A man and woman dress in each other's clothing in a brick room.QUEST AND LAURA CHANGE CLOTHES SO THAT QUEST MAY MAKE HIS ESCAPE.
QUEST AND LAURA CHANGE CLOTHES SO THAT QUEST MAY MAKE HIS ESCAPE.
A huge crowd looks on as a man pulls an alarm.ONE OF THE CLUB’S BUTLERS TURNS IN A FIRE ALARM.
ONE OF THE CLUB’S BUTLERS TURNS IN A FIRE ALARM.
“Quest,” he said, “I wish I could induce you to dismiss this extraordinary supposition of yours concerning my servant Craig. The man has been with me for the best part of twenty years. He saved my life in South America; we have travelled in all parts of the world. He has proved himself to be exemplary, a faithful and devoted servant. I thought it absurd, Mr. Quest, when you were suspected of these crimes. I should think it even more ridiculous to associate Craig with them in any way whatever.”
“Then perhaps you will tell me,” Quest suggested, “where he is now, and why he has gone away? That does not look like complete innocence, does it?”
The Professor sighed.
“Appearances are nothing,” he declared. “Craig is a man of highly nervous susceptibilities. The very idea of being suspected of anything so terrible would be enough to drive him almost out of his mind. I am convinced that we shall find him at home presently, with some reasonable explanation of his absence.”
Quest paced the room for a few moments, moodily.
There was a certain amount of reason in the Professor’s point of view.
“Anyway, I cannot stay here much longer, unless I mean to go back to the Tombs,” he declared.
“Surely,” the Professor suggested, “your innocence will very soon be established?”
“There is one thing which will happen, without a doubt,” Quest replied. “My auto and the chauffeur will be discovered. I have insisted upon enquiries being sent out throughout the State of Connecticut. They tell me, too, that the police are hard on the scent of Red Gallagher and the other man. Unless they get wind of this and sell me purposely, their arrest will be the end of my troubles. To tell you the truth, Professor,” Quest concluded, “it is not of myself I am thinking at all just now. It is Lenora.”
The Professor nodded sympathetically.
“The young lady who shut Craig up in the garage, you mean? A plucky young woman she must be.”
“She has a great many other good qualities besides courage,” Quest declared. “Women have not counted for much with me, Professor, up till now, any more than they have done, I should think, with you, but I tell you frankly, if any one has hurt a hair of that girl’s head I will have their lives, whatever the penalty may be! It is for her sake—to find her—that I broke out of prison and that I am trying to keep free. The wisest thing to do, from my own point of view, would be to give myself up. I can’t bring myself to do that without knowing what has become of her.”
The Professor nodded again.
“A charming and well-bred young woman she seems,” he admitted. “I fear that I should only be a bungler in your profession, Mr. Quest, but if there is anything I can do to help you to discover her whereabouts, you can count upon me. Personally, I am convinced that Craig will return to me with some plausible explanation as to what has happened. In that case he will doubtless bring news of the young lady.”
Quest, for the third or fourth time, moved cautiously towards the window. His expression suddenly changed. He glanced downwards, frowning slightly. An alert light flashed into his eyes.
“They’re after me!” he exclaimed. “Sit still, Professor.”
He darted into his room and reappeared again almost immediately. The Professor gave a gasp of astonishment at his altered appearance. His tweed suit seemed to have been turned inside out. There were no lapels now and it was buttoned up to his neck. He wore a long white apron; a peaked cap and a chin-piece of astonishing naturalness had transformed him into the semblance of a Dutch grocer’s boy.
“I’m off, Professor,” Quest whispered. “You shall hear from me soon. I have not been here, remember!”
He ran lightly down the steps and into the kitchen, picked up a basket, filled it haphazard with vegetables and threw a cloth over the top. Then he made his way to the front door, peered out for a moment, swung through it on to the step, and, turning round, commenced to belabour it with his fist. Two plain-clothes men stood at the end of the street. A police automobile drew up outside the gate. Inspector French, attended by a policeman, stepped out. The former looked searchingly at Quest.
“Well, my boy, what are you doing here?” he asked.
“I cannot answer get,” Quest replied, in broken English. “Ten minutes already have I wasted. I have knocked at all the doors.”
French smiled.
“You can hop it, Dutchie,” he advised. “By-the-bye, when was that order for vegetables given?” he added, frowning for a moment.
“It is three times a week the same,” Quest explained, whipping the cloth from the basket. “No word has been sent to alter anything.”
The Inspector pushed him hurriedly in the direction of the street.
“You run along home,” he said, “and tell your master that he had better leave off delivering goods here for the present.”
Quest went off, grumbling. He walked with the peculiar waddle affected by young Dutchmen of a certain class, and was soon out of sight round the corner of the street. French opened the door with a masterkey and secured it carefully, leaving one of his men to guard it. He searched the rooms on the ground floor and finally ascended to Quest’s study. The Professor was still enjoying his cigar.
“Say, where’s Quest?” the Inspector asked promptly.
“Have you let him out already?” the Professor replied, in a tone of mild surprise. “I thought he was in the Tombs prison.”
The Inspector pressed on without answering. Every room in the house was ransacked. Presently he came back to the room where the Professor was still sitting. His usually good-humoured face was a little clouded.
“Professor,” he began—“What’s that, Miles?”
A plain-clothes man from the street had come hurrying into the room.
“Say, Mr. French,” he reported, “our fellows have got hold of a newsie down in the street, who was coming along way round the back and saw two men enter this house by the side entrance, half-an-hour ago. One he described exactly as the Professor here. The other, without a doubt, was Quest.”
French turned swiftly towards the Professor.
“You hear what this man says?” he exclaimed. “Mr. Ashleigh, you’re fooling me! You entered this house with Sanford Quest. You must tell us where he is hiding.”
The Professor knocked the ash from his cigar and replaced it in his mouth. His clasped hands rested in front of him. There was a twinkle of something almost like mirth in his eyes as he glanced up at the Inspector.
“Mr. French,” he said, “Mr. Sanford Quest is my friend. I am here in charge of his house. Believing as I do that his arrest was an egregious blunder, I shall say or do nothing likely to afford you any information.”
French turned impatiently away. Suddenly a light broke in upon him, he rushed towards the door.
“That damned Dutchie!” he exclaimed.
The Professor smiled benignly.
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With a little gesture of despair, Quest turned away from the instrument which seemed suddenly to have become so terribly unresponsive, and looked across the vista of square roofs and tangled masses of telephone wires to where the lights of larger New York flared up against the sky. From his attic chamber, the roar of the City a few blocks away was always in his ears. He had forgotten in those hours of frenzied solitude to fear for his own safety. He thought only of Lenora. Under which one of those thousands of roofs was she being concealed? What was the reason for this continued silence? Perhaps they had taken her instrument away—perhaps she was being ill-used. The bare thought opened the door to a thousand grim and torturing surmises. He paced restlessly up and down the room. Inaction had never seemed to him so wearisome. From sheer craving to be doing something, he paused once more before the little instrument.
