The Sting of the Scorpion (12 page)

“I'm sorry, he's not here,” she said. “Who's calling, please?”

Frank deliberately slurred his own name in replying and asked, “Can I reach him in Bohm's office?”

“Certainly,” the woman said. “He doesn't get out of work until five.”

 

 

 

 

Joe saw the triumphant look on his brother's face as Frank returned to the car. “Any luck?” he asked.

“You bet!” Frank grinned. “It was Clyde Bohm who sicked that guy on us.” He explained how he had found out.

“Nice going,” Joe said. “We might've known it was Bohm. The shadowing started right after we left his office.”

“Sure. Not only that, but remember how he excused himself for a few minutes? He probably went to tell the guy to wait in his car and follow us.”

“What are we going to do about it?”

“Wait'll we hear from Sam Radley,” Frank replied. “Then we'll put pressure on Bohm.”

Later that afternoon, the Hardy boys drove to the Morton farm as Chet had requested. Mrs. Morton told them with a smile that their pal was out in the barn. Chet was not alone. Iola and Biff Hooper were with him, and so was Biff's huge Great Dane, Tivoli. Iola wore a pretty blue-and-white terry-cloth beach jacket, and Chet's barrelchested figure was encased in a red bathrobe. He was tying what looked like a black string mop, or several of them, to Tivoli's head, while Biff clutched the Great Dane's collar.

The Hardys eyed the scene with mystified grins.

“Mind telling us what you're doing to that poor pooch?” Frank inquired.

“This is no pooch,” Chet retorted. “He's Simba the lion, king of the jungle, and this black wig will be his mane.”

“I thought
you
were the king of the jungle,” said Joe.

“No. I'm Jungle Man. Get down, you idiot!” Chet blurted as the huge dog reared up on its hind legs and began lapping his face. Standing erect, Tivoli was taller than the boy.

“That critter's really gotten enormous,” Frank remarked in awe.

“Right. He'll probably make a pretty good lion at that!” Biff chuckled proudly.

“What do you feed him?”

“Better ask what we
don't
feed him. He'll eat anything he can wrap his jaws around, possibly including Chet!”

“Listen! Jungle Man can handle
any
kind of wild beast!” the plump performer boasted as he finished tying the black mop under Tivoli's chin.

“What have you got in mind, Chet?” Joe asked.

“Stick around and you'll see.”

Joe turned to Jungle Man's sister. “Are you part of the act, too?”

Iola giggled, looking a bit embarrassed. “Chet talked me into it. I owe him five dollars, but he promised to cancel the debt if I'd be his assistant.”

“Sounds like blackmail to me,” Joe cracked.

“Go ahead and make fun, wise guy,” Chet said confidently. “I'll bet we get offers from television once our act premiers, and maybe even from Hollywood!”

“You mean they'll offer you money to keep the act out of sight?”

“Very funny!”

“On second thought,” Joe corrected himself with a glance at Iola, “at least part of the act will be worth looking at.” She blushed.

Chet sniffed and turned to her with a dignified air. “Just ignore the remarks from the peanut gallery. Let's get ready for costume rehearsal!”

He flung off his robe and Iola did likewise. She was wearing a bikini swimsuit, but despite her attractive costume, the boys couldn't help goggling at Chet. His beefy figure was revealed by a suit of fake leopard-skin tights that strapped over one shoulder.

“Sufferin' snakes! Where'd you get that?” Joe exclaimed.

“I made it for him on Mom's sewing machine,” Iola confessed, giggling again.

“You'll bring down the house!” Frank told Chet.

“Think they'll like it?” Chet asked eagerly, preening himself proudly before an imaginary audience of thousands.

“That's not quite what I meant.”

“I get it. You've no confidence in the act.” Chet snorted. “Well, this didn't just happen overnight. I've been working on the show for weeks. I got the idea long before Pop Carter hired us at Wild World, and it's been developing ever since.”

“Maybe you should have squashed it when it first hatched,” Biff said with a wink to the others.

