The Chase for the Mystery Twister (11 page)

Joe returned the pry bar to the tool chest. Hearing voices outside the truck, he ducked down behind the wood chipper. He recognized the first voice as Hal Kanner's. “See anyone in there?”

“No,” the other man replied. Joe wondered why Phil hadn't warned him. Maybe he had slipped away to get help.

“Help me load this on,” Kanner said.

Joe heard the two men groan as they hefted something onto the back of the truck. Joe peeked around the wood chipper. An oblong object wrapped in a plastic tarp had been loaded into the truck.

“No way you can push that check through?” Kanner asked.

“United Insurers put a stop-payment order on it, so no bank will give us cash for it,” the other man said. “And United won't let me issue you another check until there's a complete investigation.”

“I'll bet money it's because of those nosy kids,” Kanner snarled.

“Let's cut bait and clear out,” the other man ordered. “Empty the Tamco account and head south for the border.”

“Give up one point seven million dollars?” Kanner griped. “Are you crazy, Alvin?”

Alvin, Joe thought. It's Alvin Bixby!

“I'd rather have the half million from Tamco
and be a free man than be a millionaire in prison,” Bixby argued. “Grab that crate. We'll put it in my car.”

“What about the equipment?” Kanner asked.

“We can't save it this time,” Bixby replied. “I'll follow you out to the Brafford Quarry. We'll send the truck and the whole shebang over the edge and into the basin.”

Joe heard the two men dragging the crate with the Ming vase and painting off the back of the truck. A chance to escape, he thought.

Moving cautiously from his hiding spot, Joe was alarmed to hear the hydraulic door being activated. It was closing.

Joe rushed forward and was about to leap through the opening when he heard a moan. It was coming from inside the plastic tarp.

“Phil?” Joe called.

“Yeah,” his friend answered groggily.

Joe knew he couldn't pull Phil out in time. He refused to leave his friend behind.

Joe watched as the rear door closed with an echoing bang, throwing them into darkness.

Frank pressed the Stop button on the editing machine in room 136 at the Oklahoma Tech Computer Center.

Diana sighed loudly. “Do you want to watch it again?”

“How many times will this be?” Frank asked.

“Number twenty-five,” Diana replied.

“Phil would know exactly what to look for,” Frank lamented, checking his watch. “It's five-thirty. Where are they?”

“Wherever Phil and Joe are, I'll bet they're having more fun than we are,” Diana remarked. “Frank, we're in a lot of trouble. If we can't prove this is a fake, Glover can have us arrested for stealing it.”

Frank nodded and gave a sigh. “We might as
well keep running the tape until they get here,” he suggested. “Glover kept watching the same two seconds of tape over and over again.”

Frank found the spot in the mystery twister tape, and he and Diana watched it frame by frame.

“Something's not quite right,” Frank remarked.

“What do you mean?” Diana asked.

“My brain knows something's wrong with this picture, but my eye can't find it,” Frank replied, backing up the tape frame by frame. “That's it!” he exclaimed.

“What?” Diana asked.

Frank pointed to a tiny object on the screen. It was on the roof of the Kanner farmhouse, barely visible.

“The weather vane?” Diana wondered.

“Keep your eye on it while I run this section again,” Frank told her.

Frank pressed Play. The mystery twister hit the side of the house, tearing away one wall. It stalled a moment, then rotated in a clockwise direction. Frank paused the tape.

“It never moved!” Diana exclaimed.

“Bingo!” Frank said. “Two-hundred-mile-an-hour winds spinning in two different directions, and the weather vane never moved.”

“We got 'em!” Diana shouted, giving Frank a high five.

“Now my biggest concern is Phil and Joe,” Frank said.

“Maybe they're just running late,” Diana offered.

“Joe knows better,” Frank told her. “In detective work,
late
means
trouble.
Let's check back at Windstormer headquarters, see if they've heard anything.”

“Then we'd better get Sheriff San Dimas this videotape,” Diana added.

• • •

Frank was surprised to see Greg Glover's monster truck and San Dimas's squad car parked in front of Windstormer headquarters. “Looks like we're having a party,” Frank tried to joke.

