The man disguised as Doctor Vaughton spoke strangely then.
“I might have known Betty Dale would go where there was danger—and where she could be of service!”
The girl’s face drained of color. Amazement darkened her eyes as she stared into the face of the man beside her.
“I—I don’t understand! You know my name!”
Secret Agent “X” smiled. His fingers closed momentarily over hers.
“The Man of a Thousand Faces knows more than just your name. He knows that Betty Dale is one girl in a million—with the blood of her fighting father in her veins.”
The effect of his words upon Betty Dale was electric. Her lovely eyes dilated and the fingers holding the magazine in her lap trembled. Then her breath caught. The stranger had extended one finger and made a quick motion on the cover of the magazine. His finger tip had traced the outline of an invisible X.
Color flooded Betty Dale’s pale cheeks then. The conflict in her eyes, where hope had seemed to struggle with disbelief, gave way to a look of sheer happiness.
“I never dreamed!” she whispered. “You—you fooled me again!”
In the instant when the man beside her had revealed himself as Secret Agent “X,” Betty Dale’s glowing blue eyes and the deepened flush of her cheeks had betrayed an emotion she struggled to master.
For, though she had never to her knowledge seen his real face, Betty was one of the few people in the world who knew the details of the Secret Agent’s glamorous, amazing career. She was aware of his strange talents, sensed his dynamic power, and had proof of his courage. He had been a friend of her dead father’s, the father who had been a police captain, slain by gangster bullets. In her heart she scorned and hated criminals with the same intensity that drove Agent “X” again and again into danger against them.
And in her heart she loved this strange man. He made all other men seem tame and ordinary by comparison. That was perhaps why she had not married, why she had rejected a dozen proposals and had chosen to make her own career as a clever, talented newspaper woman—waiting, without quite admitting it to herself, for the time when Agent “X” would finish his battle against crime—and they might be more to one another than mere loyal friends.
In months past, her one thought had been to help him. She had kept her own emotions hidden lest they interfere with his dangerous, desperate work. She hid them now, and spoke composedly.
“Why are you going to Branford? Is there some crime there, also?”
“X” hesitated a moment. Then he spoke in the strange, enigmatic manner he often used.
“If the signs are true, there are wolves as well as apes behind the plague. If the signs are true, crime holds the high card in this game of death.”
Betty Dale’s slender fingers became tightly interlaced.
“You don’t mean—it can’t be—”
Agent “X” nodded. “But it is! Be careful, Betty. Say nothing of this to anyone—and keep your eyes open every instant. You understand?”
“Of course! Oh, how glad I am that I decided to come,” whispered the girl. “Something seemed to tell me— And now perhaps I can be of some help to you—”
She gave him the address of her aunt. He told her she could reach him at the Hotel Regis. Then, assuming again his role of Doctor Vaughton, “X” went back to his own seat as the train rolled on toward the city over which the spectral figure of Death kept ceaseless watch.
AGENT “X” was prepared for the greeting accorded Doctor Vaughton by the citizens of Branford. Otherwise it might have taken his breath away.
As the train pulled into the Branford terminal, he saw the gleaming instruments of a brass band. It was stationed just beyond tight lines of armed police that guarded the station platform to see that no one broke the quarantine by boarding the train. He saw, too, several cars filled with city-officials; and a sea of faces behind them—thousands of Branford’s citizens, eagerly awaiting a sight of the great doctor.
A group of Red Cross workers descended from the train first. They, too, were risking death to help combat the terrible malady, and their appearance was greeted with cheers. Then came Betty Dale, her slight, golden-haired young figure causing a ripple of question and comment among the onlookers. Lastly, Agent “X” in his remarkable disguise stepped to the platform.
At sight of him the cheers rose to a frenzy. The band broke into a lively military march. But, as Agent “X” approached, even the music was drowned out in a wild clamor of voices.
“Vaughton—Vaughton—Vaughton!”
