Trial and Terror (8 page)

Frank and Joe's father, Fenton, had worked a number of years for the New York City Police Department before he became a renowned private investigator.

Sergeant Tyrell stopped and pulled down a cardboard box, which he set on the floor. “It says here,” Tyrell said, studying a file of papers he had brought, “the gloves and ski mask are being kept at the courthouse because the prosecutor is using them in the trial. The coat and knife have not been found.”

“So what's in the box?” Frank asked.

“Not much,” Tyrell said, still looking at the file. “It says these are items the police collected from the floor right near where the crime took
place. Karen Lee claims she swept her floor shortly before the attack, and the police collected these items shortly after the attack.”

“In other words,” Frank said, “there's a chance these items came from the attacker.”

“It's possible,” Tyrell said as he opened the box and reached inside. “Let's have a look.”

Tyrell handed Frank a sealed plastic packet. The only thing inside was a tiny pink item. It was oval and no bigger than a fingernail fragment. “This is a small piece of metal with painted enamel on it,” Tyrell said, checking the file. “No one has any idea what it is, and it may not have anything at all to do with the crime.”

Frank stared at the piece of pink enamel a few moments, trying to imagine what it might be. Nothing came to mind. “Anything else?” he said, handing the packet back to Sergeant Tyrell.

“Just this,” Tyrell said, handing Frank another sealed plastic packet. This one contained a few tiny shreds of a yarnlike substance in a color somewhere between gray and beige.

“These are carpet or rug fibers,” Tyrell explained. “They don't match with any carpets or rugs found in the apartment or place of work of Lee or Rodriguez, but they still could have come off one of those two people.”

Frank was thinking about how the fibers might be of use. “Let's say I had a suspect for this crime,” Frank said, “and I found this person
had a carpet or rug that matched these fibers exactly. Would that help point a finger at that person?”

“It certainly could,” Tyrell said, “If you could match those fibers exactly.”

“How would I do that?” Frank asked.

“First you would have to gather some samples from that person's home or office,” Tyrell explained. “Then you would need an expert to compare them with these samples. We have a crime lab where specialists are trained for that type of work, but you wouldn't be allowed access to it.”

“Not even if it would help establish the truth?” Frank said with a hopeful look.

“Our facilities are for the police and prosecutors only,” Tyrell said with a shrug. “You're lucky the judge is even letting you look at this stuff.”

“But if, say,
you
wanted to send something to the crime lab for analysis,” Frank said, “you could do it. Because you're a policeman. Right?”

“That's not really my job,” Tyrell said, scratching his mustache. “But I know some of those people fairly well, and, yes, I probably could. But that doesn't mean I could do it for someone else who's
not
a cop or prosecutor.”

“Not even if that person was the son of Fenton Hardy,” Frank said, locking eyes with Tyrell. Frank did not like to throw his father's name
around, but sometimes it proved helpful. Most folks who knew Fenton Hardy liked and admired him a great deal.

Tyrell scratched his mustache some more, all the while looking at Frank. “Okay, kid,” he said, lowering his voice. “If you get some fibers, I'll send them and these over to the crime lab and have them run a quick check. But you need to keep real quiet about it. Understand?”

“Quiet is my middle name,” Frank said, handing the plastic packet with the fibers back to Tyrell.

•  •  •

Joe climbed out of a subway station and walked east. Right away, Joe could see that this area, the East Village, was where the hip people hung out. Most of the people passing by looked to be about his age, Joe thought. Most were dressed in funky clothing, and many of them had their hair dyed wild colors, from orange to aqua.

Joe walked along a block lined with stores that sold things like old rock' n' roll records and super-cool sunglasses.

Stopping at a pay phone, Joe dialed his home number, then punched in the code to retrieve any messages. There was a message from Frank, who explained that if Joe got into John Q.'s apartment and if there was a carpet or rug there, Joe should collect a few fibers from it. He then said Joe should meet him near Karen Lee's apartment house in one hour.

