Secret Agent “X” – The Complete Series Volume 2

by Paul Chadwick

  The door opened in answer to his invitation, and the Princess Ar-Lassi walked in. There was a mocking smile on her face. She carried a handbag under her arm.

  “X” could tell from the expressions of astonishment on the faces of the four men that they had not known she was on the grounds.

  Rice recovered first, and bowed. “This is a pleasure, princess,” he murmured. “I didn’t know—”

  Hanscom interrupted him, scowling. “How did you get here? I thought you were at the Clayton!”

  The princess uttered a low laugh. She came a couple of steps farther into the room. “There was nothing to keep me at the Clayton, since my fiancée—left. So I came here. I wish to have a little talk with you four gentlemen.”

  Chapter XIV

  Adventuress

  “X” saw that Rice was almost imperceptibly edging toward the desk in the corner, while he said, masking his uneasiness with a cloak of courtesy, “It is always a pleasure to talk to a beautiful woman. I, for one, am at your service.”

  Hanscom and Thane were also uneasy, the Secret Agent saw, while Gates, the utility man stared from one to the other of them, and then at the princess, while he fidgeted nervously. There was something tense about the princess, something electric, that made these men realize she had not just come in to chat about the weather.

  Hanscom rolled the cigar to a corner of his mouth, asked, “What do you want, lady?”

  The Princess Ar-Lassi smiled sweetly at them all inclusively. It appeared she had shed her accent for good, for she said: “You’ll be surprised at what I want, Mr. Hanscom. I want a hundred thousand dollars—in cash!”

  Hanscom’s face grew apoplectic. He exploded: “What!”

  Thane started to laugh, while Gates looked bewildered. Only Rice did not seem surprised. In his face “X” saw a dawning comprehension.

  The princess nodded. “A hundred thousand dollars. You can have Mr. Gates, there, take it out of one of his slush funds. It’ll never be missed. And you can be thankful I am so modest in my demands!”

  Rice allowed himself a thin smile. “Perhaps you will tell us, princess, why you think we are going to give you a hundred thousand dollars?”

  “Of course I’ll tell you. I thought you knew. You’re going to give me that money so that I’ll feel well disposed toward you; so that I won’t talk about—things!”

  Thane said coldly, “Are you trying to blackmail us, princess? You—the fiancée of the governor-elect?”

  She shrugged. “You should know better than anyone, Senator Thane, that I will never be able to marry the—governor-elect!”

  “What—what do you mean?” Thane became blustery. “Are you insinuating—”

  “That you have been planning to murder my—fiancée! You hired Killer Kyle to do it. Don’t deny it. Kyle is right here on the estate now.”

  Hanscom heaved his heavy body in the chair, and tried to bluff. “You’re crazy!” he cried. “Go and tell the newspapers; go and tell everybody. Let them come here and look. They’ll find nothing.”

  “Of course not, Mr. Hanscom. By that time you’ll have got rid of the evidence—that bullet-riddled hearse, for instance. But there are things you can’t get rid of. Suppose I went to Mr. Linton, of the Liberal Party, and told him that Judge Farrell—”

  Rice cried out, “Stop! Never mention that!”

  Her eyes glowed. “Now, I think, we understand each other. You are ruthless, unscrupulous men, working for power—power that almost slipped out of your fingers last week—power that may be wrested from your hands tomorrow, tonight, if you are not careful. And you may lose more—you may lose your lives—the way Michael Crome lost his!

  “How would you like to have your bodies swell up—you, and you, and you,” she indicated Rice, Hanscom, Gates, in turn, “the way Crome’s did, until your throats are closed and you can breathe no longer! That is your danger!”

  Gates had gone white while she talked. Now he gasped, cried weakly, “Enough! Enough! Let’s give her the money. Anything! Only stop her! Stop her!”

  Hanscom growled at him, “Shut up!”

  Rice’s lips curled in scorn. “I’ll stop her! The way I stop them all when they talk too much!” He slipped open a drawer of the desk, and put out his hand for the gun that lay there.

  But the princess was quicker than he. Her handbag snapped open, and her ugly black automatic appeared in her hand, pointing at Rice.