A woman, tears streaming down her face, ran forward to kiss his hand. A man, overcome with emotion, grasped his arm. Doctor Traub’s publicity had taken effect. The people of Branford looked upon Doctor Vaughton as a human savior—a man who would lift the curse of the sleeping sickness from their loved ones.
Pale strained faces about him showed the ravages of fear, of restless nights, of worry. He was heavy-hearted as he looked about him. He was fighting for these people—but not as they believed. If they could pierce his disguise, their cheers would turn to fury. They would fall upon him, rend him limb from limb.
His mind raced as he was conducted through the quarantine lines to one of the official cars. Doctor Traub was there; the mayor of Branford; two of the commissioners. Other commissioners and a group of aldermen made up the retinue.
TRAUB stood up in the tonneau of the open car, pulled Agent “X” to his feet beside him. Traub’s hand was lifted, asking for silence. The band ceased playing. The multitude grew quiet. Traub’s voice boomed out.
“My friends and fellow citizens! We welcome today one who is to perform miracles in our midst. We welcome Doctor John Vaughton—the greatest living authority on sleeping sickness. He’ll have our sick cured in a few weeks, friends. We can rest easy now, knowing that the tide has turned—knowing that the black hordes of disease are about to be driven back by the white light of science.”
It was a pretty speech. The crowd broke into a wild tumult of acclaim. People cheered and wept. Children were raised to shoulders to get a glimpse of the great physician. The mayor shook “X’s” hand, moisture gleaming in his own eyes.
“Speak to them!” he cried. “Brace up their morale, doctor! Tell them you’re going to cure their sick families!”
Taut with the emotion that racked him, Agent “X” lifted his own hand in a gesture for silence. As he spoke into the tense hush that followed, he could not keep the hoarseness from his voice. Incomparable actor that he was, the blind faith of these poor souls affected him.
“I’ll do my best,” he said. “Go to your homes. Be patient. I will work for you body and soul.”
It was all he could say. Traub thumped his back. The mayor wrung his hand again. The people cheered.
When the cars turned toward city hall, the people followed, shouting and rejoicing. But it seemed to Agent “X” that the gaunt spectre of Death leered down sardonically from the skies above.
He was taken into the mayor’s office in the city hall. Traub and the commissioners and aldermen crowded around him.
“I want you to know, doctor,” said the mayor, “that we are all for you. We understand that the epidemic in this city is out of your line. We understand that you’re here partly if not wholly to bolster up the morale of our people; to keep them quiet until headway has been made. We appreciate that, and you’ll have our eternal gratitude for anything you can do.”
Traub spoke after the mayor. “You’ve got to keep on being a propagandist,” he said. “Don’t let the people know that you have any doubts. Let them think you’ve got a serum that will fix them up.”
Agent “X” pondered a moment. A mysterious gleam came into his eyes. A gambler always, he was about to make a gamble now. For a deep motive of his own, he was about to make an assertion that on its face was a falsehood, yet which held in it the elements of truth. He studied each face in the group around him. He spoke in a low, tense voice:
“Gentlemen, let us
hope the faith of your citizens in me is not altogether misplaced. I dared not wire ahead for fear I would be misquoted. But I have something almost worked out which will arrest if not cure the disease. Otherwise I would not have come at all.”
Cheers broke the startled silence that followed his words. Traub and the mayor pumped his hand once more. An alderman left to give the word to his family. Another stepped forward to beg Vaughton to visit his own home, where a case of sleeping sickness had developed.
“I’ve got to get my bearing first of all,” said “X.” “I want to try and trace the progress of the disease—to study its particular type and confer with the doctors at the institute.”
“A car and chauffeur are at your disposal, doctor,” said the mayor. “They will be yours while you are here—at your service day and night.”
“Thank you, gentlemen,” said Agent “X.” “If I may have the car at once, I’ll start going over the ground without further delay.”
He was conducted down the steps of city hall to a big black limousine from which a liveried chauffeur sprang with quick deference. “X” directed him to drive to the Regis Hotel. Here he deposited all of Doctor Vaughton’s luggage. It would be safe until, or if, the real Doctor Vaughton arrived.
