X squinted up at the narrow trap door. There was something in it that looked a lot like a keyhole. He took off his hat and handed it carefully to Betty. “Can you manage to keep that above water? Bates and I will dig up the spring.”
“It’s right under the trap door,” Betty informed them.
X allowed himself to sink beneath the surface. He opened his eyes. Enough light came down through the water so that he could make out the outline of the iron bedstead. Bates was standing within a foot of it, groping for it beneath the water.
X got over to the other side of the bed. Together, he and Bates tilted the spring up so that one end rested on the bedstead and the other against the wall. Then X groped in his pockets beneath the water and got out his master keys. He turned to Betty, took back his hat, and placed it firmly on his head.
“If you hear anything like a lot of glass smashing, hold your breath,” he ordered. Hardly were the words out of his mouth before a dull explosion sounded from the corridor outside. There was a tinkling of glass on steel.
“That’s it!” X snapped. “Hold your breath. Steady the bed spring, Bates.” X dug a toe into one of the coiled springs, climbed quickly, reached the ceiling. How long could Betty and Bates hold their breath? That was what worried him. A minute, perhaps? Two minutes at the most.
THE AGENT steadied his trembling fingers and examined the lock. The first key he tried failed to take hold. He discarded it for another, shot a worried glance down at the two anxious faces above the black water. The air was already heavy with that sweetish, cloying odor of the unseen flowers of silence. X inserted the second key in the lock and twisted it. The lock clicked. He dropped the keys into his pocket and pushed up on the door. The door banged down on the floor above. X looked into the room. It was empty.
X went down the spring. He motioned to Bates and pointed to the opening above. Bates nodded. The spring sagged under his great weight, but he moved with a swiftness born of desperation. Once through the trap, he dropped on his belly and extended both arms down through the opening.
Agent X turned to Betty. He could see the oxygen-starved blood throbbing in the arteries at her temples. He reached under the water, seized her about the waist and lifted her to the spring. She climbed slowly, but in another moment, Bates had seized her and dragged her through the opening. X joined them at once and slammed the door.
He put his fingers to his face and began to work with the plastic material while Betty and Bates watched in amazement. Quick, skillful alterations here and there and he appeared like quite a different person than Inspector Burks.
“Any weapons, Bates?” X snapped.
Bates shook his head. “Lost my gun in the water.”
“Maybe we won’t need any. Something tells me this killer works alone.” X went to the door of the room and opened it cautiously. Beyond was only darkness and the sound of some one groaning. Bates pressed the flashlight into X’s hand. X took it, snapped it on. The feeble ray brought out the figures of men and one woman standing with faces to the wall. Evidently, they were fastened to the wall in some manner.
“Where in hell is your gas?” Burks roared. “If you’re going to kill us, get it over with. Just remember my boys are going to fill you with lead for this work.”
X found a light switch near the door. He turned it on and looked about the room. Fastened to the opposite wall by means of handcuffs, were Inspector Burks, Dr. Mills, Warden McCray, Fay October, and Dean Winton. There was no one else in the room, but a loudspeaker hanging from the ceiling indicated the source of the killer’s voice.
X motioned to Bates and Betty to enter. Then X took off his hat, carefully removed the wadded handkerchief. “There isn’t going to be any gas,” he said calmly. “And there’s going to be no more murder.” He opened the handkerchief, took hold of one corner, and shook it out. Hundreds of downy canary feathers floated out into the room.
Then X approached Inspector Burks.
“Who are you?” Burks snapped over his shoulder.
“Oh, I’m a G-man,” X replied vaguely. He examined Burks’ bonds and discovered that they were simply handcuffs to which a link to fix them to the wall had been added.
“Did you run across Tony Lizio?” asked Burks. “He’s the man behind all this.”
“Couldn’t be,” X contradicted. “He’s dead, and been that way for some time. If you heard his voice, it came from a dictaphone record made before he was killed. The gas bombs with which Lizio managed his escape from Sing Sing were supplied to him by his worst enemy.”
