by Otto Penzler
Traile gravely shook his head.
“Eric is a prisoner, and I’m going to save him if it’s humanly possible. Yen Sin will think he’s safe now. He’ll hide out for a day or two to make sure, and then shift to some base in New York. He won’t give up this mysterious scheme of his, you can bank on that.”
“I believe you’re right,” Allen said quickly. “He wouldn’t have built up that group of Gray Men and all his spy system, unless he was after something big.”
“Today’s events, with that desperate business about the Golden Skull, prove that.” Traile gazed soberly across the water toward the distant skyline of Manhattan. “Allen, I’ve a feeling that we haven’t heard the last of the Chuen Gin Lou.”
Chapter 11
The Hong Kong Chest
Outside the Q-Station, purple dusk was settling over the city, but within Michael Traile’s heavily curtained den the lights were blazing. Traile stood before the wall map of Greater New York, his eyes on the area known as Chinatown. There was weariness in the pose of his tall figure. The bronze of his face had paled somewhat from long hours spent indoors.
He turned restlessly, went into the adjoining room. His glance passed over Eric Gordon’s bed, and the sad look in his eyes deepened. It had been four days since Eric had vanished as a prisoner of Doctor Yen Sin. He slid back the panel which covered the special telephone system that Eric had installed. One of the lines was a direct wire to his contact officer at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. He plugged the connection.
“Q-four,” he said, when a voice answered. “Any further report from the patrol?”
“Not a thing, sir,” the officer replied. “I’m afraid they got away.”
“Hold to the same schedule,” said Traile. He disconnected, was about to make another call when his door buzzer rasped. He went to the vestibule, glanced up at the mirror which was placed to show whoever was outside. It was Allen.
“I was about to call you,” he said as he admitted the F.B.I. man. A hopeful look replaced his weariness as he saw the excited expression on the lanky agent’s face. “What’s happened?” he asked.
“It’s not about Eric, I’m sorry to say,” Allen responded. “But I’ll bet my shirt it’s connected with Yen Sin.”
Traile closed the steel-backed door. Allen was hastily taking an X-ray film from a large manila envelope.
“It’s got me going in circles,” he exclaimed. “This was just one of several routine jobs done in the last three days. It was an exposure made of an ordinary document we suspected of being a forgery. But here’s what we found!”
He lifted the shade from a table lamp and held the film close to the light. Traile leaned down, stared at the X-ray picture. The typewritten words of the document stood out clearly against a blurred but terrible background. A diabolical face looked out from behind the legal lettering, a face like some hideous thing seen in a nightmare. It had no ears, and its lips were stretched wide so that the teeth showed from jaw to jaw. The eyes were two slits of staring horror, and the lower part of the nose had been cut away.
“Good Heaven!” Traile whispered.
“I damn near fell out of my chair when I saw it,” Allen said. “Then I realized it was a picture of some poor guy that had been tortured. Right away I thought of Doctor Yen Sin—”
He started, for Traile had snatched the film and was bending over it feverishly.
“I got men after the bird we think forged it,” he began, but Traile cut him short.
“We’ll have to go to your office! My microscope outfit is in Washington.”
“But what’s the idea?” said Allen, blankly.
Without answering, Traile held the film almost against the lamp. The face was still blurred, and the close-spaced lines of the document obscured much of the detail, but he could catch the general effect. The cheeks were shrunken, and the emptiness of the eyes was more horrible than it had seemed at first. The forehead, where the legal writing did not cover it, was marked with a mass of tiny blurred scratches or cuts, suggestive of slow, deliberate torture.
“Hellish!” Traile muttered as he straightened up. “Only one man in the world would ever have thought of it.”
“What I don’t see,” said Allen, “is why or how it was ever printed on that paper. It must have been done with invisible ink, of course, but what idea could they—”
—
He stopped as Traile laid down the film and went rummaging through a pile of newspaper clippings on his desk. In a moment Traile returned with the photograph of a gaunt, elderly man. He penciled the eyes to a solid blackness, blocked out the ears and altered the mouth and nose. As he held it up beside the film, Allen jumped. Then he stared at the name under the photograph.
