The street was very dark. Rupert Sayre felt sure that he could reach the limousine undetected. He moved along the silent building walls until he had reached the large car. He could see through the side window of the front seat. The car was empty. The cadaverous driver had evidently left to report.
Cautiously, Sayre reached the side of the limousine. He listened intently to make sure that no one was near by. He placed his hand upon the handle of the rear door. He noted, as he stared at the glass, that it reflected only blackness. It looked like an ordinary car window, except upon close inspection; then Sayre realized that it was opaque.
Sayre hesitated. He knew from what Barratini had said, that the door would not open from the inside. If the knob should function from the outside, however, it would be possible to effect Barratini’s release, should the surgeon now desire to escape. Sayre resolved to try. At least he could assure his friend that he was on the trail, and also give him the location of the neighborhood which they had reached.
The knob turned. The door opened. A sharp gasp came from Rupert Sayre’s lips. A flood of illumination came from the interior of the limousine.
Had that been all that Sayre saw, the young physician would quickly have closed the door. But there was something else which made Rupert Sayre stand motionless.
Doctor Joseph Barratini still occupied the interior of the limousine. But the light which came from the ceiling showed a complete change in the surgeon’s appearance.
Sprawled upon the cushions of the rear seat, Barratini was staring straight upward. His hat had fallen from his head. His black hair, disheveled, was strewn downward upon his ashen face.
A TRAINED physician, Rupert Sayre forgot all other than the stricken man who lay before his eyes. He leaped into the car and bent over Doctor Barratini’s body. He realized rapidly that the celebrated surgeon was dead.
Then came a sound from the sidewalk. Sayre turned quickly, but too late. In the glare of the dome light, he caught a glimpse of the leering, cadaverous face of the man who had summoned Joseph Barratini to his death. Sayre made a leap for the door. It slammed before he could reach it.
Rupert Sayre, like Joseph Barratini, was in a black-walled prison. Vainly, the young physician shouted and beat at the surrounding glass. The limousine began to move. Sayre realized that his cries could not be heard; that this shatter-proof glass would resist every effort that he applied to break it.
The limousine swung around a corner. Barratini’s body came toppling along the seat. Sayre was jolted down beside it. He gave his attention to the form of the dead physician and found that his first surmise was correct. Barratini was stone dead.
What had killed him? Stark terror came over Rupert Sayre. The mysterious force — whatever it might be — that had slain Barratini could still be present in the car! Would he, Rupert Sayre, become a victim also?
As the thought flashed through his mind, Sayre began to experience an unaccountable dizziness. Joseph Barratini’s body went slumping to the floor. Rupert Sayre made no effort to stop it. The light was dimming before his eyes. A whirling sensation possessed him. The limousine seemed to be climbing tremendous mountains; then sinking into limitless depths.
Rupert Sayre sank gasping upon the seat. His listless body began to respond to the rolls of the big car.
His staring eyes were livid until the lids closed over them. Rupert Sayre’s breathing became a painful, mechanical process.
Two victims lay within the rear of the limousine. One was Joseph Barratini, dead; the other was Rupert Sayre, unconscious. These two physicians, who had so recently discussed the insidious schemes of Eric Veldon, had paid the penalty for their attempt to pry into the evil devices of that master plotter.
MILES passed. The limousine came to a stop. The door opened. The light from the inner dome showed a gravelly driveway. Then, into that zone of illumination, came a face.
It was not the cadaverous visage of the human automaton who had summoned Doctor Joseph Barratini; it was the evil countenance of a personage more terrible than that man who looked like a living corpse.
Eric Veldon, the man who plotted murder, was surveying the bodies that lay within the limousine. Joseph Barratini, dead, came under his leering inspection. Rupert Sayre, alive, but in complete stupor, also commanded Eric Veldon’s attention.
The fiend’s lips formed a snarling smile. Stepping back from the open door, Veldon uttered a short command. Two men, moving with the mechanical stride of automatic figures, stepped forth from the darkness. They lifted the dead form of Joseph Barratini and carried it away.
A few minutes later, they returned. They raised Rupert Sayre’s limp body and bore it into darkness. Eric Veldon’s evil face surveyed the emptiness. The smile still showed upon the plotter’s lips, as Eric Veldon extinguished the light within the limousine.
Another man had died — another whom Eric Veldon had used as a dupe — another who could have revealed the identity of this living fiend.
Doctor Joseph Barratini, like Merle Clussig and Wycroft Dustin, was no longer of use to Eric Veldon.
Death was the final award that the superfiend had given him.
Rupert Sayre still lived. What fate awaited the young physician? That rested, at present, in the hands of Eric Veldon, to whom human lives were trifles!
CHAPTER XIII. WORD TO THE SHADOW
Two days had elapsed since the eventful evening when Doctor Joseph Barratini had died and Doctor Rupert Sayre had fallen into the toils of Eric Veldon. The evanishment of the two prominent physicians had become Manhattan’s newest mystery.
In an office situated high in the towering Badger Building, a chubby-faced man was busy at his desk. The great buildings of upper New York formed an amazing sky line when viewed from the window by the man’s side; but this lethargic, slow-moving individual paid no attention to the scene without. He was entirely occupied with a newspaper, clipping long paragraphs from it.
A stack of items formed a little pile upon the desk. The chubby-faced man slipped them together and inserted them in an envelope. Just as he was about to seal this, there was a rap at the door. In response to the man’s query, the voice of the stenographer announced that a visitor was outside.
The lethargic individual showed unusual haste as he dumped the bulky newspapers into a wastebasket and laid the envelope at the side of the desk. He arose from his chair and opened the door into the outer office. A tall, bluff-faced man arose to meet him.
“You are Mr. Rutledge Mann?” inquired the stranger.
“Yes,” acknowledged the chubby-faced man.
“I am Holbrook Edkins,” explained the visitor.
“Ah, yes!” exclaimed Mann. “The gentleman who is interested in inventive investments. Come in, Mr. Edkins. Come in.”
Seated in the inner office, Edkins looked quizzically at the investment broker. He expected to hear Mann begin a sales talk. On the contrary, the investment broker opened conversation along a different trend.
He seemed anxious to learn something about Edkins.
“You have made previous investments of this nature?” inquired Mann. “Specifically, have you ever financed inventions which offered definite possibilities?”
“A rather unusual question,” laughed Edkins. “I hardly see what that has to do with the present matter.”
“A great deal,” explained Mann, seriously. “You must understand, Mr. Edkins, that I usually deal in gilt-edged securities. I would not recommend my present proposition to any one who is unfamiliar with the risks incurred in purchasing rights to new inventions.”