The Vanishing Thieves (3 page)

“Mr. who?” Miss Nash asked loudly, trying to make herself heard over the cries of some nearby passengers.

“Anton Jivaro is the hijacker's real name,” Frank explained. “He's an escaped mental patient my dad's been trying to track down.”

“What!” she exlaimed. “You mean we're in the hands of a madman?”

Just then the cockpit door opened and the hijacker and flight attendant emerged. The frightened burst of conversation that had broken out throughout the plane suddenly died.

A slightly shaken voice came over the intercom. “This is your captain. As you all know, the plane has been hijacked. Please stay calm. The hijacker has promised not to harm anyone if we all do as he says. He tells me he is the Maharaja of Kashmir. I don't want any heroes attempting to subdue him, because he is carrying dynamite. My instructions are to change course from Los Angeles to Miami. There we will refuel to fly, via Casablanca, to Kashmir. We are now on the way to Miami.”

The hijacker spoke up. “All of you are to obey the captain and stay calm. We'll carry on just as though eveything was normal.” He turned to the flight attendant. “Isn't it about time you served lunch?”

“Lunch?” she said, flustered. “Oh, yes. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now have lunch.”

The strain of being in great danger left few of the passengers hungry, and some were so upset that they could not eat at all. The Hardys only picked at their food, and even Chet's appetite was diminished. Only the hijacker ate with gusto, standing at the rear of the plane.

Shortly after the meal, the captain's voice came over the intercom again. “Ground Control at Miami reports the airport closed in by fog,” he announced. “Will the maharaja please come forward to discuss an alternate landing place?”

Jivaro walked up to the flight attendant. “Go tell him to make an instrument landing.”

The young woman disappeared into the cockpit. When she came out a few moments later, she called to the hijacker. “The skipper wants to see you.”

Jivaro moved forward, but when the flight attendant opened the door to the cockpit for him, he shook his head. “I want my eye on the passengers,” he said. “We'll talk through the door.”

The voice of the captain was heard. “It's too dangerous to land at Miami, Maharaja. The south Atlantic and Gulf coasts are socked in by fog clear to Mobile. Ground Control recommends New Or-leans. ”

“We will land at Miami,” the hijacker insisted. “Unless you want to land right now, in pieces.”

“Can't we talk about it?”

“No. You have instruments to land in a fog. Use them.”

The captain sighed. “Close the door, Peg,” he said to the flight attendant.

Jivaro returned to his position at the rear of the plane. Again the captain's voice came over the intercom.

“Ladies and gentlemen, in case some of you couldn't hear my conversation with the maharaja, we are going down at Miami despite the fog condition there. We will be landing in about one hour. Please don't be alarmed. We are equipped with instruments for a blind landing. While not quite as safe as visual landing, we'll make it. However, we will take certain routine precautions so you're not shaken up too much in case it gets a little rough. The flight attendant will instruct you. ”

Raising her voice, Peg said, “Please remove all sharp objects from your pockets. Women passengers should take off shoes with high heels. When the seat belt light goes on, fasten your belt loosely enough so that you can bend forward with your head between your knees, and cover your head with your hands.”

With frightened expressions on their faces, the passengers followed her instructions. Nervously, Vern asked Joe in a low voice, “How safe is a blind landing?”

“Not very,” Joe muttered. “The captain was just trying to prevent panic. If he comes in a few feet too low, we'll belly flop and skid maybe a quarter mile. The friction could set the plane on fire. If he comes in a few feet too high, we could hit the control tower. ”

Frank added reassuringly, “But on the other hand, instrument landings are often made without even shaking up the passengers.”

An hour later, the “Fasten Seat Belts” sign went on, and the captain could be heard on the intercom. “We will be landing in five minutes. Please follow the instructions given you.”

