Chapter 11

It was perhaps half an hour, perhaps longer, after we had left the Senorita, before, sure that everything was all right with his line and the batteries which he had brought, Kennedy turned a little lever that moved in a semicircle, touching one after another of a series of buttons on the face of the cedar box, meanwhile holding a little black disc from the back of the box to his ear as he adjusted the thing.

Nothing seemed to happen, but I could tell by the look of intentness on his face that he was getting along all right and was not worrying.

Suddenly the look on his face changed to one of extreme satisfaction. He dropped the disc he was holding to his ear back into its compartment and turned to me.

All at once it seemed as if the room in which we were was peopled by spirits. There was the sound of voices, loud, clear, distinct. It was uncanny.

"He has just come in," remarked Craig.

"Who?" I asked.

"Lockwood--can't you recognize his voice? Listen."

I did listen intently, and the more my ears became adjusted, the more plainly I could distinguish two voices, that of a man and that of a woman. It was indeed Lockwood and the Senorita, far above us.

I would have uttered an exclamation of amazement, but I could not miss what they were saying.

"Then you--you believe what he says?" asked Lockwood earnestly.

"Professor Kennedy has the prints," replied Inez tremulously.

"You saw them?"

"Yes."

"And you believe what HE says, too?"

There was a silence.

"What is it?" I asked, tapping the box lightly.

"A vocaphone," replied Kennedy. "The little box that hears and talks."

"Can they hear us?" I asked, in an awestruck whisper.

"Not unless I want them to hear," he replied, indicating a switch. "You remember, of course, the various mechanical and electrical ears, such as the detectaphone, which we have used for eavesdropping in other cases?"

I nodded.

"Well, this is a new application which has been made of the detectaphone. When I was using that disc from the compartment there, I had really a detectaphone. But this is even better. You see how neat it all is? This is the detective service, and more. We can 'listen in' and we don't have to use ear-pieces, either, for this is a regular loud-speaking telephone--it talks right out in meeting. Those square holes with the converging sides act as a sort of megaphone to the receivers, those little circles back there inside magnifying the sound and throwing it out here in the room, so that we can hear just as well as if we were up there in the room where they are talking. Listen--I think they are talking again."

"I suppose you know that Whitney and I have placed detectives on the trail of Norton," we could hear Lockwood say.

"You have?" came back the answer in a voice which for the first time sounded cold.

Lockwood must have recognized it. He had made a mistake. It was no sufficient answer to anything that he had done to assert that some one else had also done something.

"Inez," he said, and we could almost hear his feet as he moved over the floor in her direction in a last desperate appeal, "can't you trust me, when I tell you that everything is all right, that they are trying to ruin me--with you?"

There was a silence, during which we could almost hear her quick breath come and go.

"Women--not even Peruvian women are like the women of the past, Chester," she said at length. "We are not playthings. Perhaps we have hearts--but we also have heads. We are not to be taken up and put down as you please. We may love--but we also think. Chester, I have been to see Professor Kennedy, and--"

She stopped. It hurt too much to repeat what she had seen.

"Inez," he implored.

There was evidently a great struggle of love and suspicion going on in her, her love of him, her memory of her father, the recollection of what she had heard and seen. No one could have been as we were without wishing to help her. Yet no one could help her. She must work out her own life herself.

"Yes," she said finally, the struggle ended. "What is it?"

"Do you want me to tell you the truth?"

"Yes," she murmured.

His voice was low and tense.

"I was there--yes--but the dagger was gone!"

XVII

THE VOICE FROM THE AIR

"Do you believe it?" I asked Kennedy, as the voices died away, leaving us with a feeling that some one had gone out of the very room in which we were.

He shrugged his shoulders and said nothing. But I cannot say that he seemed ill pleased at the result of the interview.

"We'll just keep this vocaphone in," he remarked. "It may come in handy some time. Now, I think we had better go back to the laboratory! Things have begun to move."

