Elusive Isabel, by Jacques Futrelle

by Unknown

  One of the men glanced at his watch—it was just two o’clock—then rose and took a position beside the table, facing the semicircle. He placed the timepiece on the table in front of him.

  “Gentlemen,” he said, and there was the faintest trace of a foreign accent, “I shall speak English because I know that whatever your nationality all of you are familiar with that tongue. And now an apology for the theatric aspect of all this—the masks, the time and place of meeting, and the rest of it.” He paused a moment. “There is only one person living who knows the name and position of all of you,” and by a sweep of his hand he indicated the motionless figure of the woman. “It was by her decision that masks are worn, for, while we all know the details of the Latin compact, there is a bare chance that some one will not sign, and it is not desirable that the identity of that person be known to all of us. The reason for the selection of this time and place is obvious, for an inkling of the proposed signing has reached the Secret Service. I will add the United States was chosen as the birthplace of this new epoch in history for several reasons, one being the proximity to Central and South America; and another the inadequate police system which enables greater freedom of action.”

  He stopped and drew from his pocket a folded parchment. He tapped the tips of his fingers with it from time to time as he talked.

  “The Latin compact, gentlemen, is not the dream, of a night, nor of a decade. As long as fifty years ago it was suggested, and whatever differences the Latin countries of the world have had among themselves, they have always realized that ultimately they must stand together against—against the other nations of the world. This idea germinated into action three years ago, and since that time agents have covered the world in its interest. This meeting is the fruition of all that work, and this,” he held the parchment aloft, “is the instrument that will unite us. Never has a diplomatic secret been kept as this has been kept; never has a greater reprisal been planned. It means, gentlemen, the domination of the world—socially, spiritually, commercially and artistically; it means that England and the United States, whose sphere of influence has extended around the globe, will be beaten back, that the flag of the Latin countries will wave again over lost possessions. It means all of that, and more.”

  His voice had risen as he talked until it had grown vibrant with enthusiasm; and his hands pointed his remarks with quick, sharp gestures.

  “All this,” he went on, “was never possible until three years ago, when the navies of the world were given over into the hands of one nation—my country. Five years ago a fellow-countryman of mine happened to be present at an electrical exhibition in New York City, and there he witnessed an interesting experiment—practical demonstration of the fact that a submarine mine may be exploded by the use of the Marconi wireless system. He was a practical electrician himself, and the idea lingered in his mind. For two years he experimented, and finally this resulted.” He picked up the metal spheroid and held it out for their inspection. “As it stands it is absolutely perfect and gives a world’s supremacy to the Latin countries because it places all the navies of the world at our mercy. It is a variation of the well-known percussion cap or fuse by which mines and torpedoes are exploded.

  “The theory of it is simple, as are the theories of all great inventions; the secret of its construction is known only to its inventor—a man of whom you never heard. It is merely that the mechanism of the cap is so delicate that the Marconi wireless waves—and only those—will fire the cap. In other words, this cap is tuned, if I may use the word, to a certain number of vibrations and half-vibrations; a wireless instrument of high power, with a modifying addition which the inventor has added, has only to be set in motion to discharge it at any distance up to twenty-five miles. High power wireless waves recognize no obstacle, so the explosion of a submarine mine is as easily brought about as would be the explosion of a mine on dry land. You will readily see its value as a protective agency for our seaports.”

  He replaced the spheroid on the table.

  “But its chief value is not in that,” he resumed. “Its chief value to the Latin compact, gentlemen, is that the United States and England are now concluding negotiations, unknown to each other, by which they will protect their seaports by means of mines primed with this cap. The tuning of the caps which we will use is known only to us; the tuning of the caps which they will use is also known to us! The addition to the wireless apparatus which they will use is such that they can not, even by accident, explode a mine guarding our seaports; but, on the other hand, the addition to the wireless apparatus which we will use permits of the extreme high charge which will explode their mines. To make it clearer, we could send a navy against such a city as New York or Liverpool, and explode every mine in front of us as we went; and meanwhile our mines are impervious.

  “Another word, and I have finished. Five gentlemen, whom I imagine are present now, have witnessed a test of this cap, by direct command of their home governments. For the benefit of the others of you a simple test has been arranged for to-night. This cap on the table is charged; its inventor is at his wireless instrument, fifteen miles away. At three o’clock he will turn on the current that will explode it.” Four of the eleven men looked at their watches. “It is now seventeen minutes past two. I am instructed, for the purposes of the test, to place this cap anywhere you may select—in this house or outside of it, in a box, sealed, or under water. The purpose is merely to demonstrate its efficacy; to prove to your complete satisfaction that it can be exploded under practically any conditions.”

  His entire manner underwent a change; he drew a chair up to the table, and stood for an instant with his hand resting on the back.

  “The compact is written in three languages—English, French and Italian. I shall ask you to sign, after reading either or all, precisely as the directions you have received from your home government instruct. On behalf of the three greatest Latin countries, as special envoy of each, I will sign first.”

