"Do you believe it?" I asked Kennedy, as the voices died away, leaving us with a feeling that some one had gone out of the very room in which we were.
He shrugged his shoulders and said nothing. But I cannot say that he seemed ill pleased at the result of the interview.
"We'll just keep this vocaphone in," he remarked. "It may come in handy some time. Now, I think we had better go back to the laboratory! Things have begun to move."
On the way back he stopped to telephone Norton to meet us and a few minutes after we arrived, the archaeologist entered.
Kennedy lost no time in coming directly to the point, and Norton could see, in fact seemed to expect and be prepared for what was coming.
"Well," exclaimed Kennedy, "you've done it, this time!"
"I know what you are going to ask," returned Norton. "You are going to ask me why I did it. And I'm going to tell you. After I left you, the other day, I thought about it a long time. The more I thought, the more of a shame it seemed to me that a girl like that should be made a victim of her feelings. It wasn't so much what they have done to me that made me do it. I would have acted the same if it had been de Moche instead of Lockwood who was playing on her heart. I was afraid, to tell the truth, that you wouldn't tell her until it was too late. And she's too good to throw herself away and allow her fortune to be wasted by a couple of speculators."
"Very well," said Craig. "For the sake of argument, let us admit all that. What did you expect to accomplish by it?"
"Why—put an end to it, of course."
"But do you think she was going to accept as truth what you told her?Would that be natural for one so high-strung?"
"Perhaps not—right away. But I supposed she would come to you—as I see she has, for you know about it. After that, it was only a question of time. It may have been a heroic remedy, but the disease was critical."
"Suppose," suggested Craig, "that, after all, he told her that he was there in the Museum, but that he did not get the dagger. And suppose that she believed it. What then?"
Norton looked up quickly. "Did he tell her that?"
"I am supposing that he did," repeated Craig, declining to place himself in a position which might lead to disclosing how he found out.
"Then I should say that he was a great deal cleverer than I gave him credit for being," returned Norton.
"Well, it's done now, and can't be undone. Have you found out anything about the de Moches?"
"Not very much, I must admit. Of course, you know I'm not on the best of terms with them, for some reason or other. But I've been around the Prince Edward Albert a good deal, and I don't think they've been able to do much that I haven't some kind of line on. Alfonso seems to be moping. His professors here tell me that he has been neglecting his work sadly for the past few days. The Senora and Whitney seem to be as friendly as ever. I should say that they were going the pace fast, and it shows on him."
I glanced significantly at Kennedy, but he betrayed nothing that might lead one to suppose he had discovered the cause. Evidently he was not ready yet to come out into the open and expected further developments on the poisoned cigarette clue.
The telephone rang and Craig took down the receiver.
"Yes, this is Kennedy," he answered. "Oh, hello, Lockwood. What's that? You've been trying to get me all day? I just came in. Why, yes, I can see you in about half an hour."
"I guess I'd better clear out," said Norton with a bitter laugh, as Kennedy hung up the receiver. "There have been enough crimes committed without adding another murder to the list."
"Keep on watching the de Moches," requested Kennedy as Norton made his way to the door.
"Yes," agreed Norton. "They will bear it—particularly Alfonso. They are hot-blooded. You never know what they are going to do, and they keep their own counsel. I might hope that Lockwood would forget; but a de Moche—never."
I cannot say that I envied him very much, for doubtless what he said was true, though his danger might be mitigated by the fact that the dagger was no longer in his Museum. Still, it would never have left Peru, I reflected, if it had not been for him, and there is, even in the best of us, a smouldering desire for revenge.
Lockwood was more than prompt. I had expected that he would burst into the laboratory prepared to clean things out. Instead he came in as though nothing at all had happened.
"There's no use mincing words, Kennedy," he began. "You know that I know what has happened. That scoundrel, Norton, has told Inez that you had shoe-prints of some one who was in the Museum the night of the robbery and that those shoe-prints correspond with mine. As a matter of fact, Kennedy, I was there. I was there to get the dagger. But before I could get it, some one else must have done so. It was gone."
I wanted to believe Lockwood. As for Craig he said nothing.
"Then, when I did have a chance to get away that night," he continued,"I went over to Mendoza's. The rest you know."
"You have told Inez that?" asked Kennedy in order to seem properly surprised.
"Yes—and I think she believes me. I can't say. Things are strained with her. It will take time. I'm not one of those who can take a girl by main force and make her do what she won't do. I wish I could smooth things over. Let me see the prints."
Kennedy handed them over to him. He looked at them, long and closely, then handed back the damning evidence against himself.
"I know it would be no use to destroy these," he remarked. "In the first place that would really incriminate me. And in the second I suppose you have copies."
Craig smiled blandly.
"But I can tell you," he exclaimed, bringing his fist down on the laboratory table with a bang, "that before I lose that girl, somebody will pay for it—and there won't be any mistakes made, either."
The scowl on his face and the menacing look in his eye showed that now, with his back up against the wall, he was not bluffing.
He seemed to get little satisfaction out of his visit to us, and in fact I think he made it more in a spirit of bravado than anything else.
Lockwood had scarcely gone before Kennedy pulled out the University schedule, and ran his finger down it.
"Alfonso ought to be at a lecture in the School of Mines," he said finally, folding up the paper. "I wish you'd go over and see if he is there, and, if he is, ask him to step into the laboratory."
The lecture was in progress all right, but when I peered into the room it was evident that de Moche was not there. Norton was right. The young man was neglecting his work. Evidently the repeated rebuffs of Inez had worked havoc with him.
Nor was he at the hotel, as we found out by calling up.
There was only one other place that I could think of where he would be likely to be and that was at the apartment of Inez. Apparently the same idea occurred to Kennedy, for he suggested going back to our observation point in the boarding-house and finding out.
All the rest of the day we listened through the vocaphone, but without finding out a thing of interest. Now and then we would try the detective instrument, the little black disc in the back, but with no better success. Then we determined to listen in relays, one listening, while the other went out for dinner.
