Secret Agent X – The Complete Series Volume 1 (Annotated)

by Paul Chadwick

  THE ruddy face of Senator Blackwell was contorted. A cigar was clamped in his mouth. He was pacing the room. There was a strange, haunted look in his eyes. His daughter’s words seemed to be affecting him strangely, but he spoke with explosive emphasis.

  “What you say is impossible! Do you hear? I should never have told you about the ray. It put silly ideas into your head. The plans of it only were stolen—just a few hours ago.”

  “They were stolen, then?”

  “Yes—but you mustn’t breathe a word of it to anyone. No hint of it must reach the papers.”

  The young man in the room spoke suddenly. Agent “X” had been watching him. He looked like Suzanne in feature, but he hadn’t her spirit or haughtiness. There was weakness in his mouth, lines of dissipation around his eyes. His complexion was bad. The muscles of his face were twitching. His hands shook, and the tones of his voice had an hysterical quaver.

  “They’ll get us all,” he said shrilly.

  The senator turned on him fiercely. “You’re a fool, Ferris. As a son you disgrace me. If you can’t talk sense, shut up. Don’t frighten your sister more than she is. I want both of you to forget this thing. You’re going away, Ferris—back to the sanatorium for another treatment.”

  It was painful to see the twitching of the young man’s face now. To the eyes of Agent “X” the evidence was plain, Ferris Blackwell was a drug addict of some sort. Here was tragedy in a high place.

  “I can’t go yet,” said Ferris. “Not until I’ve seen someone!”

  The senator answered sternly. “Doctor Claude says that one more treatment is necessary. I spoke to him today. He’s coming for you—and you are going with him tonight.”

  The eyes of the two men clashed strangely. Ferris Blackwell’s lips began quivering violently. Then he cried out and hunched back as though trying to escape his father’s penetrating stare. Suzanne Blackwell suddenly straightened her shoulders.

  “I’m sorry, Dad. I’ll buck up. It’s bad enough to have one weakling in the family. I was scared tonight—that’s all. I left right away after Senator Cobb mentioned the ray. Otto von Helvig brought me home.”

  “You didn’t tell him your fears?”

  “No.”

  “Well don’t. I don’t like him, Suzanne. He asks too many questions. He’s the last person in the world who should hear about any of this.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he works for a foreign government, and because I don’t trust him as an individual. Stick to Barkley—if you must have a man hanging around. He may be a loafer—but he’s harmless.”

  “And you don’t think Otto is?”

  “No—I tell you I don’t trust him.”

  Senator Blackwell jerked his watch from his pocket.

  “It’s ten-thirty now,” he said. “Doctor Claude will be here any minute. Get your things packed, Ferris. You’ve got to go with him. Try to behave like a man.”

  Agent “X” withdrew quietly. He had heard enough. He was determined now to trace Otto von Helvig and see whether this man was still engaged in espionage activities. If so, the stolen blueprints of Browning’s hideous mechanism might have passed through his hands.

  Chapter VII

  A Dangerous Move

  THE eyes of the Secret Agent were gleamingly bright. A desperate plan had occurred to him. Not to confront von Helvig at the legation. That would be futile. Disguised, he could interview the man. But there was an infinitely better way.

  He would get at the very heart of Washington’s espionage activities, find the center of that spider web of spy work which is spun about every capital in the world, even Washington. Along its threads would travel whatever whispers there were concerning von Helvig and Lili Damora.

  The Agent deliberated a moment, frowning. There was no one in Washington to help him; no one upon whom he could depend for information concerning the movements of the five who had sat on the senatorial committee.

  Beneath the peaceful surface life of Washington lay a dark underworld of espionage, a dank, unwholesome labyrinth. While he investigated this, he needed someone to contact the stratum above. The future safety of America hinged on the return of the Browning plans.

  Yet in all the world there was only one person who could help him. Only one whom he could completely trust. That one was Betty Dale. Blonde and lovely, daughter of a police captain who had fallen victim to underworld bullets, Betty hated criminals as much as “X” did.

