CONTENTS
Chapter 1 The Holdup
Chapter 2 Seeing Double
Chapter 3 Consequences
Chapter 4 Harmless
Chapter 5 Monitored
Chapter 6 The Arrow
Chapter 7 Panic Project
Chapter 8 Secrets
Chapter 9 The Dark Side
Chapter 10 Blast from the Past
Chapter 11 Pett
Chapter 12 Rumors
Chapter 13 A Call for Help
Chapter 14 Mischief
Chapter 15 A Tip
Chapter 16 Watched
Chapter 17 The Joy of Public Speaking
Chapter 18 Gush
Chapter 19 Retired
Mystery of the Phantom Heist Excerpt
About Franklin W. Dixon
THE HOLDUP
1
FRANK
IT’S FUNNY TO THINK ABOUT HAVING ENEMIES. Not funny ha-ha. Funny strange.
I was standing in line at the First Bayport Bank on Water Street. Dad had sent me here on an errand, explaining that the Hardy household believed in banking in person, not online. Mistakes were less common, he said, when the tellers had a face to remember. Even plain old Frank Hardy’s face.
I knew it was just an excuse to get me out of the house. “You’re spending too much time cooped up in front of a computer screen.” Dad, Mom, Aunt Trudy, and my brother, Joe, each told me that at least five times a day.
Well, they weren’t the ones who had to give a speech. That’s right: In one week, yours truly had to get up in front of the entire Bayport High School student body to present my American history paper on civil liberties, which my teacher, Ms. Jones, had called “exceptional.” I’d been really happy about that until I realized it would lead to mandatory public speaking. Thinking about it gave me turbocharged butterflies. I was embarrassed to admit it, but if there was one thing I truly hated, it was public speaking. D-day was right around the corner, and I didn’t even have a final speech yet. I pretended to be “researching,” but the reality was that I was turning into Joe: a world-class procrastinator.
The line in the bank was long, and the wait was boring. It had rained all morning, which meant drippy umbrellas inside. My sneakers were soaked through from the walk.
I took out my cell and texted Joe. We were going to meet up later at the Meet Locker to study. (That’s a coffee shop, in case you were wondering. A popular hangout, it’s open late, and they serve a mean Maximum Mocha.)
NO SIGNAL.
Typical, I thought. Bayport had become notorious for its spotty cell reception.
Staring down at my phone, I accidentally bumped into the person in front of me in line. “Sorry,” I said. The guy glanced back. Then, eyes widening, he turned to face me.
It was Seth Diller, Bayport High’s very own Quentin Tarantino.
“Oh. Hey, Seth,” I said.
He studied me with his strange, unblinking, pale-blue eyes. He looked very highly charged for some reason, like he’d beaten me to the Meet Locker and drunk about twelve espressos. A few inches shorter than me, Seth was wearing a black turtleneck so tight it made me wonder if his brain was being deprived of oxygen. Finally he dipped a nod in my direction. “Frank,” he said quietly.
I didn’t know Seth very well. But he always had a camera in his hand. He was president of the Bayport High AV Club.
His specialty was monster videos. I’d seen a couple on the club website. Lots of fake tissue damage and gross-out effects. Joe appreciated that Seth took the time to make all his effects “in the camera”—meaning not digitally. No CGI for Seth. He was a purist. Joe was a fan, me not so much.
“Working on any new monster masterpieces?” I asked, just to be friendly.
He nodded. “Yes . . . in fact, I’m cooking up something really special.”
“Really?”
He smiled. “That’s right. I’m hoping this new movie will break my record of eleven thousand four hundred fifty-six views on YouTube.”
I guessed that was impressive. “What’s it about?” I asked.
He frowned and gave a shrug. “It’s hard to describe.”
I figured he didn’t want to talk about it, so I just wished him luck and changed the subject. “Hey, how’s your brother doing?” Tom Diller, Seth’s older brother, had been badly wounded while serving with the marines in Afghanistan.
