In Private Killer, Frank and Joe continue their undercover investigation of Gamma Theta Theta, a mysterious-turned-dangerous fraternity at an all-boys New England boarding school. The headmaster’s meddlesome, trouble-making daughter is in danger, and it seems like the fraternity members—and even some faculty—will stop at nothing to protect their secrets.
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About the Author
Franklin W. Dixon is the bestselling author of The Hardy Boys series.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
1
The Writing on the Wall
Just once, I thought as I stared at the two buckets full of red liquid, couldn’t it be cherry cough syrup? Killer, the former police dog turned school mascot, seemed to know exactly what it was. He growled low and deep at the buckets. I stepped up and held up my finger, which I’d just dipped into the fluid to confirm my suspicion.
My stomach churned. “Looks like we’ve got another mystery on our hands.”
“Blood?” my brother Frank asked.
Everyone around me—except for Frank—immediately drew back.
“What kind of sick person would do something like that?” asked Mr. Marks. His face was pale, and he sounded genuinely disgusted, which was almost funny considering that his son Ellery had just been found responsible for the death of one student and the serious wounding of another. In fact, if I had to take a guess as to “what kind of sick person” would do something like this, I’d pretty much lay my money on Ellery. Speaking of which . . .
“Where’s Ellery?”
The adults looked around in confusion. Could Ellery have taken this opportunity to make a run for it? Frank nodded at me and rushed outside to look for him.
“He’s here,” Frank yelled a second later. I was about to ask what he was doing out there, when an unmistakable sound echoed around the walls of the little cabin.
BLUGH—BLUGH—BLEAAARGH!
Sounded like Ellery, for all his murderous ways, couldn’t handle the sight of blood. I wasn’t that surprised really. He seemed pretty unstable—he’d killed someone just to get out of having to join the fraternity his father had been in! Talk about overreacting. This didn’t seem like him. Buckets of blood were too cold and calculating.
It was pretty clear Ellery knew nothing about the blood. And from his reaction, it didn’t look likehis father did either. So what were two buckets of blood doing in an abandoned hut in the middle of nowhere on the grounds of the exclusive Willis Firth Academy? Whose blood was it? Something told me that this case wasn’t as over as we’d thought it was. Seems like Ellery wasn’t the only one making trouble around here.
“Whose hut is this, anyway?” I asked Dr. Darity.
He shrugged. “I didn’t even know this existed,” he said. “I’ll look into it, but there have been a lot of renovations done to the grounds over the years. Who knows when it was built?”
“Well, until we have more information, we need to have security watching this place. No one gets in or out.”
“I think I can help with that,” said Mr. Marks. “I can leave behind one of my private security detail. Just until the school can hire security of their own, of course.”
“Thank you, but—”
Mr. Marks cut Dr. Darity off. “No need to thank me. But perhaps some of the more . . . sordid details of the events of the past few hours could be kept quiet?”
Guess he didn’t want the whole world knowing his son had gone off the deep end. I couldn’t blame him for that.
“Of course the school will be discrete, Mr.—”
“Good,” Mr. Marks said. “I will be removing Ellery from the school immediately. Your organization—what’s it called again? ALAC? ALAS?”
“ATAC,” I said. I’d forgotten that Mr. Marks and Ellery knew all about our real reason for being at the school. That made me nervous; I wondered who else knew.
“Right. ATAC has suggested a place where Ellery might be taken care of until he is recovered from this illness. He and I will be heading there by private jet tomorrow. You may keep my bodyguard for as long as necessary. Oh, and Dr. Darity—I assume that none of this unpleasantness will interfere with the Annual Firth-Blair Benevolence Weekend next week. Because as the head of the alumni association, I can assure you, people would be upset. Everyone wants the big game to go on.”
With that, he turned and left. I heard him grab Ellery on the way out. Frank came back in. Dr. Darity had his head in his hands.
“What am I going to tell the students?” he mumbled. “What am I going to tell the parents? This is a disaster.”
“You can’t mention this to anyone,” said Frank. “Until we figure out more about whose blood this is, this could cause a panic—which is exactly what this person seems to want. Someone is out to get this school.”