Back in the car again. Agent “X” gave swift orders through tight lips.
“Drexel Institute first,” he said.
ALL that day Agent “X,” as Doctor Vaughton, gathered facts. Driving up and down the streets of the city, he got the names of each family which had been visited with sleeping sickness. These he noted down carefully in a small book he carried. He was especially careful to record the names of the wealthy, and the dates at which the malady had first broken out. In most cases these coincided. And all of the earlier cases had come as a result of an attack by gorillas.
At dusk he ordered his chauffeur to drive him back to the Hotel Regis. A banquet was to be given in his honor by officials of the city that evening. After it was over, “X” planned to change his disguise and mingle with the city’s poorer population.
Vronsky, the radical agitator, was a character who interested him. The man seemed to hold great power over the city’s labor unions. There was also Branford’s underworld to be explored. Here he might find the roots of the hideous crime plot.
His swift car swept through fast darkening streets. With the approach of night, nearly everyone in Branford retreated to their homes, closed doors and windows, and stayed inside. Fear of the gorillas still held sway.
A bridge over the river at a spot where it cut through the town loomed ahead. The river divided the city in half. Stores and the homes of the wealthy were on one side. On the other were factories and the jumbled crowded homes of workmen and their families. The uniformed chauffeur, aware of the importance of his position as driver for the great Doctor Vaughton, sat stiffly in his seat. The big closed car rumbled out on the bridge. And suddenly the Agent’s eyes focused ahead.
A truck was coming from the opposite end of the bridge. It was a high-bodied vehicle with huge tires and heavy bumpers. It seemed to be approaching at reckless speed. Dust and grime darkening its windshield hid the face of the driver. But Agent “X” tensed as he saw it come plunging on at a swift pace directly down the center of the narrow road.
His chauffeur honked, expecting the truck to give way. But the big vehicle roared on, hogging the middle. Agent “X” shouted a warning. The chauffeur wrenched the wheel, clamped down on the brakes. Tires screamed on the hard macadam. The limousine slewed over toward the concrete railing at the side of the bridge.
Then the left wheel and heavy bumper of the speeding truck struck the car a heavy, jarring blow. Agent “X” caught a brief glimpse of an evil, tense face peering down.
Concrete snapped like brittle glass. The limousine rocked crazily, twisted about, and reared up. Its heavy engine, jammed sidewise by the full weight of the truck, burst through the railing. End over end, its chauffeur crushed behind the wheel, the big car hurtled toward the sluggish black waters of the river below.
Chapter VII
A Ghastly Plot
THE catapulting limousine struck the surface of the river with a mighty splash. The water was deep here. The engine’s weight sent the car plunging to the bottom. Agent “X,” half-stunned by the shock of his crash against the car’s side, was fully aware of his peril as cold water gushed in through shattered glass.
Nose first, the limousine had plunged at least thirty feet and buried its hub caps in the river mud. A roar like a thousand waterfalls drummed in the Agent’s ears. Death’s icy fingers were clutching for him greedily. The river water rushing into the car’s front compressed the air in the space above till a giant vise seemed clamped on “X’s” lungs.
Leaning over the back of the front seat, he turned the beam of his pocket flashlight on the chauffeur. A ghastly sight was revealed. The steering gear, snapping in two, had pierced the man’s body. He must have died instantly.
“X” stood up. In the condensed air formed by the tonneau of the limousine his lungs were bursting. He could not tell whether the roar he heard was that made by the swirling black waters of the river or the surging of his own blood. He lashed out with his fist at one of the plate glass windows. His gloved hand, backed by the air pressure behind it, made the glass literally explode outward. Water filled the car and Agent “X” was sucked out and up in a geyser of foam and escaping air.
With powerful strokes of arms and legs he fought to the surface. He was encumbered by a baggy topcoat, but he was still able to swim. His head emerged above the water only long enough to draw in a deep lungful of fresh air. Then he ducked down again. If there were any watchers, they must not see him.