Seth grew quiet, and I was starting to feel sorry I’d brought up such a personal subject. That’s when we heard the screams.
“Everybody stay where you are!” a voice yelled.
Three men with guns, each wearing a mask from a recent slasher movie, had entered the bank. They were moving fast, pistols in their outstretched hands. One disarmed the security guard, dropped the guard’s gun in a trash can, and forced him to lie on the floor. Another locked the front doors. The third came toward us.
I’m not going to lie: I was shocked, and a little scared. I could feel my heart hammering in my chest like it was trying to break out. The truth is, I’d been in far stickier situations than this one, but you don’t exactly expect to run into a bank robbery on a Saturday morning in a sleepy little town like Bayport.
Seth, standing right beside me, stiffened and made a panicky sound in his throat. Seeing his fear brought me back to my senses. “Stay calm,” I whispered to him. “Do whatever they ask. Everything will be fine.”
He was fumbling in his pocket. Glancing over, I saw him take out his smartphone. Hands shaking, he hurriedly tapped the screen until a wobbly image of his own feet came up. He had enabled the video cam.
He was going to record the robbery.
“Seth, listen to me very carefully,” I said in an urgent whisper. “Do not do that. These men are wearing masks for a reason. Just put your phone away.”
But he wasn’t listening. He cupped his hand so the phone was partway concealed and held it low against his leg, angling out at the room, capturing the heist in action.
“Empty your pockets and your purses!” the third gunman yelled. He was my height and thin, wearing a bulky army jacket that didn’t fit. “Nice and calm, people. No sudden moves. We don’t want to hurt anybody.”
The gunman who had locked the doors joined him. “But we will shoot anyone who gets in our way!” he shouted. He rushed to one of the tellers’ windows and proceeded to collect money from behind the counter.
Army Jacket began taking valuables from the people standing in line. Rings, necklaces, and wallets disappeared into a canvas bag he was carrying. He made quick work of it. My mind was racing. What would be the reaction of the gunmen if they saw Seth recording them? It would depend on a million factors. How experienced they were. How nervous. How desperate. Were these men killers?
Army Jacket reached Seth, standing right by my side. I held my breath. The gunman paused only for an instant while Seth dropped his wallet and wristwatch into the canvas bag in one movement. He hadn’t seen Seth’s phone in his other hand. I breathed a two-second sigh of relief. Then Army Jacket was facing me.
Something strange happened then. Army Jacket just stood there, letting the moment drag on too long. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t take my watch or my wallet. He didn’t even seem all that threatening. He was just . . . staring at me.
Did he know me? It was possible. Even though my brother and I are supposed to be officially “retired,” we’d put away a fair share of criminals in our time. Maybe this guy had been sent to prison, courtesy of Frank and Joe Hardy, and had just gotten his release.
See, our dad, Fenton Hardy, was once a world-famous detective. Growing up, Joe and I would help him on his cases. Then we began tackling mysteries on our own. We were proud of our successes. But after one too many cl
ose calls, things started to get a little out of hand, for reasons having to do with private investigators’ licenses (we didn’t have any), insurance (none of that, either), and the threat of being sued by every hoodlum we ever put under a citizen’s arrest. Which is not how my brother and I wanted to spend the remainder of our teenage years, provided we’re lucky enough to survive them. Some of us even have hopes of college one day . . . of a scholarship . . . of a normal life.
So with a few phone calls, including references from our principal and assurances to the police chief and state attorney general, we “retired.” Officially, it stays that way—for all the Hardys. Our dad writes books on the history of law enforcement. And Joe and I go to high school.
That cozy arrangement, a.k.a. “the Deal,” lasted about a month before Joe and I started going crazy. Maybe being a detective is something in your blood. I don’t know.
Since then we’ve started taking the occasional case for a good cause or to help a friend, but we try to keep it confidential. And we deny everything. We don’t consider it lying, just being prudent. We haven’t told our dad, which makes me feel a bit guilty, but I get the feeling he suspects.
