CHAPTER XXI—FINGER PRINTS
The detective’s face was as dull and unimpassioned as a caricature carved out of wood. He stood pointing the pistol with a listless air, and his eyes were heavy and sluggish, as if he were not fully awake. He lowered the weapon almost as soon as he saw the Phantom’s face, but did not put it out of sight.
“Oh, it’s you, Granger.” He spoke in a drawl, and there might have been the faintest trace of disappointment in his tones. “I thought it might be someone else.”
“The Gray Phantom, for instance?”
“Well, maybe. There’s no reason, though, why the Phantom should be prowling around here, is there?”
“Apparently not.” The Phantom advanced leisurely and looked sharply at the speaker’s stolid face. The question had been spoken in a tone faintly suggestive of an underlying meaning. “It seems both of us are taking advantage of the absence of Doctor Bimble and Jerome to do a little investigating on the quiet.”
Culligore yawned ostentatiously. “The doc ought to have new locks put on his doors. It’s too easy for people to get in.”
“He is a simple and unsuspecting soul. But tell me, lieutenant, how it happens that the Phantom’s trail leads into Doctor Bimble’s basement.”
“Does it?”
“Well, I don’t suppose you would be here unless it did. Your object in coming here wasn’t to interview the skeletons upstairs, was it?”
Culligore laughed softly. “I might put the same question to you.”
“Then we’re on an even footing. And, since we don’t seem to get anywhere, we might as well drop the subject of our mutual presence here. Each of us can take it for granted that the other has a tip which he wants to keep to himself. Seen anything of the Gray Phantom lately?”
“Not exactly.”
“What’s the idea of the ‘exactly’? You either have seen him or you haven’t seen him. Which is it?”
“Neither the one nor the other,” said Culligore mysteriously. “With a man like the Phantom you can never be sure. Even when you think you see him, he isn’t always there. Say that was a queer case you tipped me off on this morning.”
“It was. Simple enough, though, as far as the murder of the housekeeper is concerned. Apparently there’s not the slightest doubt that the Phantom did it.”
“Think so?”
The two words, spoken in low and casual tones, caused the Phantom to raise his brows. “Don’t you?”
Culligore tilted his head to one side and squinted vacantly into space. “Things aren’t always what they seem,” he drawlingly observed. “I’ve been seesawing up and down ever since I was turned loose on this case. One hour I feel dead sure the Phantom did it; the next I don’t know what to think.”
“All the facts seem to point to the Phantom’s guilt.”
“That’s just the trouble.” Culligore scowled a little. “There’s such a thing as having too many facts. If the evidence wasn’t so perfect I’d be more sure of my ground. As it is, I wouldn’t bet more than a pair of Bowery spats on the Phantom’s guilt. I’m not sure he killed either Gage or the housekeeper.”
The Phantom eyed him intently, trying to read his mind.
“I see,” he murmured. “You don’t want to believe the Phantom has fallen so low as to——”
“You’re talking rot!” snorted the lieutenant, as if touched on a sensitive spot. “What I want to believe makes no difference. If I could lay my hands on the Phantom this minute, I’d put the links on him so quick it would take his breath away. Even if he didn’t kill Gage and Mrs. Trippe, there are one or two other things we can send him up for.”
“I suppose so,” said the Phantom thoughtfully. “Much as you would hate to pinch him, you can’t let sentiment interfere with duty.”
“Sentiment be damned!” grumbled the lieutenant, reddening a trifle as he saw the knowing grin on the Phantom’s face. “I never was long on that kind of stuff. By the way, what’s your opinion of the case, Granger?”
“I haven’t any.” The Phantom wondered what was going on in the back of Culligore’s mind. He knew the dull features were a mask and that the lieutenant, practicing a trick cultivated by members of his profession, was studying his face every moment without appearing to do so. “You seem to be holding something back,” he added.
“Think so?” Culligore uttered a flat, toneless chuckle. “Aren’t you holding something back yourself? What’s the use trying to hog it all for your paper?”
“Didn’t I tip you off on the doings in the Gage house this morning?”
“You did,” said Culligore dryly, “and I’m still wondering how you knew about them. Did you just walk in on a hunch and discover a dead woman, and a cop chained to an opium-eating runt, or did someone put you wise beforehand?”
The Phantom felt he was on dangerous ground. “It was only a hunch. We newspaper men have them, you know, and once in a while they pan out. But what do you make of it, Culligore? How do you explain the cop being handcuffed to Dan the Dope?”
“I don’t explain it. I suppose Pinto will tell us how it happened when he comes to.”
“Think there’s any connection between the handcuffed pair and the murder of the housekeeper?”
“How could there be? The medical examiner said the housekeeper must have been dead from twenty to thirty hours when the body was found. Besides, where do you find any connection between a murder on the one hand and a cop chained to a dope fiend on the other? To my way of thinking, the two cases are separate. The one of Pinto and Dan the Dope is all a riddle, and the only clear thing about it is that the Phantom had a hand in it.”
“The Phantom?”
“Yep. The Phantom was in on it. Surprised, eh? Well, there are some things we don’t tell the newspapers, and this was one of them. Just how the Phantom figured in the thing I can’t tell, but he was in the Gage house last night or early in the morning. Beats the dickens how that fellow can walk past our noses without getting caught.”
The Phantom stared. He did not think he had left any traces of his connection with the affair at the Gage house, and Culligore’s statement startled him for a moment.
“How do you know?” he asked, getting a grip on himself.
“Finger prints,” said the lieutenant. “This is on the q. t. I examined the handcuffs, and there were three sets of prints on them, showing that three different persons had handled them. There were only two or three marks of each set, but enough to identify them. One set was Dan the Dope’s, the other must have been Pinto’s, and the third was the Gray Phantom’s.”
The Phantom bit his lip, chiding himself for having been caught off his guard. He might have known that the smooth and shiny surface of the handcuffs would register finger prints, but he had been bodily and mentally exhausted at the time, and his habitual sense of caution had failed to assert itself.
“Wonder what the Phantom was up to,” he murmured, feeling a trifle uncomfortable beneath Culligore’s covert and incessant scrutiny.
“Hard telling. Lots of queer things happen in this world.” Culligore grinned while absently toying with the pistol. “For instance, this morning after I left you on the corner——”
“You had me shadowed,” interrupted the Phantom. “What was the idea, Culligore?”
“Just a hunch. My man trailed you to the Sphere office. Then, thinking you wouldn’t be out for a while, he went into a beanery for a bite and a cup of coffee. After coming out he hung around the entrance to the Sphere Building for a while longer, but you didn’t show up. Finally, he went inside and inquired for you. They told him you had left.”
