Nancy Clue Mysteries 3 - A Ghost in the Closet (28 page)

"Oh, you don't need to show me the way," Cherry assured her. "I'm sure now I know where I'm going."

"I bet you do, dear," Nurse Cramp smiled back. "Only I'd better show you how to operate the equipment."

"Oh, I've assisted with plenty of hydrotherapy treatments at Seattle General Hospital," Cherry assured her. She regretted her words the minute they were out of her mouth. Hadn't she told everyone she was a Hollywood Nurse?

Nurse Cramp didn't skip a beat. "Our way of doing things might be different. The pipes in this building are old; getting just the right water temperature is sometimes a tricky business. We wouldn't want our newest nurse hurting herself, now would we?"

CHAPTER 44

"Boy, Oh, Boy!"

"Do you see that?" Joe gasped in wonder as he peered through his binoculars, his mouth agape. Four burly guys stripped to the waist and glistening with sweat, large tools firmly in hand, were bent over an enormous machine spewing sparks and smoke. The boys were perched on a stone ledge overlooking the entrance to a vast cavern two-stories high and as wide as a basketball court.

"I sure do!" Frank whispered back as he trained his spyglasses on the scene below. He was agog with excitement about a discovery of his own! "Golly," he murmured as he brought his binoculars sharply into focus on a tall, clean-cut darkly handsome fellow not much older than himself. The man was clad in a simple charcoal-colored worsted wool continentalcut suit and owlish glasses, but even from this distance Frank could see the intelligent glimmer in his eyes. He was listening intently to his walkie-talkie, his handsome brow furrowing in concentration.

Frank gave a low whistle. This fellow would certainly bear watching!

"The electrical current from this generator must be what's interfering with our compass," Joe reported excitedly. "What's down here that requires that much juice?" he wondered.

"How are we going to get past these men?" Frank shivered to himself. "Why, those fellows are so manly and muscular they'll have us down on the floor in no time at all-and there's two for each one of us!"

Inch by inch, the Hardly boys surveyed the fascinating sights captured in their binoculars. Frank watched the handsome man's every move with the keen interest befitting a boy detective hard at work. Already breathless from their travels, Frank felt himself getting warmer by the minute. "Is it getting hot in here?" he asked his brother.

"It sure is!" Joe agreed. He unzipped his wet suit to the waist and fanned himself with his hand. That generator was conducting an awful lot of heat!

The darkly handsome man suddenly climbed down the stairs, spoke briefly with the four-man crew, strode purposefully across the floor and disappeared into an chasm in the cave wall.

"Let's follow him," Frank urged. "I'll toss a smoke bomb to the far side of the generator to create a diversion. They'll think it's coming from the equipment and won't be unduly alerted." Frank's scheme proved victorious and soon the boys found themselves creeping down a tunnel lit by flickering electric bulbs set high up on the wall. "Lucky for us, they're having electrical problems," Frank whispered, "The dim lighting makes it easier to hide."

The boys spotted two men clad in white laboratory coats coming their way. The men however were too engrossed in their clipboards to notice two boys in rubber suits quickly jump behind a metal cabinet. "Those men look very smart," Frank whispered to Joe.

"I bet they're math teachers," Joe replied. Frank nodded. He had expected to find some Russian agents and his parents blindfolded and tied to chairs, but it looked as if they had stumbled onto something really queer!

CHAPTER 45

What Goes Up Must
Come Down

"Give me a blow-by-blow," Joe directed. "What do you see?"

Frank was standing on his brother's shoulders, peering through the transom in a windowless metal door. "It's a long room with man-sized tubular metal cylinders stacked horizontally," Frank reported. "There are all sorts of chains and hooks hanging from the rocky ceiling. It must be a pulley system to move these things. But why? What are the cylinders used for? Joe, stop wobbling," Frank ordered curtly. He could see the shadowy figure of two men amid the columns and he wanted to get a closer look.

"I'm trying to get comfortable," Joe grumbled. "Frank, you're going to have to cut back on your wiener consumption. You weigh a ton!" He gave a little cry as he lost his footing, and Frank came crashing down on his head. Luckily neither lad was injured, but they had attracted some unwanted attention. They could hear footsteps on the other side of the door. Someone was headed their way!

Without a moment to lose, the boys snatched up some sharp rocks and held them ready. The door flew open and two men strode out. Joe struck first, beaning a man clad in blue mechanic's overalls on the noggin. The man went down without a fight. Then Frank raised his rock, but froze when he realized his foe was none other than the handsome man they had been following. A look of alarm, then a flicker of recognition passed through the man's soft gray eyes. Frank flushed under his intense gaze. The boy went weak at the knees when he saw the little smile gathering at the corners of the man's plump yet manly lips.

Without a moment's hesitation, Joe stepped forward and clunked the handsome man on the back of the head. "Ooh!" the man moaned as he fell right into Frank's arms.

"That's funny," Frank thought as his stomach did flip-flops. "He's the one who took it from behind, but I'm the one seeing stars!"

