by Earl
“The company,” Hale explained, “arranged this private television hookup with the future site of the New York terminal. When I press this button, it will flash a signal to them—”
Watching the clock, Hale trembled more than before. He wanted so much to time it just right. Somehow, it would be a symbol of all that was to come. He pressed the button of a contact switch beside him.
In the visi-screen, the workmen broke their line at the signal and leaped away as though they had been on a leash. They scattered to all the machinery. The foreman remained in close focus. With a common shovel, he gravely dug up a shovelful of dirt and tossed it into a wheelbarrow. Then he looked up and waved.
Hale waved back, then faced the audience.
“Ladies and gentlemen! The first shovelful of ground dug for the new Subatlantic Tube!”
The clock marked twelve to the very second.
From outside, through an opened window, came the sudden blast of a siren, followed a split-second later by a deluge of sound—bells, horns, trumpets, drums, and the full-throated roar of human voices. Timed to the last second, New York City blasted forth its welcome to the New Year, and to the New Century.
It was January first, 2001 A.D.! Richard Hale still stared at the visi-screen. Now the great AP—atomic-power—excavator rumbled to life, and the tremendous project was under way, right on schedule. It was merely ceremony, of course. The men out there would quit in a moment and join in celebrations. But the project had been officially started.
Suddenly Hale was being pummeled on the back. His arms were pumped up and down. Voices screamed in his ear.
“Happy New Century! Happy New Century!”
A slim form struggled through the crowd and grasped his arm. Laura Asquith rested a moment pantingly, then turned her face up.
“Happy New Century, Dick!” Her lips formed the unheard words.
Hale bent to the invitation of her lips. He knew it was the supreme moment of his life. Only two things had counted to him—the start of the project, and Laura. He had timed things perfectly so far. One more thing remained before the moment would be over forever.
HE grasped the girl tightly, so they wouldn’t be torn apart.
“I want you to marry me!” he screamed.
Not a word was audible, but the girl had read his lips. Hers formed a startled “oh!” also inaudible.
“What a time and place you picked, silly!” Her smile was impish, and tender.
“Well?” he pursued in their silent lip-reading.
She shook her chestnut tresses and laughed at his suddenly crestfallen air.
“Try again tomorrow, when we’re alone!” she informed him with elaborate pantomime of her lips.
Hale nodded, satisfied. After all, it had been rather foolish to spring that here in this pandemonium of yelling, celebrating people. He turned at a touch on his arm. Peter Asquith stood there. The two men shook hands silently. Hale felt a glow within him. It was good to have a girl like Laura and a friend like Asquith starting off the new century at your side. The new century could mean everything splendid, or could mean turmoil.
The height of the moment spent itself, and the peak of noise dropped.
Voices could be heard once again.
“Wonderful speech, dear,” Laura said, squeezing his hand. “I’m proud of you. But didn’t you put it rather strongly about Transport Corporation?”
Peter Asquith nodded gravely. “Transport may sue you for libel, ray lad.”
Hale’s eyes gleamed.
“Let them! That’s exactly what I want. If they take me to court. I’ll give a real expose. You two know how they came after Dad, trying to buy him out. Dad and I investigated. Through a private source, we learned of the Five. We wanted to expose them then. But the man who gave us the information disappeared. Murdered, of course. I’m trying to smoke out the Five this way. Yes, let them sue me for libel!”
Peter Asquith shook his head slowly. “You’re playing with fire. You haven’t any proof of your claims, have you?”
Hale lowered his voice cautiously.
“The man who was murdered left one concrete piece of evidence with us. A receipt showed that one million dollars was transferred to the account of the subversive Dictator Syndicate, in middle Europe. You know the Dictator Syndicate and their outdated ideology. It hasn’t been disbanded because it poses as a legal political party.
“The source of the million dollars that went to them is cleverly unnamed, but the Syndicate records would show it, if investigated by Government order. The Five, I believe, are sponsoring the Dictator Syndicate, or at least strengthening it, helping to build an outlawed body of trained troopers!”
“Good Lord!” exclaimed Asquith. “Where do you keep that paper?”
Hale patted a spot under his right shoulder.
“I carry it with me in a silk pouch tied around my chest. When the time comes—”
He paused significantly. Laura shuddered a bit.
“Dick, I’m worried for you! I almost feel the way I’ve felt several times before. An invisible net is settling down over you—over us!”
Hale laughed, patting her hand reassuringly.
“I can take care of myself. Let’s dance. Everybody else is.”
AT twelve-thirty aching silence came suddenly in the great room. It had the converse effect of a thunderclap in quiet air. Hale and Laura turned. People were staring in the direction of the main door, at the other end of the hall.
Hale saw the reason for the startling cessation in merriment. Six blue-uniformed men marched forward—police. The celebrants were dumbfounded. A raid? But for what, on New Year’s Eve, a time sacred to free spirits?
Hale stiffened. Straight for him the men came, led by a police sergeant. They stopped.
“Richard Hale?” asked the officer.
“Yes.”
“I have a warrant for your arrest!” The officer displayed the document.
Hale could feel Laura trembling against him. He let out his breath, smiling.