It must have been just a bit after dark that we could hear Inez talking in a low tone with Juanita.
A buzzing noise indicated that there was some one at the hall door.
"If it's any one for me," we heard Inez say, "tell them that I will be out directly. I'm not fit to be seen now."
The door was opened and a voice which we could not place asked for the senorita. A moment later Juanita returned and asked the visitor to be seated a few moments.
It was not long before we were suddenly aware that there was another person in the room. We could hear whispers. The faithful little vocaphone even picked them up and shot them down to us.
"Is everything all right?" whispered one, a new voice which was somewhat familiar I thought, but disguised beyond recognition.
"Yes. She'll be out in a minute."
"Now, remember what I told you. If this thing works you get fifty dollars more. I'd better put this mask on—damn it!—the slit's torn. It'll do. I'll hide here as soon as we hear her. That's a pretty nice private ambulance you have down there. Did you tell the elevator boy that she had suddenly been taken ill? That's all fixed, then. I've got the stuff—amyl nitrite—she'll go off like a shot. But we'll have to work quick. It only keeps her under a few minutes. I can't wear this mask down and I'm afraid some one will recognize me. Oh, you brought a beard. Good. I'll give you the signal. There must be no noise. Yes, I saw the stretcher where you left it in the hall."
"All right, Doc," returned the first and unfamiliar voice.
It all happened so quickly that we were completely bowled over for the moment. Who was the man addressed as "Doc"? There was no time to find out, no time to do anything, apparently, so quickly had the plot been sprung.
I looked at Kennedy, aghast, not knowing what to do in this unexpected crisis.
A moment later we heard a voice, "I'm sorry to have had to keep you waiting, but what is it that I can do for you?"
"Good God!" exclaimed Kennedy. "It is Inez herself!"
It was altogether too late to get over there to warn her, perhaps even to rescue her. What could we do? If we could only shout for help. But what good would that do, around a corner and so far away?
The vocaphone itself!
Quickly Kennedy turned another switch, of a rheostat, which accentuated a whisper to almost a shout.
"Don't be alarmed, Senorita," he cried. "This is Kennedy talking. Look under the bookcase by the window. You will find a cedar box. It is a detective vocaphone through which I can hear you and which is talking out to you. I have heard something just there just now—"
"Yes, yes. Go on!"
"You are threatened. Shout! Shout!"
Just then there came a sound of a scuffle and a muffled cry which was not much above a whisper, as though a strong hand was clapped over her mouth.
What could we do?
"Juanita—Juanita—help!—police!" shouted Craig himself through the vocaphone.
An instant later we could hear other screams as Juanita heard and spread the alarm, not a second too soon.
"Come on, Walter," shouted Kennedy dashing out of the room, now that he was assured the alarm had been given.
We hurried around the corner, and into the apartment. One of the elevators was up, and no one was running the other, but we opened the gates and Kennedy ran it up by himself.
In the Mendoza apartment all was a babel of voices, every one talking at once.
"Did you get them?" Craig asked, looking about.
"No, sir," replied the elevator boy. "One of them came in from the ambulance and told me Miss Mendoza was suddenly taken sick. He rode up with the stretcher. The other one must have walked up."
"Do you know him? Has he ever been here before?"
"I can't say, sir. I didn't see him. At least, sir, when I heard the screams I ran in from the elevator, which the other one told me to wait with—left the door open. Just as I ran in, they dodged out past me, jumped into the car and rode down. I guess they must have had the engine of the ambulance motor running, sir, if they got away without you seeing them."
We were too late to head them from speeding off. But, at least, we had saved the Senorita. She was terribly upset by the attack, much shaken, but really all right.
"Have you any idea who it could be?" asked Craig as the faithfulJuanita cared for her.
"I don't know the man who was waiting and 'Nita never saw him, either," she replied. "The one who jumped out from behind the portieres had on a mask and a false beard. But I didn't recognize anything about him."
Sudden as the attack had been and serious as might have been the outcome, we could not but feel happy that it had been frustrated.
Yet it seemed that some one ought to be delegated to see that such a thing could not occur again.
"We must think up some means of protecting you," soothed Kennedy. "Let me see, Mr. Lockwood and Mr. Whitney seem to be the closest to you. If you don't mind I'll call them up. I wonder if you'd object if we had a little luncheon up here, to-morrow? I have a special reason for asking it. I want to insure your safety and we may as well meet on common ground."
"There isn't the slightest objection in the world," she replied, asKennedy reached for the telephone.
We had some little difficulty in locating both Lockwood and Whitney, but finally after a time managed to find them and arrange for the conference on the Senorita's safety for the next day.
Outside Kennedy gave instructions to the officer on the beat to watch the apartment particularly, and there was no reason now to fear a repetition of the attempt, at least that night.
Early the following morning Kennedy left me alone in the laboratory and made a trip downtown, where he visited a South American tobacco dealer and placed a rush order for a couple of hundred cigarettes exactly similar in shape and quality to those which Mendoza had smoked and which the others seemed also to prefer, except, however, that the deadly drug was left out.
While he was gone, it occurred to me to take up again the hunt for Alfonso. Norton was not in his little office, nor could I find Alfonso anywhere about the campus. In fact he seemed to have almost dropped out of his University work for the time. Accordingly, I turned my steps toward the Prince Edward Albert Hotel, in the hope that he might be there.
Inquiries of the clerk at the desk told me that he had been there, butwas out just at that moment. I did not see Whitney around, nor theSenora, so I sat down to wait, having nothing better to do untilKennedy's return.
I was about to give it up and go, when I heard a cab drive up to the door and, looking up, I saw Alfonso get out. He saw me about the same time and we bowed. I do not think he even tried to avoid me.
"I haven't seen you for some time," I remarked, searching his face, which seemed to me to be paler than it had been.