Culligore paused for a moment. He was turning the pistol in his hand with a playful air. The Phantom felt a curious tension taking hold of his body.
“They told my man,” continued the lieutenant, speaking very softly, “that you didn’t write the story yourself, but told the facts to a reporter named Fessenden. As I understand it, they gave Fessenden a new desk not long ago. It’s a nice-looking piece of furniture, with a smooth, glossy finish. Maybe you noticed it?”
“No, not particularly,” said the Phantom, finding it a little hard to keep his voice steady. The rôle he was playing had claimed all his thoughts while he was in the Sphere office, and he had not noticed details.
“Too bad you didn’t.” Culligore was still speaking in low, purring accents. Gradually and without apparent intent, he turned the muzzle of the pistol until it pointed to the Phantom’s chest. “Well, I understand Fessenden was sitting at that nice, new desk while you told him the story, and you were sitting right beside him, with one of the corners of the desk toward you. Some people have a habit when nervous of drumming with their fingers on whatever object is before them. It’s a bad habit, Granger.”
The Phantom nodded. A thin smile played about his lips and his eyes glittered like tiny points of steel between half-closed lids.
“Very bad habit, Granger. Well, my man saw finger prints on the smooth and shiny surface of the desk, right where you had been sitting. He touched them up by sprinkling a little gray powder over them, after which they were photographed. It didn’t take very long to identify them. Steady now! This little toy of mine can be real ugly when it gets mad. What I want you to explain is how Tommie Granger’s fingers happened to leave the Gray Phantom’s finger prints on Fessenden’s desk.”
CHAPTER XXII—THE PHANTOM TURNS A SOMERSAULT
There was a humorous glint in Lieutenant Culligore’s lazy, mouse-colored eyes as he noted the look of consternation that was slowly creeping into the Gray Phantom’s face. He drew a step nearer, and now the menacing muzzle was less than six feet from its target. There was a touch of carelessness in his manner of handling the weapon, but his aim was sure and a slight pressure on the trigger would have meant death.
But the Phantom’s look of dismay was not due to fear. Many a time he had laughed in the face of dangers far more serious than the present one. The thing that appalled him was the realization that twice within a few hours he had committed a stupid blunder. The Gray Phantom, once the astutest and craftiest of rogues, had bungled like an amateur.
The thought was galling. Was it that his hand had lost its old-time finesse and his mind its keen edge, or had his mental stress and fagged nerves been the cause of his bungling? Again, perhaps he had been distracted by the haunting vision of a pair of troubled brown eyes.
He looked hard at Culligore. Some faces were like an open book to him, and this was one of them. The lieutenant was no man’s fool. Behind the mask of dullness and stolidity were shrewdness and quickness of wit, and he knew that the man before him would not permit private inclinations to swerve him from his duty. Culligore was as dangerous an adversary as he had ever faced. But there was still another quality behind the mask, and it was this that gave the Phantom his cue.
Quickly he looked about him. The way to the basement door was barred by the lieutenant, but the stairway leading to the laboratory was unobstructed. With an appearance of utmost unconcern the Phantom turned away and started to ascend the steps.
“Stop!” commanded Culligore, following the retreating man’s movements with his pistol. “I’ll pop you if you take another step.”
The Phantom stopped, turned, and grinned. “Oh, no, you won’t,” he drawled.
“Can’t you see that I’ve got you covered?”
“But you won’t shoot. It takes a particular kind of nerve to kill a defenseless man in cold blood, and you haven’t got it. Good-by.”
He took another step, but a short and peremptory “Halt!” brought him to a stop. There was something in the lieutenant’s tone that gave him pause. He turned and looked down.
“You’ve sized me up just about right,” admitted Culligore. “I can’t kill a man who hasn’t got a chance for his life. But if you move another step, you’ll get a slug of lead in your leg. If you think I’m bluffing, just try.”
The Phantom hesitated. The words and the tone left no room for doubt as to the speaker’s earnestness, and even a slight flesh wound would hamper the Phantom’s movements and frustrate his plans. He came down the few steps he had covered and stood on the basement floor.
“All right, Culligore. You win this time, but don’t think for a moment that I’ll let you carry this joke much further. I have very strenuous objections to being arrested at this particular time. Mind if I smoke a cigarette?”
“I do,” the lieutenant said dryly. “I have heard about your cute little ways, and I’m not taking any chances. You don’t play any of your tricks on me, Mr. Phantom.”
“You surely don’t think that I’ll permit you to drag me off to a cell?”
“How are you going to help yourself?”
“Why, man, it can’t be done! It’s been tried before, you know. And just now I am a very busy man and can’t afford to waste time. Besides, what charge do you propose to arrest me on? Not the murder of Gage and Mrs. Trippe?”
“There are other charges waiting for you in court. You’ve been having a gay time for a good many years, but this is the end of it. You’ve done some very fancy wriggling in the past, but you can’t wriggle out of this.”
“Perhaps not.” A great gloom seemed suddenly to fall over the Phantom. “It looks as though you had me, Culligore. A man can’t fight the whole New York police force single-handed. All you have to do is to blow your whistle and——”
“Whistle be hanged! I’m not going to give you the satisfaction of saying that it took a regiment to get you. I mean to arrest you alone, just to prove that you’re not as smart as some people think.”
The Phantom glowed inwardly. His adroit and subtle appeal to the lieutenant’s pride had produced the desired effect. Culligore felt so sure of his advantage that he would not summon help, and this was an important point in the Phantom’s favor. Yet he knew the situation was critical enough. On former occasions he had gambled recklessly with death, often winning through sheer fearlessness and audacity, but much more than his life was at stake now. He looked in vain for a loophole in the situation. All he could do for the present was to spar for time.
“I see,” he murmured. “The achievement of taking the Phantom single-handed would put a gorgeous feather in your cap. But look here, Culligore. Fame is a fine thing, but you can’t eat it, and it won’t buy clothes. Isn’t it just as important to find the murderer of Mrs. Trippe and Gage?”
“I’ll attend to that, too.” The lieutenant inserted a hand in his pocket and drew out a pair of handcuffs. “Out with your hands, Phantom.”
The Phantom promptly put his hands in the pockets of his trousers. “Why be in such a rush, Culligore? You know I can’t get away from you so long as you keep me covered. Let’s discuss things a bit. You don’t think I committed those murders?”
“Not exactly,” said the detective thoughtfully, the steel links dangling from his hand. “Whatever else you may be, I don’t think you’re a murderer.”
