Hardy Detective Agency featuring Hardy Boys Fan Fiction

Chet

Frank came home about a half hour later and I knew that something was wrong. I mean obviously something was wrong, his brother was missing, but there was something more than that.

He walked straight through the living room and into his bedroom. Only Biff and I were in the house at the time, we had just come back from a particularly frustrating evening walking around the dodgier parts of town looking for the Invisible Man.

We could hear his voice, low and slightly muffled a few moments later. We couldn’t hear what Frank was saying and anyway it wasn’t any of our business at that stage, but we couldn’t help but catch snatches of the conversation, which was obviously quite heated. What was even more unusual than that was the fact that Frank seemed to be arguing with his father.

………”I know it doesn’t seem possible Dad, but I’m telling you….”

……..”No, I can’t prove it at the moment but….”

…….”LISTEN to me Dad, ring Sam, please, just ring him…. I don’t want to believe it’s true but if it is....”

The n Frank’s voice lowered somewhat and they could hear no more. After another few moments he emerged from the room, looking pale and wretched. Sitting down heavily on the couch, Frank Hardy scrubbed his hand over his face.

Now Joe I can read like a book, but then so can anyone; that boy wears his heart firmly on his sleeve. Sometimes he can hide it, if he really, really has to, but generally his eyes give it away.

Not that we are given to many deep and meaningful conversations, mind you; most of the time it’s typical machismo of the highest order: who can eat the most, who has the nicer car; you know, the usual. But sometimes, just the very odd time, we do talk, about Iola, about Frank, about the past.

I know that we’ve had some, well, issues since Iola died. It was awkward for a while; he had a lot of guilt, and I had a lot of guilt. His was understandable, but totally unjustified. I mean, I couldn’t really blame him, could I? Because he could easily have died, he or Frank.

What I’m trying to say is that I didn’t blame him, honestly, and that wasn’t what caused the strain, what made me avoid him for that short while.

What got to me was the fact that he had gotten to spend that last day with her, and most of the previous ones. I took my sister for granted, because she was just always there, and I thought that she always would be. Joe seemed to know more about her in a few months than I did in 16 years. THAT was what bugged me. But that wasn’t his fault, and in time I got over it.

Anyhow, that’s not the point; the point was that Frank is trickier to approach. I mean he doesn’t talk about things as much.

Chet and Biff looked at each other warily. The y didn’t want to pry but knew that one of them had to. An unspoken conversation borne out of a lifetime of friendship ensued, and Biff stood up from the easy chair he had been occupying and, putting a hand on Frank’s shoulder, he wandered casually into the kitchen.

Chet sat down heavily on the couch beside Frank. “What’s up?” he asked as casually as possible. “I mean, besides the obvious” he added quickly.

Frank looked at Chet. He had been his and Joe’s friend for as long as he could remember, but somehow, he was always that bit closer to Joe, ‘probably because Joe let people in more easily’ he thought.

So he told Chet about Callie’s phone call, about going to the bars, and about seeing the video with Fenton Radley on it.

Chet had met Fenton a couple of times, he had even spent a weekend in his house with the Hardys many years previously. He had thought the boy a little shy and spoilt, but just thought that it was a result of being an only child. He would never in a million years have imagined that this man, who was the son of someone that was closer to the Hardys than family, could do this, could kidnap Joe.

“Are you sure?” he finally managed to ask.

Frank nodded miserably, his face reflecting the utter betrayal and despair that he was feeling at that time.

“I can’t believe it Chet; you know, I just can’t.”

The re was silence for a couple of minutes. Chet honestly didn’t know what to say and he knew that there was no point in trying to console his friend.

Frank stood up abruptly and started dialling his cell-phone. He was obviously talking to his father again, and in about fifteen minutes Fenton Hardy too walked through the door. I called Tony and Callie on their cell phones and told them all to head back here. I figured that Frank and his Dad would come up with some kind of plan.

What I didn’t figure on was the conversation that ensued between the pair of them when Fenton walked in to the living room.

Fenton Hardy looked as if he had aged twenty years in a matter of hours; there even seemed to be more grey hairs on his head than usual. Chet knew that wasn’t possible, but still, he looked…devastated.

Chet stood up and started walking into the kitchen, but the elder Hardy stopped him. “No, Chet,” Fenton began, his voice weary and full of pain. “You might as well stay; we’re all here to find Joe after all.”

The n Fenton looked over at his son. Frank was standing by the window, staring at the floor, not meeting his father’s piercing gaze. Fenton walked over and put one hand on his son’s shoulder.

“You were right, Frank, and so was Callie, and Laura.”

“I know, Dad,” Frank replied, and when he looked up at his father Fenton could see tears forming in his eyes. “I saw him, I saw him, Dad, talking to Jimmy Harris.”

Fenton simply nodded. He wasn’t surprised that Frank had kept going until he found proof, that was his way.

The n he paused and turned away, suddenly. Chet was standing awkwardly on the other side of the room. He didn’t want to be there, he felt almost like an intruder, but it was almost as if Fenton Hardy needed him to be there.

“I talked to Sam,” Fenton said finally, sitting down in the easy chair beside Frank. “He’s still staying with your mother in Bayport.”

“And?” Frank asked. At the mention of his father’s oldest friend, Frank Hardy couldn’t help but feel anger. For some reason he was tying them together, Fenton and his Dad….

“Was he involved too?” Frank burst out suddenly. “Did he know Dad, did he?? If he did, then Mom’s in danger, why—”

“NO, Frank!” Fenton Hardy hadn’t meant to raise his voice, but he wanted to stop his son from saying anything more. “I’ve worked with Sam for more years than I care to admit to. He loves you, and Joe. He didn’t know anything. He yelled and raved and said how dare I…and then I asked him where was Fenton at that moment, and he told me that he was back in New York , at home.“

“ The n he hung up on me, and ten minutes later he rang me back and told me that Fenton wasn’t there anymore. His wife told him that Fenton had left ten minutes after Sam had got into the car to drive to Bayport. She hadn’t heard from him. And now nobody knows where he is, and it turns out that he’s been suffering from bouts of depression.

“And when Sam got his wife to search through Fenton’s old room, she had found a scrapbook on the top of the wardrobe, filled with newspaper cuttings, mostly of Joe, on the football field, getting medals, solving mysteries. And each one of them had the face blotted out.”

Frank Hardy was silent, and Chet could see that he was having a hard time coming to terms with what his father was saying.

“How could he not have known, Dad?” he finally burst out.

“Because Fenton is his son, Frank; no one ever wants to believe that their sons or daughters would cause harm to anyone. You’ll understand that when you have kids.”

The re really wasn’t much that anyone could say at that moment. Fenton looked so shattered, so utterly despondent, and Frank, well, Frank looked lost, as if he had believed in something for so many years and all of a sudden that belief had been shattered.

Fenton said that Sam was on a plane at that moment, and that he was going to do everything possible to help them find his son…and hopefully, Joe.

Hopefully.