On the way back he stopped to telephone Norton to meet us and a few minutes after we arrived, the archaeologist entered.

Kennedy lost no time in coming directly to the point, and Norton could see, in fact seemed to expect and be prepared for what was coming.

"Well," exclaimed Kennedy, "you've done it, this time!"

"I know what you are going to ask," returned Norton. "You are going to ask me why I did it. And I'm going to tell you. After I left you, the other day, I thought about it a long time. The more I thought, the more of a shame it seemed to me that a girl like that should be made a victim of her feelings. It wasn't so much what they have done to me that made me do it. I would have acted the same if it had been de Moche instead of Lockwood who was playing on her heart. I was afraid, to tell the truth, that you wouldn't tell her until it was too late. And she's too good to throw herself away and allow her fortune to be wasted by a couple of speculators."

"Very well," said Craig. "For the sake of argument, let us admit all that. What did you expect to accomplish by it?"

"Why--put an end to it, of course."

"But do you think she was going to accept as truth what you told her? Would that be natural for one so high-strung?"

"Perhaps not--right away. But I supposed she would come to you--as I see she has, for you know about it. After that, it was only a question of time. It may have been a heroic remedy, but the disease was critical."

"Suppose," suggested Craig, "that, after all, he told her that he was there in the Museum, but that he did not get the dagger. And suppose that she believed it. What then?"

Norton looked up quickly. "Did he tell her that?"

"I am supposing that he did," repeated Craig, declining to place himself in a position which might lead to disclosing how he found out.

"Then I should say that he was a great deal cleverer than I gave him credit for being," returned Norton.

"Well, it's done now, and can't be undone. Have you found out anything about the de Moches?"

"Not very much, I must admit. Of course, you know I'm not on the best of terms with them, for some reason or other. But I've been around the Prince Edward Albert a good deal, and I don't think they've been able to do much that I haven't some kind of line on. Alfonso seems to be moping. His professors here tell me that he has been neglecting his work sadly for the past few days. The Senora and Whitney seem to be as friendly as ever. I should say that they were going the pace fast, and it shows on him."

I glanced significantly at Kennedy, but he betrayed nothing that might lead one to suppose he had discovered the cause. Evidently he was not ready yet to come out into the open and expected further developments on the poisoned cigarette clue.

The telephone rang and Craig took down the receiver.

"Yes, this is Kennedy," he answered. "Oh, hello, Lockwood. What's that? You've been trying to get me all day? I just came in. Why, yes, I can see you in about half an hour."

"I guess I'd better clear out," said Norton with a bitter laugh, as Kennedy hung up the receiver. "There have been enough crimes committed without adding another murder to the list."

"Keep on watching the de Moches," requested Kennedy as Norton made his way to the door.

"Yes," agreed Norton. "They will bear it--particularly Alfonso. They are hot-blooded. You never know what they are going to do, and they keep their own counsel. I might hope that Lockwood would forget; but a de Moche--never."

I cannot say that I envied him very much, for doubtless what he said was true, though his danger might be mitigated by the fact that the dagger was no longer in his Museum. Still, it would never have left Peru, I reflected, if it had not been for him, and there is, even in the best of us, a smouldering desire for revenge.

Lockwood was more than prompt. I had expected that he would burst into the laboratory prepared to clean things out. Instead he came in as though nothing at all had happened.

"There's no use mincing words, Kennedy," he began. "You know that I know what has happened. That scoundrel, Norton, has told Inez that you had shoe-prints of some one who was in the Museum the night of the robbery and that those shoe-prints correspond with mine. As a matter of fact, Kennedy, I was there. I was there to get the dagger. But before I could get it, some one else must have done so. It was gone."

I wanted to believe Lockwood. As for Craig he said nothing.

"Then, when I did have a chance to get away that night," he continued, "I went over to Mendoza's. The rest you know."

"You have told Inez that?" asked Kennedy in order to seem properly surprised.

