The Domino Lady

by Lars Anderson

  The tall man left the room immediately thereafter and Ellen could hear his heavy tread receding down the stairs. The other officer walked slowly over, and began a casual examination of the Wyatt safe.

  The clothes closet was tiny, really only a locker built into one corner of the office, and Ellen found it hot and unbearably close within the cramped space.

  Perspiration slipped down her face and across the smooth expanse of her shoulders and bosom. She had hoped that the officers would leave to telephone, or go for the homicide squad, allowing her a chance to escape the room, and the premises But she had hoped the hopeless. She was trapped, and could be certain of discovery at any moment!

  Murmuring a little prayer for deliverance beneath her breath, she raised the back of one slender hand and wiped the perspiration from her forehead. Then, a grim, hard smile twitched at the corners of her red mouth.

  “It’s now or never,” she told herself, silently. “If I wait until the other officer returns, I’m sunk. I’m certain to be discovered. Or, in case these men do not find me, the homicide detectives are sure to do so when they go over the place.”

  The policeman called Mac was busily engaged in studying the rifled safe. Ellen gripped the little automatic in her right fist, and reached upward to see that the little domino mask was securely in place about her eyes. Her slender fingers were trembling a little. This was the tightest spot of her entire career, and she feared that she might be forced to shoot her way out of it. She had never taken human life and she didn’t want to take one now. But she was determined to escape this trap, send death-spitting streams of fire toward anyone who crossed her path to safety!

  The officer was bending over, examining the combination on the safe door. This was the precise opportunity for which Ellen had been waiting. She softly opened the closet door, lunged forward into the room, the little automatic bristling ominously in her white-knuckled fist!

  Something seemed to warn the policeman of danger, and just as Ellen reached a point directly behind him, he swiveled around on his heel, his right hand going for the holstered service revolver at his waist.

  “Hold it!”

  HER voice, through tightly-drawn lips, was cold as death as it knifed through the stillness of the room. Her brown eyes glittered grimly through the holes in her mask.

  “Lay off the gun!” she gritted, savagely. “Or you get the entire contents of this thing right where it’ll do you the most good!”

  The officer stared, hard. “Oh, The Domino Lady, eh?” he snarled, angrily as he raised his hand from the gun in his belt. “So it’s you? And you’ve another killing to your credit! How long do you think you can get away with this stuff, sister?”

  Ellen let his speech pass, ignored it. “Just march over to that closet if you want to go on living!” she commanded in a brittle voice. “And make it snappy! I haven’t all night!” She gestured toward the small closet which she had so recently quitted.

  The man hesitated for a moment, then moved toward the closet. There was no mistaking the gleam in his captor’s eye, or the businesslike tones of her cool voice. Discretion was the better part of valor, he decided; he’d seen the corpse on the floor, and felt certain this Domino Lady had perpetrated the crime of murder. He had no desire to join the cadaver on the reddened rug! Muttering under his breath, he stepped within the closet. Ellen promptly turned the key in the lock, imprisoning him.

  She was speed personified, now. With a quick glance about the room, she glided to the door, peeped downward. No sign of the returning Dean as yet. Bringing her pocket flash into play, she moved swiftly along the upper corridor toward the rear of the house. A moment later, she was quitting the structure through the same window by which she had gained entrance. And, shortly thereafter, her yellow roadster was cutting the blackness of Market Street, heading toward a distant section of town!

  ELLEN shot a glance at the dial of her watch as she sped along through the night. It was precisely twelve-thirty, or exactly fifty minutes since she had ventured into the Wyatt menage.

  At that time, things had appeared pretty hopeless. Now, she had a live lead to work upon. No use quitting when there was so much valuable time ahead before daybreak. Might as well strike while the iron was hot, and try to accomplish as much as possible!

