Three-Ring Terror Read Free Page B

at least.”
    â€œWhat’s that?” Chet asked.
    â€œThe gems aren’t real,” Joe explained to Chet. “Otherwise, the knife wouldn’t have scratched them.”
    Frank looked at the ball carefully again. This time, he saw a thin seam running around the middle of the ball. “I think I’ve found something,” he told Joe, pointing out the seam.
    â€œTry twisting the ball to see if it opens,” Joe suggested.
    Frank turned the ball over in his hands. Sure enough, Joe was right. The two halves turned and the ball popped open. A small folded-up piece of paper fell out and fluttered to the ground.
    Joe picked up the paper and unfolded it. “Weird,” he said, handing the paper to his brother. “Definitely weird.”
    Frank looked at the paper. On it were three pairs of letters with numbers written on them.
    â€œAre you thinking what I’m thinking?” Joe asked his brother.
    Frank nodded. “It looks like we’ve just found some kind of coded message!”

3 The Human Cannonball
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    â€œWell, what do you know,” Joe said, looking at the slip of paper. “I get the feeling our juggler friend left us with more of a mystery than we thought.”
    â€œI wonder what this code means,” Chet said, taking the paper from Joe and reading the figures 1220, 103, and 214. “That’s a strange set of numbers,” he remarked.
    â€œAnd look at the letters next to them,” Frank said, pointing. “CN, JL, GU. I don’t see any patterns, do you?”
    Joe thought for a moment, quickly running down a sequence of simple codes he’d learned over the years. “Nope,” he said finally. “Frank, ifthis really is a coded message, that juggler was passing information, whether he knew it or not.”
    â€œBut why was he passing information to me?” Chet asked.
    Joe shook his head. “Who knows? But I think we had better try to find out.” He looked around the backstage area. The place was clearing out. Most of the guests had gone, and only a few circus performers remained. “I doubt we’ll learn anything here tonight, though,” Joe said.
    â€œYou’re right,” Frank agreed. “Let’s go home and see if we can crack this code.”
    â€œHey, guys,” Chet protested, pointing to the two halves of the gem-studded ball in Frank’s hand. “We can’t leave here with that. It belongs to the circus, or Circus U., depending on who that juggler was. We have to return it.”
    Joe reached out for the ball, which Frank had put back together. “We will,” he said firmly. “As soon as we find out just who this mystery juggler is and what he’s doing passing coded information.”
    â€¢Â â€¢Â â€¢
    The next morning, Joe woke up bright and early. He got out of bed, showered, and went down to the kitchen, taking the coded message with him.
    He read the numbers and letters on the slip of paper: CN—1220, JL—103, GU—214. “There’s got to be some way to crack this code,”he muttered to himself as he sat at the table and poured himself a bowl of cereal.
    Joe was still at it when Frank came down to breakfast half an hour later. “Any luck?” his brother asked, opening the refrigerator and taking out a pitcher of juice.
    â€œNope,” Joe said, shaking his head and staring once more at the arrangement of letters and numbers.
    â€œWhere is everyone?” Frank asked, sitting down next to his brother.
    â€œDad left a note saying he had to go out of town to the police headquarters in Philadelphia to run a check on someone. A new case, I guess.”
    Frank nodded. The brothers’ father, Fenton Hardy, was a private investigator, and his hours often started early and ended late. “What about Mom and Aunt Gertrude?” he asked.
    â€œThey left a note saying they’d be gone all day,” Joe said, looking up for