Joe and Biff finished looking around the first floor and walked back to the library. They saw that Frank and Phil went into the cellar and went to help Jack and Jerry on the second floor. The four boys looked through every room, but found no one.
“Let’s check the attic, make sure no one could be hiding up there,” said Joe.
“OK, but, where is it?” asked Jack.
Jerry threw up his hands. “Ugh, looks like we have to go through all the rooms again.”
“Then let’s make it quick,” said Joe before taking off into one room. The other three dashed into other rooms.
It was a minute later that Biff hollored. “I found it!” Joe, Jack, and Jerry dashed into the room as Biff was pulling down the stairs. “You first,” Biff told Joe with a huge grin.
Joe shot him a grin. “Well, thanks.” He bounded up into the attic, followed closely by Jack, Jerry, and Biff.
Jack gasped when Joe flashed a flashlight around. “Look, footprints!” Footprints could be seen easily amidst the dust.
“Someone has been up here!” said Jerry.
“Spread out!” said Joe. “But be careful, he could still be here.”
“Yeah, and he knows we’re up here,” said Biff as he went off towards one side of the attic. The four searched it thoroughly, but quickly found that there was no one up there, even with all the empty boxes.
“So, he’s not up here,” said Jerry as they rendezvoused at the top of the attic stairs.
“No, but he was,” said Joe thoughtfully. “Just, where is he now?” He thought for a moment. “Well, come on, let’s get downstairs and see if Frank and Phil found anything.” The others nodded and followed him down into the room. “Uh, Jerry? Did you have to close the door?” said Joe.
Jerry scoffed. “I didn’t close it.” But when he glanced at Joe, he saw that Joe’s face was grim as he approached the door.
“Uh, Joe?” asked Jack worriedly.
Joe tried to open the door, but it wouldn’t budge. He glanced at his friends and spoke through gritted teeth. “He did know we were up there. He came and locked us in!”
“Let me go at it,” said Biff, flexing his muscular arms. Joe moved out of the way as Biff walked to the far edge of the room. He took a running leap and rammed into the door. The door shuddered and there was a little cracking noise.
“Let’s work on this together,” said Joe. “Jack, Jerry, check the windows and see if you can get Tony and Chet’s attention. Frank and Phil might be in trouble!”
“Right!” chorused the two and rushed towards the windows as Joe and Biff rammed into the door. Joe could feel the door was starting to give way.
“Ugh, we’re at the back end of the house!” blurted Jerry.
“We can’t see the van!”
“Two more rams should get us out though,” said Biff as he and Joe primed for another ram. They rammed the door again, and the door cracked more.
“Want us to have a go at it?” asked Jerry.
“No, we got this,” said Joe right before he and Biff rammed the door again. The door fell away from its hinges and the two boys stumbled into the hall.
“Yay!” cheered Jerry and Jack as they rushed out of the room after Joe and Biff.
“Great job, you two!” said Jack.
“Are you going to be alright?” said Jerry.
“I’m a little sore, but I’ll be fine,” said Joe as he rubbed his arm.
Biff flashed a toothy grin. “That’s why you’ve got to train more often, Joe. Stuff like that doesn’t even phase me.”
Jerry whacked his chest playfully. “What do you mean? You were born like this.”
Biff’s eyes twinkled.
“Guys, we need to check on Frank and Phil,” said Joe, worry becoming evident in his voice. The others nodded and followed him down the stairs. As they neared the cellar door, they could hear shouting. They reached the cellar, and saw that it had a bar across the thick, wooden door, and a chair propped up against it.
“Good grief, this guy wasn’t taking any chances,” muttered Joe through gritted teeth.
“Help!”
“Frank?” called out Joe.
“Joe?”
“Hang on, we’ll have you out in a jiffy!” Joe called as Biff quickly pulled back the chair. Jerry and Jack lifted the bar, and Joe opened the door. Frank and Phil just about dashed out into the room.
“A good thing you didn’t try ramming this door down,” said Biff grimly as he felt the cellar door, “this thing feels like it might never break.”
“That’s why we didn’t bother trying,” said Frank.
“What took you guys so long, anyhow?” asked Phil. The four tooks turns telling about being locked up.
“Wait,” said Frank, “if this guy doesn’t want us finding out anything here . . .”
Joe’s eyes widened. “Chet and Tony!” The group dashed towards the library and quickly climbed out the window. They raced towards the van.
