by Van Powell
Chapter 22 WHAT HAPPENED TO THE EYE OF OM
They allowed Roger to lock up the laboratory; but he had not beenpermitted to re-set the rays or other protective devices.
That did not concern him overmuch. Roger knew that the safe protectionwas a separate circuit from those he had cut out when he had unfastenedthe door on arriving. Besides, he told himself triumphantly, he hadrecalled the camera fixed in the small decorative panel over theinterviewing chair, so arranged that it would photograph a short timeexposure of the office and of anyone there. Used to make records ofvisitors on their arrival with new propositions, as well as a nightprotection and recorder for the office, it had been operated by Roger,with good presence of mind, when his captors had entered.
Whoever came there later would be able to develop the picture he hadleft recorded. He had not used the continuous mechanism, but his onephotograph would reveal him and the Tibetan trio.
A taxi, taking them to some unknown district, was further cause fortriumph. The taxi, from a nearby stand, had been used before by thelaboratory people. Its driver knew him, though he gave no sign.
Roger meant to act in such a way that the man, discharging his fare andbeing paid, would suspect something wrong, return to the laboratory, orconsult the police.
At a quiet, small hotel, the machine stopped. Roger, with hands claspedbehind his back, made gestures; waggling his fingers to attract thetaximan's notice, then touching himself and clenching his fist.
"Thanks, feller," the man took his fare, and added, to show Roger he was"wise," "That science place brought me a good tip. Guess I better goback and see about more good fares there."
Instead of causing a commotion as they passed the drowsy office clerk,Roger let things stand as they were, and was taken up to a quiet suitewhere the two guards placidly watched him while the Lama telephoned fromanother room.
After a while, returning, the man ushered in--Grover.
"How did you come here?" cried Roger.
"So they got you."
"But you shouldn't----"
"I didn't exactly walk into a trap, Roger. The Chief of Police knowswhere I came in answer to a note handed me while I was trying to traceAstrovox. If I do not telephone within an hour, somebody will come tosee what's what."
He explained what Roger had not known (after hearing the strange eventsof the opened door, the screeching table radio and seeing thesmoke-filled office).
"I stayed to watch Astrovox make spectra-graphs of color bands," Groverexplained, "sending Tip here to be on guard. An excited call seeming tocome from him brought me to the house just as a note he got started himto the laboratory. We passed, not knowing. I found your safeguardsapparently working, and returned. Potts was trying to reassure thestar-gazer who had heard that Voice of Doom. But Tip was frightenedalso. We sent the astrologer to lie down on Tip's bed, while weinvestigated. He came back to us after a few minutes saying he was toomuch upset to stay there. He thought the Tibetans had involved him insome manner."
Tip, it appeared, had agreed to go along to be sure the man got goingand reached home safely.
Tip had bidden him wait, in the chemical section, while he went to hisown room to get a weapon for safety's sake.
"I suppose he must have heard something or started into the office,Roger. At any rate, suddenly, we heard the shot. I was down those stairsin a bound, and beat Tip by ten feet getting in where the smoke stillhung in the air."
"It was strong when I got there."
"But the office was empty. I told Potts to stay, and ran out. A man,strolling, had stopped. I asked if he had seen a man go out and hepointed up the street, and like most of those night-prowlers he tried toavoid the light and hid his face with his hat brim. He was fairly shortand stoutish, but it wasn't Astrovox. I ran, and thought I saw thestar-gazer further along; but it was not our man. I suppose Tip,worried, came to look for me. You say the wires were silent."
He was stopped by the arrival of Tip who had been lured, as he had, by anote delivered by a boy; and almost on his heels came Clark and DoctorRyder, fuming and puzzled and anxious.
They were given no time to exchange words. The Lama spoke:
"We want the sacred relic, the Eye of Om."
"It is in the Buddha's head," Roger said earnestly, "I saw this man putit there."
"He tells the truth," Clark declared.
"To prove it," Roger hurried on, "the prongs work open when you pressthe Buddha's third left finger straight in and then back."
The Lama stared.
"And to furthermore prove it and make it inadmissible----"
"Incontrovertible, Tip means," said Grover.
"--I went back, later, to take wedges out of the lower lever, after webeat your trick tunnel, and picked up the Imitation that Rog' tells meMister Clark throwed away. I carried it as far as Bombay, and figured itwasn't worth anything anyhow, so I left it in the waste-basket in thehotel room."
The Tibetan lama stared at him sternly.
"That was but an imitation. It was the one taken _out_ that I demand,from the boy who must know where it is."
"But--I tell you!" Roger was earnest, "I saw Mister Clark exchange thefalse one. And he dropped the one taken out into his coat, and when wegot out of the tunnel and closed the rock, he threw it away, saying itwasn't any use. Tip, here, found that!"
The lama shook his head.
"The Eye of Om is not in its socket!"
A sudden thought came to Mr. Clark. With a cry of dismay he told themhis startling idea.
"It must be that in the excitement, meaning to exchange the imitationfor the real--to put back what rightfully belonged there and protect myfriend, Doctor Ryder, I must have mixed the gems, and instead ofreplacing the false one with the real one, I must have put the false oneback, and really threw away the true Eye."
"Then--I throwed it away in Bombay."
The lama considered the statement made by Tip.
"If any of you speak falsely," he said, slowly, "you who speak so shallhear the Voice of Doom and shall feel the Wrath of the Hand of Doom."
With that threat he bade them depart.
