“Secret Agent X!” shouted the men about the car.
“Must have struck his head with the top of the door,” X quickly supplied. “He’s knocked out. I guess we effected a pretty smart capture here, Chief Hurd!”
Hurd raised John Morris’s limp arms and clicked handcuffs on his wrists. “I’ll have this crook under lock and key in no time,” Hurd declared.
John Morris, X knew, was bound to cause him trouble if he remained at large. Jail was a very good place for the competent Morris while X went about his mysterious mission. Shortly after Hurd had taken the still unconscious secret service man away in his own car, X turned to Reed Kennedy saying:
“You’re in charge here until I show up. My duty is to take the poor, staggering maniac, who came with Agent X, to the hospital.”
“Just leave everything in my hands,” said Kennedy.
X went over to Morris’s car. The unfortunate victim of torture and the malady of madness, was still at peace under the influence of the drug X had administered. In the guise of Dr. Davies, X passed the barrier without further trouble and was driving at top speed toward the city when the pavement in front of him suddenly conjured up an oncoming car. The car, rocketing out of a side road, deliberately turned into his path.
INSTINCTIVELY, X spun the wheel to the right. There was a scream of metal against metal as fenders clashed. X’s car seemed to leap into the air as it struck a culvert and bounded across a ditch. As though in the grasp of a mighty giant, it was flung sideways against a tree. Door hinges sprung. The sudden loss of momentum as the car struck the tree flung X through the door. He had no sensation of striking the ground.
Completely stunned, he lay there without moving for nearly a minute. Then gradually, his senses returned and he recalled that at the moment the two cars had caromed off one another, he had got a glimpse of the face of the man behind the wheel of the other car.
Or had he? It all seemed like a hideous nightmare. Yet the vague impression of that face clung persistently to his memory. It was hardly a face. There had been a veil of something like green silk—and above it, the most diabolical pair of eyes he had ever seen. Eyes that had gleamed with satanic, unholy light.
Agent X picked himself up and staggered toward the remains of the roadster. Through the twisted door, X saw the unfortunate victim of the mad malady. The man was dead. There was a deep gash in the center of his forehead. It might have been made by an axe, certainly by no portion of the wrecked car near at hand.
X’s eyes narrowed. Had this been an accident? How easily it might have been cleverly plotted murder. And the murderer, the man in the other car whom X had instinctively saved by wrecking his own machine, could have so easily stopped long enough to dispose of the unfortunate man who was riding with Agent X.
It was possible that the murdered man had known something that he might have told in an interval of sanity. X remembered how, when he had first picked up the man, he had babbled about “Shaitan.” Was it possible that the fiendish, clever criminal who had terrorized half of Asia was actually here in America?
Two cars had pulled up opposite the place of the accident. Men were hurrying toward Agent X. He anticipated any inquiries by immediately saying:
“This man has been killed. One of you take him to a hospital. They will notify the morgue. I’m Dr. Davies. Some one give me a lift into town.”
The driver of one of the cars offered to assist him. X, now completely recovered from the crash, climbed into the car and told the driver to go to the corner of Twentieth and Elm Streets. This was on the edge of the city. X alighted, thanked the driver, and proceeded on foot. He thought to himself that he must have cut a very odd figure, walking down the street in a surgeon’s cap and with a torn and soiled smock flapping about him. He was only a block from Lorin Garvey’s big house, and this distance would give him an opportunity to repair his makeup.
A few moments later he passed through the imposing iron gates and hurried along the gracefully curved walk that led to the big square house of yellow brick. He crossed the wide porch and knocked in the authoritative manner that he thought befitted his impersonation of Dr. Davies.
The door opened.
“Good evening—” X began, only to stop and take a second look at the huge figure, crowded into butler’s livery, that had opened the door. The butler’s component parts seemed all in the form of cubes—square-headed, square-shouldered, and so marvelously equipped with solid muscle that his breadth belied his six feet of height. He was dark complexioned, with shaggy, black hair. The man was Harvey Bates, Secret Agent X’s chief lieutenant.