He was certain that this had been a deliberate attack. Some one had attempted the murder of Doctor Vaughton. The vicious maneuver of the heavy truck had given “X” visible and startling proof that he was at grips with some criminal organization.
There could be only one reason for wanting to murder the English doctor. Some one feared that his skill would stem the epidemic. Some one wanted the disease to spread.
As “X” swam swiftly to the bank of the river, his mind made a quick decision. He would let it appear that Vaughton had been killed. If the murderer felt he had succeeded in putting the Englishman out of the way, he would be less on guard.
The Secret Agent emerged momentarily under the shadow of an anchored barge, then swam from there to a group of dark pilings. He crawled cautiously out and plunged into the space between two warehouses.
There he paused, hearing shouts and cries of horror. People in a neighboring tenement must have seen the accident. They were running toward the river, risking the threat of gorillas and marauding mosquitoes. A moment later, a clanging ambulance approached the ramp leading to the bridge.
“X” stripped off his soggy topcoat and stuffed it far under the foundations of one of the warehouses. In the darkness his fingers moved swiftly, skillfully, removing the disguise of Doctor Vaughton. He whipped the white toupee off, stuffed it in his pocket.
HE was no longer an elderly doctor but a brown-haired young man. A few deft touches with makeup material from sealed waterproof tubes and his own appearance was changed. But he was still wet. He kept cautiously to the darkest streets as he went back to the hideout he had established on his previous visit to Branford.
There he quickly changed his dripping clothes for a dry blue serge suit. He still had Doctor Vaughton’s papers and the list of victims of sleeping sickness that he had collected during the afternoon in his role as Vaughton.
He studied the list carefully. He had marked two of the names with asterisks. The answers given him by these two had aroused his curiosity. Agent “X,” a close student of human nature, knew when people were trying to conceal something.
One of the two was Stephen Vorse, a rich merchant whose small daughter was one of the first to contract the dread disease. The child had been in a state of coma for weeks. And yet Stephen Vorse and
his wife had not seemed worried. They had not implored the supposed Doctor Vaughton for immediate help, as other distracted parents had done.
Why was this? Had they adjusted themselves to their daughter’s terrible malady—to her almost certain death? Or was there some other reason for their odd manner?
Another of Branford’s wealthier citizens had acted in the same way. Agent “X” in the role of Vaughton had planned to keep a sharp eye on these two families. He had, in fact, intended to return to the Vorse home directly after the banquet, before changing his disguise.
But, as a result of the grim incident of half an hour ago, there would be no banquet in honor of Doctor Vaughton. Agent “X” knew what consternation must now be reigning in the mayor’s home. And he realized heavily that fear would soon have the city in its grip again.
His lean jaw set. He still held an ace in the hole. If necessary, he could give a plausible explanation if it seemed expedient to have Vaughton appear again. His chauffeur had been killed. No one except the murderous driver of the truck could prove that Vaughton had been in the car.
But for the moment Agent “X” meant to let everyone believe that Vaughton had been killed. He had another disguise ready; another role thought out. Before his three-sided mirror he was already building a new make-up.
Transparent strips of adhesive drew the flesh back from his cheeks, giving his face a hatchet-thin appearance. More of his volatile material covered the tape. A gray toupee covered his brown hair. He had become a middle-aged, hawk-faced man. The blue serge suit lent an air of importance and efficiency.
The Agent selected a card from a hidden compartment of his suitcase—a card which certified him as a special representative of the governer. As a doctor of the State Sanitation Department he would steer clear of the suspicious Traub, use his card only to gain entrance to those homes he wished to visit.
He left the hideout and strode quickly down the street two blocks. There he hailed one of the few taxies still cruising the streets with windows closed to keep insects out. He gave the number of Stephen Vorse’s home. Once again the Man of a Thousand Faces was in action.
Secret Agent “X” – The Complete Series Volume 2 Page 5