With another disdainful sniff, the leopard-skinned boy led the way out of the barn and into the wooded grove at the rear. Long ropes were dangling from several trees. Chet grabbed one, and with remarkable agility, swung himself up onto a high branch.

Despite their teasing a few moments earlier, his school chums broke into spontaneous applause.

“Not bad, Jungle Man!” Joe called out.

Chet sketched a pleased professional bow, teetering precariously on the branch as he did so. “Okay, white princess and Simba!” he shouted down. “This is your cue! Go get her, Simba!”

Biff let go of Tivoli's collar, but the huge Great Dane merely stood there, panting and gazing around contentedly.

“What's he supposed to do?” Frank inquired.

“Leap at Iola with fangs bared,” Biff explained, trying to keep a straight face. “Then Chet will swing down to her rescue and grapple with the ferocious man-eating lion.”

After several encouraging slaps of the flank, Tivoli finally ambled toward Iola, tongue lolling and tail wagging amiably.

“Trying to keep that mop out of his eyes,” Frank deduced.

“Go on! Snarl at her, you dumb cluck!” Chet berated the dog from his tree branch. “Act ferocious!”

“Gr-r-r!” Iola growled, trying to get Tivoli to imitate her. Instead, he licked her hand.

“Oh, never mind!” Chet fumed in disgust.

At that moment, Tivoli suddenly reared up on his hind legs and began to slobber kisses on Iola's face.

“Hey, that's great! Hold it!” Chet yelled.

“Well, hurry up!” Iola cried frantically, covering her face with her hands in a vain effort to protect it from Tivoli's moplike tongue.

With a jungle bellow, Chet swung down from his perch. As he did, his leopard-skin snagged on a projecting branch, threatening to strip him down to his underwear!

Desperately Chet let go of the rope with one hand and tried to hold his costume in place. But his hefty weight was too much to support. Losing his grip, he slid down the rope and, with a plop, landed heavily astride the Great Dane, who bounded off into the underbrush, yelping loudly!

Jungle Man wound up sprawling among the dead leaves on the ground, with his costume half off.

His audience staggered around and leaned against nearby trees, rocking with laughter.

Chet got up sheepishly, brushing himself and examining his torn clothes. “I guess the act needs a little more work,” he conceded, then burst out laughing, unable to control his own mirth.

Joe flung an arm around his plump pal. “What a sense of humor! Chet, you're wonderful!”

The Hardys escorted their pal into his house, then left for home. When they arrived, the telephone rang. The caller was Sam Radley.

“I just heard from the FBI,” he reported. “Clyde Bohm's got a record, all right.”

“No kidding!” Frank exclaimed. “What for?”

“Fraud and embezzlement. He served two years behind bars in Kansas and got out a couple of months ago. But the Bureau's got nothing on any of the foreign passengers who flew in Monday on the
Safari Queen.”

“What you just told me about Bohm is news enough,” Frank said with an eager smile. “And that's not all, by the way.”

He informed the operative about the car that had shadowed them that afternoon and how he had discovered that their shadow was one of Bohm's employees.

“Good work, Frank,” Sam Radley congratulated him. “Are you going to confront Bohm with all this?”

“You bet! I think Joe and I will drop around to his place tonight. Want to come along?”

“Wouldn't miss it for the world!” Sam chuckled.

After dinner that evening, he accompanied the Hardy boys to Clyde Bohm's home, which they found by consulting the latest phone directory. It proved to be a rented flat on the north edge of town.

The real-estate man was at first indignant that the Hardys should bother him after hours. “What right have you got to come snooping around here at this time of evening?” he ranted, snuffling and squinting at his three visitors. “I'll report this to the police!”

“You do that,” Frank said calmly. “And while you're at it, maybe you'd better tell them how you've been employing
this
fellow lately.” He held out a piece of paper bearing the name, address, and license-plate number of their shadow, which he had obtained from the police that afternoon. Bohm turned pale as he read the information.