"Yes--and I think she believes me. I can't say. Things are strained with her. It will take time. I'm not one of those who can take a girl by main force and make her do what she won't do. I wish I could smooth things over. Let me see the prints."

Kennedy handed them over to him. He looked at them, long and closely, then handed back the damning evidence against himself.

"I know it would be no use to destroy these," he remarked. "In the first place that would really incriminate me. And in the second I suppose you have copies."

Craig smiled blandly.

"But I can tell you," he exclaimed, bringing his fist down on the laboratory table with a bang, "that before I lose that girl, somebody will pay for it--and there won't be any mistakes made, either."

The scowl on his face and the menacing look in his eye showed that now, with his back up against the wall, he was not bluffing.

He seemed to get little satisfaction out of his visit to us, and in fact I think he made it more in a spirit of bravado than anything else.

Lockwood had scarcely gone before Kennedy pulled out the University schedule, and ran his finger down it.

"Alfonso ought to be at a lecture in the School of Mines," he said finally, folding up the paper. "I wish you'd go over and see if he is there, and, if he is, ask him to step into the laboratory."

The lecture was in progress all right, but when I peered into the room it was evident that de Moche was not there. Norton was right. The young man was neglecting his work. Evidently the repeated rebuffs of Inez had worked havoc with him.

Nor was he at the hotel, as we found out by calling up.

There was only one other place that I could think of where he would be likely to be and that was at the apartment of Inez. Apparently the same idea occurred to Kennedy, for he suggested going back to our observation point in the boarding-house and finding out.

All the rest of the day we listened through the vocaphone, but without finding out a thing of interest. Now and then we would try the detective instrument, the little black disc in the back, but with no better success. Then we determined to listen in relays, one listening, while the other went out for dinner.

It must have been just a bit after dark that we could hear Inez talking in a low tone with Juanita.

A buzzing noise indicated that there was some one at the hall door.

"If it's any one for me," we heard Inez say, "tell them that I will be out directly. I'm not fit to be seen now."

The door was opened and a voice which we could not place asked for the senorita. A moment later Juanita returned and asked the visitor to be seated a few moments.

It was not long before we were suddenly aware that there was another person in the room. We could hear whispers. The faithful little vocaphone even picked them up and shot them down to us.

"Is everything all right?" whispered one, a new voice which was somewhat familiar I thought, but disguised beyond recognition.

"Yes. She'll be out in a minute."

"Now, remember what I told you. If this thing works you get fifty dollars more. I'd better put this mask on--damn it!--the slit's torn. It'll do. I'll hide here as soon as we hear her. That's a pretty nice private ambulance you have down there. Did you tell the elevator boy that she had suddenly been taken ill? That's all fixed, then. I've got the stuff--amyl nitrite--she'll go off like a shot. But we'll have to work quick. It only keeps her under a few minutes. I can't wear this mask down and I'm afraid some one will recognize me. Oh, you brought a beard. Good. I'll give you the signal. There must be no noise. Yes, I saw the stretcher where you left it in the hall."

"All right, Doc," returned the first and unfamiliar voice.

It all happened so quickly that we were completely bowled over for the moment. Who was the man addressed as "Doc"? There was no time to find out, no time to do anything, apparently, so quickly had the plot been sprung.

I looked at Kennedy, aghast, not knowing what to do in this unexpected crisis.

A moment later we heard a voice, "I'm sorry to have had to keep you waiting, but what is it that I can do for you?"

"Good God!" exclaimed Kennedy. "It is Inez herself!"

It was altogether too late to get over there to warn her, perhaps even to rescue her. What could we do? If we could only shout for help. But what good would that do, around a corner and so far away?

The vocaphone itself!

Quickly Kennedy turned another switch, of a rheostat, which accentuated a whisper to almost a shout.

"Don't be alarmed, Senorita," he cried. "This is Kennedy talking. Look under the bookcase by the window. You will find a cedar box. It is a detective vocaphone through which I can hear you and which is talking out to you. I have heard something just there just now--"

"Yes, yes. Go on!"

