“When did you get this?” asked Frank.
“It came in the afternoon mail. It was addressed to me, and the envelope had a Bayport postmark.”
“What is there to worry about?” Joe asked. “It’s better than not hearing from him at all.”
“But I’m not sure that it’s from him.”
“Why?”
“Your father has an arrangement with me that he would always put a secret sign beneath his signature any time he had occasion to write to me like this. He was always afraid of people forging his name to letters and notes like this and perhaps getting papers or information that they shouldn’t. So we arranged this sign that he would always put beneath his name.”
Frank snatched up the note again.
“And there’s no sign here. Just his signature.”
“It may be his signature. If it isn’t, it is a very good forgery. And it may have been that he forgot to put in the secret sign, although it isn’t like him to do that.”
Mrs. Hardy was plainly worried.
“If he didn’t write it, then who did?” asked Joe.
“Your father has many enemies. There are relatives of criminals whom he has had arrested and there are criminals who have served their terms and have been released. If there has been foul play the note might be meant to keep us from being suspicious and delay any search.”
“Foul play!” exclaimed Frank. “You don’t think something has happened to dad?” he added, his face showing his alarm.
“The fact that he didn’t put the secret sign underneath his name makes me anxious. What other object could anyone have in sending us a note like that, if not to keep us from starting a search for him?”
“Well, whether he wrote that note or not, we will start a search for him,” declared Frank firmly. “He merely said not to worry about him. He didn’t order us not to look for him. If he really did write the note he can’t say we were disobeying instructions. And then, the absence of the secret sign makes it all different.”
“I’ll say we’ll look for him!” cried Joe. “Vacation starts next week, and we’ll have plenty of time to hunt for him.”
“Wait until then, at any rate,” Mrs. Hardy advised. “Perhaps he will return in the meanwhile.”
But as she glanced at the note again and once more regarded the signature, strangely lacking its secret sign, her forebodings that Fenton Hardy had met with foul play increased.
X
The Vain Search
Fenton Hardy was still missing when the summer vacation began.
There had been no word from him. Never, in all his years of detective work, had he vanished from home so completely and for such a length of time. He was an intensely considerate man and his first thought was always for his wife and boys. Occasionally it was necessary for him to leave home suddenly on trips that would keep him away for some length of time, sometimes it seemed wiser to keep the knowledge of his whereabouts to himself. But he always managed to communicate with Mrs. Hardy to assure her of his safety.
But this time, with the exception of the dubious note, there had been no such assurance. From the moment he had left the house on the morning after the kidnapping at the Kane farmhouse he had vanished as utterly as though the earth had swallowed him up.
The Hardy boys questioned many people in and around Bayport, but no one recollected having seen their father on the day in question. At the railway station they ascertained the fact that the detective had not bought a train ticket that day or any day since. The agent admitted it was barely possible that Fenton Hardy might have taken a train and paid his fare on board, but said it was not likely. Inquiries at the steamboat office brought a similar response. The detective had not been seen.
None of the local police officers remembered having seen Mr. Hardy that morning. The detective was a well-known figure in Bayport and it seemed strange that no one had seen him about the streets of the city, in spite of the fact that he had left home at an early hour. The boys questioned everyone who was likely to have seen him, even to milkmen who might have been on their routes at that time, but the further they pursued their inquiries the deeper the mystery became.
One of the boys greatly interested in the disappearance of Mr. Hardy was Perry Robinson. Perry was the son of Henry Robinson, who had once gotten into difficulties over the disappearance of some valuables, as related in “The Tower Treasure.” All of the Hardys had done much for the Robinson family, and the Robinsons were correspondingly grateful.
“I saw your dad on the street one day, boys,” said Perry. “He waved his hand to me.”
“When was that?” demanded Frank quickly.
“Oh, a day or two before you say he disappeared. Gee, fellows, I wish I could help you!” went on Perry.
“Well, keep your eyes open and if you learn anything let us know,” said Joe, and to this Perry readily agreed.
Shortly after the boys had had their talk with Perry Robinson they ran into a number of their girl friends. One of these girls had likewise seen Mr. Hardy, but after considerable questioning the boys came to the conclusion that the meeting had taken place several days before their father’s disappearance.
“Oh, I’m so sorry this happened,” said one of the girls, and the others nodded in sympathy.
The Hardy boys extended the search beyond the city. It occurred to them that their father might have gone out to the Kane farm, and they made their way to that place. But the farmer and his wife said no one had called at the house since the eventful Sunday of the kidnapping.
“They’ve left us in peace, praise be!” declared Mrs. Kane. “No one’s been near the house since those