Not that it mattered right now. All that mattered was that Army Jacket’s arm had slowly fallen to his side. His gun was pointed at the floor. Like he’d forgotten about it. Now was my chance.
I was about to grab the gun and wrestle it out of his hand, but his accomplice hollered, “Hey! What are you doing?”
Shocked back into the moment, Army Jacket raised his gun again. My chance was gone. I’d blown it. I could see the tiny mouth of the black barrel, aimed between my eyes. He was about to fire!
SEEING DOUBLE
2
JOE
I WAS STARING INTO A FACE I’D KNOWN MY ENTIRE life: my big brother Frank’s. For a dizzy second or two, I forgot where I was and what I was doing.
It had totally slipped my mind that Frank had been sent on a phony errand down to the bank. Everybody in the Hardy family agreed he had been spending way too much time on the computer lately, and that he needed to go out and get some exercise and fresh air. The rain shower was just a bonus. Besides, Mom and Dad did all the household banking online. It is the twenty-first century, after all.
When I saw Frank, I almost blurted out his name. I caught myself just in time. But there had to be some way I could let him know it was me in the Michael Myers mask (the one from Halloween, you know). How could I signal to him? How could I let him know?
For a second, I thought about speaking to him in sign. Frank and I are both pretty fluent in American Sign Language. I could keep it simple: B-B G-U-N.
Letting him know, first of all, that I was just holding a BB gun. An unloaded one at that. It was the most important thing to communicate if we were going to stop these idiots!
But I’d better back up a little bit. You’re probably wondering how Joe Hardy came to be holding up a bank in the company of two hardened criminals in the first place.
I had been on my way down to the Locker to meet Frank. (It’s actually called the Meet Locker, which I think is kind of a stupid name. Most kids seem to agree and just call it the Locker.) Frank was all worked up about his speech, which was (as he had told me a million times) exactly one week away. Anyway, I was supposed to help him with it.
As I walked past the alley behind the bank, a big guy in a Michael Myers mask—just like the one I was wearing now—darted out from behind a car and yanked me off my feet. Now, before you call me a wuss, I do know judo (I’m a green belt). But the business end of a nine-millimeter Glock was pressed right up against my gut, so I played along.
It was not the first time I’d had a gun trained on me by some hoodlum. Frank and I had been solving crimes since we were little. We had to keep it on the down low nowadays, of course, because we kept getting sued. But the situation wasn’t completely unfamiliar to me.
Mr. Glock dragged me over to a van. The door was wide open. Inside, a woman was squirming and whimpering, and when I took a closer look I recognized Mrs. Steigerwald, the owner of Bayport’s bowling alley, Seaside Lanes. A big guy was holding another gun and had a hand clamped over her mouth, but he lifted it just long enough for her to shout, “Joe! Help m—”
She was wearing a baseball cap and these big, 1970s-style sunglasses—her usual getup—and she was so terrified, her glasses seemed to be fogging up. It was awful. The other gunman told me I had to help them rob the bank . . . or she’d “get it.” Their partner hadn’t shown up, he said, so they were a man short. Then the first guy tossed a big, greasy-looking army jacket at me and handed me another Halloween mask and the BB gun.
I racked my brain, but I couldn’t see any way out. Poor Mrs. Steigerwald was about to hyperventilate.
“Don’t worry, Mrs. S,” I assured her, putting on the army jacket and the mask. “It’ll all be over really quick. Then I’ll come right out to check on you.”
“All r-right . . . J-Joe,” she answered through chattering teeth. Which surprised me, since she normally called everybody plain old “you.” I didn’t think she knew my name. I was always “You—the blond Hardy.” But I let it slide, thinking she was just terrified.
Sixty seconds later, I was a felon.
Have you ever tried to hold up a bank with the sole aim of keeping anyone from being hurt? It’s quite a high-wire act.
“Hey!” one of my accomplices barked at me now, snapping me back into the present. I’d been staring at Frank, trying to figure out how to communicate with him. “What are you doing?” he demanded.