“Have you heard from my brother or—” Frank began to ask, walking into Jansen's office.

“Look who's here,” Glover huffed. He and San Dimas were standing beside Jansen.

“Did you steal the twister tape from Mr. Glover?” Jansen asked.

“Yes, we did,” Frank admitted. “And we apologize.”

“That's not good enough.” Glover sneered.

“Neither is this,” Frank replied, holding up the video cassette. “It's a fake.”

Frank ran the tape on a VCR in the Windstormer control room, pointing out the telltale weather vane that never moved. All eyes fell on Glover.

“I guess it's my turn to apologize,” Glover
said, bowing his head. “I shouldn't have accepted the authenticity of the tape so quickly.”

“Are you saying you didn't create it yourself?” Diana challenged.

“No, I did not. It was brought to Glover Laboratories by a man with curly black hair and a mustache,” Glover explained.

“The mystery man,” Frank said.

“Not anymore,” San Dimas said. “The lab in Tulsa found strands of blond hair in the black wig.”

“Kanner had brown hair,” Diana said, shaking her head, disappointed.

“But Toby Gill was blond!” Frank said, recalling the photo they had seen in his office.

“This strand of hair wasn't just blond, it was
dyed
blond, with brown roots,” San Dimas explained. “I cut Toby Gill's hair once, and I remember—he had blond hair but brown roots.”

“So it was Toby Gill who created the fake tape and gave it to Mr. Glover,” Frank deduced.

“Only he used the name Miller,” Glover told them.

“Sounds like a man of many faces,” Jansen said.

“And names,” Frank added. “Miller is the name of the man who swindled Henry Low River.”

“I've dropped all charges against Henry,” San Dimas told Frank. “He's gone home with his grandson.”

“Good,” Jansen said. “Maybe now we can get back to the business of chasing tornadoes.”

“Not yet,” Frank said. “Phil and my brother are missing.”

The phone in the control room rang. “This could be them now,” Jansen said as he lifted the receiver. “Hello?  . . . No, but Frank is.”

Jansen offered Frank the phone.

“Is it them?” Frank asked.

“It's your father,” Jansen replied.

Frank slowly put the receiver to his ear. “Dad?”

Frank listened as Fenton Hardy covered all the facts he had dug up at Joe's request. “Five years ago Hal Kanner received two hundred twenty thousand dollars in an insurance payment on a collection of Tiffany lamps he lost in a tornado in New Mexico.”

“New Mexico?” Frank repeated, then covered the phone to tell Jansen. “I think I've solved the riddle of the first mystery twister.”

“The insurance company was Southwest Home and Auto, and the representative handling the case was—”

“Alvin Bixby?” Frank guessed.

“On the nose, son,” Fenton said. “We came up empty on the name Todd Allan Miller, but judging by the details of the scams Joe described, my colleague in Dallas said it sounded like a lifetime con man whose real name is Dutch Wise. He changes names like a jockey changes shirts and
has been involved in insurance and real estate scams from Missouri to Texas.”

“Sounds like our man, Dad,” Frank told him.

“And tell Joe that Tamco is the name of a dummy company in Lone Wolf,” Mr. Hardy added. “In short, it's a post office box and a bank account.”

“I would like to tell Joe that,” Frank replied. “But right now we don't know where Joe is.”

• • •

Joe banged his fist on the rear door of the truck, hoping someone might hear him. But the metal door was thick and solid, and Joe figured the highway noise outside would drown out any sound he could make.

Phil was sitting up, recovering from the blow to the head Kanner had dealt him after sneaking up on him in the cab of the truck. He held a penlight, illuminating the trailer slightly.

“Sorry, Joe,” Phil said. “Next time maybe you should be the lookout.”

Joe smiled, covering his concern that there might not be a next time for Phil and him. Joe felt the truck shudder, and the ride got bumpy. “We're off the main highway, Phil. Maybe even on a dirt road,” Joe reported. “Can you work any Phil Cohen magic on this door?”

Phil shook his head. “The hydraulic cables run under the truck. Basically, we need a battering ram.”

