Agent “X” approached the door and examined it. But there was no lock. There was no keyhole on the inside. The old-fashioned bolt that shuttered the door offered a greater obstacle to the Agent than any modern lock mechanism could have done. All his detailed studies of tumblers were futile in the face of it. The fittings of the bolt were riveted to the door. The rivets’ heads came through to his side.
Given hours in which to work, he knew he could file these rivets off. But time was too precious. He had overheard the astoundingly cruel scheme that the head criminal had outlined. Knowing that their cards were almost played out, they would soon be leaving Branford; leaving terror and suffering behind them; leaving Betty Dale ill with a malady that no doctor could cure.
“X” could not tell how effective the serum injection he had received would be. He could not tell how much time there was left for him to work in. He must escape while his nerves and his muscles were still unimpeded by the onslaught of the disease, before the paralyzing coma of encephalitis disabled him. When that happened, he would be out of the running for a long time — perhaps forever.
He studied the door, his quick brain devising and discarding a dozen schemes. Suddenly his eyes brightened. He stared at the light bulb above his head. It hung three feet from the ceiling. If he jumped, he could reach it. And there above the bulb was wire. Wire — that was the one thing he needed.
With deft fingers he inserted his diamond-set bit into the socket of the tiny penlike tool. He measured the rivets of the outside bolt with his eyes, estimated the length of the bolt. Then he began drilling eight inches behind it on a line that was parallel.
Quickly, expertly, he worked. Strong alternating movements of his wrist and the teeth of the bit sank into the metal. Small curlicues of steel dropped away beneath it, fell to the floor. He kept a sharp ear out for footsteps in the corridor.
The steel of the door was nearly an inch thick. It took him ten breathless minutes to drill the hole behind the bolt.
Then he walked back to the center of the small room under the light. He leaped up, caught the wire above the bulb, yanked it from the ceiling. The room was plunged instantly in darkness. But he had his own small light for later use. Now he worked in the stuffy blackness; tearing off the insulation, drawing out slender copper strands.
At last he had a wire over two feet long. He brought the ends of this together, twisted till the double, foot-length wires had become as one, with a small loop left at the end.
He approached the door again, bent the wire carefully, thrust the loop through the hole he had drilled.
A minute of careful movement. The Agent manipulated the wire with deft fingers. Then he was rewarded. He had caught the loop over the handle of the bolt.
A slow, steady pull and he drew the bolt toward him. It squeaked once. He waited, listening with every nerve taut. Another pull, and the bolt’s end slid out of its socket The door swung open.
But Agent “X” did not move. If they caught him again, he knew he would never have another chance. He could win now only by caution and by the exercise of all the cunning he possessed. The odds against which he was pitted seemed hopeless. He waited inside the door of the dark room until footsteps sounded. The gangster detailed to keep an eye on him was coming back.
“X” waited until the man was opposite the door. Then, almost in one movement, it seemed, he thrust the door open and sprang out into the dim corridor.
The gangster, still clad as an ape, had the hairy, masklike hood of his costume thrown back. He gave one hissing gasp. It was cut short as Agent “X” smashed a balled fist against his chin. The blow was calculated, delivered by a man who had had training as a boxer and wrestler.
Before the gangster collapsed, Agent “X” slipped an arm around him; pulled him into the dark room.
There he worked quickly, drawing the man’s strange gorilla costume off his body. The gangster was tall, brutal-looking, with a face almost as ugly as the ape mask he had worn. The furry costume had made him seem huge.
Agent “X” flashed his small light on the man’s features. For seconds he examined them, eyes strangely intent. Then he drew his hypo needle and his make-up set from his pocket. He had a tube of the plastic, volatile material that he always carried with him. There was also a thin vial of whitish pigment. He spread this over the gangster’s face till his features appeared gray as death.
Over this Agent “X” spread the make-up material and quickly molded it into new lines. He had no mirror. He was working from memory only. But the disguise he wore himself was impressed indelibly on his mind.
Under his deft fingers, the features of the unconscious gangster changed. To the casual glance they became the features of the man called Doctor Preston.
“X” did not use all of his material. He saved out as much as he could, pocketed it. No telling when he might need it again! Next he injected nearly a gram of his anesthetizing drug into the gangster’s veins, making sure the man would stay out even after the effect of the punch had worn off.
Standing up, flashing his light on his handiwork, Agent “X” smiled, grimly satisfied. The man lying on the floor appeared as Doctor Preston, with the pallor and rigidity of sleeping sickness upon him.
Agent “X” changed his own features as nearly like the gangster’s as he could, then stooped and picked up the horrible gorilla costume. He slipped the hood of it over his own head, closed the zipper fastenings that the long, dark hair prevented from showing.
He could see through the eyeholes, breathe air through the nostrils. A downward pressure with his chin, and the gorilla mask responded in a hideous way, opening its mouth, showing white fangs. No wonder the citizens of Branford had been terrified and thoroughly convinced that the thing they saw was one of the escaped gorillas from Drexel Institute.
The Agent’s next moves were purposeful. Before he left this place, before he made an attempt to capture the criminals, he must investigate the mystery of Hornaday’s disappearance, and learn what he could about the curative serum.
Walking easily, naturally, as though he belonged there, he moved along the corridor. The dim overhead light cast a hideous contorted shadow at his feet — the shadow of a monstrous ape.
There were five or six doors along this hallway. Most of them gave into deserted, dust-laden storage rooms. Listening at one before he opened it, he heard strange animal sounds. There were rustlings, the scrape of claws, an occasional hoarse grunt. In the air, seeping around the cracks of the door, was a pungent animal smell.
With tense fingers the Agent unbolted the door, stepped across the sill. Huge iron cages, looking as though they had been purchased second hand from a circus, ranged the walls. In them were the great, hairy forms of real gorillas — the anthropoids that had been stolen from Drexel Institute. Five of the cages were empty, however. There were only four of the animals left. These seemed dazed and sickly.
Heads rolling on slack necks, eyes goggling horribly, hairy skin hanging loosely, they clung to the bars and looked at him. One wrinkled its nose, snarled gutturally in its furry chest.
THE apes, he could see, were not well. No wonder the criminals’ supply of serum was running short. The anthropoids from which they obtained it were succumbing to the unwholesomeness of this damp, airless place. The presence of chill steel and concrete made the building unfit for human or animal habitation. Hideous and fierce-looking as these great beasts were, Agent “X” felt sorry for them.
The way they had been treated was further evidence of the inhuman attitude of the criminals. At the institute the gorillas had been properly fed and cared for. They had been made as comfortable and happy as possible, and used as living laboratories only that mankind might combat a terrible disease.