THE Vorse residence was another huge mansion in Branford’s “Millionaires’ Row,” facing the river and almost directly opposite the state troopers’ camp that guarded the water exit from the town. A trim maid answered the Agent’s ring, and his sharp eyes studied the girl keenly. Her eyes were shining. Her manner was brisk. Here in this home the dread of the sleeping sickness seemed to have lifted.
Mrs. Vorse’s manner when she greeted him in the drawing room of the luxurious home was not that of a mother who fears the death of her child. It was even more buoyant than it had been when “X” had talked to her in the role of Vaughton less than two hours before. Her voice was steady, assured. There was even a sparkle of happiness in her eyes. The Secret Agent tensed with a heightening excitement.
“I am here to investigate for the governor,” he stated. “We are taking a special census of all sleeping sickness victims. Your little girl was one of the first, I believe.”
For a moment the woman hesitated. “Yes I believe she was,” she said at last. “It was dreadful, doctor! Those early stages—when her little face looked like a mask—then the terrible coma—”
“You are more hopeful now. She is better?” “X” shot the question quickly.
Mrs. Vorse dropped her eyes, then smiled and met his gaze frankly. “Much better. Our doctor has been wonderful.”
“I’m glad to hear it! What is your doctor’s name?”
The woman shook her head.
“I’m sorry—he does not want it disclosed just yet. He has a reason.”
Agent “X” sat silent for a moment. He was puzzled. The woman was evading—but her evasions were not those of a person who fears to betray his own guilt. She was under some sort of constraint—a constraint that obviously troubled her.
She cast a startled glance at her visitor as a child’s voice rang out suddenly upstairs. It was the clear, strong voice of a little girl. Not the voice of an invalid—not the blurred mumbling of a patient in the coma of sleeping sickness. Agent “X” spoke quietly:
“You have only one daughter, Mrs. Vorse. That must have been her voice. You have been most fortunate in her recovery!”
“Most,” agreed the woman fervently. “I can never thank enough the man who did this for us.”
Agent “X” rose abruptly.
“I’d like to see your daughter if I may, Mrs. Vorse.”
Tenseness had crept into his tone, and there was a look in his eyes that seemed to intimidate the woman.
“Why, yes—I think so. I—I’ll speak to my husband.”
She left the room, returning almost immediately with Stephen Vorse. He was a large man, and there was no mistaking his good humor. He beamed at “X” and extended a cordial hand. “I understand you wish to see Mary, our daughter,” he aaid. “But I’m sure you will not insist. The child is still convalescing and must not be excited. A strange face—”
He finished the sentence with a gesture that seemed to take for granted the Agent’s understanding of the matter. But the voice of Agent “X” became suddenly as firm as granite.
“I comprehend your feelings, Mr. Vorse. But I’m afraid I must insist. I promise not to excite the child. I’m used to dealing with them—perhaps you forget that I myself am a doctor.”
A panicky note came into Mrs. Vorse’s voice. “But really, doctor, you must be guided by what my husband says. We have had such luck so far—”
With what appeared to be complete callousness Agent “X” walked toward the stairs. Mr. Vorse’s voice, calling after him, was harsh instead of cordial now.
“I tell you, I won’t allow it, sir!”
Agent “X” paused and looked down at them from the first broad landing of the curved staircase.
“Perhaps,” he said slowly, “you have something to conceal?”
THE words seemed to have a quieting effect on the Vorses. They stared uneasily at each other, then followed “X” up the stairway. The child’s voice sounded again, guiding him to a door which he opened. It was a luxurious nursery, and beneath the silken covers of a small bed a little girl was sitting up playing with a set of dolls. Her eyes widened at sight of Agent “X.” He smiled reassuringly.
“The governor of the state wants to congratulate you on getting well, Mary,” he said.
“Oooo—are you the governor?”
“No—but I’m delivering his message. He hopes a lot of other little girls will get well, too.”
