Reluctantly the clerk said, “The home is owned by a movie scenario writer named Vincent Steele. The reason I didn't want to tell you is that I happen to know him. He's an absolute nut about privacy. Please don't let on that I gave you this information. He might make trouble for me.”
The boys assured him they would not tell Steele and the clerk gave them the address, which was 125 Port Street.
Shortly before four-thirty they returned to the construction site. There was no sign of the bulldozer, but Harry Madsen, Jim Emory, and a small, sinewy man stood next to a car. To the boys' surprise the wine storage building was still standing!
“How come this place hasn't been razed?” Frank asked.
“The contractor phoned,” Emory answered. “He wants us to postpone the job till Monday.”
“Why?”
“I don't know. Some archaeologist is supposed to come and talk to Harry at six o'clock.”
Madsen was impatient. “You ready?” he asked.
“Any time you are,” Joe said coldly.
Madsen had brought a set of foils, masks, and gloves. He pointed to the small man. “This is my friend Amos Cain. He'll direct the bout.”
“What does he know about fencing?” Joe inquired.
“He happens to be the maestro of my school!” Madsen replied with a superior air.
Joe suggested that if Madsen was going to have a personal friend act as bout director, his brother and Chet should be judges. When Cain learned that both boys knew the rules, he agreed.
Then he marked an area six feet by forty feet in the dirt street to serve as the arena.
Joe and Madsen donned their wire-mesh masks and gloves and made some parries and counter-parries to get the feel of their blades.
By now the workday had ended. Instead of going home, the construction crew crowded around to watch the bout.
Madsen casually moved nearer to Joe as he began to make parries and thrusts and lunges. Then he swished the blade of his foil through the air.
Suddenly Chet shouted, “Look out, Joe!”
Joe leaped aside just in time to avoid a slash across the legs. Harry Madsen said mockingly, “Sorry, Hardy. Accident.”
“That was no accident!” Chet said angrily, stepping toward the blond man.
Madsen swung the foil back over his shoulder with the evident intention of whipping Chet with it. Instead, Chet threw a rolling block into the man's knees. His feet were knocked out from under him. Madsen pitched forward over Chet, dropping his foil.
Both jumped to their feet and faced each other. Madsen swung a roundhouse right at Chet's head. The stocky boy ducked and punched Madsen in the stomach. Harry grunted and doubled over.
Frank pulled Chet away, but the blow had cooled Madsen's desire to bedevil Chet any more. He blustered and threatened but made no further attempt at violence.
“Forget it and pick up your foil,” the foreman ordered.
Eventually the contestants were ready to begin fencing. Amos Cain took up the director's position.
Joe and his opponent both raised their foils vertically before their masks.
“Ready?” Cain asked.
The fencers got on guard, crossed their foils, and nodded Yes.
“Fence!” the director ordered.
The blades engaged, disengaged again. Madsen extended his arm and Joe parried. Then he engaged his opponent's blade in rapid order in what were called the fourth, sixth, and second positions and executed a filo and patinando with a disengage from the last position.
Madsen parried the blade but not before it struck his mask. The blond man stumbled backward, clutching at his mask with his left hand. Concerned that the tip of his foil might have penetrated and inflicted a face wound, Joe lowered his foil.
Instantly Madsen extended his arm and lunged.
“Halt!” Amos Cain ordered. “First touch against Hardy.”
“Wait a minute!” Chet protested. “Madsen pretended to be hurt. Anyway, you should have halted the action as soon as Joe made that foul touch.”
“You judges should have called the foul touch,” the director pointed out. “Since you didn't, and I saw none, no halt was called. Harry's hit was perfectly legal.”
“Legal, maybe,” Chet muttered. “But not ethical.”
“On guard!” the director ordered.
The foils crossed again. After several lunges and parries by both opponents, the blond man suddenly stepped back, lowered his foil, and began to remove his mask. Regarding him inquiringly, Joe lowered his foil too.
