He opened the inner door and looked into a connecting bedroom. It was dark, but by a shaft of light from the study he saw a man lying on the bed. The man was about the size of Deb, perhaps an inch or two shorter and even more slender. He appeared quite youthful himself, despite the touches of gray at his temples and the relaxed tracery of lines about his mouth.
Cabot looked down at him, studying his position with an obscure frown. Rand lay in none of those familiar postures which a person almost automatically assumes when he intends to go to sleep. He sprawled there as though unconsciousness had overtaken him, his legs twisted sideways, his mouth open. The sound of his heavy breathing was audible across the room.
Cabot spoke quietly. “Rand.” He waited a moment, gazing thoughtfully at the highball glass on the bedside table. There was a little liquid left in it, and if looked like straight whisky. He glanced back at Rand. The man on the bed was perfectly motionless. The heavy breathing continued with its slow, disturbing accent of exhaustion.
Cabot crossed the room noiselessly and looked into the bathroom. Then he inspected the two windows and the outer door into the corridor and found them all latched from the inside. He moved back through the study to the other door. There he reversed the key in the lock, turned it as he went out, and slipped it into his pocket.
So far, he thought, so good. If it happened now, it would be one of those sealed room things. That is, if it happened to either of them. But it wouldn’t happen to Rand tonight, and it might just as conceivably happen to somebody other than Deb. Rand himself, apparently, could not guess to whom, and it hadn’t mattered greatly to him. He had said: It’s rather dreadfully irrelevant.
Cabot went on down the stairs.
Deb woke up very slowly. It was not like that other awakening, made abrupt and terror-stricken by the intrusion of the unknown. This time he found that he could not throw off sleep entirely. It clung to him like an inexplicable weakness, dulling his fear, dimming even the insistent realization that something was wrong.
Something?
He opened his eyes and found himself still sitting in the big chair. His body felt heavy and somewhat cramped, as though he had slept in that one position for many hours. The light was still burning on the bedside table, and beside it was the empty glass from which he had drunk the malted milk—how long ago?
He tried to remember. It was all hopelessly hazy and remote, like the recollection of something in a vanished past. He could recall drinking the milk soon after Cabot left. Immediately after? No, before that he had done something else. He had struggled up, hobbled across the room on his crutch, turned the key, and brought it back with him. Yes...the key.
It was lying there on the table. Of course! He remembered now. Midway in that floundering return he had noticed that Cotton was still in the room. But he had been unwilling to take the trouble then to put the cat out. He had sat down again, he had drunk the milk, and then he must have fallen asleep. But all that didn’t matter. What did matter was that he had gotten up. He had locked the door. It was all right. He was safe. And yet...Something was wrong.
He turned his gaze slowly toward the bed. The great white cat was still there. Deb looked at him and then kept on looking in a vague disbelief that changed gradually into terror.
Cotton—Cotton who had been asleep—was crouching there at the very edge of the blue coverlet. He was staring past Deb, past the chair, at something behind them—at something which, his wide eyes seemed to say, had not yet moved, but would.
Deb found himself curiously unable to turn his eyes from the cat. As in a trance, he noted every detail of his position, and it was as fascinating as though he were viewing obliquely in a mirror the occurrence of the impossible. It was impossible, he thought dully; it was utterly impossible, but——he would have to look behind him.
The huge cat’s little ears were drawn back, almost flat against his head, and his long white mustache twitched in a soundless snarl. His body appeared to be gliding back and forth on his taut paws in the manner of cats preparing to spring, and his tail lay behind him in a tense straight line. The tail jerked once, spasmodically; the wary eyes blazed; and then Cotton was down in a long leap that carried him past the chair. And Deb knew instinctively in the passing of a moment that he was gone, that he was out of the room. That meant—oh, God!
The quick little flurry of sound which came to him was not footsteps. He knew that. But there was something about it that instantly suggested steps—the rhythm and the rustle of human movement. His straining senses caught at the explanation: it was the whistling of legs. But legs didn’t whistle. Why was he hearing them?
He tried to look around.
Chapter Three
Cabot instinctively quickened his steps. He swung down the hall and into the drawing room and then spun away from the sight of his own face reflected upon the shining walls. The face showed tension. There was no one in the room.
He came back swiftly to the foot of the staircase and halted, listening. There was no sound on either side of him, no sound above. The house, he thought, was too still. There was something artificial about it. It was the kind of stillness that is achieved.
He had a feeling that someone was watching him.
He turned his head quickly and saw that a door on his right was open about four inches. The space behind it was dark, but he was sure that there were eyes beyond the crack.
He said, “Confound it! Come out of there!”
The door opened slowly, and the woman with the large, lovely eyes came out. The eyes were staring at him.
Cabot stood with his hand on the newel post. He said, “Who are you, anyway? That’s one thing I want to clear up right now.”
She made a vague gesture toward her uniform. “Can’t you see? I’m the maid. My name—if it makes any difference—is Theresa Church.”
He replied, almost irritably, “You should have rehearsed for this role. You should have studied maids. Come on now!”