"No," he replied. "I haven't been feeling very well lately and I've been running up into the country now and then to a quiet hotel—a sort of rest cure, I suppose you would call it. How are you? How is Senorita Inez?"
"Very well," I replied, wondering whether he had said what he did in the hope of establishing a complete alibi for the events of the night before.
Briefly I told him what had happened, omitting reference to the vocaphone and our real part in it.
"That is terrible," he exclaimed. "Oh, if she would only allow me to take care of her—I would take her back to our own country, where she would be safe, far away from these people who seek to prey on all of us."
He paced up and down nervously, and I could see that my information had added nothing to his peace of mind, though, at the same time, he had betrayed nothing on his part.
"I was just passing through," I said finally, looking at my watch, "and happened to see you. I hope your mother is well?"
"As well as is to be expected, surrounded by people who watch every act," he replied, I thought with a rap at us for having Norton about and so active, though I could not be sure.
We separated, and I hastened back to the laboratory to report to Craig that Alfonso was rusticating for his health.
Kennedy, on his part, had had an experience, though it was no more conclusive than my own. After he had left the tobacco district, he had walked up Wall Street to the subway. In the crowd he had seen Senora de Moche, although she had not seen him. He had turned and followed her until she entered the building in which Whitney and his associates had their offices. Whether it indicated that she was still leading them a chase, or they her, was impossible to determine, but it at least showed that they were still on friendly terms with each other.
In the laboratory he could always find something to do on the case, either in perfecting his chemical tests of the various drugs we had discovered, or in trying to decipher some similarities in the rough printing of the four warnings and the anonymous letter with the known handwriting of those connected with the case, many specimens of which he bad been quietly collecting. That in itself was a tremendously minute job, entailing not only a vast amount of expert knowledge such as he had collected in his years of studying crime scientifically, but the most exact measurements and careful weighing and balancing of trifles, which to the unscientific conveyed no meanings at all. Still, he seemed to be forging ahead, though he never betrayed what direction the evidence seemed to be taking.
The package of cigarettes which he had ordered downtown was delivered about an hour after his return and seemed to be the signal for him to drop work, for the meeting with Lockwood and Whitney had been set early. He stowed the package in his pockets and then went over to a cabinet in which he kept a number of rather uncommon drugs. From it he took a little vial which he shoved into his waistcoat pocket.
"Are you ready, Walter?" he asked.
"Whenever you are," I said, laying aside my writing.
Together we made our way down to the Mendoza apartment which had been the scene of the near-tragedy the night before. Outside, he paused for several moments to make inquiries about any suspicious persons that might have been seen lurking about the neighbourhood. None of the attendants in the apartment remembered having seen any, and they were now very alert after the two events, the murder and the attempted abduction. Not a clue seemed to have been left by the villain who had been called "Doc."
"How do you feel after your thrilling experience?" greeted Craig pleasantly, as Juanita admitted us and Inez came forward.
"Oh, Mr. Kennedy," she answered, with a note of sadness in her tone. "It makes me feel so alone in the world. If it were not for 'Nita—and you, I don't know what I should do."
"Doesn't Mr. Lockwood count?" asked Kennedy observantly.
"Of course—everything," she answered hastily. "But he has to be away so much on business, and—"
She paused and sighed. I could not help wondering whether, after all, his explanation of the dagger episode had been enough to satisfy her. Had she really accepted it?
Neither Lockwood nor Whitney had arrived, and Kennedy improved the opportunity to have a quiet talk aside with her, at which, I imagine, he was arranging a programme of what was to happen at this meeting and her part in it to co-operate with him.
She had left the room for a moment and we were alone. It was evidently a part of his plan, for no sooner was she gone than he opened the package of cigarettes which he had ordered and took out from the box in which Mendoza had kept his cigarettes those that were there, substituting those he had brought.
We had not long to wait, now. Lockwood and Whitney came together. I was interested to see the greeting of Inez and her lover. Was it pure fancy, or did I detect a trace of coldness as though there had sprung up something between them? As far as Lockwood was concerned, I felt sure that he was eager to break down any barrier that kept them from being as they had been.
Whitney took her hand and held it, in a playful sort of way. "I wish I were a young buck," he smiled. "No one would dare look at you—much less try to carry you off. Yes, we must be more careful of our little beauty, or we shall lose her."
They turned to greet us. I felt, as we shook hands, that it was much the same sort of handshake that one sees in the prize ring—to be followed by the clang of a bell, then all going to it, in battle royal, with the devil after the hindmost.
There was scarcely a chance for a preliminary bout before luncheon was announced, and we entered the cozy little dining-room to seat ourselves at the daintiest of tables. One could feel the hostess radiating hospitality, even on such a cross-current set of guests as we were, and for the time, I almost felt that it had been Kennedy's purpose to promote a love-feast instead of an armed truce.
Nothing was said about the main cause of our being together for some time, and the small talk almost lifted for a time the incubus that had settled down on all our lives since the tragedy in the den at the other end of the suite. But the fact could not be blinked.
Tacitly every one seemed to wait on Kennedy to sound the gong. Finally he did so.
"Of course," he began, clearing his throat, "there is no use making believe about anything. I think we all understand each other better now than we have ever done before. As for me, I am in this case under a promise to stick to it and fight it to the end. I suppose the rest of you are, also. But that need not prevent us agreeing on one thing. We can work together to protect Senorita Mendoza, at least, from such danger as threatened her last night."
"It's a dastardly shame," Lockwood exclaimed angrily, "that a man who would attempt a thing like that should go unpunished."
"Show me how to trace him and I'll guarantee the punishment," rejoinedCraig drily.
"I am not a detective," replied Lockwood.
Kennedy forebore to reply in kind, though I knew there was a ready answer on his tongue for the lover.
Ever since they had arrived, the Senorita had seen that they were well supplied with cigarettes from the case in which she and they supposed were the genuine South American brand of her father. Kennedy and I smoked them, too, although neither of us liked them very much. The others were smoking furiously.