“On what charge? Libel? You can’t arrest me for that.” Surely the Five, striking back, must know that.
The officer’s voice was terse. “No. For High Treason against the World Government! Come along.”
Hale gasped. It took him by surprise. He thought rapidly. Naturally the Five had brought the charge against him, through Transport Corporation. But what did they have on him? Nothing! On the other hand . . . He patted the silken envelope next to his skin. The crucial moment had arrived sooner than he expected.
“That’s ridiculous!” Laura Asquith was saying, clutching his arm. “There is some mistake—!”
“Sorry, miss. He has to come with us.”
Two of the police firmly disengaged the girl and took Hale’s arms. He shrugged them off angrily.
“No need for that.” To Laura he said: “Don’t worry, dear. This may spoil our tomorrow, but they can’t hold me forever.”
“I’ll stick by you, no matter what happens!” Laura cried.
“We’ll be down to see you as soon as we can,” Peter Asquith seconded.
Holding his head high, Hale strode to the door between two rows of police, aware of the stares of the crowd. He felt miserable at this climax to the launching of the Subatlantic Tube project. It was a hell of a way for the evening to turn out. The Five had struck more swiftly, and more mysteriously, than he had expected.
RICHARD HALE paced his cell like a caged tiger, cursing in a low tone. It was the third day after his arrest, and still he had not been released. There was no bail for the charge of High Treason, or the Company would have come to the rescue.
He had been allowed no visitors, save only a counselor-at-law, sent by the Company. He had not heard a word from Laura or her uncle. Behind his rage, Hale was sick with apprehension. The ponderous machinery of law, once started, was not so easily stopped.
The electric lock clicked.
Hale wheeled in the middle of a stride. The steel door closed behind
a tall, burly figure in a form-fitting uniform. A craggy, domineering face peered from beneath a visor. Hale recognized him as Ivan von Grenfeld, a high official of the World League police force. Hale narrowed his eyes, puzzled at this visit.
“Richard Hale, you are in grave trouble,” von Grenfeld declared without preamble. “Your trial will be held in a week.”
“Trial?” gasped Hale. “But the charge against me is ridiculous. That paper the police—your men—found on me can be traced back to the Dictator Syndicate. And their record will show the money came from Transport Corporation, not me.”
Von Grenfeld held up a hand stiffly. “The paper was investigated. The money came from your Tube Company.”
“Impossible!” stated Hale. “It’s dated a year ago. At that time the Company had barely started. Our assets were ten thousand dollars. Where did the million come from?”
“From Transport Corporation, for services rendered!”
Hale sagged weakly to his prison cot. His brain whirled. A million dollars mysteriously donated by Transport to Tube, and as mysteriously signed over to the Syndicate! Hale suddenly thought of Laura’s words. An invisible net certainly was settling down.
He stared at the visitor. Something had exploded in his mind.
“You’re one of the Five!” he snapped.
Ivan von Grenfeld nodded imperturbably. “I have been sent here to give you one chance of leniency. But there are two things you must do. Publicly refute your New Year’s accusations. Sign a statement never to oppose us again.”
“Get out,” Hale said quietly, coldly. “Get out.”
Ivan von Grenfeld drew himself up haughtily.
“You will regret this, Richard Hale!”
Hale sat with head in hands after von Grenfeld stalked out. Was he bucking more than he could handle? Ivan von Grenfeld, ranking police official, one of the Five! Then what high positions must the other four hold?
AN hour later the door opened again. The man who entered was thin and solemn-faced, known widely through television. Sir Charles Paxton was Supreme Court justice of the World Government. He placed himself in the sunlight streaming from the barred window. His skin had a golden color in the radiation which he liked.
“Number two?” guessed Hale.
“Eh?” Sir Charles appeared startled. Then he smiled. “Sharp young man, aren’t you? Yes, number two of the Five. My mission is to suggest a way out of our mutual differences. Suppose you were to live comfortably the rest of your life on a steady annuity. One percent of the profit of the completed Tube service would do that nicely, wouldn’t it?”
Hale laughed harshly at the irony of it. He spoke savagely.
“You, a Supreme Court justice, offering me a bribe! Nice reflection on your character.”
“That’s neither here nor there,” returned Paxton testily. “Well?”
“No!” Hale said the word quietly, but with a world of firmness behind it.
“But you can’t turn down so much money!” gasped Paxton. His mouth was open as though he had heard the incredible.
“Fill this cell with gold and I’ll throw it out as fast as it comes,” Hale returned bitingly. “Get out.”
Sir Charles Paxton left, his expression still one of dazed disbelief.
CHAPTER III
Who Is the Fifth?
HALE expected a third visitor, but it was not till the next day that Jonathan Mausser, Government attorney-at-law, came in rubbing his hands. He stood in the middle of the cell, well away from the slightly sooted walls. He wore a pious expression.
“Number three,” Hale said. “What’s your offer?”
Jonathan Mausser looked pained at the blunt statement.
“Out of sheer pity for you, young man, I’ve convinced my colleagues to give you one more chance. We’ll withdraw our charge if you’ll give Transport fifty-one percent stock control of Tube, no more. Isn’t that reasonable?”
