The Flickering Torch Mystery (16 page)

“Why not?” one of the boys said. “Hop on!”

Chet and Joe got on the back seats and the four sped toward Marlin Crag. On the way, the Bay-porters gave their rescuers a quick explanation of what the chase was all about.

A short time later Fenton Hardy watched the delivery van drive into the airfield and head for a small plane far out on the runway.

The van stopped and the driver and his two companions leaped out. Hurriedly they opened the doors, and transferred three mummy-like bodies on stretchers to the aircraft. The pilot and another man emerged from the plane and gave them a hand.

Sensing trouble, Mr. Hardy jumped into his car and raced toward the runway. The engine of the plane started with a roar. The backwash of the propeller threw up a cloud of dust. The craft began to move while the detective was still twenty yards away.

Suddenly two motorcycles whizzed past him in a furious staccato of noise and came abreast of the taxiing airplane, one on each side. Two figures jumped off the back seats and grabbed the tail. The plane was so heavily loaded that the pilot had had trouble gathering speed, and the action slowed the craft down.

Quickly Mr. Hardy drove up to the front and cut across the plane's path, compelling it to stop.

Nettleton glared furiously out the window as the two Hardys gathered next to the cockpit door. Zinn, who sat beside him, shook his fist. Behind them appeared the faces of Bozar, Weber, and Cain. All were fuming.

The commotion had alerted the airport police. They rushed up in two patrol cars and surrounded the plane. “Come out with your hands up!” an officer shouted through a bullhorn. Minutes later the five criminals were handcuffed and led to a squad car.

Two officers entered the plane and brought out the three stretchers. Joe and his father quickly ripped the tarps away from the bodies and revealed Frank, Lefty, and Seymour. They were breathing heavily.

“We'll need an ambulance,” one of the policemen said. “Jack, go call—”

“Wait,” Fenton Hardy interrupted. “This may look worse than it is.”

He bent over Frank, who blinked his eyes and sat up. “Wow!” he muttered. “I thought I'd wake up in the briny deep!”

Seymour and Lefty also regained consciousness after two of the policemen had administered first aid.

Mr. Hardly quickly clued in the officer in charge, and told him that the State Police were working on the case.

“Good. We'll take the prisoners right down there,” the officer said.

“We'll follow in my car,” Mr. Hardy suggested.

Joe and Chet thanked their motorcycle friends, who had thoroughly enjoyed the chase. “It was a pleasure,” they assured the boys and rode off with big grins on their faces.

Lieutenant Cook had sandwiches and coffee waiting for everyone at his office, and the Hardys, Chet, Seymour, and Lefty hungrily devoured the food while piecing together the latest events.

A trooper fingerprinted the prisoners, advised them of their rights, and brought them in.

“They wanted to get rid of us,” Frank said, pointing to the quintet, “because we knew too much about the airport thefts they had going, especially the uranium isotopes.”

Lefty shuddered. “That night in Newark I meant to tell you Zinn was the top guy in the gang, working through the Midatlantic Distribution Corporation. As assistant airport manager, he could keep tabs on what shipments were coming in.”

“And he had his pilots fly without vacuum pumps whenever they transported isotopes. That's why Scott and Martin crashed when the weather was bad,” Frank deduced. “And he removed the telltale isotopes before the wrecks were investigated.”

“When Zinn learned we were searching for information about the crashes,” Joe added, “he knew he had to get us out of the way.”

“Sure,” Chet put in. “He spied on us in Holmes's office, heard that we were going to Mudd‘s, and called Mudd to eliminate us.”

“Luckily he failed,” Frank said. “Even though he tried it three times.”

“What do you mean
three
times!” Zinn protested. “Only twice—the business of the crane and the airplane wing, and the junkyard truck that smashed your car.”

“Didn't Mudd sabotage the steering mechanism of our car?”

Zinn shook his head. “That must have been strictly coincidental.”

“One thing I don't understand,” Frank said, looking at Nettleton. “Why did you buzz us when we flew to Marlin Crag the first time? You didn't know us then!”

“Oh, didn't I?” Nettleton sneered. “You think we were stupid? We found out your father was on the case and kept tabs on all of you. When I saw your plane number, I knew what you were up to!”

“But you missed, and you missed again that night at the cliffs when we were looking for the engine,” Joe put in. “Also you failed in sabotaging our boat.”

“If that big-mouth trucker hadn't let you in on where he dropped the engine, we'd have been all right,” Nettleton growled. “You just can't trust people.”

“Tell me something,” Mr. Hardy said. “How do Mudd and the Flickering Torch fit into your setup?”

“Figure it out yourself,” Nettleton snapped and sullenly looked at his fingernails.

“Maybe Mudd will tell us,” Lieutenant Cook suggested, then ordered one of his men to bring in the junk dealer.

“You idiot!” Zinn hissed when he entered. “If you hadn't botched up the job two weeks ago, we wouldn't be in this mess!”

“Oh, shut up!” Mudd muttered. “You had the chance to shoot those nosy brats and what did you do? Nothing!”

Curtice Cain, meanwhile, was arguing with Weber. “I told you we should never have gotten involved with these people! Everything went well as long as they didn't know who we were!”

“Wait a minute,” Mr. Hardy said. “Who didn't know who you were?”

“These—these stupid, ignorant, amateur smugglers!” Cain fumed, pointing at Zinn and his buddies.