"You are threatened. Shout! Shout!"

Just then there came a sound of a scuffle and a muffled cry which was not much above a whisper, as though a strong hand was clapped over her mouth.

What could we do?

"Juanita--Juanita--help!--police!" shouted Craig himself through the vocaphone.

An instant later we could hear other screams as Juanita heard and spread the alarm, not a second too soon.

"Come on, Walter," shouted Kennedy dashing out of the room, now that he was assured the alarm had been given.

We hurried around the corner, and into the apartment. One of the elevators was up, and no one was running the other, but we opened the gates and Kennedy ran it up by himself.

In the Mendoza apartment all was a babel of voices, every one talking at once.

"Did you get them?" Craig asked, looking about.

"No, sir," replied the elevator boy. "One of them came in from the ambulance and told me Miss Mendoza was suddenly taken sick. He rode up with the stretcher. The other one must have walked up."

"Do you know him? Has he ever been here before?"

"I can't say, sir. I didn't see him. At least, sir, when I heard the screams I ran in from the elevator, which the other one told me to wait with--left the door open. Just as I ran in, they dodged out past me, jumped into the car and rode down. I guess they must have had the engine of the ambulance motor running, sir, if they got away without you seeing them."

We were too late to head them from speeding off. But, at least, we had saved the Senorita. She was terribly upset by the attack, much shaken, but really all right.

"Have you any idea who it could be?" asked Craig as the faithful Juanita cared for her.

"I don't know the man who was waiting and 'Nita never saw him, either," she replied. "The one who jumped out from behind the portieres had on a mask and a false beard. But I didn't recognize anything about him."

Sudden as the attack had been and serious as might have been the outcome, we could not but feel happy that it had been frustrated.

Yet it seemed that some one ought to be delegated to see that such a thing could not occur again.

"We must think up some means of protecting you," soothed Kennedy. "Let me see, Mr. Lockwood and Mr. Whitney seem to be the closest to you. If you don't mind I'll call them up. I wonder if you'd object if we had a little luncheon up here, to-morrow? I have a special reason for asking it. I want to insure your safety and we may as well meet on common ground."

"There isn't the slightest objection in the world," she replied, as Kennedy reached for the telephone.

We had some little difficulty in locating both Lockwood and Whitney, but finally after a time managed to find them and arrange for the conference on the Senorita's safety for the next day.

Outside Kennedy gave instructions to the officer on the beat to watch the apartment particularly, and there was no reason now to fear a repetition of the attempt, at least that night.

XVIII

THE ANTIDOTE

Early the following morning Kennedy left me alone in the laboratory and made a trip downtown, where he visited a South American tobacco dealer and placed a rush order for a couple of hundred cigarettes exactly similar in shape and quality to those which Mendoza had smoked and which the others seemed also to prefer, except, however, that the deadly drug was left out.

While he was gone, it occurred to me to take up again the hunt for Alfonso. Norton was not in his little office, nor could I find Alfonso anywhere about the campus. In fact he seemed to have almost dropped out of his University work for the time. Accordingly, I turned my steps toward the Prince Edward Albert Hotel, in the hope that he might be there.

Inquiries of the clerk at the desk told me that he had been there, but was out just at that moment. I did not see Whitney around, nor the Senora, so I sat down to wait, having nothing better to do until Kennedy's return.

I was about to give it up and go, when I heard a cab drive up to the door and, looking up, I saw Alfonso get out. He saw me about the same time and we bowed. I do not think he even tried to avoid me.

"I haven't seen you for some time," I remarked, searching his face, which seemed to me to be paler than it had been.

"No," he replied. "I haven't been feeling very well lately and I've been running up into the country now and then to a quiet hotel--a sort of rest cure, I suppose you would call it. How are you? How is Senorita Inez?"

"Very well," I replied, wondering whether he had said what he did in the hope of establishing a complete alibi for the events of the night before.

Briefly I told him what had happened, omitting reference to the vocaphone and our real part in it.

