“Okay, okay,” Frank said. “It just seems to me that he had a motive to try to get rid of Montreux, just like you.”
“What motive?”
Frank steered them back toward the van. “He seems pretty happy to be the new facility director. Maybe he wanted Montreux’s job all along.”
“He was disappointed when she was named director, I know that,” Victoria said. “But not as disappointed as some other people.”
“Like who?”
Victoria sighed. “After what’s happened to me, I don’t want to say anything bad about anyone else.”
“Name names,” Frank said. “I’ve got a metal file that makes it look like you rigged the rope to break. That kid could’ve been killed.”
Victoria stopped. “Frank, you’ve got to believe me. I would never do anything like that!”
“Who would?”
“William Moubray,” Victoria whispered. “He hates Montreux.”
“That’s a strong word.”
“She ignores the archers,” Victoria said. “She barely considers it a sport. Believe me, Moubray’s a nice guy, but he does not like Montreux at all.”
They were back at the van. “I’ll look into it,” Frank said.
“Thanks.” Victoria disappeared into the darkness.
Frank got out his keys but realized he’d left the van door unlocked when he went on the walk with Victoria. He climbed in, thinking over all the details of the case.
He gunned the van’s engine and pulled out of the parking lot. If Sokal wanted to be director of the training center, then it made sense that he and Victoria would set things up to make Montreux look bad. But if Victoria was innocent, as she claimed, who was Sokal’s accomplice? Was it Moubray?
And what about Sokal? His mission had already been accomplished. He was the new facility director, so there was no longer any reason for him to sabotage Jake Targan’s hotplate and cause a fire. That would only be counterproductive.
A light snow began to fall, the delicate flakes sticking to the windshield. Awesome, Frank thought. A good snow that night would add to the pack the snow machines had put down already. He and William might even be able to blaze their own trails through the woods.
Frank switched on the wipers and glanced in the rearview mirror. What he saw made his heart jump in terror.
A man in a black ski mask was crouching behind his seat, red-rimmed eyes coldly staring back at Frank in the mirror.
10 Hospital Horror
* * *
The man in the ski mask leaned forward, placing a gloved hand firmly around Frank’s throat. “Listen to me, and listen good,” he whispered hoarsely. “It’s over. Victoria Huntington’s the one. You caught her, now leave it alone!”
“Let go of me, punk!” Frank said. He threw his right arm back and connected with hard cheekbone.
“Ahhgg!” The man tightened his grip on Frank’s throat.
A burning pain made Frank twist in his seat. The van swerved on the slick road, headlights catching the houses along the quiet street.
Frank pushed back at the guy with his right hand while steering with his left. The van swerved back the other way, going up on three wheels, then jolted to a stop against the opposite curb.
Frank lurched against the steering wheel. The masked man tumbled forward between the front seats.
Recovering, Frank clawed at the door handle. The door popped open, and he rolled out onto the street.
His attacker followed, leaping nimbly from the van.
* * *
Joe sat up in his hospital bed eating a bowl of orange Jell-O. Callie and Iola had left before dinner. Mrs. Hardy had stayed most of the afternoon and evening but finally left, promising to return in the morning.
After finishing his food, Joe reclined the bed, clicked off the TV with the remote, and reached over to switch off the lights.
The room was nice and dark. A row of tiny LED lights scaled the IV dispenser like a glow-in-the-dark centipede. Dull red lights on the bedside monitor registered his pulse.
He tried sleeping on his side, but that was too painful. Rolling over on his back, he sank his head into the pillow and closed his eyes. It had been a long day.
He drifted off, thinking of nothing for a long, long time.
Then he had a dream. At least he thought it was a dream. He was swimming. The water was warm, but he needed to come up for air. The water was very deep, so deep no light broke through. He was in total darkness.
He needed air. Kicking his legs and pulling at the warm water with his hands, Joe struggled to make it through the dark to the surface and the light.
Then he knew he was awake. He was awake, but he couldn’t breathe. His lungs burned. Something, a pillow, was being pressed down on his face.
Joe yanked at it with his hands. It didn’t budge, and even more terrifying, he felt a pair of strong hands holding the pillow down.
He kicked wildly, tried to yell. No sound came out. Still the pillow smashed into him, crushing his nose, his eyes, filling his mouth.
He felt himself losing consciousness. In desperation, he reached behind the bed. Clawing at the wall, he found the emergency call button and pressed.
The weight disappeared. Joe ripped the pillow off his face.
A shadowy figure ran from the room, bowling over a nurse as she opened the door.
Joe lay back in the bed, gasping for breath. “No false alarm this time,” he said to the nurse.
She stared at him, stunned.
* * *
Frank sprang up from the ground, expecting the guy in the mask to come right at him. His attacker hit the pavement lightly and paused as if trying to decide what to do.
Frank threw a spinning back kick. Coming around, he waited for the jolt of contact when his heel hit its mark. It didn’t come. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his opponent duck neatly under the blow.
Frank remembered to hold his hands high: the finish of a spinning kick always left you open for a straight right.
He needn’t have worried. The man had taken off, sprinting up the street across front lawns so he’d be out of the streetlights.
