The woman was stubborn, keeping her one defense — her lies. She shook her head again.
“I know that you are — fond of her. If I knew where she was — if I could save her — I would. Perhaps if you leave this house at once—”
“She is not here?”
“No.”
The Agent stood dumbly for a moment, baffled, heartsick, everything forgotten except Betty Dale’s danger. A hoarse, pleading note crept into his voice.
“You are a woman,” he said. “You would not want to see her die — with lead in her throat. You must tell me where she is — now, so that I can save her.”
Greta St. Clair rose, facing him, the look of fear in her dark eyes slowly being replaced by craft. Womanlike, she sensed suddenly that she had the man before her at a disadvantage.
THEN the Agent saw her glance swerve for an instant. It was only the barest movement; but, trained to miss nothing, he caught it. Every nerve in his body leaped into instant response. The brief shifting of her eyes was like a shrieking signal of death.
The Agent lunged sidewise, whirled. In the doorway back of where he stood, a man was framed — one of the men he had fought and left in the hallway outside. Even as the Agent turned, the man raised his hand. So quickly that it was only a shimmering, silver streak, the man hurled his knife.
In a split-second response of nerves and muscles that co-ordinated perfectly, the Agent dropped to his knees. He heard the doom whisper of the deadly blade pass his head. He heard a soft thud as the knife struck something in back of him. Then he heard a cry that he was destined never to forget. It was the cry of a human being in pain and terror — the cry of Greta St. Clair.
The man in the doorway gave a horrified exclamation. He lunged forward into the room, meeting a blast from the Agent’s gas pistol. And, as the man staggered back, the Agent turned toward the wall of the room once more.
Greta St. Clair had sunk to the divan again — but not in fear alone this time. The gleaming blade of the knife had pierced her dress. Its ugly handle was quivering to her gasping breaths. She was staring down at it with a look of dull horror.
He wondered that she lived at all. It seemed to have struck close to her heart. He dared not touch it, fearing that the slightest movement of the long blade would snuff out the spark of life that her steely will preserved. He leaped to her side, eased her gently back against the pillows. Crimson was staining her dress, spreading in a great ugly blot.
She looked up at him then, her eyes already glazed with approaching death. They seemed uncomprehending; but they turned from him to the man lying on the floor. She nodded slowly, as if answering in her own mind some strange question that had troubled her. The Agent spoke softly then.
“He did it! The knife meant for me — struck you.”
“And — I—am dying!” she breathed, in a whisper so low that he could hardly distinguish the words. Her head fell sidewise. For a moment he thought she had gone. But, tensely, feeling an icy dread that he was too late, he asked a question.
“Tell me. It can do no harm now! Where is Betty Dale?”
The woman opened her eyes with the languor of one who is close to sleep. They became fixed on the face of the Agent. They seemed to be searching, brushing away a fog that was obscuring their focus. Suddenly Greta St. Clair smiled. It was the smile that had once flashed on the silver screen, bringing Greta close to stardom. It was the tender smile of a woman who, for all her strange cruelty and ruthless ambition, can still feel human emotion. Slowly she nodded again, spoke so softly that it seemed the voice of a person already talking from another world.
“I know,” she said. “She loves you — and you—”
She could not finish the sentence. Pain brushed the smile away. She reached up, clasped the hilt of the knife. Close to her ears the Agent’s lips moved, almost like a man uttering a prayer.
“Where is she?”
Greta St. Clair’s lips moved in response. The sound that came from them was hardly speech. It was a ghostly whisper, faint, pain-racked.
“My — house!”
IT was the last sentence that Greta St. Clair was ever to utter. But for a moment her dark eyes opened again, and the faint smile softened her lips. Then she slipped sidewise, slowly on the pillows — slipped and remained staring off into space. Greta St. Clair was dead.
For a second only Agent “X” stared down at this woman who was not altogether bad. The answer that she had given with her last dying breath amazed him as much as her presence here had. It amazed him and sent him into action at the same time.
There was no sound anywhere in the big house. Greta St. Clair had apparently been its sole occupant. Now she, too, had joined the silence.
Grimly the Agent turned and strode from that room of death. Near the doorway into the hall he paused for one brief instant. A telephone stood on a small ebony table. The number written on it corresponded to the one he had heard the DOAC leader speak.
He passed down to the hallway by the other unconscious DOAC, lying still as death. Recklessly he opened the door to the street and raced down the steps. There might be other DOACs lurking outside. For the moment he did not care. His emotion was too great to think of any risk. Up the block he knew Jim Hobart was waiting. He turned and covered the pavement with long, quick strides.
Dusk was falling over Washington. The night seemed to speak of menace, evil, and the mystery that cloaked the disappearance of Betty Dale and the strange and hideous activity of the DOACs in America.
The Agent was breathing quickly. The evening air felt cold on his face, chilling through the plastic, flexible material of his disguise. He was almost running when he reached the coupé where Jim Hobart crouched over the wheel. The lanky operative stared at “X” anxiously, seeming to sense his inner turmoil.
“What is it, boss? Anything happen? Did you find the girl?”
The Agent shook his head, leaping into the car and edging Jim Hobart over as he took the wheel himself.
“No — but I know where she is. We’re going after her now.”
Chapter XX
A PLANE’S motor sounded muffled over Meadow Stream. A wide-winged shadow darted above the silver band of the river, veiled now in darkness. In two hours Jim Hobart and Agent “X” had made the trip from Washington in the fast two-place ship he had hired, replacing his own Blue Comet. For there must be no slip-up in the work ahead. He wanted help at hand.
The Agent made a skillful landing in a field almost opposite the penitentiary. The plane had scarcely taxied to a stop when the two men were climbing over the fuselage to the ground. They sprinted through pitch-dark woods, crossed the road to the high wall surrounding the St. Clair house.
The gate had been repaired and was now locked, but the Agent quickly inserted a skeleton key that gained them admittance to the grounds. They moved across the dark lawn, silent as wraiths, on guard against a surprise attack by any DOACs who might be lurking about.
The Agent felt a slight, unpleasant tingle along his scalp as he passed the spot where he’d seen the mangled bodies of Greta St. Clair’s guards.
His eyes were flashingly alert. The DOACs might have got in communication with others at Meadow Stream, warning them that “X” was on the way.
The big house was dark and bleak. There was no sign of life, but to “X” it stood there like a sinister monument of treachery. What lurked within? Were human fiends waiting in the pall of gloom for more torture victims? Was Betty Dale really here, or had Greta St Clair, in spite of her dying smile, given the Agent a false lead?