"However," resumed Kennedy, "I do not feel that I want to intrude myself in this matter without being perfectly frank and having the approval of Senorita Mendoza. She has known both of you longer and more intimately than she has known me, although she has seen fit to place certain of her affairs in my hands, for which I trust I shall render a good account of my stewardship. It seems to me, though, that if there is, as we now know there is, some one whom we do not know"—he paused—"who has sunk so low as to wish to carry her off, apparently where she shall be out of the influence of her friends, it is only right that precautions should be taken to prevent it."
"What is your suggestion?" demanded Whitney, rather contentiously.
"Would there be any objection," asked Kennedy, "if I should ask my old friend,—or any of you may do it,—Deputy Commissioner O'Connor to detail a plainclothesman to watch this house and neighbourhood, especially at night?"
We watched the faces of the others. But it was really of no use.
"I think that is an excellent plan," decided Inez herself. "I shall feel much safer and surely none of you can be jealous of the city detectives."
Kennedy smiled. She had cut the Gordian knot with a blow. Neither Lockwood nor Whitney could object. The purpose of the luncheon was accomplished.
In fact he did not wait for further consideration, but excused himself from the table for a moment to call up our old friend O'Connor and tell him how gravely his man was needed. It was a matter of only a few minutes when he returned from the other room.
"He will detail Burke for this special service as long as we want him," reported Craig, sitting down again.
Inez was delighted, naturally, for the affair had been a terrific shock to her. I could see how relieved she felt, for I was sitting directly next to her.
The maid had, meanwhile brought in the coffee and Inez had been waiting to pour until Kennedy returned. She did not do so, now, either, however. It seemed as if she were waiting for some kind of signal from Kennedy.
"What a splendid view of the park you get here," remarked Kennedy turning toward the long, low windows that opened on a balustraded balcony. "Just look at that stream of automobiles passing on the west drive."
Common politeness dictated that all should turn and look, although there was no novelty in the sight for any of us.
As I have said, I was sitting next to Inez. To me she was a far more attractive sight than any view of the park. I barely looked out of the window. Imagine my surprise, then, at seeing her take advantage of the diversion to draw from the folds of her dress a little vial and pour a bit of yellowish, syrupy liquid into the cup of coffee which she was preparing for Whitney.
I could not help looking at her quickly. She saw that I had seen her and raised her other hand with a finger to her lips and an explanatory glance at Kennedy who was keeping the others interested. Instantly, I recognized the little vial which Craig had shoved into his waistcoat pocket. That had been the purpose of his whispered conference with her when we arrived. I said nothing, but determined to observe more closely.
More coffee and more cigarettes followed, always from the same box which was now on the table. The luncheon developed almost a real conversation. For the time, under the spell of our hostess, we nearly forgot that we were in reality bitter enemies.
My real interest, as time passed, centred in Whitney and I could not help watching him closely. Was it a fact, or was it merely my imagination? He seemed quite different. The pupils of his eyes did not seem to be quite so dilated as they had been at other times, or even when he arrived. Even his heart action appeared to be more normal. I think Inez noticed it, too. There was none of the wildness in his conversation, such as there often had been at other times.
Our party was prolonged beyond the time we had expected, but, although he had much on his mind, Kennedy made no move to break it up. In fact he did everything to encourage it.
At last, however, the others did notice the time, and I think it was with sincere regret that the truce was broken. Even then, no parting shots were indulged in.
As we left, Inez thanked Kennedy for his consideration, and I am sure that that in itself was reward enough. We parted from Lockwood, who wished to remain a little while, and rode down in the elevator with Whitney, a changed man.
"I'll walk over to the elevated with you," he said. "I was going to my hotel, but I think I'll go down to the office instead."
Evidently he had got Senora de Moche out of his mind, at least temporarily, I thought. Then for the first time I recalled that during the whole luncheon there had been no reference to either the Senora or Alfonso, though both must have been in our minds often.
"What was it you had Inez drop into Whitney's coffee?" I asked Craig as we parted from him and rode uptown.
"You saw that?" he smiled. "It was pilocarpine, jaborandi, a plant found largely in Brazil, one of the antidotes for stramonium poisoning. It doesn't work with every one. But it seems to have done so with him. Besides, the caffeine in the coffee probably aided the pilocarpine. Then, too, I made them smoke cigarettes without the dope that is being fed them. Lockwood's case, for some reason, hasn't gone far. But did you notice how the treatment contracted the pupils of Whitney's eyes almost back to normal again?"
I had and said so, adding, "But what was your idea?"
"I think I've got at the case from a brand-new angle," he replied. "Unless I am greatly mistaken, when the person who is doing the doping sees that Whitney is getting better—why, I think you all noticed it, Inez and Lockwood as well as you—it will mean another attempt to substitute more cigarettes doped with that drug. I think it's by substitution that it's being done. We'll see."
At the laboratory, Kennedy called Norton and described briefly what had happened, especially to Whitney.
"Now is your chance, Norton," he added, "to do some real good work. I want some one to watch the Senora, see if she, too, notes the difference in him. Understand?"
"Perfectly," returned Norton. "That is something I think I can do."
It was not until after dinner that we heard again from Norton. He had evidently spent the time faithfully hanging about the Prince Edward Albert, but Whitney had not come in, although the Senora and Alfonso were about.
"I saw them leaving the dining-room," he reported to us in the laboratory directly afterward, "just as Whitney came in. They could not see me. I took good care of that. But, say, there is a change in Whitney, isn't there? I wonder what caused it?"
"It's as noticeable as that?" asked Kennedy. "And did she notice it?"
"I'm sure of it," replied Norton confidently. "She couldn't help it. Besides, after he left her and went into the dining-room himself she and Alfonso seemed to be discussing something. I'm sure it was that."
