The Agent studied him carefully. Van Houten, too, had a face of intelligence; but the nostrils were thin, the mouth small, and the eyes narrow and close-set. High, flat cheek bones and a cleft chin gave the features a look of power — but it was a face that might harbor brutality and greed — the face of a possible criminal.
The Agent slid noiselessly to the ground and began a patient vigil in the shadows across the street. If an immediate crime were being plotted, the trio would surely meet again.
IT was close to ten-thirty when he saw the figure of Doctor Van Houten emerge. Many patients had gone in and come out. The doctor’s office hours were over.
With the skfll of long experience, the Agent shadowed his man. His heart beat faster. Doctor Van Houten was getting into a cab.
At a safe distance the Agent followed. Where was Van Houten bound? The doctor’s next move convinced him. For Van Houten got out, dismissed the cab and walked several blocks. Then, after a glance around him, signaled another taxi.
The Agent overtook the cab, passed it, and went on out of sight. He pressed the gas button down and drove his roadster like a demon. He glanced at the clock on the instrument board. It was twenty minutes to eleven. Could it be that a meeting was scheduled to take place in the mysterious council chamber at that hour? Van Houten’s furtive movements seemed an affirmative answer.
He raced ahead of the doctor, reaching the deserted warehouse at ten minutes of eleven. Somewhere inside the sinister deaf-mutes might be lurking, but there was one route through which the Agent felt he could go unmolested. Morvay always entered by the rear buildings, and Morvay would not be present tonight.
Using his master keys, he let himself in through the now familiar door. The place seemed silent and deserted. But “X” sensed the presence of death and horror. He stopped a moment, his reasoning faculties working.
The trio always wore black hoods and robes. Was it to hide their identities from their victims? Or did they want to remain unknown to their slaves, the deaf-mutes, as well. Morvay had not had the weird garments with him when he had emerged. They must be stored close at hand, for, if they were to protect Morvay from the gaze of the deaf-mutes, he would not want to traverse the corridors without them.
Risking detection, Agent “X” probed carefully with the beam of his flash. Then he stepped forward. Reason had led him aright. There was a locked closet close to the first door. He groped, opened it, and drew forth the hood and robe — symbols of darkness and death.
Standing in the blackness of the corridor, he adjusted them over his body and walked forward. Twice he turned on the flash light, fearless now of being discovered by the mutes.
He was the first to reach the council chamber and he had a strange sense of eeriness as he settled himself into the middle chair. He was taking a terrible chance tonight, going into the very jaws of death. A slip might betray him — some overt act that he couldn’t anticipate.
A tiny bulb flashed on, throwing dim shadows around the room. He stared at the floor, saw a slight bulge in the carpet close by his foot and understood then how secret signals had been flashed to the mutes.
The seconds seemed to pass with crawling slowness. He heard no sound in the room or in the vastness of the building outside. Had he been right about Van Houten? Was the man coming here tonight?
Slow footfalls approached. They sounded first as a ghostly whisper, measured, precise. They made his scalp crawl.
Waiting tensely in the dimly lit room, he did not know what the next few minutes would bring.
A faint noise came from the door. It opened slowly and another hooded figure came in. Without sign or word of greeting, the figure moved across the room to a chair at “X’s” right and sat down. Eyes met the Agent’s from behind the black hood. Was this Van Houten or Albert Bartholdy, he wondered?
The man did not move or speak, and when minutes had passed, a third figure entered. It was only then that the first man opened his lips.
“What news?” he said in a low, harsh voice. “Are there any new plans to discuss? The Victoria docks tomorrow night. When do we move?”
Agent “X” wondered what answers would be given to this. Details, he hoped, would be brought out that would make it possible for him to reconstruct what was passing through their minds. But no one spoke.
Seconds passed. The silence in the room deepened. It grew oppressive, deathly.
“Well?” said a voice at last.
The Agent started then. A slow prickle moved along his spine, reaching to his scalp. He grew tense in his chair, flexing the muscles that the black robe concealed.
For the hooded figures beside him were staring his way — the man who had asked the questions and the other who had just spoken.
He could see a sharp, expectant glitter in the gaze that they fastened on him. And all at once he understood. Professor Morvay had been the master mind of the trio. And, because he had taken the middle seat, they thought he was Morvay. Now they looked to him for guidance and strategy in the crime they planned. He was suddenly placed in a terrible position, with death and defeat as the pitfalls into which he would stumble if the answers he made should be wrong.
Chapter XVII
HE waited breathlessly while the hooded figures at his left and right continued to stare at him with hard, penetrating glances. They, too, were waiting, and Agent “X” cleared his throat.
“I have been thinking—” he said, then paused, his tongue feeling dry against his teeth. It had taken an effort to make his voice sound like Morvay’s.
“You said you would investigate — discover where Dunsmark would first be invited,” said the man at his right who had first spoken.
“Yes,” the Agent spoke slowly, stalling for time. “Many invitations have been sent to him. It will depend upon his own plans. We will not know till he lands.”
Aggressiveness crept into the voice of the speaker at his right.
“It has been our method to strike swiftly and depend on surprise and terror. We must not delay too long. We must act while the public and press are still in a furor — while fear of us is rampant. Then Dunsmark’s government will pay.”
Behind the black hood the eyes of Agent “X” gleamed like bits of steel. He stared from one hooded figure to the other. There was silence in the room again, silence that was pregnant, filled with the greed of men who could not wait. He had learned enough. His voice was low, hoarse when he spoke, but still the voice of Morvay. There was confidence in his tone. They looked to him as the leader, and he would give them leadership undreamed of.
“You are right,” he said. “We must strike soon — why not immediately, the moment he lands?”
The man on his right spoke sharply. “We discussed that last night. A police escort will be there and secret service operatives will undoubtedly be guarding him.”
Agent “X” made an impatient, deprecatory gesture.
“There is a way. One man can sometimes accomplish what many cannot do. I will capture him myself — bring him here. I have thought of a method.”
Exclamations of doubt and amazement followed his words.
“You can’t accomplish the impossible. How do you propose to go about it?”
“Trust me,” said the Agent quietly.
“We have always gone over our plans together. Three minds are better than one. There may be flaws.”
The Agent was stubborn. “I will get Dunsmark alone. Our slaves cannot act in this for us. I will meet him, introduce myself. I will have forged papers from a bank. He will think—”
The man at his left interrupted harshly.