The Secret of Phantom Lake Read online

  THE MYSTERY

  OF

  THE PHANTOM LAKE

  William Arden

  A Message from Alfred Hitchcock

  An ancient shipwreck! A pirate hoard! A ghost town! An island of phantoms!

  Confound that rascally juvenile confidence man, Jupiter Jones! How can I resist announcing this tale with such tantalizing elements in it?

  So once more I take up my pen to invite all adventurous readers to join me. But step carefully and look behind you, mystery and danger await all who follow The Three Investigators to Phantom Lake!

  For the deprived few who live in regions so remote that they are still ignorant of our trio, be informed that their annoyingly brainy leader is the overweight Jupiter Jones. Peter Crenshaw is the tall, muscular Second Investigator, and Bob Andrews is the small, but dogged, Research man.

  Residents of Rocky Beach, California, a town a few Miles north of Hollywood, they made their headquarters in a hidden mobile home trailer in The Jones Salvage Yard, owned by Jupiter’s aunt and uncle. From this hideaway they sally forth to foil the most clever villains and unravel the darkest of riddles.

  But now comes a riddle more than a hundred years old! Can even our formidable trio solve it? What is the secret locked in a yellowing letter and a long-lost sailor’s journal? Was a hoard of pirate treasure spirited from a sinking ship one stormy night long ago, and who are the shadowy men lurking in the path of the boys?

  Can the stubborn trio solve a message from the dead, and find the secret of Phantom Lake? And if they do, can they find it in time? We shall see!

  ALFRED HITCHCOCK

  Chapter 1

  The Sea Chest

  “WOW!” BOB ANDREWS cried. “It’s a real Malay Kris!”

  Eyes shining, Bob displayed the rippled blade of the long knife to his two companions, Jupiter Jones and Pete Crenshaw. The boys were in a roadside museum a few miles north of their home in Rocky Beach. Pete gently felt the wavy edge of the Kris and shuddered. Jupiter nodded wisely.

  “Many ships sailed from California to the East Indies in the old days,” Jupiter remarked. “A number of the artifacts in this little museum came from the Orient.”

  Pete and Bob groaned silently as Jupe began to lecture them. The stocky boy had a head full of interesting facts, but he tended to become unbearably pompous when sharing his knowledge.

  Aunt Mathilda Jones interrupted the lecture by calling across the room, “I’m more interested now in where these artifacts are going, Jupiter Jones! Stop loafing, you young scamps, and load the truck.”

  “Yes, Aunt Mathilda.” Jupiter said meekly. The tourist museum, which specialised in relics from old seafaring days, was closing down. Aunt Mathilda and Uncle Titus Jones had arranged to buy its small collection for resale in The Jones Salvage Yard, the most elegant junkyard on the West Coast.

  Aunt Mathilda really ran the salvage yard, as Uncle Titus was more interested in scouting for exciting new junk. A large, powerful, rather sharp-tongued woman, she was basically good-natured and kind. But when she saw boys around, she had only one idea: put them to work! Jupiter, who lived with his uncle and aunt, tried to keep out of Aunt Mathilda’s way. He and his two friends had their own important business to attend to, running their junior detective firm, The Three Investigators. But this morning Aunt Mathilda had spotted the boys in the junkyard and demanded their help. On the very first day of Christmas vacation, they were trapped!

  Sighing, the boys began to carry items outside to Hans, one of the two big Bavarian brothers who worked at the salvage yard. Noting the boys’ expressions, Hans mischievously started to whistle “Jingle Bells” as he loaded the yard’s pickup truck.

  Aunt Mathilda watched the boys for a moment, then returned to taking inventory with the museum’s owner, Mr. Acres.

  When the inventory was finished, Aunt Mathilda went to help the boys pack some boxes at the back of the exhibition room. Mr. Acres went to the entrance hall to tend to a visitor who had just come in. Moments later, the boys and Aunt Mathilda heard a voice shouting at Mr. Acres.

  “I don’t care who you promised it to!”

  Mr. Acres’s voice was soothing. “Please now, sir !”

  “It’s mine,” the angry voice cried, “and I want it now!”

  The voice was hoarse and rasping with a menacing edge. Aunt Mathilda hurried towards the entrance hall with the boys behind her. As they reached Mr. Acres, he was saying, “I’m sorry, but I’ve sold everything in the museum to The Jones Salvage Yard.