  She brought the roadster to a standstill before a large, unpretentious apartment house on San Luis Place. This was the address she had secured from the wrist bag found in Wyatt’s house all right! She hoped to find her impersonator here, The Domino Lady’s Double! And she’d get the truth from her lips, or else —

  She ignored the push button that gleamed at the jamb of the outer door. She twisted the knob instead and, to her surprise, it silently yielded to the pressure of her hand. A moment later Ellen was creeping silently along a passageway that led to a rear courtyard where withered plants rustled in the night breeze.

  Noiselessly, she swung to the left and ascended carpeted stairs that led to the second floor.

  Before number three-o-two, she paused. Light showed beneath the door. She knocked softly, the tiny automatic again sprouting from her right hand as she did so.

  There was no response. She frowned, rapped again. But still there was no answer, no sound of movement from within. Ellen tried the knob. The door swung softly open before her. A cold chill shook her shapely body at the ghastly sight that met her wide-eyed gaze.

  In the center of the high-ceilinged room, Ellen saw a blonde girl whose arms and legs were bound tightly to the chair in which she sat. Her golden head was slumped grotesquely forward, her soft hair dotted with blood that had not yet darkened. Despite the cruel gag, that partly concealed the averted features, Ellen had no difficulty in recognizing the girl who had been posing as The Domino Lady!

  Chapter 5: A Dying Confession

  THE girl was almost nude, but The Domino Lady costume tossed upon the foot of the bed further convinced Ellen of the accuracy of her identification.

  Blood was oozing in a long slit in the soft, white throat. It was flowing slowly through the downy valley of her bosom, and forming a great scarlet pool on the light pattern of the rug beneath her chair!

  Had she arrived too late? Had both Wyatt’s and this girl’s lips been sealed upon the truth which might have cleared her name? With a low cry, Ellen sprang across the room to the side of the girl who so strangely resembled herself!

  Ellen kneeled beside the stricken girl, her brown eyes bulging wide with horror and pity. Criminal though the creature might be, the slim, limp body, bound, gagged and done to death touched her deeply. Her slender fingers trembled as she hastily removed the gag and tore at the cruel gyves which held the bare arms and legs in cramping restraint.

  Gently, she slid the slight body from the chair, easing it slowly to the soft rug. She cushioned the golden head on a silken pillow obtained from the bed. Even as the girl collapsed upon the floor, Ellen knew that she was more dead than alive. A doctor would be powerless before the encroachment of death.

  She glided into the bathroom, returned with a tumbler of water. She forced a few drops between the flaccid lips. After a moment, the eyelids fluttered, opened gently. The girl smiled wanly up at Ellen.

  “The Domino Lady!” she gasped faintly, wonderingly.

  Ellen nodded. “And you?” she suggested, softly.

  “I’m — I’m Sybil Stevens,” returned the girl, weakly. “I suppose I’m — I’m — dying —?” Her great eyes were misty with mute appeal.

  Ellen nodded again, sadly. “I’m afraid so,” she said, and reached out a pink-nailed hand to soothe the fevered brow, “and there’s nothing I can do. Won’t you please tell me all you know about the events of the past twenty-four hours, Sybil, and let me take it down on paper to clear myself, before it’s too late?” She felt that much depended upon the last words of her impersonator.

  Briefly, Ellen sketched the story of her campaign of vengeance against Wyatt and his political machine, and explained to the girl just the sort of spot th
e impersonation had placed her in as the real Domino Lady. “Can’t you see that you’re my one hope of solving this matter, and planting the blame where it belongs, Sybil?” she asked, imploringly.

  A look of fierce determination replaced the fleeting smile upon the girl’s dead-white face. She nodded grimly.

  “You’ll find paper and pencil in the drawer of the table,” she said, indicating the receptacle with a movement of her brown eyes. “Get it, and I’ll tell you all I can.”

  It was the work of a moment for Ellen to locate the desired writing implements. She was back at the girl’s side as the latter began her strange confession.

  “You must forgive me,” the girl began, piteously, “because I was forced to impersonate you! Forced by that beast, Rob Wyatt! He had letters of mine which I couldn’t afford to have published!”

  “Blackmail?”

  Ellen’s pencil was flying over the paper, jotting down every word as spoken by the weakening girl. To add speed, she was using a shorthand method of transcription.