Kennedy said nothing, except to thank Norton and compliment him on his powers of observation. Norton took the praise with evident satisfaction, and after a moment excused himself, saying that he had some work to do over in the Museum.
He had no sooner gone than Kennedy took from a drawer a little packet of powder and an atomizer full of liquid, which he dropped into his pocket.
"I think the Prince Edward Albert will be the scene of our operations, to-night, Walter," he announced, reaching for his hat.
He seemed to be in a hurry and it was not many minutes before we entered. As he passed the dining-room he glanced in. There was Whitney, not half through a leisurely dinner. Neither of the de Moches seemed to be downstairs.
Kennedy sauntered over to the desk and looked over the register. We already knew that Whitney and the Senora had suites on the eighth floor, on opposite sides and at opposite ends of the hall. The de Moche suite was under the number 810. That of Whitney was 825.
"Is either 823 or 827 vacant?" asked Kennedy as the clerk came over to us.
He turned to look over his list. "Yes, 827 is vacant," he found.
"I'd like to have it," said Kennedy, making some excuse about our luggage being delayed, as he paid for it for the night.
"Front!" called the clerk, and a moment later we found ourselves in the elevator riding up.
The halls were deserted at that time in the evening except for a belated theatre-goer, and in a few minutes there would ensue a period in which there was likely to be no one about.
We entered the room next to Whitney's without being observed by any one of whom we cared. The boy left us, and it was a simple matter after that to open a rather heavy door that communicated between the two suites and was not protected by a Yale lock.
Instead of switching on the lights, Kennedy first looked about carefully until he was assured that there was no one there. It seemed to me to be an unnecessary caution, for we knew Whitney was down-stairs and would probably be there a long time. But he seemed to think it necessary. Positive that we were alone, he made a hasty survey of the rooms. Then he seemed to select as a starting-point a table in one corner of the sitting-room on which lay a humidor and a heavy metal box for cigarettes.
Quickly he sprinkled on the floor, from the hall door to the table on which the case of cigarettes lay, some of the powder which I had seen him wrap up in the laboratory before we left. Then, with the atomizer, he sprayed over it something that had a pungent, familiar odour—walking backwards from the hall door to the table, as he sprayed.
"Don't you want more light?" I asked, starting to cross to a window to let the moonlight stream in.
"Don't walk on it, Walter," he whispered, pushing me back. "No, I don't need any more light."
"What are you doing?" I asked, mystified at his actions.
"First I sprinkled some powdered iodine on the floor," he replied, "and then sprayed over just enough ammonia to moisten it. It will evaporate quickly, leaving what I call my anti-burglar powder."
"I'm sure I wouldn't be thought one of the fraternity for the world," I observed, stepping aside to give him all the room he wanted in which to operate.
He had finished his work by this time and now the evening wind was blowing away the slight fumes that had arisen. For a few moments he left our door into Whitney's room open, in order to insure clearing away the odour. Then he quietly closed it, but did not lock it again.
We waited a few minutes, then Craig leaned over to me. "I wish you'd go down and see how near Whitney is through dinner," he said. "If he is through, do something, anything to keep him down there. Only be as careful as you can not to be seen by any one who knows us."
I rode down in an empty elevator and cautiously made my way to the dining-room. Whitney had finished much sooner than I had expected and was not there. Much as I wanted not to be seen, I found that it was necessary to make a tour of the hotel to find him and I did so, wondering what expedient I would adopt to keep him down there if I found him. I did not have to adopt any, however. Whitney was almost alone in the writing-room, and a big pile of letters beside him showed me that he would be busy for some time. I rode back to the room to tell Craig, flattering myself that I had not been seen.
"Good," he exclaimed. "I don't think we'll have to wait much longer, if anything at all is going to happen."
In the darkness we settled ourselves for another vigil that was to last we knew not how long. Neither of us spoke as we half crouched in the shadow of our room, listening.
Slowly the time passed. Would any one take advantage of the opportunity to tamper with the box of cigarettes on the table?
I fell to speculating. Who could it possibly have been that had conceived this devilish plot? What was back of it all? I wondered whether it were possible that Lockwood, now that Mendoza was out of the way, could desire to remove Whitney, the sole remaining impediment to possessing the whole of the treasure as well as Inez? Then there were the Senora and Alfonso, the one with a deep race and family grievance, the other a rejected suitor. What might not they do with some weird South American poison?
Once or twice we heard the elevator door clang and waited expectantly, but nothing happened. I began to wonder whether, even if some one had a pass-key to the suite, we could hear him enter if he was quiet. The outside hall was thickly carpeted, and deadened every footfall if one exercised only reasonable care. The rooms themselves were much the same.
"Don't you think we might have the door ajar a little?" I suggested anxiously.
"Sh!" was Kennedy's only comment in the negative.
I glanced now and then at my watch and by straining my eyes was surprised to see how early it was yet. The minutes were surely leaden-footed.
In the darkness, I fell again to reviewing the weird succession of events. I am not by nature superstitious, but in the black silence I could well imagine a staring succession of eyes, beginning with the dilated pupils of Whitney and passing on to the corpse-like expression of Mendoza, but always ending with the remarkable, piercing, black eyes of the Indian woman with the melancholy-visaged son, as they had impressed me the first time I saw them and, in fact, ever since. Was it a freak of my mind, or was there some reason for it?
Suddenly I heard in the next room what sounded like a series of little explosions, as though some one were treading on match heads.
"My burglar powder works," muttered Craig to me in a hoarse whisper."Every step, even those of a mouse running across, sets it off!"
He rose quickly and threw open the door into Whitney's suite. I sprang after him.
There, in the shadows, I saw a dark form, starting back in quick retreat. But we were too late. He was cat-like, too quick for us.
In the dim light of the little explosions we could catch a glimpse of the person who had been craftily working with the dread drug to drive Whitney and others insane. But the face was masked!
He banged shut the door after him and fled down the hall, making a turn to a flight of steps.
