong looked grave. “First, let me remind you that there must be no leaks about the theft. We don't want any publicity in the news media.”

“Mum's the word,” Chet vowed.

Joe inquired about security precautions.

“The best,” Armstrong stated. “See this panel on my desk? It monitors the entire mint. We have hidden television cameras watching every square inch of the building. Our security equipment includes trip wires, photoelectric plates, and laser beams. If anybody gets in their way, sirens go off and warning lights flash on the panel.”

“It sounds as if you're better protected than Fort Knox,” Joe said. “How come the gold was stolen anyway?”

“That's just it,” Armstrong said, looking bewildered. “The equipment must have been turned off. It was back on the next morning, however.”

“What about the guards?” Frank asked.

“That's stranger yet,” Armstrong went on. “One was posted at the outer door, one at the inner steel door, and one here in my office, monitoring the mint through the TV cameras. They were supposed to alert the rest of the night shift if anything happened, but they didn't.”

“In other words, they went off with the thieves,” Chet said.

“No. They're here!”

“You mean they helped the thieves get in, then let them escape with the loot, and stayed behind?” Joe was incredulous.

“Yes. That's what's so strange,” Armstrong replied. “They claim nothing unusual happened at any time that night. The police questioned them after they were arrested but they're sticking to their story.”

Frank shook his head. “It doesn't make sense. Where was the gold taken from?”

“The subterranean vault,” Armstrong said. “Come on. I'll take you down there.”

He ushered the group to his private elevator and pushed the button. The elevator descended three floors. The doors opened and Armstrong led the way to a steel door, where a guard was on duty. He spun the dial until the combination clicked and pushed the door inward.

The boys gaped. Gold bars about a foot long were stacked in rows on racks that stretched across most of the room. A yellow gleam shimmered under fluorescent lighting. A couple of men in shirtsleeves were counting the bars and entering figures in a ledger.

Chet's eyes bulged. “There's got to be a million dollars in here,” he practically shouted.

“More than that, young man,” Armstrong said. “We're missing twenty-five bars. Each weighs over twenty-seven pounds, and with gold selling on the international market at a very high rate presently, that consignment comes to more than a million.”

He gestured toward an empty rack near the door. “That's where the stolen bars were when we closed the vault for the night. The thieves must have carted the gold out of here and around to the outer door at the rear of the building. That's where they made their getaway.”

Frank was peering at the nearest row of gold bars. “Why, they're stamped with the hammer and sickle,” he noted.