The Clue of the Broken Blade (4 page)

When they had finished taping the last voice, Frank suddenly had an idea. He turned to the bank's vice-president. “Mr. Dollinger, didn't you say you were using your dictaphone when the bandit stepped from your office closet?”

“That's right.”

“Was the dictaphone still on when he spoke to you?”

Mr. Dollinger said thoughtfully, “I see what you're getting at. Yes, it was. I switched it off before I got up from my desk, but it was on when he told me it was a stick-up.”

“Then his voice would be recorded!”

“Come on, let's see!” Dollinger said eagerly and led the boys and Chief Collig into his private office. He set the dictaphone on playback.

After the last two sentences of the letter a guttural, obviously disguised voice broke in. “This is a stick-up. Make the wrong move and you've had it!'”

“Great!” Joe exclaimed.

Frank asked Dollinger to run it once more so they could record it.

“That's just fine,” he said when he was finished. “If the stick-up man is one of your employees, we'll find out soon!”

When Frank and Joe got home, it was lunch-time. They took a sandwich to their lab and made spectrograms of all the employees on the tape, including the one on the dictaphone.

The latter matched the voiceprint of the visiting Swiss, Signor Zonko! Obviously the man's Italian accent had been assumed, because the voice on the dictaphone was American.

“How do you like that for nerve?” Frank said in amazement. “He helped rob the bank, then took off his mask and walked right back in. No doubt he was the heavy-set member of the gang that Dollinger described.”

Frank phoned Collig to report their discovery. The chief thanked him and said he would call back as soon as Signor Zonko was under arrest.

The phone rang an hour later. Frank answered.

“Zonko didn't return to the bank after lunch,” Chief Collig reported. “We raided his apartment, but it was empty and all his belongings gone!”

“Oh brother!” Frank said. “As soon as we mentioned voiceprints, he must have known the jig was up.”

“Right. And here's another piece of news. I telephoned the president of the Ticino Bank in Bellinzona. They were closed, because it's nine o'clock at night there now, but the operator got him at home. There's a bank officer there named Zonko, but he never left Switzerland. Our Zonko's credentials were faked.”

“Looks as if we're dealing with international criminals,” Frank said. “Since the only real evidence we have against them is the fake Zonko's voiceprint, I think we'll put it and the other spectrograms in Dad's safe-deposit box at the bank.”

“Good idea,” Collig replied. “You'd better hide that sound spectrograph somewhere, too. After failing to steal one in Somerville, the gang may try for yours!”

“I hadn't thought of that,” Frank said. “Thanks for the suggestion.”

When Frank hung up, he and Joe carried the spectrograph into the master bedroom and hid it behind a secret panel in their father's closet. Then they drove down to the bank and put the tape and voiceprints they had made that day into Fenton Hardy's safe-deposit box.

Next morning, after breakfast, the boys went to the lab to get some notes they had left there. When Joe opened the door, he stopped dead in his tracks and gaped.

The place had been torn apart. Every cabinet door stood open, the locks broken, and papers were strewn all about!

 

 

 

“GOOD night!” Frank exclaimed. “And we never heard a thing!”

Joe shook his head. “I'm glad we didn't leave that tape and the voiceprints here.”

“The spectrograph, too,” Frank added. “Whoever did this obviously never thought of looking in the house for it.”

“Well, let's clean up the mess,” Joe said. “And then we'd better check on a flight to California!”

When the boys finished putting the laboratory back in order, Frank phoned Chief Collig, who had no news, then called the airport and made reservations for the ten-o'clock flight the next morning. He had just hung up when a well-dressed young man looked in the door.

“Hi, Scoop,” Frank said. “Come on in.”

Cub reporter Scoop Scales of the
Bayport
35
Times
entered the living room. “My editor sent me over to do a feature story on you guys,” he said.

“On us?” Joe said in surprise. “What for?”

“You're too modest,” Scoop replied with a smile. “The way you two identified that fake Swiss at the Bayport Bank and Trust Company as one of the robbers deserves a special story.”

“Look, Scoop,” Frank began, “we're not too keen on any publicity. We don't want the whole world to know what we're doing!”

“Don't worry, I'll keep it general enough. No trade secrets. Just the regular stuff, you know. Whether you like baseball and chocolate shakes, et cetera.”

Frank sighed. “All right. Go ahead if you must.”

The boys answered questions about their recent activities, including their attendance at the Voiceprint Lab, but said nothing about their impending trip. Scoop told them he would like to have a newspaper photographer take a picture of the Hardys' house the next day.

“Aunt Gertrude will be here,” Frank said. “Just contact her.”

The following morning Callie Shaw came by in her car to drive the boys to the airport. Slender, blond Callie was Frank's steady date. With her was Iola Morton, Chet's dark-haired sister, whom Joe regarded as his best girl. Chet did not come along because he was on duty at the fencing school.

When it was time to say good-by at the loading gate, Callie said, “You boys stay out of trouble, hear!”

“You know they never do that,” Iola remarked with a laugh. She turned to the Hardys. “Just get out of any trouble you get into!”

As the plane passed over Denver, Joe was commenting on the amazing speed of jet travel compared to the covered wagons of a hundred years ago.

Suddenly Frank interrupted him. “I just thought of a possible motive for the bank robbers going after those tapes and voiceprints!” he said excitedly.