“And that shows that you have more gray matter than some of your colleagues.”
“Thanks,” dryly; “but you’d better save the compliments. I haven’t quite made up my mind about the murders yet. If you didn’t commit them, there are a lot of things that will have to be explained. The threatening letter, for instance.”
“Forged.”
“And Gage’s dying statement.”
“Pinto lied, or else Gage was mistaken.”
“Think so?” The lieutenant’s upper lip brushed the tip of his nose. “It’s a queer thing that nothing but the Maltese cross was taken.”
“That was only a detail of the frame-up. Listen, Culligore. Isn’t it your idea that the two murders were committed by one and the same person?”
“It looks that way, but——”
“Well, then, I happen to know who killed Mrs. Trippe, because I was there when it happened.”
Culligore stared; and the Phantom knew he had gained another point.
“There when it happened? You saw the murder committed?” The lieutenant seemed at once amazed and incredulous. “Just where were you? In the storeroom?”
“No; the murder was committed in Gage’s bedroom, and the body was afterward removed to the storeroom by the murderer.”
For a moment Culligore’s astonishment was so great that he almost forgot to maintain his aim. He gathered himself quickly, but his face bore a look of bewilderment.
“He moved the body, eh? I wonder why. If the job was done by a certain person I have in mind, I don’t see what object he could have in carrying the corpse from Gage’s bedroom to the storeroom. The natural thing would have been to leave the body on the spot. You’re not kidding me?”
“Absolutely not.” The Phantom grinned at Culligore’s perplexity. Evidently the lieutenant’s theories and calculations had been completely upset by what he had just heard. “Who is the certain person you had in mind, Culligore?”
“Never mind that. Let me get this straight. You were in Gage’s bedroom when Mrs. Trippe was murdered?”
“Not in the bedroom, but——” The Phantom checked himself on the point of explaining that he had witnessed the murder from his place of concealment in the narrow opening back of the window frame. In a flash it dawned upon him that he had another advantage over the detective. He had found the loophole in the situation for which his mind had been searching for the past ten minutes. Culligore, of course, was not aware of the existence of the tunnel. The stairs leading to the cellar were at the Phantom’s back. If he could elude the detective long enough to slip down the steps and crawl into the mouth of the tunnel, he would be temporarily safe. It was a slender chance, but he had no other.
“Where were you, then?” demanded Culligore.
“My secret.” The Phantom assumed a mysterious expression, meanwhile edging ever so slightly toward the stairs at his back. “I saw Mrs. Trippe and she saw me. She was in a terribly frightened condition, and she called out that someone was killing her. Then, of a sudden, a hand appeared, holding a knife. Before I could utter a word or move a muscle, the knife had done its work.”
Culligore muttered something under his breath. He scanned the Phantom’s face keenly, but what he saw evidently convinced him of the narrator’s truthfulness. A noise, scarcely louder than the falling of a pin, sounded at the head of the stairs. The Phantom’s sensitive ears detected it, but the lieutenant appeared to have heard nothing.
“Well, what happened after that?”
The Phantom waited for a moment before he answered. A draft faint as a breath told him that the door at the top of the stairs had been opened. He had a vague impression that somebody was looking down on them, and he wondered whether Doctor Bimble or Jerome had returned. Not the slightest flicker in his face showed that he had noticed anything.
“I didn’t see any more. The—the curtain fell a moment or two after the blow was struck.”
Culligore regarded him narrowly. Another faint sound came from the head of the stairs, and in the same instant the draft ceased, indicating that the door had closed. The lieutenant, his every faculty bent to the task of ferreting out the thoughts in the Phantom’s mind, had heard nothing. He seemed inclined to doubt and scoff, but a stronger instinct compelled him to give credence to the story he had just heard.
“And all you saw of the murderer was a hand and a knife?”
“That was all.”
“Do you remember the woman’s exact words?”
The Phantom searched his memory for a moment. “She said: ‘He’s killing me! He’s afraid I’ll tell! He locked me in——’ She never finished the last sentence, but she had said enough. Evidently, the murderer of Gage knew that the housekeeper was aware of his guilt, and imprisoned her in the bedroom so that she would not reveal what she knew. Later he returned with a knife in his hand, having decided it would be safer to kill her. The housekeeper must have had some warning of his arrival; perhaps she saw or heard him coming.”
Culligore looked as though he had a baffling problem on his mind. “Who do you suppose was the ‘he’ she referred to?”
“I think that’s fairly plain. She had previously made it known that she suspected Pinto of having murdered her employer.”
The lieutenant arched his brows and seemed to be revolving a new idea in his mind. “Just the same, we can’t be sure she meant Pinto, as long as she didn’t mention him by name. The fact that she suspected him once doesn’t really prove anything. Something may have happened in the meantime that caused her to change her opinion. The ‘he’ might have been an entirely different person—maybe somebody she’d never seen before and whose name she didn’t know.”
“Possible,” admitted the Phantom thoughtfully. Culligore had turned his thoughts into a new channel.
“Besides,” added Culligore quickly, “even if Pinto was the ‘he’ she had in mind, she might have been mistaken, just as you claim Gage was mistaken.”
The Phantom made another slight movement toward the cellar stairs. “I’m not at all sure Gage made the statement Pinto claims he made. My private opinion is that Pinto is a liar as well as a murderer. What the housekeeper said isn’t the only evidence I have against him. I hadn’t meant to tell what happened in the storeroom this morning; but since I was careless enough to leave my finger prints on the handcuffs, I might as well come out with it.”
Culligore’s mouth opened wider and wider as the Phantom related what had occurred in the storeroom during the early morning hours. When the story was finished, he seemed stunned, and the dazed look in his eyes told the Phantom his chance had come.
For an instant he flexed his muscles for action, then executed a swift and nimble somersault that landed him on his feet in the middle of the stairs. A spiteful crack told that Culligore had fired his pistol, but the Phantom was already at the bottom of the stairway. Then he dashed across the floor toward the point where the mouth of the tunnel was. He ran his fingers over the wall in search of the hidden door, the ingenious arrangement of which he had previously noticed.
Culligore, momentarily taken aback by the Phantom’s quick and unexpected move, was losing no time. Already he was scampering down the stairs in pursuit of the fugitive. The cellar was dark, save for the narrow shaft of light slanting down from the basement, and the Phantom heard him muttering to himself as he picked his way through the gloom.