  She was a lady of the press now, a society reporter, forging ahead by her own hard efforts. She would come to Washington if he asked her to. The paper would give her leave.

  It would be a simple matter, too, for her to move in the very circles “X” wanted watched. For Betty had invested her father’s life insurance money in a college education—and at college Suzanne Blackwell had been her roommate. When in Washington Betty always stayed with Suzanne. There was nothing more natural than that she should come to Washington now, to cover for her paper the ball that Senator Marvin Foulette was giving tomorrow night. A wire from “X” would bring her.

  But Agent “X” had qualms. What right had he to ask her? The theft of the plans had brought horrible forces into play. Was he justified in risking Betty’s safety in the slightest degree?

  It was minutes before he could decide this question. He knew that if she ever found he had needed her and not called her, she would be hurt. She’d asked him to promise once that he would always tell her when she could be of use to him. Often in the past she had helped him. At the times when he took money from crooks she distributed it for him among the helpless victims of crime; among the innocent children of men sent to prison; among widows left by assassin’s bullets.

  And, with America itself menaced, she would be eager to take any risk. He finally made his decision. On the way to his hideout Agent “X” sent a carefully worded telegram to Betty. It would bring her by plane the next day. He instructed her to proceed directly to Suzanne’s house, not letting Suzanne know that her visit had any purpose except to cover Senator Foulette’s ball.

  At his hideout “X” swiftly examined the tiny dart which had so nearly imbedded its point in his flesh. He scraped the black, gummy substance from the tip and sniffed at it. Then he took a small box from the false bottom of his suitcase. It held a compact chemical outfit—miniature vials of acids for chemical tests, a tiny collapsible retort for making distillations.

  He put the substance from the dart in a test tube a quarter inch in diameter and used the flame of his cigar lighter in lieu of a Bunsen burner.

  TEN MINUTES of analysis confirmed his suspicions. The gum on the dart was poisonous black resin from the deadly Rengas tree, known also as Singapore mahogany. Agent “X’s” eyes reflected hot pin points of light as his mind flashed back to that tiny mark on Senator Dashman’s neck, his strangely paralyzed condition, his stertorous breathing.

  The brown-skinned men spoke a Malayan dialect. The Rengas tree was found commonly in the Malay peninsula. This upheld his belief that the murderous Green Mask headed a band of Malay poisoners. The blinding powder loosed in Saunders’ car was probably Malay. So also was the Kep-shak torture which had ended Saunders’ life.

  Agent “X” replaced his miniature laboratory, and shed the army captain’s uniform. He stripped the makeup from his face; with swift precision began to create a new disguise. Beneath his skillful fingers an inconspicuous-looking young man emerged—a man with a smooth-shaven face and sandy hair; a man who carried the cards of H. Martin, Associated Press reporter. He had credentials, travelers’ checks.

  He left his hideout and went to a “drive-yourself” garage, hired a smart roadster with a roomy compartment in the rumble seat. He sped along the night-shrouded streets of Washington, eyes bleakly alert.

  It was nearly midnight now. A chill drizzle still fell. Lowering clouds hung low over the city. Danger seemed to lurk in the darkness.

  He followed Massachusetts Avenue to Stanton Square. He cut into Maryland Avenu
e, circled the Capitol grounds, then headed down Delaware Avenue toward that point of land bordered by Washington Channel on one side and Anacostia River on the other.

  Ahead of him was the Army War College, but he stopped before he reached it, turning into a dark, nondescript side street. Here, within a half-mile of the War College, was a place known to “X” as a hotbed of espionage. Perhaps spies chose this spot because it was close to some of America’s military secrets, past and present. Perhaps it was to keep an eye on the men at Uncle Sam’s fighting college.

  Agent “X” did not know. But he knew that at a certain address in this dark, badly lighted street was a clearing house for spy information. Here a sinister personage conducted a sinister traffic. Here secrets for which men risked their lives and women risked their honor were bought and sold. Here dwelt a man who was a veteran operative of espionage.

  Agent “X” had long known of his existence. So had men of the D.C.I., but they did not know his address and “X” did. He had long hoped that this knowledge might prove useful. Now the time had come to test it.