"Quick, Frank," Joe ordered. "Drop that guy, strip off his outfit and get into it. This is our chance to move about this place freely." Frank lost no time following Joe's orders, starting with the man's trousers.

Once costumed, the Hardly boys trussed up the unconscious naked men, dragged them into the room with the metal cylinders and deposited them among the tubes. Upon closer inspection, Frank realized that each cylinder had a small hatch and a circuit board with wires attached to its shaft. "These look familiar," Frank thought.

"Let's go," Joe urged impatiently.

Frank paused to loosen the prisoners' gags. Then he gently slipped the handsome man's glasses onto his face.

"Frank, stop fussing," Joe demanded.

"I don't want them to suffocate. Besides, he'll need his glasses when he wakes up," Frank explained.

"So he can see clearly when he comes after us?" Joe snapped. "Do you think they gave us one minute's thought when they kidnapped our parents?"

Frank remembered the look in the man's face before the blow. He gulped. He had captured a lot of fellows in his day, but this time he felt none of his usual pleasure. There had been a look in the man's eyes-one that Frank just couldn't forget. "Who knows," Frank murmured as he gazed at the handsome unconscious man. "Under different circumstances, in a world where all men are free, we could have been chums."

"Frank, what is wrong with you today?" Joe demanded to know. "First you act all peevish about Father being a girl, and now you're mooning over this Russian guy. I don't know who you are anymore," he cried in exasperation. "That fall through the closet floor must have loosened a few wires in your brain."

Something clicked in Frank's head. "Mooning-wires-?

"Oh, Joe, that's it! Now I know what this place is! We've stumbled upon a secret Russian moon-missile launching laboratory!" he cried excitedly. "These cylinders with the wires attached-they're Russian rocket bodies, and those men in the white coats are Russian rocket scientists!"

"That's right, Frank. These people are the enemy," Joe reminded his brother.

Frank nodded. He had come to his senses. "Let's get them," he cried, balling up his fists. "And when we do, why-"

"Why, they won't need rockets-we'll send them into orbit!" Joe promised.

CHAPTER 46

To the Moon!

"This proves my theory to the letter," Frank scribbled on the clipboard in his hands. He and Joe were striding manfully through the middle of enemy territory in their Russian agent disguises. All around them, men were hard at work: hunched over tables drawing rocket diagrams, heating chemicals in beakers, working with electronic gizmos, welding sheets of aluminum. So far, no one had even glanced at the two lads, who were furtively writing their communiques instead of talking, so as not to give away their true nationality.

"What do you think that low roar in the distance is?" Joe penned.

"Wind tunnel," was Frank's guess. NASA had a wind tunnel the size of a city block where they tested the wind-resistance factors of all their missiles. No doubt there was one here, too. From what the boys could see, this was a fully operational space experimentation center.

Frank and Joe's mouths dropped open when they peered through a doorway and saw in the distance a full-sized model of a rocket ship, poised as if for takeoff. Joe whistled softly when he saw the acronym NASA painted on its side.

"They stole this stuff from us!" Joe scribbled hurriedly. Frank nodded. There was a very big leak at the National Space and Aeronautics Agency! Only then did Frank begin to fully understand the gravity of their situation. Not only were their parents' lives in danger, but the fate of the Space Race was in the Hardly boys' hands!

Joe elbowed Frank and pointed to a machine much like a giant cocktail shaker. Inside the huge plastic canister, two men in helmets and thickly padded suits were trying unsuccessfully to keep their footing while the machine rolled them about. A few yards away, a man was strapped in a chair attached to a long metal arm rotating faster and faster around a sphere until the centrifugal force flattened the man's features into one big blob.

"G-force test," Frank scribbled. He wondered how the Russians had found this spot in the first place, and how they had managed to infiltrate it without alerting any of the local citizenry. But before he could mention it to Joe, a glass-walled room at the far end of the laboratory caught his attention. Frank blinked and rubbed his eyes. For a minute, he thought he had seen a bunch of poodles floating in thin air! When he took a closer look, he gasped.

"Look, Joe, it's an anti-gravity chamber filled with dogs!" Frank scribbled. Joe looked up. Like buoys in an ocean, dozens of small fuzzy poodles were floating about unfettered, their rhinestone collars twinkling like stars. The mournful-looking animals were falling head over paws, bumping into one another like lost atoms.

Now Frank knew for certain who was behind the rash of dognappings in Illinois. His eyes filled with tears as he thought of Laika, the last dog the Russians had sent into space. She never came back!

"The Russians do want our top dogs for their space launches!" Frank cried, momentarily forgetting to keep his voice down. "Uh, oh," he then gulped. Everyone was staring at the two lads.

"Run for it, Frank!" Joe gasped. The boys threw down their clipboards and hotfooted it out of the room. Each knew what the other was thinking. It was worse than they could have imagined! If the Russians were willing to test gravity on poodles, what were they doing to their parents?