“Lenora, where are you?” he signalled. “I have taken a lodging in the Servants’ Club. I am still in hiding, hoping that Craig may come here. I am very anxious about you.”
Still no reply! Quest drew a chair up to the window and sat there with folded arms looking down into the street. Suddenly he sprang to his feet. The instrument quivered—there was a message at last! He took it down with a little choke of relief.
“I don’t know where I am. I am terrified. I was outside the garage when I was seized from behind. The Hands held me. I was unconscious until I found myself here. I am now in an attic room with no window except the skylight, which I cannot reach. I can see nothing—hear nothing. No one has hurt me, no one comes near. Food is pushed through a door, which is locked again immediately. The house seems empty, yet I fancy that I am being watched all the time. I am terrified!”
Quest drew the instrument towards him.
“I have your message,” he signalled. “Be brave! I am watching for Craig. Through him I shall reach you before long. Send me a message every now and then.”
Then there was a silence.
Quest was conscious of an enormous feeling of relief and yet an almost maddening sense of helplessness. She was imprisoned by the Hands. She was in their power, and up till now they had shown themselves ruthless enough. A room with a roof window only! How could she define her whereabouts! His first impulse was to rush madly out into the street and search for her. Then his common sense intervened. His one hope was through Craig. Again he took up his vigil in front of the window. Once more his eyes swept the narrow street with its constant stream of passers-by. Each time a man stopped and entered the building, he leaned a little further forward, and at each disappointment he seemed to realise a little more completely the slenderness of the chance upon which he was staking so much. Then suddenly he found himself gripping the window-sill in a momentary thrill of rare excitement. His vigil was rewarded at last. The man for whom he was waiting was there! Quest watched him cross the street, glance furtively to the right and to the left, then enter the club. He turned back to the little wireless and his fingers worked as though inspired.
“I am on Craig’s track,” he signalled. “Be brave.”
He waited for no reply, but opened the door and stealing softly out of the room, leaned over the banisters. His apartment was on the fourth story. The floor below was almost entirely occupied by the kitchen and other offices. The men’s club room was on the second floor. From where he stood he heard the steward of the club greeting Craig. He was a big man with a hearty voice, and the sound of his words reached Quest distinctly.
“Say, Mr. Craig, you’re an authority on South America, aren’t you? I bought some beans in the market this morning which they told me were grown down there, and my chef don’t seem to know what to make of ’em. I wonder whether you would mind stepping up and giving him your advice?”
Craig’s much lower voice was inaudible but it was evident that he had consented, for the two men ascended to the third floor together. Quest watched them enter the kitchen. A moment or two later the steward was summoned by a messenger and descended alone. Quest ran quickly down the stairs and planted himself behind the kitchen door. He had hardly taken up his position before the handle was turned. He heard Craig’s last words, spoken as he looked over his shoulder.
“You want to just soak them for two hours longer than any other beans in the world. That’s all there is about it.”
Craig appeared and the door swung back behind him. Before he could utter a cry, Quest’s left hand was over his mouth and the cold muzzle of an automatic pistol was pressed to his ribs.
“Turn round and mount those stairs, Craig,” Quest ordered.
The man shrunk away, trembling. The pistol pressed a little further into his side.
“Upstairs,” Quest repeated firmly. “If you utter a cry I shall shoot you.”
Craig turned slowly round and obeyed. He mounted the stairs with reluctant footsteps, followed by Quest.
“Through the door to your right,” the latter directed. “That’s right! Now sit down in that chair facing me.”
Quest closed the door carefully. Craig sat where he had been ordered, his fingers gripping the arms of the chair. In his eyes shone the furtive, terrified light of the trapped criminal.
Quest looked him over a little scornfully. It was queer that a man with apparently so little nerve should have the art and the daring to plan such exploits.
“What do you want with me?” Craig asked doggedly.
“First of all,” Quest replied, “I want to know what you have done with my assistant, the girl whom you carried off from the Professor’s garage.”
Craig shook his head.
“I know nothing about her.”
“She locked you in the garage,” Quest continued, “and sent for me. When I arrived, I found the garage door open, Lenora gone and you a fugitive.”
Bewilderment struggled for a moment with blank terror in Craig’s expression.
“How do you know that she locked me in the garage?”
Quest smiled, stretched out his right arm and his long fingers played softly with the pocket wireless.
“In just the same way,” he explained, “that I am sending her this message at the present moment—a message which she will receive and understand wherever she is hidden. Would you like to know what I am telling her?”
The man shivered. His eyes, as though fascinated, watched the little instrument.
“I am saying this, Craig,” Quest continued. “Craig is here and in my power. He is sitting within a few feet of me and will not leave this room alive until he has told me your whereabouts. Keep up your courage, Lenora. You shall be free in an hour.”
The trapped man looked away from the instrument into Quest’s face. There was a momentary flicker of something that might have passed for courage in his tone.
“Mr. Quest,” he said, “you are a wonderful man, but there are limits to your power. You can tear my tongue from my mouth but you cannot force me to speak a word.”
Quest leaned a little further forward in his chair, his gaze became more concentrated.
“That is where you are wrong, Craig. That is where you make a mistake. In a very few minutes you will be telling me all the secrets of your heart.”
Craig shivered, drew back a little in his chair, tried to rise and fell back again helpless.
“My God!” he cried. “Leave me alone!”
“When you have told me the truth,” Quest answered, swiftly, “and you will tell me all I want to know in a few moments…. Your eyelids are getting a little heavy, Craig. Don’t resist. Something which is like sleep is coming over you. You see my will has yours by the throat.”
Craig seemed suddenly to collapse altogether. He fell over on one side. Every atom of colour had faded from his cheeks. Quest leaned over him with a frown. The man was in a stupor without a doubt, but it was a physical state of unconsciousness into which he had subsided. He felt his pulse, unbuttoned his coat, and listened for a moment to the beating of his heart. Then he crossed the room, fetched the pitcher of water and dashed some of its contents in Craig’s face. In a few moments the man opened his eyes and regained consciousness. His appearance, however, was still ghastly.
“Where am I?” he murmured.
“You are here in my room, at the Servants’ Club,” Quest replied. “You are just about to tell me where I shall find Lenora.”
Craig shook his head. A very weak smile of triumph flickered for a moment at the corners of his lips.
“Your torture chamber trick won’t work on me!” he exclaimed. “You can never—”
The whole gamut of emotions seemed already to have spent themselves in the man’s face, but at that moment there was a new element, an element of terrified curiosity in the expression of his eyes as he stared towards the door.
“Is this another trick of yours?” he muttered.
