Chapter Ten
Homecoming
Itsmeocean@hotmail.com
"Did we get anything?" Frank asked a policeman who had his headphone off. Joe was still immobilized on the couch but instead of Vanessa, who had returned to her quietly piqued husband's side, Elle had taken position next to him, keeping silent while placing a sanitized hand on his thigh. Vanessa and Greg argued in hushed whispers.
Looks like someone's not pleased by his wife's show of concern for her ex-husband. Frank noted silently to himself with a slight frown- he did not exactly approve of what Vanessa did as well.
The policeman, just a couple of years older than Frank with curly black hair trapping dust on top of his head, shook his head. When he did so, Frank changed his mind. It wasn't dust. The man was suffering from a bad case of dandruff.
"No… we couldn't trace the call, make that, it can't be trace. Most likely, it's from a pre-paid SIM card. There's no way we can nab down the exact location of a pre-paid SIM card or find out who's the buyer."
Chief Collig stretched his lips thinly. "Sorry Fenton. Maybe we can run the tape on the audio analyzer. See if we can come up with anything."
"I think that'll be a good idea. I thought I heard some background noises but I can't be sure. Dad, can we use yours in the study?" Frank asked immediately, not wanting Chief Collig to leave with the precious bit of evidence because he knew once it was in the hands of the police, it would take a long time before he could informally retrieve it for further investigation.
Owing to the nature of the case, Chief Collig relented after taking one look at Joe's shell-shocked anger which was only slowly leaving his tortured features.
"Yes, of course. Let's go see what we can find."
"Joe? Coming?" Frank went over to his brother and gently shook his shoulders. "Hey…"
Joe looked up at Frank and his features relaxed. "Huh? Oh… of course. We'll get something from there, right?"
"Yes, we will. C'mon." Frank stretched out a hand which Joe took gratefully. Elle stood up as well. "Vanessa, Greg… there's too many people going up so…"
"It's ok. We understand. We'll wait here." Vanessa looked away from her fuming husband and, with begging eyes, almost pleaded with Frank. "Come back with something, anything."
Frank smiled grimly, not wanting to promise anyone anything. He was not being pessimistic but he just hated to bring up hopes only to send them tumbling down when he could not deliver.
Moments later, he, Joe, Elle, Fenton and Chief Collig had gathered in Fenton's impressive study. Fenton slipped the tape into the player while Frank started the computer and called out the audio analyzing software before slipping the headphones over his ears. He didn't even bother sitting down on the leather armchair- somehow, when he was working standing up, he seemed to think better.
As the conversation played through once, giving Frank a sense of what he needed to look out for, it was recorded into the computer, ready for analysis. Frank, at that moment, was grateful that he had convinced Fenton to invest in some investigative software and actually taught his dad how to fiddle around with them. This powerful, custom-made software which he employed Phil to program for him was never needed until now. While it was residing in Fenton's hard disk like a white elephant and probably costing like one too, Frank often had to bear with his father's grumbles about how an acute mind and sharp senses were all that were needed to solve a case. Nonetheless, Fenton was the most up-to-date private investigator of his era that Frank ever knew and took his father's grouses with a huge pinch of salt.
"I hear some rumbling here." Frank adjusted some frequencies after which he scrolled the toolbar to-and-fro over a certain range. "Most likely, it's a train."
"A train? Are you positive?" Fenton asked.
Frank fiddled around with the functions and nodded positively. "Yes… it is a train, definitely. But it sounded far away. There's more." He concentrated now on another portion, the part when the man spoke about striking again and again. Now that he heard for himself what Joe had to listen to, he could comprehend how his brother almost had a nervous breakdown. He would as well. An undulating chilling sensation ran down his spine with each change of tone the kidnapper used and when he bade farewell to Joe in that childish manner, Frank winced with phantom pain as his stomach knotted up in several twists.
"A faint hissing sound. Like a snake, iguana, some giant lizard… I'll go with snake from how the man described himself. Strike. Paralysis. Fork tongue. Venom." Frank slipped the earphones off. "I have a friend who studies reptiles. He could shed light on the description the man used when talking about himself and narrow down to some species for us. Maybe we can generate a list of collectors or something and compare them with whatever we know."
"Hissing. Snake. Yah, that's the right kind of pet for the devil!" Joe barked. "I'll skin that snake alive and feed it to dogs."
"Joe…" Elle cautioned, placing a hand on Joe's shoulder. Frank wondered if Joe was sick of people doing that to him. "What else, Frank?"
"No… nothing much of interest though I'm surprised that he knows so much about Joe's history with Vanessa. How did he know about the fact that they wanted to abort the child in the first place?"
"You mean abort Hallie, Frank. Don't mince words. He's right. The intention… I'm a lousy father…" Joe tugged at his collar. "It's really hot in here."
"You didn't, Joe. Besides… the two of you were young, rash and helpless…"
"Let's not talk about that, bro. Train… the phone call came around one-thirty. We can check with the Bayport Train Terminal… see if there're any trains that were supposed to call at the station around that time." Joe stood up and walked over the phone, punching in the numbers for the Train Terminal.