Soon Joe was walking along a block lined with run-down apartment buildings, most of them with graffiti scrawled on their walls. Joe approached the front door of the building with the address that matched the one from John Q.'s letter. Joe buzzed 4F, John's apartment. There was no answer.

Joe waited a moment while a girl with a ring in her nose passed by. I must be the squarest guy in the neighborhood, Joe thought as he pulled a metal strip from his pocket. Every now and then, the Hardys found it necessary to pick a lock, and this was one of those times, Joe figured. After a little fiddling, Joe managed to get the door open.

The hallway was dimly lit, and the walls were in need of a paint job. Joe climbed several sets of steps and came finally to the door of apartment 4F.

Joe knocked. After getting no answer, he picked the lock on the door. Then he stepped into the apartment's living room and relocked the door.

Joe thought the place was surprisingly neat and well decorated. Posters of movies and plays hung on the walls, and some top-of-the-line audio and video equipment rested on the shelves of an entertainment center.

Joe heard a click. He froze and listened. Was someone in the apartment? There seemed to be
another room or two he had not yet checked. Then Joe was aware of a low, whirring sound.

After a look at the entertainment center, Joe realized the VCR had just switched on. John Q. must have preset it to tape a program, Joe figured. Wondering what the program was, Joe pushed a button on the cable box, and the television lit up.

Suddenly Joe was face-to-face with Karen Lee.

She was on TV, wearing a nurse's uniform and telling a worried-looking woman that her little son was going to be all right. Joe realized John had preset the recorder to videotape the day's episode of Lee's soap opera,
Days of Destiny.

Joe watched the show briefly. At this moment, he realized, Karen Lee was coming into millions of homes all over the country. The scary part was, she had no control over who got to know her and develop feelings for her. If a crazy person wanted to watch her every day, that person was free to do so.

After turning off the TV, Joe noticed the floor was covered with a gray carpet. He pulled a few fibers and put them inside his wallet.

Joe heard another click. He thought some other gadget must have switched on or off, but he could not figure out what it was. Then he realized the sound had come from the front door. It was the sound of a key turning in a lock.

Someone was about to enter the apartment.

All Joe had time to do was duck behind a sofa.

Crouched in hiding, Joe heard the door open. Then he heard shoes moving across the gray carpet.

A moment later, there was a click, and the television came on. It was
Days of Destiny
again, and Joe heard Karen Lee discussing some medical situation with a doctor.

Joe stole a peek around the side of the sofa. He was shocked by whom he saw. It was the clean-cut young man Joe had
thought
was a reporter. He was standing right in front of the TV, the light from the screen reflecting in his wire-rimmed glasses.

Joe realized this was John Q. He was at the trial not as a reporter but because he wanted to
watch Karen Lee in person. That's also why he was standing across the street from her apartment building. Joe had just assumed he was a reporter.

“Hi,” the young man spoke. “How are you?”

At first Joe thought John Q. might be talking to him, but he was still facing the screen. Then Joe realized John Q. was talking to Karen Lee on TV as if she were actually in the room.

“Oh, I'm not too bad,” John Q. told the screen version of Lee. “Sorry I had to leave the trial today, but they needed me to come in to work at the video store a little early. You looked awfully beautiful in there. It's all I can do to stop myself from going up and talking to you. But maybe I will someday. Who knows? Since things didn't work out with Nick, maybe they'll work out with me.”

Maybe he's the one, Joe thought. He was seeing that John Q. might indeed be crazy enough to have staged the murder attempt on Karen Lee. He felt a sudden thrill, the kind he usually got when closing in on a criminal.

Then John Q. took off his ski vest and walked into another room. Joe briefly considered sticking around to watch more, but he decided he'd better take the opportunity to slip out the door.

Thirty minutes later, Joe arrived in Chelsea, on the corner of the block where Karen Lee lived.
Sleet was now slanting down from the sky, and Joe found Frank under the canvas awning of a small food market.

“You were right,” Frank said after Joe had explained about his East Village discovery. “John Q. sounds like a nut.”