“Hey guys, we were getting worried. What happened?” asked Chet as he and Tony climbed out of the van to meet their panting friends.
“That jerk locked us up!” blurted Joe.
“Did you see anyone come out of the house?” asked Frank.
Chet and Tony shook their heads.
“How is that possible?” said Jerry. An evil-sounding, maniacal laugh answered him. The sound sent shivers down the boys’ spines.
Chet gulped. “I-it is haunted!”
“No ghost ever had to lock anybody in a room to scare them off,” said Frank matter-of-factly. Joe took off towards the back of the house. “Joe, wait!” But Joe kept on going. Frank groaned before turning to their friends. “Come on Biff, let’s go make sure he doesn’t hurt himself.”
Biff nodded with a roll of his eyes. “On it.” He took off after Joe. Frank started to follow, but was stopped.
“What about the rest of us?” asked Jerry.
“You guys lock yourselves up in the van and be ready to go. Hopefully this won’t take long,” said Frank. He turned and dashed off after Joe and Biff. He found them on a trail behind the house and joined them in the search. But when they didn’t find anyone, or anything, Joe became livid.
“Where is that jerk?” he blurted. Another maniacal laugh answered him.
Biff shivered. “It’s almost like he’s watching us.”
Frank’s face became grim. “It’s very likely. Come on, we should go. I think we’ve overstayed our welcome.”
Joe grumbled. “I think you’re right. Come on Biff, let’s go.”
Biff nodded with relief. “Right.” The three dashed back to the van, and they were soon on their way back to Bayport.
About a couple miles away, Frank spoke up. “Tony, turn around.”
“What?”
“You want to go back to that haunted house?” blurted Chet.
Frank shook his head. “To Willow Grove, we have just enough time for a quick search. Joe, Chet, I want you to take at least someone with you and look through Willow Grove. I’ll stay with Tony at the van and keep an eye out on things here. Shoot me a text if you find something.” The others nodded.
“Biff, want to come with me again?” said Joe.
“Sure.”
“I’ll go with Chet,” said Jerry, raising his hand.
“So will I,” said Jack.
“I’d like to stay at the van with Frank and Tony,” said Phil.
Frank nodded. “Alright.”
As soon as the van pulled into the parking lot at Willow grove, the boys separated and dashed off, leaving Frank, Tony, and Phil with the van.
A few minutes later, Joe sent Frank an excited message. “I found something!! I’ve already sent a text to Chet. Make it quick!!!” Frank read the text out loud.
Tony gasped. “They found it?”
“I hope so,” said Frank as he pocketed his cell phone. “Come on!”
Tony quickly locked the van and the three dashed off in the direction Joe and Biff had taken. They quickly came to Joe and Biff’s location, a small clearing thickly surrounded by trees and bushes. Frank pursed his lips when he saw the ares. No one would have noticed the Queen here, that’s for sure. Chet, Jerry, and Jack arrived on the scene a minute later.
“Did you find the Queen?” said Chet, panting.
Joe shook his head grimly. “No, but the Queen was here. Look.” He pointed to some tire tracks.
“Those are the Queen’s!” blurted Chet as he bent down to trace his fingers over the markings.
“Wait until you see where they go.” Joe and Biff led the group on a northwestern route, following the tire tracks. Chet groaned when they saw the tracks ended at a two-lane, paved road.
Chet sighed. “He’s long gone by now.”
“I don’t know,” said Frank slowly. Everyone glanced at him.
“What do you mean by that?” said Chet.
“There’s still a chance he might not have left Bayport. Chief Collig still has that APB out on him. This may be the best place to hide.”
Joe snapped his fingers. “And there is still a chance he’s involved with that ring of smugglers using the Pollitt place!”
Frank nodded. “Yes, but there’s also still a chance that he could just be staying out here. It’s true that Willow Grove isn’t that far away from the Pollitt place, but it is still quite the hike.”
“Yeah, but, now what?” asked Phil.
“We’ll come back tomorrow as we planned,” said Frank, “and see if he’s come back. If we need to, we can take him on and get Chet’s car back. Chet?”
“Yes?”
“Do you have pictures of the tires?”
Chet nodded vigorously. “I do, all on my phone.”
“Take pictures of these tire tracks so we can show them to Chief Collig if the Queen’s not back here tomorrow,” said Frank. “Everyone else, let’s spread out and see if we can’t find some clue, anything, to this thief’s identity, or maybe even where he went.”
