in the wildest parts of the uncivilized world, much of it when he was still in his teens. He had faced death so often, in such varied forms, that he could almost smell it.
And without one tangible reason for feeling that way, he felt death very close to him, now!
It seemed to walk with him in the darkness, step for step. It seemed to gibber behind him and to jog his elbow whenever he stopped. It seemed to claw out for his throat with shadowy but inescapable fingers.
But with pallid, flaring eyes expressionless, he went on with his searching.
He found so little in the scrubwoman’s room that the very scarcity of it was, if the sudden glint in his colorless eyes meant anything, an important clue.
There was one dress, patched and worn, on a hook. There was a hat on the same hook. And that was all.
No dishes, no eating utensils, no little personal things and no linen, save the pair of torn sheets on the sagging cot. There was practically nothing in here to indicate that it was the home of a human being.
Benson went down the stairs, and up the other flight to the room of the bookkeeper with the twisted leg. And his eyes glittered like moonstones in bright moonlight as he found much the same state of affairs here.
Keeping the chemical-saturated coat lapel over his face, he moved soundlessly about.
There wasn’t as much stuff in the place as you would usually find discarded, in an empty room, after its tenant had moved out. Bare walls, bare floor, curtainless window.
There was just one room of the four unexplored, now. The room belonging to the character The Avenger was impersonating, Johnny the Dip.
He went to that.
First he moved the door gently, or tried to, because even a hard shove did not suffice to make it quiver in its solid jamb. And that was odd, for the panel looked so old and frail that you’d think a breath would split it.
He turned his attention to the locks.
Dick Benson could pick any lock made, just as he could open any safe made. But some of the latest and best are tricky.
These surprising locks, on a door that looked so frail and was solid beyond imagining, were of that sort. And there were three of them.
Even The Avenger had to take time on those locks, over ten concentrated minutes apiece, to be exact. Half an hour, with the feeling of death mounting yet higher in his breast, and with the more practical anticipation that one of the four living here might return at any moment mounting, too.
But none had come back by the time the third lock opened with a click that could not have been heard by any but The Avenger’s sharp ear. He turned the knob and the door, moving so ponderously as to suggest that it might be of wood-sheathed metal instead of plain wood, opened a half inch.
Even the other ground-floor room was not so dark as in here. And even those marvelous pallid eyes, that seemed able to match the sight of an owl in the night, could make out nothing.
As he had done in the other rooms, he stepped inside, shut the door noiselessly behind him and stood a moment with every sense alert, listening.
It was cleverly done.
They must have literally held their breaths when the door started to open, because Dick heard no breathing in that crowded half second of time. They must have had their hands already up, for he heard no sound of clothing rustling.
Not till the upheld arms came down and, with them, a thing like a net that swathed Dick instantly in its paralyzing folds like the tentacles of an octopus!
He heard the preliminary rustling, then, and started to leap ahead.
His whipcord body collided with two other bodies in the blackness, and one of the two went down. But the net went down, too, over Benson more tightly than ever.
He had just one arm free. That was all he had gained by his inhumanly swift leap. But that one arm was worth several ordinary arms.
He made out a dim white blotch which was a face, and his fist laced into it with a force that jolted his arm clear to the shoulder.
And without one tangible reason for feeling that way, he felt death very close to him, now!
It seemed to walk with him in the darkness, step for step. It seemed to gibber behind him and to jog his elbow whenever he stopped. It seemed to claw out for his throat with shadowy but inescapable fingers.
But with pallid, flaring eyes expressionless, he went on with his searching.
He found so little in the scrubwoman’s room that the very scarcity of it was, if the sudden glint in his colorless eyes meant anything, an important clue.
There was one dress, patched and worn, on a hook. There was a hat on the same hook. And that was all.
No dishes, no eating utensils, no little personal things and no linen, save the pair of torn sheets on the sagging cot. There was practically nothing in here to indicate that it was the home of a human being.
Benson went down the stairs, and up the other flight to the room of the bookkeeper with the twisted leg. And his eyes glittered like moonstones in bright moonlight as he found much the same state of affairs here.
Keeping the chemical-saturated coat lapel over his face, he moved soundlessly about.
There wasn’t as much stuff in the place as you would usually find discarded, in an empty room, after its tenant had moved out. Bare walls, bare floor, curtainless window.
There was just one room of the four unexplored, now. The room belonging to the character The Avenger was impersonating, Johnny the Dip.
He went to that.
First he moved the door gently, or tried to, because even a hard shove did not suffice to make it quiver in its solid jamb. And that was odd, for the panel looked so old and frail that you’d think a breath would split it.
He turned his attention to the locks.
Dick Benson could pick any lock made, just as he could open any safe made. But some of the latest and best are tricky.
These surprising locks, on a door that looked so frail and was solid beyond imagining, were of that sort. And there were three of them.
Even The Avenger had to take time on those locks, over ten concentrated minutes apiece, to be exact. Half an hour, with the feeling of death mounting yet higher in his breast, and with the more practical anticipation that one of the four living here might return at any moment mounting, too.
But none had come back by the time the third lock opened with a click that could not have been heard by any but The Avenger’s sharp ear. He turned the knob and the door, moving so ponderously as to suggest that it might be of wood-sheathed metal instead of plain wood, opened a half inch.
Even the other ground-floor room was not so dark as in here. And even those marvelous pallid eyes, that seemed able to match the sight of an owl in the night, could make out nothing.
As he had done in the other rooms, he stepped inside, shut the door noiselessly behind him and stood a moment with every sense alert, listening.
It was cleverly done.
They must have literally held their breaths when the door started to open, because Dick heard no breathing in that crowded half second of time. They must have had their hands already up, for he heard no sound of clothing rustling.
Not till the upheld arms came down and, with them, a thing like a net that swathed Dick instantly in its paralyzing folds like the tentacles of an octopus!
He heard the preliminary rustling, then, and started to leap ahead.
His whipcord body collided with two other bodies in the blackness, and one of the two went down. But the net went down, too, over Benson more tightly than ever.
He had just one arm free. That was all he had gained by his inhumanly swift leap. But that one arm was worth several ordinary arms.
He made out a dim white blotch which was a face, and his fist laced into it with a force that jolted his arm clear to the shoulder.
Similar Books