The passengers fastened their seat belts loosely, leaned forward, and gripped their heads between their knees with both hands. The hijacker took an empty seat in the back of the plane, and leaned into the aisle so that he could keep an eye on everyone. The cadence of the engines changed as the plane dropped. Suddenly, the wheels struck the ground hard. The plane bounced, came down again, and taxied smoothly along the runway.

Cries of relief filled the cabin. A few sobs were heard, and Chet looked so white that Frank was afraid his friend would pass out.

When the plane stopped, everyone got up and looked through the windows. Outside there was a blank wall of fog.

The captain said over the intercom, “All right, Maharaja, we're down. Now what?”

The hijacker, back on his feet, moved forward to open the cockpit door. Without going inside, he asked, “Do police have the plane surrounded?”

“I imagine so,” the captain replied. “Do you want to talk to them?”

“No, I merely want them to keep their distance. Order the plane refueled.”

“This plane isn't designed for overseas flight, Maharaja,” the captain pointed out. “But we could make Casablanca with less weight. If you'd release the passengers and just keep the crew, we'd be better off.”

After considering, Jivaro gave in. “All right, I'll let most of them go, and just keep five. It would lighten the plane even more to unload the baggage, so have that done, too. But no tricks. If any cops come aboard as baggage handlers, I'll blow us all up.”

“They couldn‘t,” the captain said. “There's only an outside door to the baggage compartment, and no way to get in here from there.”

“All right. Have the stuff removed and the plane refueled. When that's finished, I'll release everyone but five hostages.”

Some time passed before the captain announced that the plane was refueled and they were ready to take off.

Satisfied that everything had been carried out as he had requested, the hijacker walked back to the center of the plane and pointed to the Hardy boys, Vern, Chet, and Cylvia Nash. “You five stay aboard. Everyone else can get off.”

As the passengers were leaving, Jivaro said to Frank and Joe, “I warned your father to get off my back. Because he didn‘t, you two are going to end up in Kashmir.”

When everyone but the hostages and the crew were off the plane, Joe got to his feet and stepped past Frank into the aisle.

“What's on your mind?” the hijacker hissed.

“I don't think you'd blow up this plane, because you'd have to blow yourself up, too. ”

Opening his coat, Jivaro gripped the loop on the end of the lanyard. “Test me,” he challenged.

After studying the six tubes strapped to the man's body, Joe suddenly grabbed him and threw him down into the aisle! The hijacker jerked the lanyard, and Cylvia Nash screamed in terror!

Frantically, the hostages and the crew dived behind seats in a desperate attempt to escape the explosion. But nothing happened!

As Joe fell on top of the hijacker, the little man squirmed like an eel from his grip and delivered a karate chop to Joe's neck that momentarily stunned the boy. Then Jivaro jumped to his feet and raced for the emergency exit. By the time the others cautiously peeked above the headrests, the fake maharaja had opened the emergency door. He slipped through it, letting himself down by his hands, and dropped the dozen feet or so to the ground.

Frank rushed after him to the door, but he could see nothing through the thick blanket of fog.

Meanwhile, the flight attendant ran to the cockpit and returned with the pilot, the copilot, and the navigator. When the captain, a large, ruddy-faced man, learned what had happened, he hurried back to the cockpit to radio the surrounding police.

By then Joe had recovered from the karate chop. Frank asked him why he had taken the chance of jumping the hijacker.

“I recognized his so-called dynamite as highway flares,” Joe told him. “It was all a blun!”

Police, led by a uniformed lieutenant, raced aboard the plane. After questioning the witnesses about the hijacker's escape, the lieutenant ordered the entire landing field sealed off and searched.

At once, his men left to put the order into effect, and the lieutenant turned to the flight attendant. “I suppose he gave a fake name, but how was this kook listed on the manifest?”

She went to get her clipboard. “John Smith,” she reported.

“Figures,” the lieutenant said glumly.

“His real name is Anton Jivaro,” Frank volunteered.

The lieutenant looked at him in surprise. “Who are you?”

“Frank Hardy.” He pointed to his companions. “This is my brother Joe and my friends, Chet Morton and Vern Nelson.”

