And then it was over. The Skull must have pulled the switch, for suddenly Tyler’s body relaxed, sagged in the chair. His head hung on his breast, but the quick, heavy breathing attested to the fact that he still lived.
“Tomorrow, gentlemen,” the Skull said to them in the same steady voice, “Tyler will be able to get about again. His condition will no doubt be amusing to you. We will keep him around for you to play with for a day or two, then send him out into the street as a warning to those who defy the Skull!”
The light over the chair went out, leaving the room once more in utter darkness.
Chapter VI
A LOW murmur swept through the room as the men began to comment to each other on the scene they had just witnessed. Low, incoherent moans began to come from the other side of the mesh screen where Tyler was still strapped in the chair. “X” waited silently, bitterly. He could do nothing for Tyler, and now he would be unable to learn anything from him. The man’s mind had been destroyed by the ordeal. Through the mind of Secret Agent “X” there flashed a picture of Ainsworth Clegg, one day a brilliant, shrewd businessman; and the next, a doddering idiot. Now it was clear how the man’s condition had been brought about. If those men at the Bankers’ Club — Dennett, Grier, Hilary, Jewett — could see this diabolical means by which Clegg had been robbed of his sanity, they would hardly credit their senses.
His thoughts were interrupted by the opening of the outer door. Binks, more horrible in appearance than ever, stood there. The light from the corridor cast an evil reflection on his vacuous, scarred countenance.
“All right, boys,” he announced. “The show’s over. All out.” He cackled, “Ha, ha — just like a movie — all out. Ha, ha!”
He waited while the men filed out past him. Five of the men he tapped on the shoulder, whispered to. Those five men stayed in the room. Among them were Nate Frisch, and Gilly, the gunman. When the Secret Agent passed him, he tapped him on the shoulder, too. “Stay here till I take these boys back,” he whispered. “Then I’ll take you to the Skull. He wants to see you.”
“X” nodded, waited with the others. Binks closed the door on them, leaving them in utter darkness once more. “X” debated the chances of breaking out of there. He wondered if those others had been told to guard him.
Soon the door opened once more, and Binks beckoned to them. Out in the corridor he said nothing to them, but led them through a new series of passages, to another anteroom similar to the one where Rufe had searched him.
Binks left him alone, going out through the side door, giving them a last leering grin.
While they waited, the men lit cigarettes, engaged in desultory conversation. Nate Frisch, though he had been appointed second in command, seemed to know as little about the reason for their presence there as the others. “Maybe it’s a new job,” he said. “The Skull has been planning something extra big for a long while.”
Gelter, a coarse brute of a man, who had escaped from the state prison where he had been serving a life term for kidnaping, said, “If it’s a snatch job, it’s right up my alley. This is good stuff, pullin’ jobs an’ bein’ able to disappear so the cops think you got magic or something!”
They relapsed into moody silence, watching the door opposite them — the door that had no handle. They were kept waiting a long time, so long that the Secret Agent began to think it was deliberately done for the purpose of increasing their nervousness. Finally there was a click and the door began to swing open, revealing an inner room without any lights. The men strained their eyes to pierce the gloom of that inner room, but without success.
When the door had opened wide, a voice from within, the voice of the Skull, called out, “Fannon and Gilly! Come in first.”
Gilly looked apprehensively at the others, wet his lips and went in. “X” followed him. The door closed behind them, and clicked as the lock caught. “X” could hear Gilly breathing hard close beside him, could hear the little gunman’s body shivering close to his own. But he also sensed another presence in the room — a sinister presence that seemed to exude an aura of evil.
A soft glow began to appear in the room, bathing it in a sort of dull, uncertain luminance. It was accomplished by a system of indirect lighting, of course, but the effect was uncanny.
As the light grew stronger, there became visible at the other side of the room, the figure of the Skull, seated at a desk, facing them. The glowing outline of the skeleton head grinned at them in weird, macabre brilliance.
Secret Agent “X” inspected the room through veiled eyes. It was a large room, perhaps twenty feet square, and absolutely bare except for the desk and the chair where the Skull was seated. The floor was of varnished hardwood except for a strip about four feet wide that ran clear across the middle, between the Skull and his visitors.
The Skull noted “X’s” eyes inspecting the place, and said mockingly, “You seem to be interested in my layout here, Fannon. What do you think of it?”
“It strikes me,” the Secret Agent answered, “that you have gone to a great deal of trouble to make this headquarters invulnerable. It looks as if you have built a permanent place here — secret panels, electric chair, a maze of passages. Is it all necessary?”
The Skull chuckled. “You have seen only a small portion of my arrangements here, Fannon. But I assure you that every bit of it is necessary, thoroughly planned. Think, for instance — you have been here a whole day; have you any idea where you are?
“Frankly, no,” said “X,” “I confess that I don’t know whether we are above or below ground. I don’t even know what portion of the city we are in. I can see that this place takes up a good deal of space, but I can’t imagine where it could be.”
THE Skull chuckled. “The location of this headquarters is nothing short of a stroke of genius, Fannon. And you see how efficient my other precautions are? No one of you can find his way out of here. No one of you can find his way back. Binks and I are the only ones who know the various ways in and out. If, by chance, one of you should be a traitor, he would never be able to lead the police here, because he knows as little as they.”
The Skull turned to the little gunman, who had stood silent during the conversation. “What do you think of this set-up, Gilly?”
“Gee, boss,” Gilly exclaimed, “you’re a wonder! You certainly got things down pat!”
The Skull’s voice suddenly became crisp. “X” felt that he was about to learn the real reason for his being there with Gilly.
“Fannon, I am going to send you out on a mission. Every new man must be tested.”
“X” breathed easier. The Skull then was not sure that it had been he who had struggled with Rufe in the corridor last night. Perhaps Binks had not reported his suspicions; or perhaps Binks’ manner had hinted of suspicions that did not exist in that quirked mind of his. In any event, it was a promise of action, and that was welcome.
The Skull went on. “Gilly will accompany you. Gilly is a very fast man with a gun, and he always goes out with new men. It is so easy for him to place a bullet accurately in the event that he smells treachery. You understand?”
“X” nodded.
Gilly broke in eagerly, “What’s the job, boss?”
“You are going to open a safe. Fannon, who is an expert safe man, will do the opening, while you act as lookout”
“Suits me swell,” said Gilly.
The Skull looked at “X.” “And you?”
“X” nodded, dissembling his emotions. This was what he feared. Though he had made a study of many types of safes, though he had instruments and equipment in his various hideouts which would open any safe door, he certainly did not possess the great degree of skill which the real Fannon had developed in a lifetime of crime. He could not open a safe the way Fannon could, by listening to the fall of the tumblers. He must, in some way, get the use of his own tools. An accomplishment which seemed, on the face of it, impossible.