J.M.J.

Author's note: Wouldn't ya know it? When I finally start cranking out chapters quickly, this website is having a major glitch where it won't let anyone see new chapters! Just in case the issue gets resolved and you haven't read chapter 17 and 18 yet, be sure to go back and read them before reading this one!

Chapter XIX

Monday, May 10

Day Ten

"Look, Mr. Given, it's very important that you tell us everything that you do remember." Chief Osmund stood with his arms folded over his chest. His tone was calm, but there was a no-nonsense ring to it.

The young man sitting on the other side of the table was certainly much less calm. He kept shifting his weight and pushing his hair up off his forehead, revealing several stitches just below his hairline. His face was pale, and the others in the room thought he looked ill, which considering how near he had come to being killed less than two weeks ago was understandable.

He glanced at the other two men in the room, perhaps searching for some kind of comfort, but neither of them gave it. Lieutenant Durant seemed nervous himself, particularly in the presence of his superior. Fenton Hardy's face was stern. He knew that Marshall Given could shed some light on this whole twisted mess, and he wasn't about to encourage him to do anything less.

"I…I really don't remember anything," Marshall said again.

"What's the last thing you remember?" Osmund asked.

Marshall hesitated. "I…I don't know." He put his face in his hand.

Osmund rested his hands on the table and leaned forward slightly. "Are you trying to protect your sister?"

Marshall didn't move.

"If you are, it's not going to work." Osmund softened slightly. "We've got an idea what's going on here. If we're right, your sister has dug herself into a deeper hole than you realize. The safest place for her right now is jail."

At that, Marshall glanced up at him. "What do you think she's gotten into?"

"It's very complicated and going into the details just now would compromise our investigation," Osmund explained. "You're just going to have to trust us on this."

"Allison and I aren't really too close," Marshall said. "But she is my sister. Half-sister, anyway. How big of trouble is she in? Is someone trying to hurt her?"

"It does look that way, considering the attack on her," Osmund told him.

"Okay." Marshall ran his hand through his hair once again. "I, uh…It's kind of embarrassing to be honest. Angelo didn't hit me. We were having a fight, sure. Angelo and Allison were always coming to my place asking for money, as if I had any to give them. I had just paid the rent—I always pay it a few days early when I can, to try to appease my landlord for those months that I can't pay it on time—so I was completely tapped out. We had a fight about it. A big one. Angelo took a poke at me. I tried to defend myself, and that's the last I remember. I could just be not remembering the last couple minutes before getting knocked out, but honestly, I think Allison's the one who hit me."

Fenton and the officers all raised their eyebrows at this.

"Why would she do that?" Fenton asked.

"From what I hear happened later, probably to get Angelo in trouble," Marshall said. "Maybe when those other people—the Hardys—showed up, she thought she could get a hand-out if she played the poor, abused girlfriend card."

"But that would mean she would have had to know that they were coming before she hit you," Fenton pointed out.

"Then I don't know," Marshall said.

"Where was your sister living?" Osmund asked.

"With Angelo."

"Are you sure she hadn't moved in with you?"

"Of course, I'm sure. Is that what she's saying?" None of the men had to answer for Marshall to know that it was. He sighed. "Look, Allison—I don't think she means it, but she does lie, and about stupid things like that. Honestly, I don't think she can help it. So, you've kind of got to take everything she says with a grain of salt."

A thought was growing in the back of Fenton's mind. "You mentioned you thought she was looking for a hand-out. Is she the sort of person who will manipulate people to get what she wants out of them?"

Marshall looked at floor. "Yeah. I think she is."

"Does the name Rhett Gaint mean anything to you?" Fenton asked. Chief Osmund and Durant glanced at him with some element of confusion in their faces.

Marshall thought about it. "Allison's had about a zillion boyfriends, but yeah, I think that was one of them."

"How recent?"

"I don't keep track. I really don't care."

The interview ended shortly after that. Marshall was allowed to leave, and Fenton and the two officers remained in the same room to talk over what they had learned.

"It isn't much," Durant commented in disgust, "but I do think he was finally telling the truth."

Fenton nodded. "I agree. What he said about his sister is interesting. She sounds like a sociopath."

"But not necessarily like a serial killer, if that's what you're thinking," Osmund said. "How could a girl like that kidnap and murder? She's not big enough."

"She could drugged or incapacitated them in some other way," Fenton pointed out. "Additionally, she could have had help. Maybe she and Gaint were working together, the relationship went sour when Gaint attacked her, and she later killed him."

Osmund considered this a few moments. "Well, if we do have the killer here in this building, I feel a little better, but the important thing here is to try to find Iola Morton. If Allison Given is the one who is holding her, she's not going to tell us where she's at. She's refused to even say a word since we brought her in."

The discussion was interrupted by a knock on the door. Officer Ewing poked his head in. "Sorry for interrupting, Chief, but there's something I thought you'd want to know about."

"What is it?"

"The officers who have been keeping an eye on the Ferris house today just called in. They just saw David Ferris go in. I guess he's home after all."

"Maybe he'd answer some questions," Durant said.

HBHBHBHBHB

It wasn't much later that Osmund and Fenton knocked at the door of the Ferris house. Mrs. Ferris opened the door.

"Yes?" she asked. "Do you have some news about David?"

Fenton and Osmund glanced at one another.