Now a strange story unfolded. Weber and Cain had developed a new, inexpensive process of making industrial diamonds from coal through the use of uranium isotopes. By way of the criminal underground grapevine they had learned of the freight thieves and had begun buying the illicit isotopes from them without ever meeting any of the gang in person. In their mobile lab Weber and Cain changed the structure of the coal by means of the isotopes. Then they turned the product over to an unethical manufacturer in the New York area who completed the process.

The isotopes were deposited in specially fitted lead containers in the amplifiers at the Flickering Torch and Pete Guilfoyle's barn. Weber and Cain would then pick them up at odd hours and leave the payment.

“Joe, when we went to the Flickering Torch the first time, we saw Nettleton fooling around with the amp!” Frank said. “He either made a delivery or picked up the payment!”

“No kidding!” Nettleton said sarcastically. “And if you're real smart, you'll tell me which one it was!”

“Probably both,” said Joe. “And how do you like this: Last Wednesday night you went to Guilfoyle's barn in the rain, took a container with diamonds from the amp, deposited isotopes, and left. Then Weber and Cain picked up the loot when the weather had cleared.”

Nettleton glared at Weber. “That's when you got us in trouble. Mudd told you no more rocks! I took the stuff to Morrisville and my contact refused to accept them!”

“So you brought them back and lost a couple in a bum landing,” Joe completed the thought.

Nettleton shrugged.

“How come you and Zinn let me check out your plane that day?” Frank asked. “You did transport diamonds in the tailpost!”

Nettleton grinned. “By the time you were through with my suitcase, Zinn had already removed the container.”

“Another thing I don't understand,” Frank went on, “is why you hid the diamonds in the tailpost, but the isotopes in the vacuum pump housing?”

“We couldn't take the isotopes out of the lead container, and it didn't fit in the tailpost. We therefore had to find another good hiding spot, and the vacuum pump seemed the best.”

“Who's Nick?” Joe inquired, changing the subject.

Mudd pointed his thumb at Bozar. “It's his nickname.”

“You gotta tell ‘em everything?” Bozar grumbled. “You a big believer in confessions or what?”

“Your voice seems familiar,” Mr. Hardy put in. “You called me when you caught Lefty and told me to lay off, didn't you?”

Bozar did not answer.

Frank turned to Lefty. “It was Zinn's heavies who waylaid you in Newark. How did you ever wind up with Weber?”

“I was taken to the Midatlantic warehouse in Beemerville. They kept me there tied up until the van came in,” Lefty replied. “Then this guy” —he pointed to Weber—“gave me a shot in the arm and I don't remember anything from that moment on.”

“Which brings us to the last link in the case,” Lieutenant Cook said, looking from Zinn to Weber. “How did you two ever get together?”

“It was a mistake,” Weber said resignedly. “We knew that the Hardys were working on the freight case, and should have stayed as far away from the gang as possible. But yesterday a plane circled over the van and we felt sure they were on to us, too. The first thing we had to do was hide the lab, so I got in touch with Zinn and asked him for shelter. He told us to put the portable lab in the warehouse. Then we drove the empty van back into the woods to mislead the Hardys.”

“Which was another mistake,” Zinn grumbled.

“Where did you plan to go today?” Cook continued his questioning.

“When we found out this morning that Mudd had been arrested, we figured the jig was up. We called Zinn, who said they were leaving for Canada and offered to take us along. We decided to give up the lab, despite the large investment and save our lives. Lefty, Frank Hardy, and Schill knew too much and had to be eliminated. Rather than poisoning them in the warehouse and leaving them as evidence, we decided to take them on the plane and drop them into the ocean.”

“Nice thought,” Frank muttered. “You're awfully kind.”

“I have another question,” Joe spoke up. “Someone seemed to be spying on me and the boys last Wednesday night at Pete Guilfoyle's barn. Who was it?”

“Curtice kept the place under surveillance since we had a pickup at night. We usually did that, just a routine precaution.”

Joe nodded. “I also found a guitar pick outside the barn.”

“No wonder, with all those musicians around,” Nettleton said.

“Coming back to the beginning of the whole thing,” Frank said to Zinn, “did your pilots know they were transporting contraband?”

“No. Martin Weiss and Jack Scott became suspicious but crashed before they found out anything definite.”

“How come the FAA didn't find the isotopes?”

“We got there ahead of them,” Zinn replied.

The telephone rang and Lieutenant Cook answered. When he had finished, he said, “That was the Morrisville police. They have closed down the Midatlantic operation and arrested all suspects, including a pilot. Late last night Scotland Yard made their move in London and got the exporters of the isotopes, who in turn revealed their contacts in New York. The New York police are rounding up everyone on that end. Which just about solves our case.”

“As far as the isotopes are concerned,” Frank agreed. “But what about the other freight heists?”

“The cargo was either flown to Morrisville, New Jersey, or trucked to various locations in New York State. The Morrisville and New York police have all the information on that. And, what's more, they know the names of everyone concerned with the distribution. It'll take a few days to round up all the people connected, but thanks to Mr. Hardy we know exactly whom to look for.”

Mr. Hardy grinned. “It was a hard case to crack, but as Frank once said, ‘the harder the better!'”

The young sleuths relaxed momentarily in the glow of success. But another knotty mystery, to be known as
The Melted Coins,
was to challenge the Hardys in the near future.