  He parked his roadster a block away, proceeding along the dark street as silently as a shadow. The house he sought was a wooden, three-story affair. He saw it looming darkly, no lights in its windows, something unprepossessing about its misshapen lines.

  Its infamous occupant had apparently gone to bed. But one could never be sure—not with the man who used the business name of Michael Renfew. He was as cunning as a fox, as spineless as a rabbit, except—

  Agent “X” knew Renfew’s character. The man was an espionage merchant. His own active days were over. He was a coward at heart, but a sly, sneaking jackal of a man; and a man still to be feared.

  The Agent didn’t go to the front door. He went to the rear of the house, creeping along its side, moving like a wraith. At the rear door he took out his tool kit again. Never had he been so careful as now. A man like Renfew would have ears that would detect any sound. His dangerous work would make him fear for his life. He would take means to safeguard it.

  The Agent, before he opened the rear door, took a small metal disc from his pocket. He drew from its side a ribbon of gleaming copper that was like a measuring tape. But it had no numbers on it. It served another purpose.

  He thrust one end of it in the moist, rain-wet earth. With a thin tool like a knife blade he probed cautiously around the door’s edge till he heard the faint scrape of metal. There he wedged the knife blade. He attached his metal disc to it, and opened the door.

  By doing this he had disconnected an ingenious burglar alarm, which operated on a broken circuit when the door was open. Agent “X” had seen to it that the circuit remained unbroken.

  He entered the house and closed the door after him. He took off his shoes, laid them on the floor, and moved forward on his stocking feet.

  Was it possible that Michael Renfew was not at home? Agent “X” planned to see—and wait for him if he wasn’t.

  A second door he came to was closed. With the caution of a man whose dangerous life had taught him eternal vigilance, Agent “X” explored this also.

  HE found two tiny electric wires, hardly larger than threads, running along the frame. The door had an alarm system, too. He scraped the insulation from the wires, connected them with a small piece from his own pocket, and opened this door. He was convinced now that the spy was at home.

  A flight of stairs that had a tendency to creak gave him trouble. Once he paused, thinking he heard movement above. Then he continued upward, stepping on the sides of the stair boards to prevent movement.

  He came at last to the door of a bedroom, closed like the others. It was many minutes before he found means to open it, found the location of the last electric alarm. There wasn’t a burglar alive who could have entered that house without waking the tenant. But Secret Agent “X” was no burglar.

  An old-fashioned four-poster bed was in the room. A man was sleeping in it. So silently had the Agent approached, so trustful was the man of his alarm system that the Agent crept to the bed and bent over the sleeper and still the man slept on. The Agent clicked on his tiny flashlight, then leaned forward to wake the sleeper.

  As he did so Renfew stirred. He was a gaunt, wizened man with a bald head and a face as wrinkled and leathery as a turkey buzzard’s. He opened his little eyes, gave a sudden scream of fear.

  Quick as a striking snake his hand reached out toward a cord beside his bed. He yanked it, and in the same instant Agent “X” leaped forward, sprawling across the bed. As he did so the floor beside the bed where he had been standing a second before dropped away. A trapdoor fell downward, a yawning black hole leading all the way to the cellar opened up. How many people visiting Renfew had taken this terrible plunge?

  “X” grasped the wrinkled spy’s body, held him fast by the arms, while his eyes glared into Renfew’s.

  The spy screamed again, and the Agent shook him as a terrier would shake a rat.

  “Silence,” he ordered, and his strangely compelling voice seemed to affect Renfew like a blow. The spy lay back gasping.

  “Who are you,” he croaked, at last. “Don’t kill me. I have nothing!”

  The Agent had drawn a gun from his pocket. It was a gun that fired only a small charge of anesthetizing gas, but Renfew didn’t know that. The muzzle of the gun was pressed against his chest.

  “Get up,” said the Agent, “and get dressed.”

  “Who are you? What do you want?” the man repeated.

  “Never mind! Get up!”