“What?”

“Wouldn't the criminals whose voices are recorded gladly pay to have the tapes and their spectrograms destroyed?”

After thinking it over, Joe said, “The old shakedown racket, you mean?”

“Exactly. The gang could make big-shot crooks all over the country pay through the nose for those parts of Dad's catalog that apply to them!”

“You may have hit it,” Joe agreed.

When they landed at San Francisco they were paged over the public-address system. “Frank and Joe Hardy please come to the United Air Lines counter,” a pleasant voice said.

While the announcement was being repeated, the boys were already entering the terminal. At the reservation desk they found a message to call Aunt Gertrude immediately.

“That's strange,” Joe commented. “I wonder what's so urgent.”

“Let's find out,” Frank replied, pointing to a telephone booth. The boys squeezed in and Frank called home.

Aunt Gertrude sounded panicky. “Come back immediately!” she demanded. “Someone's going to blow up our house!” She spoke so loud that Joe could hear her too.

“What?” Frank asked incredulously. “Who's going to blow up the house?”

“I don't know. A man called a little while ago. What should I do, Frank?”

“Did you call Chief Collig?”

“N-no. Didn't think of it. All I could think of was getting in touch with you!”

“All right. Call him immediately. We'll be at the Occidental Hotel. Phone us there. There's nothing we can do for you from here, but the chief can give you police protection. Okay?”

“Yes,” Aunt Gertrude said weakly. “I'll do it right away.”

Frank hung up. “Trouble,” he muttered glumly.

Joe nodded. “Let's get to the hotel and wait for her call.”

While the boys were getting settled in their room at the Occidental, Joe had an idea. “I'll call Chet,” he said. “Maybe he can run over to our house and see what's going on.”

Chet answered the phone. When Joe explained the situation to him, he promised to check on Aunt Gertrude right away.

A half-hour later Chet called back. Joe held the receiver so Frank could listen in.

Chet was laughing so hard he could hardly get out what he wanted to say. Between guffaws he wheezed, “Aunt Gertrude—the paper—she misunderstood—”

Joe said to Frank, “I take it she isn't in any danger.” Then he spoke into the mouthpiece. “This is probably costing you about a dollar a minute, Chet!”

This instantly sobered their pal. “It was Scoop Scales,” Chet said. “He phoned your aunt because he wanted to take a picture of your house for the feature he's writing. When he said he was going to shoot the place and blow it up, she panicked and hung up on him. He meant blow up the negative into an enlargement!”

Relieved that Aunt Gertrude was not in any danger, Frank and Joe could not help laughing, too.

“Thanks, Chet.” Toe chuckled.

“That's only one of the things I called about,” Chet went on. “My father says he'll pay my fare out there if you need me.”

“Why should we need you?” Joe asked.

“Aw, come on,” Chet said. “I have him all talked into it. Tony, Phil, and Biff will handle the fencing school without me. You need my help, don't you?”

“All right,” Joe said, relenting. “I guess we could use you.”

“I'll be in tomorrow on the same flight you took. Meet me at the airport.”

“We'll be there,” Joe told him.

Since they would have to drive to Stockton, which was eighty-three miles from San Francisco via the freeway, the boys decided to rent a car. They got a new Ford sedan and drove to police headquarters to check in as visiting detectives.

When the officer on duty at the information desk learned they were the sons of the famous Fenton Hardy, he took them to see Chief of Detectives Henry Copeland.

Copeland was a muscular, ruddy-faced man. He greeted the boys cordially and inquired about their father, whom he knew well. Frank told him Mr. Hardy was in fine health and was presently on vacation at the Grand Canyon. Then he explained their reason for being in California.

“You may have trouble locating this Miguel Jimenez if he lives on a houseboat,” Copeland said thoughtfully. “Do you know anything about the delta region?”

Both boys shook their heads.

“It's a triangular area of about five hundred square miles between Stockton, Sacramento, and Antioch. Once it was all under water, but many years ago it was partially drained, leaving hundreds of small islands surrounded by about a thousand miles of waterways.”

“Good grief!” Joe said. “We'll never find him.”

“The thing is,” Copeland went on, “if he's a recluse, he might not be listed at the Stockton Post Office.”

Frank looked glum. “It would take us a year to search all the waterways.”

“Try the mailman,” Copeland suggested.

During the conversation the boys mentioned that they had recently attended the Voiceprint Laboratories school in New Jersey. Copeland was greatly interested, since the San Francisco Police Department had just acquired a sound spectrograph.

They discussed voiceprint technology for a while, then Frank and Joe thanked the detective for his advice and left.

When Chet Morton arrived by jet the next afternoon, he brought with him a cablegram addressed to the Hardy boys from Bellinzona, Switzerland. It read:

“Any news, so far?” Chet asked his friends.

“None, except that we might have trouble locating our man.”

“Well,” Chet said breezily, “you didn't expect this job to be easy, did you?”

When they got back to the Occidental Hotel, a uniformed policeman was waiting for the Hardys in the lobby. He said he had been sent by Chief of Detectives Henry Copeland.

“What's up?” Joe asked.

“Our voiceprint identification expert is in the hospital with a broken leg,” the officer said. “The boss wants you to look at the spectrogram of a suspected extortionist.”