“That’s not it, really. I had to have a job in a hurry. I had lost my money——”
He said, “Who told you that you could lie? You can’t. That’s the point. It’s why I think you’re straight.”
Her eyes suddenly relaxed from their fixed stare and turned away. There was a brief little flicker in them, almost an expression of obscure amusement.
“You’re a strange detective, Mr. Cabot,” she said. “You’re the strangest one I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen a lot.”
“Where have you seen a lot? Or, rather, why?”
“Can’t you guess that, too?” She stood there half expectantly for a moment before she murmured, “I’m one myself.”
Cabot stared at her for a second and then grinned. “Well!” he said. “Greetings, sister! I think perhaps it’s a good idea—your being a detective.” He paused. “Private agency? Not New York?”
She shook her head. “Cleveland.”
“Who——”
Her head was turning stiffly. From somewhere in the back of the house there came the faint tinkle of a bell. Her eyes swerved back to him, and in them there was a trace of terror and appeal. She said in a low voice, “I’m at your mercy now. I hope that I can still read men.”
He stood there frowning for a time after she had disappeared. Once more he felt the strange sense of urgency rising in him, like an insistent impulse to hurry. But to hurry where? It was, he thought, like being in the dark. All he could do was to start turning on lights. All sorts of lights.
He went back up the stairs. The upper hall was deserted, and he heard nothing as he passed Deb’s door. He continued into the corridor and unlocked the door of Rand’s apartment.
He sat down at the desk in the study and dialed the number of Terry Crowell. Terry was a friend of his. He was also a city editor.
He said, “Terry, what do you know about Magnamite? I don’t mean the stuff itself; I mean the human side.”
“Plenty,” said Crowell. “More, anyway, than you’ve seen in print. Say, are
n’t you getting married?”
Cabot said, “Yes—now, it’s just possible, Terry, that this will be a matter of life or death——”
“Your getting married? Holy mackerel! Where is her father from—Mississippi?”
“Hell, no. I meant about the Magnamite. I want you to give me the dope on that in something flat. How it started, so on.”
Terry Crowell promptly plunged into a staccato recital. “It’s a whale of a story, but it hasn’t come out yet. It’s a war casualty. The big shot there is a man named Darryl Rand. He has had control of it for several years. Nine months before Pearl Harbor he went to Washington with it, but they laughed at him. They’ve stopped laughing now.”
“I don’t know anything about the technical aspects of it, but the point seems to be that it has a terrific effect upon the strata of the earth. It creates a sort of artificial earthquake which extends a considerable distance beyond the actual point of explosion.
“You can readily see its tremendous possibilities in warfare. But the odd thing is that the man who invented it apparently didn’t see them. That man wasn’t Rand himself; he was a fellow named Martin Kirk. Kirk was a mining engineer, and his idea was to use it in that line. If he had realized to what extent it could become a weapon of destruction, he would certainly have destroyed the formula. For this bird, Kirk, you see, was an impractical sort of genius—an idealist and an almost fanatical pacifist.
“I don’t know how he and Rand first came into contact. Maybe it was by chance that Rand heard of Magnamite. But from then on chance had nothing to do with it.
“Rand saw immediately that Kirk was a man with a big idea and no money. He saw, too, from the very start that the ultimate potentialities of Magnamite lay in its sheer destructiveness. He realized that another war would break out in a few years and that locked away in the mind of this crack-brained visionary was a secret that might decide it.
“It was a ticklish problem, but Rand solved it. It probably wasn’t even very difficult for him. He was shrewd and practical—and wealthy. He had only to persuade the inventor to let him organize a company to develop the discovery, ostensibly for the purpose which Kirk had in mind. It’s a familiar pattern.
“After that, Darryl Rand simply played along with Kirk until the showdown came. By that time Rand had complete control. He was in a position to force Kirk out, and when it became necessary, he did just that.”
Cabot’s jaw tightened. He asked quickly, “Where is Kirk now?”
“He’s dead. And that’s the story, Phil. That’s the punch line. You see, the nut committed suicide.”
“When?”
“About two months after he was thrown out. It seems that when he realized what had happened, when he saw that his discovery would some day be used to destroy thousands of human beings, he went to pieces. It became an obsession with him, and he started drinking. He stayed drunk for sixty days, and then they found him dead in a miserable attic bedroom with two empty whisky bottles beside him. He had stuffed his last shirt into the cracks and turned on the gas.”
“Do you know anything about his background?”
“He had been a rolling stone. Rand himself didn’t know much about him. There was supposed to be a wife somewhere from whom he had long been separated, and somewhere else there was a son by a previous marriage. Possibly Kirk wasn’t even his name. His death, anyway, attracted very little attention, for at that time Magnamite wasn’t generally known. His suicide didn’t matter to anybody except Rand.”
“Rand?”
Terry Crowell said, “Yes. The outcome appears to have hit him pretty hard, for he wasn’t expecting anything like that. Rand is one of those hard-shelled business babies who are really as sensitive as the devil underneath. To him it must have been very much like beating a man in a game of tennis and then having the fellow run off and blow his brains out.”