We followed, and at the steps paused a moment. "You go up, Walter," shouted Kennedy. "I'll go down."
It was fifteen minutes later before we met downstairs, neither of us with a trace of the intruder. He seemed to have vanished like smoke.
"Must have had a room, like ourselves," remarked Craig somewhat chagrined at the outcome of his scheme. "And if he was clever enough to have a room, he is clever enough to have a disguise that would fool the elevator boys for a minute. No, he has gone. But I'll wager he won't try any more substitutions of stramonium-poisoned cigarettes for a while. It was too close to be comfortable."
We were baffled again, and this time by a mysterious masked man. Could it be the same whom we heard over the vocaphone addressed as "Doc"? Perhaps it was, but that gave us no hint as to his identity. He seemed just as far away as ever.
We waited around the elevators for some time, but nothing happened. Kennedy even sought out the manager of the hotel, and after telling who he was, had a search made of the guests who might be suspected. The best we could do was to leave word that the employees might be put on the lookout for anything of a suspicious nature.
Whitney, the innocent cause of all this commotion, was still in the writing-room with his letters.
"I think I ought to tell him," decided Kennedy as we passed down the lobby.
He seemed surprised to see us, as we strolled up to his writing desk, but pushed aside the few letters which he had not finished and asked us to sit down.
"I don't know whether you have noticed it," began Craig, "but I wonder how you feel?"
Whitney had expected something else rather than his health as the subject of a quiz. "Pretty good now," he answered before he knew it, "although I must admit that for the past few days I have wondered whether I wasn't slowing up a bit—or rather going too fast."
"Would you like to know why you feel that way?" asked Craig.
Whitney was now genuinely puzzled. It was perfectly evident, as it had been all the time, that he had not the slightest inkling of what was going on.
As Craig briefly unfolded what we had discovered and the reason for it,Whitney watched him aghast.
"Poisoned cigarettes," he repeated slowly. "Well, who would ever have thought it. You can bet your last jitney I'll be careful what I smoke in the future, if I have to smoke only original packages. And it was that, partly, that ailed Mendoza?"
Kennedy nodded. "Don't take any pilocarpine, just because I told you that was what I used. You have given yourself the best prescription, just now. Be careful what you smoke. And, don't get excited if you seem to be stepping on matches up there in your room for a little while, either. It's nothing."
Whitney's only known way of thanking anybody was to invite them to adjourn to the cafe, and accordingly we started across the hall, after he had gathered up his correspondence. The information had made more work that night impossible for him.
As we crossed from the writing-room, we saw Alfonso de Moche coming in from the street. He saw us and came over to speak. Was it a coincidence, or was it merely a blind? Was he the one who had got away and now calculated to come back and throw us off guard?
Whitney asked him where he had been, but he replied quickly that his mother had not been feeling very well after dinner and had gone to bed, while he strolled out and had dropped into a picture show. That, I felt, was at least clever. The intruder had been a man.
De Moche excused himself, and we continued our walk to the cafe, whereWhitney restored his shattered peace of mind somewhat.
"What's the result of your detective work on Norton?" ventured Kennedy at last, seeing that Whitney was in a more expansive frame of mind, and taking a chance.
"Oh," returned Whitney, "he's scared, all right. Why, he has been hanging around this hotel—watching me. He thinks I don't know it, I suppose, but I do."
Kennedy and I exchanged glances.
"But he's slippery," went on Whitney. "He knows that he is being shadowed and the men tell me that they lose him, now and then. To tell the truth I don't trust most of these private detectives. I think their little tissue paper reports are half-faked, anyhow."
He seemed to want to say no more on the subject, from which I took it that he had discovered nothing of importance.
"One thing, though," he recollected, after a moment. "He has been going to see Inez Mendoza, they tell me."
"Yes?" queried Kennedy.
"Confound him. He pretty nearly got Lockwood in bad with her, too," said Whitney, then leaning over confidentially added, "Say, Kennedy, honestly, now, you don't believe that shoe-print stuff, do you?"
"I see no reason to doubt it," returned Kennedy with diplomatic firmness. "Why?"
"Well," continued Whitney, still confidential, "we haven't got the dagger—that's all. There—I never actually asserted that before, though I've given every one to understand that our plans are based on something more than hot-air. We haven't got it, and we never had it."
"Then who has it?" asked Kennedy colourlessly.
Whitney shook his head. "I don't know," he said merely.
"And these attacks on you—this cigarette business—how do you explain that," asked Craig, "if you haven't the dagger?"
"Jealousy, pure jealousy," replied Whitney quickly. "They are so afraid that we will find the treasure. That's my dope."
"Who is afraid?"
"That's a serious matter," he evaded. "I wouldn't say anything that I couldn't back up in a case of that kind. I'd get into trouble."
There was nothing to be gained by prolonging the conversation andKennedy made a move as though to go.
"Just give us a square deal," said Whitney as we left. "That's all we want—a square deal."
Kennedy and I walked out of the Prince Edward Albert and turned down the block.
"Well, have you found out anything more?" asked a voice in the shadow beside us.
We turned. It was Norton.
"I saw you talking to Whitney in the writing-room," he said, with a laugh, "then in the cafe, and I saw Alfonso come in. He still has those shadows on me. I wouldn't be surprised if there was one of them around in a doorway, now."
"No," returned Kennedy, "he didn't say anything that was important.They still say they haven't the dagger."
"Of course," said Norton.
"You'll wait around a little longer?" asked Kennedy as we came to a corner and stopped.
"I think so," returned Norton. "I'll keep you posted."
Kennedy and I walked on a bit.
"I'm going around to see how Burke, O'Connor's man, is getting on watching the Mendoza apartment, Walter," he said at length. "Then I have two or three other little outside matters to attend to. You look tired. Why don't you go home and take a rest? I shan't be working in the laboratory to-night, either."
"I think I will," I agreed, for the strain of the case was beginning to tell on me.