THE AGENT did not reveal himself to Bates. He simply asked to see Lorin Garvey, saying that he was Dr. Davies.
Bates, who had somehow managed to worm himself into Garvey’s household as butler, bowed and led X into a reception hall.
For several minutes, X was allowed to wait alone. Seated in a shadowy corner where dim light was kinder to his hastily applied makeup, X watched a door beneath the stairway opening quietly. He heard the rustle of silk, saw a short, flared, black skirt and the white, postage-stamp apron of a housemaid. The girl was evidently unaware of the Agent’s presence. She closed the door quietly and turned around.
Agent X all but started from his chair as he beheld the girl’s face in the revealing light from the hall lamp. She was darkly beautiful. Her narrow, velvety-lidded eyes were almost black and extraordinarily shrewd. High cheek bones accented a small, pointed chin. Her rouged lips suggested firm determination without in any way detracting from her beauty. Her name, as far as X knew, was Charlotta.
Nature had endowed her with brains as well as beauty. Her mastery of foreign languages and her love of adventure had caused her to seek her fortune in strange lands at an early age. She had served Russia in the early days of the war though she was American born. In the capacity of a spy she had remained connected with the Czar’s government until the Russian army had become demoralized.
Agent X had met her when she had transferred her abilities to the French Intelligence Service. Their paths had crossed frequently. Wherever X had found adventure and intrigue, there he had found Charlotta.
She claimed no country as her own. She devoted her time to any service that promised money and adventure. She had always been an enigma to Agent X, and he instinctively mistrusted her. He wondered if the years had altered her character or whether even now she might not be employed by some foreign power to obtain the secret which Garvey so jealously guarded for the United States Government.
X allowed the woman to cross the room and go through the opposite door without attracting her attention. As soon as she was gone, he stood up and went directly into the living room which he had seen Bates enter. The big, square man was evidently just returning from announcing the arrival of the man he supposed to be Dr. Davies.
He looked at the odd figure in white, his eyes wide with surprise. “Mr. Garvey will see you soon,” he said in close-clipped syllables.
“Bates,” X whispered.
The big man jerked up his head. His eyes widened. “Beg pardon?” he said hesitantly.
“Bates, don’t you recognize me?” X was now speaking in the voice which served to identify him to his lieutenant.
A STRANGE expression, that mingled devotion and delight, crossed Bates’s countenance. In his eyes there was an almost worshipful glow. “You, sir!” he said hoarsely. He came forward quickly to eagerly grasp the Agent’s extended hand. “Think it is all right?” he asked. “Didn’t want to take too much on myself. Didn’t know what you’d think.”
“You couldn’t be in a better position.”
“Think there’s a connection between Garvey’s danger and the mad sickness?” Bates asked.
“It’s too early to decide that definitely,” X told him. “How far has this strange malady gone?”
“About ten cases and three deaths so far, sir.”
“I see. Now about Charlotta—”
“Who, sir?”
“Charlotta,” X repeated. “I mean the maid.”
“Oh, Charlotta,” Bates replied. He seemed to be tasting the name. “Why, that’s her name. What about her?”
“She is a very dangerous woman,” said X quietly.
Bates’s heavy, black brows drew together. Yet there was something more than bewilderment reflected in his countenance. There was pain, too, and doubt.
“Charlotta?” again his tongue toyed with the name.
“Bates, I know how this woman has plotted, and how her beauty has confounded the best brains in Europe.”
Bates shook his head slowly, almost sadly back and forth. “No, sir,” he said huskily.
“She is as cunning as—” X stopped, his brow furrowed. “What do you mean, ‘no, sir?’ ”
“Just—just that, sir,” Bates said humbly. “She isn’t, couldn’t be, what you said.” He still looked hurt and worried, but there was bulldog determination in the set of his square jaw. X pitied the man, thought he could imagine how Bates felt. He was thoroughly aware of Bates’s unswerving loyalty to his chief. Yet somehow, some way, in the brief time that Bates and Charlotta had been together in the house, the clever spy had managed to gain some portion of Bates’s affection.