“Tell me more about Rand.”
“Well, he hasn’t made any money out of Magnamite. He simply held on to it until his moment came. When it arrived, he was in the spotlight. Maybe that was what he wanted. I don’t know. You can stick on the label yourself:
‘Patriot—Prophet—Egoist——”
“Know anything about a man named Carlo Pugh?”
“He was the brother of Rand’s first wife, and he’s an analytical chemist. He came into the company when it was organized, and after Kirk’s exit Pugh became pretty important to Rand.”
“And Rand, I suppose, is pretty important to the government? His death at this stage would tear things up?”
“I don’t think it would—at this stage.”
Cabot was surprised. “What do you mean?”
“The whole business has been turned over to the government. Rand is now only a figurehead.”
“I see.” Cabot paused. “Go on.”
“This is where your story starts.”
Cabot said, “Is it? Thanks, Terry.”
He sat perfectly still at the desk after he had replaced the receiver. He sat with his arms resting upon the blotter pad and his gaze fixed across the room. He looked like a man who was pondering deeply.
He did not make the mistake of turning his head.
It took a few moments to become quite certain of it. He thought that that was because of the long intervals between. He estimated that there were at least ten or twelve seconds each time before it came again—that long, indrawn quiver upon the air which had the quality of a shudder rather than a sound.
It was coming from behind him, through the partly open door leading into the corridor.
He thought for a second of springing up from the desk and making a dash for the door, but it occurred to him that the person outside would certainly be expecting him to get up at any moment and would probably react to it with lightning speed. A better plan came into his mind.
He called out, almost cheerfully, “Well, Mr. Rand, are you awake now?” He got up audibly, called again, “Mr. Rand?” and began moving toward the bedroom door.
He had it precisely planned. He was looking at the very spot on the rug where he would be directly in line with the outer door behind him. At that point he would spin around, sprint straight at the door, and get the fellow in a flying tackle.
The room was completely quiet. He could no longer hear even the faint gasp, but he was certain that the unknown was still there and, by now, off guard.
He moved on unhurriedly toward the bedroom door, and his whole body became tensed for that last step, when he would whirl.
He never took it.
It happened so quickly and out of such stillness that it might have been a bolt from a tranquil sky. And after it there was only the distant and unreal thunder of his own fall.
The blow stunned him without making him actually insensible. He found that he was still dimly aware of what was going on, but he was no longer able to react to it.
He knew that nobody bent over him. Nor did anyone come closer as he sprawled there on the rug. That fact seemed to have a significance of its own and to bring with it an obscure relief. As he slowly struggled back to complete consciousness, he saw the reason.
He was lying squarely before the inner door. Anyone would have had to come closer in order to go into the bedroom, whose other door was locked from inside. Instead of doing that, his assailant had run back into the corridor. The purpose, then, had not been to get in to Rand. It had been simply to keep him from getting in.
Why?
There was a roaring in his ears, and the walls and ceiling of the room appeared to be tilting around him at utterly fantastic angles. He had an impression that this had been going on for hours, but he recognized that the hours had more likely been minutes.
He sat up with a groan, putting his hand out to the wall. The room was revolving around him like a giant top in slow motion. He caught at the facing of the door and began pulling himself up groggily.
He stood there, swaying a little, his fingers fumbling doggedly and persistently for the handle of the do
or. He knew that he would have to go in at once. He would have to see why Long-Breath had been willing to wait—why he had wanted him to wait.
He was sure now that Rand had not been merely asleep. He had not been merely drunk.
He got the door open and staggered into the room.
Rand was lying in the same position as before. There was no change whatever in his posture. The change was in his face.
Cabot walked unsteadily to the bed and reached for the wrist lying on the coverlet. He frowned down at the thin features, which had taken on a faintly bluish tinge. The sight of them was so oddly unnerving and his own hand was so shaky that he found himself incapable of counting the erratic pulse.
His gaze swerved again to the highball glass and the house telephone on the small desk near the bed. He raised his left hand to look at his wrist watch and began counting once more, very carefully. A muffled hammer seemed to be beating a devil’s tattoo in his own skull.
He counted for fifteen seconds and, then he muttered, “My God!” and lurched away from the bed toward the other telephone in the study. He knew that he would have to get a doctor immediately.
He got back inside the door and saw Theresa Church creeping across the study. Her face was as white as cotton.
She said, “Mr. Cabot, come quickly! I think something terrible has happened.”
He caught at the door for a moment, staring at her. “It has,” he said. “We must get a doctor. This man may be dying.”
The fright deepened in her eyes. “Mr. Rand! What——”
“He has been drugged—poisoned.” He took his hand from the door, stepped away. “But that wasn’t what you meant. What did you mean?”
“It’s Deb. There’s someone in his room. I could hear someone tiptoeing.”
He said, “That door is locked. It must have been Deb himself.”
Her great, frightened eyes were fixed upon him. “It couldn’t have been!” she whispered. “Don’t you see? Deb can’t tiptoe.”
The Whistling Legs Page 3