"That is terrible," he exclaimed. "Oh, if she would only allow me to take care of her--I would take her back to our own country, where she would be safe, far away from these people who seek to prey on all of us."

He paced up and down nervously, and I could see that my information had added nothing to his peace of mind, though, at the same time, he had betrayed nothing on his part.

"I was just passing through," I said finally, looking at my watch, "and happened to see you. I hope your mother is well?"

"As well as is to be expected, surrounded by people who watch every act," he replied, I thought with a rap at us for having Norton about and so active, though I could not be sure.

We separated, and I hastened back to the laboratory to report to Craig that Alfonso was rusticating for his health.

Kennedy, on his part, had had an experience, though it was no more conclusive than my own. After he had left the tobacco district, he had walked up Wall Street to the subway. In the crowd he had seen Senora de Moche, although she had not seen him. He had turned and followed her until she entered the building in which Whitney and his associates had their offices. Whether it indicated that she was still leading them a chase, or they her, was impossible to determine, but it at least showed that they were still on friendly terms with each other.

In the laboratory he could always find something to do on the case, either in perfecting his chemical tests of the various drugs we had discovered, or in trying to decipher some similarities in the rough printing of the four warnings and the anonymous letter with the known handwriting of those connected with the case, many specimens of which he bad been quietly collecting. That in itself was a tremendously minute job, entailing not only a vast amount of expert knowledge such as he had collected in his years of studying crime scientifically, but the most exact measurements and careful weighing and balancing of trifles, which to the unscientific conveyed no meanings at all. Still, he seemed to be forging ahead, though he never betrayed what direction the evidence seemed to be taking.

The package of cigarettes which he had ordered downtown was delivered about an hour after his return and seemed to be the signal for him to drop work, for the meeting with Lockwood and Whitney had been set early. He stowed the package in his pockets and then went over to a cabinet in which he kept a number of rather uncommon drugs. From it he took a little vial which he shoved into his waistcoat pocket.

"Are you ready, Walter?" he asked.

"Whenever you are," I said, laying aside my writing.

Together we made our way down to the Mendoza apartment which had been the scene of the near-tragedy the night before. Outside, he paused for several moments to make inquiries about any suspicious persons that might have been seen lurking about the neighbourhood. None of the attendants in the apartment remembered having seen any, and they were now very alert after the two events, the murder and the attempted abduction. Not a clue seemed to have been left by the villain who had been called "Doc."

"How do you feel after your thrilling experience?" greeted Craig pleasantly, as Juanita admitted us and Inez came forward.

"Oh, Mr. Kennedy," she answered, with a note of sadness in her tone. "It makes me feel so alone in the world. If it were not for 'Nita--and you, I don't know what I should do."

"Doesn't Mr. Lockwood count?" asked Kennedy observantly.

"Of course--everything," she answered hastily. "But he has to be away so much on business, and--"

She paused and sighed. I could not help wondering whether, after all, his explanation of the dagger episode had been enough to satisfy her. Had she really accepted it?

Neither Lockwood nor Whitney had arrived, and Kennedy improved the opportunity to have a quiet talk aside with her, at which, I imagine, he was arranging a programme of what was to happen at this meeting and her part in it to co-operate with him.

She had left the room for a moment and we were alone. It was evidently a part of his plan, for no sooner was she gone than he opened the package of cigarettes which he had ordered and took out from the box in which Mendoza had kept his cigarettes those that were there, substituting those he had brought.

We had not long to wait, now. Lockwood and Whitney came together. I was interested to see the greeting of Inez and her lover. Was it pure fancy, or did I detect a trace of coldness as though there had sprung up something between them? As far as Lockwood was concerned, I felt sure that he was eager to break down any barrier that kept them from being as they had been.

Whitney took her hand and held it, in a playful sort of way. "I wish I were a young buck," he smiled. "No one would dare look at you--much less try to carry you off. Yes, we must be more careful of our little beauty, or we shall lose her."