“Holy mackerel! It’s John J. Meredith—the broker who disappeared two weeks ago.”
Traile’s dark eyes held a strange light.
“It’s part of the answer, Allen! We should have seen it before.”
He put the film and the clipping into the envelope.
“Look here,” said Allen aggrievedly, “if you’ve figured out something, you might—”
They both turned at the sound of the buzzer. Traile stepped to the door, glanced up at the angled mirror. With a puzzled look, he beckoned to Allen. The F.B.I. man stared up into the glass. The reflection showed a tall Hong Kong chest, beautifully carved, standing on end just outside the door. There was no one in sight.
“How many people know about that X-ray?” Traile whispered.
“Only myself and Griel—the assistant lab man who took Stone’s place,” Allen replied. “But why?”
“It couldn’t be that, then,” Traile said, as though to himself. He pushed a wall-switch button, and a bright light outside shone down on the carved chest. Several Chinese characters, painted on the lid, were at once discernible. The mirror reversed them, and it took Traile a few seconds to read the short inscription. Suddenly he turned pale, sprang to unlock the door.
“Watch your step,” Allen said tensely. “It may be a trick to bump you off.”
But Traile heedlessly ran out, and with shaking hands unfastened the brass clamps of the long lid. It swung open like a door. A broken cry came to his lips as he looked inside. Within the chest was a stiffened form, held upright by three web belts. And the white, waxen face which showed in the light was the face of Eric Gordon!
“My God!” groaned Allen. “They’ve killed him.”
Traile, after his first short cry, made no other sound. He reached out one hand, touched the pale cheek of that pitiful figure. It was as cold as marble. Like a man in a stupor, he turned to Allen.
“We must—take him—inside,” he said dully.
They closed the lid, laid the chest flat, and then carried it into the second room. Without a word, Traile unfastened the belts. He shook his head as Allen bent to help him. Unaided, he lifted Eric’s body and laid it upon the bed. For more than a minute he stood looking down at the cold white face.
“Eric!” he whispered. “Eric….”
Allen’s eyes blurred. But after a moment he touched Traile’s arm.
“You can’t let it get you like this. He wouldn’t want you to—” He stopped, pointed down. “Look, there’s something in his left hand.”
—
Traile gently pried apart the stiff fingers. The object was a small glass bottle with a paper rolled up inside. He removed the paper, saw that it was a message in Chinese. Dull anger, then a sudden wild hope, came into his eyes as he read. He whirled toward the den. Allen followed, stared in amazement as Traile switched on his microwave set and fumbled with the dial.
“What’s up?” he asked in a startled voice, but the taller man was now springing to the window. A few minutes after Traile threw back the heavy curtains, a low hum became audible from the miniature radio. Then a mocking voice spoke.
“I am sorry, Mr. Traile, to have caused you these moments of grief.”
Traile’s face was stony, but Allen flushed with rage.
&
nbsp; “It’s Yen Sin!” he rasped.
Traile motioned him to keep silent.
“You will tilt your desk lamp so that it shines directly on your face,” the voice of the Yellow Doctor went on silkily. Then, as Traile obeyed, “That is better…stand back a little farther, if you please.”
“For God’s sake, Traile, are you crazy?” Allen burst out “He’ll kill you!”
“The glass is bulletproof,” Traile muttered over his shoulder.
“Keep your face toward the window,” came the sharpened accents of Doctor Yen Sin. “And for Mr. Allen’s benefit, it will do no good to take a bearing on this station. It will be moved within five minutes.”
Allen let out an explosive gasp. There was a pause, then the suave voice continued.
“As you probably have guessed, Mr. Traile, you are being observed through binoculars. The observer is a lip-reader. You will enunciate clearly to avoid mistake.”
“I understand,” Traile said bitterly. “What are your conditions for reviving Eric Gordon?”
There was another pause.
