CHAPTER XXII--THE PHANTOM TURNS A SOMERSAULT
There was a humorous glint in Lieutenant Culligore's lazy, mouse-coloredeyes as he noted the look of consternation that was slowly creeping intothe Gray Phantom's face. He drew a step nearer, and now the menacingmuzzle was less than six feet from its target. There was a touch ofcarelessness in his manner of handling the weapon, but his aim was sureand a slight pressure on the trigger would have meant death.
But the Phantom's look of dismay was not due to fear. Many a time he hadlaughed in the face of dangers far more serious than the present one.The thing that appalled him was the realization that twice within a fewhours he had committed a stupid blunder. The Gray Phantom, once theastutest and craftiest of rogues, had bungled like an amateur.
The thought was galling. Was it that his hand had lost its old-timefinesse and his mind its keen edge, or had his mental stress and faggednerves been the cause of his bungling? Again, perhaps he had beendistracted by the haunting vision of a pair of troubled brown eyes.
He looked hard at Culligore. Some faces were like an open book to him,and this was one of them. The lieutenant was no man's fool. Behind themask of dullness and stolidity were shrewdness and quickness of wit, andhe knew that the man before him would not permit private inclinations toswerve him from his duty. Culligore was as dangerous an adversary as hehad ever faced. But there was still another quality behind the mask, andit was this that gave the Phantom his cue.
Quickly he looked about him. The way to the basement door was barred bythe lieutenant, but the stairway leading to the laboratory wasunobstructed. With an appearance of utmost unconcern the Phantom turnedaway and started to ascend the steps.
"Stop!" commanded Culligore, following the retreating man's movementswith his pistol. "I'll pop you if you take another step."
The Phantom stopped, turned, and grinned. "Oh, no, you won't," hedrawled.
"Can't you see that I've got you covered?"
"But you won't shoot. It takes a particular kind of nerve to kill adefenseless man in cold blood, and you haven't got it. Good-by."
He took another step, but a short and peremptory "Halt!" brought him toa stop. There was something in the lieutenant's tone that gave himpause. He turned and looked down.
"You've sized me up just about right," admitted Culligore. "I can't killa man who hasn't got a chance for his life. But if you move anotherstep, you'll get a slug of lead in your leg. If you think I'm bluffing,just try."
The Phantom hesitated. The words and the tone left no room for doubt asto the speaker's earnestness, and even a slight flesh wound would hamperthe Phantom's movements and frustrate his plans. He came down the fewsteps he had covered and stood on the basement floor.
"All right, Culligore. You win this time, but don't think for a momentthat I'll let you carry this joke much further. I have very strenuousobjections to being arrested at this particular time. Mind if I smoke acigarette?"
"I do," the lieutenant said dryly. "I have heard about your cute littleways, and I'm not taking any chances. You don't play any of your trickson me, Mr. Phantom."
"You surely don't think that I'll permit you to drag me off to a cell?"
"How are you going to help yourself?"
"Why, man, it can't be done! It's been tried before, you know. And justnow I am a very busy man and can't afford to waste time. Besides, whatcharge do you propose to arrest me on? Not the murder of Gage and Mrs.Trippe?"
"There are other charges waiting for you in court. You've been having agay time for a good many years, but this is the end of it. You've donesome very fancy wriggling in the past, but you can't wriggle out ofthis."
"Perhaps not." A great gloom seemed suddenly to fall over the Phantom."It looks as though you had me, Culligore. A man can't fight the wholeNew York police force single-handed. All you have to do is to blow yourwhistle and----"
"Whistle be hanged! I'm not going to give you the satisfaction of sayingthat it took a regiment to get you. I mean to arrest you alone, just toprove that you're not as smart as some people think."
The Phantom glowed inwardly. His adroit and subtle appeal to thelieutenant's pride had produced the desired effect. Culligore felt sosure of his advantage that he would not summon help, and this was animportant point in the Phantom's favor. Yet he knew the situation wascritical enough. On former occasions he had gambled recklessly withdeath, often winning through sheer fearlessness and audacity, but muchmore than his life was at stake now. He looked in vain for a loophole inthe situation. All he could do for the present was to spar for time.
"I see," he murmured. "The achievement of taking the Phantomsingle-handed would put a gorgeous feather in your cap. But look here,Culligore. Fame is a fine thing, but you can't eat it, and it won't buyclothes. Isn't it just as important to find the murderer of Mrs. Trippeand Gage?"
"I'll attend to that, too." The lieutenant inserted a hand in his pocketand drew out a pair of handcuffs. "Out with your hands, Phantom."
The Phantom promptly put his hands in the pockets of his trousers. "Whybe in such a rush, Culligore? You know I can't get away from you so longas you keep me covered. Let's discuss things a bit. You don't think Icommitted those murders?"