After a few moments’ search the Phantom’s fingers found the tiny rift in the brick surface that marked the location of the door. Culligore, evidently hesitating to use his electric flash for fear of becoming a target for the Phantom’s pistol, was scudding hither and thither at the opposite end of the cellar. The Phantom crawled into the opening, feet foremost, and softly pulled the door to, then lay on his back, chuckling gently to himself as he pictured the lieutenant’s discomfiture.
He had no fear that Culligore would find his hiding place. The door was so carefully concealed that only a careful search would reveal its location, and the detective did not even suspect its existence. Yet the Phantom knew that he would not be safe for long. He could not remain in the tunnel indefinitely, and escape through the other end was impossible, for he had previously ascertained that the mechanism of the revolving window frame could not be manipulated from that side. All he had gained was time. He could only hope that his lucky star, which so far had never deserted him, would once more turn the situation in his favor.
His mind was working quickly while he listened to Culligore’s movements in the cellar. Doubtless the detective would soon summon assistance and have the building surrounded, and then, unless some chance and unforeseen development came to his rescue, the Phantom’s position would be critical indeed. Even if the searchers should not find his hiding place, he would eventually die from lack of air.
Suddenly his figure stiffened. He lay rigid, trying to account for the curious sensation that had just come to him. In a moment he knew what it was a faint current of air was stirring in the tunnel. At first he could not understand, for he was certain that both exits were closed, and the tube itself was air-tight. He worked deeper into the tunnel, trying to trace the mysterious current to its origin, and presently it came to him that, through some unaccountable circumstance, the other end must be open.
It was mystifying, but the stirring of air could be explained in no other way than that in some manner the revolving window frame had come open. He moved forward as rapidly as he could, hoping to gain the exit and get out of the zone of danger before the block was surrounded. By this time Culligore must have discovered that his quarry had in some inexplicable way escaped from the basement. Perhaps he was even now cursing himself for his vain-glorious boast that he would take the Gray Phantom single-handed and unaided.
The movement of air became more noticeable as the Phantom drew near the end of the passage. He proceeded more slowly now, moving forward by cautious twists and wrigglings, a few inches at a time, carefully calculating each motion so as to make no noise. There was something at once puzzling and ominous about the open exit, and he could not know what awaited him in the bedroom at the end of the tunnel.
His progress became more difficult as he reached the acclivity in which the passage terminated, for he had been moving crab fashion, having entered the tunnel feet first in order to be able to close the door behind him, and the width of the tube did not permit him to turn. Silent as a mole, he twisted his body upward, all his senses on the alert against the slightest hint of danger. Now his feet were almost at the window frame. As he had surmised, the opening was clear, and a few more twists would land him on the floor of the bedroom.
Cautiously he thrust a foot through the opening, but in a moment he drew it back. Then he lay rigid, listening, for something warned him of danger. The bedchamber was dark and there was not the faintest sound; yet he knew someone was lying in wait for him on the other side.
CHAPTER XXIII—THE WATCHERS AT THE WINDOW
The Phantom strained his ears. Faint sounds of breathing came to him; then a board creaked ever so slightly under someone’s weight. A watcher—or were there two?—was standing just inside the window, guarding the exit. The discovery nettled him, for it meant the loss of precious seconds, but he thanked the warning instinct that had prompted him to muffle his movements. It had probably saved him from an unexpected attack in the dark.
Warily he reached for the pistol in his hip pocket. He was still listening, and now he was almost certain that two watchers were standing close to the window sill. Doubtless they were armed and ready to spring upon him the moment he betrayed himself, and his awkward position would make it extremely difficult for him to defend himself.
He turned the situation over in his mind while he waited. It had been a trap, of course. He remembered the slight sound that had told him of the opening of the door to the laboratory while he was fencing for time with Culligore. Someone had looked down on them from the head of the stairs, remaining there long enough to take in the situation and decide on a course of action. Doubtless he had suspected that the Phantom would make an attempt to reach the tunnel, his only avenue of escape, and the plan had been to attack him as he came out of the passage.
Again a board gave forth a slight creak, signifying that one of the sentinels was growing impatient. The Phantom was in a cramped position and, with his feet above his head, he would be at a decided disadvantage in a fight. He could still use his pistol, but to do so would be dangerous, to say nothing of the difficulty of taking aim in the dark. He was still looking for a way out of the difficulty when one of the watchers at the window spoke in a whisper.
“‘Slim!’”
“Well?”
“Hear anything of him yet?”
“Not a sound. Suppose he shouldn’t come out at all, ‘Toots’?”
“What’s in has got to come out. He’ll come acrawlin’ this way by ‘n’ by. Don’t you worry.”
The whispering voices were unrecognizable, and the names were not illuminating, but the Phantom did not think that the speakers were officers. More likely they were members of the Duke’s band and had gained entrance to the house during the absence of Doctor Bimble and Jerome. It was even possible that they had trailed the Phantom to the anthropologist’s residence.
Again the man named Toots spoke. “I don’t like this job a little bit. The Phantom’s a bad customer—a reg’lar devil.”
“But we’ve got him this time. He’ll come this way as soon as he notices the draft. He won’t be suspectin’ a thing, and all we’ve got to do is grab him. It’ll be as easy as picking a banana out of the peeling.”
Toots was silent for a time. Evidently he stood in great awe of the Phantom. “What about the dick?”
“Oh, he’s taken care of. The boss is handlin’ him. No danger of him buttin’ in on us.”
The Phantom listened intently, but was barely able to distinguish the faint whispers. Slim’s last remark was interesting. If Culligore had been attacked and overpowered while searching the cellar, then the Phantom was in no danger from the police just at present. His only immediate problem was how to deal with the two watchers.
“What’s the lay, Slim?” Toots was asking. “Why is the big chief so all-fired anxious to get his mitts on the Phantom?”
“Orders from the Duke. There’s a big job on, but only two or three are in the know of it. All you and me got to do, Toots, is to keep our mouths shut, ask no questions, and collect our little bit when the time comes. The boss will do the thinkin’ part.”
Again a silence fell between the watchers; then Toots asked: “Why don’t one of us go to the other end and smoke him out? I’m gettin’ tired of waitin’.”
“What’s eating you? Time’s cheap, ain’t it? The Phantom will come out when he gets ready.”
Another pause ensued; then the inquisitive Toots asked another question. “What I don’t get atall is how the ‘skirt’ figgers in the deal. Where does she come in, Slim?”
The Phantom held his breath to catch the answer.
“Search me. All I know is that the Phantom has a crush on her. I s’pose the boss thinks the Phantom will be easier to handle if he’s got a grip on the moll.”
“Where’s the boss keepin’ her?”
“Say, ask me somethin’ easy. The boss don’t tell me his secrets.”