“He is alive now,” was the Crime Emperor’s calm reply. “However, he is in a state of completely suspended animation, and I am the only one who can restore his normal functions. I warn you, if you attempt to use adrenalin or a similar preparation, it will kill him instantly.”
“What are your conditions?” Traile repeated, this time harshly.
Again there was a pause, evidently while the lip-reader relayed his query.
“Your agreement to surrender yourself unarmed, alone, within an hour,” answered Doctor Yen Sin. “The proper drug will then be delivered to any surgeon you designate. It is simply a matter of an intravenous injection.”
“I agree,” Traile said grimly. He waved Allen back as the agent frantically tried to protest.
He could hear the hiss of the Yellow Doctor’s indrawn breath.
“I accept your word,” Yen Sin spoke rapidly. “It is now almost eight o’clock. You will leave the building exactly at eight. A private car will draw up at the Forty-eighth Street entrance, and the chauffeur will address you as ‘Mr. Scott’—in keeping with your present role. You will enter. He will take you to another location, where one of my agents will give you further instructions. If there is any attempt to have yourself followed, or any variation from this order, your young companion will never awaken.”
“I have your sworn word that you’ll send the drug?” Traile demanded.
“You have,” said the Yellow Doctor, “on condition that you are my—guest—by nine o’clock.”
—
The miniature radio became silent. As Traile stepped out of the glare of light by the window, Allen made a helpless gesture.
“I think you’ve lost your senses. Eric couldn’t be alive. Yen Sin’s lying just to get you in his power.”
Traile went past him, into the room where Eric Gordon lay. He knelt, felt for a heartbeat, then held a small mirror to Eric’s nostrils.
“You see?” Allen said. “There’s not a sign of life.”
“That doesn’t mean anything,” Traile answered. “I’ve seen a Hindu miracle man go into a similar trance and let himself be buried alive for two weeks. But I never could learn what drug he took, or what they used to revive him.”
“You can’t go through with this,” Allen persisted desperately, as Traile took off his shoulder harness. “It’s suicide.”
Traile looked down at Eric’s pallid face while he put on his coat.
“If I don’t, it will be murder.” He turned abruptly and went into the other room. At the door he paused, looked sharply at the Federal man. “No rush call to your men, to try to have me followed. Until Eric is revived I’m holding you also to the promise I made Yen Sin.”
Allen’s face was a picture of misery.
“Damn it, I can’t let you go, knowing what—”
“You’ll help me by staying here with Eric,” Traile broke in. “After eight o’clock, call the best doctor you know and have him waiting.”
He put out his hand. Allen gripped it, swore helplessly. Traile went to the elevator. He rang, and the car came up. He went down to the lobby, was almost at the Forty-eighth Street side when he remembered about the X-ray film. He had intended to tell Allen. He hesitated, but already the clock was striking eight.
He turned and went on out. A long black car was sliding up to the curb. It was, he thought with grim humor, vaguely like a hearse.
Chapter 12
The Room of the Dolls
In the dimly-lighted chamber which contained the talking Buddha, a panel had silently opened. Doctor Yen Sin paused in the aperture, spoke in Mandarin dialect to someone in the passage behind him.
“I have finished with him. Prepare the scene as I directed earlier, so that it will make the proper impression upon our friends.”
“Tche, Master,” the other man answered hastily.
The Yellow Doctor stepped into the room, and the panel closed behind him. He paused, glanced impassively at the clock, then began to remove the long rubber gloves which covered his hands. There was blood on the tips, and in place of his usual embroidered robes he wore a jacket similar to a surgeon’s operating gown, save that it was shorter and was decorated with silken braid.
He laid the gloves aside, was about to remove the surgical gown, when the eyes of the Buddha glowed with white light. Impatiently, he touched a long-nailed finger to a button on the table before him.
“I ordered that all routine reports were to be received by Kang Fu.”
“This is an emergency, Master,” the half-caste’s anxious voice came from the idol. “I believe the man Traile is trying to betray you in spite of his promise.”
The Crime Emperor gazed fixedly at the Buddha.
