“Here — get out!” he roared. “What do you mean—”
He stopped speaking, backed away. Still the Secret Agent advanced. His thumb clicked the injector open. Its terrible teeth offered grim menace. Traub was like a man stricken with palsy. He leaned against his desk, his whole gross body quivering. His voice came in a terrified bleat.
“Get out! Get out — there’s some mistake — you don’t know—”
“No mistake,” said “X” icily. “You’ve been slated to get it. The boss told me.”
“Oh!” Mottled red spread over Traub’s face now. His voice came thick with fury. “The double-crosser!”
In that one sentence Traub had betrayed himself — and, as his fingers groped frantically for a gun that he kept in his desk drawer, Agent “X” leaped forward.
He dropped the tooth-shaped injector to the carpeted floor. His balled fist lashed out, landed flush on Traub’s jaw. The commissioner’s head snapped back. He staggered against the desk, slid to the floor and lay still, inert as a fallen sack of meal.
Quickly Agent “X” jabbed the point of his anesthetizing hypo needle into the commissioner’s arm. The man would stay out for hours now. Then “X” raised his head and listened.
For seconds he waited tensely, fearing that Traub’s harsh voice had waked some one in the house. But there was no sound. “X” crossed the room quietly and closed the door into the corridor. Then he came back to Traub’s side.
FOR nearly two minutes he studied Traub’s face from every angle. The commissioner had bulbous features, a complexion that was usually ruddy. To a man who was the master of the thousand faces, these characteristics would not be hard to duplicate.
Agent “X” set to work quickly. When he had conserved his plastic material in doctoring up the face of the unconscious gangster back in the hideout, he had not guessed how soon he would have use for it himself. Now he was glad he had conserved it. He pushed back the ape mask hood of his costume.
There was just enough material left in the tube to accomplish what he wanted. He selected one of his small vials of colored pigments, quickly rubbed it over his face, imitating Traub’s natural complexion. Then he remolded his features, giving them the bulbous look of Traub’s. He worked fast, tensely. The gangster was waiting outside. Any instant some one might wake in the house. But he did not rise from Traub’s side until he had put the last, final touches to a make-up that was a masterpiece of creation, considering the short time he had had to work.
Traub was a fatter man than Agent “X.” The Agent, resourceful as always, had already figured out a way to get around that when the time came. His face was now molded into the right, flabby bulbous proportions. It seemed to be the face of Commissioner Traub, rising grotesquely from the hairy gorilla suit.
Before covering his head again with the ape mask hood, Secret Agent “X” crossed quickly to Traub’s desk. He seated himself, lifted the telephone from its hook and called the home of Chief Baxter.
When the chief got on the wire, Agent “X” spoke quickly, but his voice was the thick voice of Traub. For nearly five minutes he talked, uttering words that brought gasps of amazement to Baxter’s lips. Detailed instructions followed, to which Baxter agreed. Then Agent “X” hung up.
He slipped the hood over his head again, left the room and the house as quietly as he had come.
Out on the dark lawn, his gangster colleague greeted him with harsh surliness.
“What the hell took you so long?”
Agent “X” laughed.
“I went through the commish’s desk. Thought maybe I could locate a little extra change. Figured I might as well kill two birds with one stone.”
“Got him then?”
“Yeah. I knocked him out cold first so he wouldn’t squawk.”
“And you got some money, too?”
“Only a little change. Maybe I’ll split with you later if you don’t say nothin’ to the boss.”
“O.K.”
The two figures crept across the lawn. Keeping in the shadows, they moved down the block toward the car that was parked there.
CHIEF BAXTER was tense with excitement. The siren of his special car wailed in the night as he turned into the driveway of the mayor’s house.
The mayor was just getting ready for bed. Baxter’s furious ring at the door brought him downstairs in his bath robe and slippers.
“Chief!” he gasped. “What the—”
Baxter gave the mayor no time for questioning. He spoke hoarsely.
“We’re going to round up that double-damned crook doctor and his gang! We’re going to save this city a million dollars — and we’re going to save our kids.”
“When?”
“Tonight! Traub — don’t ask me how — got on the trail of him! He’s got the goods on the doctor. He don’t know who he is — but he knows where he and his gang are hanging out. They’re in the old gas works down on Canal Street. They’ve got a regular organization. Traub has given me all the dope.”
“Why don’t you go after them then?”
“Not for an hour. Traub’s told me how to get in — but he’s going there first to oil the way. He’s wangled an interview with this crook doctor. There’s a bunch of gangsters there all heeled. There’ll be a fight. We’re going to throw a cordon around the place — an’ we’ve asked some of the troopers to help us. There’s serum there. We’ve got to get that and save the apes, Traub says.”
Chief Baxter paced the floor. He could hardly contain himself. Every few minutes he went to the mayor’s telephone, called up one of his inspectors and bawled orders. Silently along the city’s darkened streets, blue-coated men and men in plain-clothes were assembling. And across the river, in the state troopers’ camp, an officer was issuing abrupt orders. A detachment of armed troops was to be sent into the city, daring the epidemic to catch the fiendish gang behind it. Word was spreading from lip to lip. Men were talking in hushed voices. Baxter left the mayor’s house and sped to headquarters.
It was as though the city were awakening from a deep sleep of hideous dreams. With hope of getting to the bottom of things, stopping the epidemic, and finding a cure at last, the police of Branford were in a frenzy of excitement.
In police radio cruisers, armed headquarters’ cars, and huge emergency trucks mounted with batteries of searchlights, they moved through the city toward Canal Street.
But Baxter ordered silence until the appointed hour came. He was co-operating with Health Commissioner Traub, obeying his instructions. If this raid succeeded tonight, the name of Traub would never be forgotten in Branford. But Chief Baxter was more than glad to share the honors with anyone who could help round up this band of fearful extortionists. Traub, over the phone, had confirmed this belief that the disease had been spread deliberately. Traub said he had secretly been investigating the criminals and had unearthed extraordinary facts.
Chapter XIX
IN the strange, evil hideout of the extortionist ring, Agent “X” was also active. Entering with his gangster colleague, he spoke to the man quickly.
“Let me tell the boss what happened. Here!”
He unfastened the zippers on his fur suit, reached in the back of his coat to a hidden pocket and brought out some bills. These he handed to his companion.
“Some of the change I picked up at Traub’s,” he said. “Give me that injector gadget. You didn’t use it. The boss will want it back.”
The other, impressed by the sight of the money, made no objection. He handed Agent “X” the injector. With both this and his own in his gloved hand, Agent “X” walked back to the room at the end of the corridor, in the wall of which was the boss’s peek-hole.