Free Tunnel of Secrets by Franklin W. Dixon Page A

face.
    “Layla?”

13
THE WOMAN BEHIND THE MASK
FRANK
    I LOOKED UP THE INSTANT I heard my brother say Layla’s name. And there she was, like a kid caught with her hand in the cookie jar as she hurried to slide the mask over her face.
    “Go to your room now!” Keith yanked her away by her robe, but the damage was done. She glanced quickly back at us before running off, but there was no way to read her expression beneath the mask. I had no problem reading my brother’s expression, though: confused and betrayed.
    Layla Hixson was one of them? Had she kidnapped herself? Had we risked our lives trying to save one of the bad guys?
    I was trying to make sense of it as Scott and another one of Keith’s masked lackeys led us up to a cell overlooking the altar.
    The iron gate clanked shut, locking us in a dank stone cell barely large enough for two people. One of the walls had a small barred window into the empty cell next door.
    Joe tested the gate’s lock. “It’s solid. I might be able to pick it if I had my tools, but they took my bag.”
    “At least they didn’t search us,” I said, motioning to Joe’s pocket, where the small skeleton key remained safely hidden.
    “Too bad it’s not the right size for this lock,” he said, sitting on the floor with his back to the wall. “Do you really think she’s part of this? I know it looks bad, but I can’t believe Layla would put her family through this.”
    “Her mom could be a part of it too,” I reminded him. “For all we know, she, Sal, and Layla are in it together. Whatever it is.”
    Joe flung a pebble against the wall. Finding out that the girl you like might be part of a bizarre criminal conspiracy is a hard pill to swallow. We still didn’t have all the facts, though, and the facts we did have didn’t make a lot of sense. We’d managed to solve part of the mystery, but that just made it even more mysterious.
    I started to review what we’d learned so far. “We know for sure the missing kids are connected to the sinkhole that swallowed the Admiral’s statue, but we don’t know how. We know how Keith and his accomplices caused the sinkhole and that they did it to steal the Admiral’s key, but we don’t know who’s really behind it or what they need the key for. And we know it has something to do with the resurrection of anearly American secret society started by Admiral Bryant, but we don’t know why or what the master plan is.”
    “And we know we’re locked in a cell a few hundred feet beneath Bayport, where no one will ever find us,” Joe huffed.
    “We’ve squeezed out of tighter spots than this.” I tried to reassure him, but I had to rack my brain to see if it was true. Sure, we’d wrangled out of some tough situations before, but none as tough as this. The Admiral had spent about two hundred fifty years down here waiting for someone to find him!
    Joe must have seen the doubt creep across my face, because he jumped to his feet.
    “No, you’re right. If Layla is innocent, we’re going to help her. And if she’s guilty, well, I’d hate it, but it’s our job to prove it. Either way, we’re going to make it out of here. After all, you’ve got a cute journalist to impress.”
    That was one of the great things about being partners with my brother. One would never let the other give up, no matter how dire the situation. It was a big reason why we had made it out of so many tight spots.
    “Okay, we have to come up with a plan . . . ,” I started to say, but I was interrupted by footsteps.
    “Someone’s coming,” Joe hissed.
    That someone was Layla.
    She was still wearing her mask, but as the shortest of the cult members we’d seen, she was easy to recognize. Joe’s eyes narrowed as she approached the cell door, carrying a tray of food and water.
    She looked around.
    “I’m not supposed to be talking to you. If they caught me, I could be in a lot of trouble, but I was able to convince the guard to take a break and let me bring