Frank wasn’t about to let this coward escape. If he didn’t want to stay to fight, Frank would take the fight to him.
At top speed, he dashed after the guy.
They crossed three lawns, leaping hedges like high hurdlers. Closing in on a picket fence, Frank’s prey jumped too early. Frank watched as the guy tried to extend his lead leg over the pointed boards. His toe caught, and he flopped headlong into the next yard, skidding on the snow-slicked grass.
Frank dove. Clearing the fence with ease, he landed right on top of the guy in the mask. With one burly arm, the guy threw Frank off.
Watch yourself, Frank thought as he rolled to his feet. You don’t want to get too close and get into a wrestling match with someone this strong.
The two opponents faced each other on the snowy lawn. “Take off your mask, mystery man,” Frank said. “Or are you so ugly I’d fall over dead when I see you?”
The guy just shook his head. He lunged at Frank, trying for the judo hold that could finish Frank in mere seconds.
Frank stood up straight, waiting. A split second before his attacker made contact, Frank lifted his right leg and swung it in a high, half-moon arc. The outside of his shoe cracked into the side of the man’s face.
The guy crumpled at Frank’s feet.
Blue and red lights illuminated the snow. Frank glanced over to see a police cruiser skid to a stop at the curb.
An amplified voice boomed, “Freeze, Bayport police!” Two officers jumped from the car.
Frank bent down to remove the man’s ski mask. The two officers were on him, shouting, “I told you to freeze, kid!”
Frank went down, tackled by the cops. They rolled across the new snow. He didn’t give the officers any resistance. “It’s Frank Hardy!” he shouted.
Frank felt himself being lifted to his feet. He held up his hands, making i
t clear he wasn’t a threat. He scanned the ground, but the guy in the mask was already up and gone.
“Frank?” It was the Hardys’ friend on the Bayport police force, Con Riley.
“The guy on the ground attacked me,” Frank said.
The other officer took off, following the tracks in the snow.
“Sorry, Frank,” Riley said. “We got a call from one of these houses. They said some guy was getting chased. When we pulled up, I thought you were some criminal about to seriously hurt that guy.”
“He hid in my van,” Frank said, pointing up the street where the van sat, still idling against the curb.
The other officer returned, out of breath. “Lost him,” he said. “Lost his prints in the woods back there.”
“Oh, man,” Riley said. “I guess we let him get away.”
“I wanted to get his mask off,” Frank said, “to see who he was.”
Con and the other officer walked Frank to his van. “Try to stay out of trouble, Frank,” Con said. “If you have another run-in with that character, give us a call. Meanwhile, we’ll drive around the neighborhood in case he comes out of the woods.”
“You know I always call when I’m in trouble,” Frank said with a smile. “That is, when there’s time.”
“Which there never seems to be,” Con said. “How convenient.”
Frank waved goodbye and drove off. Instead of going home, he figured he should head to the hospital to check in with Joe. It was late, but he figured he could talk his way past the nurses for a visit.
To Frank’s surprise, he had no trouble getting in to see his brother. In fact, the nurses seemed relieved to see him when he stepped off the elevator on Joe’s floor.
The first thing he noticed was the police officer standing outside Joe’s room. The guy was big, so big that he looked stuffed into the bullet-proof vest under his uniform shirt.
Then, as he got closer, Frank spotted his mother behind the cop. She was talking and moving her hands a lot, something Frank knew she did when she was upset, which was pretty rare.
When he approached, Frank heard the end of their conversation.
“Just don’t feel that I can go home, now,” Laura Hardy was saying.
“Believe me,” the cop said. “Your son will be safe now. I’ll be here until the shift change in the morning.”
“Oh, Frank!” Mrs. Hardy said as Frank came up. “You’re safe. I’ve been calling everywhere.”
“I’m fine, Mom,” Frank said, giving her a hug to reassure her. “Why the guard for Joe?”
“He had a visitor,” the officer said. “An unwelcome visitor.”
“It’s awful,” Laura Hardy said. “Joe seems okay though. He keeps telling me to go home.”
Frank could tell his mom was working hard to keep her composure. She almost never lost it like this.
Frank went into the room. He found Joe watching the tube and sucking down a large milkshake.
“What flavor?” Frank asked.
Joe took one last slurp and then gave the barrel-size cup a satisfied look. “Chocolate, what else?”
“I should’ve guessed.”
“Hey, did Mom tell you what happened?”
“No,” Frank said. “But she looks pretty upset. What did you do?” he teased.
“What did I do?” Joe said. “I almost managed to get myself suffocated by an untamed killer pillow.”
“No way!”
“Absolutely, man. I wake up with some fool trying to make me eat this thing,” Joe said, holding up his pillow.
“Did you see who it was?” Frank asked.
Joe shook his head. “The lights were out, and I was just trying to get some air in my lungs.”
He told Frank how the emergency call button had saved him. “Whoever it was ran over the nurse like a fullback, but she didn’t get a good look at him either.”
Frank, careful to be sure his mother was still outside the room, related his story to Joe.
“At least now we can be sure it’s two people,” Joe said. “While I was munching pillow stuffing, you were fighting some guy all the way across town.”