  CAME a sob. “Yes. We had been lovers at one time. Wyatt promised to get me a break in pictures. After a time, he grew tired of me, and threw me over. I hated him, but could do nothing because of the foolish letters. I could only do his bidding.”

  “When did you first meet Wyatt?” asked Ellen when the girl hesitated, gasping for breath. It was apparent that she was weakening fast from the loss of blood.

  “Two years ago when our show visited Los Angeles. I was the ingénue with a road show, just a kid at that time. Wyatt insisted that I belonged in pictures. He talked me into leaving the show, with the promise of his securing me a chance in pictures. Of course, he failed to keep his promise.

  “Later, he threw me over, and I’ve managed to get along on the bits I’ve managed to pick up around the studios. Then, after your exposé of the Black Legion, and your latest triumph over Wyatt in Los Angeles, he seemed to fear you and your power because of his political aspirations.

  “He knew that I resembled the real Domino Lady closely enough to get by with an impersonation of her. So...” Again, the girl’s soft voice gave way before the weakness which had dampened her forehead with the dew of death.

  Ellen regretted the necessity of further questioning under the circumstances, but she steeled herself, and said, softly: “And then?”

  “Wyatt demanded my presence in San Francisco,” she continued, weakly. “I was ordered to impersonate The Domino Lady, steal certain valuable papers from the Japanese Legation under cover of Wyatt’s men, and leave a card which would identify the intruder as The Domino Lady!

  “I was forced to carry through with the plan. But, please believe me, I didn’t kill that attaché! On the contrary, I knew nothing of the murder until I read the newspaper the next morning! One of Wyatt’s men had shot the attaché after my departure, thus placing the crime of murder against The Domino Lady! Please tell me you believe me?” Mute appeal was mirrored in the great eyes that were already glazed with the sightlessness of death. Ellen shivered, and nodded.

  “I do believe you,” she whispered, and meant it. “Won’t you please try to go on, dear?”

  The stricken girl was gradually going, but she showed plenty of gameness as she went on: “Tonight I went to Wyatt’s to remonstrate with him, because of the wanton slaying of that Japanese and the trick he was playing on an innocent girl.

  “He laughed at me, threatened me, and I drew my automatic. At the moment, I could have killed him I was so angry. Suddenly, the lights were extinguished. There were shots. It was all so confusing for a few seconds. Then, I found the switch, snapped the lights on again. Wyatt was dead on the floor, shot by some mysterious intruder!

  “And his safe had been rifled of his blackmail files as well as the papers I had obtained at the Japanese Legation! I fled the house in terror.”

  “But surely,” said Ellen, imploringly, “knowing Rob Wyatt as well as you did, you must have some idea as to the identity of his slayers? And the ones who came here to attack you, Sybil?”

  The girl gasped, swallowed hard, nodded.

  “Rob Wyatt was afraid of Wade Lilmyer,” she breathed, chokingly.

  “Afraid of his great political power. Lilmyer was secretly out to get Wyatt. I can’t be certain of the actual killer of Wyatt, of course, but one of Lilmyer’s men, one Blackie Thorpe, attacked me shortly after I arrived home. So I believe he was present at Rob’s house, and was the actual murderer of Wyatt. He knew me and was afraid of what I might know. He came here and —” Her great eyes closed, and for the moment, Ellen thought she was gone. Gently, she caressed the hot brow of the dying girl. The eyes feebly flickered open.

  “WILL you try to sign this statement, Sybil, so as to make it authentic?” Ellen asked, softly. “It’s taken down exactly as you gave it to me.”

  Too weak for further conversation, the girl nodded, feebly. With Ellen’s hand steadying her numbing fingers, she scrawled her signature at the bottom of the sheet of shorthand which was going to be a link in the chain of evidence which was to clear the good name of The Domino Lady!

  Even as the girl completed the movement, Ellen knew it would be her last. The cruel wantonness of the murder touched the little adventuress very deeply. As the golden head lolled lifelessly to one side, a great tear rolled from her brown eyes, and dropped upon the smooth cheek of the dead.