The Phantom felt a twinge of disappointment. Toots’ question had given him hope of learning something about Helen’s whereabouts, but Slim’s answer had quickly dashed it.
“I’m dying for a smoke,” he heard Toots whisper.
“Well, get back in the corner and have one. But don’t make any noise, and be careful when you strike the match.”
The Phantom heard Toots tiptoeing away from the window. Then came a faintly scratching sound as of a match being struck. A daring idea entered the Phantom’s mind. For the time being the enemy’s force was divided, and there was only one watcher at the window. He saw a chance—a slender and dubious one, but perhaps the only chance he would have—to get the upper hand of the sentinels.
Bracing his shoulders against the wall of the passage, he drew his electric flash from his pocket. His right hand was already gripping the pistol. Holding both in readiness for instant action, he pricked up his ears and listened. Sounds of breathing told him that Slim was standing a few inches from his feet, perhaps looking directly at him through the darkness. He had already decided that Slim was the more resourceful man of the two. If Slim could be put out of action, his difficulty would be more than half solved.
His finger touched the little button, and a shaft of light pierced the darkness. In the same instant a head was thrust into the opening. A pair of startled eyes stared at him for a moment—and in that brief space of time the Phantom acted. His foot shot out, delivering a sharp blow in the region of the nose and eyes. With a cry of pain the man tottered back, blood streaming from his face.
The Phantom extinguished his flash and flung it through the opening. Toots, evidently wondering what had happened, was jabbering excitedly, but Slim gave no sound. With a swift and agile movement, the Phantom jerked himself forward, dropping his legs over the sill, and in another moment he was standing inside the room. He stooped, ran his fingers over the floor, and recovered the electric torch, then darted noiselessly to one side. A pistol shot sounded, followed by a sharp thud as the bullet hit the wall a few feet from where he stood.
He leaped silently across the floor. The brief flash emitted by the pistol had given him a glimpse of Slim at the opposite wall. Before the man could move, the butt of the Phantom’s pistol had crashed down on his head. Uttering a feeble grunt, he sank limply to the floor, and in the same instant came another crack and flash, and a bullet whistled past the Phantom’s head.
“You almost winged me that time, Toots,” he remarked coolly, at the same moment dropping to his knees and noiselessly crawling toward where Toots stood with his back to the door. Another shot, fired at random, lighted up the room for a brief instant, giving him another glimpse of his adversary. Swiftly and without making the slightest sound, he advanced toward the door. Now he reached out a hand, fumbling for a moment in the darkness until he lightly touched one of Toots’ shoes. With a swift and powerful motion he jerked the man’s feet from under him.
The Phantom sprang to his feet and rushed out of the room, turning the key in the lock on the other side. He paused for breath while he brushed some of the dirt from his clothes. He had vanquished his adversaries, but possibly the shots had been heard, and haste was necessary. He ran to the front of the store. The street outside was quiet and dimly lighted. Cautiously he opened the door and stepped out, casting a quick glance up and down the street.
He made a few rapid calculations as he walked to the corner. If Culligore had fallen into the clutches of the Duke’s gang, as seemed likely from the remark dropped by Slim, then he was still reasonably safe so far as the police were concerned. Yet, for the first time in many years, the Phantom was haunted by misgivings. Each thought of Helen Hardwick burned itself into his mind, leaving a scar. The realization that the Duke’s minions had her in their power was maddening. He felt an urge to find her at once and snatch her away from her jailers.
Yet, at almost every step, he was hampered by the designs of his enemies. There were traps and snares everywhere. He had just escaped from one of them, but another time he might not escape so easily, and what would become of Helen then?
He shuddered at the thought. His mind was as keen and his muscles as pliant as ever, but he was playing against overwhelming odds, and the mere thought of defeat was unbearable. To ask help of the police was out of the question. His old organization was scattered to the four corners of the earth. Wade, his former chief lieutenant and now his trusted friend, had grown too fat to be of much use, and to reach him would be difficult.
Suddenly he thought of Thomas Granger. The reporter’s journalistic instincts, coupled with his fondness of strong drink, had given the Phantom the feeling that he was not to be trusted. Those two qualities aside, he had rather liked the fellow. Granger had traits that appealed to him strongly. He reconsidered the question as he stood on the corner, glancing furtively in all directions to see whether he was being spied upon.
In a few moments his mind was made up. For Helen’s sake he must seek assistance somewhere, and he was in no position to be squeamish about his choice. A glance at his watch told him that it was half past eleven. Pell Street was only a dozen short blocks away, and a brisk walk brought him to Peng Yuen’s door.
The wooden-featured Chinaman scanned his face as he held the door open and bade him enter.
“There is fire in your eyes,” he observed as he conducted his guest into the den. “Is it the little Lotus Bud who is troubling the Gray Phantom? The ‘Book of the Unknown Philosopher’ says——”
The Phantom interrupted him with a short laugh. “Peng Yuen, for a man who doesn’t read the newspapers, you are surprisingly well informed. I have come to have a talk with my double.”
The Chinaman regarded him stonily. Two incense sticks, burning before a hideous joss idol, filled the air with acrid fumes. Peng Yuen, sucking a bamboo pipe with gorgeous tassels, seemed to be turning over a question in his mind.
“I think your friend is sleeping,” he said at length.
“Then wake him,” directed the Phantom impatiently.
The Chinaman shrugged his shoulders and touched a button on the wall, then motioned the Phantom to enter. Granger was in bed, but he looked up gloomily and stretched himself. There was a litter of cigarette ends on the table, and torn and crumpled newspapers were scattered over the floor.
“Hope you’ve brought me a drink,” said Granger.
The Phantom shook his head. Then he sat down on the edge of the bed and fixed the reporter’s face with a keen and minutely searching gaze, as if exploring the depths of his soul.
“What’s the idea?” asked the reporter. “You look at me as if I were some kind of curiosity.”
There was a faint hint of doubt in the Phantom’s face, but it vanished soon.
“I think you will do,” he declared. “There’s just one quality in your face, Granger, that I can’t quite analyze. It’s a weakness of some kind—your craving for alcohol, perhaps. Anyway, I am willing to take a chance on it. You are going with me.”
The reporter sat up, his face all eagerness.
“Wait,” commanded the Phantom; “I want to be sure that we understand each other. I am making the biggest play of my career. I am going after the Duke’s crowd. My primary object is to get Miss Hardwick out of their clutches. My secondary one is to put the whole gang of sneaks and cowards behind the bars, where they belong. If I succeed, it will be as great a sensation as the Sphere ever sprang. You are welcome to it, provided you accept the conditions.”