"Not exactly," said the detective thoughtfully, the steel links danglingfrom his hand. "Whatever else you may be, I don't think you're amurderer."
"And that shows that you have more gray matter than some of yourcolleagues."
"Thanks," dryly; "but you'd better save the compliments. I haven't quitemade up my mind about the murders yet. If you didn't commit them, thereare a lot of things that will have to be explained. The threateningletter, for instance."
"Forged."
"And Gage's dying statement."
"Pinto lied, or else Gage was mistaken."
"Think so?" The lieutenant's upper lip brushed the tip of his nose."It's a queer thing that nothing but the Maltese cross was taken."
"That was only a detail of the frame-up. Listen, Culligore. Isn't ityour idea that the two murders were committed by one and the sameperson?"
"It looks that way, but----"
"Well, then, I happen to know who killed Mrs. Trippe, because I wasthere when it happened."
Culligore stared; and the Phantom knew he had gained another point.
"There when it happened? You saw the murder committed?" The lieutenantseemed at once amazed and incredulous. "Just where were you? In thestoreroom?"
"No; the murder was committed in Gage's bedroom, and the body wasafterward removed to the storeroom by the murderer."
For a moment Culligore's astonishment was so great that he almost forgotto maintain his aim. He gathered himself quickly, but his face bore alook of bewilderment.
"He moved the body, eh? I wonder why. If the job was done by a certainperson I have in mind, I don't see what object he could have in carryingthe corpse from Gage's bedroom to the storeroom. The natural thing wouldhave been to leave the body on the spot. You're not kidding me?"
"Absolutely not." The Phantom grinned at Culligore's perplexity.Evidently the lieutenant's theories and calculations had been completelyupset by what he had just heard. "Who is the certain person you had inmind, Culligore?"
"Never mind that. Let me get this straight. You were in Gage's bedroomwhen Mrs. Trippe was murdered?"
"Not in the bedroom, but----" The Phantom checked himself on the pointof explaining that he had witnessed the murder from his place ofconcealment in the narrow opening back of the window frame. In a flashit dawned upon him that he had another advantage over the detective. Hehad found the loophole in the situation for which his mind had beensearching for the past ten minutes. Culligore, of course, was not awareof the existence of the tunnel. The stairs leading to the cellar were atthe Phantom's back. If he could elude the detective long enough to slipdown the steps and crawl into the mouth of the tunnel, he would betemporarily safe. It was a slender chance, but he had no other.
"Where were you, then?" demanded Culligore.
"My secret." The Phantom assumed a mysterious expression, meanwhileedging ever so slightly toward the stairs at his back. "I saw Mrs.Trippe and she saw me. She was in a terribly frightened condition, andshe called out that someone was killing her. Then, of a sudden, a handappeared, holding a knife. Before I could utter a word or move a muscle,the knife had done its work."
Culligore muttered something under his breath. He scanned the Phantom'sface keenly, but what he saw evidently convinced him of the narrator'struthfulness. A noise, scarcely louder than the falling of a pin,sounded at the head of the stairs. The Phantom's sensitive ears detectedit, but the lieutenant appeared to have heard nothing.
"Well, what happened after that?"
The Phantom waited for a moment before he answered. A draft faint as abreath told him that the door at the top of the stairs had been opened.He had a vague impression that somebody was looking down on them, and hewondered whether Doctor Bimble or Jerome had returned. Not the slightestflicker in his face showed that he had noticed anything.
"I didn't see any more. The--the curtain fell a moment or two after theblow was struck."
Culligore regarded him narrowly. Another faint sound came from the headof the stairs, and in the same instant the draft ceased, indicating thatthe door had closed. The lieutenant, his every faculty bent to the taskof ferreting out the thoughts in the Phantom's mind, had heard nothing.He seemed inclined to doubt and scoff, but a stronger instinct compelledhim to give credence to the story he had just heard.
"And all you saw of the murderer was a hand and a knife?"
"That was all."
"Do you remember the woman's exact words?"
The Phantom searched his memory for a moment. "She said: 'He's killingme! He's afraid I'll tell! He locked me in----' She never finished thelast sentence, but she had said enough. Evidently, the murderer of Gageknew that the housekeeper was aware of his guilt, and imprisoned her inthe bedroom so that she would not reveal what she knew. Later hereturned with a knife in his hand, having decided it would be safer tokill her. The housekeeper must have had some warning of his arrival;perhaps she saw or heard him coming."
Culligore looked as though he had a baffling problem on his mind. "Whodo you suppose was the 'he' she referred to?"
"I think that's fairly plain. She had previously made it known that shesuspected Pinto of having murdered her employer."