“Bates,” said X kindly but earnestly, “I may be mistaken, but I think I know this woman better than you do.”
“No, sir,” Bates said again. “She’s good and beautiful and generous.”
“How do you know?”
“I—just know. She couldn’t be otherwise.”
“She’s an international spy, I tell you. How can such a woman be loyal if she serves one country one day and another the next?”
X thoughtfully regarded Bates. Then he spoke mildly. “I don’t deny that she is beautiful. No one knows better than I the power of her enchantment. I have seen her make fools of generals, field marshals and members of nobility. I have seen that same beauty result in the destruction of an entire German battalion because of information she had gained through apparent innocent questioning of men who had become infatuated with her. I know her and I fear her. Surely that should mean something to you.”
Bates swallowed with difficulty. “I hate to contradict. I hate to do anything or think anything that doesn’t agree entirely with you, sir. But I would stake my life on it, that Charlotta is exactly what I think she is.”
A SLOW, patient smile formed on the Agent’s lips. “I understand,” he said quietly.
“Then—then I’d better go, sir,” Bates asked huskily.
“Go?”
“I mean leave. Better leave your services. I can’t spy on Charlotta. And I couldn’t have you think I wasn’t doing my part.”
X regarded Bates for several seconds before saying: “My orders did not instruct you to spy on Charlotta. Your job is to keep an eye on Garvey and see that no harm comes to him. That’s your job. Stick to it.”
Bates’s eyes brightened. “Then you—you’ll let me go on, doing what little I can? You’ll—”
“Some one is coming.”
Bates coughed, stepped back, bowed stiffly as the door behind him opened. “Mr. Garvey will see you in a moment, sir,” Bates said.
It was Garvey who had entered the room. The man squinted at the light in spite of his smoke-lensed glasses. There was something almost spectral about him. His thin cheeks were so pale, his hair so blond, his lips so colorless that they were practically invisible. He looked steadily at Agent X.
“You wanted to see me, Dr. Davies?” he asked without the slightest hint of cordiality. “You have perhaps changed your mind about permitting me to leave the city for a day or two?”
“I wanted to see you, yes. As to your wanting to leave the city, I have already intimated that that was impossible.”
“Very well.” Garvey held the door of his study open. “Just step in here, please.” And when Agent X had entered, Garvey waved him into a chair. “I resent very much these constant efforts of yours to pry into my affairs, Dr. Davies.” He sat down on the desk and seemed tremendously interested in a hang-nail on his thumb. “I think if you were a little more subtle in your efforts to find out what I am doing, I could find it in my heart to like you a little better.”
“Perhaps,” said X pleasantly, still clinging to the impersonation of Davies’ voice, “you will think better of me when you know more about me and why I am here.” He reached into the pocket of his coat beneath the white smock and produced a sealed letter addressed to Lorin Garvey and which, X knew, was from K9, the Agent’s Washington sponsor.
GARVEY took the letter, excused himself, opened and read it over quickly. Then he folded it and put it in his pocket. For a moment he continued picking at the hang-nail on his thumb. “I hardly understand this letter you have given me, Mister— Mister—”
X allowed the man to grope. “Suppose we let it go at that, Mr. Garvey. You understand my position. As the writer of that letter explains, I cannot reveal my true identity. Call me Davies, if you wish.”
“But you are not Davies.” Garvey tapped the note in his pocket. “This tells me that you are a special agent who has been sent to cope with the spy situation.”
X nodded. “I am here to protect you. And, believe me, I can do a better job of it if you will frankly explain to me the reason for all this secrecy. What kind of a discovery have you made that is of such great importance to Washington?”