  Ellen Patrick remembered the mansion of Wade Lilmyer now. The place had been called Chaseview.

  As she slid her shapely body behind the wheel of the powerful car, her thoughts were racing. Chaseview was some thirty miles removed from San Francisco; an ideal spot near the peaceful Pacific for the headquarters of the political monster who fed upon the lifeblood of the citizens of the state.

  She brought the dash lighter into play, kindled a cigarette. For a moment, she sat quite still, smoking and thinking.

  Her baguette showed one-twenty. But she had no thought of quitting for the night. Better to go on while she was getting the breaks, try to clear her name of the stigma placed against it by the vulpine murderers of her father!

  Ellen sought the narrow back streets as she tooled the car toward the open highway leading to Chaseview. And no car ever left the limits of San Francisco faster than her yellow speedster.

  Thirty miles to go.

  At seventy an hour all the way, she could make it in about twenty minutes! A heavy police car would require twice that time for the trip, she figured. And Ellen knew the police wouldn’t be far behind her after the call to headquarters she had made in the hallway of the apartment building where Sybil Stevens had been murdered! She clung to the wheel as she hit open country, and gave the rocketing car all she had! She must accomplish the impossible within the next forty minutes, or never!

  Ten miles melted away. Speedometer dancing at sixty-five. Engine hot and roaring. Steam shooting up around the nickel-plated Adonis on the radiator cap.

  Still more speed. Seventy now.

  The yellow Cad threatened to leave the highway at any moment. The Domino Lady was riding a hunch; tempting Fate; gambling her life and future on one wild venture; the most desperate venture of her entire career!

  The catapulting car streaked down great hills, roared up steep inclines, beyond the top of which she knew not what she might encounter!

  She thrilled to the breathless speed of the hurtling machine as the night breeze, provoked, whipped at her face and her tousled, golden hair!

  Then, before she realized it, she was upon Chaseview. Squealing brakes. Burnt tire marks on the concrete highway. Twisting the wheel with dexterous skill, Ellen nosed the roadster down into the mouth of a sandy lane which led off to the right near Wade Lilmyer’s great house.

  Overhanging branches of a row of tall trees effectively concealed the car from any chance passerby.

  Shivers of excitement chased along her shapely spine as she adjusted the little domino into place, and glided like a phantom of the night toward the rear of the Lilmyer mansion. It was an i
mposing structure of gray stone, its grandeur eloquently testifying to the power of the owner. Ellen saw but one light in the structure. It was far up on the second floor of the house.

  The night was moonless, and a veritable pall of blackness seemed to hang ambiently over the little adventuress as she crept forward.

  Her usually pleasant face was drawn and white, her whole body keenly alert to her great danger.

  Chapter 6: Trapped

  ELLEN slipped soundlessly into a small vestibule before a side door of the house.

  She could almost feel the intensity of the darkness that swallowed her immediately. She bent to the lock, her heart pounding tremulously beneath her quivering left breast. Had it been possible, she would have welcomed the presence of Roge McKane at the moment! But no! The young investigator must never know her true identity as the notorious Domino Lady!

  She had little trouble with the lock of this side door. Evidently, Wade Lilmyer was unafraid of intrusions in the face of his great political power and underworld connections. Presently, the portal swung silently open. With palpitant heart, Ellen dug into her evening bag and produced the tiny automatic in whose use she was so adept. It steadied her, brought confidence in its wake.

  She slid softly across the threshold, merged into the blackness of the interior. Silence pressed down upon her with weighted shrouds.

  Her straining eyes were balls of fire, her ears a taut tension. Alone in the mansion headquarters of the murder king, where something intangible, terror-inspiring seemed to be hovering over her, just out of sight! She shivered, paused momentarily considered retreat.

  Then, she took a firm grip on her panicky nerves, flogged herself onward. No daughter of Owen Patrick, fighting Irishman, would ever show the white feather, she told herself grimly. Come what might, she was in this thing to the finish!