“Condensed report,” he directed.
“Followed instructions at his hotel and while being transferred,” Kang Fu said hurriedly. “Met Agent Eighty-five at Position E, entered car with her, apparently not followed. No police or Federal men seen on arrival of car outside the Black Dragon, but on descending to the lower floor he was immediately noted by three men, one now identified as Department of Justice operative. The three men have stationed themselves in position to relay signals. One is watching Traile, another is on the balcony, and the third at a window on the rear court.”
“Where are Traile and Agent Eighty-five now?” the Yellow Doctor inquired.
“Near the roulette table in the Lotus Room,” replied the Eurasian. “Agent Eighty-five was signaled to delay until further instructions.”
Doctor Yen Sin turned and looked at the diagram painted on the opposite wall.
“It is a simple problem.” He rapidly gave instructions, adding: “Allow ten minutes for Group Seven to get placed. Also, make arrangements to escort Citizens Five and Eight by one of the other entrances instead of through the Black Dragon.”
“Citizen Five has already been admitted,” came the reply from the Buddha. “He arrived early, and was taken to the usual room.”
“Very well, proceed with your orders,” directed Doctor Yen Sin.
—
The light faded from the eyes of the idol. The Crime Emperor gazed down with a thoughtful look on his saffron face. Then with sudden decision, he crossed to the Dictaphone under the painted diagram. He inserted a plug, and one of the lights on the diagram flickered.
“Advise Citizen Five that I will speak with him,” Doctor Yen Sin said coldly.
“But, Master, he has not yet arrived,” was the quick answer.
The Yellow Doctor stiffened.
“He was admitted some time ago, through Entrance Three?”
“Something must be wrong, Master,” the unseen man replied in alarm. “The Frenchman, Lecoste, went to escort him here, twenty minutes ago, but they did not return. I wondered at his being so early—”
The word was broken as Yen Sin snatched the plug from its socket. With a look of rage, the Crime Emperor whirled to the Buddha. He jabbed a bu
tton, spoke fiercely in Chinese, then slid open the hidden panel and hurried into the passage. A few seconds later a similar panel opened in one side of a small octagonal room. The section which the Yellow Doctor had entered was almost in darkness. A partition had been built across the center of the room, almost touching the walls on both sides. Back of it was a heavy chair, placed so that the occupant could easily see through the special black glass in the middle of the partition, and yet be invisible from the other side. A microphone and several switches were mounted on a small shelf just under the rectangular black glass.
Yen Sin hurriedly passed through the narrow space between the left side of the partition and the wall. A light shone down on the other half of the octagonal room, revealing three glass panels which formed a bay at the front. The panel at the left had been partly slid back into a niche in the wall. Beyond the three panels a long room with a table and chairs was visible. A ceremonial pedestal stood just inside the center panel.
After one furious glance at the opened section. Doctor Yen Sin turned swiftly toward the front of the partition. Directly under the rectangle of black glass was a cabinet about three feet square. It was almost filled with hideous-faced masculine dolls. There were two rows of them, all dressed in men’s attire, like ugly little puppets in some wholly male farce.
On the upper shelf, between the third and fifth doll, was an empty space. Where the fourth puppet had been, two insulated wires had been neatly clipped. As the Yellow Doctor saw the space and the severed wires, a murderous flame blazed up in his tawny eyes. He went to the side of the partition, stepped back of it to where the microphone stood. One talonlike hand raked at a switch.
“Kang Fu!” he rasped out.
“Yes, Master!” came the frightened half-caste’s answer.
“Warn all searching parties!” the Yellow Doctor snarled. “Citizen Five and Lecoste have stolen one of the dolls!”
—
In the softly-lighted Lotus Room, under the ornate restaurant known as the Black Dragon, Michael Traile stood coolly waiting. From the moment he had entered with Iris Vaughan, he had been aware of furtive movements among the group of men and women who filled the room. The wooden-faced croupier at the roulette table, a German by his appearance, was watching him from the corner of his eye.