Quest, too, turned his head and sprang instantly to his feet. From underneath the door came a little puff of smoke. There was a queer sense of heat of which both men were simultaneously conscious. Down in the street arose a chorus of warning shouts, increasing momentarily in volume. Quest threw open the door and closed it again at once.
“The place is on fire,” he announced briefly. “Pull yourself together, man. We shall have all we can do to get out of this.”
Craig turned to the door but staggered back almost immediately.
“The stairs are going!” he shrieked. “It is the kitchen that is on fire. We are cut off! We cannot get down!”
Quest was on his hands and knees, fumbling under his truckle bed. He pulled out a crude form of fire escape, a rough sort of cradle with a rope attached.
“Know how to use this?” he asked Craig quickly. “Here, catch hold. Put your arms inside this strap.”
“You are going to send me down first?” Craig exclaimed incredulously.
Quest smiled. Then he drew the rope round the table and tied it.
“You would like to have a chance of cutting the rope, wouldn’t you, when I was half way down?” he asked grimly. “Now then, don’t waste time. Get on to the window-sill. Don’t brake too much. Off you go!”
Yard by yard, swinging a little in the air, Craig made his descent. When he arrived in the street, there were a hundred willing hands to release him. Quest drew up the rope quickly, warned by a roar of anxious voices. The walls of the room were crumbling. Volumes of smoke were now pouring in underneath the door, and through the yawning fissures of the wall. Little tongues of flame were leaping out dangerously close to the spot where he must pass. He let fall the slack of the rope and leaned from the window to watch it anxiously. Then he commenced to descend, letting himself down hand over hand, always with one eye upon that length of rope that swung below. Suddenly, as he reached the second floor, a little cry from the crowd warned him of what had happened. Tongues of flame curling out from the blazing building, had caught the rope, which was being burned through not a dozen feet away from him. He descended a little further and paused in mid-air.
A shout from the crowd reached him.
“The cables! Try the cables!”
He glanced round. Seven or eight feet away, and almost level with him was a double row of telegraph wires. Almost as he saw them the rope below him burned through and fell to the ground. He swung a little towards the side of the house, pushed himself vigorously away from it with his feet, and at the farthest point of the outward swing, jumped. His hands gripped the telegraph wires safely. Even in that tense moment he heard a little sob of relief from the people below.
Hand over hand he made his way to the nearest pole and slipped easily to the ground. The crowd immediately surged around him. Some one forced a drink into his hand. A chorus of congratulations fell upon his deafened ears. Then the coming of the fire engines, and the approach of a police automobile diverted the attention of the on-lookers. Quest slipped about amongst them, searching for Craig.
“Where is the man who came down before me?” he asked a bystander.
“Talking to the police in the car over yonder,” was the hoarse reply. “Say, Guv’nor, you only just made that!”
Quest pushed his way through the crowd to where Craig was speaking eagerly to Inspector French. He stopped short and stooped down. He was near enough to hear the former’s words.
“Mr. French, you saw that man come down the rope and swing on to the cables? That was Quest, Sanford Quest, the man who escaped from the Tombs prison. He can’t have got away yet.”
Quest drew off his coat, turned it inside out, and replaced it swiftly. He coolly picked up a hat some one had lost in the crowd and pulled it over his eyes. He passed within a few feet of where Craig and the Inspector were talking.
“He was hiding in the Servants’ Club,” Craig continued, “he had just threatened to shoot me when the fire broke out.”
“I’ll send the word round,” French declared. “We’ll have him found, right enough.”
For a single moment Quest hesitated. He had a wild impulse to take Craig by the neck and throw him back into the burning house. Then he heard French shout to his men.
“Say, boys, Sanford Quest is in the crowd here somewhere. He’s the man who jumped on to the cable lines. A hundred dollars for his arrest!”
Quest turned reluctantly away. Men were rushing about in all directions looking for him. He forced a passage through the crowd and in the general confusion he passed the little line of police without difficulty. His face darkened as he looked behind at the burning block. A peculiar sense of helplessness oppressed him. His pocket wireless was by now a charred heap of ashes. His one means of communication with Lenora was gone and the only man who knew her whereabouts was safe under the protection of the police.
The Professor swung round in his chair and greeted Quest with some surprise but also a little disappointment.
“No news of Craig?” he asked.
Quest sank into a chair. He was fresh from the Turkish baths and was enjoying the luxury of clean linen and the flavour of an excellent cigar.
“I got Craig all right,” he replied. “He came to the Servants’ Club where I was waiting for him. My luck’s out, though. The place was burnt to the ground last night. I saved his life and then the brute gave me away to the police. I had to make my escape as best I could.”
The Professor tapped the table peevishly.
“This is insufferable,” he declared. “I have had no shaving water; my coffee was undrinkable; I can find nothing. I have a most important lecture to prepare and I cannot find any of the notes I made upon the subject.”
Quest stared at the Professor for a moment and then laughed softly.
“Well,” he remarked, “you are rather an egoist, Professor, aren’t you?”
“Perhaps I am,” the latter confessed. “Still, you must remember that the scientific world on those few occasions when I do appear in public, expects much of me. My sense of proportion may perhaps be disarranged by this knowledge. All that I can realise at the present moment, is this. You seem to have frightened away the one man in the world who is indispensable to me.”
Quest smoked in silence for a moment.
“Any mail for me, Professor?” he asked, abruptly.
The Professor opened a drawer and handed him a telegram.
“Only this!”
Quest opened it and read it through. It was from the Sheriff of a small town in Connecticut:—
“The men you enquired for are both here. They have sold an automobile and seem to be spending the proceeds. Shall I arrest?”
“The men you enquired for are both here. They have sold an automobile and seem to be spending the proceeds. Shall I arrest?”
Quest studied the message for a moment.
“Say, this is rather interesting, Professor,” he remarked.
“Really?” the latter replied tartly. “You must forgive me if I cannot follow the complications of your—pardon me for saying Munchausen-like affairs. How does the arrest of these two men help you?”
“Don’t you see?” Quest explained. “These are the two thugs who set upon me up at the section house. They killed the signalman, who could have been my alibi, and swiped my car, in which, as it cannot be found, French supposes that I returned to New York. With their arrest the case against me collapses. I tell you frankly, Professor,” Quest continued, frowning, “I hate to leave the city without having found that girl; but I am not sure that the quickest way to set things right would not be to go down, arrest these men and bring them back here, clear myself, and then go tooth and nail for Craig.”
“I agree with you most heartily,” the Professor declared. “I recommend any course which will ensure the return of my man Craig.”
“I cannot promise you that you will ever have Craig here again,” Quest observed grimly. “I rather fancy Sing-Sing will be his next home.”