“When you two get done conferring, I’d appreciate it if you’d let me loose,” said Warden McCray harshly. “I’ve been in this place ever since Lizio escaped.”
X found a key that fitted Burks’ shackles and turned the inspector loose. “Yes, I know about that, McCray.” He went over to the warden.
“Lizio forced me to leave the prison with him,” McCray explained. “I was a shield to prevent anyone from shooting him. But there was some one in my office before Lizio got there—some one who waited for Lizio and told him what to do. That some one wrote something on the typewriter. Might get his fingerprints from the keys.”
“That won’t be necessary. The man who wrote that note also visited Lizio before his escape and gave him instructions on where he would find the gas bombs and how to use them. We’ll get him, don’t worry about that.”
“What’s the matter with this building?” demanded Dean Winton at the end of the line. “It feels like it’s swaying.”
X unlocked the warden’s shackles. “Didn’t you get a look at the face of the man who helped Lizio escape, McCray?”
McCray shook his head. “He wore a veil.”
“What gets me,” Burks was growling, “I go on a wild goose chase all over town because some dim-wit got the Lynn Café mixed up with a nonexistent Linden Café. I finally track down Agent X, come here, and get in this jam. Then the killer slides out from under me.”
Down the line of prisoners, Dean Winton struggled with an explosive sneeze.
“Wasn’t Agent X your killer?” asked X mockingly as he moved to Dr. Mills.
“He was not!” snapped Burks. “Or if he was, there’s no sense to him doing what he did. Why, he saved—well, never mind that. Let’s get out of here. Feels like this place is coming apart.”
“Can’t get out this door,” Bates said from one end of the room. “Door’s locked and all of steel.”
“We’ll get out in due time,” X said deliberately. He inserted his key in Dr. Mills’ shackles. He looked shrewdly into the aged doctor’s face. “Was it the Hempstead diamonds that worried you? I gathered as much from what your daughter said in her delirium.”
Then X crossed quickly to the door. He looked at the lock, then held up his keys in order to pick the one most likely to fit. Bates and Betty Dale were near him.
SUDDENLY, came the crack of an automatic. Betty screamed as she saw the fingers of X’s right hand stiffen out. The keys rattled to the floor. At the same moment, the entire building lurched to one side. There was a brilliant flash of blue flame, then instantaneous darkness. All lost their footing. There were screams from the women, oaths from the men. It was as though a giant unseen hand had the building in its clutches. X rolled down the steeply slanting floor, collided with Betty Dale. She uttered a sharp, pained cry.
“Hurt, Betty?” he whispered anxiously.
“No. But you are. You’re hurt. That bullet—”
“Just grazed my arm. Made me drop the keys. We’ve got to find them some way. The killer is in this room.”
Near at hand, Harvey Bates said: “Water rushing in somewhere. I can hear it. Feels like the whole place is settling.”
“Who fired that shot?” roared Bates.
“I saw him do it!” shrilled Fay October. “It was—”
The sound of a clenched fist striking flesh. The sound of some one falling. Then, the soft voice of the killer: “This structure rests on rather flimsy piles. As long as there was the buoyanc
y of the water beneath the building, those piles were enough. But I flooded the lower floor to get rid of certain persons, and the weight of the water-logged lower structure seems to have been too much for the piles. Electrical connections also seem to have broken. The building will sink in the river.
“No one will be able to get out except myself. It is not exactly as I had planned your deaths—you who are my betrayers, my enemies, and you who have clumsily stumbled upon my trail. But you will all die, and none will know the truth. Don’t move, anyone. I’m a very good shot.”
“What does it mean?” Warden McCray asked in a husky whisper. “Is the killer in this room?”
Dean Winton sneezed violently.
“Most decidedly,” said X in reply to the Warden’s question.
Betty Dale clutched the Agent’s arm. “The building is sinking. Water is spurting through the wall.”
“Some of you may not realize it,” the killer whispered, “but it’s perfectly dark outside. Unless you have a light, nobody will find you until they drag the river. Very soon, I mean that you shall have a light.”
Some one tugged X’s sleeve. It was Bates. He whispered: “I’ve found the keys.”