“Sorry,” said Garvey. “I cannot confide in you as to the nature of the formula I am working on. Doubtless, at some later date, the official who chooses to call himself K9 will tell you of it. The point is that I am certain that I am surrounded by spies. I might go so far as to say that should my secret become public the world might never be the same again. Perhaps that will make it clear to you why I cannot trust you with it. Under the circumstances—”
Garvey stopped, turned his head quickly to the right. “What’s that?” he asked sharply.
It was a mighty roar that might have come from the throats of a hundred men. It sounded right outside the Garvey house and mingled with it was the sound of marching feet. The flare of red torches tinted the drawn blinds of the study with a rosy glow.
X sprang up, went to the window and pulled back the blind. Lorin Garvey joined him. A motley army of men and women paraded down the street. Their faces were white and strained, their eyes bright with hatred and fear. And as they marched, they chanted:
“Kill Agent X! Kill the Master of Madness! Show him he can’t make a madhouse of our town!”
Garvey asked: “What do they mean? Is the man known as X in this town?”
“Yes,” said X quietly. “They seem to have the notion that he is the man behind this epidemic of madness. Where is the city jail?”
“Up Elm Street a little way. Why? Have they Agent X in jail?”
“I am afraid they are under that impression,” replied X. He knew well what had happened. Chief of Police Hurd had not been able to keep his triumphant capture of Agent X a secret. Nor was there any particular reason why he should have kept it a secret. Then some ugly rumor had taken root that X was the chief cause of the plague of madness.
Garvey sighed. “I suppose because the people make the laws they think the laws belong to them and they can take them in their own hands whenever they want to. But a lynching is an ugly business.”
“It’s murder,” said X. “I’ll be back soon.”
“Leaving?”
“A matter of urgent importance,” X told him as he went through the door of the study. Urgent importance indeed! A man’s life at stake. For in some cell of the city jail, John Morris was the hunted quarry of that furious mob. It was Agent X who had sent him there. So John Morris had to be saved from that mob.
CHAPTER III
Malady of Madness
AGENT X sprinted along the street in the direction of the city jail. Ahead, he could hear the roaring mob as it stormed the prison, demanding that the man they supposed to be Secret Agent X be delivered to them. How easily a lynch
ing could be accomplished this night—with most of the police force out on quarantine duty.
The red brick jail building had an eight-foot wall around its shallow front court, but this had already been scaled, the guard knocked down, and the gate opened. The mob was pouring into the court as Agent X plunged into their midst. He fought like one possessed to gain the front line of the advancing mob. He gouged with his elbows. He cracked heads together. He dealt stunning blows. But always, at the top of his lungs, he shouted: “Lynch Agent X!” Apparently, he was the most vengeance-thirsty man among them.
X had not had time to make even a slight alteration in his makeup. To all appearances, he was Dr. Davies, one of the leading citizens. Many bystanders, who might have doubted the justice of lynch law, joined the mob when they saw the man they supposed to be Dr. Davies foremost among the mobsters.
Only a man of the Agent’s supple strength and sudden movements could have worked his way from the rear of the mob to the very front by the time the jail-house doors were battered down. X was among the first into the entry way. He seized a guard who was trying to hold off the mob with a rifle which he was obviously afraid to use.
X took the man by the collar and sent him spinning to the floor of the turnkey’s office. He stooped, picked the guard’s pockets of keys, and was off again at the head of the pack that rushed from cell to cell until at last they came upon the one occupied by John Morris.
The secret service man was standing upright. Not the slightest sign of fear showed in his hazel eyes. There was no expression on his face except that of a bewildered man who was alert to his own dangerous position. He strode to the bars of his cage.
“So I am Agent X, am I?” he cried defiantly.
And the mob jeered and hooted and shook the bars. Some removed shoes to hurl at the man in the cell. All cursed him, called him Agent X, Master of Madness as well as every vile name they could lay tongue to.
Foremost in the mob that stormed the cell was Agent X. He battled his way to the cell door, the guard’s keys in his hand and something else cleverly palmed in the same hand.
Secret Agent X - The Complete Series Volume 7 Page 24