“Don’t be foolish, Mr. Quest,” the Professor advised. “Don’t let me lose confidence in you. Craig would not hurt a fly, and as to abducting your assistant—if my sense of humour were developed upon normal lines—well, I should laugh! What you have really done, you, and that young lady assistant of yours, is to terrify the poor fellow into such a state of nerves that he scarcely knows what he is doing. As a matter of fact, how do you know that that young woman has been abducted at all? Such things are most unlikely, especially in this part of the city.”
“What reason do you suggest, then, for her disappearance?” Quest enquired.
“At my age,” the Professor replied, drily, “I naturally know nothing of these things. But she is a young woman of considerable personal attractions—I should think it not unlikely that she is engaged in some amorous adventure.”
Quest laughed derisively.
“You do not know Lenora, Mr. Ashleigh,” he remarked. “However, if it interests you, I will tell you why I know she has been abducted. Only a few hours ago, I was talking to her.”
The Professor turned his head swiftly towards Quest. There was a queer sort of surprise in his face.
“Talking to her?”
Quest nodded.
“Our pocket wireless!” he explained. “Lenora has even described to me the room in which she is hidden.”
“And the neighbourhood also?” the Professor demanded.
“Of that she knows nothing,” Quest replied. “She is in a room apparently at the top of a house and the only window is in the roof. She can see nothing, hear nothing. When I get hold of the man who put her there,” Quest continued slowly, “it will be my ambition to supplement personally any punishment the law may be able to inflict.”
The Professor’s manner had lost all its petulance. He looked at Quest almost with admiration.
“The idea of yours is wonderful,” he confessed. “I am beginning to believe in your infallibility, Mr. Quest. I am beginning to believe that on this occasion, at any rate, you will triumph over your enemies.”
Quest rose to his feet.
“Well,” he said, “if I can keep out of my friend French’s way for a few hours longer, I think I can promise you that I shall be a free man when I return from Bethel. I’m off now, Professor. Wish me good luck!”
“My friend,” the Professor replied, “I wish you the best of luck, but more than anything else in the world,” he added, a little peevishly, “I hope you may bring me back my servant Craig, and leave us both in peace.”
Quest stepped off the cars at Bethel a little before noon that morning. The Sheriff met him at the depot and greeted him cordially but with obvious surprise.
“Say, Mr. Quest,” he exclaimed, as they turned away, “I know these men are wanted on your charge, but I thought—you’ll excuse my saying so—that you were in some trouble yourself.”
Quest nodded.
“I’m out of that—came out yesterday.”
“Very glad to hear it,” the Sheriff assured him heartily. “I never thought that they’d be able to hold you.”
“They hadn’t a chance,” Quest admitted. “Things turned out a little awkwardly at first, but this affair is going to put me on my feet again. The moment my car is identified and Red Gallagher and his mate arrested, every scrap of evidence against me goes.”
“Well, here’s the garage and the man who bought the car,” the Sheriff remarked, “and there’s the car itself in the road. It’s for you to say whether it can be identified.”
Quest drew a sigh of relief.
“That’s mine, right enough,” he declared. “Now for the men.”
“Say, I want to tell you something,” the Sheriff began dubiously. “These two are real thugs. They ain’t going to take it lying down.”
“Where are they?” Quest demanded.
“In the worst saloon here,” the Sheriff replied. “They’ve been there pretty well all night, drinking, and they’re there again this morning, hard at it. They’ve both got firearms, and though I ain’t exactly a nervous man, Mr. Quest—”
“You leave it to me,” Quest interrupted. “This is my job and I want to take the men myself.”
“You’ll never do it,” the Sheriff declared.
“Look here,” Quest explained, “if I let you and your men go in, there will be a free fight, and as likely as not you will kill one, if not both of the men. I want them alive.”
“Well, it’s your show,” the Sheriff admitted, stopping before a disreputable-looking building. “This is the saloon. They’ve turned the place upside down since they’ve been here. You can hear the row they’re making now. Free drinks to all the toughs in the town! They’re pouring the stuff down all the time.”
“Well,” Quest decided, “I’m going in and I’m going in unarmed. You can bring your men in later, if I call for help or if you hear any shooting.”
“You’re asking for trouble,” the Sheriff warned him.
“I’ve got to do this my own way,” Quest insisted. “Stand by now.”
He pushed open the door of the saloon. There were a dozen men drinking around the bar and in the centre of them Red Gallagher and his mate. They seemed to be all shouting together, and the air was thick with tobacco smoke. Quest walked right up to the two men.
“Gallagher,” he said, “you’re my prisoner. Are you coming quietly?”
Gallagher’s mate, who was half drunk, swung round and fired a wild shot in Quest’s direction. The result was a general stampede. Red Gallagher alone remained motionless. Grim and dangerously silent, he held a pistol within a few inches of Quest’s forehead.
“If my number’s up,” he exclaimed ferociously, “it won’t be you who’ll take me.”
“I think it will,” Quest answered. “Put that gun away.”
Gallagher hesitated. Quest’s influence over him was indomitable.
“Put it away,” Quest repeated firmly. “You know you daren’t use it. Your account’s pretty full up, as it is.”
Gallagher’s hand wavered. From outside came the shouts of the Sheriff and his men, struggling to fight their way in through the little crowd who were rushing for safety. Suddenly Quest backed, jerked the pistol up with his right elbow, and with almost the same movement struck Red Gallagher under the jaw. The man went over with a crash. His mate, who had been staggering about, cursing viciously, fired another wild shot at Quest, who swayed and fell forward.
“I’ve done him!” the man shouted. “Get up, Red! I’ve done him all right! Finish yer drink. We’ll get out of this!”
He bent unsteadily over Quest. Suddenly the latter sprang up, seized him by the leg and sent him sprawling. The gun fell from his hand. Quest picked it up and held it firmly out, covering both men. Gallagher was on his knees, groping for his own weapon.
“Get the handcuffs on them,” Quest directed the Sheriff, who with his men had at last succeeded in forcing his way into the saloon.
The Sheriff wasted no words till the two thugs, now nerveless and cowed, were handcuffed. Then he turned to Quest. There was a note of genuine admiration in his tone.
“Mr. Quest,” he declared, “you’ve got the biggest nerve of any man I have ever known.”
The criminologist smiled.
“This sort of bully is always a coward when it comes to the pinch,” he remarked.
Crouching in her chair, her pale, terror-stricken face supported between her hands, Lenora, her eyes filled with hopeless misery, gazed at the dumb instrument upon the table. Her last gleam of hope seemed to be passing. Her little friend was silent. Once more her weary fingers spelt out a final, despairing message.
“What has happened to you? I am waiting to hear all the time. Has Craig told you where I am? I am afraid!”