"As a matter of fact, we do," Osmund said. "Good news, too. Two of my officers say they saw him come home."

Mrs. Ferris' face blanched. "They must be mistaken. I'd know if he was home."

"Aw, Mom, what's the use?" The voice came from behind Mrs. Ferris and she stepped aside slightly to reveal a teenage boy coming down a staircase. "Looks like we're busted. Anyway, it was starting to get to be a drag." He came out the door and stood on the porch. "I didn't do anything illegal, did I?"

"I don't know," Osmund told him. "What did you do? But first, just in case, I'd better read you your rights."

When he finished, David nodded. "I really don't think we did anything wrong. I was just hanging out at Marshall's place one day and his sister was there. She told me that some guy was going to pay her a bunch of money for doing a favor for him and I could get cut in if I wanted to. I was pretty suspicious at first."

"Oh, I'm sure," Osmund said, surprisingly mildly.

"I was," David insisted. "It sounded shady. But all he wanted was for me to refuse to talk to some people who were going to come to our house and to lay low until he said it was okay. Mom didn't even file a missing persons report, so we didn't do anything wrong."

"Then why haven't you said anything before?" Fenton asked.

"I really didn't think I did anything wrong, but I'm not stupid. I've seen the officers watching the house, and I started having second thoughts. I mean, maybe Mom and me didn't do anything wrong, but the guy who's paying me might have."
"Please, officer, what he's saying is true," Mrs. Ferris interjected. "We didn't do anything wrong at all."

Osmund didn't comment on that. Instead, he asked David, "Do you know who this guy is?"

"No. He didn't tell me his name, which did seem a little suspicious, I guess."

"Do you know what he looks like?" Osmund asked.

"Oh, sure. I'd recognize him if I saw him again."

Osmund took out an envelope and removed the photo of Rudger. "Is this the man?"

David barely glanced at it before he shook his head. "No. The guy who's paying me is way older. He's bald, too. Wears glasses. Kind of heavy. He doesn't look like a crook."

Fenton silently weighed the possibility of this being a disguise for Rudger, but he decided that was unlikely. It was far more likely that it was someone hired by Mayor Hodgefield, if Joe's theory about Hodgefield being behind all this was correct.

"I have some more pictures down at headquarters that I'd like you to look at," Osmund said. "If you can't identify any of those, I'd like to arrange to have a police artist make a sketch based on your description."

"Okay," David agreed. "What did the guy do?"

"I'm afraid I can't tell you that."

David nodded slowly. "It must be pretty bad, then. Okay. I'll do it. Just to show that I really am a good, upstanding citizen."

"Indeed," Osmund replied sarcastically, no doubt thinking of the impressive juvenile record that David had already racked up.

When they reached the police station again, Osmund showed David a photo of a man who fit the description David had given. Immediately, David nodded eagerly.

"That's the guy, all right," he declared. "Does he have a record or something?"

"No, but this is very helpful. Thank you," Chief Osmund told him. He called Officer Ewing in to show David out.

"I don't get it, Chief," said Durant, who had been present for the identification. "I think it's about time you level with me on this."

Osmund tapped the photo against his fingers a few times. "It'll have to wait a few more days. After all this time, I can't take any chances. You just keep focusing on that serial killer." He turned and left the room.

Fenton looked at Durant. "Who was that picture of?"

The confusion was still obvious on Durant's face. "Burt Rancaster, one of Mayor Hodgefield's staff."

Fenton took in a breath and nodded slowly. It looked like Joe's theory was right.

HBHBHBHBHB

Frank was half-asleep when a knock on his apartment door jolted him to wakefulness and caused him to scatter the books and papers that were resting on his lap. He had dozed off studying. He'd finished one final that day, but there were three more to go. After all the stress and adrenaline of the past ten days, the sudden inactivity of trying to study had lulled him to sleep.

There was another knock and this time it occurred to Frank that he should see who was at the door. He looked out before opening the door and saw that it was a mail carrier.

"Good afternoon," the man said as Frank opened the door. "I've got a certified letter for a Frank Hardy."

"I'm Frank Hardy," Frank told him.

The mail carrier held out an electronic device. "Just sign here, please."

Frank signed it and the man handed him a letter. As he closed the door again, Frank noticed that the return address was from the State of Massachusetts. It only took a moment for his foggy brain to realize that this had to be the list of birth records he had sent for last week and that knowledge woke him up entirely.

He ripped the envelope open and took out the single sheet of paper. The list was short: only one name. It appeared that Angela Carthage was the only person who had been born on August 28, 1975 in Southport. Frank let out a sigh of disappointment. The name meant nothing to him.

He remembered that there had been another date from the '70s: November 4, 1971. Maybe that was the serial killer's birth date. That made more sense, actually, if the dates really were events in the killer's life. There could have hardly been any such events before he was born.

Frank was still pondering this when his phone chimed to let him know he had received a text. It was from Iola's number again, although the message was a little longer than usual: Time's running out, Sir Galahad. Only three more days to find the Grail. August 21, 2007.

Author's note: Thank you so much for continuing to read! I am getting some emails for reviews even though they're not all showing up on the website, so I'm still seeing your feedback and appreciating it greatly! That's quite an idea, angelicalkiss! It looks like Fenton agrees it's possible, but unfortunately I can't say yay or nay on it. We'll find out soon, though. I can't believe how close we're getting to the end! Only about five to six chapters left!