“And it means Victoria probably isn’t involved,” Frank said. “Unless…”
“Unless what?”
“Unless she asked me to go for a walk so the guy in the mask could sneak into the van and wait for me to get back.”
“You mean we’ve got three criminals?”
Frank put his hand to his chin. “It’s possible. The guy who attacked me was definitely a judo expert. Who do we know who fits that description?”
“Allen Frierson,” Joe said. “And Coach Sokal and—”
“But I still don’t get it,” Frank said, interrupting. “Sokal is director now. If things go wrong at the center, he gets kicked out, just like Montreux.”
“So it’s not Sokal,” Joe said. “It could be Frierson or anyone on the judo team.”
Frank stared at the floor, thinking.
“We still don’t trust Moubray,” Joe said. “Are you sure he’s not involved?”
“No, I’m not,” Frank said. “Apparently he hates Montreux as much as anybody.”
After telling Joe good night, Frank convinced their mom to go home. Joe would be safe with that great bear of a cop looking out for him.
* * *
The next morning was Sunday. Frank got up early and peered out his bedroom window.
“Excellent!” he said. At least four inches of fresh snow had fallen during the night—nice light powder, perfect for skiing.
He packed up his skis and drove to the athletes’ dorm. Inside the building, he stomped the snow from his boots and clapped his gloved hands together to warm them.
The second floor was quiet. Only a slight smoky smell remained to remind Frank of what had happened the evening before.
He went to room 206 and knocked on the door. No answer. He peered under the door. No light. It was almost as if no one was around. He knocked again, louder.
Still, no answer.
A door opened down the hall. Frank turned. Jake Targan came out of his room, skis in his hand, and a target rifle slung over his shoulder.
Frank felt his hands go clammy with sweat. Targan was certainly a judo expert. He could have attacked Frank the previous night.
Targan walked toward Frank, unslinging the rifle as he did.
Frank squared his shoulders to face Jake.
“Looking for William?” Targan asked.
“Yes,” Frank said.
“He’s not in, obviously,” Targan said.
Frank expected Jake to level the rifle at him any second. Targan stopped a few feet away and swung the rifle around, offering the stock end to Frank.
“Here,” he said. “Moubray’s waiting for us at the trail. He asked me to give this to you.”
Frank took the rifle. “What for?”
“He said you’d need it,” Targan replied.
11 Cross-Country Combat
* * *
“I hope he meant I’ll need it for target shooting,” Frank said.
Targan smiled. He handed Frank a box of .22 caliber pellets and a cartridge of carbon dioxide for the air rifle. “The way things have been going, you never know.”
“I’m not late, am I?” Frank asked. “Is that why Moubray took off already?”
“No. Right on time,” Jake replied. “William seemed to be in a big hurry when I saw him this morning. He got some kind of phone call, but I don’t know what was up. This is all he talked about last night, though, so I’m sure we’ll catch up to him on the trail.”
Frank checked the safety on the gun and swung it over his shoulder. “I didn’t know you were into the biathlon, too,” he said.
“I’m not,” Jake replied. “I don’t shoot, but I love to ski. You don’t mind if I go along, do you?”
“Of course not.”
Once outside, Jake pulled on a red candy-striped stocking cap. “It’s cold, man. That’s the only thing I don’t like about skiing
. You can’t do it in the summer.”
“This isn’t cold,” Frank said. “Wait until January. Now, that’s cold.”
Targan slid his skis into the back of the van, and Frank drove inland from the bay toward the only mountains close to Bayport. They weren’t mountains, really. More like long, sloping hills. But with good snow, the miles of trails made for fun skiing. Down-hillers had to pay for lift tickets at the lodge. Cross-country enthusiasts merely entered the park area and drove to the lot next to the trail head.
They entered on a narrow gravel road. The snow had made the city streets slick. Here, though, the tires grabbed well on the snow-covered rocks and dirt.
No one was in the little information hut at the park entrance so early on a Sunday morning, so Frank drove on through the raised wooden gate.
“There’s William’s car,” Jake said, pointing to a silver hatchback.
“It’s the only other car in the lot,” Frank observed. “He shouldn’t be too hard to find.”
Frank maneuvered the van next to Moubray’s car. He and Jake jumped out.
“William!” Frank shouted. “William!”
No one answered.
“Maybe he’s warming up,” Targan said. “As competitive as he is, I bet he wants to ski us both into the ground.”
“Let him try,” Frank said, grinning. He opened the back doors of the van and unloaded their skis. Within a few minutes they were both locked into the bindings of the long, narrow cross-country runners.
Frank hoisted the rifle over his shoulder. He then stabbed his poles into the ground and slid the skis back and forth. His bindings were working nicely.
“Ready?” Targan asked, pulling yellow-tinted goggles over his eyes.
In answer, Frank took off. He strode forward, his legs slightly bent at the knee. His arms and legs soon fell into a smooth rhythm. He glided over the snow, arms swinging like pendulums and legs pushing, then recovering.
They reached the wooden sign at the end of the parking lot. It read, Bay Ridge Trail, 12.5 Miles.
Training for Trouble Page 7