As “X” talked to gain the child’s confidence, he was studying her. That she was convalescing was evident. The horrible traces of sleeping sickness had left and her eyes were bright and alert, without a vestige of the fatal drowsiness apparent.
“You must have a good doctor, Mary,” “X” said.
Her parents put their fingers to their lips, but the child spoke quickly.
“He cured me, but I don’t like him. He wears a mask and sticks things in my arm. He won’t talk to me at all.” She turned suddenly to her mother. “Now I’m well, mummy, I won’t have to go out and see him any more, will I?”
The child’s mother was silent.
“X” spoke quickly. “You have to leave the house to meet your doctor?”
“Yes! They wrap me in blankets and take me out at night. And I’m afraid of the dark.”
Agent “X” nodded slowly. “It must be a very funny doctor you have, Mary. I should think they’d bring your medicine here and not make you go out at night.”
“Maybe he knows my mummy wouldn’t like him to stick pins in my arm.”
“It wasn’t a pin, dear,” said Mrs. Vorse. “It was an injection. It drove all the sickness away.”
The Agent patted the child’s hand, then motioned to the parents, who followed him downstairs. There he faced them questioningly.
“I don’t like your high-handed methods, doctor,” said Stephen Vorse. “I think they’re rather uncalled for. But you’ve discovered the truth. We did send Mary away to be cured by a doctor in this city smart enough to have worked out a remedy for sleeping sickness. He has reasons of his own for wanting to keep his name hidden.”
“What are those reasons, Mr. Vorse?”
“He has only a small quantity of serum in his possession. Not enough, I imagine, to deal with the hundreds of cases which have developed. He has restricted himself to the early victims of the disease.”
The Agent’s lips grew suddenly white. He could not hide the fire that burned in his eyes.
“Nothing to get excited about,” said Mr. Vorse. “I promised our doctor not to speak to anyone of this. But you’ve snooped and ferreted it out. His serum is rare, hard to procure. We are rich—and were able to make it worth while for him to cure our daughter.”
“I see,” said the Agent slowly. But the Vorses did not know that what he saw were the completed outlines of a plot too horrible to be believed. These people were unconscious dupes. They did not know that they were victims of one of the most preposterous and ghastly rackets Agent “X” had ever uncovered in his entire career.
“You are sure you don’t know even this doctor’s name?”
“No—he called us on the telephone and said he could cure our little girl. We thought he was a quack at first. But our own doctor seemed unable to do anything. Mary got steadily worse—passed into the coma. We were desperate. When this doctor who would not give us his name called again, we decided to comply with his request. We took Mary out in the car to a spot designated and parked there until another car came by. The doctor’s assistants were in this car. We were fearful when they drove off with her. But they brought her back, and she began to show signs of recovery at once. She had several more treatments, and the coma gradually passed.”
“I see,” said the Agent again. “I’m sorry I seemed impertinent, Vorse. But it is my business to cover the entire field.”
MRS. VORSE laid her hand on his arm as he rose to go. “You will not speak of this to anyone?” she pleaded. “We gave our promise to the doctor whose skill cured our little girl
. He says he is using the money we gave him to develop more of the wonderful serum.”
“I shall not speak of it,” said “X,” “unless—”
He stopped abruptly, and all three heads turned. From the street outside had come a sudden wave of sound. It was a babble of voices, shrill with excitement. They grew louder and louder. Then steps sounded on the front veranda of the house and the doorbell rang violently.
The Vorses’ maid ran to the door. They heard her protesting, arguing with some one. Another voice, gruff and truculent, rose over her own. She gave a little cry. There were footsteps in the hall, and a figure suddenly appeared in the doorway. It was that of Vronsky, the radical. He held his cap in his hand, but his broad, ugly face was aggressive.
“Sorry to intrude,” he said in a tone which made an insult of the apology. “I came here to find out if it was true that your daughter has been cured.”
The maid turned frightened, imploring eyes toward the Vorses.