There was no chance to team up with my brother at the moment. It was too risky. I just needed to get this ordeal over with as soon as possible. I took Frank’s wallet and moved on.
The next customer in line brought me to a halt. This time I couldn’t hide my shock.
“Um . . . Mrs. Steigerwald?” I said. My voice was muffled through the mask.
Mrs. Steigerwald looked freaked out—and mad. She wasn’t wearing her hat and glasses now, and her bright-red hair stuck out at crazy angles. Her green eyes—a really memorable shade—stared at me suspiciously. She clutched her purse, getting ready to hit me with it. “What do you want, you?” she asked.
Now I was really confused. How was Mrs. Steigerwald standing right in front of me? If she was in the bank, who was out in the van being held captive? How could she be in two places at once?
“Were you just outside?” I asked her.
She looked confused. “When?”
“Like, two minutes ago.”
“No,” she replied. “I’ve been here for the past half hour, discussing Seaside Lanes’s bank loan with Tom Baines.” The color started returning to her cheeks as she got going. “Which I wouldn’t need to do if the young people in this town would tear themselves away from their screens once in a while for some good, clean, healthy bowling!”
I took a deep breath, set my gun on the floor, and stepped away from it. Then I raised my hands over my head.
Frank nearly knocked the wind out of me when he tackled me and wrestled me to the ground. My brother looks skinny, but he has some power. I didn’t resist. The bank erupted in chaos. People screamed. I caught a glimpse of the other two robbers ducking out the side door. The security guard ran over and put a knee in my back.
Frank ripped the mask off my face. To his credit, he didn’t say anything. He just frowned.
“There’s a really good explanation,” I said.
“I bet there is,” Frank answered.
Before I could get that explanation out, though, Bayport’s finest were on the scene. Our town might have lousy cell phone reception, but I guess the landlines worked just fine.
I was in cuffs and out the door before I could say another word.
Frank offered some good parting advice: “Joe, don’t say anything until Dad and I get to the station.”
I nodded and gave him a behind-the-back thumbs-up.
The police cruiser was waiting at the curb. The office
rs put me in the back, slammed the door, and took off.
Now, I know Frank told me not to say anything, but I didn’t see any harm in being friendly. I’m a people person. Besides, I was just relieved the whole ordeal was over without anyone getting hurt. I figured together, we would sort this whole thing out.
So I said, “I know it sounds funny, but I am so glad to see you guys.”
They didn’t answer. No problem. For the present, I was a robbery suspect, caught in the act. Not the kind of person most cops would want to be friendly with. I wasn’t offended.
Then a thought occurred to me. “How did you guys get there so quick?” I asked. “Was there a silent alarm? Or were you just passing by?”
Unsurprisingly, they kept up the silent routine.
As we cruised down Orchard Street, my gaze shifted out the window to a familiar yellow scooter, parked in a driveway. I felt a little tingle in my chest. She was home. Janine Kornbluth, that is.
The police cruiser took the corner at Starboard and Main. We were a block from police department headquarters. I began preparing myself for booking and getting my mug shot taken. (Sadly, this was not the first time I had been inside a jail cell.) But instead we sped up.
“Hey,” I said. “You missed the turn.”
We passed the station, gathering speed. Main Street leads straight out of town and becomes State Road 17. We passed the last houses. Then there was nothing but pine trees growing tall and straight all around us.
Was I being kidnapped? I stared hard at the police officers, then noticed a detail about the hefty one behind the wheel. He had a scar on the back of his left hand—kind of a pink crescent moon. One of the guys in the bank heist had had the same scar! I should’ve noticed it sooner.
These guys weren’t the police—they were the bank robbers!
Now I realized what had happened: The gunmen must have been wearing these police uniforms under their jackets. They had rushed out of the bank, dumped their masks, jackets, and the loot, and then dashed right back in to “arrest” me. No wonder the cops had been so quick.
My ordeal wasn’t over after all.
Secret of the Red Arrow Page 1