“What are they?”
“I am very likely to get into trouble before the job is done. I may walk into the arms of the police, or into one of the traps set by the Duke. I may get shot, put in a dungeon, murdered, perhaps. You are to follow me at a safe distance wherever I go, never letting me out of your sight. If anything happens to me I want you to take up the search where I left off. Above all else you are to get Miss Hardwick away from those ruffians. Do you agree?”
Impulsively, without a moment’s hesitation, Granger put out his hand. The Phantom gripped it. As he held it for a moment, another look of doubt flickered across his face, but it was soon gone.
“Then get into your clothes,” he directed; “or mine, rather. We might as well keep up the masquerade a while longer. I am just a shade safer when I am hiding behind your personality.”
“But what about me?” inquired Granger, making a wry face.
“Give the dicks and bulls as wide a swath as you can. At worst, they can only pick you up again and take another impression of your finger prints, and you will have to explain why you have shed your gaudy feathers. If we have a bit of luck we’ll pull off a stunt that the police won’t forget in many a day. They’ll be so busy explaining their own mistakes and blunders that they won’t ask many questions.”
He had found a whisk broom and was removing from his clothing some of the grime and dust he had gathered in the tunnel. He glanced impatiently at his watch, while Granger dressed with time-consuming care.
“Which way?” inquired the reporter.
“Do you suppose it’s too late to find the coffeehouse pirate?”
“Doubtful, but you might try. Sometimes he hangs around the Catharine Street joint till late.”
“What’s his name?”
“You might call him Matt Lunn. He has several names, and he isn’t particular which one you use.”
The Phantom considered. “Is he close to the inner circle of the gang? Does he share its secrets?”
“I think he does, but I wouldn’t swear to it. Anyhow, he is a lot closer to the big chief than I ever got.”
The Phantom scowled while Granger adjusted his tie. The reporter seemed almost as keen on sartorial polish as on journalistic attainments.
“By the way,” inquired the Phantom, “who is the illustrious personage that’s referred to as ‘the big chief’?”
“He is the Duke’s chief agent. I don’t know his name, and I’ve never seen him. Through underground channels the Duke sends him orders from his cell in Sing Sing. The Duke is the brain that plans, and the big chief is the hand that executes. Say, I’m being consumed with curiosity. Aren’t you going to tell me something of your plans?”
“I haven’t anything definite. I shall go to the Catharine Street coffee house and try to cultivate the acquaintance of Mr. Matt Lunn. I mean to obtain certain items of information from him. Just how I shall go about obtaining them depends upon what sort of man I find him to be. We’ll be on our way whenever you are through primping.”
At last the reporter was ready. Peng Yuen was stolidly smoking his pipe as they passed out. The almond-shaped eyes narrowed a trifle as the Phantom shook his hand, and for an instant he seemed about to say something. In another moment he had changed his mind, however, and with a queer little grunt in his throat he went back to his green-tasseled pipe.
With a final admonition to exercise care and discretion, the Phantom left Granger outside the shop and walked rapidly toward Catharine Street. He had no reason for doubting the reporter’s sincerity. Granger’s moral stamina might not be all that could be desired; but, on the whole, the Phantom was well pleased with the arrangement. It had already relieved him of much worry and enabled him to center his thoughts and efforts on the task before him.
He had no difficulty in finding the coffee house, a crumbling and evil-looking hovel squeezed between a sooty factory building and a squalid tenement. Lights shone dimly through several windows in the block, which had a gloomy and somewhat sinister appearance, and he was looked at sharply by several wretched creatures who passed him on the sidewalk. The window and glass door of the coffee house were covered with green paper blinds, but there was a narrow opening through which the Phantom could get a glimpse of the interior.
Some twelve or fifteen men were seated at long tables, drinking coffee and smoking pipes or cigarettes. The air was so heavy with tobacco fumes that the Phantom could not distinguish their features clearly, but he got the impression that they were a disreputable lot. He looked in vain for anyone answering the description Granger had given of Matt Lunn. He walked away from the window and stood at the curb, scanning the street in either direction. At a corner a block away, he saw a shadowy figure leaning against a stack of boxes outside a grocery.
“Granger is on the job,” he mumbled.
Then he turned quickly just as a huge, raw-boned man appeared from the opposite direction and walked into the coffee house. The Phantom caught a glimpse of his face as he opened the door and passed through, and that glimpse revealed a great, livid scar over the left eye.
In an instant he knew that the man was Matt Lunn. A thin, audacious smile hovered about the Phantom’s lips as recognition flashed through his mind. For a moment he hesitated, casting a swift glance to the corner where Granger stood; then he crossed the sidewalk and resolutely pushed the door open.
A minute or two later, in a cheap, all-night lunchroom a block down the street, someone was impatiently jigging the hook of a telephone.
CHAPTER XXIV—THE FACE IN THE LIMOUSINE
Twelve or more pairs of eyes looked up as the Phantom walked into the coffee house. They gave the newcomer a long, stony stare, followed his brisk progress across the floor to a table in the rear, then looked down again into coffee cups and pipe bowls, as if the new arrival had been completely forgotten.
With a view to obtaining an unobstructed view of Matt Lunn’s face, the Phantom had chosen his position carefully. He wished to study the man before he approached him. A glance told him that Granger’s description had been apt but incomplete. He was a wicked-looking creature, with coffee-brown complexion, eyes that were as hard and emotionless as bits of colored porcelain, and thick, coarse lips that were fixed in a perpetual sneer and gave him a look of sullen ferocity that was set off strikingly by the scar over his eye.
The Phantom noted these details and made his deductions while he gave his order to a gaunt, hunchbacked waiter. So far Lunn, who sat alone across an aisle between the tables, had not even looked in his direction and seemed totally unaware of his presence. The others, too, appeared to be ignoring him, but furtive glances and an occasional whisper warned the Phantom that he was under surveillance.
He sipped a little of the coffee that was brought him, shoved the cup aside and strolled across the aisle, seating himself opposite the man with the scar.
“Hello, Lunn,” he said easily, imitating Granger’s manner of speech. It was a convenient opening, even if he should not be able to deceive the man in regard to his identity.
Slowly the other lifted his flinty eyes, fixing a vacuous stare on the Phantom’s face, and pulled hard at his pipe. “Hullo, yourself,” was his gruff response.
“A bit grouchy to-night, Lunn?” bantered the Phantom, resuming his study of the man at closer range and confirming his previous suspicion that Matt Lunn was a bully with a coward’s heart. A cranning of necks and lowering glances signified that the rest of the men in the room were following the conversation.