“Mrs. Vorse,” she cried. “I didn’t mean to! But when Mary began to get better—I—I mentioned it to Fred, a friend of mine. He must have told this man—”
“Then it is true!” rasped Vronsky. “If you have money—the doctors can cure you!”
His eyes blazed with fanatical light. Mr. Vorse made an attempt to quiet him.
“Mary is not well yet—only better. Our doctor is working now to perfect a treatment that will cure everyone.”
But Vronsky had turned and was striding to the door. Agent “X” followed. There was a tense mob of men and women outside.
“The rich can be cured!” shrieked Vronsky. “But the poor cannot! Our Government is betraying us. Doctor Vaughton is here in Branford, and he is betraying us, too! He is tending to the rich and neglecting the poor. We will take Doctor Vaughton prisoner and hold him hostage until our demands for fair treatment have been met. He is at Drexel Institute now. We will go there!”
Chapter VIII
Mob of Madness
A THUNDERING chorus from the mob answered Vronsky’s impassioned speech. A woman leaped up on the steps beside him, gesturing wildly.
“Vronsky is right! If Doctor Vaughton can cure the rich, he can cure the poor! Why should we stand for such wicked discrimination! We must demand—”
Vronsky brushed the woman aside and drowned her out with his great voice, lashing the crowd to a frenzy with his oratory.
“The institute is guarded, but we outnumber the guards. If Vaughton refuses to come out, we will burn him out! We’ll burn the place down and drive him out—along with the other medical rats in there!”
Agent “X” turned back into the house and sprang past the white-faced Vorses to a telephone.
“Police headquarters—and hurry!”
If these people destroyed the institute they would be destroying their main hope. Sooner or later the expert knowledge of the staff would produce results. The priceless scientific equipment of the institute would be needed. The institute must not be destroyed.
When the voice of Chief Baxter answered, “X” spoke quickly:
“A mob is headed for the institute! They are violent—worked up to a fever pitch of destruction. Send police reserves at once. Strengthen all guards!”
“Who is this speaking?”
“A representative of the governor.”
Agent “X” slammed up the receiver. In his questioning of the Vorses he had unearthed the ghastly motive behind the crime plot in Branford. Greed—incredible, devouring greed, lay behind it; the awful greed of men willing to inflict agony and death in order that they might reap a golden harvest from human fear. The identity of the criminals behind it was still veiled in black mystery. But the present emergency must be dealt with before anything else.
Agent “X” plunged out the door. The crowd was surging down the street now. He ran after it, mingled in the fringes of the mob. The faces of its members were weird and barbaric in the glow of flickering torches improvised from oil-soaked rags wound around broomsticks and fence pickets. They were, he guessed, as much to drive away the escaped gorillas and to smoke out mosquitoes as to give light.
Vronsky headed the mob, turning from time to time to harangue those behind him. Someone broke into a wild, rhythmic song. The crowd took it up, marching to the time of it. Agent “X” did not blame these people. His sympathies were with them. They were desperate. But they were inflamed beyond the reach of reason. No words could persuade them that they were on the wrong track.
The mob swelled its ranks with recruits that ran out to join it. The news had spread like wildfire that favoritism was being shown in Branford—that Doctor Vaughton had attended to the rich and ignored the poor. News of Vaughton’s supposed murder was still being withheld by the police.
Agent “X” left the throng. He dashed down a side street and taxied to the institute. There his credentials took him past police guards and into the presence of Chief Baxter, who had already arrived.
“I’m the man who phoned the warning,” said “X.” “The mob is on the way. But there are women among them. Instruct your men not to fire. There must be no bloodshed. Use tear gas to dispel them if there is no other way.”
Baxter nodded grimly. “I’ll have five hundred men here before the mob arrives. They’ll never break through.”
Police sirens were wailing from all sides. Every instant another police cruiser arrived, disgorging one or more bluecoats. The shrill clanging of a bell, the shrieking of a siren louder than all the rest, announced the arrival of an emergency squad truck carrying a dozen cops.
Agent “X,” the compelling ring of authority in his voice, gave another order.