Nodding acknowledgment, the lieutenant asked, “How do you happen to know this screwball's name?”

“My father's been trying to hunt him down,” Frank said. “He's an escaped mental patient.”

“Who is your father?

“Fenton Hardy.”

The lieutenant looked impressed. “I've heard a lot about him. So you two are the famous Hardy boys. ”

“We're the Hardy boys,” Joe said modestly. “I don't know about famous.”

The lieutenant grinned. “Give me a description of Anton Jivaro,” he said.

The boys told all they knew about the fake maharaja while the lieutenant made notes. Just then, a police sergeant returned to report that no trace of the hijacker had been found.

“The fog is so thick, he could easily have sneaked by the cordon,” the officer said. “I'm having the terminal and hangars searched right now.”

“Also put out an all-points bulletin,” the lieutenant instructed. “The man's name is Anton Jivaro.” He rattled off a description from his notes.

“Yes, sir,” the sergeant said, and left again.

The lieutenant turned to the captain, “You may as well reload your passengers and continue to Los Angeles.”

Even though the plane was already refueled, it took some time before it could start again. The passengers, who had not yet recovered from their fright, boarded reluctantly, and all the luggage had to be reloaded.

Shortly after they were airborne, Chet said, “I just thought of where that hijacker might be.”

“Where?” Frank asked.

“In the baggage compartment!”

“Oh, my!” Cylvia Nash said. “You mean he could hijack us again?”

“No. There's no way to get from the baggage compartment into the cabin while we're in flight,” Frank said reassuringly. “Didn't you hear the captain say that? Besides, Chet's brainstorms are usually not on target.”

“I figured it out logically,” Chet insisted. “In the fog the hijacker could have hidden under the plane, or maybe in one of the wheel housings. I read about a young boy stowing away in a wheel housing once. While the stuff was being reloaded, Jivaro could have climbed through the open door.”

“Two things wrong with that,” Joe said. “The door's too high above the ground, and the baggage handlers would have seen him.”

“Not so,” Chet said. “It's a low opening at the back of the plane, not up high like the passenger entrance. And the handlers had to make more than one trip to load all those suitcases. They wouldn't close the door between trips. He could have gotten aboard easily.”

“Could he survive in there?” Vern asked. “I mean, is the baggage compartment pressurized?”

“Sure,” Chet said. “They ship pets in there, don't they?”

“Well, there's no way to check now,” Frank said. “You can't get into the compartment from here any more than Jivaro could get into the cabin.”

The flight to California was uneventful. Chet checked the rest of his nickels, but found none of any real value. The others tried to relax, and Cylvia closed her eyes in a futile attempt to take a nap. At ten P.M. they landed at Los Angeles International Airport.

As the boys were starting to debark, a baggage truck manned by two handlers backed up to the plane and one of them unlatched the baggage compartment door. As they pulled it open, a small, dark figure suddenly dashed out, knocking the men down as he pushed past them.

Before the dazed baggage handlers realized what had happened, the hijacker jumped from the truck and raced off across the field toward a distant chain-link fence.

Joe had watched Jivaro's swift escape and ran down the gangway as fast as he could. “Chet was right!” he exclaimed. “Let's get him!”

The four boys rushed after the fugitive. However, the hijacker had gained too much of a lead. Reaching the fence twenty yards ahead of them, he climbed up and over it with the agility of a monkey. He dashed to the corner and hopped aboard a bus that had just stopped.

Frank and Joe started to scale the fence, but dropped to the ground when the bus pulled away. Grimly, they walked back to the plane which by now was swarming with security guards who were questioning the passengers. Cylvia Nash pointed to the young detectives excitedly. “Here are the boys who chased after the man when he jumped out,” she said.

The chief security guard turned to the Hardys. “Was it the hijacker Miami wired us about?” he asked.

“Yes,” Frank replied. “He climbed over the fence and caught a bus at the corner.”