“And here are the carpet fibers from his place,” Joe said, pulling them from his wallet.

“Let's see,” Frank said, putting the fibers in one of several plastic packets he had been given by Sergeant Tyrell. “They look like they could be the right color. Thanks, Joe.”

“So we know John Q. is seriously obsessed with Lee,” Joe said, zipping his coat up higher. “Which lends support to my theory that he may have staged the attack on her in order to frame Rodriguez.”

“True,” Frank said, watching people hurry by to get out of the icy sleet. “But it's still a shaky theory. We still need some kind of hard evidence linking John to the crime.”

“But the carpet fibers could do it,” Joe said.

“If we're lucky,” Frank said. “Right now, let's move on to the Garfein-Alex theory. That's why I wanted to meet here. You'll go to Alex's apartment. If he's there, talk to him, especially about his relationship with Garfein. If he's not there, get in and have a look around. Either way, if there's a carpet or rug, pick some fibers.”

“And while I'm in another potentially dangerous situation,” Joe said, “where will you be? Doing some late Christmas shopping?”

“I'll be in the basement,” Frank told Joe. “Checking to see if the heat has been turned off. And we all know how dangerous basements can be.”

Frank and Joe hurried down the block, bracing themselves against the freezing pellets of sleet. “Before we visit Alex's place,” Joe suggested, “how about we take another look in Lee's apartment? I saw a bunch of fan letters in there, and now I'm thinking there may be more of them from John Q. Maybe one that contains a link to the crime.”

“Even if it does,” Frank pointed out, “the letter wouldn't be allowed in court because we got it by being there illegally. Remember, we're not really supposed to do that.”

“Okay, but if we find a letter from John,” Joe argued, “maybe we can have Myers gain legal access to it. He can tell the judge it's important that he sees all of Karen Lee's fan letters. That could work.”

“You're starting to think like a lawyer,” Frank said as the Hardys came to Lee's building.

The Hardys made their way past the building's front door and climbed the stairs to the third floor. Stepping out of the stairwell, Frank noticed the door with a small window that Nick had spoken of. Did Nick really see a face through that
window? Frank believed he had. But whose face was it?

Joe picked the lock to 3C, and the Hardys entered Lee's apartment. “Still no heat,” Frank said, finding the place even colder than before.

At the desk, Joe found the manila envelope filled with fan letters that he had seen the day before. “None of them is opened,” Joe said, thumbing quickly through the letters.

“Any of them from John Q.?” Frank asked.

“Nope,” Joe replied.

A bell jingled, causing Joe to jump. Then Joe realized it was Karen Lee's telephone.

An answering machine turned on. “Hi, I can't get to the phone right now,” a recorded message with Lee's voice said. “Please leave a message.”

Frank and Joe both turned to the machine.

“Hello, Karen,” a male voice said on the machine. “My name is Zeke Washington. I've sent you several letters in the past few months, but I haven't heard from you yet. Listen, Karen, in the name of justice, it's urgent I talk to you about the issue I discussed in my letters. It's a little complicated getting hold of me, but I left the information on how to do this in all three of my letters. Please, please contact me. Goodbye.”

Then the man hung up.

“He said it's urgent he talk to her in the name of justice,” Frank said thoughtfully. “Do you think this has something to do with the case?”

“I don't know,” Joe said, leafing through the
fan letters again. “But I do see some letters from a Zeke Washington.”

Joe showed Frank one of the letters. In the upper lefthand corner of the envelope, the following return address was written:

Zeke Washington, Inmate 82658

Ossining Correctional Facility

Ossining, NY 10562-5498

“This address is for a state prison about fifty miles north of here,” Frank said. “Sing Sing. Zeke Washington is a prisoner there. What do you suppose he wants?”

“Why don't we open his letters?” Joe said.

Frank ran a finger over the envelope. “It's tempting,” he said, “but I think we should resist. Even if we sealed them back up, Lee might notice. Opening someone's mail—at least, if it's not in the trash—is a federal offense.”