  “Close that drawer!” she ordered. “And leave the gun in it!”

  Rice swore under his breath, and obeyed.

  The princess now swung the gun so that it menaced everybody in the room.

  “X” knew that she was dangerous, ruthless, cruel, as she stood there with narrowed eyes behind the automatic. He remained motionless, allowing the strange play to go on in the hope of learning more from the excited, unguarded reactions of these people.

  THE princess said, “Rice, I could kill you now, and it would be self-defense. These men can testify that you went for your gun.”

  “You’re crazy!” Rice snarled. “Why should they testify to that? They’re my friends!”

  “Your friends? They are also the—governor-elect’s friends. You are his friend. Yet you hired Kyle to kill him. Just so, they would be glad to see me kill you. Senator Thane would become acting governor; Hanscom would be rid of a blundering fool; Gates doesn’t care as long as he can get his bills through the legislature—and anyway, he’s scared of his shadow; he’d fall in line.”

  Rice’s face had become ashen. He said nothing, watched her in silence.

  She went on. “But I am interested in only one thing—I want to get as much out of this as I can. Frankly, I don’t care who is governor. I don’t care if you finally eliminate—Farrell. I’ll keep my hands off—I’ll even help you—if I get one hundred thousand dollars! Perhaps,” she leaned forward as she spoke the next words, “I would even tell you where to find the body of—”

  “God! Stop!” Gates blurted. “Don’t say it! The walls may have ears!”

  Secret Agent “X” stiffened. Whose body had she meant? Was it the governor-elect’s? It could hardly be, from the tenor of the previous conversation. Had there been another murder, as yet unreported? Was the body being held over the heads of these men as a club, a menace?

  “X” began to feel that the key to the sinister mystery that lay over this place was in the hands of no one person; that each held a thread of clue. That there were dark cross-currents of greed, of desire for power, of hate, all working against each other.

  He was piecing together things he had heard so far, things he had seen; but he was no nearer a solution than when he had set out to drag information from Kyle. In fact, the more he learned, the more confusing it seemed. This missing body that the princess had mentioned was a factor he had not been aware of at all.

  He set himself to listen more closely, in the hope of catching a further clue from an inflection of voice, from an unguarded remark. And suddenly he stiffened. The door behind the princess was slowly opening as she spoke. Engaged as she was, in holding the four men at bay with her automatic, she did not hear it.

  But Rice saw the door move, and said nothing. “X” could tell when Hanscom and Thane noticed it, for they both started perceptibly, then, studiously tried to appear natural. Gates was too nervous to notice anything.

  In the narrow opening of the door appeared the ugly face of Fleer. He stared into the room, as if not thoroughly comprehending the situation.

  Rice gave him his cue. He said to the woman, “We are all helpless while you threaten us with that gun, princess.” He spoke very loud, looking at the part of Fleer’s face that showed in the open crack of the door.

  Fleer took the cue. He pushed the door open noiselessly, crept up on the princess. She was saying, “You’d better decide quickly. There isn’t—”

  THAT was as far as she got. Fleer pounced upon her gun hand, and twisted it mercilessly, until she dropped the automatic, uttering an involuntary cry
of pain.

  Rice yanked open the drawer and snatched up the gun he had tried to get before. “Good work, Fleer,” he said, with a thin smile. “Stand away from her!”

  Fleer backed away.

  The princess stood silent, rubbing her wrist where the marks of Fleer’s hand showed.

  Rice said to her, “And now, princess, you see what a mistake it was to come here and threaten us. In this game you are only allowed one mistake.”

  Hanscom took the cigar out of his mouth, breathed a sigh of relief.

  Gates was silent, eyes wide, fidgeting nervously.

  Thane said, “What are we going to do with her?”

  “There is only one thing to do with her,” Rice answered. “The same thing we’re going to do with Kyle. We can’t afford—”

  Fleer interrupted him, excitedly. “Say, boss! That’s what I come to tell you! Kyle’s gone! He broke out of the coffin somehow, an’ knocked out Jurgen. He’s loose some place in the grounds, an’ he has Jurgen’s gun!”