Or at least the number he thought belonged to it.
"Joe, they changed their numbers after moving the station to Lower End."
"Oh…" Joe was momentarily stunned by his father's interruption. He held on to the receiver still, unsure of what to do. The helplessness rounding his mouth in a small 'O', making him look fourteen instead of twenty-four, broke just about everybody's heart in the room, at least, Frank knew his was twisted up achingly. He made his way to Joe at the side table and gripped his brother's shoulders firmly.
"Why don't I do it?"
"Ok…" Joe shrugged away the contact. "Whatever."
Frank watched his brother stumbling gawkily back to the couch in the study worriedly. The phone call had definitely pushed all the right buttons to get Joe all riled up and now, without the anger to mask his fear, Joe was falling into a very vulnerable state of losing all hope. He had to remind Joe that they had clues to work with and evidence often told the story better than most.
"Hello. Is this Bayport Train Terminal? I'll like to know if there's a train that's supposed to be call in at around one-thirty?... There's one that called in just only at one-forty eight? Thank you very much." Frank put the receiver down just as the woman was about to tell him where the train was calling from. Fenton Hardy had already took out the map of Bayport and spread it out on his study table after hurriedly clearing it of all his criminology books and notes scattered all over the top.
"One-forty eight. The train was about fifteen minutes away from the station when it passed by near to where the kidnapper was. The average speed of our train is about 100mph." Fenton punched some numbers into the gigantic calculator on his table and then pointed at a spot on the map somewhere in the middle of the forest which bordered Bayport and Port City to the west.
"I'm calling to get an overhead view…" Chief Collig informed them while his right ear was already plastered to his mobile.
"Frank, remember the cabin down at the water hole in the forest? We used to hike there with the gang in summer for a swim. There's this rotting, abandoned cabin hidden behind the trees… do you think he could be holding Hallie there?" Joe, having snapped out of his trance-like state, was once again in clear faculties. Frank stared at the map, letting intuition and estimation guide him before nodding.
"Yes. That shack should be around the area."
Joe looked at all them with crazed, hopeful eyes. "What are we waiting for? Let's move it!"
Elle stood up and pursed her lips. "You guys go ahead. I think I'll rather check out the footprints. And the snake lead plus how he knew about Joe and Vanessa's history should be more fruitful, though I can't imagine how."
"Elle, the case is solved! We know where Hallie is…" Joe stared at her incredulously only to be met with skeptical eyes. Frank had a hunch that Elle had arrived at one of the conclusions he had- that the man was just fooling around with them, stringing them along like they were puppets. That all the evidence they found so far were planted deliberately by the man.
But he had to have hope- if only for Joe and Hallie's sake.
"I want to be as optimistic as you guys but think about it. This guy is someone who went through great lengths to mask his identity. His prints were obviously burned off so we cannot do an AFIS match. He digitalized his voice so we cannot do a voice match as well and I don't think he'll be so careless as to let the sound of a train blow his hideout- I think if you guys call the station to ask if there was a train calling in about the same time as when the kidnapper called the first time round but couldn't get Joe, the answer will be yes. He's most probably leading us on a leash, knowing we'll be looking out for these indications and having a great time imagining us running to the place to find him. He's probably already gone. Maybe he isn't even there in the first place. I'm having doubts about the shoe prints too but I made a call to the airlines earlier to reserve a few tickets to LA while you were all going gaga over the conversation. I take it that I'll be going alone, though."
Frank kept silent- looking at Elle from a different view. While he could find comfort and triumph in supporting views from kindred minds in ordinary times, having someone second his ideas in this instance was actually disturbing for, if what he thought was true, then Joe's wild hope would be dash and there would no telling how Joe would react.
In addition, it would make the case more complicated and Hallie much more difficult to find- taking a longer time and time was definitely not on their side.
The two older men in the room stared at her with some disbelief but Fenton's seasoned detective senses probably heard quite a lot of validation in what Elle had said.
Joe was not as stubborn as he had thought as well. Instead of cajoling Elle, his kid brother actually nodded. "Go, Elle. I don't think you can reach there in time to do much but you can have some head start in case we… we don't succeed."
Frank smiled at her sincerely, making eye contact with those burning hazel orbs. "Don't take this wrong way- I'm glad you thought of it. But I'm hoping that you're wrong and the guy's just an amateur at this cop and psycho game."
"Psycho…" Elle clucked her tongue, exchanging a look with Joe. Joe chuckled mirthlessly at the silent message exchanged fleetingly between the both of them.
"Go, Psycho. I'm crossing my fingers that you're wrong too… but I'm trying to be calm here. If we are wrong, at least you'll be LA with some clues about how we can proceed. Damage control."
Elle lifted her shoulders in a half-shrugged before embracing her partner lightly. "For your sake, I'm letting my ego crumble and hoping with all my heart, I'm mistaken." She leaned over and whispered something into Joe's ear that Frank could not catch. For the first time, after she pulled away, Frank saw a smile on the ice-princess face lifted to give comfort as she patted Joe's shoulder.
"The helicopter and our squad team are on their way." Chief Collig looked up from his cell phone. "Let's go."