“Yeah,” I added. “And we’re out to get them first.” I wanted to ask him more about this weekend thing and the upcoming game. I’d heard students talking about it since we’d arrived on campus, and it seemed like a big deal. But now wasn’t the time.
Frank pulled out a square black case from his back pocket, about the size of an MP3 player. He flipped it open. One side was lined with all sorts of things: tiny bottles, tweezers, eye droppers, etc. The other side was a tiny computer we’d nicknamed JuDGE: Junior Data Gathering Equipment. It was wirelessly connected to a giant mainframe computer at ATAC headquarters. Any evidence placed within the computer’s main compartment would be remotely analyzed within a few hours.
Frank pulled on a pair of rubber gloves and carefully drew up a sample of blood from one of the buckets. He placed a single drop inside the open compartment in JuDGE’s center, then closed the tiny plastic window. Instantly, the computer came to life and began transmitting information home. Frank folded it shut and put it back inside his pocket.
“There,” he said. “It should be able to tell us where it came from pretty quickly. And if there’s a match for the source in our database, we might even get some specific information by morning.”
“You boys don’t think it’s—it couldn’t be—I mean, it’s not . . . human, is it?” asked Dr. Darity.
Frank and I exchanged a look.
“That much blood? There’s no way,” I told Dr. Darity. “Besides, no one else has been reported injured, right?”
Dr. Darity nodded.
“We’d have heard about it by now if it came from a student. This is probably just a prank. I bet someone bought it from a butcher shop or something.” I hope, I added silently.
Just then a big beefy guy in a bad gray suit peeked in the door. He was built like a man-mountain.
“Mr. Marks sent me,” he rumbled, his voice like an avalanche. “Said to keep people out.”
Dr. Darity nodded. “Yes, thank you.”
Frank and I escorted Dr. Darity out of the hut, with Killer walking along beside us. “Let’s get some sleep,” I said. “Hopefully, by the morning, ATAC will have all the information we need.”
JuDGE beeped. It had finished its preliminary analysis. Frank pulled it out of his pocket.
The look on his face said everything.
“It’s human.”
The best part about this mission was that I wasn’t posing as a student. So while Frank had to worry about classes and tests, all I had to do was take care of Killer. Even if the dog didn’t love me the way he did his old handler, Hunt Hunter, he was too well trained to be much of a problem. In fact, the only bad part was that Killer was totally a morning dog. He liked his first walk right after dawn! It was almost as bad as having to get up for school. On the plus side, we were hoping to get information from ATAC about the source of the blood this morning, so I’d have to be up anyway.
Half-awake, I dragged myself over to the cafeteria. After last night, I was going to need some serious sugar to wake me up enough to be able to handle Killer. I grabbed a couple of donuts and a big plate of Frosted Kitten-Os. The cafeteria served both students and staff, but the only people awake this early were some of the cleaning crew. They had one table near the back, and there was a steady hum of conversation as I approached. Word must have been going around about the events of last night.
“Have you heard?”
That was the first thing someone said to me when I sat down. I played dumb, figuring I’d get a chance to see what information had leaked.
“Heard about what?”
Erik Hudson, one of the cleaning crew members I’d met a few times before, pulled his chair closer to mine. He was a nice guy, and he loved his gossip. At places like Firth Academy, the cleaning crew always had the best gossip, since the students rarely ever noticed they existed. And by the excited expression on his face, Erik definitely had some good gossip today.
“Dude! Someone trashed the soccer team’s locker room!”
My ears perked up. This wasn’t what I was expecting. “Trashed it how?”
“That’s the sick part! There was blood all over the room. Some psycho had painted the words ‘GET OUT’ in blood on the walls.”
So that’s what the blood was from! I thought. But out loud I simply said “Gross.”
“You’re telling me,” said Erik. “I was the one who had to clean it up. I don’t think I’ll ever get that smell out of my nose.”
“I wonder why anyone would do that?” I said, hoping to keep Erik talking.
“I don’t know. But whoever did it sure doesn’t like Lee Jenkins.”
“What do you mean?”
“They destroyed his locker. Ripped the hinges off, poured blood on the stuff inside it. Really messed with him.”
Interesting. Lee Jenkins was a junior, a star soccer player, a new Gamma Theta Theta pledge, and a straight-A student who also happened to be one of the few kids at the school whose family wasn’t m...
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