The Masked Monkey (8 page)

“Where to now?” Joe asked.

“There's a park a few blocks down the street,” Frank said. “San Marten won't think of looking for us there. We'll have to hang around a while till money from home arrives.”

They found the park practically deserted. Seated on a bench under some spreading tropical foliage, they were able to talk freely with no fear of eavesdroppers.

“San Marten can't be operating against us all by his lonesome,” Joe remarked. “He must be the leader of a gang.”

Frank agreed. “Try this for size, Joe. The gang kidnapped Graham Retson, took the money he withdrew from the bank, and are now holding him for ransom. They're out to get us before we rescue Graham.”

“You're on my wave length, Frank, coming through loud and clear.”

Frank paused to think over the problem. “I
can't figure out where Manaus fits in. That clue might be a plant to lure us up the Amazon so San Marten and company can ambush us.”

“On the other hand,” Joe countered, “Graham could really be in Manaus. Our job is to find him, so we can't ignore the whole thing.”

“Besides,” Frank said, “if it's a trap, we may be able to turn the tables on the gang. Forewarned is forearmed, as Aunt Gertrude would say.”

“I'll buy that,” Joe said. “But how do we get to Manaus? If we take a boat upriver, it'll take weeks before we arrive.”

“We'll have to fly.”

“San Marten will have the commercial lines watched,” Joe predicted. “And I doubt if e can rent a plane without identification papers. That second-story monkey grounded us.”

“Maybe the man at the consulate can give us some advice,” Frank said. “We'll have to check in there anyhow for our money. I hope it has arrived.”

Toting their bags, Frank and Joe returned to the American Consulate, which was near the park. The man they had spoken to that morning greeted them with a smile. “Your money is here,” he said. “I'm having your passports canceled and you will have new ones soon.”

Frank explained that they wanted to fly to Manaus and the man made a quick phone call.
He spoke in Portuguese, smiled, and hung up.

“This should do the trick,” he said to the Hardys. “Go to the airport on the edge of town. A pilot by the name of Rico Armand is waiting there. He has a small private plane and will fly you to Manaus.”

“Thank you very much,” Frank said, and the Hardys walked out of the office.

They hailed a taxi and an hour later were at the airport. They found the pilot, a handsome youth in his early twenties, who spoke English.

Armand shook hands, mentioned his fee, and the boys paid in advance. Then the three took off.

They circled over the vast delta of the Amazon, heading upriver. The east coast disappeared behind them, and the rain forest extended on both sides like a huge green carpet.

Smaller tributary streams could be seen snaking through towering trees before emptying into the broad river.

The plane flew on and on, and it seemed nothing else existed in the world except those countless miles of jungle beneath their wings.

Two refueling stops were made at intermediate airstrips. Armand followed the Rio Negro from its confluence with the Amazon, and finally Manaus came into sight.

Frank and Joe looked down on hundreds of canoes in the river, paddled by natives headed
for the waterfront market with cargoes of fruit and vegetables. The buildings of the city were a conglomeration of styles, running from primitive huts to old colonial and modern high rise.

One building in particular stood out—an ornate structure of pink and white marble. Frank and Joe stared in disbelief.

“How did that ever get into the jungle?” Joe asked.

“That's the old opera house,” Armand replied. “Manaus used to be the rubber capital of Brazil. The wealthy planters had the best of everything, including opera.”

“The city must have gone downhill since then,” Frank remarked.

“Brazil's rubber doesn't sell too well these days,” said the pilot. “Can't compete with the East Indies. So Manaus is pretty much what you Americans would call a ghost town of the Amazon.”

“How do people make a living now?” Joe asked.

“Partly from tourism. Manaus is a free port and you can buy things duty free. That's one reason I see more visitors in Manaus every time I come.”

A message from the airport tower came over the radio: “Wait for permission to land.” Armand began to circle. His fuel gauge showed the plane could not keep flying much longer.

“I don't understand the delay,” he said nervously. “I'll have to land without permission if this keeps up.”

“Frank,” Joe muttered, “this may be San Marten's doing.”

The fuel gauge pointed to
empty
and the three aboard were braced for a crash landing when the control tower finally gave the okay.

“Down to the last drop of gas,” Armand commented as they taxied to a halt. In the terminal they found out that a maintenance truck had been stalled on the runway.

After a quick sandwich at the airport the boys said good-by to the pilot, then took a taxi to a hotel in the middle of town. After checking in they began to scout Manaus for Graham Retson. None of the hotels had any record of him, so they turned their attention to the rooming houses. It was not till the next day, however, that they struck a lead.

“Yes,” said the owner of a small rooming house, a German named Bauer, “Graham Retson was here, but left yesterday. I found this paper in his room. Maybe it will help you.”

Frank took the piece of paper. It was dirty and wrinkled as if it had been crumpled into a ball and tossed aside. He examined the crudely scrawled message. It was dated May seventh and said: “I am being taken to a small boat next to the Argentine freighter in Manaus harbor. My
captors intend to take me farther up the Amazon. Help! Graham Retson.”

Joe whistled and pulled his brother aside. “Frank, this is a real clue!”

“You're wrong, Joe.”

“Why?”

“Look at the date. The seven has a bar through it. That's the European way of writing the number. No American would do it like that. Another thing. Today is May seventh. The landlord said Graham left yesterday. He's in cahoots with San Marten, Joe! Bauer wrote the note himself. They're trying to trick us!”

“We'll trick them in return!” Joe declared. “They want to get us aboard their boat for a oneway voyage to the bottom of the Amazon. Instead, we'll stay off the boat and listen to what's going on.”