  That announcement started a small panic in the room. Only the princess was cool.

  Gates turned viciously on Rice. “Well, what are you going to do now? You’ve been handling this whole thing in your own way. Do something. Don’t you realize that Kyle will be out for revenge? Who wouldn’t—after you were going to bury him alive. Do something, man!”

  Outside the window, the Secret Agent hugged the shadows. As soon as these men recovered from their panic they would hunt him like a dog throughout the grounds. Should he stay? He decided to remain.

  Thane was walking up and down in great perturbation. “After all,” he suddenly said, “Kyle has nothing against us. It’s Rice he’ll be after. Let Rice take care of himself!”

  Rice’s face grew a mottled purple. “Sure,” he shouted. “Let me do all the dirty work. Then let me take all the chances! It would suit you fine, Mr. Senator, wouldn’t it, if I passed out of the picture. Then you’d be next in line for the acting governorship!” He had temporarily forgotten the princess. He waved his gun wildly at Thane.

  Hanscom flung his cigar into a far corner. “Stop!” he thundered. “We can’t afford to have fighting among ourselves.” He shook a finger at Rice. “Remember that I’m still the boss of the party. I’ll take charge—”

  “You’ll take charge of nothing!” Rice snarled at him. “I’ve done all the dirty work, and I’m serving notice that from now on I’ll give the orders. Things are going to be done my way!”

  Hanscom restrained himself with an effort. “Is that so?” he inquired sweetly. “Well, Mister Rice, we’ll see about that. Others have tried that little game in the past. But,” he thrust his chin up at Rice, “John Hanscom is still the boss! And they are either dead or in jail who—”

  He stopped as Rice picked up the phone. “What are you doing now?”

  Rice spoke a number into the phone. “Rave on,” he said to Hanscom over his shoulder. “Me, I’m phoning the state troopers. Kyle is on the grounds. We can’t let him get away. I’m going to give the troopers orders to shoot on sight! There’ll be no chance for Kyle to talk this time!”

  He got his connection, and spoke swiftly into the phone, hung up.

  Hanscom settled back in his chair. “All right. We’ll arrange our own differences—more conveniently.”

  Chapter XV

  The Bloated Death

  THE Secret Agent had watched the scene with great interest, hoping to gain information from the dissension of the others.

  Now he gave thought to his own predicament. The troopers would be here in a short time. He would have to take cover, his usefulness might be ended. There was only one thing to do—precipitate matters. He had to find out where Farrell was, before something happened to him.

  Rice had put down the phone and was pointing to the balcony in the far corner of the room. This balcony was in shadow. He said to Fleer, “Take the princess up there. You’ll find rope in the pantry in the rear of the hall. Tie her up and put her on the balcony. It may be better for the troopers not to find her here.”

  The princess started to protest, when “X” opened the French window wide and stepped into the room.

  They all stopped as if turned to stone when they saw him.

  “X” had Jurgen’s gun, with which he covered them. “Put your gun down,” he ordered Rice.

  Rice had half turned from the desk at the sound of his entrance. Now he let the gun drop from shaking fingers, and exclaimed. “Kyle! Don’t shoot! Let’s talk this over!” His face had become ashen.

  Fleer crouched back in the shadows, his hand stealing toward his armpit. “X” snapped, “As you were, Fleer!”

  The little gunman straightened, let his empty hand drop to his side. His mouth was twitching, he was bracing himself as if expecting a bullet in his chest.

  “X” let his eyes rove over the others. Hanscom had his cigar half way to his mouth, seemed carved in that position. Gates was cowering in his chair, clutching the arms. Thane was cooler than the rest. There was a half-smile on his face, as if he were enjoying some secret joke.

  Suddenly the princess burst into laughter. “My rescuer!” she cried. “Mister Kyle, you couldn’t have come at a better moment. Do you know what they were going to do to me?” “X” acted the part of Kyle with consummate art. “Lay off!” he growled. He swung his gun so that it was pointing at Gates. He had picked the utility man as the weakest one in the room. “Where,” he demanded, “is Farrell? Talk fast, or—”

  Gates’s eyes widened in terror. “God! Don’t shoot! I don’t know. I tell you, I don’t know!”

