Free Tunnel of Secrets by Franklin W. Dixon Page B

your lunch. Or maybe it’s dinner. It gets so confusing down here without any sunlight.” Layla paused for a second and looked at Joe. “Did you really come all the way down here looking for me?”
    Joe didn’t answer. I could tell he was still figuring out whether she was the victim or the villain.
    I nodded to Layla. “And we almost got killed a few times doing it, so I think you’d better tell us what’s going on.”
    “Thank you guys so much,” she said. There was no way to read her expression through her mask, but she sounded teary. “I didn’t think anyone would ever find me.”
    “So you’re not with them? Then why are you dressed up in that awful costume?” Joe asked, not bothering to hide his skepticism.
    “They made me, I swear. You’ve got to believe me,” she pleaded.
    “Keep talking and we’ll see,” Joe said.
    “Two of them grabbed me off the street after school. I think they drugged me, because at first I thought I was just having a bad nightmare, but I woke up down here. They told me there was no way to escape and that I’d die if I tried, so I went along with it until I could figure something out.”
    “Went along with what?” I asked.
    “I don’t know if you’ll believe me. It all seems so crazy,I don’t even know if I believe it myself,” she said.
    “Try us,” Joe said. “You’d be surprised what we’d believe at this point.”
    She took a deep breath. “Okay, well, these guys, the Knights of whatever they call themselves, they’re supposed to be the direct descendants of an old secret society that was started by that Admiral guy from the statue in the town square.”
    I nodded.
    “So this weird Grandmaster person is the boss, and he gives orders to that Keith creep and some of the others and they give orders to us. Keith said they were recruiting the other descendants to claim some kind of birthright. I told him kidnapping wasn’t exactly recruiting, and he said that some people needed more convincing than others, but according to him, everyone came around and joined the club when they heard what they had to gain.”
    “Which is . . . ?” I prodded her.
    “Pirate treasure!”
    Joe and I exchanged glances. All the myths and legends Mr. Schneider had told us about in the library were turning out to be true.
    “I know, it’s wild!” Layla continued. “They say there are loads and loads of it. Enough for everybody to be superrich. I think it’s a bunch of baloney, but who knows? I mean, this place exists, and I never would have believed that if you had told me before I was dragged here. And it does have a big vault. I guess anything’s possible.”
    More pieces were starting to click into place. If the Knights thought the Admiral’s treasure was locked in the vault and the vault wouldn’t open without a giant skeleton key roughly the same size as the Admiral’s “key to the city,” well then, the theft of the key from the statue might finally make sense. And if they were targeting descendants of the original Knights, then Layla’s kidnapping made sense too. That is, assuming Sal was right and they were related to the Constable Foreman from the old book Mr. Schneider showed us.
    I was tempted to interrupt with questions, but Layla was on a roll.
    “But what do I need a treasure for? I’m in high school! And my dad’s practically the sheriff. Like I’d really go behind his back and be a part of some crazy conspiracy. I’d be grounded until I was thirty!” Layla looked around nervously and lowered her voice. “But that’s why they wanted me so badly—because my dad is deputy sheriff. They say they’re going to use the treasure to fund some master plan to take control of all of Bayport. They want me to follow in my dad’s footsteps and rise through the police force so that they can have a Knight to pull strings from inside the department. Nuts, right?”
    I nodded, encouraging her to keep talking.
    “They say they already have other important