I went directly to our apartment after Craig left me and for a little while sat up, speculating on the probabilities of the case.
Senora de Moche had told us of her ancestor who had been intrusted with the engraved dagger, of how it had been handed down, of the death of her brother; she had told us of the murder of the ancestor of Inez Mendoza, of the curse of Mansiche. Was this, after all, but a reincarnation of the bloody history of the Gold of the Gods?
There were the shoe-prints in the mummy case. They were Lockwood's. How about them? Was he telling the truth? Now had come the poisoned cigarettes. All had followed the threats:
Several times I had been forced already to revise my theories of the case. At first I had felt that it pointed straight toward Lockwood. But did it seem to do so now?
Suppose Lockwood had stolen the dagger from the Museum, although he denied even that. Did that mean, necessarily that he committed the murder with it, that he now had it? Might he not have lost it? Might not some one else—the Senora, or Alfonso, or both—have obtained it? Might not Mendoza have been murdered with it by some other hand to obtain or to hide the secret on its bloody blade?
I went to bed, still thinking, no nearer a conclusion than before, prepared to dream over it.
That is the last I remember.
When I regained consciousness, I was lying on the bed still, but Craig was bending over me. He had just taken a rubber cap off my face, to which was attached a rubber tube that ran to a box perhaps as large as a suitcase, containing a pump of some kind.
I was too weak to notice these things right away, too weak to care much about them, or about anything else.
"Are you all right now, old man?" he asked, bending over me.
"Y-Yes," I gasped, clutching at the choking sensation in my throat."What has happened?"
Perhaps I had best tell it as though I were not the chief actor; for it came to me in such disjointed fragmentary form, that it was some time before I could piece it together.
Craig had seen Burke, and had found that everything was all right. Then he had made the few little investigations that he intended. But he had not been to the laboratory. There had been no light there that night.
At last when he arrived home, he had found a peculiar odour in the hall, but had thought nothing of it, until he opened our door. Then there rushed out such a burst of it that he had to retreat, almost fainting, choking and gasping for breath.
His first thought was for me; and protecting himself as best he could he struggled through to my room, to find me lying on the bed, motionless, almost cold.
He was by this time too weak to carry me. But he managed to reach the window and throw it wide open. As the draught cleared the air, he thought of the telephone and with barely strength enough left called up one of the gas companies and had a pulmotor sent over.
Now that the danger was past for me, and he felt all right, his active mind began at once on the reconstruction of what had happened.
What was it—man or devil? Could a human fly have scaled the walls, or an aeroplane have dropped an intruder at the window ledge? The lock on the door did not seem to have been tampered with. Nor was there any way by which entrance could have been gained from a fire escape. It was not illuminating gas. Every one agreed on that. No, it was not an accident. It was an attempt at murder. Some one was getting close to us. Every other weapon failing, this was desperation.
I had been made comfortable, and he was engaged in one of his characteristic searches, with more than ordinary eagerness, because this was his own apartment, and it was I who had been the victim.
I followed him languidly as he went over everything, the furniture, the walls, the windows, the carpets—there looking for finger-prints, there for some trace of the poisonous gas that had filled the room. But he did not have the air of one who was finding anything. I was too tired to reason. This was but another of the baffling mysteries that confronted us.
A low exclamation caused me to open my eyes and try to discover what was the cause. He was bending over the lock of the door looking at it intently.
"Broken?" I managed to say.
"No—corroded," he replied. "You keep still. Save your energy. I've got strength enough for two, for a while."
He came over to the bed and bent over me. "I won't hurt you," he encouraged, "but just let me get a drop of your blood."
He took a needle and ran it gently into my thumb beside the nail. A drop or two of blood oozed out and he soaked it up with a piece of sterile gauze.
"Try to sleep," he said finally.
"And you?" I asked.
"It's no use. I'm going over to the laboratory. I can't sleep. There's a cop down in front of the house. You're safe enough. By George, if this case goes much further we'll have half the force standing guard. Here—drink that."
I had made up my mind not to go to sleep, if he wouldn't, but I slipped up when I obeyed him that time. I thought it was a stimulant but it turned out to be a sedative.
I did not wake up until well along in the morning, but when I did I was surprised to find myself so well. Before any one could stop me, I was dressed and had reached the door.
A friend of ours who had volunteered to stay with me was dozing on a couch as I came out.
"Too late, Johnson," I called, trying hard to be gay, though I felt anything but like it. "Thank you, old man, for staying with me. But I'm afraid to stop. You're stronger than I am this morning—and besides you can run faster. I'm afraid you'll drag me back."
He did try to do it, but with a great effort of will-power I persuaded him to let me go. Out in the open air, too, it seemed to do me good. The policeman who had been stationed before the house gazed at me as though he saw a ghost, then grinned encouragingly.
Still, I was glad that the laboratory was only a few blocks away, for I was all in by the time I got there, and hadn't even energy enough to reply to Kennedy's scolding.
He was working over a microscope, while by his side stood in racks, innumerable test-tubes of various liquids. On the table before him lay the lock of our door which he had cut out after he gave me the sleeping draught.
"What was it?" I asked. "I feel as if I had been on a bust, without the recollection of a thing."
He shook his head as if to discourage conversation, without taking his eyes off the microscope through which he was squinting. His lips were moving as if he were counting. I waited in impatient silence until he seemed to have finished.
Then, still without a word, he took up a test-tube and dropped into it a little liquid from a bottle on a shelf above the table. His face lighted up, and he regarded the reaction attentively for some time. Then he turned to me, still holding the tube.
"You have been on a bust," he said with a smile as if the remark of a few minutes before were still fresh. "Only it was a laughing gas jag—nitrous oxide."
"Nitrous oxide?" I repeated. "How—what do you mean?"