  No exceptions.”

  Mr. Acres was standing over an ornate Oriental teakwood chest bound with heavily decorated brass.

  Facing the owner across the chest was a short man with a full black beard. His glittering dark eyes were set deep in a weather-wrinkled, sunburned face. Two long scars ran down his cheek into the beard. He wore a heavy, sailor’s pea-jacket, dark blue bell-bottom trousers, and a merchant sailor’s cap with faded brass braid.

  The short stranger glared at Mr. Acres and snarled, “I’m making an exception, you hear me? The chest belongs to me, and I aim to have it back. I’m warning you!”

  Mr. Acres bristled. “Now you listen to me, my man! I?”

  “The name’s Jim,” the stranger growled. “Java Jim, they call me, and I brought that chest a long cruise. There’s danger in that chest, you hear?”

  The boys gulped. Java Jim turned his glittering eyes on them and muttered an oath.

  “What do you brats want, eh?” he snarled. “Sail off now, you hear? The old lady there, too – Shove away!”

  Jupiter looked quickly at Aunt Mathilda and suppressed a grin. Aunt Mathilda’s face was turning beetroot red.

  “What!” Aunt Mathilda roared at the sailor. “What did you say to me, you bearded clown! If I wasn’t a lady I’d throw you out of here myself!”

  Stunned by Aunt Mathilda’s fury, the sailor fell back with the large woman following him.

  “It seems you’ve made an error, Mr. Java Jim,” said Mr. Acres with a smile. “This lady happens to own The Jones Salvage Yard. The chest you want belongs to her now.”

  Java Jim blinked. “I… Well, I’m right sorry, ma’am. It’s just my hot temper, I do apologize, no offence meant. Been on ships too long, round just men, eh? And now that I’ve found my chest, I just lost my head.”

  All the violent anger seemed to have gone out of the bearded man. Aunt Mathilda calmed down as quickly as she had exploded. She nodded at the Oriental chest, which the three boys were now examining.

  “If that chest belongs to you, how did it get here?” Aunt Mathilda asked.

  “Stolen, ma’am,” Java Jim replied promptly. “Some scoundrel stole it right off my ship two weeks ago when we hit port up in San Francisco. Sold it to a secondhand dealer on the waterfront up there. But the dealer had sent it down here before I got to him, so I came after it.”

  “Well …” Aunt Mathilda began slowly.

  Bob, who had the chest open now, pointed to the inside of the raised lid. “There’s a name on the lid – Argyll Queen. Was that the name of your ship, Mr. Java?”

  “No, boy,” Java Jim said. “It’s an old chest, probably been through fifty hands over the years. That name was in it when I bought it in Singapore.”

  Mr. Acres said, “I did get it just

  yesterday from Walt Baskins in San

  Francisco, Mrs. Jones. I had a standing

  order with him for any items of local

  interest for the museum. I forgot to cancel

  the order when I decided to sell out.”

  “I’m ready to pay a fair price,” Java

  Jim said quickly.

  “Well,” Aunt Mathilda said again, “I

  suppose it belongs to you. You can pay

  what it cost Mr. Acres, and…”

  A sudden whirring sound filled the

  museum.

  “What??” Bob began, and looked up

  from the old chest.

  There was a sharp click. A flash in the

  light and a short, wicked dagger whizzed

  past Jupiter’s ear and buried itself in the

  wall!

  Chapter 2

  Danger – Past and Present

  FOR A LONG moment everyone froze. The dagger quivered in the wall. Then Aunt Mathilda hurried to Jupiter.

  “Are you all right, Jupiter?” she cried.

  Jupe nodded but sat down weakly on an old bench. The dagger had missed his ear by inches!

  “Who threw it?” Mr. Acres cried, glancing wildly round.

  Java Jim said, “Don’t go looking at me!”

  “N-n-no one threw it,” Bob stammered. “It came out of the chest!”

  Mr. Acres went over to the chest and looked inside. “Good heavens!” he said.

  “There’s a secret compartment in the bottom! It’s open now! Bob must have touched some hidden mechanism that opened it.”

  “The dagger must have been inside the secret compartment,” Bob continued, “on a spring that released when the compartment was opened! A booby trap!”

