The Dead Season

by Franklin W. Dixon

  Joe said nothing but continued to stare at the place where Heather had been standing. He was still trying to digest what had taken place.

  "Joe? Do you hear me?"

  Still Joe said nothing.

  "Joe, for Gary and Janet's sake, we have to act now. That gunman character is a killer, and if I'm not mistaken, he has an escape planned, and we don't have a moment to spare."

  Joe Hardy turned to look at his brother and said, "Let's get him." His look was determined.

  Frank Hardy smiled and gave his brother a look that said he knew he could always count on him, no matter what.

  "This way," said Frank, and he let Joe back down the secret stairs to the cavern.

  "There's no way the gunman will leave without checking for the other jewels on Wiley Reed's boat one more time," Frank said quietly as they walked down the stairs.

  The stairs were dark, but Frank still had his penlight, and using it sparingly, the Hardys were able to navigate the dark stairs fairly quickly.

  Joe was about to say something, but Frank gestured for him to keep silent.

  Ahead of them, coming from the direction of Wiley Reed's boat, they could now hear the sound of people arguing.

  It was Heather and the Ghost Gunman.

  As they listened to the argument, the Hardys made their way toward the boat.

  "I don't understand what you're saying," pleaded Heather. "We had a deal."

  "The same deal your grandfather gave mine, right?" snapped the gunman. "Look at this. Don't you see what it means?"

  "No," sobbed Heather, sounding afraid.

  The Hardys rounded the corner at the bottom of the stairs and sneaked a look out at the boat. There, in the light of the glowing torch, stood the gunman and Heather.

  They were about fifty feet away from the boat, and each of them was still holding a gun.

  The gunman was hovering over another skeleton, a second one, that was in a crouched position clutching a gun.

  "It's only fair," said the gunman.

  "What?" asked Heather.

  "That I get to keep all the jewels."

  "Why?"

  "It's obvious that Wiley could never have operated without my grandfather's help, and Wiley betrayed him."

  "I don't see it that way," said Heather, now raising her automatic at the gunman.

  "What you see doesn't concern me anymore," said the gunman, and he slowly raised the black mask to reveal his face.

  It was Brady Jamison.

  "We had a deal!" cried Heather.

  "Look at him," said Brady, pointing at the remains of his grandfather. "Wiley Reed did that."

  He knelt beside the skeleton and lifted the gun from its bony grasp.

  "This debt has to be paid!" cried Brady as he threw the old gun at Heather.

  Catching her off guard, he swung his gun in her direction. Laughing, he pulled the trigger at point-blank range.

  Chapter 17

  The bullet grazed Heather on the arm, and she screamed and fell to the ground.

  Joe yelled an angry "No!" and charged straight at Brady, tackling him just as he squeezed off another bullet. The impact of Joe's charge caused the bullet to fly harmlessly up in the air, and the gun flew out of Brady's hand as he and Joe tumbled to the ground.

  Frank ran to retrieve the gun.

  Once again Brady would not surrender easily.

  He landed a quick jab to Joe's throat that stunned Joe momentarily, but adrenaline revived him almost instantly.

  He used his weight and strength to roll Brady over onto his back, and then Joe knocked the man out with a single blow.

  Joe slowly got to his feet and stood over Jamison. He stared at the killer for several seconds and then walked away in disgust.

  With gun in hand Frank helped Jamison to his feet and began to lead him back off the wharf toward the stairs.

  Joe approached Heather slowly.

  No matter what she had done, he still had feelings and cared for her.

  She lay on the ground, crying softly to herself. The wound in her arm was not serious. Luckily for her, Brady Jamison was not such a great shot.

  Still Joe said, "Are you okay?"

  She looked up at him, tears in her eyes, and nodded her head yes.

  "Why?" Joe asked, shaking his head.

  Heather studied him for a long time and then said, "I'm not sure anymore."

  ***

  The next morning Joe was the last one down to the dining room for breakfast.

  Frank was sitting next to Callie on one side of the big table, and across from them were Gary and Janet.

  Joe was surprised to see that Sergeant Wrenn was also there.

  "Morning," said Joe as he walked to the sideboard to pour himself a glass of orange juice.

  " Good morning," they said in unison.

  Janet got up from her chair and said, "Can I get you some eggs and bacon?"