  He dropped into the chair, signed each of the three parchment pages three times, then rose and offered the pen to the cowled figure at one end of the semicircle. The man came forward, read the English transcript, studied the three signatures already there with a certain air of surprise, then signed. The second man signed, the third man, and the fourth.

  The fifth had just risen to go forward when the door opened silently and Mr. Grimm entered. Without a glance either to right or left, he went straight toward the table, and extended a hand to take the compact.

  For an instant there had come amazement, a dumb astonishment, at the intrusion. It passed, and the hand of the man who had done the talking darted out, seized the compact, and held it behind him.

  “If you will be good enough to give that to me, your Highness,” suggested Mr. Grimm quietly.

  For half a minute the masked man stared straight into the listless eyes of the intruder, and then:

  “Mr. Grimm, you are in very grave danger.”

  “That is beside the question,” was the reply. “Be good enough to give me that document.”

  He backed away as he spoke, kicked the door closed with one heel, then leaned against it, facing them.

  “Or better yet,” he went on after a moment, “burn it. There is a lamp in front of you.” He paused for an answer. “It would be absurd of me to attempt to take it by force,” he added.

  XXIII

  THE PERCUSSION CAP

  There was a long, tense silence. The cowled figures had risen ominously; Miss Thorne paled behind her mask, and her fingers gripped her palms fiercely, still she sat motionless. Prince d’Abruzzi broke the silence. He seemed perfectly calm and self-possessed.

  “How did you get in?” he demanded.

  “Throttled your guard at the front door, took him down cellar and locked him in the coal-bin,” replied Mr. Grimm tersely. “I am waiting for you to burn it.”

  “And how did you escape from—from the other place?”

  Mr. Grimm shrugged his sho
ulders.

  “The lamp is in front of you,” he said.

  “And find your way here?” the prince pursued.

  Again Mr. Grimm shrugged his shoulders. For an instant longer the prince gazed straight into his inscrutable face, then turned accusing eyes on the masked figures about him.

  “Is there a traitor?” he demanded suddenly. His gaze settled on Miss Thorne and lingered there.

  “I can relieve your mind on that point—there is not,” Mr. Grimm assured him. “Just a final word, your Highness, if you will permit me. I have heard everything that has been said here for the last fifteen minutes. The details of your percussion cap are interesting. I shall lay them before my government and my government may take it upon itself to lay them before the British government. You yourself said a few minutes ago that this compact was not possible before this cap was invented and perfected. It isn’t possible the minute my government is warned against its use. That will be my first duty.”

  “You are giving some very excellent reasons, Mr. Grimm,” was the deliberate reply, “why you should not be permitted to leave this room alive.”

  “Further,” Mr. Grimm resumed in the same tone, “I have been ordered to prevent the signing of that compact, at least in this country. It seems that I am barely in time. If it is signed—and it will be useless now on your own statement unless you murder me—every man who signs it will have to reckon with the highest power of this country. Will you destroy it? I don’t want to know what countries already stand committed by the signatures there.”

  “I will not,” was the steady response. And then, after a little: “Mr. Grimm, the inventor of this little cap, insignificant as it seems, will receive millions for it. Your silence would be worth—just how much?”

  Mr. Grimm’s face turned red, then white again.

  “Which would you prefer? An independence by virtue of a great fortune, or—or the other thing?”

  Suddenly Miss Thorne tore the mask from her face and came forward. Her cheeks were scarlet, and anger flamed in the blue-gray eyes.

  “Mr. Grimm has no price—I happen to know that,” she declared hotly. “Neither money nor a consideration for his own personal safety will make him turn traitor.” She stared coldly into the prince’s eyes. “And we are not assassins here,” she added.

  “Miss Thorne has stated the matter fairly, I believe, your Highness,” and Mr. Grimm permitted his eyes to linger a moment on the flushed face of this woman who, in a way, was defending him. “But there is only one thing to do, Miss Thorne.” He was talking to her now. “There is no middle course. It is a problem that has only one possible answer—the destruction of that document, and the departure of you, and you, your Highness, for Italy under my personal care all the way. I imagined this matter had ended that day on the steamer; it will end here, now, to-night.”

  The prince glanced again at his watch, then thoughtfully weighed the percussion cap in his hand, after which, with a curious laugh, he walked over to the squat iron globe in an opposite corner of the room. He bent over it half a minute, then straightened up.

  “That cap, Mr. Grimm, has one disadvantage,” he remarked casually. “When it is attached to a mine or torpedo it can not be disconnected without firing it. It is attached.” He turned to the others. “It is needless to discuss the matter further just now. If you will follow me? We will leave Mr. Grimm here.”

  With a strange little cry, neither anger nor anguish, yet oddly partaking of the quality of each, Isabel went quickly to the prince.

  “How dare you do such a thing?” she demanded fiercely. “It is murder.”

  “This is not a time, Miss Thorne, for your interference,” replied the prince coldly. “It has all passed beyond the point where the feelings of any one person, even the feelings of the woman who has engineered the compact, can be considered. A single life can not be permitted to stand in the way of the consummation of this world project. Mr. Grimm alive means the compact would be useless, if not impossible; Mr. Grimm dead means the fruition of all our plans and hopes. You have done your duty and you have done it well; but now your authority ends, and I, the special envoy of—”

  “Just a moment, please,” Mr. Grimm interrupted courteously. “As I understand it, your Highness, the mine there in the corner is charged?”