Joe looked at the nose and grille of the huge tractor. “Have you ever hot-wired a tractor?” Joe asked.

“No,” Phil replied with a half-smile. “But I'm willing to try.”

Joe held the penlight while Phil went to work. Using a number of different tools from the chest, Phil soon had the ignition switch dismantled and rewired.

“Cross your fingers, Joe,” Phil said as he touched two wires together. With a sputter and a bang, the tractor engine came to life.

Joe slapped his friend on the back, then hopped into the driver's seat. Putting the tractor in gear, he gave it full throttle. The nose of the tractor crashed against the heavy rear door with a thundering sound.

Joe backed up, and Phil moved in to check the progress. “Barely dented it.”

“I need a running start,” Joe realized. Jumping off the tractor, he and Phil began moving the snowblower, wood chipper, and other cargo to the side.

Joe backed the tractor up an extra twenty feet, then put it in gear and floored. The nose of the tractor hit the door with such impact, sunlight flashed through a crack in the top before the door bounced back into place.

“Get it up, Joe!” Phil cheered on his friend.

Joe rammed the door again and again. On the fifth try, the door gave way slightly.

“We've breached the integrity of the seal!” Phil shouted.

“What?” Joe asked.

“We've cracked the door open!” Phil clarified.

Joe saw that he needed to open the crack about another six inches in order for him and Phil to squeeze out.

Suddenly, the truck came to a stop. Joe feared that at any moment Kanner would be putting another rock on the gas pedal to send the tractor-trailer into the Brafford Quarry.

Joe backed up the tractor as far as he could, crushing the wood chipper as he backed over it. Giving it the gas one last time, Joe rammed the door with the nose of the tractor, separating it from the frame by several more inches.

Phil stuck a leg through the opening, then squeezed his body through. “Come on, Joe!” he called, standing on the rear bumper.

Joe jumped down from the tractor. The truck lurched forward, knocking him off his feet.

“Hurry!” Phil shouted.

“Go!” Joe shouted at his friend. Instead, Phil reached back through the opening, helping Joe up.

The front of the truck dipped violently. Joe squeezed through the crack, but it was too late.

The back of the truck had cleared the quarry's edge and was plummeting through space with Phil and Joe clinging to it for dear life!

Joe watched the sheer cliff of the quarry passing by in a blur. Forcing himself to look down, he saw the surface of the water coming up fast. If they stayed glued to the truck, Joe knew they would be crushed against it when it hit. “Push off!” he yelled to Phil.

Fighting the G-forces, Phil and Joe pushed away from the truck, landing hard in the water a safe distance away from the twenty-ton vehicle. The impact of the landing stunned him, and he could see a wall of water explode around the truck.

Joe fought to stay conscious, searching the surface of the water for his friend. Phil was floating facedown about fifteen feet away. Putting Phil's chin into the crook of his arm, Joe
swam toward the side of the quarry, looking for a place to get out.

The walls of the quarry were sheer rock that rose straight up out of the water. Finding no shore or rock face to climb up onto, Joe hung on to a small jut in the cliff face and floated in the water.

Phil coughed up a mouthful of water. He was still stunned by the impact, but at least he was conscious.

“How are you doing, buddy?” Joe said.

“I've been better,” Phil answered, managing a weak smile.

Scanning the hundred-foot-high rock wall that surrounded them, Joe realized they would never be able to climb out on their own.

“What's the plan,
amigo?”
Phil asked, grabbing on to the same jutting rock as Joe.

“Think good thoughts,” Joe told his friend. “And hope that we're rescued.”

• • •

“This is an all-points bulletin.” Frank spoke into the CB radio in Diana's Jeep. “We are still on the lookout for a light blue 1973 pickup truck, being driven by two males in their late teens.”

“Frank, it's Greg Glover. Still no luck. I'm going to check out Alvin Bixby's office.”

“Thanks, Mr. Glover. Over and out,” Frank replied. He put the CB microphone in its cradle with a sigh. He and Diana had been up and down
every street in Lone Wolf but had seen no sign of Joe or Phil.

“Where would they have gone?” Frank wondered aloud.

“Do you want to head over to Tulip?” Diana asked.