There was still no reply. Her head sank a little lower on to her folded arms. Even the luxury of tears seemed denied her. Fear, the fear which dwelt with her day and night, had her in its grip. Suddenly she leaped, screaming, from her place. Splinters of glass fell all around her. Her first wild thought was of release; she gazed upwards at the broken pane. Then very faintly from the street below she heard the shout of a boy’s angry voice.
“You’ve done it now, Jimmy! You’re a fine pitcher, ain’t you? Lost it, that’s what you’ve gone and done!”
The thoughts formed themselves mechanically in her mind. Her eyes sought the ball which had come crashing into the room. There was life once more in her pulses. She found a scrap of paper and a pencil in her pocket. With trembling fingers she wrote a few words:
“Police head-quarters. I am Sanford Quest’s assistant, abducted and imprisoned here in the room where the ball has fallen. Help! I am going mad!”
“Police head-quarters. I am Sanford Quest’s assistant, abducted and imprisoned here in the room where the ball has fallen. Help! I am going mad!”
She twisted the paper, looked around the room vainly for string, and finally tore a thin piece of ribbon from her dress. She tied the message around the ball, set her teeth, and threw it at the empty skylight. The first time she was not successful and the ball came back. The second time it passed through the centre of the opening. She heard it strike the sound portion of the glass outside, heard it rumble down the roof. A few seconds of breathless silence! Her heart almost stopped beating. Had it rested in some ledge, or fallen into the street below? Then she heard the boy’s voice.
“Gee! Here’s the ball come back again!”
A new light shone into the room. She seemed to be breathing a different atmosphere—the atmosphere of hope. She listened no longer with horror for a creaking upon the stairs. She walked back and forth until she was exhausted…. Curiously enough, when the end came she was asleep, crouched upon the bed and dreaming wildly. She sprang up to find Inspector French, with a policeman behind him, standing upon the threshold.
“Inspector!” she cried, rushing towards him. “Mr. French! Oh, thank God!”
Her feelings carried her away. She threw herself at his feet. She was laughing and crying and talking incoherently, all at the same time. The Inspector assisted her to a chair.
“Say, what’s all this mean?” he demanded.
She told him her story, incoherently, in broken phrases. French listened with puzzled frown.
“Say, what about Quest?” he asked. “He ain’t been here at all, then?”
She looked at him wonderingly.
“Of course not! Mr. Quest—”
She hesitated. The Inspector laid his hand upon her wrist. Then he realised that she was on the point of a nervous breakdown, and in no condition for interrogations.
“That’ll do,” he said. “I’ll take care of you for a time, young lady, and I’ll ask you a few questions later on. My men are searching the house. You and I will be getting on, if you can tear yourself away.”
She laughed hysterically and hurried him towards the door. As they passed down the gloomy stairs she clung to his arm. The first breath of air seemed wonderful to her as they passed out into the street. It was freedom!
The plain-clothes man, who was lounging in Quest’s most comfortable easy-chair and smoking one of his best cigars, suddenly laid down his paper. He moved to the window. A large, empty automobile stood in the street outside, from which the occupants had presumably just descended. He hastened towards the door, which was opened, however, before he was half-way across the room. The cigar slipped from his fingers. It was Sanford Quest who stood there, followed by the Sheriff of Bethel, two country policemen, and Red Gallagher and his mate, heavily handcuffed. Quest glanced at the cigar.
“Say, do you mind picking that up?” he exclaimed. “That carpet cost me money.”
The plain-clothes man obeyed at once. Then he edged a little towards the telephone. Quest had opened his cigar cabinet.
“Glad you’ve left me one or two,” he remarked drily.
“Say, aren’t you wanted down yonder, Mr. Quest?” the man enquired.
“That’s all right now,” Quest told him. “I’m ringing up Inspector French myself. You’d better stand by the other fellows there and keep your eye on Red Gallagher and his mate.”
“I guess Mr. Quest is all right,” the Sheriff intervened. “We’re ringing up headquarters ourselves, anyway.”
The plain-clothes man did as he was told. Quest took up the receiver from his telephone instrument and arranged the phototelesme.
“Police-station Number One, central,” he said,—“through to Mr. French’s office, if you please. Mr. Quest wants to speak to him. Yes, Sanford Quest. No need to get excited!… All right. I’m through, am I?… Hullo, Inspector?”
A rare expression of joy suddenly transfigured Quest’s face. He was gazing downward into the little mirror.
“You’ve found Lenora, then, Inspector?” he exclaimed. “Bully for you!… What do I mean? What I say! You forget that I am a scientific man, French. No end of appliances here you haven’t had time to look at. I can see you sitting there, and Lenora and Laura looking as though you had them on the rack. You can drop that, French. I’ve got Red Gallagher and his mate, got them here with the Sheriff of Bethel. They went off with my auto and sold it. We’ve got that. Also, in less than five minutes my chauffeur will be here. He’s been lying in a farmhouse, unconscious, since that scrap. He can tell you what time he saw me last. Bring the girls along, French—and hurry!”
Quest hung up the receiver.
“I’ve given Inspector French something to think about,” he remarked, as he turned away. “Now, Mr. Sheriff, if you can make yourself at home for a quarter of an hour or so, French will be here and take these fellows off your hands. I’ve still a little more telephoning to do.”
“You go right ahead,” the Sheriff acquiesced.
Quest rang up the Professor. His response to the call was a little languid, and his reception of the news of Quest’s successful enterprise was almost querulous.
“My friend,” the Professor said, “your news gratifies me, of course. Your rehabilitation, however, was a matter of certainty. With me life has become a chaos. You can have no idea, with your independent nature, what it means to entirely rely upon the ministrations of one person and to be suddenly deprived of their help.”
“No news of Craig, then?” Quest demanded.
“None at all,” was the weary reply. “What about your young lady assistant?”
“She’ll be here in five minutes,” Quest told him. “You had better come along and hear her story. It ought to interest you.”
“Dear me!” the Professor exclaimed. “I will certainly come—certainly!”
Quest set down the receiver and paced the room thoughtfully for a moment or two. Although his own troubles were almost over, the main problem before him was as yet unsolved. The affair with the Gallaghers was, after all, only an off-shoot. It was the mystery of Lenora’s abduction, the mystery of the black box, which still called for the exercise of all his ingenuity.
Inspector French was as good, even better, than his word. In a surprisingly short time he entered the room, followed by Laura and Lenora. Quest gave them a hand each, but it was into Lenora’s eyes that he looked. Her coming, her few words of greeting, timid though they were, brought him an immense sense of relief.
“Well, girls,” he said, “both full of adventures, eh? What did they do with you in the Tombs, Laura?”
“Pshaw! What could they do?” Laura replied. “If they’re guys enough to be tricked by a girl, the best thing they can do is to keep mum about it and let her go. That’s about what they did to me.”
Inspector French, who was standing a little aloof, regarded Laura with an air of unwilling admiration.
