Again the Ghoul’s voice whispered along the corridor. “Spy, Secret Agent ‘X,’ or whoever you are, my eyes are upon you. My hand is lifted to strike!”
Betty tried to suppress a shudder.
“Be brave, Betty,” the Agent whispered. “He may try some sort of a trick. But remember, you are Drew Devon. If we are cornered, you must pretend to struggle with me. You must cry out that I am Secret Agent ‘X’.”
A little sob broke from Betty’s lips. “No — no! I will never do that! Not for all the mayors and presidents!”
“X” STOPPED, seized the girl’s shoulders, and held her tightly. “Betty!” he whispered sternly. “And I always thought that I could rely upon you! You must do exactly as I tell you if the Ghoul’s men come. It will give you an opportunity to get through the lines. Your disguise is perfect. In the part of Drew Devon, you cannot do otherwise than denounce me. And remember, when you reach China Bobby’s office, I will be right behind you!”
“But you can’t hope to escape!”
“I can escape, only if you play your part. Hush!… There’s some one coming up the passage behind…. Remember your part — struggle, cry out that I am Secret Agent ‘X’…. Wait—”
Breathless, they listened in the darkness. Soft, padded footsteps sounded behind them. And in front of them, the rasp of a door opening. Husky whisperings. They were between two squads of the Ghoul’s men.
Suddenly, a barrage of light-beams shot through the darkness in front of them. And from behind, men came running. “X” turned and seized Betty with his left arm. His right hand closed gently but realistically over her throat. She struggled, kicking and screaming. “Help! This man is Secret Agent ‘X’. Help!” she cried.
And as the twin squads bore upon them, “X” pushed Betty from him and toward the door. He turned to meet his foremost foeman, knowing that the man would not dare use his gun for fear of hitting the girl he supposed to be Drew Devon. “X’s” fist smashed into the man’s jaw, sent him reeling backwards.
The agent ducked under a descending knife, seized the man by the waist, picked him up bodily, and threw him back over his shoulder. As he fought with silent fury, he saw a bright flash of color move through the criminal band, and streak toward the steps. Betty had played her part well. She was on the way to safety.
But the girl gone, “X” knew the criminals would not hesitate to use firearms. Though he wore a bullet proof vest, he knew that at such close range he could not hope that vulnerable parts of his body would escape the flying shot. But he had prepared for that crucial moment. Beating back his nearest opponents with Herculean blows of his left fist, his right hand plunged into his pocket and closed upon a little glass capsule that had been enclosed in his medical kit.
He took a deep breath, sprung aside to avoid a knife-thrust, and dropped the fragile glass bubble on the floor of the passage. There was a sharp pop and instantly a cloud of gray vapor rose from the floor. A man directly in front of “X” spilled forward on his face. “X” hurdled him; brushed aside another staggering, choking man; drove his fist into the surprised face of another, and he was free. He ran up the passage, pounded up the stone stairway, and sprang into China Bobby’s office.
The half-caste was there, his back toward “X.” He was holding Betty by the arms, evidently thoroughly convinced that she was Drew Devon.
“But, Drew,” China Bobby insisted, “you can’t go out in the streets in broad daylight in the outfit of a Chinese girl. It might lead the police to investigate these cellars.”
Betty, over the Eurasian’s shoulders, saw “X” as he stealthily approached. Perhaps China Bobby saw the anxiety in the girl’s eyes, for he immediately released her, turned, and snatched at the gun in his coat pocket. But as China Bobby turned, “X” leaped. All the strength of his lean, hard body was behind that long upper-cut that landed on the point of the Eurasian’s chin. China Bobby hardly had time to utter a groan as he fell to the floor.
“X” seized him under the arms and dragged him to a little curtained closet. It would not do for the Ghoul to look through the peek-hole and see his chief lieutenant laid out on the floor. Then “X” joined Betty at the desk. With his finger, the Agent pressed the switch button marked “F.” This, he believed, was the switch operating the front door of the office. As the panel slid back, he saw that his conjecture had been correct; beyond was a beautiful yet terrible temple of the black smoke. Some of the silk-curtained bunks were still occupied by dreaming addicts. “X” led Betty across the room, into the entryway, and up the spiral staircase to the rear door of the restaurant.
Looking out through the door of the restaurant, “X” saw that China Bobby’s legitimate employees were busily engaged in preparing the restaurant for the evening.
“Go at once to the mayor and warn him,” the agent whispered in Betty’s ear. “But do not go to the police. A police raid at such a time would ruin all my plans. The Ghoul would escape.”
“You’re not coming with me?” she said, a look of dismay passing over her ivory-tinted face.
“X” shook his head. “My task has only begun.” And, as he watched Betty hurrying toward the door, he looked through the plate glass front of the building. It was evening. He had, then, spent over twelve hours in the catacombs beneath China Bobby’s restaurant.
Chapter X
“X” HURRIEDLY retraced his steps to China Bobby’s office. Slipping into the closet where he had concealed the Eurasian, he stood his pocket mirror against the wall and began working on the most difficult disguise he had ever attempted. For a man of “X’s” ability, the features and flesh tints of China Bobby were not difficult to duplicate; but there were two physical defects in China Bobby’s appearance that it was almost impossible for anyone to imitate — the missing finger on his right hand, and the fact that some muscular trouble had turned one of his eyes far to the right.
Yet, even as he worked, molding plastic material on his face to resemble the contours of the Eurasian’s face, a plan suggested itself to “X” by which he could overcome one of those difficulties. It would be painful, and perilous, but without attempting it, he could not hope to succeed in impersonating China Bobby.
Having changed clothes with the Eurasian, “X” slicked down the hair of his black toupee so that it resembled the polished hair of the half-caste. Then he made an injection of a harmless narcotic in China Bobby’s arm — enough of the drug to keep the man unconscious for eight hours or more. He pocketed the Eurasian’s gun and immediately left the office.
He had little fear of being apprehended in the dark passages that honeycombed the basement floor below. Instinctively, he groped his way through the gloom, returning to the second laboratory by the same route he and Drew Devon had used in leaving it. He found the laboratory empty. In fact, the entire building had sunk into a silence that somehow foreboded disaster.
In the laboratory, he procured a length of thin, copper wire, a small dry cell, an induction coil, and a tiny push-button switch. He worked one wire lead under the plastic volatile material that covered his face. The end of the wire he fastened above an important nerve center near his right eye. Having completed the circuit, he concealed all wires under his coat and pocketed battery, induction coil, and switch. His right hand, thrust into his pocket, operated the little switch for making and breaking the circuit.
He then approached a cabinet, the glass front of which would mirror his face. Pressing the switch, something happened that would have appeared nothing short of miraculous when observed by a person unaquainted with artificial stimulus of nerve centers of the body. “X’s” right eye jerked sharply to the right and remained fixed in that position as long as his finger depressed the switch. His left eye was free to move in any direction. It was extremely unpleasant and interfered with his vision, but he knew he had only to lift his finger from the switch and his eye would return to its normal position.