“Maybe they'll also be interested in your record as a con artist and embezzler,” Sam Radley added.

Gulping and stammering, Bohm stepped back from the door. “M-M-Maybe you'd better come inside.”

Wringing his hands after they had entered and sat down, the real-estate man went on, “My reputation could be ruined here in Bayport if all this comes out. Remember, I'm new on this job, gentlemen. Surely you won't find it necessary to make the information public?”

“That depends on how well you cooperate,” Frank said.

“I'll tell you anything you want to know,” Bohm whined. “Anything at all!” He then revealed that he had been ordered to buy out Pop Carter's interest in Wild World, using available means.

“Did that include harassing him with stink bombs and nasty rumors?”

“No, no! Nothing like that!” Bohm assured them.

“Where did your orders come from?” said Frank.

Bohm claimed they had been passed down by some unnamed official higher up in the holding company that owned his real-estate firm. “We're just a subsidiary!” he stressed.

After the trio left, Sam Radley promised to trace the owners of the holding company. “But it may not be easy,” he added. “The financial structure of corporations can get complicated these days. Often holding companies are used to mask the real owners of a business.”

The operative was amazed to hear about the Hardy boys' investigation of the dirigible crewman, Hector Maris. “If he turns out to be the son of Quinn's ex-partner, he may be the saboteur behind the
Safari Queen
explosions,” Sam conjectured, “trying to avenge his father's breakup with Quinn.”

“That's the angle we're working on,” Frank said.

After dropping Sam Radley at his house, the Hardys drove to their own home on Elm Street. As they turned up the drive, Aunt Gertrude suddenly appeared in the glare of their headlights. Waving a broom, she appeared to be in a state of high excitement.

“Help me!” she cried. “I've caught the culprit!”

 

 

 

 

FRANK slammed on the brakes, and both boys leaped out of the car.

“What culprit, Aunt Gertrude?” Joe demanded.

“Over there!” she replied, jabbing the air with her broom in the direction of the back porch. “He may be the head of that Scorpio gang Fenton's after! Or at least the rascal who chalked those marks on our front door!”

Joe had snatched a flashlight from the car's glove compartment, and aimed it in the direction in which Miss Hardy was pointing.

A man was slumped on the back-porch steps, clutching his head in both hands. He looked up groggily. The Hardy boys gasped as they recognized his mustached face.

“It's Jemal Raman!” Frank exclaimed.

The man shook his head. “No. I'm not.”

“Tell us another story,” Joe scoffed. “How'd you catch him, Aunt Gertrude?”

Miss Hardy explained that she had been home alone and had noticed a suspicious-looking mustached stranger lurking on the corner when she went out to the drugstore to buy some indigestion pills.

“When I came back, he was no longer in sight,” she went on, “but I remembered what you had told me about that terrorist Fenton had mentioned, so I decided not to take any chances.”

“Smart thinking, Aunty,” Frank approved.

After scouting the front of the house, she had circled around through a neighbor's yard and had glimpsed a dark form huddled outside one of the Hardys' rear basement windows.

“I retreated to the front porch,” Aunt Gertrude related, “and armed myself with a broom I had left out this morning. Then I tiptoed around the house and attacked the intruder. I whacked him good and proper!”

“Aunt Gertrude, that's the bravest thing I've heard in a long time,” Frank declared, hugging her.

“You said it!” Joe chimed in, planting a kiss on her cheek.

“Hmph! Well, anyhow,” she continued, trying to maintain her poise, “I was just about to go in and call the police when you boys drove up.”

“We'll attend to him,” Frank said.

After herding their prisoner inside and frisking him, the boys made him sit down on a kitchen chair while Joe checked the contents of his wallet. To their surprise, the man's ID showed his name as Gopal Raman.

“I'm Jemal's brother,” he confessed. “I've been a student in your country for three years.”

Gopal explained that he had happened to see Fenton Hardy at the St. Louis airport and had recognized him from news photos. This gave him the idea of coming to Bayport during the detective's absence and trying to break into his office.