“Find the big key that feels like a Yale,” X directed quietly. “Going around the ring from the left, the third key may open the door. The smallest key opens the shackles so that you can free the others. But don’t make a move until I have attracted the killer’s attention.”
“What are you going to do?” whispered Betty.
“Wait.” X stood up, took a step forward, sloshing through water that was running in between floor and wall.
“I said no moving,” whispered the killer hoarsely.
“How did you expect to live in this room after you turned on the gas?” asked X. He took another step toward the whispering voice.
“A hole in the wall big enough for my mouth and nose,” replied the man. “From my position against the wall, I could control the gas valves and also the cocks that let in the water. There was a microphone by means of which my voice seemed to come from the loudspeaker in the ceiling. At times, I may have seemed a whole gang of men, but I have played a lone hand, pitting my enemies against Lizio and even Agent X, while I alone destroyed my enemies. Though apparently I was shackled here, my hands were free at all times. My plan would have worked perfectly if—”
“If it had not been for a color,” X interrupted. “That color is yellow. It was the yellow in you that made you kill off your own companions in the Jonalden crime. It was the yellow in you that made you attempt to kill the investigators that followed you, sometimes before they had any real evidence against you. Your powerful gas weapon gave you a synthetic courage, but even now, you are afraid to face me, man to man.”
THE CRACK of a shot answered the Agent’s challenge. The slug sang by his ear and imbedded itself in the wall.
“And the yellow feathers gave you away.” X advanced another step. Across the rapidly sinking room, Bates was moving. But X held the killer’s attention by moving continually forward and speaking in a calm, even voice.
“Did you hear that, Burks?” X went on. “Yellow feathers gave the killer away. Disguised as a woman, he boarded the Chicago plane in order to rub out Lolly Turney, whom he feared. He carried a canary bird with him, because canaries are particularly sensitive to poisonous gases in the air. The killer wanted to know just the moment that his poisonous gas began to escape. When the canary died, he knew it was time to clear out of the passenger compartment.
“But if canaries are sensitive to gas, the killer is also sensitive to canaries. I proved that a few minutes ago. I—”
Something flaming and white-hot streaked across the room, illuminating startled faces for a moment. It was a small, magnesium flare. No sooner did the flare strike the wall, than the wood burst into flame—a red, smoke-billowing flame. For the entire room seemed to have been soaked in oil.
“Now,” screamed the killer, “they’ll come for you. They’ll take you out of here, blackened corpses!”
The wall of flame mounted, hissed across the floor to meet the water, climbed to the roof. On the other side of the flames, X saw the slinking killer, moving over the sloping floor toward the back of the building. X sent one glance over his shoulder. The steel door was open. Bates was herding the others through the opening. X hesitated only a moment. Then he pulled his sodden coat over his head and sprang through the wall of flame.
Beside the Agent, was another charging figure. The voice of Inspector Burks, already grown hoarse from the smoke, shouted: “Let’s go, G-man!”
Through the flame, the boards sagged beneath their feet. The water had deepened. The entire building rocked with every step they took. Directly ahead of them was something that was as white as a tombstone in the lurid light. X could see that the floor ended sharply and water filled the rear of the building. The white thing was a boat, rocking at its mooring.
“He’s getting in a speed boat!” shouted Burks. “I’d give half my life for a gun.”
A MOTOR sprang into life, but X could see no one in the boat. As he sprang forward, his foot went completely through one of the rotten boards. He fell forward on his face. Pain shot through his leg. For a moment, he feared that it was broken. He gritted his teeth, regained his feet, just as Burks shot ahead of him and seized the rail of the boat.
A tall shadow reared itself above Burks. Burks tried to grapple with the shadowy figure, but something came down on his head. Burks sank to the edge of the floor, stunned, but did not relinquish his grip on the rail of the boat.