The lieutenant arched his brows and seemed to be revolving a new idea inhis mind. "Just the same, we can't be sure she meant Pinto, as long asshe didn't mention him by name. The fact that she suspected him oncedoesn't really prove anything. Something may have happened in themeantime that caused her to change her opinion. The 'he' might have beenan entirely different person--maybe somebody she'd never seen before andwhose name she didn't know."
"Possible," admitted the Phantom thoughtfully. Culligore had turned histhoughts into a new channel.
"Besides," added Culligore quickly, "even if Pinto was the 'he' she hadin mind, she might have been mistaken, just as you claim Gage wasmistaken."
The Phantom made another slight movement toward the cellar stairs. "I'mnot at all sure Gage made the statement Pinto claims he made. My privateopinion is that Pinto is a liar as well as a murderer. What thehousekeeper said isn't the only evidence I have against him. I hadn'tmeant to tell what happened in the storeroom this morning; but since Iwas careless enough to leave my finger prints on the handcuffs, I mightas well come out with it."
Culligore's mouth opened wider and wider as the Phantom related what hadoccurred in the storeroom during the early morning hours. When the storywas finished, he seemed stunned, and the dazed look in his eyes told thePhantom his chance had come.
For an instant he flexed his muscles for action, then executed a swiftand nimble somersault that landed him on his feet in the middle of thestairs. A spiteful crack told that Culligore had fired his pistol, butthe Phantom was already at the bottom of the stairway. Then he dashedacross the floor toward the point where the mouth of the tunnel was. Heran his fingers over the wall in search of the hidden door, theingenious arrangement of which he had previously noticed.
Culligore, momentarily taken aback by the Phantom's quick and unexpectedmove, was losing no time. Already he was scampering down the stairs inpursuit of the fugitive. The cellar was dark, save for the narrow shaftof light slanting down from the basement, and the Phantom heard himmuttering to himself as he picked his way through the gloom.
After a few moments' search the Phantom's fingers found the tiny rift inthe brick surface that marked the location of the door. Culligore,evidently hesitating to use his electric flash for fear of becoming atarget for the Phantom's pistol, was scudding hither and thither at theopposite end of the cellar. The Phantom crawled into the opening, feetforemost, and softly pulled the door to, then lay on his back, chucklinggently to himself as he pictured the lieutenant's discomfiture.
He had no fear that Culligore would find his hiding place. The door wasso carefully concealed that only a careful search would reveal itslocation, and the detective did not even suspect its existence. Yet thePhantom knew that he would not be safe for long. He could not remain inthe tunnel indefinitely, and escape through the other end wasimpossible, for he had previously ascertained that the mechanism of therevolving window frame could not be manipulated from that side. All hehad gained was time. He could only hope that his lucky star, which sofar had never deserted him, would once more turn the situation in hisfavor.
His mind was working quickly while he listened to Culligore's movementsin the cellar. Doubtless the detective would soon summon assistance andhave the building surrounded, and then, unless some chance andunforeseen development came to his rescue, the Phantom's position wouldbe critical indeed. Even if the searchers should not find his hidingplace, he would eventually die from lack of air.
Suddenly his figure stiffened. He lay rigid, trying to account for thecurious sensation that had just come to him. In a moment he knew what itwas a faint current of air was stirring in the tunnel. At first he couldnot understand, for he was certain that both exits were closed, and thetube itself was air-tight. He worked deeper into the tunnel, trying totrace the mysterious current to its origin, and presently it came to himthat, through some unaccountable circumstance, the other end must beopen.
It was mystifying, but the stirring of air could be explained in noother way than that in some manner the revolving window frame had comeopen. He moved forward as rapidly as he could, hoping to gain the exitand get out of the zone of danger before the block was surrounded. Bythis time Culligore must have discovered that his quarry had in someinexplicable way escaped from the basement. Perhaps he was even nowcursing himself for his vain-glorious boast that he would take the GrayPhantom single-handed and unaided.
The movement of air became more noticeable as the Phantom drew near theend of the passage. He proceeded more slowly now, moving forward bycautious twists and wrigglings, a few inches at a time, carefullycalculating each motion so as to make no noise. There was something atonce puzzling and ominous about the open exit, and he could not knowwhat awaited him in the bedroom at the end of the tunnel.
His progress became more difficult as he reached the acclivity in whichthe passage terminated, for he had been moving crab fashion, havingentered the tunnel feet first in order to be able to close the doorbehind him, and the width of the tube did not permit him to turn. Silentas a mole, he twisted his body upward, all his senses on the alertagainst the slightest hint of danger. Now his feet were almost at thewindow frame. As he had surmised, the opening was clear, and a few moretwists would land him on the floor of the bedroom.
Cautiously he thrust a foot through the opening, but in a moment he drewit back. Then he lay rigid, listening, for something warned him ofdanger. The bedchamber was dark and there was not the faintest sound;yet he knew someone was lying in wait for him on the other side.
The Gray Phantom's Return Page 22