“Park the police cruisers around the square nose to nose as a barricade!”
CHIEF BAXTER nodded again. As he barked the order, the voice of the oncoming mob could be heard. It was a whisper of sound at first; hundreds of shouting voices far off. It swelled in volume like the slow approach of a storm wind sweeping across the sea. It echoed and re-echoed along Branford’s dark streets. Heads appeared at windows. Some, catching the excitement, poured out to join it, risking the night-flying mosquitoes. It was an hysterical outburst, the violent expression of the city’s long pent-up fears. Many joined the crowd without knowing what its objective was.
Thousands poured into the square around Drexel Institute. Searchlights mounted on emergency trucks were turned on and swept the scene. The lavender beams sprayed light on a wild sea of faces. Vronsky, the fiery radical, mounted a box. The crowd ceased its shouts and cries to listen to their leader. His voice echoed across the square and reached those on the steps of Drexel Institute.
“We want Doctor Vaughton! We demand that he come with us! We demand that he treat our families as he has already treated the rich!”
Police Chief Baxter stepped forward with desperate determination. But his voice was hoarse, and his eyes bright with fear.
“Doctor Vaughton is not here!” he shouted. “Doctor Vaughton has been killed!”
A hush like the dead silence of a tomb followed his words. Then angry murmurs arose. A woman gave an hysterical sob. Vronsky spoke again, harshly.
“A lie!” he screamed. “You are feeding us lies again! You are trying to hide him for your own selfish interests. He has sold himself to the rich!”
Chief Baxter shouted fiercely for silence. “It is the truth!” he cried. “You must listen! He was killed tonight. His car was crowded off the West Bridge in an accident! They are pulling it out of the river now. Go back to your homes and wait. Try to be patient! We must all be patient. No favoritism is being shown. Our doctors are tending rich and poor alike. Other specialists are coming in from outside. We will have the epidemic in hand shortly.”
A sound like a snarl came from Vronsky’s throat.
“The doctors have blundered at every step. What spread the disease in the first place? The institute! We are here to see that no more germs come out of it. Burn the place down, my friends! Burn the institute!”
VRONSKY was versed in mob psychology. He knew that what his followers wanted was violence. Any reasoning, no matter how warped, was good enough for them so long as it led to action. And Vronsky was drunk with his own power. He threw up his hands as the mob roared its acclaim. Women began to creep back. Men edged forward. Those with torches raised them aloft.
“Burn the institute! Burn the pest-house!”
Chief Baxter spoke again, his desperate voice faint amid the uproar.
“Stand back! We have guns and tear gas! By God, we’ll turn them both loose on you if you move another step!”
The cops tightened their grim lines, holding nightsticks and tear gas bombs ready. They had guns, too, but had been instructed not to use them except as a last resort. They were willing to obey. Many had friends among the mob.
But the enraged, milling mass was like a blind beast now, surging forward with but one desire—the desire to destroy—to express its fear by rending, tearing, and burning. They were aflame with resentment against the institute.
Agent “X” watched with taut alertness, eyes brilliant. If the building were fired, the staff might be killed, murdered if they tried to escape. He had seen mobs before.
Now it was surging forward in a yelling, jostling mass. Those with torches were pushed to the front. Cries of “Burn the institute” rose into a mighty dirge.
Chief Baxter barked an order. The foremost police lines hurled their tear gas bombs. They fell among the leaders of the mob, exploded and let loose their stinging vapor.
Coughing, choking, shrieking curses, those at the front of the on-rushing tide of crazed humanity clutched at their eyes. The more timid tried blindly to turn back. But they were pushed forward by their comrades from behind. All the tear gas in the possession of the police could not stem this human flood.
The police began swinging night-sticks. The lead-packed wood cracked on heads and arms. But the police wielding them were manhandled, the sticks wrenched from their hands.
Chief Baxter shouted to the second line of police entrenched behind the barricade of cars. The cops leveled their revolvers, menacing the mob.
Secret Agent “X” – The Complete Series Volume 2 Page 6