The speed boat got into motion. X saw Burks’ body drag along the slopping floor and strike the water. All the strength in the Agent’s lithe body went out in a leap that landed him on the rear deck of the boat. His left arm shot out. His fist struck the killer somewhere on the shoulder with the force of a projectile. The killer was knocked flat and the wheel of the boat spun in his fingers. But the throttle was wide open, and the boat, completely out of control, was tearing madly toward the rear wall of the shack.
As soon as he had landed in the boat, X dropped, seized Burks by the arms just as Burks’ fingers peeled from the rail. With a backward lunge, X dragged Burks aboard. And at that moment, the prow of the boat struck the rear wall. There was a deafening crash. Planks splintered into hundreds of lethal lances. Timbers thundered down from the roof. A falling board struck X across the back of the neck, a stunning blow that flattened him.
He ground his teeth as though he clung to consciousness only with his jaws. Somewhere, among the red and yellow lights that flashed across his brain, he saw the dark and dangerous silhouette of an automatic. The muzzle of that gun was within inches of his temple. He felt for the moment as though he could not make another move. The blow seemed to have paralyzed him mentally and physically. Then he saw the gun again—more clearly, this time, because it was even closer.
He had to move. The fiend would murder both him and Burks if he didn’t move. But a slow, laborious effort would only serve to warn the killer that he had not been completely knocked out. Everything depended on the element of surprise.
A confident, whispering chuckle from the killer. It seemed, almost, as though X could hear the ping of the trigger-spring as the killer’s finger tightened. And then, X moved.
The law of self preservation, instinct, long practice, and perfect physical condition were instantly translated into smooth-flowing action that was swift as light and utterly surprising. His left hand came up to catch the killer’s wrist in the fork between thumb and first finger. The gun went off in mid-air. The force of the Agent’s blow brought the killer’s arm down against the gunwale of the boat. Beneath gripping fingers, X felt the murderer’s wrist bones crunch as they met the wood.
Desperately, the killer threw himself upon X. He clawed at the Agent’s throat. But though he was under the man, X’s right fist came up like a piston to crash to the point of the killer’s chin. And the man went suddenly limp.
&n
bsp; Somewhere, a hoarse-voiced whistle sounded. Out of the corner of his eye, X saw the hull of a river boat that was bearing down upon them out of the night. “Burks!” he shouted. “Look out. We’ll be rammed!”
But Burks was already acquainted with the danger. He reached out a big hand, seized a wheel spoke, pulled down with all his strength. The speed boat veered instantly, shot by the river boat only inches from her hull. Then as Burks reached out and cut the throttle, they rocked gently in the wake.
“Nice work,” grunted Burks. “Mighty nice work.” He crawled to join X beside the killer. “Got a flashlight in my pocket if the water hasn’t ruined it. We’ll get a look at him.”
X WENT back to the wheel, turned the boat back toward the shore, and advanced the throttle. A fireboat had pulled in toward the burning building. Its heavy jets of water arched up against the ruddy sky. Against the glare of searchlights, he saw firemen wrapping blankets around two women rescued from the building—one woman who would go to jail, and the other who was Betty Dale. Near Fay October, X could see Harvey Bates’ square-shouldered form as he looked anxiously out toward the speed boat.
“Ho-lee smoke!” gasped Burks. “This—this guy isn’t Dr. Mills.”
“I didn’t expect him to be,” X said. “Mills was hiding from the killer because Mills and his daughter had evidence that put them in a dangerous position. Surely the killer’s attempt on Dora Winton proved that. Dr. Mills and Dora somehow traced the Hempstead diamonds, which the killer picked up on the plane. You see Dora was following Winton, trying to get something on him so she could shake him down for more alimony. I think that’s why they visited Sing Sing, trying get some information out of Lizio about Winton.”
Burks looked down at the white face of Dean Winton, an ugly, hateful moon in the light of the inspector’s flashlight. “You mean they actually ran across the Hempstead diamonds and didn’t come to the police with the information?”
“That’s it. Dr. Mills needed more money for research. They may not have connected Winton directly with the killings, but when they used the matter of the fenced diamonds to throw a scare into Winton, they might just as well have signed their own death warrants.”
Secret Agent X - The Complete Series Volume 7 Page 11