“That’s some girl, that Miss Laura,” he muttered in an undertone to Quest. “She roasted us nicely.”
“I mustn’t stop to hear your story, Lenora,” Quest said. “You’re safe—that’s the great thing.”
“Found her in an empty house,” French reported, “out Gayson Avenue way. Now, Mr. Quest, I don’t want to come the official over you too much, but if you’ll kindly remember that you’re an escaped prisoner—”
There was a knock at the door. A young man entered in chauffeur’s livery, with his head still bandaged. Quest motioned him to come in.
“I’ll just repeat my story of that morning, French,” Quest said. “We went out to find Macdougal, and succeeded, as you know. Just as I was starting for home, those two thugs set upon me. They nearly did me up. You know how I made my escape. They went off in my automobile and sold it in Bethel. I arrested them there myself this morning. Here’s the Sheriff, who will bear out what I say, also that they arrived at the place in my automobile.”
“Sure!” the Sheriff murmured.
“Further,” Quest continued, “there’s my chauffeur. He knows exactly what time it was when the tire of my car blew out, just as we were starting for New York.”
“It was eleven-ten, sir,” the chauffeur declared. “Mr. Quest and I both took out our watches to see if we could make New York by mid-day. Then one of those fellows hit me over the head and I’ve been laid up ever since. A man who keeps a store a little way along the road picked me up and looked after me.”
Inspector French held out his hand.
“Mr. Quest,” he said, “I reckon we’ll have to withdraw the case against you. No hard feeling, I hope?”
“None at all,” Quest replied promptly, taking his hand.
“That’s all right, then,” French declared. “I’ve brought two more men with me. Perhaps, Mr. Sheriff, you wouldn’t mind escorting your prisoners around to headquarters? I’ll be there before long.”
“And you girls,” Quest insisted, “go right to your room and rest. I’ll come upstairs presently and have a talk. Look after her, Laura,” he added, glancing a little anxiously at Lenora. “She has had about as much as she can bear, I think.”
The two girls left the room. Quest stood upon the threshold, watching the Sheriff and his prisoners leave the house. The former turned round to wave his adieux to them.
“There’s an elderly josser out here,” he shouted; “seems to want to come in.”
Quest leaned forward and saw the Professor.
“Come right in, Mr. Ashleigh,” he invited.
The Professor promptly made his appearance. His coat was ill-brushed and in place of a hat he was wearing a tweed cap which had seen better days. His expression was almost pathetic.
“My dear Quest,” he exclaimed, as he wrung his hand, “my heartiest congratulations! As you know, I always believed in your innocence. I am delighted that it has been proved.”
“Come in and sit down, Mr. Ashleigh,” Quest invited. “You know the Inspector.”
The Professor shook hands with French, and then, feeling that his appearance required some explanation, he took off his cap and looked at it ruefully.
“I am aware,” he said, “that this is not a becoming headgear, but I am lost—absolutely lost without my servant. If you would earn my undying gratitude, Mr. Quest, you would clear up the mystery about Craig and restore him to me.”
Quest was helping the Inspector to the whisky at the sideboard. He paused to light a cigar before he replied.
“I very much fear, Professor,” he observed, “that you will never have Craig back again.”
The Professor sank wearily into an easy-chair.
“I will take a little whisky and one of your excellent cigars, Quest,” he said. “I must ask you to bear with me if I seem upset. After more than twenty years’ service from one whom I have always treated as a friend, this sudden separation, to a man of my age, is somewhat trying. My small comforts are all interfered with. The business of my every-day life is completely upset. I do not allude, as you perceive, Mr. Quest, to the horrible suspicions you seem to have formed of Craig. My own theory is that you have simply frightened him to death.”
“All the same,” the Inspector remarked thoughtfully, “some one who is still at large committed those murders and stole those jewels. What is your theory about the jewels, Mr. Quest?”
“I haven’t had time to frame one yet,” the criminologist replied. “You’ve been keeping me too busy looking after myself. However,” he added, “it’s time something was done.”
He took a magnifying glass from his pocket and examined very closely the whole of the front of the safe.
“No sign of finger-prints,” he muttered. “The person who opened it probably wore gloves.”
He fitted the combination and swung open the door. He stood there, for a moment, speechless. Something in his attitude attracted the Inspector’s attention.
“What is it, Mr. Quest?” he asked eagerly.
Quest drew a little breath. Exactly facing him, in the spot where the jewels had been, was a small black box. He brought it to the table and removed the lid. Inside was a sheet of paper, which he quickly unfolded. They all three read the few lines together:—
“Pitted against the inherited cunning of the ages, you have no chance. I will take compassion upon you. Look in the right-hand drawer of your desk.”
“Pitted against the inherited cunning of the ages, you have no chance. I will take compassion upon you. Look in the right-hand drawer of your desk.”
Underneath appeared the signature of the Hands. Quest moved like a dream to his cabinet and pulled open the right-hand drawer. He turned around and faced the other two men. In his hand was Mrs. Rheinholdt’s necklace!
Return to Table of Contents
Something in the nature of a conference was proceeding in Quest’s study. The Professor was there, seated in the most comfortable easy-chair, smoking without relish one of his host’s best cigars, watching with nervous impatience the closed door. Laura and Lenora were seated at the table, dressed for the street. They had the air of being prepared for some excursion. Quest, realising the Professor’s highly-strung state, had left him alone for a few moments and was studying a map of New York. The latter, however, was too ill at ease to keep silent for long.
“Our friend French,” he remarked, “gave you no clue, I suppose, as to the direction in which his investigations are leading him?”
Quest glanced up from the map.
“None at all. I know, however, that the house in which Lenora here was confined, is being watched closely.”
The Professor glanced towards the table before which Lenora was seated.
“It seems strange,” he continued, “that the young lady should have so little to tell us about her incarceration.”
Lenora shivered for a moment.
“What could there be to tell,” she asked, “except that it was all horrible, and that I felt things—felt dangers—which I couldn’t describe.”
The Professor gave vent to an impatient little exclamation.
“I am not speaking of fancies,” he persisted. “You had food brought to you, for instance. Could you never see the hand which placed it inside your room? Could you hear nothing of the footsteps of the person who brought it? Could you not even surmise whether it was a man or a woman?”
Lenora answered him with an evident effort. She had barely, as yet, recovered from the shock of those awful hours.
“The person who brought me the food,” she said, “came at night—never in the daytime. I never heard anything. The most I ever saw was once—I happened to be looking towards the door and I saw a pair of hands—nothing more—setting down a tray. I shrieked and called out. I think that I almost fainted. When I found courage enough to look, there was nothing there but the tray upon the floor.”
“You never heard, for instance, the rustling of a gown or the sound of a footstep?” the Professor asked. “You could not even say whether your jailer were man or woman?”
Lenora shook her head.