  “Yes. It just happened to be here for purposes of experiment.”

  “The cap is attached?”

  “Quite right.” The prince laughed.

  “And at three o’clock, by your watch, the mine will be fired by a wireless operator fifteen miles from here?”

  “Something like that; yes, very much like that,” assented the prince.

  “Thank you. I merely wanted to understand it.” Mr. Grimm pulled a chair up against the door and sat down, crossing his legs. On his knees rested the barrel of a revolver, glittering, fascinating, in the semi-darkness. “Now, gentlemen,” and he glanced at his watch, “it’s twenty-one minutes of three o’clock. At three that mine will explode. We will all be in the room when it happens, unless his Highness sees fit to destroy the compact.”

  Eyes sought eyes, and the prince removed his mask with a sudden gesture. His face was bloodless.

  “If any man,” and Mr. Grimm gave Miss Thorne a quick glance, “I should say, any person, attempts to leave this room I know he will die; and there’s a bare chance that the percussion cap will fail to work. I can account for six of you, if there is a rush.”

  “But, man, if that mine explodes we shall all be killed—blown to pieces!” burst from one of the cowled figures.

  “If the percussion cap works,” supplemented Mr. Grimm.

  Mingled emotions struggled in the flushed face of Isabel as she studied Mr. Grimm’s impassive countenance.

  “I have never disappointed you yet, Miss Thorne,” he remarked as if it were an explanation. “I shall not now.”

  She turned to the prince.

  “Your Highness, I think it needless to argue further,” she said. “We have no choice in the matter; there is only one course—destroy the compact.”

  “No!” was the curt answer.

  “I believe I know Mr. Grimm better than you do,” she argued. “You think he will weaken; I know he will not. I am not arguing for him, nor for myself; I am arguing against the frightful loss that will come here in this room if the compact is not destroyed.”

  [Illustration: “You think he will weaken; I know he will not.”]

  “It’s absurd to let one man stand in the way,” declared the prince angrily.

  “It might not be an impertinent question, your Highness,” commented Mr. Grimm, “for me to ask how you are going to prevent one man standing in the way?”

  A quick change came over Miss Thorne’s face. The eyes hardened, the lips were set, and lines Mr. Grimm had never seen appeared about the mouth. Here, in a flash, the cloak of dissimulation was cast aside, and the woman stood forth, this keen, brilliant, determined woman who did things.

  “The compact will be destroyed,” she said.

  “No,” declared the prince.

  “It must be destroyed.”

  “Must? Must? Do you say must to me?”

  “Yes, must,” she repeated steadily.

  “And by what authority, please, do—”

  “By that authority!” She drew a tiny, filigreed gold box from her bosom and cast it upon the table; the prince stared at it. “In the name of your sovereign—must!” she said again.

  The prince turned away and began pacing, back and forth across the room with the parchment crumpled in his hand. For a minute or more Isabel stood watching him.

  “Thirteen minutes!” Mr. Grimm announced coldly.

  And now broke out an excited chatter, a babel of French, English, Italian, Spanish; those masked and cowled ones who had held silence for so long all began talking at once. One of them snatched at the crumpled compact in the prince’s hand, while all crowded around him arguing. Mr. Grimm sat perfectly still with the revolver barrel rest
ing on his knees.

  “Eleven minutes!” he announced again.

  Suddenly the prince turned violently on Miss Thorne with rage-distorted face.

  “Do you know what it means to you if I do as you say?” he demanded savagely. “It means you will be branded as traitor, that your name, your property—”

  “If you will pardon me, your Highness,” she interrupted, “the power that I have used was given to me to use; I have used it. It is a matter to be settled between me and my government, and as far as it affects my person is of no consequence now. You will destroy the compact.”

  “Nine minutes!” said Mr. Grimm monotonously.

  Again the babel broke out.

  “Do we understand that you want to see the compact?” one of the cowled men asked suddenly of Mr. Grimm as he turned.

  “No, I don’t want to see it. I’d prefer not to see it.”

  With hatred blazing in his eyes the prince made his way toward the lamp, holding a parchment toward the blaze.

  “There’s nothing else to be done,” he exclaimed savagely.

  “Just a moment, please,” Mr. Grimm interposed quickly. “Miss Thorne, is that the compact?”

  She glanced at it, nodded her head, and then the flame caught the fringed edge of paper. It crackled, flashed, flamed, and at last, a thing of ashes, was scattered on the floor. Mr. Grimm rose.

  “That is all, gentlemen,” he announced courteously. “You are free to go. You, your Highness, and Miss Thorne, will accompany me.”

  He held open the door and there was almost a scramble to get out. The prince and Miss Thorne waited until the last.

  “And, Miss Thorne, if you will give us a lift in your car?” Mr. Grimm suggested. “It is now four minutes of three.”