  "Yes, please," said Joe, and Janet smiled and headed for the kitchen.

  Frank said, "Well, now that Joe's here, we can get started answering Sergeant Wrenn's questions."

  "That would be helpful," said Sergeant Wrenn.

  He took a sip of coffee and put down his cup. He reached into a shirt pocket and took out a small notebook and pen. "I'm not exactly certain where we should begin," he said. "I hope you can clarify the many confusions I have."

  "We'll try," said Frank.

  Sergeant Wrenn began, "Well, I guess we should start with what we know. Brady Jamison was the person posing as the ghost running around Runner's Harbor."

  "Yes," said Callie, "but I'm not sure why."

  "Yeah," said Gary. "All along we thought Randolph Tyler was behind our problems. Say, why didn't he buy the hotel two years ago when we did?"

  "Actually," said Frank, "he just didn't have the money. The hotel itself had less to do with what was happening than we all thought."

  "I do hope you can explain these things," said the detective, "because I'm afraid young Mr. Jamison isn't doing any talking."

  "And Heather?" asked Callie.

  The sergeant said, "We have placed her in the hospital as a precaution for her wound, though it is quite superficial. She may be willing to talk eventually, but I'm not so sure she knows all that much."

  "I suspect she knows very little," said Frank. He looked at his brother and hoped this bit of news would make things a little easier for Joe.

  Gary said, "Well, then, Frank, why is it you think the hotel didn't have so much to do with all of this? After all, Brady Jamison was pretending to be a ghost, and that hurt business."

  "The ghost routine was his cover so that he could snoop around the tunnels and hidden passageways more easily," Frank explained. "If people saw him, as they occasionally did, he wouldn't run the risk of being recognized."

  "That makes sense," said Janet, who had returned from the kitchen with a plate of food for Joe.

  "That was Brady's main goal. He wanted the jewels. I suspect that if he'd found them sooner, he'd have left here and your troubles would have ended."

  Callie looked puzzled. "How do you explain the snake in my bedroom that first night?"

  "My guess is that it happened one of two ways," said Frank. "It might have been an accident. Brady's snooping around roused the snake in the tunnels, and it could have crawled up into the room, or more likely, he did put it there to scare us away."

  "Well, it worked on me." Callie laughed a bit nervously.

  "And the piano playing?" asked Gary.

  It was Joe's turn to answer. "That was Logan," he said. "Although I have to admit, I'm not quite sure what he hoped to accomplish."

  "Yes," said Sergeant Wrenn, looking up from his notebook. "That part has puzzled me also."

  Frank smiled. "You have to remember that Earl Logan completely accepted the legend of Wiley Reed and believed to his dying moment that it was Wiley's ghost that was haunting Runner's Harbor."

  "But why play the piano? That doesn't seem to make any sense," said Janet
.

  "It does, or did, to him," said Frank. "Logan spent nearly half his life in prison just thinking about the legend of Wiley Reed and all those jewels. He was obsessed with the idea of finding the gems and being rich. He played the piano in hopes of luring Wiley's ghost out into the open. He thought the ghost would then lead him to the treasure."

  "That's sad," said Callie.

  The people at the table were silent for a moment.

  Gary said, "But how did Logan learn about Wiley and the hotel and the jewels?"

  Joe said, "He said his cellmate hardly talked about anything else."

  "Did he say who that was?" asked the sergeant.

  "No," said Joe. "He died before he answered me."

  Frank said, "Well, we can verify it later, but I'm almost certain his cellmate had to be John Jamison."

  "Brady's father," said Callie.

  Frank nodded.

  The sergeant asked, "How did Wiley get his boat in and out of the secret cave if the only entrance was through the boathouse?"

  "I'll take this one," said Frank. "It had us confused until we remembered the night of the storm and the boathouse flooding with water. Wiley couldn't take the boat in or out - except on a flood tide. He'd have to plan his trips around the tides, but it obviously worked."

  It was Joe's turn to look puzzled now. "Wait a minute," he said. "Was Logan responsible for the song I heard in my room the second night?"

  "No." said Frank. "That was Brady again."

  "But how?" asked Callie.