  “To stab anyone who found the hiding place!” Pete exclaimed.

  Aunt Mathilda strode towards Java Jim. “If this was your work, I’ll have you!”

  “I don’t know anything about any booby trap!” tile bearded sailor declared angrily.

  “No,” Jupiter said suddenly. The colour was back in his face now. He pulled the dagger out of the wall and studied the deadly weapon. “It’s an Oriental dagger, pro
bably East Indian. I’ll bet that booby trap was set a hundred years ago by East Indian pirates!”

  “Wow!” Pete said.

  “Pirates?” Bob cried.

  His eyes sparkling, Jupiter carried the old dagger to the chest and bent down to examine the spring mechanism inside the secret compartment, He nodded triumphantly.

  “See! The spring and catch are handmade and rusty,” the stocky boy said.

  “Definitely old work. This is a typical East Indian booby trap to protect hidden valuables. Perhaps the work of Javanese or Malayan pirates!”

  “Java like in Java Jim!”

  Everyone looked at the bearded sailor again.

  “Hold on now,” Java Jim said. “It’s just a nickname I got when I was young because I lived in Java awhile. I don’t know anything about any pirates!”

  Pete groaned. “I don’t even know where Java is.”

  “It’s a big island in Indonesia,” Jupiter explained. “Along with Sumatra and New Guinea and Borneo and Celebes and several thousand smaller islands. Indonesia is an independent country now, but in the old days it was a colony, the Dutch East Indies.

  It used to be full of hundreds of little kingdoms called sultanates, ruled by local sultans who were mostly pirates!”

  “You mean like Blackbeard?” Pete asked. “Sailing ships, and cannons, and the skull-and-crossbones and all that?”

  “Not exactly, Pete,” Jupiter answered a trifle pompously. “Those were the hallmarks of Western pirates. Blackbeard was English, you know. The East Indian pirates had no big ships or Jolly Roger flags, and few cannon. They were natives who lurked in hundreds of East Indian islands in small rivers and villages and attacked European and American ships by boarding them in swarms.

  “The Western ships were there to get pepper and other spices, and tin, and tea and silks from China. Our ships carried manufactured goods for trading and also many bags of gold and silver for purchasing Oriental products. The East Indian pirates attacked the sailing ships to steal money and weapons. Sometimes our ships would retaliate and attack the pirates in their lairs. The pirates had all kinds of defence tricks, including booby traps in chests.”

  Bob said, “You mean our sailors would try to steal back what the pirates stole?

  You think this booby trap comes from way back then, Jupe?”

  “I’m certain of it, Bob. Although,” he added thoughtfully, “they do say that there are small bands of pirates still hidden in the remote islands.”

  “Jupe, look!” Pete cried. The tall boy had been rummaging in the old chest. Now he held up a small, shiny object. “A ring! It was in the secret Compartment!”

  “Is there anything else?” Bob exclaimed.

  Java Jim pushed Pete aside and bent over the chest. “Let’s see! No, curse the luck, nothing else!”

  Jupiter took the ring from Pete. It was intricately carved in what could have been gold or brass. The design was Oriental, and a red stone gleamed in the centre.

  “Is it real, Jupe?” asked Pete.

  “I don’t know, Pete. It could be. They had a lot of real gold and jewels in the Indies. But they had a lot of fake stuff, too. Trinkets traded by Europeans to natives who couldn’t tell the difference.”

  Java Jim reached out for the ring.

  “Real or fake, boy, the ring’s mine, eh? The chest was stolen from me, and everything in it is mine,” the bearded sailor said. “Name your price, I’ll take my chest.”

  “Well, let me see,” Aunt Mathilda began.

  Jupiter spoke quickly, “We don’t know the chest is his, Aunt Mathilda. His name isn’t on it, and all we have is his story.”

  “You calling me a liar, boy?” Java Jim growled.

  “Show us a bill of sale,” Jupiter said stoutly, “or some witnesses who saw you buy it, or knew you had it on your ship.”

  “All my shipmates saw the chest! Now you …”

  “Then,” Jupiter said firmly, “I suggest we hold the chest at the salvage yard, and promise not to sell it for a week while you bring proof. I’m sure you can wait a few days.”

  “That sounds fair to me,” Mr. Acres said.