Madsen's blade instantly came up again, he stepped forward, thrust, and lunged.
“Halt!” the director ordered. “Point two for Harry. Two against Hardy.”
Both Chet and Frank protested loudly.
“I hadn't called a halt,” Amos Cain said reasonably. “Hardy shouldn't have dropped his guard.”
“Let it go, fellows,” Joe said grimly. “He won't catch me with any more sneaky tricks.”
It was an accurate prediction. Several more times Madsen pretended to be hurt, but each time Joe kept his foil raised defensively when he disengaged. In rapid order Joe made five touches in a row.
Madsen objected to each one as off target, but by now the watching workmen realized what a poor sport Madsen was and booed him down every time.
After the fifth straight touch, Cain said reluctantly, “Bout. Hardy wins.”
“On five fouls!” Harry yelled. “He cheated!”
“You're the cheater,” Chet said. “The only two hits you made were by dirty play.”
The blond man turned on Chet, his foil raised. Joe stepped forward, his raised also. But Madsen decided not to risk tangling with Joe again.
“I'll get even with you guys,” he muttered as he turned away.
Joe tossed his foil and glove on the ground, dropped his mask next to it, and went over to get his coat from the workman who had been holding it for him.
“Come on. Let's get out of here,” he said to Frank and Chet.
The boys said good-by to Emory and his men, then Joe slid behind the wheel of the Ford.
They drove in silence for a few moments. Then Frank said, “We should definitely go back there at six and see who the archaeologist is.”
“You fellows can go,” Chet said. “At six I plan to be eating.”
“We can eat later,” Joe told him.
“Not me,” Chet declared. “I need something to keep up my strength after protecting you guys!”
Frank and Joe left Chet at a hamburger stand and returned to the construction site just before six. They parked a short distance away and crossed through a stand of trees edging the development. Halting near the housing area, they peered toward the contractor's office.
They were perhaps fifty yards from the sheet-metal shack. No one was around except Harry Madsen, who was leaning against the fender of his car in front of the office.
“Now why would this archaeologist talk to Harry instead of the foreman?” Joe asked in a low voice.
Frank shrugged. “The whole thing seems fishy to me,” he said.
A sleek sports car drove up and a tall, thin, gray-haired man got out.
“Professor Von Stolk!” Frank murmured in surprise. “Now I'm sure his research in the library was not for an academic reason. That guy's after Russo's sword too!”
They watched as the professor showed two sheets of paper to Madsen.
“Maybe those are the pages torn from that book!” Frank speculated.
“Could be,” Joe said. “Too bad we can't get closer to see.”
Von Stolk and the bulldozer operator conversed for some time. Then the professor disappeared into the wine cellar. He emerged a few minutes later, handed Madsen something, and left. Harry followed in his own car.
Frank and Joe once more searched the cellar, but to no avail. “We may as well get Chet,” Frank said.
It was six-thirty when they picked up their pal at the hamburger stand. Chet had consumed two cheeseburgers and a milk shake, and announced that he was now ready for dinner.
The boys found a restaurant and ate. During the meal Frank and Joe described the meeting they had observed between Harry Madsen and Professor Von Stolk. Chet shook his head in despair. “No doubt this professor is on the trail of our saber,” he said. “But what possible motive could he have?”
“What are we going to do next?” Joe inquired.
“Yes,” Chet put in. “Now that I've eaten, I'm ready for action again!”
“Let's look up this guy Steele,” Frank suggested.
The boys paid their check and drove to 125 Port Street.
When they arrived, Chet said, “This place doesn't resemble the wine storage building, except for the ancient stone.”
A second story with a peaked roof had been added, and there was a huge picture window in front. The house sat on about an acre of ground, surrounded by a split-rail fence. The driveway leading to a garage behind was blocked by an iron gate, and another iron gate barred the way to a walk leading to the front door.