“With our bug, you mean?” Frank asked. “Great idea.”

The boys went back to their hotel. Frank opened his suitcase and drew out a length of coiled wire from a hidden pocket under a false bottom. One end of the wire had a set of earphones attached. From the other dangled a sensitive metal sphere. The Hardys had often used this detection device to listen in on conversations at long range.

They walked to the harbor at nightfall. Frank pointed to the lights of a hulking vessel anchored there. “That's the Argentine freighter, Joe. And
that small boat beside it has to be the one we're looking for.”

“Okay, I'll go to work.”

Frank, holding the earphones, sat down behind some crates on the dock. Joe stripped quickly to his shorts, then slipped into the river carrying the wire, which payed out from the bank as he swam. Reaching the boat, he carefully planted the bug on one of the portholes.

“The insect is ready to strike,” Joe announced when he came back to Frank, shaking the droplets of water off his body. Then he began to put on his slacks and shirt.

“Hurry,” Frank said suddenly. “We're having company.”

Two men walked down to the water's edge and stopped a few yards from where the Hardys were concealed. Obviously convinced that they were alone in the darkness, they spoke clearly in English. The Hardys recognized the voices.

“San Marten!” Joe whispered.

Frank nodded. “The other guy sounds like Bauer—that guy at the rooming house.”

San Marten spoke in more informal English than they had ever heard him use before. “Are you positive every angle's covered? I don't want any slips, mind you.”

“Don't get upset,” his companion replied. “Diabo is standing guard. No one can sneak past him. He's foolproof.”

“Hurry,” Frank said. “We're having company.”

“Okay,” San Marten said with satisfaction. “Soon the river will have the Hardys.”

“Joachim, that was a good idea to lure them to Brazil. With Graham on our hands back north at—”

A sudden noise caused Frank and Joe to whirl around.

They saw the monkey with the evil face charging at them! He was so close that they did not have a chance to move. Snapping and snarling ferociously the animal catapulted into the Hardys. The force of the assault toppled them over into the river!

F
RANK
and Joe plummeted down through the water until they steadied themselves. Kicking convulsively, they shot back to the surface.

At once the howler monkey was on them, clawing their backs with his hind paws, nipping and scratching at their heads.

Frank twisted around and pulled the creature off Joe. Their combined strength was too much even for their savage assailant. Suddenly the monkey wrenched himself from their grasp. Streaking through the water, he made for the shore.

“Don't let him get away!” Frank spluttered.

But a fusillade of shots changed the Hardys' minds. Bullets skipped off the surface of the river and whined into the darkness.

Joe halted abruptly, treading water. He turned back toward Frank. “We can't get to shore,” he warned.

“Let's swim downstream,” Frank suggested.

“And quick,” Joe said. “They're coming after us!”

The
put-put
of a motorboat echoed across the water, growing louder as the craft cut the distance between it and the boys. Frantically Frank and Joe swam out into the river. The motorboat gained on them rapidly.

Just then a pleasure launch came gliding in their direction. The lights of the cabin threw a sheen over the Rio Negro. Three or four couples were dancing to the rhythm of a small combo.

“Follow me!” Frank gasped. “To the other side!”

Waiting until the launch was slightly upstream from him, he took a deep breath and submerged. Kicking hard, and using his arms in a powerful breaststroke, he arched down under the launch. The keel scraped his back as he passed. His lungs were bursting for want of air when he came up on the opposite side of the craft. Reaching out, he grasped a railing just above the water line.

A split second later Joe bobbed up beside him. They clung to the railing side by side, gasping for breath. The launch carried them swiftly down the river.

“Now what?” Joe asked. “Shall we call the skipper?”

“Better not,” Frank said. “There's no telling who's on board. San Marten's confederates would
be only too happy to arrange a reception committee for us.”

They clung to the launch until it passed the confluence of the Rio Negro and the Amazon, a few miles below Manaus. Feeling safe, they dropped off and swam to the shore.

“I've had it,” Frank said, flopping down in a patch of tall jungle grass.

“Rest a while,” Joe said. “I'll get us a snack.”

He walked off into the jungle and returned ten minutes later with a big bunch of bananas. Voraciously they downed the fruit, tossing the skins over their shoulders as they worked through the bunch.

“At least we won't starve here,” Frank observed.

“We're okay,” Joe said, “as long as we don't get eaten. I'd hate to wake up and find a hungry jaguar staring me in the eye.”

“There's probably a lot of them in this area,” Frank said. “Hear those monkeys chattering in the trees? Jaguars feast on monkeys.”

Joe pondered Frank's remark. “That reminds me. We've learned the name of the beast that's been annoying us—Diabo.”

“Which means devil in Portuguese,” Frank said. “You couldn't think of a better name for that horrible creature.”

Joe yawned. “We've left him far behind. Now it's me for dreamland.”

They both were soon sound asleep on the banks of the Amazon. The sun had risen by the time they woke. After breakfasting on bananas and berries, they walked along the shore, waving and shouting at boats passing by in the middle of the river.

“No go,” Joe said after a while. “They're too far out to notice us.”

“We'll have to build a raft,” Frank stated. “There are plenty of fallen trees in the jungle. They'll do for logs.”

The boys began hauling tree trunks out of the nearest patch of jungle. When they had gathered about a dozen, Frank lined them up in a row. Joe pulled down some thick, sinuous creepers from the trees to use as rope. Skillfully they braided the creepers over and around the logs. The result was a seaworthy raft. Flat driftwood provided a pair of paddles.