“You called me by a different name last time you saw me,” grumbled Lunn suspiciously.
The Phantom masked his momentary confusions behind a grin. After all, he had scarcely hoped to fool Lunn, for the latter and Granger had been intimately acquainted for some time, and this was putting the ruse to the acid test.
“You’ve got so many monickers, Lunn, that I can’t remember them all. Which particular one would you like to have me use to-night?”
“The same one you always used before, if you know which one that is.”
Of a sudden the Phantom wished that Granger had given him more explicit information regarding Lunn. The man with the scar was plainly suspicious, and the Phantom was not yet quite ready for action.
“Tell me where I can connect with a drink,” was his jocular evasion, “or I’ll call you a name you never heard before.”
The other sneered. “There are some things that hurt a lot worse than names do. One of them is a knife in the side, and I’ve been told a fellow whose name is Tommie Granger is going to get just that unless he explains certain things to the big chief.”
The Phantom’s face sobered. “I’m ready to explain. That’s why I looked you up to-night. But we can’t talk in here. Suppose we take a walk around the block?”
Lunn laughed derisively. “I was referrin’ to a guy named Tommie Granger. He looks a lot like you and he hands out pretty much the same kind of spiel, and yet I could tell the difference almost as soon as I put my lamps on you. Just the same, I’d as soon walk around the block with the Gray Phantom as with anybody else.”
He spoke the last sentence in a whisper, accompanying the words with a grin that rendered his face all the more repellent. The Phantom cast a quick glance at the evil-looking faces at the other tables, wondering whether Lunn had any confederates in the room. They were the scum of the lower levels of the underworld, and their blotched and hardened features bespoke lives steeped in loathsome iniquities, but, unless there were members of the Duke’s organization among them, the Phantom saw no reason why they should side against him.
He paid the hunchback and walked behind Lunn toward the door. Sullen and covert glances followed him, but none of the men rose, and he was permitted to reach the door without interference. He glanced back as he stepped out on the sidewalk and made sure that Lunn and himself were not being followed.
The man with the scar took a few steps down the street, then stopped and whirled round.
“What’s the idea?” he demanded brusquely. “Why did you walk in there and try to pass yourself off as Tommie Granger?”
“Not so loud, Lunn.” The Phantom glanced about him quickly. For the moment the block happened to be deserted. Lunn was standing with his back to the dark doorway of the factory building which adjoined the coffee house. There was a menacing scowl in his face and his right hand was hovering over one of his pockets.
Again the Phantom darted a quick glance up and down the street. The only person in sight was the lonely figure leaning against the stack of grocery boxes on the farther corner. Evidently Granger had not moved a single step from his post.
“I’m listening,” said Lunn. “What’s the answer?”
“This is your answer.” With one hand the Phantom pinioned Lunn’s arm; with the other he jerked his pistol from his pocket and pushed it against the other’s waist, shoving him into the shelter of the doorway. Lunn, startled by the swift maneuver, gave a throaty squeal.
“Be quiet!” commanded the Phantom. “I have a few things to say to you, and I don’t want any interruptions. I happen to know that you’re a member of the Duke’s gang. Your crowd is after me tooth and nail, and the reason you were so willing to take a walk with me was that you hoped to catch me off my guard and hand me over to your chief. You’re a fool, Lunn. Cleverer men than you have tried that and failed. Feel that?”
He jabbed the pistol harder against the other’s waist, and a yawp of terror proved that he had read Lunn’s character accurately. The big man, who would have been a dangerous adversary if he had gained the upper hand, was cowering.
“Now, Lunn,” said the Phantom sharply, “a few quick answers may prolong your life by a good many years. Did you ever hear of a young lady named Miss Hardwick?”
“The name sounds kind of familiar.”
“Don’t stall! Miss Hardwick was kidnaped by members of the Duke’s gang.”
“Ye-es.” Lunn gulped. “I—I think she was.”
“You know she was. Don’t you?” The question was emphasized with a little extra pressure on the pistol.
“I’ve been told the lady was kidnaped, but that’s all I know. I didn’t have anything to do with that job.”
The Phantom regarded him sharply, but his face was indistinct in the gloom. “Who did?”
“I don’t know; I never heard.”
“Where was she taken?”
“I can’t tell you that, either. Say, there’s no use poking a hole through me with that gat. I can’t tell what I don’t know.”
The Phantom was inclined to believe him. Evidently Granger had overestimated Lunn’s store of inside information regarding the gang’s activities.
“There’s one thing you can tell me, and you had better speak quickly. Where does this precious gang hang out? Where is its headquarters?”
Lunn did not answer. He was breathing stertorously, and he uttered a groan or grunt whenever the pressure on the pistol was increased.
“Out with it!” The Phantom cast an uneasy glance behind him as he spoke, but no one was in sight. “You’ll never get out of here alive unless you tell.”
The big fellow trembled. “I’ve sworn to keep my mouth shut.”
“Well, I guess it wouldn’t be the first time you have violated an oath. Where is the place?”
“Will you let me go if I tell you?”
An affirmative answer was on the Phantom’s tongue, but he held it back. “No, Lunn, you are not going to get off quite so easily. You might give me a fictitious address, and I would have no way of verifying it until too late. You will have to take me there, and I sha’n’t let you go until I have satisfied myself that it is the right place.”
Lunn groaned; and the Phantom looked dubiously along the street. The words were no sooner out of his mouth than a sense of diffidence assailed him. To march an unwilling and treacherous guide through the streets would be a hard and perilous task even at that late hour. Then an idea came to him. He would signal Granger and instruct him to find a taxicab.
He turned slightly and looked out of the doorway, waving his hand at the solitary figure on the corner. In the next moment a short exclamation of surprise fell from his lips. A big black car was gliding down the street, slackening its pace as it drew nearer. The Phantom, still pressing the pistol firmly against Lunn’s body, saw that it was a limousine, and he was at a loss to understand what a car of that type was doing in such a squalid neighborhood. Now it was crawling along very slowly, swerving close to the curb as it came within a few feet of the entrance to the coffee house. The driver was leaning from his seat, as if looking for someone.
Of a sudden a hoarse cry rose in the Phantom’s throat. Forgetting Lunn, he sprang from the doorway. A face had appeared at the window of the car—a white, rigid face with staring eyes and the look of death spread over its features.
The face was Helen Hardwick’s.
CHAPTER XXV—IN A CIRCLE OF LIGHT
She looked as though her whole being had frozen into rigidity, and the glacial stare of her eyes sent a chill through the Phantom’s veins. In a moment he was on the running board, wrenching the door open. He did not notice that the car gathered speed just as he tumbled in.