  Hanscom started to rise. “Look here, Kyle, none of us were in favor of Rice’s program. You shouldn’t hold anything against—”

  And suddenly, in the middle of his sentence, he stopped talking.

  For, without warning, the room was plunged into darkness.

  “X” swung away from the spot where he had stood, in case any one should fire at him under cover of the darkness. But there was no shot; only a terrified cry from Gates, and then silence, as each one in the room realized that to make a noise might mean death.

  There was the sound of feet moving swiftly over the rug.

  “X” heard a strangled cry from the direction of the desk. “Aar-gh!” And after it the noise of a falling body, then of some one threshing on the floor.

  Then some one swished through the room, the door opened and closed swiftly, and there was silence once more in the room—silence except for the labored breathing of the occupants, and except for the agonized threshing of a body on the floor.

  The Secret Agent took out his pocket flashlight, and clicked it on. Its ray found first the face of Gates, who was still sitting in the chair, his face mirroring dreadful terror.

  It traveled then to Senator Thane, who stood, tense, with a gun in his hand. Thane blinked, and jerked his head away from the light.

  “X” swung his flash upward to the old-fashioned mantelpiece, on which stood a pair of ornate candelabra. He stepped toward it, took out a book of matches, and lit the three candles. The flame threw an eerie light over the room, and “X” turned to see the group of men eyeing him queerly.

  Thane looked around, exclaimed, “Where’s Rice? Where’s the princess!”

  Neither was there.

  Hanscom said, “Some one went out through that door. Maybe—”

  But Gates, who had been sitting where he had a view of the rear of the desk, suddenly raised his voice in a high-pitched scream, and pointed a shaking finger. “Rice—there’s Rice!”

  FLEER and Hanscom, who were nearest, dashed around, looked, and raised horror-struck eyes. Thane came more slowly, an eye still on “X.” The Secret Agent reached the desk at the same time as Thane, and they both looked at the twisted, bloated body of the man on the floor who had been Lieutenant Governor Alvin Rice not ten minutes ago.

  “God!” exclaimed Hanscom. “He died right under our eyes—in the dark. And that’s the way Mike Crome’s body looked when
they found it—swollen up just like that!”

  “X” stooped, touched the body. Rice was dead. Dead of strangulation due to the swelling of his throat. The sight was repulsive. His throat, his chin, the upper part of his chest, were swollen to twice their normal size. His collar had burst open, the tie had been forced loose by the pressure of swelling flesh. The agony of the death must have been excruciating. It was he they had heard threshing about on the floor.

  The Secret Agent stood up. He still held his gun. The others had not yet recovered from the horror of the thing they had just seen.

  Gates had gone altogether to pieces. He was whimpering, unstrung, shocked. “X” eyed him carefully, suspicious that his condition was a pose. Of course, everything pointed to the princess, since she was the only one who had fled. But it was just as possible that one of the men in the room had committed the murder.

  Fleer, also, was greatly shocked. He did not have the motive that the others had—that is, there was not the same apparent motive.

  Certainly, the others had had motive enough—Hanscom might have done it to eliminate a man who was proving a dangerous blunderer; Thane might have done it to ensure that he would have the governorship. Only Gates seemed incapable of having done it. If he was not acting, he was in a state of pure funk.

  The fact that the princess had run out, helped more or less to exculpate her in the Secret Agent’s mind. There had been no necessity for fleeing, if she was the murderess; she had only to drop the death-dealing instrument—whatever it was—on the floor, and remain in the room. That would have been the logical thing to do. There must have been some great, impelling motive that caused her to run out that way.

  As the Secret Agent surveyed every man in the room in turn, another possibility suggested itself to him—that some one had been hiding on the balcony. There had been ample time, in that period of darkness, for a man to come down from the balcony, deal death, and escape.

  Hanscom’s face had become a mottled gray. He said, “God, what a way to die! What is it? What bloats him like that?”

  Gates suddenly burst into a high, piping laugh. “Who’s next?” he shrieked. “Who’s next? Who’s next?”