The Clue of the Broken Blade Read Free Page A

with a rabbit punch, driving Frank to his hands and knees.
    â€œLet’s get out of here!” the thug shouted.
    Though dazed, Frank was aware of both truck doors being slammed shut. Then his head cleared and he looked up just as the vehicle started to pull away. The driver switched on his lights. This illuminated the rear license plate—New Jersey, FHB-548. Frank memorized it.
    As he scrambled to his feet, Joe also got up. “Are you all right?” his brother asked.
    â€œOkay,” Frank mumbled. “How about you?”
    â€œI’ll live,” Joe said, fingering a growing lump on his forehead.
    Frank went over to look at the crate the thieves had left behind. Its label showed that it contained a sound spectrograph of the same model owned by their father.
    Joe whistled. “Hey, one of those guys left his hat,” he said, picking it up.
    â€œBring it along,” Frank said. “We’ll go back to the motel and call the police.”
    When they returned to their room, Joe exclaimed, “This is the same kind of hat as the one the man was wearing in the restaurant tonight!”
    Frank took the black Homburg. He examined the inside. He lifted out a hair and studied it closely. It was thick, red, and rather greasy. Taking an envelope from the writing desk, he placed the hair inside and slipped the envelope into his pocket.
    â€œWe’ll save that for the police,” he said, picking up the phone.
    While Frank was calling, Joe examined the hat further. From inside the band he pulled out a folded newspaper clipping.
    When his brother hung up, Joe said, “Look at this, Frank!” He showed the clipping, headlined KIDNAPPER TRAPPED BY VOICEPRINT. “It tells how a guy was arrested on account of a spectrogram,” Joe went on. “He kidnapped a young boy and telephoned the father for ransom. His voice was taped by the police and later the boy was found unharmed!”
    Frank put the clue in his pocket next to the envelope. “The police will want this, too,” he commented.
    Two officers arrived in a squad car five minutes later. When the boys explained what had happened, one of them put out an all-points bulletin for the truck. Then they drove the police car behind the Voiceprint Lab and illuminated the scene with their spotlight.
    Along with the boys, they searched for further clues. The rear door had been jimmied, but the burglars had left no other marks.
    â€œA robbery squad officer will be over shortly,” one of the policemen told Frank. “He’ll make the investigation inside.”
    Soon a tall, leathery detective, who introduced himself as Lieutenant Howell, arrived at the scene. Frank and Joe described their encounter with the thieves, then accompanied him to their room, where they gave him the hat, the news clipping, and the strand of hair.
    â€œI’ve called the lab manager,” Lieutenant Howell said. “He’ll be right over. We’ll go and check the building with him.”
    They went back to the lab and met the manager at the door. He thanked the boys for their alertness and led them through the building. The alarm system had been cleverly disconnected, but nothing aside from the spectrograph had been disturbed.
    One of the policemen came in to report that a bulletin had just come over the radio about the truck. “It was reported stolen earlier in the evening,” he said, “and has just been found abandoned at the airport.”
    â€œWell, that’s that,” the lieutenant said gloomily. “If it hadn’t been too dark for you boys to see the faces of those men, we could have all flights checked for persons answering their descriptions.”
    He told the lab manager he would arrange for a police guard until morning, since the rear door lock was broken, then left.
    During the following week Lieutenant Howell had no news for the boys on the would-be thieves. Frank and Joe finished their course and