“Helen!” he cried, throwing himself into the seat beside her. “What’s the matter? What has happened? Can’t you speak?”
Her body swayed slightly with the motions of the car, but otherwise she did not stir. She sat erect and immobile, with her face turned stonily to the window, as if neither hearing nor seeing. He took one of her hands. It was cold, clammy, and limp. A groan broke from his lips.
Then, from a corner of the car, two shadows leaped upon him with a suddenness that dazed him. The pistol was still in his hand, but a stinging blow over the knuckles made him drop it to the floor. Helen Hardwick’s face, terribly still, held him under a spell while his arms were twisted behind him and his wrists secured with a stout cord that bit into his flesh. Not until his legs had also been manacled did a glimmering of the truth force itself through his numbed senses; but even then he could think of nothing but the woman at his side.
“Is she—dead?” he asked.
Someone laughed. “Oh, no! She will come out of it presently. We needed a decoy, and she refused to accommodate us, so we gave her a hypodermic injection. It worked fine.”
He braced his muscles as a vivid realization of what had happened flashed upon him, but the cords about his wrists and ankles held his limbs. Again he had walked into a trap, but for once he did not blame himself for his lack of caution. With eyes open he would have rushed into a thousand traps if Helen Hardwick was the bait. He glanced out of the window, noticing that the car was gliding swiftly through dark and deserted streets.
A hand reached out and pulled down the blind, cutting off the view. The car was making numerous turns, and he soon lost all sense of direction. The man’s explanation of Helen Hardwick’s condition had removed a crushing weight of horror from his mind, and once more his head was functioning clearly.
“Another of the Duke’s tricks, I suppose?” he remarked.
“You suppose correctly,” was the answer. “You have slipped out of our hands often enough, but this time we have you. You haven’t a chance in the world.”
The Phantom was silent for a time, realizing that his captors had turned the trick neatly and with dispatch. Evidently they were men of much finer mental caliber than Matt Lunn and Dan the Dope. It had been a clever ruse, and they had set the trap very deftly.
“What’s the programme?” he inquired.
The Phantom asked no more questions. Suddenly he remembered Granger, and he wondered whether the reporter had been able to follow the speeding car. It was doubtful, he thought, unless Granger had been lucky enough to find a taxicab in a hurry. Yet the fellow was resourceful and keen-witted, and it was possible——
His thoughts were rudely interrupted. The car slowed down, and almost in the same instant a hand gripped him around the throat and shoved him back against the cushion. Another hand put a cloth over his mouth, and he became conscious of a cloying, sickeningly sweetish odor. Gradually his sensations drifted into chaos as his head grew heavier and heavier. He heard voices, but they sounded as if coming from a great distance, and he had an odd feeling that the car was sliding down a bottomless abyss. Then a great void seemed to swallow him up, and he knew nothing more.
Finally, after what seemed a lapse of hours, his mind drifted out of the stupor. There was a burning sensation in his throat and he felt sick and weak. He tried to move, but something restrained him, and he had a dull impression that he was roped to a chair and that the chair itself was clamped to the floor. His eyelids fluttered weakly, and he closed them instinctively as a door opened behind him.
Two men were entering the room, and one of them was chuckling gleefully, as if he had just heard a good joke. Though his thoughts were wandering in a haze, it occurred to him that it might be well to feign unconsciousness. He closed his eyes tightly and sat motionless in the chair. The two men advanced until they stood in front of him. The Phantom felt their eyes on his face.
“Capital!” exclaimed one of them, and he thought there was something familiar about the voice. “Too bad the Duke can’t be here and see this! It would do his soul good to see his old enemy strapped to a chair. Well, Somers, I guess this will be the end of the Gray Phantom.”
The words stung the listener’s senses like a whiplash. He tried to identify the voice, but he was unable to recall where he had heard it before.
“We’ve got him just where we want him,” remarked the man addressed as Somers, “and I don’t think he’ll get away from us this time. It will be a miracle if he does.”
“Not even a miracle can save him. The Phantom is done for. You did a good job, Somers.”
“Oh, it was easy enough. All we had to do was to shoot some dope into the moll, pose her in the window of the car, and drive past the place where we had been tipped off we would find the Phantom. I was just wondering how to get him out of the joint, when he walks out of a doorway, catches a glimpse of the skirt, and rushes blindly into the trap. It worked like greased lightning. Looks as though he’d be dead to the world for quite a while yet.”
The Phantom repressed a smile. His superb constitution was already shaking off the effects of the chloroform.
“How is the little doll?” inquired the first speaker, who seemed to be a man of authority in the Duke’s organization.
“Chipper as a wild cat. She came to shortly after we got here. That kid had spunk, and she’s all there on looks. I don’t blame the Gray Phantom for falling for her. I would myself.”
“Sentiment and business make a bad mixture,” was the other’s dry comment. “Don’t let a pretty face bedevil you, Somers. The young lady is here to serve our purpose. After that——”
He stopped, and the ensuing pause somehow impressed the Phantom as ominous.
“Well, then what?” asked Somers, and there was a slight catch to his voice.
“She is a shrewd young thing and she knows too much for our good. Our safety demands that—but we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.” He laughed again, as if to rid his mind of unpleasant thoughts. “I can scarcely realize that the Gray Phantom is in our power at last. It’s almost too good to be true.”
“It is true, though. Say, won’t he get a jolt when he comes out of the daze and finds himself strapped to a chair?”
“That isn’t the only jolt that’s in store for him. We’ll give him a glimpse of the big show, just for the moral effect it will have on him. Just a little eye teaser, you know, Somers. Is everything ready?”
“Ready to a dot. Want to have a look?”
The other answered affirmatively, and the two men left the room. The last part of the conversation had been unintelligible to the Phantom, and he did not try to puzzle it out. The unfinished sentence and its train of vaguely disturbing thoughts haunted him. Helen Hardwick was to serve some mysterious purpose. After that—he wondered why he felt a chill as he tried to imagine the rest. The words left unspoken suggested terrifying possibilities.
He opened his eyes. Evidently the two men had extinguished the lights upon leaving, for the room was dark. With the fragmentary sentence still echoing in his ears, he tore at the ropes, but the attempt only bruised his wrists.
Suddenly he sat still, his eyes fixed on a tiny light that had appeared in the back of the room. The point of luminance grew larger and larger, swelling into a circle of pale radiance, and in its center he saw something that caused him to wonder whether he was dreaming a madman’s dream.