Free The Pentagon Spy by Franklin W. Dixon

Frank murmured. “She’s making his cocoa for tonight. Maybe with knockout drops in it!”
    â€œThat means Mrs. Smith is a member of the gang and that they’re planning something else!”
    Frank nodded soberly. Together they tiptoed up to the door and cautiously peered into the bedroom. Mrs. Smith was standing at a bedside table with her back to them. She still held the cocoa can in her hand. Breathlessly they waited for her next move, hoping to catch her red-handed in the act of spiking Hammerley’s nighttime drink.
    As they watched, the housekeeper leaned toward a shelf on the wall near the bed and poured water from the cocoa can into the pot of a large philodendron.
    Ruefully the Hardys grinned at one another. They were about to retreat silently when Mrs. Smith turned around and saw them.
    â€œI want to talk to you boys,” she declared.
    â€œUh-oh,” Frank thought. “Here’s where we get it for spying on her.”
    â€œIt’s about last night,” Mrs. Smith continued.
    â€œWhat about it?” Joe asked.
    â€œWell, when I brought Mr. Hammerley’s cocoa here to the bedroom, I heard footsteps downstairs. They surprised me because Mr. Hammerley was in bed and the rest of the workers were gone for the night. I thought I must be hearing things, except for what I saw when I got back to the kitchen.”
    â€œWhat was that, Mrs. Smith?” Frank inquired eagerly.
    â€œOne of the kitchen windows was unlocked. I always lock all of them before I serve the cocoa and leave. Someone was in the kitchen while I was upstairs! I didn’t think of it this morning, with all the excitement, but now I remember.”
    â€œWhat did you do then?” Joe asked.
    â€œI locked the window again, checked that the house was empty, and went home.”
    â€œWell, whoever unlocked the window couldn’t have drugged the cocoa, because you were already serving it,” Frank pointed out.
    Joe snapped his fingers. “I’ve got it! The person who drugged the cocoa sneaked back and unlocked the window so he could get in during the night and destroy the evidence. You sure foxed him, Mrs. Smith. He must have been ready to blow his top when he came back later and tried to get in! You saved vital evidence without knowing it!”
    The housekeeper seemed pleased as she accompanied the Hardys downstairs, excited that she was taking part in one of their cases.
    When Mr. Hammerley came in, he listened to their plan to go to Chesapeake Crossing. “I don’t know anything about the place,” he admitted. “But I don’t mind where you go, as long as you get the Flashing Arrow back. When are you leaving?”
    â€œTomorrow morning,” Frank replied, without adding that the boys would stop in Washington before proceeding to their destination. The young detective did not want to upset Hammerley by revealing that they were working on the spy case as well as his weather vane mystery.
    â€œIs there anything else you’d like to know about before you go?” Hammerley inquired.
    â€œDo you suspect anybody here at the farm as a possible accomplice of the thieves?” Frank asked.
    â€œI don’t suspect anyone working for me at the moment,” Hammerley replied. “But I fired a man two weeks ago because he was loitering around the house and I caught him stealing food. I never thought he might steal my weather vane, though. His name is Ed Bryle.”
    â€œWhere can we find him?” Joe wanted to know.
    â€œI have no idea. I paid him and he left without telling me where he was going.”
    â€œDo you happen to have a photograph of him?” Frank inquired.
    Hammerley nodded. He went to a desk and withdrew a picture from a drawer, then handed it to Frank, who examined it while Joe and Chet were looking over his shoulder. Bryle was a short, wizened man dressed in farm overalls.
    â€œThat’s the man we saw at the auction!”