Joe parked and they all got out. It was nearly eight o'clock, but still light. Drapes on the picture window in the living room were wide open. A woman seated on a couch was reading a magazine.
Joe tried the gate. It was locked.
Chet said, “The fence isn't very high. Let's climb it.”
He put one hand on the top rail with the intention of swinging his legs over it. Instead he emitted a gasp and fell to the ground unconscious!
CHAPTER XI
Faked Out
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FRANK pulled Chet away from the fence, while Joe stooped to look up under the top rail. A bare copper wire ran beneath it.
“It's electrified,” Joe stated. “What a dirty trick!”
Frank had been holding an ear to the unconscious boy's chest. “His heart's still working all right,” he said. “I guess the shock just knocked him out.”
Rolling Chet over on his stomach, Frank began to give him artificial respiration.
The front door of the house opened and a middle-aged woman with graying hair came out. She walked to the gate, wringing her hands.
“I didn't know that was switched on,” she said. “I'm terribly sorry. Is your friend hurt?”
Without stopping his rhythmic movements, Frank said, “You can see he's out cold. That fence is dangerous!”
“Oh dear!” the woman said. “I told my husband he was going too far with his desire for privacy. Are you going to sue us?”
“Depends on how our friend recovers,” Frank replied.
Chet opened his eyes and said, “Hey, who's that sitting on my back?”
Frank rose to his feet. Chet rolled over and sat up.
“What happened?” he asked.
“The fence was charged with electricity,” Joe told him. “It knocked you out. This lady wants to know if you're going to sue her.”
Chet looked at the woman, then lay back down on the grass and put a hand to his forehead. “I think my brain is fried,” he said dolefully. “How much can you sue for when your brain is fried?”
“For yours, about fifteen cents,” Frank quipped.
Sitting up again, Chet gave him a reproachful look. He climbed to his feet and regarded the fence darkly.
“It's shut off now,” the woman assured him. “Won't you come in the house while we discuss this?”
When they agreed, she unlocked the gate and led them inside. While they took seats in the living room, she went into the kitchen and returned with a tray of Cokes and a bowl of cookies.
“How are you feeling now?” she asked Chet as he reached for a handful of cookies.”
“I think I'll live,” he said.
It was apparent by the way he attacked the cookie bowl that he was fully recovered from the effects of the electrical shock. The woman looked relieved.
“Then you won't sue us?” she asked.
“I'll make a deal with you,” Chet said. “You leave that fence switched off and I won't sue you.”
“Oh, I will,” she assured him. “I'm going to make my husband disconnect it.”
The woman introduced herself as Mrs. Myra Steele, and the boys told her their names. Mrs. Steele explained that her husband was the famous movie writer Vincent Steele, and that he went to such great lengths to maintain his privacy because he was constantly being bothered by aspiring actors who wanted to break into the business.
“I can understand that,” Chet said. “I'd like to be in the movies myself.”
“What role would you play?” Joe asked. “A mountain?”
“He could play the body in murder mysteries,” Frank suggested. “He put on a pretty good act outside.”
“You fellows just don't appreciate real talent,” Chet said in a patronizing tone.
Spotting an ashtray in the shape of a skull on a nearby end table, he rose to his feet and picked it up. He stared down at it with a sad expression and intoned, “Alas, poor Yorick. I knew him well.”
Mrs. Steele laughed along with the Hardys.
Joe said, “Maybe you knew poor Yorick, Chet, but you don't know your lines.
”It goes, âI knew him, Horatio,' not âI knew him well.'
Don't you remember our English teacher saying that was one of the most commonly misquoted lines in all literature?”
“I was out sick the day we studied
Hamlet,”
Chet said.
He set down the skull-like ashtray, returned to his seat, and took another cookie.
“Are you expecting your husband soon?” Frank asked Mrs. Steele.
“He won't be home tonight at all,” she said. “He's away doing research for a script. Actually the script was all finished and the film is already being shot on location, but the director wanted Vincent to rewrite part of it.”