“All that I ever heard was the opening of the door. All that I ever saw was that pair of hands. One night I fancied—but that must have been a dream!”
“You fancied what?” the Professor persisted.
“That I saw a pair of eyes glaring at me,” Lenora replied, “eyes without any human body. I know that I ran round the room, calling out. When I dared to look again, there was nothing there.”
The Professor sighed as he turned away.
“It is evident, I am afraid,” he said, “that Miss Lenora’s evidence will help no one. As an expert in these affairs, Mr. Quest, does it not seem to you that her imprisonment was just a little purposeless? There seems to have been no attempt to harm her in any way whatever, that I can see.”
“Whoever took the risk of abducting her,” Quest pointed out grimly, “did it for a purpose. That purpose would probably have become developed in course of time. However we look at it, Mr. Ashleigh, there was only one man who must have been anxious to get her out of the way, and that man was Craig.”
The Professor’s manner betrayed some excitement.
“Then will you tell me this?” he demanded. “The young lady is confident that she locked Craig up in the coach-house and that the key was on the outside of the door, a fact which would prevent the lock being picked from inside, even if such a thing were possible. The window is small, and up almost in the roof. Will you tell me how Craig escaped from the coach-house in order to carry out this abduction—all within a few minutes, mind, of his having been left there? Will you tell me that, Mr. Sanford Quest?” the Professor concluded, with a note of triumph in his tone.
“That’s one of the troubles we are up against,” Quest admitted. “We have to remember this, though. The brain that planned the two murders here, that stole and restored Mrs. Rheinholdt’s jewels, that sends us those little billets-doux from time to time, is quite capable of finding a way out of a jerry-built garage.”
The Professor sniffed. He turned once more to Lenora.
“Young lady,” he said, “I will ask you this. I do not wish to seem obstinate in my refusal to accept Craig’s guilt as proved, but I would like to put this simple question to you. Did Craig’s demeanour during your conversation seem to you to indicate the master criminal? Did he seem to you to be possessed of supreme courage, of marvellous intelligence?”
Lenora smiled very faintly.
“I am afraid,” she replied, “that this time I’ll have to satisfy the Professor. He was white and trembling all the time. I thought him an arrant coward.”
The Professor smiled beatifically as he glanced around. He had the air of one propounding an unanswerable problem.
“You hear what Miss Lenora says? I ask you whether a man who even knew the meaning of the word fear could have carried out these ghastly crimes?”
“I have known cases,” Quest observed, “where the most cold-blooded criminals in the world have been stricken with the most deadly fear when it has come to a question of any personal danger. However,” he added, “here comes our friend French. I have an idea that he has something to tell us.”
They glanced expectantly towards the door as French entered. The Inspector, who was looking very spruce and well-brushed, wished them a general good-morning. His eyes rested last and longest upon Laura, who seemed, however, unconscious of his presence.
“Now, then, French,” Quest began, as he returned his greeting, “take a cigar, make yourself comfortable in that chair and let us have your news. As you see, we have obeyed orders. We are all ready to follow you anywhere you say.”
“It won’t be to the end of the world, anyway,” the Inspector remarked, as he lit his cigar. “I am going to propose a little excursion down Gayson Avenue way.”
“Back to that house?” Lenora exclaimed, with a grimace.
The Inspector nodded.
“We have had those boys at the station,” he went on, “and we have questioned them carefully. It seems that after they had picked up the ball, a man came out of the side entrance of the house, saw them reading Miss Lenora’s message, and shouted after them. The boys had sense enough to scoot. The man ran after them, but had to give it up. Here is their description of him.”
The Inspector took a piece of paper from his pocket. They all waited breathlessly.
“Had to drag this out of the boys, bit by bit,” the Inspector proceeded, “but boiled down and put into reasonable language, this is what it comes to. The man was of medium height, rather thin, pale, and dressed in black clothes. He had what they call anxious eyes, and after running a short distance he put his hand to his heart, as though out of breath. One of the boys thought his nose was a little hooked, and they both remarked upon the fact that although he shouted after them, he used no swear words, but simply tried to induce them to stop. This description suggest anything to you, gentlemen?”
“Craig,” Lenora said firmly.
“It is a very accurate description of Craig,” Sanford Quest agreed.
The Professor looked troubled, also a little perplexed. He said nothing, however.
“Under these circumstances,” the Inspector continued, “I have had the house watched, and I propose that we now search it systematically. It is very possible that something may transpire to help us. Of course, my men went through it roughly when we brought Miss Lenora away, but that wasn’t anything of a search to count, if the place really has become a haunt of criminals.”
“What about the ownership of the house?” Quest asked, as he took up his hat.
The Inspector nodded approvingly.
“I am making a few enquiries in that direction,” he announced. “I expect to have something to report very shortly.”
The Professor stood drawing on his gloves. The vague look of trouble still lingered in his face.
“Tell me again,” he begged, “the name of the avenue in which this residence is situated?”
“Gayson Avenue,” the inspector replied. “It’s a bit out of the way, but it’s not a bad neighbourhood.”
The Professor repeated the address to himself softly. For a moment he stood quite still. His manner showed signs of growing anxiety. He seemed to be trying to remember something.
“The name,” he admitted finally, as they moved towards the door, “suggests to me, I must confess—We are going to see the house, Inspector?”
“We are on our way there now, sir—that is, if the young ladies are willing?” he added, glancing at Laura.
“We’ve been waiting here with our hats on for the last half-hour,” Laura replied promptly. “You’ve stretched your ten minutes out some, Mr. French.”
The Inspector manoeuvred to let the others pass on, and descended the stairs by Laura’s side.
“Couldn’t help it,” he confided, lowering his tone a little. “Had some information come in about that house I couldn’t quite size up. You’re looking well this morning, Miss Laura.”
“Say, who are you guying!” she replied.
“I mean it,” the Inspector persisted. “That hat seems to suit you.”
Laura laughed at the top of her voice.
“Say, kid,” she exclaimed to Lenora, “the Inspector here’s setting up as a judge of millinery!”
Lenora turned and looked at them both with an air of blank astonishment. The Inspector was a little embarrassed.
“No need to give me away like that,” he muttered, as they reached the hall. “Now then, ladies and gentlemen, if you are ready.”
They took their places in the automobile and drove off. As they neared the vicinity of Gayson Avenue, the Professor began to show signs of renewed uneasiness. When they drew up at last outside the house, he gave a little exclamation. His face was grave, almost haggard.
“Mr. Quest,” he said, “Inspector French, I deeply regret that I have a statement to make.”
They both turned quickly towards him. The Inspector smiled in a confidential manner at Laura. It was obvious that he knew what was coming.
“Some years ago,” the Professor continued, “I bought this house and made a present of it to—”
“To whom?” Quest asked quickly.