  Java Jim glared. “Blast you, I’ve had enough! I’m taking what’s mine, and don’t try to stop me!” He advanced on Jupiter, his hoarse voice threatening. “First I want that ring, boy. Hand it over.”

  As the sailor closed in on him, Jupiter backed towards the outside doorway.

  “Now look here you!” cried Aunt Mathilda.

  “Shut up, curse you!” Java Jim snapped.

  A large shadow appeared in the open doorway. Hans, the big, blond helper at the salvage yard, came into the museum.

  “You will not talk so to Aunt Mathilda,” Hans said. “You will apologise, yes.”

  “He’s trying to take a ring from Jupiter and steal that chest, Hans!” Bob cried.

  “Get him, Hans!” ordered Jupe.

  “I get him,” Hans said, and lunged forward.

  With another oath, Java Jim flung Mr. Acres into Hans’s path and ran to the back of the museum.

  “After him!” Pete yelled.

  But Hans stumbled over Mr. Acres and careered into the boys. By the time they had all untangled themselves, Java Jim had escaped out of the back door. A car started somewhere behind the museum. When the boys ran outside, all they saw was a cloud of dust where the car had vanished up the coast highway and round a steep hill.

  “And good riddance,” Aunt Mathilda said. “Now we can finish loading the truck.”

  “Gosh,” Bob said, “I wonder why he wanted that chest?”

  Just trying to steal a good chest, I’m sure,” Aunt Mathilda said. “Get to work, boys. We’ll need another trip as it is.”

  An hour later the truck was loaded as full as it could be, and Hans and Aunt Mathilda got into the cab. Mr. Acres helped the boys climb into the back. Jupiter was frowning.

  “Mr. Acres,” the stocky leader of the trio said slowly,” you said that the dealer in San Francisco, Mr. Baskins, sent you that chest because it was of local interest?”

  “That’s right, Jupiter,” Mr. Acres said. “That name in it, Argyll Queen, is the name of a ship that sank just off Rocky Beach about a hundred years ago. Small items sometimes turn up from the ship, and I display them.”

  “Of course,” Jupiter said. “That big square-rigger that hit a reef in 1870. I remember now.”

  The truck drove off, and the boys settled down in the back. Jupiter seemed lost in thought, so Bob and Pete talked and looked at the scenery. Then Pete began to frown.

  As the truck drove into the salvage yard, he leaned close to Jupiter.

  “Jupe! I think someone followed us! A green Volkswagen was behind us all the way, and it just came into our street!”

  The boys jumped from the truck and hurried to the front gate of the yard. A green VW was parked across the street. But before the boys could see who was in it, the small car suddenly drove off with squealing tyres.

  “Gosh,” Pete said. “You think it was that Java Jim?”

  “Perhaps,” Jupiter said. “But he escaped from the museum in the other direction, Pete.”

  “Maybe someone else wants that old chest,” Bob said.

  “Or is interested in the wreck of the Argyll Queen” Jupiter said. His eyes were bright as he sensed a mystery. “This could be a case for The Three Investigators!

  Well?”

  “So there you are!” Aunt Mathilda appeared behind the boys. “That truck won’t unload itself. Get to work, boys.”

  Sheepishly, the three boys returned to the truck and began to unload it. The mystery of the old chest would have to wait!

  Chapter 3

  The Wreck of the Argyll Queen

  IT WAS NOON before the truck was unloaded. Aunt Mathilda went across the street to the Jones house to prepare lunch. The boys hurried at once to the old chest.

  “We’ll study it in Headquarters,” Jupiter said. “You two carry it. There’s something I have to do first.”

  The stout boy ran ahead, leaving Bob and Pete standing over the big, heavy chest.

  With sighs of protest, Pete picked up one end and Bob the other. They struggled over to Jupe’s outdoor workshop in a comer of the junkyard. Beneath the workbench began Tunnel Two, a large galvanised pipe that ran back under a mountain of junk to the secret headquarters of The Three Investigators!

  Headquarters was an old, damaged mobile home trailer that the boys had fixed up. Outside, it was hidden from sight by carefully placed stacks of junk. Inside was a modern office, complete with darkroom, lab, desk, typewriter, tape recorder, and telephone. There was a periscope for seeing out over the surrounding junk, and all sorts of special detective equipment, mostly of Jupiter’s invention.