  “X” moved across the bed to the other side, avoiding the black pit left by the trapdoor. He kept his eyes fixed on Renfew, alert for tricks. He kept his gun against the spy’s body. He pulled the cord of a small electric bulb, flooding the room with light.

  Renfew stared at him with glittering eyes. His face showed no recognition. The Agent’s disguise was a perfect blind. He took his press card from his pocket, held it before Renfew’s face.

  “A newspaper reporter,” the spy gasped. Then his eyes became crafty. “Perhaps we can make a deal. There is no need for violence.”

  Remembering the trapdoor, “X’s” eyes grew steel hard. “A broken neck is rather violent,” he said harshly.

  “I thought you were a burglar,” said Renfew.

  “Dress and come with me,” was the Agent’s order.

  “You are a fraud,” screamed Renfew suddenly. “You are not a press reporter. You are going to kill me.”

  “Not if you obey my orders,” said the Agent. “Otherwise—” He gave the spy a jab with the muzzle of his gun.

  WITH trembling arms Renfew began to dress. There was something inhuman about the dryness of his face. He had the complexion of a mummy, but the eyes were wickedly alive. “X” wished he could turn the man over to the police. But that could not be done now. He must use Renfew’s establishment and Renfew’s reputation.

  When the spy had dressed, “X” motioned toward the door.

  “I am leaving,” he said. “And you are coming with me. Make any move to escape and—” Again he gave the man a vicious jab with his gun.

  Keeping his light switched on, he pushed Renfew ahead of him down the dark stairs. The man’s voice shook with terror as he asked a question.

  “The alarms—how did you get through them?” His eyes rolled back toward Agent “X.” He looked with awe into the steady, steely gaze of the Agent. “X” did not reply and Renfew seemed to wilt, sensing that he was in the power of a man who possessed supernatural powers.

  “X” pushed Renfew out into the night, keeping a grip on his arm. He held the muzzle of his gun close as they moved along the street. When he came to the spot where his car was parked he made Renfew get into it. In silence he drove off.

  The spy’s face had gone a sickly white now. The paleness of his complexion, overlaid with its network of wrinkles, was hideous. He kept glancing sidewise at “X.”

  Agent “X” drove quickly, plunging along the dark quiet streets. The city seem
ed to have gone to bed. Once the whistle of a patrolling cop shrilled at “X” to slow down, but he sped on.

  Not until he came to his hideout did he stop. Then he took a firm grip on Renfew’s arm. He pressed his gas gun close to the left side of Renfew’s body.

  “Quiet!” he warned.

  Renfew moved forward shivering.

  “X” had a key. He entered and went into his small furnished apartment without anyone seeing them. Renfew stood trembling, his eyes darting about, as though not knowing what strange thing to suspect.

  “Sit down,” said “X” suddenly, and pushed Renfew into a chair. He turned then and locked the door. The spy sat shaking, looking up at him like a cornered rat.

  “I know all about your work,” said “X.” “I know that you sell Government secrets as other men sell merchandise. I know that you are loyal to no country in the world, but give what you have to the highest bidder.”

  The Agent stopped speaking, took a wallet from his pocket. From it he drew a huge sheaf of bills. There were notes written in four numerals on the top, many others in three. Renfew’s eyes bulged. Greed took the place of fear. He licked his lips, then smiled.

  “Perhaps we can make a deal yet,” he said.

  “Perhaps,” said the Agent. “What great secret was stolen from America within the past twenty-four hours?”

  Renfew was silent a moment, his eyes stabbing the Agent’s. He began to fence.

  “Many rumors have come to me.”

  “One thing—more important than any,” said “X.”

  “Perhaps the building of the new D10 submarines,” said Renfew. “I have been offered—”

  “No,” said “X” harshly. He held a thousand-dollar bill forward, watching Renfew’s face fixedly.

  “I’ll give you this as a down payment if you tell me what I want to know.”

  Renfew’s eyes stared avidly at the bill. His lips moved again.

  “Perhaps the secret commercial treaty with—”

  “X” stuffed the bill in his pocket “You do not know,” he said. He was convinced of it. News of the stolen Browning plans hadn’t reached Renfew’s ears as yet.