Joe nodded. “Good idea. Come on!” He led the way around the clearing as each boy took a spot and began a thorough search while Chet took picture after picture. Frank called it quits five minutes later. No one had found anything.
“All the clues must be in Queen,” said Joe as they regrouped.
Frank nodded. “All the more reason to get out here tomorrow and see if we can’t get Queen back.” The others nodded.
“Here, here!” said Phil.
Frank glanced at his watch. “And that’s all we can do now. We have to get back home.”
‘Good, because I’m starving,” said Chet as he led the way back to the van.
“When are you not starving?” said Joe with a mischievous grin.
“When he’s eating,” quipped Jerry between snickers.
“Speaking of, did no one notice that Chet finished eating his lunch rather quickly today?” said Phil.
“What? I wanted to find the Queen’s hiding place! And now that we’ve found out where she was hidden, all that work has made me super hungry!” The others laughed.
Frank patted Chet’s shoulder. “Well then, let’s hurry it up and get back home. I’m sure Mom and Aunt Trudy will need a lot of help in the kitchen today.”
“And I won’t tomorrow?” said Phil.
“You just do the cooking,” said Joe, “we’ll clean. And you’re exempt from helping today.”
Phil let out a breath. “Good to know.”
“Then let’s hurry, I’m catching Chet’s hunger pangs!” quipped Jack. The others laughed before racing back to the van. They loaded up and Tony drove as quickly as he dared back to the Hardys. The talk consisted of what had happened at the Pollitt place and what they had found at Willow Grove. Ideas were being thrown back and forth and imaginations were running wild, so wild that the group was roaring with laughter by the time they had returned to the Hardy house. Joe did manage to include their pen pal, the lovely Nancy Drew, in some of those wild scenarios, much to Frank’s embarrassment. But all the humor vanished when they entered the Hardy house. Fenton, Laura, and Trudy were waiting for them in the living room with solemn faces.
“Good, you’re home. Five minutes later, and I would have had to text you to meet me at the Tower Mansion,” said Fenton, rising from his chair.
The boys glanced at each other, wondering what was going on.
“Dad, what’s going?” asked Joe.
“Frank, Joe, come with me please.” Fenton turned to their friends. “Please help my wife and my sister with the dinner preparations. We’ll tell you everything when we return.” The boys nodded almost as if in a daze as they parted to let Fenton through to the front door. “Frank, Joe, now.”
“Um, OK,” said Joe as he quickly followed his father.
Frank turned to their friends. “Let them know of our plans, please. See you later!” He quickly dashed after his brother and father. Fenton was pulling the car out. Joe was sitting in the front seat next to him. Frank practically dived into the back seat and quickly buckled up before Fenton sped away from the Hardy house.
“Can you tell us what’s going on?” said Joe.
“How bad is it?” said Frank softly.
Fenton’s face twisted with pain as he glanced at his eldest before letting out a sigh. “There was a robbery at the Tower Mansion.”
“What?” blurted the two boys. They glanced at each other in shock. The Tower Mansion was the closest thing Bayport had to having a castle, built by Major Applegate when he moved to Bayport. The current owners, his descendants Hurd and Adelia Applegate, both in their fifties, had added another tower to the place and turned the old tower into something of a part-time museum for the stamps Hurd collected. The two had been there a few times with their friend Perry Robinson, nicknamed “Slim”, as his father worked there and knew the actual times when the museum would open, erratic as they were.
“How much was stolen?” asked Frank.
Fenton shrugged. “I didn’t get the details. Chief Collig was desperate that I go over there and take a look around, that he was in need of a professional opinion.” Fenton pursed his lips. “Which can only mean that Hurd suspects someone that Collig doesn’t have the evidence for.”
“Hmm,” said Frank thoughtfully. The rest of the ride was quiet. When they arrived at the Tower Mansion, there were police cars and officers everywhere, it seemed. One officer noticed them and directed them to a parking spot before leading them into the house. Slim Robinson was pacing nervously around, but stopped when he saw the newcomers.
“Frank, Joe, Mr. Hardy! I’m so glad you’re here!”
Frank grabbed his shoulders. “Slim, what’s wrong?”
The door to a side room slammed open and Chief Collig stepped into the living room, followed by Hurd Applegate.
“I’m telling you Chief, the thief hasn’t left at all! It couldn’t be anyone else but Henry Robinson!”
Joe and Frank gasped as they glanced at each other and Slim in shock. Hurd Applegate suspected Slim’s father of being the thief!