“To my servant Craig,” the Professor admitted with a groan.
Lenora gave a little cry. She turned triumphantly towards the Inspector.
“All recollection as to its locality had escaped me,” the Professor continued sorrowfully. “I remember that it was on the anniversary of his having been with me for some fifteen years that I decided to show him some substantial mark of my appreciation. I knew that he was looking for a domicile for his father and mother, who are since both dead, and I requested a house agent to send me in a list of suitable residences. This, alas! was the one I purchased.”
Quest glanced around the place.
“I think,” he said, “that the Professor’s statement now removes any doubt as to Craig’s guilt. You are sure the house has been closely watched, Inspector?”
“Since I received certain information,” French replied, “I have had half-a-dozen of my best men in the vicinity. I can assure you that no one has entered or left it during the last twenty-four hours.”
They made their way to the piazza steps and entered by the front door. The house was an ordinary framework one of moderate size, in poor repair, and showing signs of great neglect. The rooms were barely furnished, and their first cursory search revealed no traces of habitation. There was still the broken skylight in the room which Lenora had occupied, and the bed upon which she had slept was still crumpled. French, who had been tapping the walls downstairs, called to them. They trooped down into the hall. The Inspector was standing before what appeared to be an ordinary panel.
“Look here,” he said, glancing out of the corner of his eye to be sure that Laura was there, “let me show you what I have just discovered.”
He felt with his thumb for a spring. In a moment or two a portion of the wall, about two feet in extent, slowly revolved, disclosing a small cupboard fitted with a telephone instrument.
“A telephone,” the Inspector remarked, pointing to it, “in an unoccupied house and a concealed cupboard. What do you think of that?”
The Professor shook his head.
“Don’t ask me,” he groaned.
French took the receiver from its rest and called up the exchange.
“Inspector French speaking,” he announced. “Kindly tell me what is the number of the telephone from which I am speaking, and who is the subscriber?”
He listened to the reply and asked another question.
“Can you tell me when this instrument was last used?… When?… Thank you!”
The Inspector hung up the receiver.
“The subscriber’s name,” he told them drily, “is Brown. The number is not entered in the book, by request. The telephone was used an hour ago from a call office, and connection was established. That is to say that some one spoke from this telephone.”
“Then if your men have maintained their search properly, that some one,” Quest said slowly, “must be in the house at the present moment.”
“Without a doubt,” the Inspector agreed. “I should like to suggest,” he went on, “that the two young ladies wait for us now in the automobile. If this man turns out as desperate as he has shown himself ingenious, there may be a little trouble.”
They both protested vigorously. Quest shrugged his shoulders.
“They must decide for themselves,” he said. “Personally, I like Lenora, who has had less experience of such adventures, to grow accustomed to danger…. With your permission, Inspector, I am going to search the front room on the first floor before we do anything else. I think that if you wait here I may be able to show you something directly.”
Quest ascended the stairs and entered a wholly unfurnished room on the left-hand side. He looked for a minute contemplatively at a large but rather shallow cupboard, the door of which stood open, and tapped lightly with his forefinger upon the back part of it. Then he withdrew a few feet and, drawing out his revolver, deliberately fired into the floor, a few inches inside. There was a half stifled cry. The false back suddenly swung open and a man rushed out. Quest’s revolver covered him, but there was no necessity for its use. Craig, smothered with dust, his face white as a piece of marble, even his jaw shaking with fear, was wholly unarmed. He seemed, in fact, incapable of any form of resistance. He threw himself upon his knees before Quest.
“Save me!” he begged. “Help me to get away from this house! You don’t belong to the police. I’ll give you every penny I have in the world to let me go!”
Quest smiled at him derisively.
“Get up,” he ordered.
Very slowly Craig obeyed him. He was a pitiful-looking object, but a single look into Quest’s face showed him the folly of any sort of appeal.
“Walk out of the room,” Quest ordered, “in front of me—so! Now, then, turn to the right and go down the stairs.”
They all gave a little cry as they saw him appear, a trembling, pitiful creature, glancing around like a trapped animal. He commenced to descend the stairs, holding tightly to the banisters. Quest remained on the landing above, his revolver in his hand. French waited in the hall below, also armed. Laura gripped Lenora’s arm in excitement.
“They’ve got him now!” she exclaimed. “Got him, sure!”
On the fourth or fifth stair, Craig hesitated. He suddenly saw the Professor standing below. He gripped the banisters with one hand. The other he flung out in a threatening gesture.
“You’ve given me away to these bloodhounds!” he cried,—“you, for whom I have toiled and slaved, whom I have followed all over the world, whom I have served faithfully with the last breath of my body and the last drop of blood in my veins! You have brought them here—tracked me down! You!”
The Professor shook his head sorrowfully.
“Craig,” he said, “you have been the best servant man ever had. If you are innocent of these crimes, you can clear yourself. If you are guilty, a dog’s death is none too good for you.”
Craig seemed to sway for a moment upon his feet. Only Lenora, from the hall, saw that he was fitting his right foot into what seemed to be a leather loop hanging from the banisters. Then a wild shout of surprise broke from the lips of all of them, followed by a moment of stupefied wonder. The whole staircase suddenly began to revolve. Craig, clinging to the banisters, disappeared. In a moment or two there was a fresh click. Another set of stairs, almost identical to the first, had taken their place.
“The cellar!” Quest shouted, as he rushed down the stairs. “Quick!”
They wrenched open the wooden door and hurried down the dark steps into the gloomy, unlit cellar. The place was crowded with packing-cases, and two large wine barrels stood in the corner. At the farther end was a door. Quest rushed for it and stood on guard. A moment later, however, he called to Laura and pressed his revolver into her hand.
“Stand here,” he ordered. “Shoot him if he tries to run out. I’ll search in the packing-cases. He might be dangerous.”
The Professor, out of breath, was leaning against one of the pillars, his arm passed around it for support. Lenora, with Quest and French, searched hastily amongst the packing-cases. Suddenly there was a loud crack, the sound of falling masonry, followed by a scream from Laura. French, with a roar of anger, rushed towards her. She was lying on her side, already half covered by falling bricks and masonry. He dragged her away, just in time.
“My God, she’s fainted!” he exclaimed.
“I haven’t,” Laura faltered, trying to open her eyes, “and I’m not going to, but I think my arm’s broken, and my side hurts.”
“The fellow’s not down here, anyway,” Quest declared. “Let’s help her upstairs and get her out of this devil’s house.”
They supported her up the steps and found a chair for her in the hall. She was white almost to the lips, but she struggled bravely to keep consciousness.
“Don’t you bother about me,” she begged. “Don’t let that blackguard go! You find him. I shall be all right.”
The Inspector swung open the telephone cupboard and called for an ambulance. Then Quest, who had been examining the staircase, suddenly gave a little exclamation.