  Frank pulled a tiny tape recorder out of his pants pocket and set it on the table. He pressed the Play button and "Someone to Watch Over Me" began to play. "I found this in the tunnels the other night. Brady made the mistake of leaving his initials on it. He planted it in a convenient place and turned it on."

  "But why?" asked Joe.

  "So that you would see Heather and think she was Millicent," said Callie.

  "Exactly," said Frank.

  "One thing I don't get," said Callie. "If Heather and Brady were in on this together, who planted the bomb in Heather's boat?"

  "It is a good question," said Sergeant Wrenn. "Do you have the answer for that one?"

  "Actually," Frank began, "though I can't prove this, I'm certain that Heather and Brady planted it there themselves."

  "To divert suspicion away from Heather," said Joe.

  "Right," said Frank. "My theory is that they were worried that people were going to suspect that there was no ghost of Millicent Reed, that it was Heather all along, and they needed to make Heather appear to be a victim.

  "But Heather could have drowned," said Callie. "Joe saved her life."

  "Or Heather could have pretended to be drowning," said Frank. "Remember, she is an expert sailor."

  "But murder," said Janet. "I mean, it's one thing to harbor a grudge and to search for missing jewels, but to kill a man - "

  Frank said, "Brady and his family blamed the Tylers and the Reeds for every bad thing that happened to them for many generations. I think Tyler unknowingly crossed Brady one time too many, and Brady just shot him. We're not dealing with a rational man here."

  "And the radio-controlled gunshot from the tree that almost killed you, Frank?" asked Gary. "That was Brady, too?"

  "I can answer that one," said the detective. "My men were able to trace the mechanism to a small shop in the city, and the owner has already identified Mr. Jamison as the purchaser. No matter what happens in the Tyler case, we'll be able to convict him of the attempted murder of Mr. Hardy."

  Janet said, "So all of this goes back sixty years or more. I'm confused about one point. If Brady could disappear from the pavilion, he must have escaped down a secret staircase. But he never knew about the cavern until last night, so he didn't go down those stairs. Is there another set of stairs from the pavilion to the tunnels?"

  "You're right," said Frank. "There are two trap doors in the pavilion - one leading to the tunnels, the other to the cavern. When he found the one to the tunnels, he probably didn't look farther. He just assumed there'd be only one." He reached into his pocket then and pulled out a small leather pouch. "I almost forgot the best part."

  "What's that?" asked Callie.

  "I went back to Wiley's boat early this morning, snooped around, and found this in a small chest."

  Frank poured the contents of the pouch onto the table. It was the jewels from the portrait on the landing and others besides.

  "Millicent's diamonds!" exclaimed Janet.

  "Yes, and I believe they belong to you and Gary," said Frank. He turned to the detective. "Am I right?"

  "Yes. They own the property."

  Frank said, "Now you can afford to fix up the hotel."

  "But we've lost our license," said Gary, suddenly changing his expression.

  "Actually," said Sergeant Wrenn, "I believe I can intercede on your behalf with the Tourist Bureau."

  "Would you?" asked Janet.

  "It would be my pleasure."

  "Well," said Gary, looking at Frank and Joe, "I guess that this wraps it all up. How can we ever thank you?"

  "Just point us in the direction of the beach," said Joe.

  The telephone rang as they were getting up, and Janet answered it.

  "Frank, it's for you. It's your father."

  Frank took the receiver, said hello to his father, and listened for more than a minute. He nodded his head several times and smiled, repeating, "Uh - huh, uh - huh - "

  "Goodbye, Dad," Frank said, finally, rolling his eyes as he put down the phone.

  "What was that all about?" asked Joe, a little warily.

  "Vacation's over," said Frank. "Dad needs us at home tonight to help him on a new case. We're going back to work!"

  The End.

  Frank and Joe's next case:

  Chet's borrowed Corvette has been hot-wired, and Chet is steamed. But when he tries to nab the crooks, he gets nabbed instead. Frank and Joe put the pedal to the metal in pursuit of Chet's kidnappers.

  The brothers go undercover to get the drop on a chop-shop ring - and find themselves riding with some pretty fast company. The hot Caddys, Camaros, and Corvettes are burning up the road, putting the Hardys on a crash course with danger. If they don't hit the curves just right, they'll be eating the car thieves' dust.. in Running on Empty, Case #36 in The Hardy Boys Casefiles®.