"I mean simply that a test of your blood shows that you were poisoned by nitrous oxide gas. You remember the sample of blood which I squeezed from your thumb? I took it because I knew that a gas—and it has proved to be nitrous oxide—is absorbed through the lungs into the circulation and its presence can be told for a considerable period after administration."
He paused a moment, then went on: "To be specific in this case I found by microscopic examination that the number of corpuscles in your blood was vastly above the normal, something like between seven and eight million to a drop that should have had somewhat more than only half that number. You were poisoned by gas that—"
"Yes," I interrupted, "but how, with all the doors locked?"
"I was coming to that," he said quietly, picking up the lock and looking at it thoughtfully.
He had already placed it in a porcelain basin, and in this basin he had poured some liquids. Then he passed the liquids through a fine screen and at last took up a tube containing some of the resulting liquid.
"I have already satisfied myself," he explained, "but for your benefit, seeing that you're the chief sufferer, I'll run over a part of the test. You saw the reaction which showed the gas a moment ago. I have proved chemically as well as microscopically that it is present in your blood. Now if I take this test-tube of liquid derived from my treatment of the lock and then test it as you saw me do with the other, isn't that enough for you? See—it gives the same reaction."
It did, indeed, but my mind did not react with it.
"Nitrous oxide," he continued, "in contact with iron, leaves distinct traces of corrosion, discernible by chemical and microscopic tests quite as well as the marks it leaves in the human blood. Manifestly, if no one could have come in by the windows or doors, the gas must have been administered in some way without any one coming into the room. I found no traces of an intruder."
It was a tough one. Never much good at answering his conundrums when I was well, I could not even make a guess now.
"The key-hole, of course!" he explained. "I cut away the entire lock, and have submitted it to these tests which you see."
"I don't see it all yet," I said.
"Some one came to our door in the night, after gaining entrance to the hall—not a difficult thing to do, we know. That person found our door locked, knew it would be locked, knew that I always locked it. Knowing that such was the case, this person came prepared, bringing perhaps, a tank of compressed nitrous oxide, certainly the materials for making the gas expeditiously."
I began to understand how it had been done.
"Through the keyhole," he resumed, "a stream of the gas was injected. It soon rendered you unconscious, and that would have been all, if the person had been satisfied. A little bit would have been harmless enough. But the person was not satisfied. The intention was not to overcome, but to kill. The stream of gas was kept up until the room was full of it.
"Only my return saved you, for the gas was escaping very slowly. Even then, you had been under it so long that we had to resort to the wonderful little pulmotor after trying both the Sylvester and Schaefer methods and all other manual means to induce respiration. At any rate we managed to undo the work of this fiend."
I looked at him in surprise, I, who didn't think I had an enemy in the world.
"But who could it have been?" I asked.
"We are pretty close to that criminal," was the only reply he would give, "providing we do not spread the net in sight of the quarry."
"Why should he have wanted to get me?" I repeated.
"Don't flatter yourself," replied Craig. "He wanted me, too. There wasn't any light in the laboratory last night. There was a light in our apartment. What more natural than to think that we were both there? You were caught in the trap intended for both of us."
I looked at him, startled. Surely this was a most desperate criminal. To cover up one murder—perhaps two—he did not hesitate to attempt a third, a double murder. The attack had been really aimed at Kennedy. It had struck me alone. But it had miscarried and Craig had saved my life.
As I reflected bitterly, I had but one satisfaction. Wretched as I felt, I knew that it had spared Craig from slowing up on the case at just the time when he was needed.
The news of the attempt spread quickly, for it was a police case and got into the papers.
It was not half an hour after I reached the laboratory that the door was pushed open by Inez Mendoza, followed by a boy spilling with fruit and flowers like a cornucopia.
"I drove to the apartment," she cried, greatly excited and sympathetic, "but they told me you had gone out. Oh, I was glad to hear it. Then I knew it wasn't so serious. For, somehow, I feel guilty about it. It never would have happened if you hadn't met me."
"I'm sure it's worth more than it cost," I replied gallantly.
She turned toward Kennedy. "I'm positively frightened," she exclaimed. "First they direct their attacks against my father—then against me—now against you. What will it be next? Oh—it is that curse—it is that curse!"
"Never fear," encouraged Kennedy, "we'll get you out—we'll get all of us out, now, I should say. It's just because they are so desperate that we have these things. As long as there is nothing to fear a criminal will lie low. When he gets scared he does things. And it's when he does things that he begins to betray himself."
She shuddered. "I feel as though I was surrounded by enemies," she murmured. "It is as if an unseen evil power was watching over me all the time—and mocking me—striking down those I love and trust. Where will it end?"
Kennedy tried his best to soothe her, but it was evident that the attack on us could not have had more effect, if it had been levelled direct at her.
"Please, Senorita," he pleaded, "stand firm. We are going to win. Don't give in. The Mendozas are not the kind to stop defeated."
She looked at him, her eyes filled with tears.
"It was my father's way," she choked back her emotion. "How could you, a stranger, know?"
"I didn't know," returned Kennedy. "I gathered it from his face. It is also his daughter's way."
"Yes," she said, straightening up and the fire flashing from her eyes, "we are a proud, old, unbending race. Good-bye. I must not interrupt your work any longer. We are also a race that never forgets a friend."
A moment later she was gone.
"A wonderful woman," repeated Kennedy absently.
Then he turned again to his table of chemicals.
The telephone had begun to tinkle almost continuously by this time, as one after another of our friends called us up to know how we were getting on and be assured of our safety. In fact I didn't know that it was possible to resuscitate so many of them with a pulmotor.
"By George, I'm glad it wasn't any more serious," came Norton's voice from the doorway a moment later. "I didn't see a paper this morning. The curator of the Museum just told me. How did it happen?"
Kennedy tried to pass it off lightly, and I did the same, for as I was up longer I really did feel better.
Norton shook his head gravely, however.
"No," he said, "there were four of us got warnings. They are a desperate, revengeful people."
I looked at him quickly. Did he mean the de Moches?