“Touching,” retorted Hale. He arose, fists clenched.
“Don’t you hit me!” Mausser cried, cringing against the wall, then shrinking back because he had acquired a slight dirt mark on the elbow of his natty suit.
Hale strode to the door and rapped on it for the jailer to take the visitor away. He jerked his thumb for Mausser’s benefit and then ignored him.
“You’ll soon have the conceit taken out of you, Hale!” snapped Jonathan Mausser before he left. It was like a rat squeaking when he spoke.
Dr. Emanuel Gordy was next, suave and dignified, radiating the air of a man who has a keen, active mind and knows it. He was a research director at the Government labs. Hale sensed immediately that he was the leader of the Five. This was the man who some day hoped to stand before the world, its master.
“Richard Hale, you’re not a fool,” he said frankly. “I sent the others to you with various propositions more or less to test you.”
Hale grinned mirthlessly.
“You mean because you’d rather have me on your side than against you.”
“Right,” admitted the scientist. “I have a rule never to make an enemy unless I can’t make him a friend. I think I know why you refused those offers. You’re holding out for more. I’m prepared to meet that. Join with us, as the—Sixth!”
Hale nearly bit his tongue. It was a long moment before he could speak.
“You’ve got me all wrong, Dr. Gordy,” he replied, fighting back an impulse to punch that cold, autocratic face. “All wrong. I’m fighting you and what you stand for to the very last.”
The scientist measured him with his calculating eyes.
“You’re intelligent, Hale,” he resumed calmly. “In fact you’re something of a genius. I happen to know that at twenty, fresh from university, you joined your father’s researches and advanced them. You devised super-recoil steel, self-absorptive rockets and flexible concrete. Without them the Subatlantic Tube would still be a dream. I can use a man like you in my laboratory. Research, if you like. One of the Six, eventually.”
“One-sixth of a dictatorship,” retorted Hale. “No, thanks. I don’t care to help dig up buried and rotten things.”
“Benevolent dictatorship,” amended the scientist. “Scientific and economic rule for all.”
“But rule as you see it,” countered Hale. “The World Government was pledged never again to allow one person or clique to lead the way over precipices. You’re an anachronism, Gordy. A Hitler born too late.”
The scientist arose, still maintaining his unshakable calm. But his voice was dry with a trace of deadliness that had edged into it.
“I’m going to break you, Richard Hale, and the Company with you. Nothing can stand in my way.”
WHEN the scientist was gone, Hale found himself trembling. The revelation of their identities shook him. He saw the magnitude of the crushing forces against him. Ivan von Grenfeld, Sir Charles Paxton, Jonathan Mausser, Dr. Emanuel Gordy—four men of towering influence and prestige! And there was a fifth. Who was he? What incredibly important man would he prove to be.
Hale almost shouted in relief. His next visitor, instead of the dreaded fifth, was Peter Asquith. Good old honest Peter Asquith, tidily well-to-do from a clipping service he owned.
Hale poured out the whole story, thus releasing the dam of his pent-up emotions.
“When I get out of this,” he concluded grimly, “I’m going after them. Now that I know who they are I’ll have something tangible to work on. I don’t know the fifth, but he’ll turn up. The first thing I’ll do, after the farce they’ll call a trial—”
Hale stopped. Peter Asquith was staring intently at him.
“You will be convicted,” Asquith stated.
“What? You know they can’t!”
“This trap was laid for you long before,” Asquith continued in a low voice. “The receipt from the Syndicate, found on your person—”
“But how did they know about that?” demanded Hale. “How could they know I had it with me New Year’s Eve? I told no one!” He swallowed, his eyes
hurt and unbelieving. “A half hour after I mentioned it to you, the police came.”
He paused, waiting for an explanation. When none came, the hideous truth lay naked before him.
“You are the last of the Five, Peter Asquith!”
For a minute there was no sound in the cell, except the breathing of two men whose gazes locked.
“I had meant to tell you myself,” Asquith said finally.
Hale spoke as though from a trance. “My father’s friend. My friend. The uncle of the girl I—” He groaned. “I can’t believe it. You gave us money when we needed it!”
“Transport money,” returned Asquith, without emotion. “We wanted you and your father to finish your great plan, but all the while we planned how to gain control. My clipping service is really the front for a world-wide espionage service. Through that we dealt with the Syndicate in our scheme.”
“I see,” breathed Hale, still stunned. He went on bleakly. “Does Laura know?”
“Yes, everything.”
“And she hasn’t tried to see me? She sent no message?”
“She has no need to see you. She has known all along. To her, the Five’s plans are beneficent. She will have a high place in the new regime.”
“Snake! You’re lying!”
Hale leaped with the words, his brain seething with rage. Asquith squirmed out of the way. When Hale turned, he faced the cold, deadly barrel of a pistol. He stopped short, warned by the grimness of his former friend’s face. He sank down unwillingly on his bunk.
“That’s better,” Asquith said coolly. “Dr. Gordy sent me in to repeat his last offer. Join us. It is the only way you can have Laura.”
“She loves me,” Hale retorted. “You haven’t destroyed that. But I won’t have her that way.”
